Here we are with a new chapter. I'm sooo excited and happy to be working on this heh. I'm having a lot of fun with the story and the concept. I wish I could start writing the other stories too, but I gotta finish this one first. And we're more than halfway there!
I also want to take a minute to give a BIG shoutout to my friend TheSiegePerilous. He's been somewhat interested in this little universe I'm working on, and the setting sparked his imagination enough to write two stories that could have taken place in this continuity. They're not precisely canonical, but if you read them, it's definitely something that could have happened in this story under the right circumstances. So yeah, if you like this story, go check those one-shots out!
Special thanks to SoulKiller13, LoudCestBest, STR2D3PO, Jeff, and FanficFan920!
Chapter 6:
Being an anonymous celebrity is dope.
Once I had recovered from the emotional weathering of participating in my first official intervention as a superhero, I found myself navigating an ocean of euphoria and adrenaline that I had never experienced. I felt like I was on top of the world. My mind couldn't stop recreating the smiles of the citizens, the clear and obvious happiness that I had made them feel. But not only did I feel impossibly proud of the reactions I got. More than anything, I felt good about myself. Proud of what I had accomplished.
Ever since the fateful night in which Ace Savvy had lost his life before my eyes, I felt like I had been carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders. A self-imposed penance that oppressed me both physically and emotionally. Now, however and for the first time, I felt that I was doing everything in my power to honor and respect Ace Savvy's legacy. I could never be as good of a hero as he had been, but I would give my best, and that's as much as I could offer.
My original idea hadn't been to use Ace Savvy's suit as a way of taking on the mantle. It had simply been the first thing I had at hand to protect my identity. After the small talk I had with Jordan, though, the idea had rooted itself deep in my mind, and the more I thought about it, the more I managed to convince myself that it was the right thing. Ace Savvy was more than a hero, he was a symbol. Royal Woods needed him, and even if I couldn't rise to the challenge and reach the high bar he har set, I would give my everything to live up to his legacy. I was his biggest fan, I had acquired his same powers, and his death was a heavy toll on my conscience. I carried no doubt: I was the best option to take on the mantle.
Maybe I was wrong. Perhaps I was the worst possible option. Too young. Impulsive. With no experience. I could see the point of anyone who had any reservations in accepting me as a hero, and even those who outright wouldn't like me at all. The only option I had was to give my best, make the best decisions I could, and try to prove to everyone —myself included— that I was up to the task.
"The possibility of doing good is the great superpower that all of us, metahumans or not, carry within us. Our actions and our will to do good is what defines us, more so than our capabilities."
Ace Savvy believed that the vocation to help others was more important than being a metahuman or not. And well, I was certainly ready to give it all to be the new symbol of peace and hope in our city. A symbol… yeah, I liked the sound of it. And to become a symbol, I needed to show myself. Let the people know and see that someone was watching over them.
That's why, after solving my first crime in the day, I kept patrolling, this time jumping from one rooftop to the next, crossing between buildings and streets to cover a bigger perimeter and expand the area under my watch.
I didn't have the opportunity to witness another crime or any illegal activity —which was good news all things considered—, but that didn't keep me from helping regular citizens in their usual activities. Going on my idea of bringing the smiles and happiness back to the beaten-down people of my town, I decided to stop by on several occasions and jump down the street to give a hand to anyone who would need it. Even if some of the things I helped with were pretty small all things considered in the universal balance of reality.
Funny enough, my first task after stopping a crime was a great cliché of television and superhero movies: a cat trapped at the top of a tree. I was just passing by a low building's rooftop when I heard a kid crying. Peeking from above, I saw a small kid watching helplessly how a woman was trying to climb up a stair, calling for a cat that, sitting on a faraway branch, had no intention of walking closer to her.
With a smile on my face, I jumped from the ledge towards a light post next to the tree.
"Need some help?" I said as I got into position, waving my hand on a friendly "hello" gesture.
The woman, the kid, and a few pedestrians that were passing by stopped to stare, gasping and pointing incredulous fingers at me. The child's crying stopped right away, and they all stood mouth agape, stunned, making no sound at all.
"Don't worry, I got this," I assured them, balancing on the post before jumping towards a branch wide enough to resist my weight. Some small branches scraped me, but my suit's material was top-notch quality, it wouldn't break as easily. I moved through the tree like it was my natural habitat, swiftly reaching the branch where the feline was trapped. It was a very young cat, or at the very least from a tiny race since they didn't seem to be bigger than my forearm. Their fur was fluffy and looked like a small wheat ball.
"Come 'ere, kitty, kitty," I called them, putting on the same silly voice I used to speak to babies. "Come on, who's a good kitty? Who's a—?"
Suddenly, the cat's spine arched up, the fur on their back standing straight within a second, and they let out a violent hiss that made them look like a starving King Cobra about to murder a chubby rodent that had previously insulted the reptile's mother.
"Kitty?" I cautiously asked, stopping in my tracks. Their pupils got smaller, their claws came out, and I barely had time to curse to myself before the cat jumped at me.
"AAAGH!" I yelled, catching them in the middle of the air, but that only seemed to piss them off. They started twisting around like a knife collection possessed by the vengeful spirit of a bloodlust tornado.
"Whiskers, no!" The kid screamed from the sidewalk, but the beast in my hands was beyond reasoning. I tried releasing a bit of my grip to turn them around, but the bastard took the chance to jump at me once again.
The surprise and the sudden assault were enough to make me slip from the brach, and suddenly the world was upside down as I headed to the floor —which was now my roof. The kitty seemed to comprehend that things weren't good anymore, and in a second their mouth stopped foaming and they stared at me with kind, gentle eyes.
I frowned, not at all buying their good pet act, but I was a Hero in action and I couldn't let anything happen to them. So in one swift move, I wrapped my arms around them and turned my body around, falling safely into a squatting position, cushioning the impact and coming out of it harmlessly.
