Prologue
Starr walked into the teacher's lounge.
Only a handful of the teachers at this school knew about the secret passage behind the refrigerator. She was one of them.
Being third in command, Starr knew where most of the passage ways where in the school.
Entering the pitch black hole, she walked through the dark tunnel that Dig-Dug, her brother, dug to reach the protector base. When she got to the base, she went past the vending machines and her co-workers and walked towards the job-postings-board.
Usually, she would walk right past the job board and go straight to the vending machines or the cafeteria because her group leader, stripes (a.k.a. Zaine Scott), would assign jobs to her and her group. But the sudden appearance of a new superhero group caused all that to change. She had a real urge to take this group as a "protected".
She scanned the job sign up sheets. A fish person in Phoenix, a freezer in Chicago, a rubber man in New York. A rubber man in New York! She read further. Reed Richards. Physicist. Mutated by a cosmic storm during space flight. Accompanied by Sue Storm, Jonathan Storm, Benjamin Grimm, and Victor VonDoom. Sue Storm: invisibility and force fields. Jonathan Storm: fire. Benjamin Grimm: increased strength and durability due to transformation into rock-human. Victor VonDoom: no powers detected.
ADVANCED TRACKERS AND ABOVE ONLY. Perma-
This was the group she was looking for!
She took the sign up sheet form the wall and walked to the receptionist. The person at the front desk was named Patty.
"Hello, Starr- I mean Screech. I'm not quite used to using the nicknames yet. Sorry, how can I help you today?" asked Patty.
"Can you sign me up for this assignment, Patty?" asked Starr as she handed Patty the file.
"Sure, but did you realize that this assignment is a permanent one?" asked Patty.
No, she didn't realize that, but she wouldn't tell Patty. That would be so embarrassing she thought. Even so, she was willing to give up anything for this job.
"Yes, I know that this job is permanent. I'm still going to sign up any way. Where do I sign?"
Chapter One: Starr
Screech soared through the sky. Her wings beat gently against the surrounding air. She reviewed the rules of her job:
Protect the to-be superheroes (the protected) with your life.
Romantic relationships with the protected are prohibited.
Try to stay hidden from the protected as long as possible.
Breaking the first rule was always out of the question; but, the other two were more flexible after the switch between a temporary protector to a permanent one. After the protected become full-fledge superheroes, romantic relationships were permitted, but looked down upon. As for the rule number three, she had always broken it within a week.
She approached the Baxter Building. From what Zoey told her, the Fantastic Four, her protected, would be coming home from a trip to the VonDoom Inc. right about now.
Tilting her wings slightly, she headed away from the Baxter Building and headed towards Central Park. The park would be almost empty since it was a week day and her protected would be arriving at the Baxter Building. The fans would swarm there and leave the park even emptier.
She lowered and found a nice spot to land by some trees. Her wings beat harder against the air to slow her. Landing, she folded her wings tightly against her back. She had to de-morph.
The de-morphing process wasn't pretty. Her wings melted into her back and her large bat ears grew smaller. Her three and a half foot long tail also receded into her pelvic area.
Once finished, Starr pulled off her backpack. It was old and raggedy, but it was one of her few personal possessions. It held a change of clothes (her morph suit would never look normal in a crowd), a laptop, a bottle of water, a few granola bars, a cell-phone, and a set of keys to her new living space- an apartment in the Baxter Building.
She took out the change of clothes. All it contained was a black t-shirt and a pair of jeans, which she put on. They were baggy against her slender, tall, fly-ready body, but they would do.
Next she took out the water and two granola bars. Her body required a lot of calories and the long flight to Central Park from the New York Air Port used up the few calories she had from breakfast.
Finishing the second granola bar, she started to walk to the Baxter building.
Zoey had told her that Reed Richards kept the top forty floors of the mid-sized Baxter Building for his laboratory. Zoey also told her that the front doorway would almost always be blocked with Fantastic Four fans. Apparently, there was a side door for residents only.
Entering the side door, Starr looked around. This place looked to be around fifty years old, but according to the plack by the reception desk, the building was only thirty years of age.
Reminded by the receptionist, she signed in.
"Name?" asked the receptionist.
"Starr Davis" answered Starr. I don't usually give out my name unless forced to, but this person seems trustable thought Starr. I wonder what my protected look like in person?