Sometimes Evelyn Deavor liked working with her hands. No outside help, no machines, no fancy tools. Just her, a set of mini-drivers and an omnidirectional closed-circuit button camera.
State-of-the-art tech, her design, of course. The button camera was no bigger than the nail on her picky. Working with something that small, your hands had to be as steady as a rock. Each move deliberate, each breath measured. Even her thoughts seemed to slow as she pried open the delicate piece of equipment. One wrong move, one errant twitch, and she could stab clean through the camera.
Evelyn's tongue popped out, held between her lips as she started to adjust the nodes on the chi-
"EVE!" A door slammed open. "Eve! Eve, Eve, Eve, eveveveve!"
Winston Deavor barreled into Evelyn's laboratory, arms gesticulating, eyes alight, and as always his mouth moving a mile a minute.
"Eve." He stopped at the head of her desk, suddenly still. "You will not believe the day I just had."
Evelyn pursed her lips and glanced down at the button camera. Sure enough, it was ruined, the mini-driver stabbed straight through. There went ten million dollars. She started to glare at Win, but her brother was all smiles. Try as she might, she couldn't hate the idiot.
Evelyn sighed. "What is it, Win?"
Her brother bit his lip, his feet bouncing a little underneath him and then when he couldn't hold it in any longer, he burst: "Supers! Superheroes is what it is!"
Evelyn's eyes narrowed, but Winston missed the look. He dashed over to a screen and set it to a news channel.
"- damaged City Hall. The cause? An entire family of Supers!"
The voice of the news anchor played over footage of a mammoth drill tearing through downtown Metroville and then nearly disemboweling City Hall until it finally came to a stop. From the gargantuan metal beast, a family of supers were escorted out. The image had been heavily blurred, obscuring the family from head to toe, but it was enough to make out the shapes of two adults, and two children.
They were multiplying.
"Supers, Eve!" Winston said, nearly jumping for joy. "I told you they were out there. They might have had to go into hiding because of the law and the politics and all that nonsense. But they're still out there, and they're still fighting for justice!"
Evelyn rolled her eyes. "According to the news report, they caused that mess."
Winston rolled his eyes right back at her. "It's a load of crap, Eve. I was there. I saw some looney mole-man called the Undertaker burst out of the ground with that drill and use it to wreck downtown. Without them— " he pointed to the screen focused on the blurry outlines of the super family, "— today would have been a disaster! Death toll in the thousands even! But of course, the media is missing the point, the supers don't have anyone to speak up for them, and everybody's focusing on the negatives. It's a whole mess, Eve."
"It sure is."
"And that is where we come in."
Evelyn gritted her teeth. She knew what was coming.
"We do it just like mom and dad."
Underneath the table, Evelyn's fist clenched.
"We support the supers. We find our core heroes, we build up a campaign around them, do the works. Redesign them, give them the latest tech, the best resources, and most important: We. Do. The. PR. We push their image hard, I'm talking branding, I'm talking interviews, I'm talking-" he stopped mid-sentence, a thought catching him. He picked up another button camera off Evelyn's desk - an older model. "We give them a camera. Record everything they see. Edit the film for safety and privacy, but otherwise we give the average person a look through a super's eyes. Have John and Jane Doe see what it's like to stand up and do what's right."
Winston wasn't looking at Evelyn anymore. His gaze was upwards, off in the distance in his own little dream world.
Evelyn stood up and walked over to a filing cabinet.
When Winston spoke next, his voice was quiet. No longer grandstanding. "We can finally do what mom and dad always wanted. We can overturn the anti-supers law. We can make sure that there's someone there to help when you need it."
Amongst the high-tech laboratory, the filing cabinet was ordinary. The sort you'd use to keep just plain old files. And for the most part, that's what it was for. But the bottom cabinet was a little different.
Evelyn gripped the handle and gave it a second. The scanners were a little slow. It could've been faster, but then the handle would've had to look more than ordinary. The limits of technology, sometimes you had to make a trade-off.
There was click as the locks in the drawer disengaged and Evelyn was finally safe to pull it open.
"I've been thinking about this a lot, Eve," Winston said. "I think this is something we need to do."
Inside the cabinet was a pair of goggles. Evelyn picked it up.
"It's the right— Eve? Eve, are you listening to me? God, I'm spilling my guts here, sis, come on!"
"I'm listening, I'm listening," Evelyn said as she walked over, the goggles behind her back. "I hear you, Win."
"Okay, so?" Winston spread his arms, "What do you think? Are you in?"
"I..." Evelyn's fingers curled around the frame of the goggles. All she would have to do was push it onto his face. Get him to see the light. He would understand. Evelyn bit her lip. Or probably not. He'd probably hate her. But he'd be better off. Everyone would be better off. Supers were illegal and that was fine with Evelyn.
She glanced at Winston and he raised his eyebrows, waiting. If she put the goggle on him now, she could make him forget this whole fiasco. Not directly, not with the goggles themselves. But with a good deal of alcohol and some rohypnol, the idea would get washed up like a muddy beach.
But then… what about the next time? Or the time after that? Winston had never given up on supers, clinging to them like a child and their blanket. He'd have the idea again, Evelyn was sure he would. What was the solution then? Roofie him again? And the time after that? Would she have to keep the goggles on him forever?
Evelyn shook her head.
Winston spoke up, mistaking her gesture. "Eve, come-"
She held up a hand and he shut up right away. Respecting her space. Being a good brother.
No, she couldn't do that to him. No matter if it was for his own good or not.
Evelyn let out a breath, long and slow.
No. Evelyn needed a better solution. Winston wouldn't be the only person thinking about re-establishing supers, either. She was sure there were other people out there that were interested in the prospect. People who weren't as honest as her brother was.
No. Evelyn needed a permanent solution.
"Okay," Evelyn said. "I'll do it. I'll help you."
"Yes!" Winston jumped. Literally jumped. When he landed, he pulled her into a hug, practically squealing. "We're gonna do it! We're gonna bring supers back and then we're gonna save the world!"
Evelyn let herself be rocked back and forth by her brother's embrace.
"Yeah," she whispered, looking down at the goggles in her hand. "We're going to save the world."
AN:
I really liked the idea of the character of Evelyn, but she wasn't as fleshed out as I would like.
This is my remedy to that.
