Junior Hero


Part 7


Catching a ride with Armsmaster was awesome. I can't stress this enough. The bike had some serious stabilisation tech built into it, and the engine gave out more power than it realistically should have been able to do. As he had said to me, this wasn't my tinker speciality, but I could definitely appreciate good workmanship. And he'd obviously spent hours, or even days, modifying it to work exactly right.

"Hey," I ventured, when we were about halfway home, and I had gotten over the initial fanboy-squee at riding on the back of Armsmaster's bike.

"Yes?" he answered, over the sound of the engine. His helmet must have had some sort of filtering tech involved there; otherwise, he would never have heard me.

"I was just thinking … if I joined the Wards, I could build a teleport device into your bike."

"What would I need that for?" He sounded amused. "It already goes from one place to another."

"Ah, but if you're trying to get across town fast and you run into a busy intersection," I explained. "If I set it to jump you, say, twenty yards directly ahead, you just press the button and pow! You're on the other side of the intersection."

"You can do this reliably?" he asked, interest in his voice.

"Well, we'd have to build it in, and do all the testing, sure," I replied. "But I can't see why not. It would have a greater power load than my personal units, but I'm fairly certain your bike could deal with that."

"We will definitely talk about this, later," he agreed.


He dropped me off about a block away from home; I watched his tail-lights recede into the distance. Then I turned and started the walk back home.

It's amazing how far even a single city block is to walk when you've just gotten used to teleporting everywhere. I kept on eyeing the next corner and calculating the coordinates that would step me right to that point. But with D-1 out of action, I had no choice but to go it the hard way.

As it was, it only took me about ten minutes to trudge the remaining distance, then sneak in through the back gate. Dad decried the usual methods of keeping a back door key hidden; thieves know to look under doormats and flower pots, he would say, so you have to put the key in a place where they won't think to look. So I reached up into the plastic downpipe, and there, attached by a magnet to a piece of metal glued into the pipe, was the back door key.

I carefully opened the door; the house wasn't brand new, but it wasn't old either. A concrete base meant that there were no floorboards to creak, but I didn't dare turn on any lights so I had just as much chance of making a noise by accident in the dark.

Just as carefully, I locked the door behind me; I would replace the key in the morning. Right now, my entire focus was on getting upstairs without being caught.

And then the lights came on.

Well, there went that plan.


The back door led through a short hallway into the lounge room. I was just emerging into the lounge, heading for the stairs, when the lights came on, temporarily blinding me. Dad stood at the switch; he'd probably been sitting on the sofa, waiting on me.

"About time you got home, son," he began coldly. "I thought I heard a noise from your room, and checked on you – what the hell is that you're wearing?"

Mom, wearing nightgown and curlers, ventured down the stairs about this time. "Rob?" she asked. "Is that you? Are you wearing a mask?"

I swore to myself. In all the excitement, the tension of sneaking back into the house, I had totally forgotten to remove my costume and mask.

I was so busted.


In my life, I had seen Dad irritated, exasperated and frustrated. I had never seen him really, truly angry, at least not at me. This was a first.

"I can't believe you'd do something so foolhardy, so reckless, without even consulting your mother or me first!" he shouted.

I sat at the dining room table, mask off, jacket hanging over the back of the chair. The harness that held D-1 lay on the table in front of me, with the battered unit still clipped in place. D-3 sat beside it, along with both remotes. I still smelled heavily of smoke; it was in my hair, in my clothes, even clinging to my skin.

"What do you want me to say?" I asked reasonably. "I screwed up, yes. I should have told you, yes. But when, and how? When's the best time to tell someone you've got powers, Dad? How do you even raise a topic like that?"

"How long have you even had powers, Robbie?" asked Mom. Whereas Dad was going with the angry-overbearing route, Mom was sticking with the tried and true how-could-you technique.

Most teens figure out these parental techniques before too long; apparently they forget that their kids will figure them out too. I was countering with reasonable-logic and sorry-won't-do-it-again, respectively. Teens have their techniques too.

"I'm sorry, Mom," I told her sincerely. "Only a couple of weeks. I've been trying to figure things out. I didn't mean to make you worry."

Unexpectedly, she hugged me. This was a change in tactic, and I couldn't help but feel guilty as a result.

"How did you even get these powers?" asked Dad. "I've been reading these things up. Apparently it takes a lot of stress for something like this to happen. Like a life and death situation."

"Were you sneaking out before you got powers, Robbie?" chimed in Mom. They were a good team; if the Olympics had a Shame-Your-Teen category, they would have been in the running for a medal.

"No, I wasn't," I responded firmly. "Tonight was the first time. And I dunno how I got them, Dad. But I do know it was the night I nearly went mad trying to solve that damn stupid no-solution physics problem you threw at me."

"Huh," he mused, distracted from his anger in his attempt to puzzle out a solution. "I might look up Wysocki over at Harvard. He might be able to shed some light on this ..."

"No way, Dad!" I blurted. "Secret identity, remember? I'm a cape. What does it matter how I got my powers? I have them! I've got ideas for new devices popping up all the time. I can build them, given a workshop, tools and materials. And tonight, I saved a woman from some guys -"

I chose not to mention that she had been a streetwalker and they, prospective customers.

" - and a bunch of others from a building fire."

That got their attention.

"What, that smoke's not from one of your device thingys there?" asked Dad, poking at D-3 with a finger. Fortunately, I had shut it off, otherwise it might have popped him back to the yellow square. As it was, I jumped violently.

"Shit, Dad, don't do that! That's a teleport mine!"

"Oh, okay," he replied, hastily withdrawing his hand. "Is it, uh, live?"

I shook my head. "But seriously, it's not a good idea to poke at a Tinker's gear. That's what they say on the PHO site, anyway."

"Robbie," put in Mom, "this stuff you're building, is it … dangerous?"

I shook my head. "No. Not really. It's all about teleporting things. Moving them from one location to another. But if it's misused, sure, people can get hurt. Just like you hurt your hand if you hit it with a hammer."

There was a pause, then, as they stopped and looked at each other.

"It's late," Mom pointed out.

"I've got school tomorrow," I added.

Dad frowned. "We'll talk about this tomorrow."

I nodded as I got up. Carefully, I picked up my devices, and handed Dad the spare key.

"Oh, by the way," I added as I headed upstairs. "Armsmaster asked me if I wanted to join the Wards."

All the trouble, all the hassle, was so worth the looks on their faces.

But I still didn't know how to raise the question of my real parentage. Or even if I should.

I decided to sleep on it.


End of Part 7