We Could Be Heroes 2

by Harmon Cooper

  “They do look good, don’t they?” Ozella asked as Sam joined her.

  “Yeah, we all look good. I think we’re the best-looking exemplar team in Centralia. But what can I say? I may or may not be a little biased.”

  Ozella smiled at Sam as she reached her hand up and swept her bangs out of her face. “Are you nervous?”

  “No, are you?”

  “We have the easiest job tonight, just some reconnaissance, and backup if necessary. Those two are the ones that have a hard job.”

  “I’m pretty confident that we will be able to do it,” Sam said. “And if not, you, me, and Dinah will swoop down to save the day.”

  “We’ll see about that,” Ozella said as she took a seat on the couch.

  Helena was the first to exit her bedroom, her costume folded in her hands.

  She wore a slim pantsuit, the waist of which went well past her belly button. Her blouse was tucked into the front, and a silk scarf was tied around her neck. She had a wig on, her hair now blond and longer than Ozella’s. She also wore a pair of glasses that made her eyes larger.

  She handed the uniform to Ozella, who placed it in her red backpack.

  “Are you going in with weapons?” Sam asked.

  “No, Ozella has those in her backpack as well,” Helena said, referring to her two energy blades.

  Zoe came out of her bedroom a few minutes later, wearing a form fitting black dress and a pair of matching high heels, a wig tucked under her arm. “Let me know when we are about to go and I will transform,” she told the group as she handed her exemplar uniform to Ozella.

  Once Ozella’s backpack was stuffed full, she zipped it up.

  “Remember, you’re Jessica Bunny and I’m Maria Meow,” Zoe told Helena.

  “How could I forget? Okay, everyone, Lance should be here any moment,” Helena told the group. “He will drop Sam and Ozella on the rooftop first, and once we take out anyone tasked with guarding the rooftop, he will teleport us down to the front.”

  “You think anyone will be on the rooftop?” Sam asked.

  “There’s only one way to find out,” said Zoe, “but if there are people there, they won’t be conscious for very long.”

  They had all agreed to try not to kill anyone, but Sam knew this was wishful thinking. Even if he was new at this, protecting his teammates was his number one priority, and Sam wasn’t afraid to set his wrist guard to lethal if need be.

  Golden sparkles in the air signaled that Lance had arrived, the flamboyant teleporter wearing a gym outfit, a gold sweatband wrapped around his head. “You are lucky I just finished cardio,” he told the group, sweating profusely.

  “You know where you’re taking us?” Helena asked.

  “That’s my job, taking you where you’d like to go. Come, my children,” Lance said as he raised his arms. “Gather around.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three: They Got Him! They. Got. Him.

  (Now it’s time to remember what you read in the prologue.)

  The four members of Vigilante Justice (it just rolls off the tongue) took shape on the rooftop, Lance barely able to get a snide comment out in the time it took Zoe to clear the distance between her and a rooftop guard.

  In high heels too.

  Which definitely impressed Sam; even though he had never worn high heels, he assumed that they were pretty difficult to navigate in. But maybe that was why Zoe was a professional model, the tiger girl able to actually run in them, leap for the man and latch onto his neck, bringing her knee to meet his face.

  “Fierce!” Lance said, clapping his hands together.

  “Stop right there,” Helena told a man coming out of the rooftop exit.

  The mobster stopped dead in his tracks, lowering his wrist guard.

  “Cancel any messages you might have already sent, and let them know that there was a large bird that landed on the rooftop. Blame this guy for being an idiot,” said Helena, pointing at the thug Zoe had taken down.

  “Sure,” the hypnotized man said.

  “Thank you,” she told the man. “Finally, I want you to lie down here and go to sleep.”

  “So that’s how she’s always telling everyone what to do. It’s her eye...” Lance told Sam, clearly trying to buddy up to him.

  “She usually doesn’t have to use her powers on us,” Ozella said. “At least, I don’t think she does.”

