Lance appeared, the teleporter now wearing a golden robe which was open at the front, his chest sparkling with glitter. “I thought you guys would never call,” he said, looking at the group. “What happened to your dress?” he asked Sam with a frown.
“It’s a long story.”
“You still have lipstick on.”
“I’m aware,” Sam said, growing agitated.
“And your dress?” he asked Zoe.
“I got into a fight,” Zoe said, the red fabric from her dress still tied around her face like a bandana.
“Apparently.”
“Back to my apartment,” Helena said. “We leave, now.”
“Well, if it’s that kind of party, I wouldn’t have wanted to come anyway,” Lance said, clearly hurt.
“Wait, were you getting dressed up to come to the party?” Zoe asked, looking at the bare-chested teleporter curiously for a moment.
“Yes, Tiger Girl. Why do you think I have all this glitter on? I thought that you four were going to call me just when the party got real.”
Zoe started to laugh, and looked to Helena for support.
Helena did eventually crack a smile, but that wasn’t until they teleported back to her mansion, when the four of them were officially safe.
Now in her living room, golden sparkles settling everywhere, Lance started to lament about how difficult it was going to be to get the glitter off his chest.
“It’s time to go,” Helena said curtly, but still with a hint of politeness to her command.
“Fine, fine,” he said. “But the next rooftop party you guys get invited to, I’m definitely coming.”
“That’s not part of your contract.”
“Neither is teleporting a team of non-exemplars parading around as exemplars.”
“Fair enough,” Helena said. “We’ll let you know about the next rooftop party we’re invited to.”
“Sweet, can’t wait,” the flamboyant teleporter said as he vanished.
“Can we unpack what just happened?” Zoe asked, removing her bandana.
“Seriously,” Sam said, still catching his breath, the adrenaline making his hands and feet tingle.
“Yes, good idea,” Helena said as she took off her mask. “Ozella, care to make some tea?”
“Sure!”
“Something soothing. That was… quite the turn of events.”
Chapter Twenty: House Call
(While the others train, Sam and Ozella get some brekky, and try to get to the bottom of where the hell Dinah comes from...)
“And what will you have?” the waitress asked Sam.
“Cinnamon toast, poached eggs, bacon and two glasses of orange juice. That comes with a side of home fries, right?”
“It sure does,” the waitress said with a nod.
It was the next morning, and Sam and Ozella were at the fancy Star Diner together. He had promised her that they would look into her little situation, the situation being the mysterious blue ghost woman that seemed to follow her around, and that was what they planned to do.
After breakfast, of course, because why deprive themselves of a morning dose of sugar and carbs?
“Great,” Sam said, “actually, change the toast to pancakes.”
“Will do. Is there a particular type of pancake you would like?”
“Let me see…” Sam said as he leafed through the menu.
“Their chocolate banana pancakes are good. I also liked their whole-wheat pancakes,” Ozella said. “Blueberries too, that’s nice.”
“All good options, but my eyes are on the pumpkin pancakes.”
“Pumpkin pancakes it is,” said the waitress. “And you?” she asked Ozella.
“I want this one,” Ozella said, tapping on the menu. “The big bowl of oatmeal.”
“Would you like brown sugar and butter on the side?”
“On top is fine.”
“Any nuts? Raisins?”
“Nuts,” Ozella told the pretty waitress. “And more tea, please.”
“Great, I’ll put your order in.”
“I wish we could just mental message the waitstaff,” Ozella said as soon as the woman was gone.
“Really?” Sam asked, stifling a laugh.
“I just don’t like the pressure of having to order food when someone is standing there. If I could just message it to them, then I wouldn’t have to waste their time. Sometimes I get indecisive.”
“Well, maybe one day we’ll get around to visiting Dr. Hamza and asking him to make you a telepath.”
Ozella chuckled. “Please, no. The less I see of that guy, the better.”
“Agreed. Did you get any sleep last night?” he asked.
“Sort of. I was trying to teach Dinah how to play this one card game, but she kept getting distracted. I think she gets the gist of it though; she did point out the card she wanted to place a couple of times.”
“Interesting,” Sam said, not able to forget waking up to find Dinah giving him head. He would take that secret to his grave, well, Zoe and him, apparently.
“I was also following up on news sources about the blood party. So far, there hasn’t been much released to the public.”
“What about the people that went over the side of the roof?” Sam asked.
“I don’t know how they are going to cover that up, but I’m sure they will figure a way. With a telepath around, it’s pretty easy to cover up information, to shift public opinion.”
“True,” Sam said as the waitress came by, and filled their glasses of tea.
“But I guess it’s better than the public knowing,” said Ozella. “Also, I wrote down the information on that exemplar team that showed up.”
“You did?” Sam asked.
Ozella reached into her red leather backpack and brought out her Book of Known Variables. It was a little tattered around the edges, but it held up pretty well, even with the fact she had filled at least half the pages. Sam assumed that she got a new book every year or so.
