2.1
"Um … did Mrs. Baylor mention the Florentine sculpture exhibition at the Belmont in your class?"
I looked up from my lunch, not recognizing the voice. It was slightly accented and belonged to a South Asian boy in some of my classes. I thought his name was Arun something. He was standing at the end of the table looking nervously at me. I looked back, nonplussed.
He looked away, first to the lunch line on the left, then to the bulk of the cafeteria on the right. Finally he look back at me. I could see him swallow something. "She mentioned it in our class and I thought she might have mentioned it in yours."
"Uh … yeah I think she said something about it," I allowed. "I didn't really pay attention. That's not the kind of art that interests me."
"Oh …" He swallowed again, looked around again, and then said. "Ok."
After that he rushed away, almost running. I watched as he hurried out the door, a look of utter perplexity on my face.
"You do realize he was trying to ask you out, right?" Another voice intruded. Again I turned. This was a girl, my age with badly dyed-blue hair and glasses. At least I knew her name, Kay Belcher. We had gone to middle school together. She was the only other person seated at my table, though I had not noticed her sit.
"What?" came my witty reply.
"Arun likes you. He told me he wanted to ask you to the museum. I give him points for both the semi-original date idea and for manning up enough to actually talk to you. He's likely to cop shit from the Nazis for that." She scooted closer and spoke more quietly. "The least you could have done was acknowledge him, even if you didn't want to go out with him."
"He likes me?" I was stuck on this. No one liked me. "I don't believe you. If he liked me, he would have said something when the bitches were tormenting me. He never stood up for me."
"No, he didn't. Did you ever stand up for him? Bruno Beck has been riding him for just as long as they were on your case. Did you even know that? Herr Bruno and his cronies may not have locked Arun in his locker, but they have hurt in him a hundred other ways. They still do, even with the new Principal. They're just smarter about it."
"What are you talking about?"
"Taylor, you were not the only target at this school. You weren't even Barnes' only target. She and Hess terrorized half the sophomore class, including me."
"They did?"
"Admittedly, you probably got the worst of it. You seemed to attract all the bad ones at once. But each of the mean girls and bully boys have their favorites. It's true no one helped you. No one does anything because they are either too busy getting bullied themselves, like you were, or too afraid to stick their head up and get noticed by the bullies. You managed to get your tormentors kicked out. But once you were safe you went back into your own little world. Are you blaming Arun for trying to survive in his world?"
"That's not what I said."
"Maybe not, but ask yourself are you still blaming him, us, the other victims? Or are you blaming the people hurting and harassing us?"
Kay scooted closer. "You were bullied and worse. Then you somehow beat your bullies and banished them from the school. But even with them gone you walk around like you're not here. You haven't done anything to join the rest of the school. I kinda wish I could ignore the world like that, but I'm still stuck in this little slice of Hell. And so is Arun."
"I …" I had no idea what to say. Could I have been that blind, that self-centered? I was supposed to be a hero. Have I been missing pain and suffering all around me? Ignoring it? "I gotta go."
"Ok." She shook her head and gestured towards the door. Not the one Arun had gone out, I noticed. "We'll still be here."
I gathered my stuff and walked away.
I wanted to ditch the rest of the day, but realized that I was fast becoming a truant with the number of times I was cutting class. Did I really want to be a delinquent? Did I only enforce laws or follow rules when I was in costume? Did I only help people as Icon?
I realized I had separated Winslow from the real world in my mind. What happened here had no bearing out there. Therefore what happened here was not real, including the other people. They were all just backdrop for the Emma and Taylor show. God! How pathetic.
I made my way to my next class early and waited outside the door. I watched as the other students went by in the halls. In ten minutes I could see Kay was right. There were a lot of kids getting picked on. Even more were just trying to get by. It wasn't all gang related. Intellectually I had always known there were numerous cliques and social groups, and the interacted with each other. But I had never realized it wasn't an academic discussion of sociology with my Mom and Dr. Jones. These were real people. Each was the center of their own universe and someone as far removed as me meant as little to them as … they had meant to me.
Shit … All it takes for evil to flourish, is for good men to do nothing. And I hadn't done shit.
Not quite sure what this meant for me. One of the reasons Superman maintained his Clark Kent identity, if I remember from Mom's comics, was that he did not want to lose touch with his fellow man. He did not want to become a god on Olympus. Was that what I was doing as Icon? Was I spending so much time as the hero I was neglecting being a person first?
When was the last time I had dinner with Dad, or watched a movie on TV?
I decided to give him a call. Maybe we could do something together tonight. I could always go out after he'd gone to sleep.
"Kay?" I approached her after our last class.
The blue haired girl smiled at me. "Taylor? Sorry I came down on you so hard earlier."
"Yeah, no problem. Got a minute?" I had no idea if she had afterschool activities. As Kay and I talked, I saw Julia closing in. When she noticed me she glared then walked away.
"Ok. You still catch the 17 bus?" How did she know what bus I took?
"Yeah?"