"Whiskers!" The kid said with a big smile, running to me and snatching the Tasmanian Devil out of my grasp, which now looked calm and placid. "You're alright!"
He squeezed it as hard as he could, closing his arms around the animal-like he was about to do a suplex to it. I could now understand the cat a bit more. After a few seconds, the little boy turned to look at me with a big, toothy smile.
"You were awesome!" He said, trying to get as much of me into his eyes as possible. "Are you really a hero?"
"Whatchu think? Do I look like one?" I asked, standing up with my back straight and my arms resting on my waist.
"Yeah!"
"Well, there you go; I'm the new Ace Savvy."
"But you're a kid," he said, tilting his head. "Aren't you scared?"
The brutal honesty of the question took me by surprise. I didn't expect having to answer such a blunt question. I let a few seconds go by as I carefully picked my words, trying to gauge what a hero should answer at such a question, especially when made by a little kid. I ended up assuming that being honest was probably the safest, best approach.
"Of course I am," I admitted. "I'm very scared. But Ace Savvy wouldn't let fear win against him. If I want to help others, I need to be brave enough to overcome fear and act whenever and wherever I'm needed!"
My response seemed to be of his satisfaction since he immediately asked his mom to take a picture of us together, and I couldn't say no. I didn't say no either to the mother that also wanted a picture of me, nor did I deny another picture to the owner of the store we were standing outside of, or when more people started to approach me from both sides of the sidewalk.
I spent one or two more hours patrolling, involving myself in small, everyday actions to help people. Was an elder man trying to cross the street but no one helped him? That was a job for Ace Savvy. Did someone need help to lift the back of their car to change a tire? Perfect opportunity to test my strength.
Turns out I was pretty strong.
After many selfies, receiving cheers from people, and thanks from those I helped, I realized that I had been out for a long time, and it was likely that my friends would be arriving soon to my home to play Dungeons and Dragons. I couldn't be late for it; my friends would kill me for missing it, and then my parents would kill me again for coming home late.
All things considered, I could confidently say that my first afternoon as an official superhero had been more than positive.
Fortunately, I managed to get home with time to spare. Enough time to take a shower, get some snacks ready, clean my room, and hide in my attic not only my suit but also the utility decks and the grappling hook gun that had been so useful to me. I had even brought some spare decks with me, not wanting to keep going to the manor for logistic stops, which might end up raising unwanted suspicion.
When I got to my house, Clyde was already there, and I spoke with him and my parents about this "new Ace Savvy". But I also had some conversations about it with my friends, so to avoid being redundant, allow me to skip straight to the point when Stella, Liam, Zach, Rusty, and Jordan joined us, all with smiles on their faces and very excited to talk as we got everything ready in our basement.
"He's everywhere!" Said Liam, walking in circles around the table where Stella was placing her maps and miniatures. He seemed to be too pumped to stay still in one place.
"Everyone's talking about him," added Rusty, checking his phone with the biggest, most honest smile I had ever seen on him. "He spent the whole afternoon helping people. He rescued a cat from a tree! A cat from a tree!"
"Look at all the pictures they took of him," Zach said, showing us his phone screen, scrolling to what seemed to be a gallery made by a website, compiling most of the selfies people had taken with me and that they had uploaded to social media.
"I can't believe this is true", said Clyde, pinching his arm to make sure he wasn't dreaming. "I thought poor Nova and Eclipse would have to carry the burden of being the only heroes in town, but after only a few days someone else has already taken on the Ace Savvy mantle! That's just what we needed!"
He turned to look at me, knowing that Ace was my biggest idol just the same way it was for him. Up until that moment, I had stayed mostly quiet, trying to take in all the reactions my friends were having at my first steps as an anonymous hero, but I couldn't just stand there and not say anything. It would look kinda sus.
"Well, obviously he's barely getting started, and he clearly doesn't measure up against OG Ace Savvy," I said, not wanting my best friends to start getting some crazy high expectations for me, "but I think he's doing the right thing! Whoever he is, he knows we're all still mourning for Ace, but we needed a sign to start getting out of our sorrow, right?"
"Exactly!" Stella said, placing her dungeon master screen to hide her dice and notes. "Some people are complaining online that it's disrespectful for him to take Ace Savvy's name, that he should've chosen something else, but they're just trolls. How many Captain Marvel's have we had?"
"Besides, I think he's sending a message," Jordan added. "I don't think it's a coincidence that he picked up Ace Savvy as his identity. I think he's doing it to make a point, to let us all know that even though the original Ace is gone, his legacy is still alive. In him… but also with us."
We all stayed in silence, staring at Jordan and reflecting on her words. I'm not even gonna lie, I felt my eyes starting to water up, and I had to hold my breath to keep a tear from falling. The fact that she, of all people, perfectly understood the reasons why I had become a hero made me stupidly happy.
Speaking of happiness, Jordan then turned to look straight at me with a smirk on her face and raising an eyebrow. "Ready to admit that he's a hero?"
I smiled and shrugged.
"You convinced me," I said, relishing the fact that no one in the room understood the double entendre.
We kept talking about my alter ego for a while until we remembered we had a DnD session to play. Stella seemed very excited to run it, and we soon found out what she had planned. The first part of the session was a one-on-one between me and the DM following the fate of Silver Edge, my paladin that had seemingly sacrificed himself by cutting a rope bridge to keep a bunch of monsters from reaching the rest of the party.
In summary, at the bottom of the cliff was a river that dragged all the monsters away from the scene, but my character had been caught by a giant spiderweb that belonged to none other than Aracne, the Queen of all Spiders. And what followed was an incredibly tense and complicated act of negotiation. The fact that in the previous session we had slain a cave filled with giant spiders was not helping with Aracne's mood. However, by staying calm, roleplaying with Silver Edge's honesty and honor code, and thanks to a clutch roll adding Jordan's bardic inspiration, I managed to step out of the encounter victorious.
