Virgil sat in the library, flipping through his homework as he checked it. It was the first time in weeks that he'd actually been able to sit down and take his time on schoolwork, so he wanted it to be as good as he could make it. This was the part of being a super hero he hated: letting his grades drop so that he could stop the bad guys. He was the type of person who hated to fail and worked hard (when he could afford to) to make sure that he didn't fail.
Virgil noticed a mistake in his work and had just bent down to fix it when a noisy thud from behind him made him jump and swivel around in his chair. A boy who was about his age had dropped a large and heavy book to clutch his head in pain and grasp the metal bookshelf for balance. Virgil, who had been about to glare angrily at the disturbance, now rushed over to the boy to see if he needed help. "Hey! Are you okay, man? What's wrong?"
The boy was shaking and breathing heavily, obviously in a lot of pain, but he shook his head and tried to shove Virgil away. The movement almost knocked him off his feet and he had to lean heavily on the bookshelf to regain his balance. Virgil put the boy's arm around his shoulders and supported him to the table he'd been working at, putting him in a chair. The boy's breathing evened out and he seemed to regain his composure a bit, though he was still shaking like a leaf. Virgil decided that it was a good sign that he was calming down and asked again whether he was all right.
The boy looked at him as he wiped a bit of sweat from his forehead and nodded. "I'm okay now. That sort of thing happens to me a lot nowadays." he said in a thick British accent. "It's really nothing to worry about. Just a bit of a headache is all. Nothing that isn't normal."
Virgil could tell he was lying. He didn't lie very well. But he wasn't going to say anything; it was obvious the guy wasn't keen on telling him about what was really going on. Virgil decided to change the subject. "What's your name?"
"My name's Harry." he replied, taking his thick round glasses off and cleaning them before replacing them on his face. That's when Virgil noticed the scar. It was a curious looking scar, shaped like a lightning bolt and set just right of the center of his forehead. It was sort of half covered by the bangs of Harry's messy black hair. Not exactly noticeable unless you looked for it.
"You can call me Virgil or V. It's nice to meet you, Harry." Virgil wanted to ask about his scar, but thought it would be rude to ask, "Oh, by the way, how in the world did you get that scar on your head?" so he kept his question to himself. "So, is there anything I can do to help you out? Do you need a doctor or something?"
"No. I'm fine." Harry insisted. He stood up, saying, "I need to get going now. I can't stay here anymore; someone'll just get hurt." He whispered the last part, but Virgil heard it anyway. "Thanks for helping me. Maybe I'll see you around." And with that, Harry left.
Virgil watched him walk off and wondered about what he had said. He got up and picked up the book Harry had been looking at before his "headache" and looked at the title. "Modes of Magical Travel for the Wandless Traveler. By Porter Keyes. What the heck is this? Why would he be looking at a bogus book like this? There's no such thing as magic!" Virgil mumbled. Still, there was something about this book that drew him in. He found himself taking the book back to his table and flipping through it. He came across headings like: 'How to Make a Wandless Portkey,' and 'Operating Forty-League-Boots.' What kind of person would want to know how to use forty-league-boots? What were forty-league-boots, for that matter? Questions were raging in his mind as he put the book away, but they were interrupted by a soft beeping noise coming from his pocket. Virgil pulled a walkie-talkie-like yellow and black striped metal box from his pocket and answered it. "What's up, Gear?"
"We have a situation, V! Someone just blew up the movie theatre on Cowan Street! Somehow, I don't think this is a regular bombing, V. You'll understand when you get here. Hurry up!"
"Yeah, yeah; I'm on my way!" Virgil replied, gathering up his homework and stuffing it unceremoniously into his book bag. He ran to the restroom and changed as quickly as he could into his superhero gear. He was Static now, superhero of Dakota city and Gear's crime-stopping partner. Static flew out the bathroom window, dropping his backpack off on the roof of the library as he guided his flying saucer toward Cowan Street to check things out.
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Static arrived at the scene to find utter chaos. What remained of the large theatre was in smoking ruins. Gear was helping the firemen contain the last of the fire and keeping an eye out for anyone who had been missed by the firemen. Static found Police Chief Barnsdale and asked him what was going on.
"I'm not quite sure, Static. We're still working on it. It's a good thing the theatre was closed to the public today. Only three people were inside. But all of them are in critical condition." Barnsdale sighed.