"So do I. We can talk on the bus."
How did I miss that? What else have I been missing? Was my neighbor Kaiser? Or maybe the lunch lady was actually the Simurgh? "Ok."
Once we were on the bus Kay looked at me expectantly. I stammered a little before I got started. "Can you apologize to Arun for me? I had no idea … about anything apparently. I certainly didn't mean to shoot him down."
"Does that mean you want to go out with him?"
"Ah … No idea really. I don't know him."
"So maybe you should get together to get to know him. Maybe a coffee rather than a date?"
"Maybe a group thing first. I don't even know if my Dad will let me date yet. It's never come up."
"Let you date?"
"Uh … or whatever? I really have no idea how this works."
"So you're not asking me to set things up with Arun?"
"No?"
"Are you asking me out, cause while that's not my thing, it's ok if it's yours."
"No. Not asking anyone out. I just …"
"Just what?"
"Just realized you were right and I was disconnected from everyone at Winslow."
"You were the walking dead. I was waiting for you to go all "Braaiinnsss …" on us."
"Yeah well, I thought it might be worth it to try to dezombify, at least a little."
"And you chose me as your first contact with the living? I'm flattered. Not as flattered as if you were after my body rather than my guidance back to the land of the living, but flattered none the less."
"But I thought you said ..."
"Just because I don't swing that way doesn't mean I can't appreciate the compliment."
"Ah … so …"
She waited while I searched around for a conversation starter. After letting me flounder for a few minutes she said, "Oh yeah, I see I've got my work cut out for me. Let's start with something simple. If you were looking to date, who would you be interested in?" She actually fluttered her eyelashes at me.
I was beginning to wonder if this was really worth it. Maybe I was better forgetting about making friends at Winslow after all.
When I got home I started cooking a tuna casserole. It was Dad's favorite of the few real dishes I could cook. He had agreed to come him early so we could eat together. While I cooked, I started reviewing my current build progress.
I had a total of 169 charges as of this morning. I tested my strength at the Boat Graveyard last night to find I could lift almost 5000lbs. My damage resistance and regeneration were also higher than before the fight with Lung. My power punch added damage and seem to ignore or negate armor from a half inch of rusty steel. On the other hand, neither my taser touch nor my arcblast had improved. My running and flight speed was still the same, 20 and 35 mph respectively, but my reaction times seemed improved to something like three times normal human. I couldn't think of a way to test out the new power reduction field. I didn't know how far it went, though I suspected it was touch only at this point. Nor did I know how much it reduced other capes' powers. In the fight with Lung it was supercharged and still didn't have much effect. No improvement in my Thinker, Shaper, or Breaker powers.
If I wanted to stick with my original build plan, I needed to boost my strength, flight, defenses, and arcblast. I had gone with the hand-based blast because eyebeams and breath weapons seemed a little too specific to the Kryptonians. Dad worried about lawyers from Earth Aleph. With hand-based blasts I got the same effect without tying myself to a single character.
The increase from each charge differed depending on the power it went into and how high that power already was. For instance the increase in pure strength was much greater from the same number of charges than the increase in speed or defense. From what I could see most powers improved in something between a linear and a logarithmic progression, but my math was not good enough to quite figure it out. I called it semi-logarithmic and tested frequently.
This, combined with subconscious charge placement during combat, made for difficulties in carefully planning my build. I also had to take into account new powers that were outside the plan, like this new Trump ability. Did I want to ignore it by starving it of new charges, or incorporate it into the build and shape it into something useful?
Maybe I needed to invest in some super planning Thinker charges.
"Dad, I discovered some new fallout from the Trio's harassment today."
"Something I need to bring in Helen for?" Dad looked worried and I realized that was probably the wrong way to start the conversation.
"No, nothing like that. I discovered that I have spent the last two years concentrating on them and their shit, and ignored pretty much the entire rest of the school. What's worse is that I've continued to ignore everyone, even though the Three are gone. That puts it on me, not them."
He forked a mouthful of noodly goodness and used the mastication time to think. Eventually he said, "So what are you going to do about it?"
"No advice?"
"I realized years ago that, while I am forced to be extroverted and social at work, in my heart I am an introvert. Other than your Mother and a very few others. I didn't socialize outside of work stuff. Your Mom dragged me to parties and events, but I without that I was more likely to stay home on nights and weekends. Since … well I've had nothing but work to get me out of the house. I see a lot of me in you. Your new 'job' has you socializing. But other than that you stay home and read. I've got no advice. Save a warning that the life of an introvert can get a little lonely unless you have that special someone with you. I'd rather not see you lonely."
"Wow … That's pretty heavy. I guess I need to …"
An explosion rocked the house. I could tell from the sounds outside that it was both massive and far away. Seconds later a second explosion sounded.
Dad and I looked at each other. "I guess you need to go to work. But Taylor, please be careful. You're all I have now. Don't leave me all alone."
"I love you Dad. I'll be careful." And with a change of costume I was out the attic window.