Aracne didn't kill my character, and under the promise that Silver Edge would help lift the curse that reigned over the spider's lands, she not only let me go but also used her primal magic to teach me the Spider Climb spell, which allowed me to get out of the cliff and join the rest of the party. The session continued normally, but the fun and enjoyment we all got out of it were out of this world.
"You outdid yourself," I told Stella as soon as we were over.
"That was AMAZING, Stella! You should write a book with all the awesome ideas that you have!" Zach added.
She told us that we were all exaggerating, but the soft blush on her cheeks and the smile on her face let us know how much she appreciated the compliments. And she had definitely earned them.
"Don't I get any congratulations?" Jordan said to me a little later, while the rest of our friends were busy talking among themselves.
"What do you mean?"
"Circe gave you the bardic inspiration. If she hadn't done so, you would have failed your persuasion check."
My first instinct was to believe that she was joking, but that her joke was hiding a certain degree of truth. Which made me very worried, since the last thing I wanted was for the girl I liked to feel that I didn't appreciate her enough. But then, perhaps due to my new perception, or maybe because I was starting to know Jordan better than before, I had a much bigger and important revelation: she wasn't mad.
She was jealous.
That revelation hit me like a firetruck. I stood silent for a few seconds before activating my charming mode.
"Definitely. Believe me, Silver Edge hasn't forgotten," I assured her, waiting a bit before adding "In fact, I think he's considering returning that kiss on the cheek next time he cures her."
Jordan's fake anger act fell immediately, and she smiled. Not confidently and ironically like she usually did, but rather shy this time. She turned her eyes to the floor before looking back at me.
"He'll have to do better than that. He owes her his life."
"You're right. I'm sure he'll figure something out."
"Well, I gotta get going. I don't wanna miss the bus," she said, nonchalantly.
"Do you want me to walk you there again?"
"If you want to."
"Alright, let's go," I said with a smile, taking off my Silver Edge cosplay.
Nothing out of the ordinary happened as I walked her to the bus stop. We talked about the session, our school project, and the new Ace Savvy. I wished I would have taken one extra step, asking her out or something, but not even as a new hero I felt brave enough to do it. I settled with simply enjoying every moment we spent together as friends.
For now, it was more than enough.
The next month and a half were unbelievable, and it's hard to summarize everything that took place within them. It was, without a doubt, the period of my life in which I was consistently the happiest I've ever been. Everything was going my way, and both my facets, hero and secret identity, were at the best. I felt like the king of two worlds.
Speaking as Lincoln McBride, my mood had been amazing all the way through. I felt constantly motivated, happy, ready for everything. I woke up early and the energy kept me going for the rest of the day and most of the night. I didn't even have to sleep too much to be at my full potential. I used to be pretty lazy, sleeping almost ten hours during the night and sometimes sneaking in a short nap in the afternoon. Now, four hours of sleep were more than enough, and I needed no nap.
This allowed me to be much more productive and make the best out of my days. Homework became a non-íssue. Even less now that my mind seemed to have improved just as much as my body. My memory was considerably better, and I was able to connect ideas and understand concepts much faster than before. I could finish my homework with enough time to enjoy playing videogames, where my fast reflexes were also turning me into a beast. If it wasn't because I had integrity and I didn't want to take advantage of my new skills, I would have opened a Twitch account just to turn into a sensation in the world of gamers and streamers.
But, as I said, my sense of responsibility and honesty wouldn't let me cheat with my new powers. I didn't want to start killing it on activities where I didn't before. It was unfair for everyone else who wasn't in equal conditions with me, and it also wasn't right to take advantage of a gift like the one I had received. So I had to start sabotaging myself. On my tests, I failed some questions on purpose so I wouldn't get the highest grade in the class. When playing videogames, I let my friends beat me on the same proportion they did before. I did allow myself to every once in a while make some impossible combos and then pretend that I had no idea what I did, but nothing more than that.
Where I had to be extra careful was in my gym class. It was hard to pretend that I was slower, weaker, or less energetic than I was, but I couldn't let myself give away my secret identity by mistake. The whole class had its eyes on me after the last time we played dodgeball, but after pretending to trip a few times and trying to jump the way I had last time only to faceplant myself, everyone seemed to buy the idea that I had just been lucky.
"Luck won't be on your side forever, kid!" The coach yelled at me one time. "There may be a new hero, but you won't be having a masked vigilante following your every step to make sure you're safe, so you better work hard or you won't survive! Now give me twenty!"
Finally, one of the best decisions I made was, during my first week as a hero, to convince my parents of letting me go to a gym.
"But you're only eleven!"
"Gyms are dangerous!"
"You can get hurt!"
"You can break something!"
"I'm not gonna do anything dangerous," I assured them. "I just want to run a bit and move my muscles. Our gym teacher says we need to be ready, and that if we don't improve our physical state, we might regret it on the crude reality of our streets. Besides, if I have high cholesterol and I don't exercise my heart, I may have a heart arrest by forty-five!"
They protested a bit more, but I was able to convince them that letting me go was for the best.
"Clyde, would you like to start with your brother?" They asked him.
"And sweating on public spaces as all the buff, athletic jocks see how pathetic I am? No, thanks!"
Attending a gym fulfilled three crucial goals. The first one was that it allowed me to measure my skills. The professor at the gym left me to do very simple tasks, barely giving me any weight to work with, but the moment he left to a different floor, I added all the extra weight I needed. In time, I kept raising the dead weight until I could lift 230lbs.
The second goal was that, even though I only went to the gym for half an hour, I managed to convince my dads that, between getting there, the warm-up, the exercising, the stretching, and getting back, I had at least three hours if I wanted to do it slowly and safely to not get hurt. That left me with two and a half hours in the afternoon to do much more… heroic activities.
And the third benefit was that it gave me a reasonable excuse to, three weeks after the incident, I could justify my muscles when my friends figured it out. It happened when Stella tried to tickle me before starting a DnD session.