  “We’re going to the front now,” Helena informed the group as she returned. Zoe stood off to her left, making sure that her dress wasn’t rumpled. She smoothed her hands over her body, Sam catching her eye for a moment as her transformation took place.

  “You clean up nice,” Lance told Zoe once she was a non-exemplar again.

  “Thin ice,” Zoe reminded him as she fixed her hair, turning to Ozella to ask if anything looked out of place.

  “Everything looks perfect to me,” Ozella said. “Sam?”

  “I guess?”

  “You guess?” Zoe asked Sam.

  “Looks great, let’s go,” Helena said, taking charge as golden energy fizzled in the air around Lance. The three were gone in a flash, leaving Ozella and Sam on the rooftop.

  “And now we wait,” said Sam.

  “We have to be ready,” Ozella reminded him.

  “Definitely,” Sam said as he got to his knees. “Power-up, hearing.”

  All the sounds came to him in that instant, Sam barely able to process the noise before Ozella appeared at his side, an earplug in her hand.

  “Thought this would be helpful,” she whispered, her whisper sounding like a scream. Sam cringed as he took it from her, actually hearing the sound of his fingers on the squishy piece of plastic.

  Watch the door, he mentally messaged Ozella rather than speak aloud.

  She took the hint.

  Will do, and be ready to switch powers if someone comes out.

  Sam placed his ear against the rooftop, the hood still over his head, which didn’t seem to prevent him from hearing in the least bit. Sounds came to him rapid-fire. The air duct, a creaking in the walls, a rat moving about, but Sam was eventually able to block all that out, homing in just as Zoe and Helena entered.

  “What are you two doing here?” he heard a gruff voice ask.

  “Hi, my name is Jessica Bunny, and this is Maria Meow, and we’re here from Knight Holdings wondering what DM Enterprises is charging you for usage of this facility. We’re prepared to charge you exactly half of whatever they’re charging to ship your goods to our facility.”

  Sam snorted, a sound which threw his hearing off and made his head spin for a moment. Where Helena came up with the name “Jessica Bunny” was beyond him, but it made sense to call Zoe “Maria Meow.”

  Focusing again, Sam heard Helena do her thing, the man obeying her as he took her up the flight of stairs to Donovan’s office.

  “Power-up, off,” he whispered. “They are making their way to Donovan’s office now,” Sam informed Ozella. “Maybe we should go down there. Maybe they will need us.”

  “They don’t need us so far,” Ozella said, “right?”

  “Not so far, but that doesn’t mean they won’t in the future,” Sam told her. “What do you think? What should we do?”

  “I…” Ozella brought her hand her mouth. “I don’t know,” she finally said. “It’s your call.”

  “Power-up, hearing,” Sam said after he pressed the side of his skull back onto the rooftop.

  It took him a moment to sift through all the sounds again, but eventually, he fell upon what he knew was Helena’s voice.

  It wasn’t too clear, but he was starting to sense somewhat of an outline, a gridline, really, but nothing that gave him enough detail to act on.

  He knew Helena and Zoe were standing in front of a wall, no, a door, and he could hear the man from earlier speaking, the one with the gruff voice.

  “...Usually doesn’t like it when we bother him like this,” he said, “but Donovan has always been one to look for a bargain.”

  “We are defi
nitely here to offer him a bargain,” Helena confirmed. “He won’t get a deal like this anywhere else. And it’s limited too, meaning that it won’t be available after today.”

  “If you say so,” the man said. What followed was the sound of a door being knocked on, the percussive noise making Sam cringe for a moment until it died down.

  Sam lifted one arm and gave Ozella a thumbs up, letting her know that Helena and Zoe were in.

  He focused harder than he’d ever focused before, wading through all the other sounds until he landed again on his two teammates.

  The first thing he heard was the sound of a door shutting, then a man hitting the ground, which he assumed was the gruff exemplar who had led them to Donovan’s office. This assumption was confirmed when Sam heard Helena speak.

