“I assume you know why I gathered you here today?” Lori asked, hands folded in front of her face.
“No, we don’t. And this is my house. Don’t act like you own the place.” I slid a bottle of water across my dining room table to her.
“You’re no fun.” Lori crossed her arms over her chest and pouted.
“Sorry,” I said. I wasn’t trying to lash out or anything, and I immediately felt guilty for it. “Ryan’s doing fine, and it’s been a week since we’ve been back. I hope I stop feeling so on edge soon.”
“I’m glad the two of them are recovering well.” Lori smiled softly and I felt my mood lift a little. “I wouldn’t have asked to use your place if they weren’t doing a little better. I’m not that much of a complete bitch.”
“Eh, you’re not much of a bitch at all,” I countered.
She shrugged. “I’ve said plenty of mean things over my life that could land me in that category. Anyway, that’s not too important right now.”
We had all the remaining members of Team Lori and Team Lizzy, as both leaders took to affectionately calling us, around my dining room table, making it look comically small. I still hadn’t talked much with Alex since I’d been back, which was annoying, but mostly because he hadn’t apologized for my door. Oh, and for being a huge dick in general. He hadn’t apologized for that either, and I was holding a little bit of a grudge over both wrongs. Team Lizzy all looked down. Julio’s passing was still uncomfortable for everyone. They were taking it especially hard.
Shelly walked in from the hallway, grabbing a seat in a camping chair she had to borrow from Lizzy. It really drove home how we weren’t equipped to host large dinners or meetings at our table. The look on her face told me it wasn’t anywhere near the strangest thing she had to deal with in a little while. She was handling a lot of the legal stuff for the pit bull attack on the kids, so I knew she was going through it with Sam’s deranged mother. All that stuff would have given me a massive headache just looking at it. I had no idea how she didn’t look like death itself trying to manage everything.
I wouldn’t have called the general atmosphere bad. It was hardly inspiring confidence, though it didn’t feel like we were all getting ready for a death march. There was plenty of anxiety and plenty of bad vibes to go around given what happened to Julio and the two kids at the birthday party. Still, there was an undeniable positive energy that came with having a bunch of friends—and Alex when he was being a dick—over. Like a chronic rash, the good feelings I had around them were hard to free myself of.
“I talked with Lori and Shelly, and we all agreed it would be in our best interest to take one of you five,” Lizzy said, pointing at all of us in turn. “We’ll put the lucky bastard on our team. That would make it an even four for everyone.”
Val shrunk a little in her chair. I wasn’t going to say anything out loud, but if I had to guess, she would have been the first one Lori nominated for moving. While Lori seemed to reach a point of professionalism with her, they weren’t anywhere close to being friends. Just because there wasn’t more outright hostility didn’t mean everything was all sunshine and rainbows. Even when she interacted with me, it still felt like she was a bit more of an outsider. I’d hoped to get that fixed up, a plan that would take a small blow if we weren’t on the same team going forward. It was a small comfort that Lizzy would take care of her.
“Will I have to move houses?” Val’s shoulders hung a little low.
“No, because you’ll be staying with us,” Lori said. She didn’t even glance in Val's direction. “Alex, you’ll be with Lizzy and her gang now.”
Nothing dramatic happened at the table. No one gasped in surprise or slammed their fists down. I was surprised, Val was surprised, and Braden was surprised. Those were the only reactions anyone had at the table. It was a quiet shock that ran through anyone who reacted at all.
“Okay,” Alex said flatly.
“But why him?” I asked, looking at Lori. “Isn’t he your boyfriend?”
“That’s exactly why,” Lori said. “Realistically, we shouldn’t have any couples on these teams. It makes our decisions too based on our emotions. Trust me, I would know. Since I’m the leader of this team, I need to have my head be as clear as I can get it. Believe me, I’m not happy about it. That’s also the point.”
“And I’d have an easier time ordering Alex around than you.” Lizzy grinned like she was doing me a huge favor.
“Okay,” Alex said again. He hadn’t moved since the talking started. “You have my number. Let me know if you want to train, set up team meetings, or if you need anything else I can help with.”
With his piece said, he just up and left, still not apologizing for my door like a dickhead. Rebecca would have called it petty for me to hold onto it for that long, and she would have been right. Oh well, it gave me an excuse to be annoyed with him and his flippant attitude.
“Won’t this mess with our team dynamics in the future?” I asked.
Lori just stared at me for a few seconds like she was waiting for something. “Ethan, there isn’t going to be a team in the future.”
“Wait, what do you mean?”