"Wow, wow, wow!" She said, quickly pulling her hand away from my stomach. "Lincoln, what the heck? What was that?"
"I-I don't know what you're talking about," I said, trying to recover from the tickles but also anxious for knowing exactly what she meant.
"That's not the tummy I remember!" She said, looking impressed. "Lift your shirt!"
"Uh, Stela, what are you doing?" Asked Liam, as all my friends looked confused. Except for Jordan. She was glaring at Stella.
"Lincoln, if you don't lift your shirt, a meteor will hit Silver Edge on his face."
"You know, if this was the other way around, that would be harassment," mentioned Clyde, but Stella just blew a raspberry at him.
After a brief argument regarding gender roles, I had to breathe in, wait for the best, and lift my shirt enough to show off the abs that the cube had granted me along with my powers.
The table went nuts. Clyde and the boys stood up and lost their minds, treating me like an alpha male, silverback gorilla.
"By the Avenger's League!" Said Rusty. "What do you EAT?"
"I, uh… the gym seems to be working fine," I said, covering myself and sitting, embarrassed. They weren't grown-men abs, they were well proportioned for my body, but it was still weird to see someone as young as me with toned muscles.
They kept arguing amongst themselves whether it was worth it or not to start going to the gym too, and they even argued about puberty and how it factored in. Just for curiosity, I sneaked a glance at Stella and Jordan, who remained quiet. Every time I turned to look at them, they both looked away with blushed cheeks.
Fortunately, everything calmed down a few minutes later and the session began. By the time we were done, my physicality became nothing but a joke that my friends would bring up every once in a while. Luckily, nothing changed, especially with Jordan.
We kept working on our project, hanging out once or twice a week in the library or my house, and I did allow my abilities to help me there. I wanted to get her the highest grade possible. Jordan seemed to be impressed by my knowledge of heroic history, and that made me pretty happy. Nothing remarkable happened between us, but spending as much time with her as I was felt like pouring fuel to the fire in my heart that burned for her. Every day she looked prettier, and we became closer.
Between all the work and investigation, we found some calm moments to talk about us. Our favorite movies, our favorite videogames, what we thought about certain food… I felt like I was getting to know her, and that made me very happy.
Lincoln McBride's life was wonderful.
Ace Savvy's life was also going phenomenal. My popularity was growing at a great pace. There were dedicated YouTube channels to cover my escapades. New articles speculating about my origins were coming out daily. They had even opened my own subreddit! I read it almost every day, checking out the different opinions. There was a lot that was negative. Some with arguments, some clearly the work of trolls. But the vast majority was positive, and that kept motivating me to keep on going with my career as a night vigilante.
I had figured out a routine. After dinner, I went to bed early and pretended to fall asleep right away. It was never long enough before the rest of my family followed suit. I would wait for some prudent minutes to make sure everyone was deeply asleep, and then I would quietly get up. I put pillows and clothes under my blankets to create the illusion that someone was sleeping on my bed. Then I'd grab my bag, go to the attic, fill it with my suit and gadgets, and then sneak out the window.
I would walk to an alley where I could change without being seen, and my night patrolling as Ace Savvy would begin. I went out every single night for several hours, taking different routes and streets every time, looking for crimes to stop or people to help. There were many uneventful nights, which was honestly kinda boring, but it was objectively the best outcome.
However, there were a lot of instances where I had to act. Robberies, assaults, people trying to break into stores, or steal a car. I intervened every chance I had, and my percentage of effectivity never went down 100%. Many delinquents surrendered the moment they saw me. Some others tried to run, to no avail. Some stubborn individuals had no demur to fight me, but I never gave them any chance. If they only had their fists, it was easy to outclass them, using my reflexes and dexterity to dodge everything they threw at me and reduce them. If they carried a knife, I would be much more aggressive, disarming them as fast as possible.
And for those that had guns, the most dangerous of them all, I gave them the least opportunities. If possible, I would enter with a cloud of smoke and give them one single kick to knock them out. If they had already seen me, then I'd resort to my cards, neutralizing them from a distance. On a couple of occasions I had to dodge bullets, which was always incredibly tense and nervewracking, but knowing that there was someone out there carrying a gun and willing to shoot children was motivation enough to give out my full potential and stop them. I couldn't let people like that get away.
Everywhere I go I found people excited about my performance as a hero. It's hard to describe how great it felt to just walk down the hallway at school, pretending to be thinking about something, and listen to what people had to say about me.
"He saved my uncle the other night! He told me Ace moved like a lightning bolt, that the bad guys couldn't even follow him!"
"I heard rumors that he was raised at a Shaolin monastery, and that he was sent here to finish his training with Ace Savvy."
"The other day he fought a gang of bikers that were causing trouble at a bar. He was outnumbered seven to one and they still lost! Though some people say they were pretty drunk and could barely stand up…"
"I don't know what he looks like under that mas but I bet he's hot!"
All the positive reinforcement I heard filled me with joy and motivation, but as I said, it wasn't all great. Some media didn't seem as happy with me as the rest.
"What is a kid doing patrolling so late in the night?" A journalist asked. "Doesn't he go to school in the morning? Has he decided that the educational system isn't cool enough or attractive enough for a superhero? I can only speak for myself, but I gotta say, I don't' feel comfortable leaving my safety to the hands of a kid that dropped out of middle school."
Not only that, but my appearance had resurrected an old debate that had been silent for many years, and that was whether it was ok for the State to allow kids to risk their lives fighting crime on the streets. The International Committee of Metahumans had resolved that the individual responsibility of metahumans regarding the use of their abilities for good was beyond the reach of any State as long as they didn't break any law or caused damages to private property product of heroic mala praxis. But even then, there were many philosophical debates about the nature of letting a kid fight the battles of adults.