  “Donovan, this won’t take very long, we just need some information.”

  “You come to my office, you assault one of my own, and now you want information?”

  “Or we could just kick your ass and drop you off at the nearest police station,” Zoe told him. “Or how about we pass this information on to a friend of ours, a friend named Mister Fist?”

  Donovan laughed long and hard. “A girl from the South, aren’t you?”

  “It doesn’t matter where I’m from; the shit you’re up to ends now,” Zoe told him.

  “But not truly from the South,” Donovan went on. “You are Centralian.”

  “Born and raised, motherfucker,” and in that moment, Sam heard the sound of Zoe’s hand morphing into claws.

  “A half-breed, too. Such a pity, you never will live up to your potential. And where’s the rest of your team? Do you think I’m stupid enough not to recognize the half-tiger?” he asked Helena. “And you… why do you look familiar?”

  “That’s enough of that,” Helena said.

  “Enough of… Yes, enough of that,” Donovan told her, now clearly under Helena’s spell.

  “We need to know about the shipment you plan to send to the South,” said Helena. “I’m talking about the infected vampire children.”

  “The infected children, yes, I know the shipment you are referring to.”

  “Hold on, while he is hypnotized, let me ask him some questions too,” Zoe said.

  “Let me get this information first,” said Helena.

  “Fine, fine,” Zoe said under her breath.

  “When are you planning to ship the children?”

  “They go out tomorrow, once they are ready,” Donovan said. “They will be on a train heading south that is supposed to include building supplies.”

  “And what city will they be delivered to in the Southern Alliance?”

  “Argoze, and shipping has already been cleared, so we’re not expecting any issues there.”

  “That’s the capital,” Zoe told Helena.

  “Aware, I have been there numerous times. What time will the shipment be departing, and from which shipping station?” Helena asked.

  “The kids will be departing from a shipping facility in the Robmon District.”

  “Which one?”

  “A new one. We had to change our shipping provider because the Knight Corporation has decided to re-examine their contracts. The new station is managed by DM Enterprises through a subsidiary.”

  “Got it,” Helena said. “Ask your questions, then let’s go.”

  “Why are you doing this?” Zoe asked Donovan. “Why are you using children for food, to infect others?”

  “Business is business,” Donovan said. “There are worse things I could be doing in Centralia. Fang pays well, they pay on time, and I can make the switch if I want to.”

  “Switch to vampire?” Zoe asked.

  “Yes, but I haven’t made that decision yet. Why be a vampire when I can just be a powerful exemplar?”

  “You sick fuck,” Zoe started to say.

  “Questions,” Helena reminded her.

  “Are you from the South, or are you second-generation?”

  “Born in the South,” Donovan said, “but I immigrated here when I was a child. I’ve been back and forth quite a bit.”

  “I don’t have any more questions,” Zoe said suddenly. “Sorry, I’m just disgusted with this guy. Let’s wrap this up.”

  “We are going to leave your office and I’m going to wake your friend here up before we do. Both of you will sit in silence in this office for the next ten minutes until we are long gone. You will not remember any of this. You will go about your business tomorrow as usual. Even if a telepath tries to break into your mind, you will not recall it. Consider this all a dream.”

  “A dream,” Donovan said.

  “Good, see you tomorrow.”

  Sam pressed off the rooftop and turned to Ozella. “Power-up, off,” he whispered as he took the earplug out of his other ear.

  “What is it?” Ozella asked, looking nervous as ever.

  “They did it,” Sam said, gesturing for her to calm down. “They got the information that we need, and we’re getting out of here. No fighting, nothing for now.”

  “And Donovan?”

  “I think that Helena wanted to go about things as normal, so we can actually stop the shipment tomorrow. If they try to take him now, then the organization would be alerted that somebody was after them.”

  “Makes sense,” Ozella said. “So that’s it? We’re done?”

