You probably want to know what happened next. If you still want to read it at all, anyway. I wouldn’t blame you for just dropping this and moving on with your life. It’s a lot of darkness, and I wish I could say it gets lighter from here on out, but again, I’m not allowed to lie to you. Let’s skip ahead.
Let me tell you about the day I got everything I had ever dreamed.
Two years had passed since prom. I was eighteen. I was, in fact, alive.
I woke up screaming.
And I had all my teeth, in case you were curious. It’s a whole thing. I’ll explain later. That’s just the kind of stuff I focus on when I’m reading. I can’t tell you how many hard-bitten detectives I’ve read about that have spit out teeth after getting worked over by Freddie Four-Finger’s goons, and that was all I could think about for the rest of the book. Why isn’t anyone mentioning this guy’s weird checkerboard smile? And it’s never addressed. You just have to assume they got dentures between scenes or something. Go ahead and assume that for now and we can both move on.
I screamed at the ceiling with a full, unblemished row of clean white chompers.
I sat up, scooting back and pressing myself into the headboard as I did. Even after I was as snug as I could get, my feet still kept kicking beneath my blankets, pushing them away until I was entirely uncovered. I tried to bite down on the scream, but it just ended up clawing its way out of my throat as a thready, animal whine. My fists wanted to slam into something, but I pressed one against my mouth to muffle the noise and the other just drummed uselessly on the bed beside me.
And then it was over. The screams fizzled out, and I sat there panting, staring at nothing as the vestiges of hysteria drained from my body. My muscles gradually loosened and unclenched, a weirdly pleasurable sensation, like I had just got done with a hard workout and then slipped into a hot bath.
When that was done, I wiggled over to the edge of the bed, stood, and continued with the rest of my morning routine.
My room was a bare grey box, empty save for my queen bed and small dresser that doubled as my bedside table. The Liebowitzes had tried to get me to spruce it up a bit, but my total indifference on the subject had eventually stymied all attempts. The dresser had been my only compromise, and only because it served a purpose, and also Mrs. Liebowitz said if I left all my clothes on the ground, they’d get moldy. I didn’t know if that was true or not.
I dressed in a moldless loose t-shirt from my dresser, men’s jeans a few sizes too big, and an oversized purple hoodie. My mind flashed back to my prom dress, but I flinched and the thought skittered away.
I left my room, shuffled down the hallway to the small bathroom, and brushed my teeth—all of my very present, unbroken teeth, I mean. The toothpaste was a semi-dry chalky paste, nothing but water, sea salt, and baking soda. There wasn’t much left—I’d have to make more within the week. The door on the medicine cabinet had been removed, and Mrs. Liebowitz was currently using it as a vanity mirror. She had smiled with a valiant, forced chipperness at me while Mr. Liebowitz had been taking it off its hinges and told me she had wanted one anyway. I had stared past her, contemplating shoving her husband aside and smashing it.
I rinsed, then plucked the only bottle from the cabinet and popped it open. It was orange, and didn't have a label. I swirled the bottle around, hearing the distressingly few pills clatter inside, then brought it to my mouth and tipped one in. I recapped the bottle, washed down the pill, and went downstairs.
Mrs. Liebowitz was already in the kitchen, baby on her hip, cooking breakfast. Though “breakfast” was a bit of a strong word for unflavored oatmeal and toast. We had run out of beans a few days ago, even though we had stretched them as far as we could. The kitchen, at least, bore a few of her warm touches. A small vase with bright blue flowers sat in the window, a mostly intact floral tablecloth lay draped over the table, and there were several wall-hung decorations that said things like Live, Laugh, Love, and Home Is Where The Love Is and Love Thy Neighbor, Kiss Thy Chef.
Look. It was the best we could find. There wasn’t much to go around.
She glanced back as I came in, smiling. I sat at the table and didn’t reciprocate, but it didn’t seem to bother her. She turned back to the oatmeal and stirred it contentedly, humming a slow, gently familiar tune. The baby pressed its head into her shoulder and stared at me with unblinking dark eyes.
The Liebowitzes were a pair of late-middle aged Jewish doctors who had volunteered to work in the refugee camps before Red Wednesday. As a reward for their humanitarianism, they had been trapped here just like everyone else. As a little ironic garnish, they had finally gotten the child they’d spent most of their lives trying for. I called them “Mr.” and “Mrs.” instead of “Dr.” because they were both doctors and do we really need that kind of confusion in our lives?