Fortunately, not all journalists were against me. And popular opinion seemed to rally behind the position of the most trustful journalist when it came to Ace Savvy, Katherine Mulligan. She publicly defended and supported me, talking about Ace Savvy's legacy and how he was a firm believer that anyone could be a hero, regardless of powers or age. That being a hero was just a matter of caring for others.
And that's how I tried to picture myself. I was simply someone that went out at night to watch over regular people, trying to give them back some of the tranquility and security that the original Ace Savvy made us feel.
It was in one of those late-night patrolling that a series of encounters changed forever my career as a hero. Or, at the very least, they changed the way I experienced it, how I thought about it, and my philosophy regarding the consequences of my actions. Once Clyde had fallen into Morpheus' hands, I got my decoy ready, packed up, and walked into the heart of the city. As soon as I found a dark place to hide my civilian clothes, I st1opped being Lincoln McBride and stepped into the night as Ace Savvy, the new cultural phenomenon in Royal Woods.
I roamed the streets for about forty minutes with nothing to report, until I heard the call of adventure, and a chance to be a hero presented itself to me once again.
"Help! Please, help!" I heard from my high position. I dashed my way to the source of the call for help, and I spotted a man lying on the street with a hand on his chest.
A heart arrest? A victim of an armed robbery? It looked serious, so I didn't doubt to find a low roof from which I jumped to the sidewalk. I cushioned the impact by flexing my legs, feeling the energy expanding through them and into my core. It didn't hurt, but it was always a strange feeling.
"Are you okay?" I asked, quickly approaching him. "What's wrong?"
"H-Help, please…" he begged, extending a hand.
The man didn't seem to have any visible wound, and there were no signs of a struggle or fight in the surroundings. I didn't have time to think, so without hesitation, I took his hand in mine and helped him back to his feet.
"What happened? Are you hurt? Let me know if—"
I saw fear in his eyes, and before I knew it, without even saying a single word he rushed away from me, running in the opposite direction. There didn't seem to be anything wrong with him, he was running like he wasn't hurt.
"Sir, wait!" I asked, but right as I was about to start a sprint to catch up with him, a potent light appeared behind me, like a stage reflector.
I turned around, having to cover my eyes with my hand, but I soon realized the light came from a car that had been parked a few feet away from me. The driver lowered the light's intensity and began a sluggish drive towards me. It was a black, luxury car, with polarized windows in every direction. Was it legal for them to hide the driver? I didn't think so, just like I wasn't entirely sure it was legal for a car to have a blank plate.
The situation was odd and had me on the edge, ready to use every tool at my disposal if it came down to it. But there was currently nothing that put me at immediate risk. The car kept moving until the doors in the back were right in front of me. I could see a blurred shadow behind the window. I was feeling the tension rising inside my chest, but it wasn't long before the driver pulled down the back window to reveal the figure in question.
The first thing I saw was a long, thin top hat, showing then a big, round head, very cartoonish in its proportions. It was mostly just fat, with a very small area destined to the facial features made of his button-like eyes and a big, humongous nose with a white mustache. He looked like an overweight snowman, and his silhouette was so exaggerated that I recognized him in the act.
"Mister Tetherby," I said out loud, remembering him from the news and his argument with Katherine Mulligan.
"Lord Tetherby," he corrected me with a big, fake smile. "I was knighted by the Queen of England."
"England has no king," I said, frowning. The man laughed.
"It did, young one," he said, sighing and looking at the distance like he was reminiscing times long gone. "It was one of the greatest, most powerful monarchies in the world. The Empire on which the Sun never sets, they called it. And then… then the heroes came, and the whole bloody world changed."
He stayed lost in thought until he shook his head, seemingly having remembered that I was still there.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, we old men sometimes lose ourselves in the past."
"No problem," I said, not even trying to hide my confusion.
"It's such a pleasure to find you here, I had been dying to talk with our brand new fantastic hero, the heir of Ace Savvy."
There was something extremely odd about the whole situation. The happy tone he was using to talk to me didn't seem to match the emotions his eyes were reflecting, almost shooting daggers at me. I was beginning to believe that our meeting had not been fortuitous.
"What do you want to talk about?" I replied nonetheless, crossing my arms over my chest. At the end of the day, even if this man was a multimillionaire owner of a private security firm, he was still a Royal Woods citizen. He deserved the same respect I'd give anyone else.
"I just wanted to congratulate you on your… bravery for taking on Ace Savvy's mantle," he said, tipping his top hat. It didn't sound like a congratulation at all.
"I try to do what he'd do. If I have a chance to help those in need… I can't stand with my arms crossed."
Just for a second, it occurred to me that right then I was, in fact, standing with my arms crossed. I almost moved them, but I decided against it. Maybe he hadn't noticed.
"Very noble of you. It's certainly inspiring to see a new hero rising when it has been years since no one else has. Between you and the young duo of heroines, we've had more new heroes in two years than in the last eight. Curious, isn't it? All of them children. Why do you think that's the case?"
To be honest, I had no idea what had been Nova and Eclipse's motivation to become heroes. They usually didn't do interviews. Their public declarations usually were given right at the crime scene as they waited for police to arrive, or answering to fans that managed to cross paths with them. I couldn't speak on their behalf, and I couldn't reveal the secret behind my decision.
So I had to improvise.
"Maybe adults have gotten used to living in a city where no new heroes are allowed. Maybe they've given up, but we kids still have the hope that things can get better."
Even though it was all a big pile of excuses that I had thought at the moment, part of me wanted to believe that there was a certain truth to it. Tetherby's smile, creepier and wider than normal, stretched even further.
"I see. That's so… inspiring. Perhaps you're right, yes… Or perhaps… I don't know… Maybe adults have learned that being a hero in Royal Woods is too dangerous. Don't you think it's dangerous for you to be out here looking for criminals?"
"Of course it's dangerous," I replied right away, "but just because it's dangerous doesn't mean it's not something worth doing."
"We live in Royal Woods, kid, this isn't your regular city. There are no supervillains here either. We don't need heroes, we need cops. Security forces."