  A sparkle of gold signaled that Lance had appeared. “Come on, you two,” he told the pair. “I’ve been informed that I should meet Helena and Zoe out front.”

  “And where are we going after that?” Sam asked as he approached the man in the golden robes.

  “To a spa. Does that sound right? Your little superhero team sure goes to the spa a lot,” he commented as shimmering energy began to swirl all around them. “Quite a bit, if you ask me.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four: Stress Test

  (A chapter in which Sam gets a bird’s-eye view of Centralia.)

  It had been a relatively good night, no one got hurt, and the four would-be heroes felt well rested after sleeping at the spa, which was more comfortable than Sam Meeko had thought it would be.

  He had never slept at a spa before, and as it turned out, renting the entire floor had its advantages. One of those advantages being the fact that they could simply sleep there, the four members of Vigilante Justice supplied with comfy pillows and sleeping mats.

  There had been some debate as to which room at the spa they should be sleeping in. Eventually, they chose one of the cooler rooms, the staff providing blankets for all of them to get under.

  Did Sam sleep under the blankets with three beautiful women?

  Sort of.

  They were around him, sure, but only Helena was cuddling. And it was quite possible that Zoe wanted to spoon up next to him, but it didn’t take an Eastern Province rocket scientist to know that that probably wouldn’t have been a good idea.

  So they were well rested and ready for training the next morning, the four now back at the mansion, Helena and Zoe already sparring.

  Sam could hear them as he hurried up and finished his breakfast, the man with the superpowered olfactory epithelium wolfing down a bowl of cereal and cinnamon butter toast that Ozella had prepared for him.

  “Here’s a list of the things I want to test today,” Ozella said as she handed him a sheet of paper. She sat down across from Sam, and smoothed her hands over her skirt.

  He looked the list over as he spooned more cereal into his mouth, immediately getting a sense of how the paper had been milled due to the fact his power-up was currently set to his sense of touch.

  Predictably, Ozella wanted to go over his senses, and she had devised several ways to test them out, most of which involved going out to the general public and snooping.

  Lots of snooping.

  Sam didn’t mind being the team’s lead snooper, but there was definitely part of him that wished he had a power that was more offense than defense, even with the wrist guards he could strap on for combat.

/>   Alas, it was the power that had been given to him, and not one created by some freak chemical explosion; no, Sam was well aware of the fact that if he ever got classified, it would be as a Type IV Class E, a nonthreatening intelligence-based super.

  There were worse things to be, though. He could still be a non-exemplar, for example. That would be worse than what he was now. Not that he’d minded being a non-exemplar, it just hadn’t been going so well for him.

  And this was.

  Vigilante Justice was seriously making some headway when it came to investigating Fang and the vampires who had descended upon Centralia. Sam couldn’t have been more proud of them for getting the info they needed last night without bringing attention to themselves, even if he had been ready for a fight.

  Now it was all about tonight, and this was on his mind as he began his training exercises with Ozella.

  The two were paired up for most of the day, using teleporters or trolleys to get to various parts of the city, Ozella checking off her list as they progressed.

  There was birdwatching in Mystery Hills State Park; a taste-testing at an ice cream factory in southern Centralia which turned out to be a tastier affair than Sam would have predicted, even if he didn’t exactly like enhancing his sense of taste and eating food (ice cream was still yummy); back on the thrift store kick, Sam using his sense of touch to better understand some of the objects that had been donated, yet this time they didn’t try to find the donor, both of them recalling what the wind user named Catherine had done to them once they brought her the pink leather jacket; they also tested his sense of hearing out by moving through one of the crowds in Centralia’s many outdoor shopping areas, Ozella asking Sam to focus on certain couples and explain what they were discussing.

  Lots of training, and they had to be smart about it as well considering he had a one-hour time limit per day. According to Ozella, who was timing him with a little red watch that matched her backpack, by the end of their little adventure, they had used his power for thirty minutes, which meant he still had half an hour left for tonight’s assault.