So basically, life happened, while precious days slipped through my fingers.
I was even kicking myself for taking so long to do another very important thing, right up to when Mom dropped me off in front of my school.
With school out, the place was quiet as a tomb. Mom gave me a curious look through the open car door. “This is a dating spot? What is there to do here?”
Tesla’s Induction Baked Beans, what a question! Thankfully, the answer was completely innocent, or I’d disintegrate on the spot. “Nothing. That’s the point. We do stuff all the time. A date is the opposite of that. It’s time just being us.”
She smiled that grownup smile they reserve for when kids say something wise, but the grownup still feels smugly superior. “Isn’t his birthday coming up? Maybe we should plan an event.”
Ooh, yeah, it was. I was older than Ray and Claire, but not by more than a couple of months. “You’re right. I need to think of a good present, too.” That could go on my list with all the other things I hadn’t gotten to.
“I don’t see him, yet. Do you want me to wait?” she asked.
I shook my head. “I’ll go down to the lab and poke at my equipment. He might be there already. If he doesn’t show up, I’ll wait for Dad.”
“Make sure to set your alarm for that. I’ll see you this afternoon, Penny.”
She drove off. I stumped my way innocently towards my old laboratory, the one everyone knew about now under Northeast West Hollywood Upper Middle, the same lab appropriated by my superhero club. The stripped-down, not-very-useful lab.
“Hello? Ray?” I called out, when the elevator reached the bottom. No response. I hadn’t expected one.
No, coming here first was a cover, more to develop good habits than because I had any reason to worry. By now, I knew which of the tunnels in this base that used to belong to Tyrant King Usurper connected to tunnels in the base that used to belong to Archmage Magico the Super Sorcerer.
Those weren’t their actual names, but I could guarantee the real names were even more ridiculous. The point was, I could enter my new base secretly through my old base! Convenient.
I just had to… right. Finding the tunnel with the door that still worked, I kicked the crack that was actually a time lock, walked up against the cement wall, and pushed through it like a turnstile, only to be flipped into an illusionary wall that felt like walking through wet jelly. Eww. Definitely not romantic, but residue-free, at least.
Emerging into the mossy, stone-brick dungeon corridors of my villainous lair, I smirked. I would bet real money the warring goofballs who used to own these hideouts each thought they alone knew about this way to sneak past their enemy’s defenses. I’d place a side bet this ‘illusion’ wall really was some kind of sophisticated jelly, and it was a shame I couldn’t take a sample to my dad to get that confirmed.
“Hello? Ray?” I tried again. Nothing, but no surprise there. Not this far from the center of the labyrinth!
By now, I could thread that labyrinth while only stopping a couple of times to check landmarks, like the room with the fake golden statue of a bearded elderly knight in full plate armor holding a massive war hammer. Okay, a large war hammer. It wasn’t massive at all, because the ‘gold’ was gold-covered foil wrapping over chocolate. Sadly, the chocolate was also fake, just some brown rubbery stuff that smelled chocolaty but tasted like clay.
Yes, I’d stuck my tongue on it. Supervillain’s privilege.
My new mannequin stood in the impressive but otherwise purposeless central hall, a silent reminder that I had a plan to finalize. A hat. A helmet. Some kind of face disguise. That’s what I needed next. I could get this done if I took one step at a time. Something that fit with the costume.
Anyway. I yelled out again, and this time, heard a response. Maybe? This place seriously was a maze. Technically not that big, but the looping, multi-level corridors produced crazy echoes, and in some places eerie silences. But I was pretty sure I’d heard Ray shout back, and tried to follow the sound.
Was he in the prison? Nope. Since we never used it, or planned to use it, Ray, Claire, and I had spent an afternoon redecorating. Now my cursed jade statue sat in the middle, with the plastic skeleton slouched against the display pedestal. It held the cursed book over its skull face protectively, shielding empty eye sockets from the oversized magic candle in a sconce by the door.
