“President Wallace wasn’t kidding. She did make fast work of that.” I should have been more surprised, maybe a little more upset, but I wasn’t. I was aware of the risks, even when I first learned of my Anomaly. It was something that could have happened if my power had been revealed at my school, in the grocery store, or anywhere. The way I saw it, I was sort of using some borrowed time. The Anomaly itself was never going to be a secret I could have kept forever. It was just my identity that could have stayed private.
“Ethan, this is bad news.” Lori frowned and her face scrunched up with worry. “When one person’s identity is revealed, dominoes start to fall. It might not be long until everyone else here is in the same boat.”
“I’m not so sure about that.” I pulled out my phone and went to the one social media app that I had used in my high school life, Chatterbox. Despite having it all set up on my phone, I hardly used it on account of being socially awkward and unpopular in school, and sure enough, a bunch of messages had piled up. Some were asking me if I was the same Ethan Harper, which as far as I knew, I was. Others were from people who just happened to want to get to know me when my name started floating around national television. Then there were a few calling me a freak, and those were all ignored. None of them mentioned anyone else, and when I looked up the news on the story, no other names but mine were given out. No one else aroused any suspicion outside of the mysterious pjulsen. Eventually, they’d all be back on Clamor without any trace of having been on Earth. “Looks like they only want me right now.”
“Your identity remaining a secret is a big deal.” Val stood up, chipping in with the group conversation for the first time since I got back home. “McLeod never let me reveal mine, which was a big reason why I wore that armor. It’s the only reason no one else has tried to attack me and I can live here peacefully. No one but a few people know that the one in that black armor was me. Staying hidden matters more than you think.”
“Guys, I don’t love it, but you can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube. The genie is out of the lamp and it’s staying that way.” Hungry, I grabbed a slice of pizza. I tried to look like I was a little stressed about it for everyone else who was stressed for me. I had such little control over it that I couldn’t make myself get too worked up. “If you’re all that worried about it, I can move somewhere else and lay low for a little while.”
“No!” Rebecca yelled. She got up in my face, a look of defiance burning in her green eyes. “I’ll protect you. I’m not letting you go again. I’ll keep you safe, no matter what.”
That broke my cool, carefree façade. My face went red and I just nibbled on the delicious food in my hand for a couple of seconds “Right, I’ll stay right here.”
“My soon-to-be-sister-in-law settled that one pretty quick,” Shelly said, proudly patting the redhead on the shoulder. I could get as strong as I wanted to, but at the end of the day, it was a comfort to know they wanted to keep me safe. “But Ethan’s identity being outed and him putting the hurt on McLeod puts us in a rough position.”
“No, no, hold on.” Val stood up and started rubbing her hands together. Her brows furrowed, the gears turning in her mind. “We might be able to use that. McLeod wanting to kill you in front of everyone isn’t an exaggeration. He’d parade your burnt corpse around New York if he could, and if you let it happen, he will. Then he'd do the same to your sister, your friends, and Megan. Believe me, he is beyond any form of mercy at this point.”
“Gee, thanks for the comfort,” I mumbled.
“Comfort means nothing, sorry to be the bearer of bad news. The good news is that he’s proud and stuck in the way he wants to do things. I think he’ll announce an attack on a major city to draw you out.” Val started to chew on her lower lip. Not that she ever looked particularly happy, but she looked especially anxious and frustrated. “It might be something like New York. Maybe Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, or Phoenix. One of the biggest cities in America.”
“You know him best,” Lori said. Even though it didn’t sound overly accusatory, Val still winced from her past connection with McLeod. “If you were still working with him right now, you knew Ethan’s identity, and you knew he hurt McLeod, where do you think he’d go to draw him out to get his revenge?”
“I...I couldn’t say, not with any certainty.” All eyes were on her and it was clear she was uncomfortable with the McLeod association. “His Anomaly is at its strongest when it’s hot outside, so cities like Phoenix and Las Vegas would be fuel buckets for him. But we’re already getting close to fall, so Houston could be his choice. It might be warmer there than in a desert city when he decides to attack.”
“What does your gut say, hon?” Rosie put a reassuring hand on Val’s shoulder. “Don’t think too much about it.”
