Yet another day of isolation was what Terra and her sisters were in for. She drummed her fingers on one of the four desks in the school's version of solitary. If they ever got out, and were ever forgiven, if they were ever to graduate and become heroes-she thought of what their titles might be.
Something powerful for Rayne, with a gloomy edge to it…perhaps 'Thunderhead'. No too tacky, she liked 'Maelstrom' better. Byrn would have a name that caused fear and respect. Terra doodled little title ideas in the form of what baseball teams looked like. Byrn could be 'The Inferno', but then Terra thought it was too much like a movie in the 70's about a hotel burning down. 'The Incinerator' sounded sinister but it really was the best possible name for her pyromaniac of a sister.
It was easy for her to think of a name for Gail; with her sister's snide remarks and fast comebacks, Gail's hero name would definitely be 'Whiplash'.
But what about herself? 'Tremors' like the painfully sequeled and even more sequeled movie series? No, she thought harder and maybe 'Seismic' could be her hero name. When she looked at her complete list, she noticed they all seemed like villain names instead of a hero's name.
"What are you doing?" Gail leaned across the aisle and stared at Terra's paper with a bewildered look.
"Just bored," Terra shrugged and tried hiding the contents of the paper. Gail caught on and grabbed it our of Terra's grasp.
"What's this? Maelstrom? The Incinerator? Whiplash? Seismic?" Gail read with a derisive laugh.
"Give it back!" Terra shouted and lunged at Gail. She landed on Gail, and the paper fell out of her hand and onto the floor at Rayne's black booted feet.
A pale hand picked up the paper and indigo irises studied the writing.
"What makes you think we could be superheroes?" Rayne asked sincerely.
Gail pushed Terra off.
Terra regained posture and almost glared. "We have superpowers don't we?"
"Just because we have them doesn't mean we have to use them," Byrn snorted.
"Oh right, only when one of you gets pissed off," Terra snapped, which surprised them. Terra didn't regularly 'snap' at people.
"Excuse me? But you do know that it happens when you get pissed off too," Byrn noted.
"Well, name a time where I set the bonds into play. I've never led my emotions to cause the first sign of destruction. Byrn, you started the one in middle school, Gail you caused the bonds to go off at our last school, and we all know of Rayne's recent slip," Terra defended herself.
The other sisters had to think about it, and realized it was true.
Gail didn't like it when Terra seemed high and mighty so she changed the subject. "You've changed."
"What?"
"Ever since we've gotten to Sky High you've become less attached to us," Gail explained, but she wasn't making up bullshit this time. It was true.
"Yeah, that Zach kid seems to have something to do with it," Byrn pointed out.
Terra looked away with a flushed face, not admitting to anything. Rayne, who was previously looking at the ground, shot a sharp gaze at Terra, "You kissed him, didn't you?" They looked at Rayne startled and then to Terra for admittance or denial.
"What?" was what Terra asked instead.
"Why else would you be more attached to that boy than your own sisters? You had to have kissed him," Rayne said with a hint of disappointment to her gloomy demeanor.
Gail frowned, jealous of course.
"Yeah, so what?" Terra crossed her arms.
"You kissed the glowing boy?" Byrn was shocked.
Terra just grabbed her paper from Rayne and sat back down at her desk.
"I also told him about our real powers before we destroyed the cafeteria," Terra added nonchalantly, not knowing why she was telling her sisters.
"WHAT?" Rayne shouted outraged, making all of them jump back.
"It's too much too handle! Besides he kept his promise and never told anybody. He's known since the second week we've been here. Just…freaking let me be okay? Our lives suck and it's just NICE to have someone you don't share a blood link with to complain to. He just listens, and doesn't judge. He's perfect."
"I can't believe you would spill our secret," Rayne spoke with bitter astonishment.
"It's not like they wouldn't find out," Terra grumbled. She suddenly agreed with Gail's earlier comment. For the first time ever she was feeling animosity towards them. Why didn't they want her to be happy? When her thoughts turned to Zach, it was like the dark cloud that was her feelings disappeared.
They spent the rest of the day in silence, working on whatever papers Powers handed to them. It was mostly futile busywork. Name the type of ray that renders a person stationary; name the type of weapon to defeat a giant robot, what power is most useful when it comes to recovering sinking ships. What did it matter? Terra knew deep down that her, nor her sisters were ever going to be heroes.
When the school day was over, she followed her sisters wordlessly to the bus. They hadn't ridden the bus in forever. As she was walking by the tree in the front, a hand lashed out and grabbed her. She was about to do murder in her fowl mood but heard, "I have to talk to you."
It was Zach; she cranked her head back to stare at him. His voice was so serious. What was wrong? His icy blue eyes were sad as well. Before she could even contemplate that issue her arms anchored onto him and she buried her head into his chest wordlessly.
Zach smiled slightly. Magenta never did that. Magenta was cold and distant. Terra was warm and close. Even now.
"I missed you…so much," she turned her head and said. It felt kind of odd, expressing her feelings in words and not in earthquakes.
"Yeah, I pretty much have been going crazy without seeing you," Zach admitted, thinking back to when he was shuffling around the flag pole, every morning for the past week.
"What were you going to say?" Terra asked, wanting to put a stop to his obvious discontent.
"Oh…damn, how do I put this?" Zach wondered out loud.
"What!"
"Well I know what you are,"
"What do you mean? I'm a human with supernatural abilities,"
"You can never be a hero though, Terra," He sighed.
She was taken aback. Then what? What could she be? "So you're saying I can only be a villain?"
"No, your one of those rare kind of supers. Like, you want to do well, in your heart. But the only thing that comes of your desire to do good…is…" He squinched his face up like he didn't want to say anything more but did, "destruction."
She didn't understand. Where did he get this kind of theory? Had he been pondering it since the cafeteria incident? It seemed like a plausible thought though.
"How do you know this?" Terra asked.
"I went and talked to your…father,"
