Chapter Four:

To Be, Or Not To Be

My roommate ended up being a girl named Cylis Andrews. She was a first-year Hero, but very nice (she let me have the shower first). It seemed like, even though we were on different teams, she genuinely wanted to be friends, so I made no attempt to stop her. Cy (as she asked me to call her) had long and straight brown hair that reached the middle of her back, but she liked to put it in a ponytail or a braid just because she could. She also had a habit of making and remaking her bed until she was satisfied with how it looked. Then and only then would she dare sleep in it. She was really funny too; liked to make a joke outta everything, but she kept it minor. She didn't wanna make a bad first-impression.

"So," she said after a time, "you're mom's Joan Grey?"

I nodded. "Yep. Not sure why my mom's so famous in the Conduit world, since I never really asked 'er."

"I heard a rumor that she kept it from you."

I frowned and climbed into my bed. "Yeah… Yeah, she did."

"Why?"

I shrugged. "Dunno. Dad told me it was to protect my brother and I. To be honest, I'm not so sure. I mean, she's my mom and I love 'er, but she just…" I sighed. "I'm not sure."

Cy smiled weakly. "Well, maybe you should ask sometime. I mean, to keep something a secret that long probably means something big."

I shrugged again and climbed under the covers. Officially, I was gonna be sixteen in October, so I should've been with Trish in the second-year since I was just a little older than most kids, but when I was in pre-school, they wouldn't take me until I was a certain age. So, I was with Vi. Not too bad, anyway.

"Are your parents Conduits?" I asked Cy.

She shook her head in the darkness of our room. Only the moon and the stars outside were illuminating the room through the window.

"Nope. It gave 'em a bit of a shock when they found out. All of a sudden one day, my room started to light up like the Fourth of July. I can make these firecracker things and shape 'em however I want with my hands, and they make one hell of a distraction. It got me out of a few classes before anyone realized that I was a Conduit. I was suspended for a day before my parents enrolled me here."

"Fun."

Cy turned over in her bed so she'd face me from across the room. "What about you?"

I bit my lip. "Well, it was the first day of my tenth grade… And the next thing I knew, when we had to introduce ourselves, the fire alarm went off. One of my friends told me that there was a fire in one of the chem. labs upstairs. We followed everyone out, but it turned out that the fire was spreading really fast—faster than the teachers had thought. A beam fell down from the roof. It was on fire." Just the memory itself was something I wanted to forget, but being at the new school… It was like a reminder every moment why I was there. "One of my friends and I were under it. I couldn't move, and the next thing I knew, I was holding up this huge-ass beam. It burned my hands, but my friend managed to get away. And then this guy came into the school, pushing past my friend, and kicked me in the chest."

I heard Cy gasp. "He must've started the fire!"

"That's what I was thinking." I vaguely remembered the pain in my hands and chest that day, despite it only being a week ago. But it felt like an eternity. "And then this woman came up behind him. They seemed like they were working together. They called me my mom's name. I've always been told I look a lot like 'er, but I was confused as to why those people would be after my mom. The next thing I knew, we were fighting. I was so much stronger than I'd ever been in my life. I ran up to a classroom near the chem. lab, but the only way to escape was through a window, and it'd be a long fall." I sighed. "The two chasing me were Alden and Sasha from Empire City. I thought Cole'd taken care of 'em, but they escaped him and the Beast by way of water. They cornered me, and then my mom broke through the window. I was so confused because she was a firefighter, but she didn't have her equipment on, and she'd gotten to the second floor without a ladder. Mom fought them and killed them." The thought of my mom killing anything but germs around the house made everything seem too surreal. "And now, I'm here."

I heard Cy chuckled. "That's one hell of an origin story."

"I wonder what my mom's is."

Cy, I could see, shrugged. "Maybe you'll get to ask 'er soon."

I turned over in my bed, away from Cy. "Maybe…"

Vi, who looked like she'd just gotten up as well, rudely awakened me the next morning.

"What the hell…?" I muttered groggily.

Vi yawned. "Team Paragon's leader wants to talk with the new first-years." She shrugged. "Beats me why she wanted to do it at seven in the morning."

I groaned. Leave it to a stranger not to know that I liked sleeping in…

"C'mon," Vi said as she tugged me out of the bed, albeit weakly. "We can go in our PJ's."

"Sounds good."

Vi led me downstairs to the living room, where a couple of the other first-year Paragons were patiently and tiredly waiting for the others. They were Nicholas and another boy, whose name, I remembered, was Hunter.

Hunter grinned at us. "Well, finally they come!"

"Where's the other one?" Vi asked, ignoring Hunter's comment.

"She went to grab something to eat," Hunter explained. "She'll be back in a sec. The team leader should be here any minute, anyway."