“My gut?” It was a figure of speech, but Val crept a hand across her midsection anyway. “I think New York. He never said he was going to attack it directly, but every major city is a possible target. He wanted to keep it random and chaotic. New York is too big of a target to pass something like this up. The chance to kill Ethan in the most important city in the country? He'd be all over that. Even with that as a very strong possibility, I can’t rule the others out completely.”
I’d learned trying to get into McLeod’s mind was a losing battle. Someone who wanted to achieve his goals by remorselessly slaughtering innocent people because he deemed them inferior wasn’t someone I cared to understand. That could be someone else’s job. With the bar set that high for what I thought of McLeod’s thought process, it was baffling to me just how big of a discussion we were having. There was no shortage of layers when it came to figuring out how McLeod would try to kill someone who embarrassed him.
“I get being safe, but we can’t just sit back and let him destroy one of those five cities,” I said. I wished Alex had been there for that little part. He would have agreed with me immediately. He could be a pain in the ass, but he was generally dependable when defending innocent people who needed it most.
“We’ll have to send teams to each city,” Shelly agreed with an unhappy huff. She had dark bags under her eyes, suddenly looking much more prominent than they had when I first showed up. “We’re already losing people to the other side in droves.”
“Are you serious? People are defecting to that lunatic?” I hadn’t expected great news when I saw McLeod in Glendale completely uncontested. Hearing that people were joining up with him was crushing.
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“He provides protection we can’t. When I took this job over, not everyone under the Luna banner took it well. The timing with McLeod just made everything worse. They have someone young and short take over, there’s a perception that’s created in their head about me that I don’t have the experience or physical capabilities to be strong. And yes, being short does matter more than you’d think.”
Lori nodded her head in agreement. I never thought she was incapable because she was nearly a foot shorter than me. That way of thinking never made sense to me. Still, I understood what my sister was saying. The first impression was with the eyes, and being physically impressive was something that could help out there.
“I’ve worked hard to keep everything in running order and improve things here. We have security and I had a new training facility built here. There’s going to be a few pools added in just in time for summer next year. People with Anomalies see McLeod’s power and his promise of protection when making their decisions. Normal people don’t care enough yet. They don’t realize he’s amassing an army of superhumans. This might be our only chance to actually stop him.”
“Cowards,” Braden whispered. I wanted to fist-bump the guy in agreement.
“We can’t put all of our eggs into one basket,” Lori said. “Since the five of us are a team again, how about we try to draw him out to New York? Instead of waiting for him, how about you challenge him, and we’re there to meet him? Maybe put the ball in our court for once.”
Me challenging him? That was going to be a big ol’ pass from me. I did it in Glendale as a quick response without much thinking. I’d been acting on adrenaline and a whole lot of stupidity. Willingly trying to draw him out by picking a fight with him made my stomach clench. I was nowhere near the level of skill and power that could genuinely threaten McLeod. I was still so far beneath him that I wondered if he would even take that kind of bait. It would be like a wolf entertaining the bold challenge of an ant.
“Uh, wouldn’t it be smarter to fight him in a field somewhere?” Lizzy asked. It was a good point, but Val was shaking her head immediately.
“He’ll only attack major population centers,” she said. “He rarely told us what he was planning until the moment his plans were going to begin. What he did tell us was that destruction on a scale the country and world cared about was all that would make people take notice. Small towns don’t mean anything to him. Some cornfield in Kansas will never be what McLeod is after.”
“Will you help?” I asked Sven. I let out a small sigh of relief when he didn’t waste any time nodding. “This guy can defend a planet alone, so we can put him in one of the cities McLeod might attack. I asked him to hold back in Glendale because I didn’t want to risk anyone’s life without knowing if any civilians were there or risk him revealing his identity. That won’t happen again. Sven will end up being one of the most dependable warriors we could have on our side. We never know if the guy is going to trick us.”
Val didn’t look convinced of my perception of McLeod. “Trickery has never been who he is. He’s very direct and very confident. But I’ve never seen anyone get even a scratch on him, so things might be different now. You might have changed how he thinks about his attacks.”
