05 The Room Where it Happens

When I went to school in the UK, the local library had a museum upstairs and an aquarium downstairs. I usually rolled into town on Saturday, but sometimes I went in on a weekday, and the library was usually still fairly occupied. Not just by OAPs - sorry, that's UK for "senior citizen" - but by random people.

I checked. The library is still there. The aquarium is still there. The museum is still there. Though it probably doesn't have superheroes, like this one.

Local 31 apparently decided to build this joint back in the early 90s; it overlooks the bay and the Golden Gate bridge. My own common sense - and Sadie's scans - say it's not their real base, just a public contact point.

I trust Sadie. That's why I let her pilot my body until we actually got to the museum this morning while I got some sleep. I'm not sure how that works out, on a physiological level, but the supercomputer on my finger was very convincing.

If I find out she robbed a bank or something, oy, we are going to have such a talk.
(! I would never. ¡)
We're seven minutes into the audiotour when I mutter "Meanwhile, at the Hall of Justice!""

Sadie looks up at me. "What?"

"Reference."

"Oh." She faces forward again. "Movie, comic book, or animation?"

She knows me so well. "Animation. Based on a comic book."

I can see her smile even from this angle. She looks and sounds an awful lot like my nine year old niece, down to the accent. Which was her idea. I'm old enough to have a kid her "age" - one of my classmates actually has an daughter who's older - and if I don't look like her dad, at least I look like her big brother.

We're here on a weekday, but it's still busy. Tourists, I guess? I want to say nobody was traveling from far and wide to see some superhero junk, but I guess, technically, I did.

We did.

Sadie studies a suit of powered armor. The little card says it belonged to some guy who tried to use it for demolition purposes, until he ran afoul of OSHA, which apparently has regulations for superpowers and exotic technology. Then he went on a surprisingly non-lethal rampage through Oakland, until Local 31 and the cops bought him down.

There are, of course, videos on Youtube.

"Mr. Clapton?"

We turn around. A staff member smiles at us. She's cute. "We found a debit card with your name on it. Could you come to the security office, please?"

And that's my appointment. "Honey, I need to go take care of this. Do you mind...?"

Sadie crosses her arms. Also, she turned into a teenager when I wasn't looking. "It's fine."

Wow. Was I that passive-aggressive?

"Are you sure you'll be okay?"

She rolls her eyes. "I'm not fifteen anymore. Ugh." And off she flounces.

The attendant tries not to smile. She's failing. I give her the rueful shrug and the exasperated-but-resigned look. "Little sisters. Whaddya gonna do?"

"This way, please."

We go through a door at the back of an information kiosk, down a hall, and into an employee break room. She tells me to wait.

I spent a decade as a member of the ugly shirt legions, so I turn around slowly. Cheap plastic table, expensive coffee machine, expensive coffee pods, midrange fridge, midrange TV, sink some jerk left a plate in, expensive pair of shoes on the cheap table, and the fastest man on the planet (according to his publicists).

Kicks waves at me. "Yo." I can see the logos on his uniform from here.

"Is this the part where I say 'I thought you'd be taller'?"

"If you like." If you ask me, there aren't many people who can pull off dreads, and I'm not sure he's one of them. Skins's a little darker than mine. Is that a faint Caribbean accent I hear? "You seem disappointed. Expecting a big conference table with our logo on it?"

"Kinda?"

"Well, y'know, we lost our instructions." A woman enters the room. Kicks stage-whispers "Personally, I think Agate just wants an excuse to buy more Swedish meatballs."

Agate slaps his feet off the table, and sits down in the seat nearer to me. She waves; her hand leaves after- and before-images in the air. "I'd like to apologize for anything this idiot said. Also, I make my own meatballs."

I blink. "Are you...just passing through?"

"Kid, this is the meeting. Or...it's about to be." She flicks a finger at the Keurig. The lid opens. Another flick; a pod from the rack. A few more flicks, and the coffee starts to brew. The cup has a stylized version of her face on it, and it thought the reader should put something magical into their morning!