"Gear hinted that there was evidence that this was a bangbaby attack when he called me. What's there?"
"Ah, yes. You must not have been paying attention on your way here, Static. It's quite obvious. Look in the air above the site. There's some sort of mark in the sky."
Sure enough, when Static looked up, he saw a giant skull with a snake twining through it hanging in the air above the demolished theatre. "What in the world? What did that? I've never seen anything like it! How did it get up there?"
"Those are all valid questions; tell me when you find the answers." Barnsdale quipped.
"Right. Now, I suppose I should get to work. I'll let you know if I find anything." Static jumped into the air on his disk and flew up to the sign to give it a closer inspection. He looked at it from all sides and looked for a point of origin for it. Finding nothing worth his time by using his normal senses, he searched for clues using his powers. As he looked for an ion trail, he came across something that felt weird. It was some sort of energy he hadn't felt before, like electricity but with a different 'taste' to it. It felt mean, as if it wanted to strike at him. He jerked his hand away from it as if it had burned him. Somehow, even though it felt mean, it was also familiar to him, like it was a part of him somehow. This frightened him for some reason. He shook the feeling off; this was no time to get jumpy and paranoid. Right now he had a job to do. He left the mark in the sky behind, turning once to look over his shoulder at it, then continuing on his way.
Static met with Gear after he concluded his search and compared the evidence they collected. Static hadn't found anything except the weird feeling from the mark in the sky. Gear hadn't had much luck, either. He found nothing that seemed to be of any use, the cameras and the film in them had been destroyed and there was no real evidence that anyone besides the injured workers had been inside the building. There was no more the two sixteen-year-olds could do. They reported their findings to Chief Barnsdale and left the crime scene.
Both boys had a lot on their minds as they began to patrol the streets of Dakota. Neither of them spoke for awhile. When they did speak, they discussed the explosion.
They decided to quit early and Static went to retrieve his book bag from the roof of the library. He heard voices from the street below and got curious. Using his flying saucer, he enhanced their voices so that he could hear them.
"The Potter boy was not in the Muggle cinema, my Lord. It seems that it was closed for the day." Said the first voice, silky and cold.
"You failed me Severus. I do not like failure. Do not fail me again. You will find Harry Potter and bring him to me. I will not tolerate another failure from you, Severus. Be warned. I am watching you closely." said a second, high-pitched, whispering voice. There was a loud CRACK! like gunfire and when Static looked again, the person to whom the second voice belonged had vanished into thin air.
The first man turned to leave, his cloak billowing behind him as he walked hurriedly toward a house that had its windows and doors borded up. Static followed him to the house and watched as the man went inside, hiding as he looked behind him before closing the door. Static hesitated a moment before going inside after him. He looked around and searched everywhere, but this man had vanished as well.
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The next day, Virgil told Richie what had happened. "V, I think you've officially gone nuts, man. You can't just disappear into thin air. It's not physically possible."
"You know, Richie, for being a super-genius, you're pretty stupid. Anything is possible with the Big Bang gas. You should know that! I mean, come on, you've seen some pretty weird things as Gear, why can't this be just another Bang Baby?" asked Virgil.
"V, you have to remember who's the genius here. Me. I already thought of that. I had Backpack do a scan for anything metahuman. Did you know that the big bang gas leaves behind a residue where ever it goes for about ten years. Anything anyone of us touches has traces of the gas left behind on it. That means we can tell if a metahuman has been there. And Backpack calculated that the last metahuman that was there came the day before. That means that our man either did it the day before yesterday, did it from a mile away, or was not a metahuman. Therefore, either the two men you saw were metahumans and had nothing to do with this, or they did it and aren't metahumans and therefore did not disappear." Richie explained.
"I hate it when you do that. Alright, maybe I was just being overreactive. It just was weird."
Just then, someone collided with Virgil from behind, knocking him to the ground while the guy who ran into him fell backwards onto his butt and sat holding his head. When Virgil looked up, he was surprised by who he saw. "Harry? 'S that you? What's wrong?" Virgil asked in concern. It was like what happened at the library the day before. Harry didn't answer; he was in too much pain to even notice that he had run into someone, not to mention a little preoccupied by a vision of Voldemort's newest plan to find him. But Virgil didn't know about his visions, he only knew that he had to get Harry some help and fast. "Richie, help me get him up!" Each of the boys took one of Harry's arms and hauled him up. They carried him to a nearby bench and settled him on it, then Richie went to call for help. Virgil stayed behind and tried to get Harry to talk to him. Suddenly, Harry sat up, eyes wide with fright. "The Library!" he yelped. He grabbed Virgil's shirt and said, "He's going to attack the library! Get everybody out!"