Mr. Liebowitz trudged down the stairs in a bathrobe a couple minutes after I did. He said nothing about me waking him up, even though I almost certainly had, but he did still look out of it. He shot a raspy, grunted question at his wife as he entered the kitchen: “Coffee?”
She sighed and shook her head. “Out.”
“Tea?”
“Out.”
He made an unhappy noise in the back of his throat. “Help?”
“I’ve got it. There’s not much to do.” She nodded at the table.
He obligingly sat. I could tell his hands were itching for a newspaper, but we didn’t have those here, so he sat across from me and picked at his nails. He shot me something that might be considered a smile, if you stretched the definition more than the lips and measured in planck time. He was almost as bad at faking morning cheer as I was. It was one of the things I respected most about him.
We settled into our quiet approximation of domesticity.
Utterly quiet.
I closed my eyes and listened, hearing nothing but my own breathing, the creaks of our small house, and the subtle bubbling of stirred oatmeal, the tapping of a wooden spoon on a metal pan. I felt nothing but a slight chill from a phantom draft.
Nothing had never felt so good.
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Mrs. Liebowitz had just started scooping oatmeal into bowls when there was a knock at the door.
Mr. Liebowitz was in the process of standing up to take the baby so his wife had room to maneuver, but I was still on my feet first. I said, “I’ll get it,” and he shot me another possibly-imaginary smile. I mostly just didn’t want to get stuck holding the baby. You can’t drop babies you don’t hold.
I rounded the corner into the entrance hall and started gathering energy into my left palm. It glowed faintly, a colorless light coalescing in a swirl that I held in front of me. As I came to the door, I reached out and touched the knob with my right hand. If the person on the other side belonged here, they would know what to do. If they didn’t, we were about to need a new front door, and possibly a hose to clean up the mess.
I immediately felt a tingle of sensation as my fingertips touched brass, meaning that whoever it was knew that touching the knob would allow me to sense them without opening my mind. It was barely enough of an impression to feel, but it was enough. And no, I didn’t know why simultaneous object-touching transferred mental impressions, but only sometimes. Psychometry was one of the less understood areas of psionic study, and I was more enthusiast than researcher.
I opened the door. A superhero stood on my stoop.
She wore her colors, a predominantly white bodysuit with orange and blue accents at the shoulders, hips, and hands. I knew her costume was pretty basic because most of it would be covered when the fighting started. A cowl covered everything but her mouth and jaw—and her blonde hair, which she wore up in a tight, severe bun.
Her name was Fury, and she was one of the most renowned metahuman bounty hunters in the Skip. Word on the street was, she’d never lost a mark, save for the one man too powerful for anyone to touch. Most, she brought back alive, but she’d left more than a few bodies in her wake.
“Hey kid,” she said, holding up a manilla folder. "I’ve got something for you."
“If you're here selling vacuums, don't waste your breath,” I said. “I already suck.”
She snorted. “Dork. Let me in.”
I knew her as Alex. She was nice.
I stepped to the side, and she slid in past me. I scanned the street behind her for threats. The row of houses lining both sides, identical except for their varying states of decay, were quiet and still, and the street empty. I shut the door and let the energy in my palm dissipate—the glow faded back into the world around me with an infrasonic rumble, vibrating settled dust into the air.
“Were you followed?” I asked.
The blonde hero nodded. “Picked up a tail for a few blocks. I took a detour through Hyperion’s territory and they didn’t feel like taking that chance.”
“And you did?”
She grinned sharply, flashing sharp canines. “Oh, I fucking wish he’d try something.” Her grin softened. “How are you doing, kid?”
She asked me that every so often like she expected a real answer. I gave her the same answer I always did—I shrugged. It was as honest as I could be.
We didn’t bother with more pleasantries. I led her into the kitchen. Mrs. Liebowitz greeted her as usual—effusive warmth—before suddenly deciding to migrate into the living room. I told her she didn’t have to go, but she insisted that the baby wanted to play and the couch was more comfortable and a whole bunch of other reasons that had nothing to do with Alex and me. They took their oatmeal and toast with them.