Our original idea had been to have the skeleton reaching for the statue, something like that, until we noticed an oddity. In the light of this candle, the book and the statue had no shadows. You could clearly see the skeleton’s skull’s shadow on the far wall, despite the shielding book.
As much as I enjoyed admiring my aesthetic handiwork, the skeleton was very slightly too thin to be Ray. I kept looking.
“Marco!”
…was that a “Polo!”?
Yes! After passing the seriously heavy-duty door I’d nicknamed Dread Portal, I made my way down the stairs to the lowest point of our base. There I found Ray, sitting on a circle of stone around the edge of the cistern with no thought as to what the ever-present moss would do to his black pants.
Because I was with Ray, I could say, “Doesn’t moss require sunlight? It’s even growing in some hallways that were dark for years. Does that mean we’re bombarded constantly with energies we don’t understand while we’re down here?” I rubbed some of the moss between thumb and forefinger, in case it was fake and the question was moot. Nope. Soft and smeary. Real plant life.
“Yes, but when aren’t we?” he countered.
He had a point. Even without the densely packed super powers in the city, the world was full of energy sources either not yet explained, or not known about by me, yet.
“Are there places where moss naturally grows without sunlight? Is this a known phenomenon?”
He pursed his lips and kicked his legs. “Hmmm. Not that I recall, but that only means I haven’t heard of them. Primitive plants clustered around natural magical sources makes as much sense as tubeworms, crabs, and bacteria living off of volcanic undersea vents.” We talked about stuff like this when we were alone. It made me feel warm, despite the chilly dungeon air.
Sliding off the cistern’s rim, he walked up to the grating, bending forward to look down it. “Or the energy might be coming from down there.”
I joined him, although there wasn’t anything to see. The rungs on one side disappeared quickly into shadow.
A suspicion stole over me. “Are you trying to talk me into going down there?”
His tone remained calm and thoughtful. “I wasn’t, but maybe now I should. Wouldn’t it be great to do together?”
Fifteen minutes ago, both of us would have refused as a matter of policy. Now… “Maybe a peek.”
Ray pulled an old-fashioned ring of heavy iron keys out of his pocket. I didn’t even know we had them. Crouching, he opened the lock on the grate. It clicked ominously.
My hands darted up. “Wait! I’m not doing this unarmed.”
Sixty seconds of frantic running later, I stumbled back down the cistern steps, tossing Ray his gloves. The big copper tanks , light and hollow, were already slung over my shoulders like a backpack. I pulled the heavy leather gloves from my new equipment set on. “Okay. Go.”
He lifted open the grating, which if it was half as heavy as it looked, I couldn’t have done myself. Without pausing to ask, he started down the ladder first.
So. You win this round, chivalry.
Unwilling to completely give in, I followed so close that my feet were in danger of stepping on his head. That became more a danger as the light got dimmer, and dimmer. This ladder was pretty long!
But not infinite. I heard Ray step off at the bottom, to the accompaniment of rattle and crunching noises.
“Uhh…,” I said cogently.
“It’s… safe?” he answered.
It was dark down here. Seriously, seriously dark. Just enough light filtered down the long hole that I could see that a mess had piled
around the bottom. Trusting Ray, I stepped off. Thin, hard things shifted under my feet.
Of course I knew what they were, but… “I’m going to get us some light.”
Claire had told me how to use these. Reaching back, I grabbed at the pointed top of the tank on my back, and pulled. Light and a crackling noise rewarded me, and I pulled out a mass of arcing lightning that skittered off and flashed into a wall.
Well, that made it darker than before.
I tried again. Keep it moving, Claire said. This time, I didn’t stop to examine the lightning, I just drew it down in front of me.
I got a glimpse of a room filled with bones before I lost the electrical ribbon again.
Okay. Third time was the charm. This time, sweeping motions, and when I had the lightning down, I passed it in Moebius curves back and forth between the gloves. Dad had shown me how to toss pizza dough once. I did like that.
The light from a blob of captured electricity flickered, but it worked. I got a good look at… wait.
“Fake human bones?” I asked.