“Team Saint. I looked them up as well through one of those mental message information services,” she explained as she stopped on a dog-eared page. “Their leader is a man named Saint, a Type I Class A. He has the ability to create hallucinations in people’s minds, sort of like what Helena can do. Telekinesis as well.”
“Yep, that’s who I saw,” Sam said, recalling the way that the exemplar team had descended onto the rooftop, caught at the last moment by an invisible force. He was pretty sure that Saint was the man wearing the black trench coat, his suspicions confirmed once Ozella continued her breakdown of the team.
“Then there’s Thalia, a Type II Class C who has the ability to morph into stone. She was handling more of the action on the rooftop, so we didn’t see much of her. The blue wolfman is named Blue, naturally. He’s a Type II Class B, and he morphs into a, well, you saw what he morphs into.”
“I remember,” Sam said, taking a sip of his tea.
He enjoyed seeing Ozella grow interested in a topic, the generally shy statkeeper talking excitedly at the moment, her cheeks slightly red, her eyes wider than normal.
“But what makes their team interesting is they also have a teleporter.”
“You mean one that is actually on the team, right?” Sam asked.
It wasn’t unusual for an exemplar team to have exclusive service from a teleporter, but teleporters weren’t normally active members.
“That’s right. Her name is Banish, a Type II Class F, and she specializes in banishing people from fights, and moving her team around too.”
“And she has no other power?”
“Apparently not. That doesn’t mean that she isn’t a good fighter. I imagine a teleporter would be an excellent fighter if they were well-trained. Can you imagine if Zoe or Helena had the ability to teleport? They could appear out of nowhere throwing kicks and punches, and disappear again before their enemy could engage them.”
“Makes sense,” Sam said. “I just hope that Team Saint won’t come after us a
s well. We already have one exemplar team on our asses.”
“We only encountered one of them, but I would be surprised if he didn’t relay the message back to his team. Then again, depending on how prideful he was…”
“We can’t assume that, though,” Sam said.
“No, you are right, we really can’t.”
“It’s good to know of these other teams, though. We need to be prepared to neutralize them if they get in our way. I guess that sounds too harsh. I don’t mean in a ‘kill them’ type of way. I only mean that we need to know how to fight back if they engage us.”
“Definitely,” Ozella said, writing something down. “But our best line of defense will be to get out of the area.”
“Of course.”
“But that’s not always an option,” she said, “especially if Lance can’t get there.”
“Better to be safe than sorry.”
The waitress came around again with his two glasses of orange juice, letting them know that their food would be ready soon.
Sam smiled at her, a big grin spreading across his face.
It was so nice to be able to eat again.
***
Sam and Ozella took the trolley.
It was Ozella’s idea, the trolley ride allowing them to test their abilities a little, Sam using his sniffer, of course, and Ozella using her ability to read people’s information.
“It’s important that we always try to improve,” she said as they took their seats.
“I can’t disagree there,” Sam told her as they waited for more people to file on.
It was a nice day outside, but there were gray clouds on the horizon, rain likely on the way.
It was a little breezy too, but Centralia was always like this, so nothing new there. It would have been a good day to head up to the park, maybe go on a hike, and part of Sam really wished that they could do something like that, but they had more important things to do for the time being.
A mental message came in from Ozella.
The man sitting across from us, what do you think?
Sam looked at the man for a moment, seeing that his clothing was a size too large. With one inhale in, Sam was pretty sure he had figured out why.
The man was wearing a fishnet bodysuit under his clothing, nipple clamps as well.
Yep, it was a kink.
And having just worn women’s clothing himself, Sam didn’t quite see the appeal. It was so tight, and nothing about him felt sexy with clothing pressed that close to his body. But different folks, different strokes, and Sam wasn’t in the business of yukking anyone else’s yums, so he took another inhale in the man’s direction.
I’ll tell you what I have, then you tell me what you have, he thought to Ozella.
This should be interesting.
His name is Robert Stromburj and he’s a fetishist. He has been paying a dominatrix couple to punish him and send him on trips around the city for frivolous things. He’s highly aroused at the moment, but his baggy pants are hiding this fact. In fact, he is on his way to pick up a loaf of bread for them, traveling all the way to eastern Centralia for the bread. He is sitting in this particular spot on the trolley because he gets the most vibration…
And?
Let’s just say he’s plugged up, and he likes the way it feels vibrating against his boy parts.
Ozella started to laugh.
You’ll give us away, Sam thought to her.
I just like how you said ‘boy parts’ instead of anus, taint, or ball sack.
Sam gulped. He had never heard Ozella be so vulgar, and hearing a voice in his head transmit this message made it that much stranger.
What do you have? he thought to her.
You are correct, his name is Robert Stromburj. He doesn’t have a lot of charisma, but he is very corrupt, and he is surprisingly kind. He was born wealthy, and donates much of the yearly stipend his parents have given him to charity. The rest goes to lodging and, well, this. He’s a non-exemplar and Terra is his astrological sign. Poverty is one of his known trigger points because he feels that a society as rich as Centralia shouldn’t have homelessness. Plus, he has a high willingness to try new things. Of course, he also has a high enough public awareness to hide his kink from others.