"You mean your company?" I shot at him, intuiting the implications behind what the man that controlled Michigan's private security thought.
Tetherby's smile dropped.
"I've dedicated my life to build a red of private security capable of protecting regular citizens. Without the need to depend on heroes or metahumans. Don't you understand you're destined to disappear sooner or later? We regular humans can't give us the luxury of putting our trust and security in the hands of heroes. Especially not the hands of kids."
Any sense of diplomacy that the man had been trying to keep was suddenly gone. There was a very clear and evident animosity coming from his end, and to be honest, the feeling was mutual.
"If you care so much about people's safety, what's the problem with us helping out?"
"The message," he responded. "People no longer respect police officers or the army as they did before. They don't treat them as the bastions of law and order. It's like people only care for metahumans. Why? Humanity had been taking gargantuan steps into progress before they appeared. We put men in the Moon! Technological progress was taking us on a road to a new golden age."
"Being a hero goes beyond having powers or not, it means putting everyone else's safety and wellbeing before our own," I said, getting tired of his rhetoric. "A cop or a firefighter is just as heroic and necessary as any other metahuman."
"And yet, ever since Ace Savvy left us we are 'helpless and alone', aren't we?"
I couldn't think of a way to refute that statement, which infuriated me. It wasn't that we didn't appreciate cops. We did, or at least, I did. It's just that… it was different. Heroes represented more than security, they were a mirror of who we wanted to be. It wasn't the way Tetherby presented it, and yet I couldn't think of how to articulate an answer.
"I have to keep patrolling," I said, turning around and beginning to walk away from him.
"This city is dangerous for heroes, kid," he repeated. "If you keep this up, you'll end up like your predecessor."
I stopped right in my tracks, turning over my heels to glare at him. "Is that a threat?"
"I'm informing you of what happens to heroes," he said with venom in his words. "All the heroes in this city disappear. The only exception, the only thing that keeps the population against letting my security forces take over was Ace Savvy. And now he's gone too. Do you think the weapon that ended him won't find its way to you?"
I felt a chilling sensation washing over me, and for a second, I was paralyzed. I had been following every news and investigation report regarding Ace Savvy's death to an almost obsessive degree. I had read every article on the internet, always aware of the sword of Damocles that hung over my head that was the fear of someone somehow figuring out that I had been a part of the incident. I was aware of every single public statement about it.
As far as I knew, Wild Card Willy hadn't said anything about getting any special weapon from no secret patron. Was I reading too much into this? Or had Tetherby just implied he knew about Willy's secret weapons?
"How do you know about the weapons?" I asked with gritted teeth, my jaw clenched and my fists closed.
The arrogant smirk on Tetherby's face vanished in a second. His eyes stared at me with terror crossing his face for the tiniest fraction of time, like he had been caught in an embarrassing position. He tried to put himself together, but something in the way he sat and looked at me had changed.
"I don't know what you're talking about. I said weapon to say something generic, we all know that Wild Card Willy specialized in—"
"How do you know about the weapons?!" I interrupted him. I felt a molten river of lava flowing through my veins, burning my insides and fueling a raging fire. If Tetherby had been somehow involved in Ace Savvy's death…
"C-Calm down!"
"Don't tell me what to do! What did you do?!"
"Drive, you fool!" He yelled at his driver, and the car began accelerating away.
I couldn't let him get away. Tetherby was hiding something, and I needed to know what it was. Ace had been willing to let Wild Card get away scot-free in exchange for the weapons, to examine them. What had he seen? What was it so interesting or special about them? Willy had mentioned a secret sponsor that had given him the weapons. Would Tetherby be involved in this? Why? What would his goal be?
I needed answers. I needed to solve Ace Savvy's case, not only for the obvious act of getting justice for a crime, which was important, but also… maybe I could find out that it wasn't all entirely my fault.
But I wouldn't be able to get any answer at all if Tetherby got away. I didn't know where he lived or where to find him. I needed to stop him right there and there and interrogate him, whatever it took. I needed to stop that car.
Without even thinking, I pressed the red deck's insignia. An explosive card jumped into my open palm. My eyes were already locked into one of the back wheels. I made all the trajectory math within a second: the speed I could throw the card, the current speed of the vehicle, its likely acceleration. I instinctively knew where to throw the projectile.
There was nothing else that mattered right then other than stopping Tetherby. I didn't care about anything else, I had tunnel-vision and all I could focus on was the vehicle I was about to damage. Maybe that's why I didn't notice a growing glow behind me or the sound of something rushing through the air at high speed. I wasn't aware of my surroundings until I threw my arm back, ready to take my action, and just as I was about to destroy a wheel, a hand closed around my wrist.
The surprise almost made me drop the explosive card. I turned to see who that hand belonged to and to say that I was stunned would be an understatement.
The hand in question was covered by a blue glove that continued up the arm, becoming a full-body spandex suit, with some areas in white and some in different tones of blue. A mask was hiding almost the entirety of her face, protecting her secret identity, and her whole body was surrounded by a blueish aura seemingly made out of innocuous flames.
Even though I had already found myself next to her in one opportunity several weeks ago, I couldn't help but feel small like an aunt next to the powerful, imposing figure of Nova. Who, by the way, was scowling down at me looking disappointed, like a mother seeing their child eating candy before dinner.
"Nova?" I said out loud, startled. She released my wrist, letting me move once again, and I suddenly remembered what I was about to do.
I looked down the street, but Tetherby's car was driving away.
"We gotta go after him!" I warned her. "We need to catch him! Let's go!"
I didn't understand why she had stopped me, but I was now excited at the prospect of temporarily teaming up with one of our town's two heroines. Who knew what would we be capable of if we joined our forces?
She didn't seem to share my enthusiasm, however. She sighed and extinguished the energy aura that enveloped her body.
"Don't go after him," she simply told me, shaking her head. "Lord Tetherby isn't someone you want to mess with."
