"I cannot preach hate and warfare when I am a disciple of peace and love!"
~ Diana Prince (Wonder Woman)
It had been a week since the incident that left poor little Aden Dashner in the hospital. I'd visited him once, when he was first admitted into the hospital. He had been unconscious at the time, so I just dropped off my flowers and candy on the bedside table. It would've been weird explaining the presence of a guy he'd only just met, especially since he didn't know that I'd been the one who saved him.
I had only been blocks away from the crash. Eric alerted me over my earpiece and I came as soon as I could. It didn't take a genius to figure out Delinquent had been the one who derailed the truck. Eric's security camera footage proved it.
She claimed that she hadn't seen the two boys until the last second, when she attempted to turn the truck around. By then it had been too late.
I believed her on that end, but she still almost cost them their lives. Thank goodness the rest of the road was clear of pedestrians, just some parked cars.
She also claimed that the truck wasn't bound for the chemical waste plant that Paramount Pharmaceuticals claimed it to be. If she was right, they'd been trying to store the special ingredient in the drugs that gave Delinquent and countless other teenagers their super human abilities. They'd been trying to save it and perhaps make more people like her.
Her intentions were noble, stopping the truck, but her methods were a bit questionable. She injured two civilians, which was not the most direct path to becoming something other than a villain.
I knew that she was eager to prove herself to me and to the rest of the city. She was recorded stopping a burglary and helping a cat down from a high tree, two petty acts of heroism that were a small step to reforming.
After she saved me from Andromeda (who'd been absent for over two weeks now), she seemed determined to be a hero, not a vigilante villain that the public believed her to be.
Maybe she had been partly responsible for Daniel's death in the prospect that she distracted me long enough for the Clown Guy to injure him, but she hadn't known. I couldn't keep blaming her for something she didn't mean to do, especially since she was trying as hard as she knew how to be good.
But Aden waking up from the hospital was another story. He had been buried under most of the truck, somehow not crushed by the hundreds of pounds weighing down on him. The part I was most concerned about was the green liquid the truck had been carrying in barrels, the stuff that had broken out in the crash and covered Aden and the sophomore kid who'd bullied him earlier, though Aden was completely covered.
The ADD and ADHD medication that the company had made only made about five percent of its takers develop superhuman abilities, even if those were just the ones who filed claims. I had a sinking suspicion that the drugs only caused such a small amount of people to gain powers because the containment in them that gave the kids powers was minimal. Having direct contact with the green liquid would certainly have its repercussions.
The sophomore boy who'd bullied him earlier (I'd learned since that his name was Dylan) did not suffer any broken bones, so he only stayed at the hospital for a day to make sure all was fine. He showed up to school on the next Monday totally fine, exaggerating his wounds to his friends for attention.
Aden's appearance at school did not go as unnoticed as he might've wanted. After saving Dylan from the brute of the attack and then being pulled from the rubble by White Lightning and Delinquent, Aden was becoming quite popular.
Even Mary debated going up to him to ask how it felt like to be next to the notorious White Lightning.
I wanted to be near him for a separate reason. I feared that the crash might've given him powers.
Now, I know that Dylan had also been covered in some of the liquid, but not as much. The liquid also definitely got mixed in with Aden's circulatory system, seeing as it seeped into his open wounds.
Maybe I was trying too hard to be like Daniel, but I felt the need to take him in if he did end up having powers. I wanted to be able to mentor him like someone had done for me.
"Olly, did you even hear a word I said?" Mary asked from across the table.
I smiled sheepishly and nodded. "Definitely."
She groaned loudly, capturing the attention of the closest tables. "Why can't you idiot boys listen to me just one time?"
"I listen to you," Elise offered.
"Yes, yes, I know you do, but you're kind of required by being my best friend and all."
Elise frowned. "We're friends?"
Mary laughed genuinely in a way that only her friends could get her to do. "No, we hate each other's guts, Elise. What do you expect?"
"Wow," Ian exclaimed, "Mary using sarcasm? Call the super brigade because it seems that the apocalypse is here."
Mary glared at him, per usual, and predictably stuffing another piece of salad into her mouth. "Remember that I hold the power, dear brother. One day I will crush you." She faked a menacing tone.
Ian laughed along with the rest of the table. "Yes, the day that happens will be the day you stop fangirling over every super you meet."
Yes, a day where Mary didn't fawn over the hotness of one super or another, including me, would be an amazing achievement.
*
*
*
After school I skipped on the offer to go to Ian's house, something I'd been doing a lot lately. The new responsibilities of being the only hero in town left me absolutely no free time.
I did, however, find Aden among a group of friends hanging out by the Freshmen Tree while they waited for their respective rides.
"Hey, dude." I greeted.
These freshmen were obviously not used to the most popular junior guy greeting them like equals and were thunderstruck. One of them even started shaking in the legs.
"Umm . . . hi, Oliver?" Aden greeted questioningly.
I smiled, showing off my movie-star white teeth. "I was just wondering how you were doing after the incident. I hope getting back to school has been okay?"
