Already suspecting the answer, I asked, “Did he use a word more precise than ‘it’?”
Daniel’s laugh had a hint of weariness, “No, but if I had to guess, he said something about a device that needed to be destroyed last time, and when we asked him if he meant the power impregnator he didn’t respond.”
I thought back to the afternoon. Even besides the tablet, we had two storage rooms worth of Abominator devices. I could think of half a dozen devices that might be good candidates for destruction and I’d only opened one of the two rooms. Plus, and I wasn’t going to mention this outside of HQ, we had a whole lower level below the main level of HQ that Grandpa set up to be a fallout shelter and base for rebuilding civilization in case of nuclear war. Continue reading Never Go Home: Part 14→
Mom frowned, leaning to look into the living room which was behind Haley and in the front of the house. Following her gaze, I noticed that unlike the windows in the dining room, the windows in the living room were shut. A breeze seemed unlikely.
“I felt it too,” she said, not looking at either Haley or me.
Dad nodded, “I think a thunderstorm is in the forecast. We could use it. The heat these last few days has been miserable. Well, enough about the weather. Did you see last night’s Tigers game, Haley?” Continue reading Never Go Home: Part 13→
As I felt it, my mom opened her mouth to reply to my dad, hesitating, but then finally speaking, “We were kidnapped.”
Her words came quietly and slowly at first but then seeing that my dad was still listening, she talked more quickly, “We were leaving my office when three huge men in suits grabbed us and pushed us into a car. You tried to fight them, but you couldn’t hurt them and they were so strong that they had to be supers. They brought us to an old warehouse and kept us there for two days. On the second day, another man came to see. He was older and talked with a strange accent, but like the others, he was also a big man.” Continue reading Never Go Home: Part 12→
Haley and I stepped into the dining room. The table was already set—white dishes, blue placemats, and even though no food was out, blue hot pads were already waiting to protect the table from hot dishes. I also noticed that the water had already been poured.
“Why don’t you sit down?” My mom opened the door of the oven. “Everything’s ready. I’ve been keeping it warm.”
We rolled into the driveway as I said, “The Grey Giant was in Armory’s place dressed as a security guard. I’d barely destroyed much of anything in his weapons lab and suddenly I had a whole new fight to deal with. The bright side was that I was supposed to be distracting people from everyone else, and it worked.”
To be clear, it was the good kind of “not alone.” In the clearing with us was everybody that hadn’t been in HQ when we teleported out.
And when I say everybody, I’m not exaggerating by much. This was what Cassie called a “friends and allies” practice. Not only did it include all current members of the Heroes’ League (except for Rachel who was in space), but it included all the former members of Justice Fist who hadn’t joined up with Sean’s new Justice Fist. So basically, we didn’t have Sean, Jody, or Dayton, but we did have Julie (voice powers), Shannon (darkness), Camille (gravity), and Sydney. Continue reading Never Go Home: Part 9→
I turned around to find Vaughn in my latest version of the Storm King armor. Black with a storm cloud on his chest, it included flaps to catch the wind he generated. Yoselin wore her own armor, the red triangle, white star, and blue and white stripes might almost pass for a patriotic US costume if you didn’t think too hard about it. The backpack and streamlined half-cylinders running up and down her arms and legs hinted at a refined version of her father’s armor’s air manipulation tech.
Chris grinned, “Can’t argue with that. We’ve still got time to figure it all out and with any luck, we won’t get corrupted by ancient alien artifacts first.”
“Sadly, that means that we’ve got to leave this one alone for the time being,” I looked down at the tablet where it lay on the table. “I’ve got a feeling I’ll want to lock this one away.”
Against the sea of stars behind her, Kee seemed to shrink into herself, saying nothing, “I don’t have an easy answer. Back when we were young, when Lee, Nataw, and other friends of ours first came into this universe, we loved to travel, he more than most of us. I think he may have been the last of us to give up traveling simply for the sake of travel–if he ever did. I think he still did even after our people divided up into factions. As one of the first members of the Live faction, the smartest thing he could have done was hide, but he kept on moving instead, never staying anywhere long enough to be found.”
Where I was, I didn’t know for sure. I’d asked before, but she told me that I didn’t have words for it. My best metaphor so far was that it seemed to be Kee’s personal breakout room in ancient, eldritch social media.
She’d raised her eyebrow when I’d suggested it the first time and while she didn’t roll her eyes, it felt like she was nearly there. Anyway, I knew better so I didn’t push it. To me, it seemed more likely that it was her personal demiplane. I mean, if you’re basically a deity, why not create your own mini-universe for conversations that you’d prefer to keep private? Continue reading Never Go Home: Part 5→
The Legion of Nothing: A Series of Online Superhero Novels (Updates Monday and Thursday)