The exclamation mark on the end sounds kinda desperate.

I try not to smile. "Phenomenal cosmic power, and you're using it for a pick-me-up?"

She shrugs. "You stay up all night for monitor duty, then get called up for a meeting with Some Guy at...10 AM? I'm running on about two hours' sleep."

Kicks says "we go through a lot of coffee here."

Knockturne and Luxia file in.

"I'm not just some guy, I'm some hero." I hold up my hand, show them the ring on it, and subspace a spoon on the draining board. Then I bring it back out again, tied in a knot. In, back out as normal. "Taa-daa!"

"Cute," Agate says. "Can you transform any kitchen implements besides spoons?"

Luxia puts a hand on Agate's shoulder. "Be nice." Then she sits down at the cheap table.

"Fine."

Knockturne leans against the back wall. "What's this about?"

Uh... "Is anyone else coming?"

Luxia shakes her head. "This is an informal meeting."

Uh, okay. "Right." At ease, soldier. I spread my feet wide, and clasp my hands behind my back. "Are you sitting comfortably? Then let's begin."

None of them get the reference, not even Knockturne. That's okay, it didn't go over much better when I used it in England.

Make eye contact. Sound confident. Wish you had prepared a Powerpoint or something.

"For reasons too complicated to explain here, I have knowledge of a potential school shooting using high-energy weaponry."

Everyone tensed a little. Except Knockturne, who waited a second or two, then raised an eyebrow. "You're gonna have to give us a little more than that, lad."

"Right. I think the shooting is going to be at a specific school. But more importantly, I think it's part of a greater plan."

Knockturne gets up and moves toward the fridge, which is behind me. He's afraid of...something. Luxia moves to a seat closer to me, and leans forward. "So, who's behind this plan?"

"Disclaimer: I don't know how accurate my intel is. In fact, I'm hoping I'm wrong."

Luxia nods. "Roger. Go ahead."

"He used to be called the Bookkeeper or Bookmaker or something. Probability manipulation. Used to pal around with a team, including Ebon Shadow, and another hero." Gabe's biological dad. I never actually settled on a powerset for him, did I? "He wanted more of the spotlight, tried to kill them all, failed, and they all either quit or went underground."

Kicks raises a hand. "What does the school have to do with it?"

"Silver City hasn't had any official heroes since the team disbanded. And all the independents have had...accidents. Sometimes discouraging, sometimes disabling. If he can provide an excuse to swoop in and save the day -"

Luxia says "-Like a school shooting with a HEW and the trafficking that implies-"

I nod. "Exa-"

Someone grabs my left arm, and pulls me back. Then someone - Luxia - grabs the right, and pulls the same way as the other. My chair goes back, overbalances, and I'm falling. I try to keep my head up. I see Knockturne on my left on the way down.

It's really a controlled fall, since two professional superheroes are holding my arms at the time. They have me flat on my front with my arm twisted behind my back before you can go "Jack Robinson."

I don't even notice when they slide the ring off, I just notice when I notice it's gone.

"You know, a lot of people would pay good money for this experience. Can you yell 'halt, evildoer!' Kicks, can you take a picture, something I can show the kids?"

I can feel their collective "huh?".

Fun fact: most people don't notice blinking. The brain edits it out. In this case, all I notice is when I'm looking at myself from the outside, in a decidedly female body, that's...confused? Then I blink again, and I'm back in myself, and I manage to twist my head - yep, Agate is staring at me.

She says "He's not afraid. Not even faking it."

Luxia and Knockturne tighten their grip.

I nod. "Oh, I see. Temporary body-switching. That would be a useful spell in combat, if you wanted to discombobulate someone. Time out."

And then my watch explodes.

Well, maybe 'explodes' isn't the right term. 'Erupts into a scintillating corona of purple light' might be more accurate.