Ray started laughing. It picked up, to the edge of hysteria, until he had to lean against the wall of the room and let it out. When he could breathe properly again, he said, “I love this base.”
I didn’t have the compulsive laughter problem, but I sure couldn’t get rid of a grin. “Just think. We could have inherited the lair of a competent supervillain.”
We were still in that base. The walls of this pretend bone pit sported the same rough brickwork as above, with the same moss. A doorway at the far end matched the rungs of the staircase along one wall .
This was not part of our base. Regular, ugly house bricks, with a couple of embedded cement blocks, filled the arch. Messy mortar glued them together. Someone had wanted to keep the outside out, and did not care if it looked good. They also didn’t have access to fancy materials for the purpose.
Whoops. Not enough attention to my hands. The lightning bolted away, and darkness surrounded us again. I could, barely, see Ray’s skinny form step past me and take hold of the ladder.
“Don’t want to open that up? I bet you could punch through it,” I said to Mister Super Strength.
“Not until I know what my target is. If you stick your head randomly into danger too often, it gets cut off.” He sounded unusually serious.
Only one topic got him sounding like this these days. “Is that a treasure hunter rule?”
“Not exactly. Maybe an apprentice treasure hunter thing. I want to learn how to do it right. Anyway…” He looked at me. My eyes were adjusting again, enough to see the warmth of the eyes behind his glasses.
I smiled, lifted my hand, and we bumped fists. Then, drawn like magnets, we kissed. A little kiss, but it still got my cheeks warm. Would I ever get used to this?
Hopefully not.
And with that, my phone rang like an alarm clock, which is precisely why I used that noise. “Criminy! I have to get going. I’m sorry again that we’re not doing this more―”
He cut me off, tone firm. “It’s not something you owe me, Penny.”
I let out a sigh. True, but maybe I owed it to me. Or something. Anyway. “I have to hurry. When my dad pulls up, I need to have come out from the other base.”
I grabbed the ladder and shimmied up as fast as I could.
Below me, Ray asked, “Shall I wait with you?”
“I wish. Mom has decided that… whatever she thinks our relationship is, it’s within some healthy statistical guideline. But Dad is Dad.” Mom would have to be convincing him that his Princess was fine dating boys even when I turned eighteen.
Ray didn’t sound resentful, or amused, just happy. Like I felt, really. Even a short date with him was sweet. He called up, “Have fun storming the hospital!”
enelope Akk, Psychic Parent Predictor, knew how this would go. Dad would be weird that I’d been spending time alone with a boy who I’d spent time with alone repeatedly for about eight years, because now romance was officially involved. He would deal with this by starting off suspicious, but moving as fast as possible into lecturing me on heroics.
Penelope Akk, Psychic Parent Predictor, couldn’t predict an overcast in June. As soon as I was all buckled in safe and we’d pulled out into traffic, Dad said, “We’ve been doing this backwards, haven’t we?”
“What?” It was the safest answer. Also, I had no idea what was going on.
“Your mother and I are pushing you too hard towards heroism,” he explained.
Help. Directory error. No entries under ‘available response.’ Pattern recognition failure. Who was this man, and why had I mistaken him for my father?
My lack of answer didn’t ruffle him. If anything, it seemed to make dad more mellow. “Your mom thinks you’ll experiment with heroing long before we’re comfortable with it. Even Beebee lost occasionally. When it happens to you, we want you to be as prepared as possible. We also want you to understand that being a superhero or supervillain is a lot more serious than it looks. There’s no way your mom is going to let up on training, but we’ve been missing the point trying to teach you responsibility. You’re already responsible, so why make responsibility miserable?”
I gaped at him. Flies might have buzzed in and out of my mouth. Mammoths might have buzzed in and out of my mouth.
For his part, dad’s smile turned a bit smug. “Yeah, nailed it. You need to try the less glamorous parts of heroing, but that doesn’t mean you should feel whipped to them. We’ll do the hospital thing, but when it’s over, how about a Father/Daughter movie day?”