“This team was formed on a volunteer basis when we needed a few people to go to the Tomb. Rebecca doesn’t want to do this and I’m pretty sure you don’t want to do this either. Don’t get me wrong, I’m extremely grateful for your help and sacrifices, so I don’t want to assume too much. The way I see it, we’re going to do our own things after we beat McLeod, or we’re just going to die trying to fight him. Neither of those has our team staying together. Not like it is now, anyway.”
“That’s cheery,” Rebecca mumbled.
“I’m sorry to be a bit of a downer here, but do any of you disagree?” When we all shook our heads, Lori sighed. “I don’t know if I really want to do this either. The idea of being a superhero looks great on paper. Doing good for the world, wearing iconic costumes, and getting flashy attention aren’t the worst things to deal with. This year has just been a lot to handle, and I’m still not sold that I’m leader material.”
“I don’t think I’m cut out for this,” I said, remembering what I told Rebecca when I came back from Vegas. “But I still want to teach people how to use their powers. No one should be confused about who they are or what they can do. I think there’s going to be a need for that once this McLeod thing blows over. Or, as you said, we die trying and it ends up being someone else’s problem down the line.”
“There you go, we’ll be doing this one more time.” Lori grinned. “Look, this doesn’t mean we won’t be friends anymore or we’ll stop talking to each other. We can still do all that and go in the directions we want to go.”
The silence in the air was heavy. None of us looked sad on the outside. Projecting tough appearances was something I was sure we’d all gotten better at. There was no way we didn’t feel a little sad about it, not after all the traumatic bonding we went through. Even Val looked like she hadn’t thought about what to do after we beat McLeod. I had an idea of what Rebecca wanted, though I had no idea how attainable any of it was. Regardless, I was going to support her no matter what she chose to do with her life after things settled down. Ditto for Lori, Lizzy, and Shelly doing what they wanted to do.
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“I have a lot of things in the pipeline. When all this is done, I’ll have work available.” Shelly was reading the mood of the room. “I plan on restructuring how we do these teams, and now that Anomalies are public knowledge, I want to properly pay the people who do the kind of work you’re doing. We will need teachers, researchers, and administrative roles. We might even need customer support depending on how all this plays out in the future.”
“You’re going to have teachers and researchers here?” Rebecca asked.
“This does not leave this room under any circumstances,” Shelly warned. “If it leaks, I know it was one of you, and there will be trouble. Got it?”
Everyone at the table nodded.
“Good. I’m planning on having a school created to help train up people with Anomalies, and it’ll be in this area. There will be a lot of planning going into its location. I think once it does come out what we’re doing, this little town is going to explode in population and become a significant city.”
Lori’s eyes widened a little. “Really? That’s incredible! Oh man, think about all the Anomalies we could see if we had a school just for people with them.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Shelly said, putting her hands up. “Minimum age requirement will be eighteen. I don’t know if I can make it a university or anything official like that. Starting one of those is a huge pain in the ass that I don't want to deal with, but I need it to be a place where you can’t just see any student walking around and make them out as someone with an Anomaly. If everyone in the world knew it was a school just for people with Anomalies, that would make it a huge target. There are a lot of question marks on this, so again, don’t tell anyone.”
Everyone around the table nodded. The idea of it brought the mood up immensely. I didn’t know what it would take to be a teacher. I knew you had to go to school to be one. Where did that end? For something specialized like Anomalies, there wasn’t exactly standardized testing you could give. The challenge filled me with excitement. Once the McLeod business was taken care of, I was going to bust my ass to make sure I was ready to take on that kind of commitment. I knew it was what I had to do with my career.
Shelly wasn’t done. “Lori, you’re kind of a nerd with Anomalies.” It wasn’t a question.
“Uh, thanks?” Lori frowned, unsure if she should have been offended or not.
“Sorry, but you are. I was going over our old categorization of the Anomalies and how we grade their strength. I want it redone. I want more categories and greater detail on what we know. I expect we’ll be getting more and more people with Anomalies when this is all done, so if we’re going to teach, I want people to make it so we have the best information on hand.”
“Oh, yeah, sure.” Lori’s brown eyes sparkled. “I’d be happy to help.”
“No, not help. If you don’t want to be a hero or do anything else, I want this to be your job for us in the future. I know you’re enthusiastic about these powers. Can you put your mind to it and essentially make a new system for us?”
We all looked at Lori and she blushed, shrinking under the gazes of everyone in the room. “Okay, I’ll do it.”
“And if the rest of you would like work, let me know.” Shelly stood up and leaned on her chair. “I get you guys have a lot on your plates right now. Don’t let it sit on your mind too much right now. Let's tackle one thing at a time. If I’m going to make this a reality, I’ll need hard workers I can trust. We’ll come back around to this when everything’s a little less messy.”