Virgil looked at Harry, bewildered for a moment. Something in Harry's eyes told him that what he said was true, but Virgil was unsure. "Harry, it was just a dream. There's nothing to worry about. Harry, just calm down. Richie's gone to get you some help; they'll be here soon. Just relax. It'll all be okay." Virgil said as soothingly as he could. "Tell me where you go to school, Harry."
"I don't go to school." Harry replied. "And it was not a dream! It was a vision, and they're almost always true."
"Where do you live, then, Harry? Do you have a place to go?"
"I can't go anywhere. At least, not if anyone is there. People tend to get hurt when I'm around. I have no friends, no family to speak of, and I don't want any."
"Too bad. You got some. Whether you like it or not." said Virgil, grinning goofily. "If everything is okay when the doctors check you out, you'll be coming over to the Community Center to talk to my Pops. This is not negotiable. Alright?"
"But…" but Harry never got to finish that thought as a paramedic came racing toward them.
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Harry, it seemed, had nothing wrong with him and so Virgil dragged him down to the Community Center, protesting the whole way. Virgil's father was quite unhappy with his son, as Virgil was now late for school because of Harry, but Mr. Hawkins was very understanding when he heard what had happened.
"I'm sorry to intrude, Mr. Hawkins, but I really can't stay here. Someone's bound to get hurt if I stay. Where ever I go, trouble always follows."
"Well, now, I can't have that. Now don't you worry, Harry. We've got people who can help you. Now, Harry, why don't you tell me a bit about yourself. What's your last name?"
"Potter. My last name is Potter." Harry ground out. Virgil noticed his fists tighten. It seemed Mr. Potter was losing his patience. Potter…why did that name seem so familiar…? Oh yeah. Last night.
"Hang on a minute, Pops." Virgil interrupted. "Your name is Harry Potter? I overheard a couple of people last night talking about you. I think they wanted to catch you. One of them was called Serverus or something like that and the other one was some type of lord or something. Do you know anything about them by any chance?"
Harry's eyes widened. "Voldemort is here! He's supposed to be back in England running his operation! What's he doing here…where ever here is…. And Snape. He's supposed to be teaching right now. Hmmm."
"Voldemort? I thought he was dead!" said Mr. Hawkins. Virgil and Harry looked at him in surprise.
"You know what I'm talking about?" asked Harry in disbelief. "But I thought you were a Muggle! You didn't even seem to recognize my name."
"Oh, I'm a Muggle alright. But Jean wasn't. She was a Muggle-born witch. But I know a thing or two about the wizarding world. I lost touch with the wizarding world when she died five years ago, and she was never really fond of all of it, anyway. She made me promise that if any of our kids turned out to be magical, we would find a way to lock the magic away until they were old enough to understand it. Anyway, she didn't really keep in contact with anyone there after her only real friend was convicted for the murder of one of his friends. It was quite an ugly shock for her to find out that someone she had trusted had been so low. That was right after Voldemort disappeared. Why is He after you?"
"Heh. Why is he after me? I'm the one who made him go away in the first place! I'm famous for it! And last year, he got the better of me by making me think he was going after the person I cared for the most, my Godfather. I ran away from my aunt and uncle's house this summer to keep my friends safe and somehow, I wound up here, without my wand."
Virgil was completely lost. "Huh? What are you two talking about? There's no such thing as magic! What's gotten into you two?"
Mr. Hawkins sighed. "Virgil, anything is possible. I mean, look at what the Big Bang did to all of those formerly normal people. What about that Static boy? four years ago, would you have thought it possible for some kid to control electricity like he does?"
"So being magic is like being a metahuman only you're born with it? Like mutation from birth?"
"No, son, you're missing my point. What I mean is that you can't say something's impossible because life has a way of proving you wrong."
"Right. I have to get to school right now. But we need to talk about this later, Pops." Virgil waved to his father and walked out the door.