We mumbled and talked among ourselves about what we thought he would do, how he would attack, where he would attack, and when he would attack. There were so many voices and so much talking, almost none of it going anywhere meaningful, I just took to eating some pizza while everyone did their thing. Four months away from the stuff didn’t hit me until I downed two slices and realized I could eat at least four more. Delicious bacon, pepperoni, and melted cheese beat the downer conversation going on around me. All the talk of cities housing at least hundreds of thousands of people being destroyed needed to take a break for a few minutes so I could enjoy some greasy food.
“Okay, that’s enough.” Shelly tapped a spoon against the side of a glass to get everyone’s attention. “Lori, you and your team will take New York. Lizzy, you guys get Houston. Sven, you and anyone you can get to help will take Los Angeles. We’ll figure out Chicago and Phoenix while looking at other big cities like Philadelphia. Sven, if you help with this, I’ll see what I can do about getting you help for your war. I’ll have to do it in secret, so if you can just give me a little time to work, I promise I’ll do what I can for you.”
My sister stuck out her hand and Sven shook it. I wasn’t sure how well getting superpowered humans to fight a pjulsen war would go, but I knew Shelly. She absolutely would keep her word and at least try to get him help. Considering the man was willing to help defend Los Angeles, I felt like we owed him a good deal.
“And not to be a rude asshole, but I’m going to need all of you to get out of my house.” Shelly divided the remaining pizza and put the slices on some paper plates for everyone. “I’m glad we were all able to come together for a happy occasion again, but there’s a lot I have to work on, I have a boyfriend hiding away, and I have a brother who probably wants some alone time with his fiancée. Scram, we’ll get everything figured out soon.”
Everyone wisely did as they were told, only Lizzy and Lori came back for another round of hugs. My ribs hadn’t recovered from the very first one I got, so I had to play nice and let the girls have their fun while hoping they wouldn’t snap me in half like a toothpick. After all, it was rude to be rude to two of the bridesmaids for my wedding. Val wasn’t much for hugging, but she did wave and give me a small smile, which was a nice enough consolation. The remaining boys left, and the pjulsen did too, once they figured out how they could teleport to my house when needed. That part was less than thrilling for my sister.
“Why did you have to be a superhero?” Shelly punched me on the shoulder after everyone cleared out. “I could have lived a nice life being a secretary in a small town. Now I’m going to stand directly against the president and help with an alien war I didn’t know existed two hours ago. Lizzy is right, you boys are useless.”
I smiled as I cleaned up the living room. Given the emotional rollercoaster my sister had been on, I insisted I would help pick up the mess our friends left behind in the living room. My hands were still in bad shape, making everything take longer than I intended. Yeah, go figure, washing dishes and cleaning up messes was hard when your hands were barely held together. Rebecca swooped in to wash our plates for us, sparing me more embarrassment from trying to bite off way more than I was capable of chewing. Instead of being embarrassed about that, I let myself be embarrassed trying to imagine what a healer would tell me when they finally got to work on my hands.
“He’s not all bad. He’s pretty brave and he’s not too bad on the eyes either.” Rebecca ruffled my hair and leaned against my chest, setting the last plate out to finish drying.
“I guess if he didn’t get these powers, I wouldn’t get to have a sister.” Shelly rolled her eyes and huffed. “Fine, you did this one thing right, kiddo. You’re lucky I like both of you.”
“Oh, Shelly, I have something to ask you!” I called out before she could vanish fully around the hallway. When her head poked back around, I felt like I had to muster some courage again. “Would you be my best man? Best woman? Best person? Whatever it’d be called, I want it to be you.”
“I’d be honored to.” She smiled warmly and her eyes went wide. “I get to wear a tuxedo, hell yeah! Okay, I’m in for sure. Just let me know exactly what kind of tux you want me to wear.”
“Wait, we decide that?” I pointed at Rebecca and myself. “That’s not something you guys decide?”
Rebecca looked helplessly at my sister, who just shook her head and snorted with laughter. “Hey, you’re marrying the guy, and he’s been to exactly zero weddings. Good luck figuring everything out, you’re going to do great.”
Between Rebecca’s shaking head and Shelly’s cackling laughter that faded down the hall, I realized I had no idea how a wedding worked at all. Shelly said it was going to be our business, but I was thrilled we had all this work to dump on Lizzy while I got to be all in love with the woman I was going to share my life with.