I sat down with Vi across from Hunter and Nicholas. Hunter had dirty-blonde hair and a cocky grin that made me want to duck-and-cover for fear of my romantic life. If I even have one, I thought. Hunter was wearing only PJ pants that advertised Guitar Hero, and no shirt. That in itself made me wonder about how confident he was about his own romantic life.

Nicholas still had his pendant on over his T-shirt (which he obviously used as a PJ shirt), but his hair was sticking out all over his head and it made me want to laugh. Not at him, but just because he seemed like the serious type, and seeing someone like that so disorganized made we want to giggle. Just a l'il bit.

Nicholas caught me looking at him and smiled softly. There it was; that careful smile I'd seen him use with Mr. Wallace. I wondered what it meant, but for the moment, I just smiled back as well (but matching his careful one).

A girl came into the room then and passed us all some fruit on plates. Of course, since there were five of us (including her), she used her telekinetic Conduit powers to help out.

"Bon appetite," she said, faking a French accent.

Hunter grabbed his plate out of the air. "Ah, merci!"

"Thanks, Steph," Nicholas said.

I instantly remembered her name: Stephanie Wallace. I wondered if she was related to the principal of the school, but I had my doubts. It was a common Scottish name.

Vi and I thanked her for the food, and she smiled politely. She seemed nice enough.

A girl came down from the rooms upstairs and regarded us thoughtfully. She had black hair, almost as dark as Nicholas's, dark skin and nicely coloured brown eyes.

"I was a little disappointed, at first," she said as she approached the couches we were sitting on. "I was hoping for a few more Paragons this year, but…" She grinned, flashing perfect white teeth. "You'll do."

Hunter scoffed. "Seriously?"

"What?" the team leader asked.

"What the hell d'you mean by 'You'll do'? I'm insulted!"

She rolled her eyes at Hunter and ignored him. "My name's Mina Dain. I'm the Paragon team leader."

"We got that, Captain Obvious," Hunter said.

Mina ignored him again, but I felt like the rule with females and the number three was about to be enforced. She sat down in an armchair that faced us all and regarded us one by one.

"I'm sure you're all curious as to what a Paragon is, exactly," Mina said as her arms extended onto the armrests comfortably. "A Paragon can be explained as many things: people who have surpassed the rank of Hero, people who are so incredibly good in their morals that they would sacrifice themselves at a moment's notice, and people who simply have powers." Mina looked at our faces again. She knew we were all-ears. "A Paragon is all of these things. Mr. Wallace saw this in you, and believed that this team was where you belonged. However, don't be so quick to think yourselves better than the other teams. You may share a few qualities with those of the other teams rather than simply Paragons. Sojourns are travellers. Mr. Wallace saw that they can be swayed, and saw that they didn't have a strong foothold in their beliefs. Heroes are those who are in the middle. They're unsure of themselves, like the Sojourns, but they're good in their morals. It's simple, really, and if you want a more detailed explanation, you'd have to ask another Hero after today."

We all took this in. So, we were Paragons because Mr. Wallace and Ms. Thatcher believed that, at any given moment, we'd be ready to stand for what's right. A noble idea, but I wasn't sure if I could. I was definitely too afraid, but I wouldn't admit it.

Mina put her hands on her knees. "Now, does anyone have anything to share? Anything I should know?"

"Like how many times we've taken cookies from the cookie jar?" Hunter inquired. "Well, I've been a very bad boy in that sense. Maybe you'd best give me a private lesson in how to be good."

Mina smiled. If you're female, or spent a good amount of time around females, you can tell what kind of smile that is. I instantly felt sorry for Hunter.

"Stand up, and I'll teach you," Mina said seductively.

Hunter grinned proudly and stood up. Mina stood as well, and in two strides she closed the gap in-between Hunter and herself. Hunter didn't know what he was in for. Mina, as if she'd done it before, slid one of her hands behind Hunter's skull and the other into his hand. She bent his head down—.

And brought her knee up, hitting him in the balls.

Hunter cried out in pain and doubled-over onto the floor. He was in agony. Mina really didn't hold back. Nicholas and the rest of us, however, were laughing.

"I don't think you've heard my nickname yet," Mina said with a grin. "They call me 'The Ball-Cruncher'. And it's not just because I've got the best kick on our Paragon soccer team." Mina leaned over him. "Now, have we learned to be a good boy?"

Hunter nodded. "Yes ma'am," he managed to get out, albeit painfully.

"Excellent. Now, who wants to get dressed and go for a run?"

I already liked Mina. She was definitely the "no-nonsense" type of person, but it looked like she could have some fun as well. And if jogging was her sense of fun, I didn't mind it at all.