Our powers work really well together, Sam thought back to her.
“They really do,” Ozella said, smiling at him. “Sorry.”
She switched back to mental messaging.
We’ll be stopping soon; let’s check out whoever gets on then.
Yes, let’s. And hopefully the next person won’t be such a kinky weirdo.
Ozella laughed out loud, both hands coming to her mouth. She made eye contact with the kinky fellow sitting across from her, and he smiled, Ozella looking away immediately.
The trolley came to a stop and the doors opened, a new group of people filing on, others leaving.
A thin teenager sat across from them, and Sam exchanged glances with Ozella.
Game on? He thought to her.
You first.
Her name is Regina Tenor. She’s sixteen years old, and she is skipping school right now, Sam thought to Ozella, his nostrils flaring again. Everything coming to him made him feel bad for the teenager, but there was little he could do, and in that moment, he wished that Helena was here to hypnotize her into making better decisions. She’s going to see her boyfriend, who is ten years older than her, at Centralia South.
The prison?
Yes. They aren’t allowed to have conjugal visits, considering she always lists herself as his sister, so she has several erotic messages and comics that she has drawn for him. They’re in her backpack. In fact, the comics are rather in-depth, and she’s thinking of trying to get them published one day. She has a real talent too, so this could be a possibility. Then again, this prisoner boyfriend of hers is a drug dealer, and he has already used her as a drug mule before. So it remains to be seen if she’ll be able to accomplish her dreams.
Yes, Regina Tenor, Ignis is her astrological sign and she’s quite clever, but she’s also very gullible, and what she lacks in confidence she makes up in neediness. Classic ‘No Confidence Karen,’ who has a bad habit of biting her nails to the point that she has to keep bandages on her fingers.
I see them, Sam thought back to her.
Her family life isn’t so bad. Her parents are both together, and she has a younger sister who goes to an exemplar school. Regina is a non-ex, and she’s jealous of the fact that her sister is powered. She has a high willingness to try new things, and she has only had one lover, the man whom she’s visiting at Centralia South.
Well, this is becoming a little invasive. Care to stop for a while?
It’s fun though, right?
Sam nodded at Ozella. “It is until the information you receive makes you sad,” he said aloud.
“There’s always that part, but you just accept it,” Ozella said out of the corner of her mouth. “Everyone has a hidden life, a secret they are keeping from someone. Transparency isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
“You aren’t wrong there.”
***
The two were silent for the rest of the trip, eventually coming to a station Sam had never been to before. Centralia was a large country that doubled as a city, or city that doubled as a country, however one looked at it. There were miles and miles of land, famous landmarks and interesting locations that Sam had only heard of, so it wasn’t unusual for him to be unfamiliar with the station or even a location in the country.
“This way,” Ozella said, leading Sam to a particular exit, which with one quick sniff he identified as the fastest way to get her parents’ home. Leave it to Ozella to have designed the perfect route to save her ten steps or so.
Sam simply followed, happy to be out of the station.
They were in a residential area with both houses and high-rise condos, definitely a quaint neighborhood to grow up in. He could see the skyscrapers in central Centralia on the horizon, another b
unch towards the west and to the east, but this area didn’t have such tall buildings.
Which he took as somewhat of a relief.
While he was used to always being surrounded by skyscrapers, it was nice to be in an area where he could actually see what was around him, a few trees actually taller than the homes they were next to.
The two continued along the quaint lane, Sam taking in location information through his nostrils and the general history of the place. It had once been a working-class neighborhood, and it still was to some extent, but nearby industries caused housing prices to increase, which was why condos had been erected that allowed for more people to live in the same amount of space.
There had been some pushback, but many of the local businesses welcomed the new additions, and several tea shops, bodegas, and even a cosplay café had popped up to the recent influx of new residents.
Before Sam could dig any deeper, they stopped in front of a small two-story home, shaped like a rectangle. It wasn’t exactly a rowhouse as it wasn’t connected to the home next to it, but it wasn’t far off.
“Here we are,” Ozella said, her voice quieter than before.
“We’ll just poke around for a little bit,” Sam told her. “And I’ll see if I can figure something else out. It’s worth a shot, right?”
“Sure,” she said as she took the steps to the front door, letting herself in.
“Mom, Dad, I’m home. And I brought my friend Sam.”
Ozella’s dad, who wore a nurse’s outfit, came out of the kitchen with a sandwich in his hand.
“I’m just about to step out,” he told her. “But it’s nice to see you. You too. Sam, was it?” he asked as he stepped forward and shook Sam’s hand.
“That’s right, Mr. Rose.”
“Please, call me John.”
“Do you need something to eat, Dad?” Ozella asked her dad.
“No, that’s okay. I just made a quick sandwich.”
“No, I insist, let me cook something for you.”
“Honey?” Ozella’s mother came out of the living room, her cheeks the same cherry red as her daughter’s. She had been ironing clothes, and carried a shirt on a hanger with her.
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