“Will we have time?” I asked, my voice squeaky and meek. Adapting to lightning shifts in battlefield conditions? No problem. My parents stepping out of their roles? I might still be reeling a week from now.
“That’s the point, isn’t it?” he countered, putting extra stress on that first sentence. “Heroes may do volunteer work, but it’s not like we bury ourselves in it. Look around, see if there’s any way your power can help. If you don’t see anything, give me a call and we’ll see what’s playing. If you want to get out of there after five minutes, that’s up to you. This is all a waste if we ruin your day.”
Mistress of my own timekeeping? A movie after? Add that to the kiss and the pile of fake bones, and this was looking like a pretty good day. I sat up straighter. “I’ll give it more than that. Just… whatever I feel like?”
“Exactly,” he said.
Shadows crowded in as we pulled into a parking garage, but my disposition was sunny enough to compensate. I practically strutted as dad walked me into what looked like the hospital’s rear entrance.
That didn’t fool me. All entrances to a hospital look like the back entrance. The front door always enters into somewhere useless. Hospitals are designed by the same architect who makes supervillain labyrinths.
As proof of my theory, instead of going to anything that looked like a front desk, dad took me through unmarked double doors into a bland beige hallway. A skinny, gray-haired woman with enough wrinkles for a fingerprint and an immaculately pressed, starched suit leaped out of a side office. “Brainy!”
She bounced up to us. In heels. Okay, they weren’t very high heels, but she moved with more energy than I did. Retired superheroine? Had to be. Note to Penny: On the way home, ask Dad―
Oh, wait. I would not be asking Dad. That would be getting personal. The same rules that kept my secret meant that not only wouldn’t he tell me, I couldn’t even ask the question. I could pump contacts for information on where Judiciary’s secret lair used to be, but this could be her and I’d have to resign myself to never finding out unless she wanted me to know.
Counterpoint. What if I looked up photos of Judiciary solely for private, confidential curiosity?
Courtesy of my mother, I already knew the answer to that one. I’d discover there are at least a thousand people in LA who you could mistake for Judiciary on the street. And that’s without having to factor in the age difference from any photos I found. Or my pi
cking Judiciary completely randomly as a famous heroine I kinda thought might be from the right time period.
As I got lost in deep, responsible thoughts, Dad clasped the woman’s hands. “Nice to see you, Judith.”
She turned on me. “And does that make you the new volunteer? What’s your pseudonym?”
He might have been calm up until now, but boy did Dad hurry to correct her on this. “She’s got a few years before she’s officially part of the community, Judith. Right now she’s signing up as Penelope Akk, talented teenager.”
“Absolutely,” she enthused. She didn’t seem capable of just saying anything. She wasn’t a spaz. She didn’t vibrate. She had energy, passion. Wasn’t Judiciary the one who won a standoff by staying awake twenty-four hours until a small army of enemies all collapsed from exhaustion? Ray and Claire would know.
I would never know. I couldn’t even hint that I wanted to know. This was what my parents felt like when they found out I knew Bull. So weird.
Judith dove back into her office, returned with a plastic card, wrote ‘Penelope’ on it in magic marker, sealed that into a clear plastic case, and hung the whole thing around my neck on a cloth strap. Umm, yay?
I picked up the card and examined it. It said ‘Extraordinary Program Volunteer, Full Access.’ It even had my photo on it. But the name, that was written in by hand. Okay.
Misinterpreting my wryly amused gaze, Judith quipped, “Originally, this was the Alternative Medical Consultant program. That lasted about five minutes.” When Dad laughed, she added, “Doctor humor.”
“I’ll leave you in Judith’s competent hands, Pumpkin. Call me when you feel like it.” Dad patted me on the head.
I grabbed his hand and gave it a squeeze. “Thanks. Is this… supposed to be weird?”
“Yes,” he answered.
“Even regular volunteer work is weird at first,” added Judith.
Dad squeezed my hand, and walked back through the double doors, headed garageward.
Please Don't Tell My Parents I Have A Nemesis Page 8