“Do you really think we’ll be the best people for what you need?” I asked.
“All of you are practically the first generation of real superheroes.” Shelly had a confident smile, looking at all of us. “I can’t imagine a group that I’d want more. For now, you should all prepare and plan your next moves. I have time to set up a school. We don’t have time to let McLeod cause more destruction.”
“What should our next move be?” I asked.
“What everyone’s tired of hearing: training,” Lori said. “Well, everyone except Val and Alex. Those two can’t get enough of it.”
It was a little bit of a whirlwind trying to decide how we should all train. Lori’s Anomaly made her an offensive threat without needing to be in top physical condition. The downside to her powers was that training them in any meaningful way meant someone was going to be reduced to a sobbing mess in a fetal position when it was all done. Or they were going to be so angry that they were going to start trying to tear throats out like an enraged lion. Most people weren’t equipped to handle sudden, forced changes in their emotional state, and especially not at the level that Lori could make them happen. We agreed that we would just take turns biting the bullet and suffering so she could improve.
Lizzy’s Anomaly was more ambiguous. It was so time consuming to set up that it seemed like trying to train it wasn’t the best move. Lizzy also didn’t need training in the same way we did. Since her power was tied to how well she could apply makeup, and she was already a pro at that, there wasn’t much more she needed to do. It was possible the efficiency of her Anomaly could be improved. While an enticing possibility, we had no idea where to begin with that, and we were too short on time to have a brainstorming meeting for ideas. We decided Lizzy’s best bet would be to train up her body for fighting or get better at shooting.
That camp was where Rebecca fell too. One of her Anomalies couldn’t be trained on us if it could have been trained at all. No one was willing to risk losing their powers to see if Rebecca could somehow improve hers. I didn’t see much room for it to be improved anyway. She touched someone and their Anomaly went away. It was simple. The only thing that could get better would be if she could somehow do it from afar. Without the resources available to risk trying it, we decided she would be better off learning how to fight and shoot as well. Her voice manipulation didn’t need a whole lot of work either.
The rest of us were much more straightforward. We had tangible Anomalies that affected the real world around us, making it much easier for us to practice using them. As unfun as physical trauma was, it was probably easier to convince one of us to take a sword slash to the thigh from Val than a complete mental breakdown courtesy of Lori. The most “abstract” Anomaly left was Rosie’s since her sound manipulation had a lot of uses in combat. It wasn’t quite as simple as big muscles, me creating swords and armor, or even how Braden could make shadows his plaything. However, like with Lori’s power, no one was exactly jumping to volunteer to get their ear drums blown out by the woman who could make a snap of her fingers sound like eighty cannons going off at once.
What started out as us discussing ways to practice by carefully taking everyone’s Anomalies into consideration quickly turned into deciding the most efficient way to get everyone ready. McLeod’s Anomaly was only a physical danger to us, so we all agreed that physical training was going to be a must for everyone, and practice shooting was going to be required for people whose Anomalies didn’t offer as much offensive firepower. We would rotate people out to let Lori practice making us crying little babies on the floor after they got their asses handed to them by Val or Alex. Even Shelly wanted to get involved in it, knowing she was going to be in danger as the new head of our Luna facility.
I appreciated the chance to learn in what I hoped would be a controlled environment. At the same time, if I wanted to be a teacher, it was a golden chance to learn how to teach. In terms of combat, Val and Alex were the only two we had to rely on. Val was going to be our biggest ally there since she had actually learned from McLeod himself. Judging by how efficient she was when fighting, McLeod was able to get something to stick with her. I only hoped he taught her enough about his own weaknesses that she’d be able to give us some knowledge there. The ability to punch well didn’t mean a whole lot when the guy could vaporize bullets with the heat he could produce. Frankly, I wasn’t sure if any of our powers could get past something like that, but we had to try something.
“I think that wraps it up for the day.” Lori stood up and stretched, her shoulders and neck popping. “I’m about sick of you all and I need to make sure the brooding boy isn’t being too broody. It’s way less fun when he’s all mopey.”
“Is he just kind of a downer when he’s like that?” I asked.
Lori opened her mouth for a second, closed it, and shook her head. “Uh, yeah, sure. Around the house. That’s what I meant. Yeah, not great at chores and stuff.”
I tilted my head in confusion and Lizzy broke out in laughter. Lori joined in right after. I sighed, knowing that I would have been way more embarrassed at them laughing at my expense if I didn’t adore them so much. Some inside jokes—or whatever they were giggling about—just weren’t for me to know.
“All right, all right, you’ve gotten your laughs at me out. Now get out of my house.” I stood up and rolled my neck. “I have my own training to dread without you two making it worse.”