He nodded still a bit shocked. "Yeah, everything's been fine."
"Can I talk to you alone for a bit?" I asked.
He nodded, walking a bit away from the Freshmen Tree.
"So, what do you want to ask?" he questioned.
I sighed, trying to find the most inconspicuous way possible to ask what was on my mind without actually saying it. "You know that if anything strange happens you can call me, right? If you experience anything out of the normal from now on, I'm here okay?"
He nodded again, obviously a bit confused. "Okay . . ."
I grinned, glad that I'd gotten my message across as quickly as possible. "Great, I'll see you around, Aden."
I walked away, notably leaving him a bit confused. If he reacted that way, then nothing strange must've happened to him after the accident . . . yet. There was still the possibility of undiscovered powers that he didn't know he had.
I just hoped I'd gotten the message across that he should come to me if any powers developed. I didn't want anyone else to know if he did.
You see, sometimes, before the people themselves even knew, super villains or secret organizations would contact new supers to work for them. They'd loop them in until they had no choice but to follow, like what happened to Tornado. Tornado had originally been a villain to the public. He'd been blackmailed into working for an evil guy who went by the name of Nemesis (Remember? Sonic's dad who had been the mayor of Empire City and then found out as some evil mastermind behind the super disappearances about two years ago) and finally broke free around the time Marvel went missing for like four months right before Blue Archer and he had their big fight against The Terror Trio.
Yeah, it's a complicated story.
By the time I'd gotten home, I'd almost convinced myself that Aden was powerless, like the other ninety fiver percent of the teens that had taken the ADD and AHD drugs. I mean – what were the chances?
I walked inside the Comic Book Shop at the same time as Chad was getting ready to leave. I hadn't seen much of him since I found out he and my mom were dating, which was still weird.
"Oh, Oliver, glad you're here. I was wondering if I could have your opinion on some stock changes." he offered.
I nodded in response and walked over, wondering why on earth a comic book shop needed stock changes when they sold almost every comic book from almost every company still in existence.
"Look," he gestured to a pile of papers listing comic book titles, "these are the ones I'm thinking of taking off of the shelf. It's only a list of about twenty, but I'd like an employee's opinion before I do anything. Seeing as Eric is always hiding in his mole cave, I need yours."
I looked at the titles and doubled back. "Umm, sir? All these titles you're canceling are the ones about the real supers who signed the comic book deals."
"Yes, and your point?"
I widened my mouth in shock. "Those issues are the most popular in the store. Most people only shop here for those. They find the histories of real supers much more interesting than the made-up ones nowadays. Most people don't even know the difference between Antman and The ATOM anymore. Why on earth would you want to remove our most successful product?"
He ignored my incredulousness and nodded to himself. "Yes, but I really don't think promoting those real supers is any good. Do you really want to keep those . . . freaks of nature up on a high pedestal?"
"Those 'freaks of nature' save this country and this city every day." I argued.
"Yes, but for every White Lightning there are ten Andromedas and Butchers. For every super who tries to do good with their powers, there are countless more using them for evil. I'd say that the simpler solution is to get rid of them all, starting with getting rid of their endorsement."
I was speechless. Being a superhero, I seriously took it as an insult whenever someone compared me to a villain. I mean – just because I got powers doesn't mean I'm a bad guy. It was just like when people blamed religion for terrorism. Just because a couple twisted their religion into a horrid ideology didn't mean that everyone who practiced that religion was a terrorist too. It was so stupid that there were people out there who were so narrow minded that they believed all supers were bad because of their inhuman powers.
I was now a little less lenient to the fact that Chad was dating my mother.
Maybe he was where she got her Remedist ideas from.
"What if we just keep them on for now? Trust me, it's where most of this shop's income comes from. You can remove them later if the Remedists actually gain some ground on the political stage, all right?"
He narrowed his eyes at me. "Of course you would be against the Remedist ideals, Oliver. Your mother always said that you were a bit too liberal, just like every other ignorant teenager in your generation, but no matter. I'll keep them on for now, but as soon as their sales drop, they're leaving."
He left, probably off to go burn spandex with his Remedist friends, and I hid the papers. I was starting to really hate Chad for more than a couple reasons.
I checked to make sure that there were no potential customers before going down to the Man Cave to see if Eric had any attacks on the city for me to go stop. But when I got there, he was already on his feet, like he was about to go upstairs to get me.
"What is it, Eric?" I asked hesitantly, expecting a huge attack by his expression.
"The police just visited a girl's house. Her parents walked into her room and found a ransom note and her bedroom ransacked, like a fight had happened. The ransom note was from Andromeda, who wants to exchange the girl for a talk with you at 'the place where it all began,' if you have any idea what that is."
I had a sinking feeling in my stomach, like I already knew who she took. "Who was the girl?"
"You go to school with her. It's Elise Howerton. You know her?"
Oh, I definitely knew her.
"I think we're going to need some help on this one, Eric. I know a super we can call."