Alex and I sat at the table. She sat next to me for the sake of convenience and set the folder on the table. She slipped her fingers under her cowl and pulled it back over her hair, the ultratech fabric of her costume stretching easily, leaving it to dangle down her back like a jacket hood. She was a striking woman, elegant and statuesque, giving off an aura of composure and knife-edged focus.
She sighed with relief. “Fuck, that’s better. You know they say that flexsteel is breathable, but…” She ran a fingertip across her forehead and eyed the new sheen on it critically.
“I think ‘bulletproof’ is the more important feature,” I said.
“You’ll think differently when you’re ten hours into your first patrol and the chafing has turned your thighs into sandpaper.” She smiled and set her hand on the folder. “Speaking of.”
“My thighs?”
“Your first patrol, dummy,” she said, eyes sparkling. “Would you like the full melodramatic reveal or are you no fun?”
“Well I wasn’t any fun when I went to bed last night,” I said, “but today is a new day and there’s always hope.”
“Well, take a bite of your oatmeal so we can make sure it’s not an energy issue,” she said.
I eyed the cooling bowl Mrs. Liebowitz had left in front of me, then picked up the spoon and brought it to my mouth. I took my bite, and was surprised to taste a faint sweetness. I hadn’t realized that we had any sugar left. I swallowed and flourished my spoon. Ta-da.
Alex watched every step of the process intently. “Good, Anna.” She took the first piece of paper out of the folder. “Here’s your reward.”
It was a fancy piece of cardstock with “General Equivalency” written across the top. The rest of the certificate was smaller print recognizing that one Annabelle D. Jones was now employable by jobs that pretended a high school education was a real milestone.
Still, I felt a twinge of pride. Not a full on rush of it or anything—the GED was hilariously easy—but I’d always tested well and it was nice to see that skill hadn’t atrophied.
I nodded. I could feel my pulse pumping away. I wished I had just said that I was no fun, because the full melodramatic reveal might cause my heart to explode.
“Next up—” She removed a piece of paper and held it facing away from me. “Another bite, please.”
“Alex, I don’t need to be—” I stopped when I saw her cock an eyebrow expectantly, then just rolled my eyes and took another bite of oatmeal.
She set the paper down on the table. This one said ACT in the corner. I was confused, at first, not to see a chart of my scores on all the various sections, or maybe an explanation of why they had just decided to rip up my test out of pity. Testing day hadn’t exactly gone smoothly, as I was probably the only person who’d ever taken it at literal gunpoint.
Instead, it was a full letter that started: Congratulations on your outstanding performance on the ACT® test! You have earned the highest possible ACT® composite score of 36.
My spoon clattered off the rim of my bowl. I stared down at the rest of the letter, dumbfounded, unable to parse the words. I looked back up at Alex, blinking. “This…is good?”
Her grin was fierce. “It’s unbelievable, Anna. It’s exactly what we needed to sell this. Less than half of one percent of people who take the test can pull it off. I got a twenty-nine on mine and my mom let me have a full glass of wine to celebrate.” She smirked. “I neglected to tell her that my drink of choice was vodka.”
I sat back in my chair. I hadn’t thought I had the capacity to be stunned, but there I was, dazed and more than a little confused. This wasn’t how this was supposed to go. Any good news life gave me was, at best, misdirection, so that when the gut punch came it hurt way more.
I felt dread start to curl up through my stomach into my chest. Surely, this next part was going to be the rug pull. This was all an elaborate setup to a cruel punchline.
“How about another bite, kid—”
I picked up my bowl, tipped it, and used my spoon to start shoveling oatmeal down my throat. There wasn’t much, so it was all gone fairly quickly. I dropped the empty bowl to the table, ripped off a piece of toast with my teeth, and washed it all down with a swallow of water. Then I stared at her.
She nodded, unable to keep an entirely straight face as she produced the final piece of the folder’s contents. This one was a whole packet of papers, but the main course was the cover letter. She handed that to me.
It was black, glossy, and expensive. I wasn’t sure if the lettering was gold leaf foil or not, but I wouldn’t have been surprised to find out it was. Those letters glittered up at me forming words that I had always wanted and never expected to read:
Congratulations, Annabelle D. Jones. You have been accepted to Aurora University and selected to participate in the Heroforge Program.
The letter slipped from my numb fingertips.
I was going to superhero college.
Neat trick for a supervillain.