You know that thing in first-person stories where the narrator deliberately withholds information to increase the suspense? See if you can figure out what I was lying about.

Five seconds.

Time's up. The ring on my finger? That wasn't The actual ring. It's actually on my toe. Because I am not an idiot.

To be strictly fair, Sadie isn't actually a ring. She's more of a three-dimensional slice of a multidimensional supercomputer, much like a slice of pepperoni is a two-dimensional slice of an entire 3D sausage. She doesn't actually need to be ring-shaped. I could've turned it into a suppository, but Sadie refused. Said something about seeing the world with her own facets, instead of through sensors.

And also the smell.

And what would happen if I had to go through any X-Ray machines.

To be extra strictly fair, I was planning for someone spying on Local 31, not spying in Local 31. I mean, it made sense.

Bookie was an ex hero. He would have connections. And with his luck powers and good ol' fashioned experience, he might be able to talk people into helping his plan. Silver City isn't that far down the coast. What if some heroes wanted to get in on the ground floor? They could have de-facto control over two cities' main hero teams.

And before you ask, no, I didn't have this scenario in the book. It's a shock to me too.

Knockturne and Luxia are both stunned, so I wriggle my arms free and stand up. Okay, they really should have psychic defenses.

(! That wasn't, strictly speaking, a psychic attack. It was an Emotional Spectrum one. All it did was let them share emotions with each other. ¡)

So...should I run or someth - wait, where's —

Something hits the back of my head. No, scratch that, the back of my head hit something. The wall of the break room. Also, ow.

There's a hand on my throat. Kicks waits for me to recognize him, then growls "What did you do to them?"

"Nothing!"

"Sure doesn't look like nothing!"

"Fine. I gave them a burst of emotional resonance. They were suddenly feeling each other's feelings."

Kicks looks around in an eyeblink. "Is it permanent?"

"Only a second. I don't have to spell out the implications, do I?"

"You knew one of us might be working with the bad guys."

"I suspected this place had been infiltrated, or was at least being watched by him. I was hoping I was wrong."

"Huh." He takes his hand off my throat, does something with my clothes, and suddenly there's something missing in my head. "Toe ring. Clever. And I thought you were just fou."

"Didn't you watch me when I called in the tip? Didn't I prove I had superpowers?"

He shrugs. "Sure. Could still be crazy."

...Good point. "Can I have my ring back?"

He thinks for a second. Then blurs over to the other side of the room and puts it on the ground.

I have to walk through a crowd of blurs to get to it. I watch the stunned heroes disappear from where they're slumped, and appear in seats, sitting with their backs to the wall. Kicks slows down just long enough to stab each one with what looks like an epi-pen. They blink, their eyes focus, and then, generally speaking, they glare at me.

He saves Luxia and Knockturne for last. After they're restrained, of course. Knockturne goes "James, listen. You can't believe anything he says-"

I slip my "ring" onto my finger-

Good morning, Sadie.

(! Good morning, Floyd. ¡)

-and try to sound cool. References are good. I can always fall back on references. "Protip -"

Wait.

Waaaait a second.

"Why didn't they let me finish?"

Kicks blurs to a stop beside me. "Because you were onto the plan."

I shake my head. "Not what I meant. Why didn't they let me finish? Don't they have some codeword for 'Kicks, put a suspect in handcuffs and a cell'?"

"Even got a cognitohazard lockdown warning. So why'd they panic?"

Agate sounds sad. "That's why."

She's turned on the TV. Breaking news!

We watch it for a few seconds in silence.

My shoulders slump.

Aw, sheisse.

-PR-

Full disclosure: I got the idea of moving the ring somewhere else on your body from aCameron's "If The Ring Fits..." Black Lantern SI. I think I may also have sto - borr - appropriated the idea of emotional stabilization from that fic (IE "Iceman Mode") but I can't be sure.