"But he—!"
"And he's definitely not someone you should throw an explosive card at," she added, this time with clear disapproval on her voice.
I looked at the card in my hand. I knew the power of Ace Savvy's arsenal. I wasn't going to destroy the card, my intention was simply to disable one of its tires so he couldn't getaway. It's not like I was going to kill or torture him to get information. I just wanted some answers.
However, hearing her words made me consider how the situation might have looked like to a third party looking at it. From a neutral point of view, I could understand how bad it looked. And to be honest, I felt very ashamed of myself. I had let my emotions get the best out of me, and because of that, I had almost done something more akin to the behavior of a villain.
I put the card back on its deck without looking at Nova. "I'm sorry, I… wasn't thinking clearly."
"Apparently."
"It's just that… Tetherby…"
"Let's go somewhere more private," she suggested. "I think it's time for us to have a talk."
I didn't remember ever being as anxious as I was during those minutes of silence that I lived next to Nova as we searched for a building on which we could have a conversation without fearing being interrupted. I would have guessed that any rooftop would do it, but Nova kept moving through the air, from building to building, looking for God only knows what. Even though I couldn't fly, I had no issues keeping up with her, although part of me wondered if this wasn't some form of test. To see if I managed to follow her.
We eventually reached a building with several billboards in different directions, and between those and the water tanks, that place seemed more like a secret lair for birds. There were many of them, in fact, but they flew away the moment two heroes interrupted into their territory. Once we had settled, Nova stopped flying, standing a few feet in front of me.
"I had been meaning to talk with you for a while," she said with no further ado.
"Oh?"
"Yeah. To be… completely honest, this is not the first time I watch you patrolling."
I could feel myself blushing when I heard that Nova, the most powerful hero our city had had in so many years, had been watching me as I patrolled. I guess that explained where she came from when she grabbed my wrist as I was about to attack Tetherby's car.
"You were watching me?"
"It's not as weird as it sounds, I swear. I was just trying to see if I could figure you out."
"What do you mean?"
"See what kind of hero you are. What's your motivation. How you treat people. That sort of stuff. I wanted to make sure you took this job seriously."
I couldn't help but feel a bit offended at that comment.
"Of course I take this seriously," I assured her, taking a step forward. "Why would I risk myself like this if I didn't?"
"Maybe not here, but many heroes in the world are only after money and game. And ever since your first day, you've been very busy taking selfies with your fans, talking to them…"
Part of me felt slightly embarrassed. The truth is that, more than once, fame and popularity had gotten over my head. I couldn't deny it. I would read YouTube comments about me, check how many likes pictures with me got on social media, I heard what the news thought of me. I was very happy whenever I read anything positive, and it ruined my day to read anything negative, even though the bad reviews were but a tiny fraction compared to the good ones. I loved seeing the way people reacted to my presence. It motivated me to keep being a hero.
But those little pleasures weren't the reason why I did this. I wouldn't risk my life just to get a bit more clout on social media. I wasn't that dull.
"I do it because it had always been my dream to talk and get a picture with the original Ace Savvy," I replied, before giving her a look filled with sentiment. "Or with you and Eclipse. Back when I was a normal kid, not a hero, what I wanted the most was to be able to one day meet you guys, the superheroes, and tell you how much I admire you and thank you for everything you do. To show you my appreciation. When I look at the people calling for me to get a picture, I see myself, and I do what I wish a hero would do to me. Ace Savvy was more than just a warrior of justice. He was a symbol of peace and hope. I'm… trying to become that."
Nova moved her eyes to the night's sky, with an expression that gave away the deep thoughts she was lost into. We remained in silence for some long seconds.
"I believe you," she said, after the pause. "I'm sorry if this was too sudden or if I made you uncomfortable. I just… want to be sure that you know what you're getting into."
"I do."
"Forgive me, but I don't think you've faced the grim reality that comes with being a hero."
Nova stepped closer, and in a very humanizing move, she knelt to be at eye level with me and put a hand on my shoulders. Her blue eyes weren't filled with her signature flaming energy, but they were still shinning with the intensity of a star. I had heard many people refer to eyes as the window into the soul, and as I felt myself being pulled into the endless lagoon that was Nova's, I felt convinced that there was something true about that trite phrase.
"You've done a great job so far, but being a hero isn't always easy and it's not always fun times. It's a very dangerous job, and just one tiny mistake can have catastrophic consequences. It can put our lives at risk, or even worse yet, innocent people's."
"I'm… aware of it," I said, overblown by mixed emotions between her piercing gaze and the softness of her hand on my shoulder. "That's why I give out my best every time."
"Sometimes our best isn't enough," she lamented. "Sometimes we believe we're ready to face anything that comes our way, but the truth is that we're not. It can be a very painful experience to realize this."
"Why are you telling me this?"
"Because I need you to understand what's at stake. I'm not telling you not to be a hero because I imagine that you're smart enough to realize how dangerous being one is in this city. Literally every hero disappears sooner or later. If that's not scary enough for you, then fine, it's your choice. But you gotta understand that some stuff's out of your control and that you shouldn't mess with it. And Lord Tetherby is one of them."
She took her hand out of my shoulder and stood up, giving anxious steps around the rooftop.
"Ace Savvy has been investigating him for years. Tetherby is a corrupt, dangerous millionaire. He has deep connections and controls more than you can imagine. Royal Woods is one of the few cities where he hasn't been able to consolidate his private security business. He knows how to cover his tracks and stay in the dark, pulling the strings from behind. Not even Ace was able to find enough evidence to prosecute him in all the years that he had been following him closely. Don't mess with him. Don't risk it."
Ace had been investigating him? Why? What kind of evil had he done for a superhero like Ace to dedicate years trying to find evidence against him? I couldn't imagine it, but it didn't sound like anything good. And yet, my mind was starting to make connections.
