Dreams Of The Golden Age Part 4

"You need to take this seriously," Teddy's disembodied voice answered.

Teia said, "How much more practice do we need? Teddy's gone out already and did fine. We need to do something."

"He didn't do fine, he got the c.r.a.p beat out of him," Anna said.

"Only half beat," Teddy said defensively. "Any fight you can walk away from..."

Anna grumbled.

"It's simple," Teia said. "We go out, find a way to prove ourselves, and do it. The crime rate in this city is terrible, and everyone keeps saying we need a new superhero team, and here we are."

Lew hefted the paintball gun like it meant something. "And if we're really smart, we call the papers first so they can cover the story."

"That's your worst idea yet," Anna said. But Teia would side with her brother, along with Sam. Stalemate.

Teia said, "Anna, the five of us together? We're powerful. Even more powerful than the Block Busters. We can do this." Everyone agreed that the Block Busters hardly counted as a crime-fighting team because they hardly went out together anymore.

But Anna wasn't powerful. If she was honest, she was scared. She couldn't defend herself, she couldn't stop anyone. Most of the time she couldn't prove that she had a power at all. And they all knew it.

"Then why don't you go do it?" Anna said, tired. She hugged herself, trying to melt away the last of Teia's frost, but her arms were still covered in gooseb.u.mps.

"She's just chicken," Sam sneered.

Teia was the one who jumped in with, "Sam, shut up, you don't know anything about it. She's not afraid. She just wants us to do this her way." She turned to Anna, eyebrow lifted. "Right?"

"I'm just saying we have to be careful," she said, knowing she was losing this fight.

Teia's thin mask across her eyes didn't do much to hide her ident.i.ty, and if Anna were that pretty she wouldn't either. She was sixteen, striking, and she knew how to stand-hands on hips, shoulders back-to look particularly heroic. "I say we announce ourselves, stage some events, get some publicity-"

Anna said, "You can't do that. My mother is watching us. She ID'd Teddy off one security tape. We have to be sure we can stay secret-"

"Why?" Teia said.

Anna had taken it for granted and resented having to explain it yet again. "Because that's how they get you. It's how they got to my mother, back in the day." The argument felt stale, she'd said it so many times. As soon as her grandparents' secret ident.i.ty had been revealed-that Captain Olympus and Spark were actually socialites Warren and Suzanne West-Celia became a target. She'd been kidnapped a dozen times after that. Even the Destructor had kidnapped her, leading to the whole sordid mess that happened after that. No, you had to keep the secret so they couldn't find you.

Teia disagreed. She crossed her arms and glared.

Anna soldiered on. "You don't go vigilante for the publicity, you do it because it's the right thing to do. Because you can help people, save lives-"

"And for the publicity," Lew added, a roguish glint in his eyes.

She just couldn't win, could she?

Teddy pointed. "You should listen to Anna, she knows what she's talking about better than anyone."

"Because of her famous grandparents?" Sam shot back. "Because of her dad? They haven't done anything in forever. Maybe if you could knock down walls I'd be more inclined to listen to you."

The bad arguments tended to come back to that. The others had flashy abilities, powers you could see, that could actually do something. Powers that looked good on camera. Hers, not so much. When she tried to explain to them how useful her power really was-who was going to be the one to track them down if they ever got in trouble, after all?-she sounded lame and whiney.

And in the end, Teia was right. All of Anna's credibility rested on her family name, and what did that really mean in the end? She couldn't defend herself.

"I'm right," Anna said. "Give it time, you'll see that I'm right."

"And I say we won't know until get out there and do something," Teia replied, pointing into the vague darkness of the city.

They had arrayed themselves, Teia, Lew, and Sam on one side; Teddy and Anna on the other. They'd all settled on their places in the argument, and n.o.body was going to change anyone else's mind.

"So much for teamwork," Anna muttered and walked away.

"Anna-" Teddy called after her.

"See, that's what I'm talking about," she said, turning on him. "We can't even remember to call each other by our code names. How are we supposed to keep our ident.i.ties secret?"

"I'm sorry, I forgot-Rose, wait a minute."

Her code name was Compa.s.s Rose. It had seemed so clever a few months ago when she came up with it. "Just give me a minute," she said and kept walking. Teddy didn't follow.

She needed to think-by herself, before anyone could say anything more awful.

What she really needed to do was figure out if this was all worth it. Of course it was worth it, she told herself, as she always told herself. Otherwise their powers were nothing more than circus tricks. The powers had been more than that to her grandparents.

She wandered to the fountain, almost by habit. It was the park's main gathering point. This late, the park was quiet. The sky overhead seemed heavy, and the trees surrounding the fountain's wide plaza were still. The setting was right for having a long serious think, but she wasn't sure that was a good thing.

She'd planned on spending a few minutes sitting here at the fountain, with its graceful, stylized lily spouts, shut off and quiet for the night, the water in the marble pool still, until the argument had been forgotten and they were ready to go home. But someone was already there.

The man crouched on the rim of the fountain, perched like a cat who'd casually leapt there and might casually leap off again at any moment. He wore a dark green skin suit that showed off a lean body with well-defined muscles. His rigid helmet-type mask hid his appearance and made guessing his age difficult. He was older than she was, but he didn't seem old.

"Who are you?" she asked, trying to sound suave and confident rather than worried. In truth, she felt a touch of panic. They'd expected to find muggers in the park, not a strange vigilante.

The guy didn't seem at all worried. In fact, he donned the hint of a smile. "I'm Eliot."

Like this was some kind of normal introduction and they weren't both wearing masks.

"That's it? No superhero name?"

"Not yet." His expression turned chagrined. "Having trouble deciding on one."

