Playing Super Hero, A Gifted and Talented Anthology

Seashells

"Quiet!" John Jacobsen yelled. There had been nonstop arguing among the team ever since the mission had ended and it had only gotten worse during the debriefing. The mission had been to deal with a five year old telekinetic. What the kindergarten had failed to mention was that they were making pin ornaments and the telekinetic had levitated whole boxes of pins. Pins were flying everywhere. The biggest problem was they had to figure out who the telekinetic was in order to stop him. Everyone had been struck with pins excluding Golden Girl, who had difficulty flying from flinching, even though the pins couldn't reach her. Heavyweight had left the school after a few pins hit close to his eyes. Dreamy had been very helpful on this round. When a pin struck her while she was sleeping, winged orange toads appeared and started eating the pins. Her Majesty had difficulty relaying the messages once she had been struck with a few pins.

Prince had informed the crew as they were dealing with the problem that the child was poltergeisting. It was where the telekinetic activity was happening without the child having conscious control over the event. He was able to wrest control of some of the pins but had difficulty himself over pins coming close to his eyes. Hot Shot started throwing the foam balls at the pins which only worked slightly due to the quantity still in the air and how spread out they were. When they did hit someone, they acted more like wasps, backing out and flying off unless the person grabbed a hold of the pins quickly. Dead End vanished part way through the mission with no one knowing where he went.

It wasn't until after John Jacobsen had called for the group to regroup outside of the school that Dead End showed up again. Everyone but Golden Girl had returned, Golden Girl stubbornly refusing and insisting on trying to protect the students from the swarm even though she couldn't fly well. When John saw Dead End trotting up he snapped as he turned to face him. Then he sighed with relief. Dead End had brought some things from the local high school shop class. He had goggles and magnetic holding trays. John felt a little guilty at snapping at him when the boy finally turned up.

With the tools that Dead End brought, the needles were eventually cleaned up. The toads upon seeing the magnetic holding trays, regurgitated the pins into them. With the small metal objects contained, it was left up to Her Majesty to read the minds of the kindergartners until the right child was found. From the three that had signs of manifesting abilities, John talked to the staff to determine which child was the most likely culprit. It was Golden Girl's idea that helped them to determine which one it really was. She volunteered to take each child individually into a room with pins. Prince stood on the outside of the classroom looking in through a window. It was his job to recollect any loose pins when the child caused them to move.

By the time that everything was wrapped up and the child in question was on his way back to the school for evaluations, the team was thoroughly fed up and at each others' throats. Even Dreamy had a cross word to say.

John looked at the team as they glared mutinously at him. "I have listened to you argue for a half an hour now. Everyone on the team is at fault on this job. Since we are getting nowhere with this debriefing, I will talk with each of you in my office individually. Once we have talked, you are then to head to your classes. You are first Golden Girl."

As the team started to argue, John headed for the door and waited for Golden Girl. In his office, John was treated to Golden Girls rendition of the events and how she was not responsible for any of it. After some discussion Golden Girl conceded that there were things that she could have done to make the situation better. While the children had different personalities, John couldn't tell that by the personal interviews this time. Every one of the children felt the events were someone else's fault. To be honest, he was grateful for his interview with Dreamy, who didn't blame anyone, as she was asleep. Oddly, the toads that had come in handy were in translucent form. She usually had bunnies or butterflies instead. When he asked about it, he was told something about not letting needlebugs anywhere near her.