Tetherby was in the private security business. His deals involved high-security jails for criminals and supervillains, and he was trying to get a foot on the coordination and improvement of police forces. His source of income was directly related to security. And Royal Woods hadn't required it for one simple reason: Ace Savvy. He was all the security we needed. We felt more than protected with him around. With him around…
His life was the great obstacle that Tetherby could never overcome to offer his services to our city. The only thing he needed was to get rid of him for his plans to advance.
That's how he knew about the weapons. An expert in stopping and neutralizing supervillains surely had developed weapons to stop them, and if they were able to stop metahumans that used their powers for evil, then they would also work against a hero like Ace Savvy. He had provided Wild Card Willy with the means necessary to end Ace, tricking him without him realizing it. Willy had just been a pawn.
I felt like I had solved a thousand pieces puzzle. It all made sense.
"Nova… he was involved in Ace Savvy's death."
That got her attention. She frowned and leaned closer, looking dead serious.
"What do you mean?" She cautiously asked. "Wild Card Willy admitted it was his doing."
I had to be careful with my words. I couldn't admit that I had been there when Ace Savvy had died. I had told her several weeks ago, at the funeral, before I became and hero and back when I was just Lincoln McBride. If I told her now, she would realize that I was the white-haired kid that she had met at the funeral. And even worse, she might remember I had given her my real name.
I couldn't risk giving away my secret identity like that, even if she was a heroine that I trusted.
So excluding the fact that I knew about Wild Card Willy's guns, I told her my whole deductive process. I explained everything I was guessing about Tetherby's motivation to get rid of Ace Savvy, how convenient the circumstances were, and the curious phrases that the businessman had said to me a few minutes ago.
"He's desperate to close his deal with the town, but as long as Ace was alive, he wouldn't be able to do it. Wild Card had retired from the crime scene after his last conviction. What if Tetherby sent someone to convince him of doing one last job? Or if he tricked him and gave him a special weapon to finish Ace? When he threatened me, he said something like 'Oh, now there are guns that can kill heroes'. Nova… he has to be involved."
She heard my whole explanation, and her eyes moved rapidly from one place to the other as her mind was processing all the information.
"It makes sense… sounds like something he'd do."
"Then we need to interrogate him!" I said with conviction, punching my open palm with a fist. "Nova, if you, Eclipse, and I join our forces, we can go after him right now and make him confess what—"
"No," she decisively said, not even letting me finish my proposal. "This is not how things work, hero. We're not cops or prosecutors, we're vigilantes. We don't have legal authorization to break into someone's house or interrogate them. It'd be illegal and use intimidation to get what we want. That's not heroic at all."
"What are we supposed to do, then?" I asked, feeling exasperated. "We can't let him go like nothing's wrong. We have enough reason to believe he's been involved in the incident. There's nothing illegal with going to his house, knocking on the door, and ask for a word with him!"
"And what do we do when he says he had nothing to do with it?" She shot back, sounding annoyed as well. "Do you really think if we tell him what we think he'll break down and admit to all his crimes? He'll lie, he'll know we have no way of proving anything on a trial, and he'll now know we're after him. He'll delete all evidence left and will watch his every step. We'd just be doing him a favor."
I wanted to protest, but even though I knew in my heart that I was right, Nova's arguments were solid. I couldn't think of how to refute them. I felt angry, not at her, but the whole situation. The reality of a bureaucratic system was getting in the way of my investigation.
"Don't you want justice for Ace's death?"
I regretted pronouncing those words as soon as they left my mouth. Nova took a step back and unconsciously brought a hand to her chest, staring at me like I had physically hurt her with my words. But her vulnerable state only lasted for a few seconds before her pain turned into anger. She clenched her fists, and suddenly her whole body was surrounded by an aura of cerulean flames that burned without emitting heat. Even then, standing in front of a girl standing ablaze like a walking torch, bathing the whole roof with her blue glow, was more than terrifying.
"Ace Savvy saved me and my sister's life," she said as she tried real hard to control her emotions. "I'm here thanks to him. I owe him more than you can imagine. He was more than a hero to me, he… he was…"
She stopped, closing her eyes and looking away. Her body seemed to shake for an instant, and the intensity of her aura increased, now extending two feet in every direction. I suddenly understood the origin of her superhero name, since she looked like a star about to explode. I had to squint my eyes and look away to deal with the brightness.
"Of course I want justice for him!" She yelled. "But he respected laws and due process more than anyone else! Ace taught me that being a hero is not about catching villains, it's about protecting people. Locking Tetherby up won't bring us Ace back, kid."
She was shining too bright for me to look at her, but I seemed to notice her moving her arms to her face, like she was rubbing her forearm against her eyes. After a few seconds, the intensity of her aura died down until it was nothing more than a thin layer of energy slithering around her, giving her silhouette a soft glow of ethereal light. She glared at me, and without moving a muscle, she lifted in the air.
"You have a good heart," she said, trying to sound serene. "You have the potential to become a great hero. But you still have a lot to learn."
She sounded like she wanted to teach me a lesson, but her figure was so powerful and intimidating that it was hard for me to look at her as a teacher.
"Stay away from Tetherby. He's literally too dangerous for you or me to get involved with him. If he had something to do with what happened to Ace… then one day he'll have to answer to me."
"Nova, we can—"
"Stay. Away," she repeated. "I think I've distracted you enough for tonight. Thanks for talking with me. There's still so much more I want to ask you, but it'll have to wait. Like how did you get Ace Savvy's weapons."
She made a pause like she was expecting me to answer her right then, but I didn't know how to do it without lying or hiding the real circumstances in which Ace Savvy had died.
Realizing I wasn't going to say anything, Nova sighed.
"I'm sure Ace meant a lot to you. He meant a lot to me, too. But if we allow our passions to turn to vengeance, then we will become as evil as the villains. Good luck, hero."And with nothing else to say, her aura shone brighter and she flew away like a comet, leaving me alone and with my heart full of doubt.