"Have you been watching us? Following us?" Wouldn't it figure, all they'd done was practice and someone had already found them out.

"I saw the flash and came to check it out. That's all. Don't worry."

Blaster's bolt, the flames on the tree. So much for being subtle. She gave a sigh and couldn't find the motivation to stay angry. The guy was just being polite.

"It's kind of embarra.s.sing. We don't know what the h.e.l.l we're doing."

"I'm sure you'll figure it out."

This guy seemed to have it down pat. His uniform was slick. "So. You new in town or just getting started?"

"I'm-"

"Hey, Rose, what are you-" Teddy came trotting up from the jogging trail and stopped to stare at the man on the fountain. "Whoa. Who's that?"

The man twitched but remained in place. Nervous, despite his calm manner. He almost ran, but didn't.

"It's okay, we're just having a talk," Anna said.

"Yeah. Okay. But Sa-Blaster's ready to take off. We gotta go."

"Give me a sec."

He regarded her, uncertain.

"I'll be fine. I'll scream if I'm not. Then you can practice rescuing me, right?"

Her confidence was possibly not well founded, but Teddy backed away and left her alone with the guy. She was sure he hadn't gone far.

"Rose?" the man asked. "That's not your real name, is it?"

"I'm Compa.s.s Rose," she said. She felt ridiculous, but she stood tall, refusing to let it show.

"Your superhero name."

"That's right."

"What's your power, then? Perfect sense of direction?"

She blushed, because it was hard to explain, and compared to people like Teddy or Sam, hers wasn't a real power anyway. "I find people. I know where they are."

"That's handy."

"Sometimes." Her sour expression told otherwise. Her power worked only on people she knew well, friends and family. But she didn't have to tell him that.

A car horn honked half a block over, where Sam had parked. "I have to go. See you around?"

"Probably."

"Okay-" She'd been about to say good-bye when he jumped, straight up, muscles in his thighs rippling as they launched him a hundred or more feet into the air. He didn't fly but sailed over an arc that would carry him to the other side of the park.

h.e.l.l of a power.

"He's gonna get p.i.s.sed off when the blogs start calling him Frogman," she murmured.

She'd been fourteen years old when her power awakened. The books and biographies about superhumans and their powers said they often manifested at p.u.b.erty. It had for her grandmother and father. Anna had started to a.s.sume she wouldn't get powers at all, like her mother. But she woke up one morning, and her brain ached. Aspirin didn't help. It was like her entire mind cramped-she'd had her first period the year before, and this felt like that, only in her head instead of her gut. Then she seemed to fill up. Her mind expanded, taking on an extra sense. Because of who she was, who her family was, she'd known exactly what was happening. Her awakening power was probably mental, like her father's. Was she developing telepathy? Telekinesis? Clairvoyance?

But no, after a couple of months of testing, trying, and thinking way too hard, the cramps settled, the extra sense lodging firmly in her hindbrain. Her mind felt full, but the information was limited. Shortly after the cramps faded, she came home from school, started for her mother's office like she always did after school, and realized before she got there that Mom wasn't there. She was in a meeting at the West Corp offices ten floors down. It felt like a light in her mind, bright as a flashlight turned on in a dark room. And her father was in his office, and her grandmother was in the lobby, coming home from a lunch outing. Without calling, without checking, she just knew. Their presences were glowing spots in her mind. She was a human radar. A homing device.

She didn't tell anyone. She didn't want to have to explain it, and she didn't want to hear what they'd have to say about it. Time pa.s.sed, she grew firmly into adolescence, and her family stopped watching for what power she'd develop. She began to move furtively through the world, because she didn't want anyone to guess.

Her power-any power-had to be good for something, she'd thought then. She still thought. Otherwise, why have power at all? She just had to figure out how to use hers.

And then her best friend, Teia, came to her with a secret, and Anna began to hope.

Teddy and Sam had another argument about getting paint all over the inside of his car, until Teddy finally stripped to his boxers and stuffed his outfit and Lew's paintball gun into a couple of grocery bags and put them in the trunk. Teddy sat in the front seat, arms crossed, pretending he wasn't s.h.i.+vering. Blus.h.i.+ng red the whole time, with Anna trying not to stare at the curve of his bare shoulders. The three of them piled into the backseat, practically in each other's laps. She thought about offering to sit in Teddy's lap to warm him up, but that would embarra.s.s them both, and they'd all had enough embarra.s.sment for one night.

Fortunately the drive wasn't too long.

"Who was that guy?" Teddy finally said. They'd all seen the stranger make that epic leap out of the park.

"I don't know."

"Was he checking us out?" Teia asked.

"Probably," Anna said.

"You think he goes to Elmwood?" she asked.

"No, he's older than that. Maybe he goes to the university."

"So much for being careful," Teddy grumbled.

"He wouldn't have stuck around to talk to me if he was planning on giving us away," Anna said.

Sam looked at her in the rearview mirror. "You sure he's a good guy?"

"I don't think he's a bad guy."

"I don't like it," Teddy said. "Guy's sneaky."

"Maybe you should give him a break until we know more."

"You think he's hot, don't you," Lew said, grinning.

Teia turned to her, disrupting their precarious seating arrangement. "Is he? Hot, I mean?"

"I don't know, he was wearing a mask. Don't worry, if he blows our cover, I can track him down and blow his."

Teddy craned around to look in the back. "Can you do that?"

"Sure," she said, but she didn't know if she could. She'd never purposefully looked for someone she'd met only once. She hadn't even seen his face. But he'd told her his name. It was a start.

"Well, no worries, then," Sam said.

The route took them past West Plaza first.