“I’m not sure what power juice has to do with anything.”
Keith tilted his head, and said, “You know, the whole thing where power juice became illegal, making us all technically criminals? Plus, you remember Logan at our prom. He was a total druggie, and then he got into power juice and tried to eat the school.”
I shook my head. “Not an issue. I don’t have any powers, and it wasn’t illegal back then. All this amounts to is secret identities. To continue to have one, I have to keep mine secret. I haven’t told anyone who I am who hasn’t figured it out first. You didn’t figure it out, so I could avoid telling you.”
Tag Archives: Camille
Off Campus: Part 4
I blinked. “That’s going to get awkward. What are we supposed to do about that?”
Haley frowned. “I don’t think there’s much we can do without leaving. I think we should warn Courtney and see what she wants to do.”
Keon rolled away, briefly looking down at the ground. It was all rocks and dirt, and couldn’t have been easy to roll over. Shaking his head, he looked up, and rolled toward the club.
I would have helped, but he started moving before I could say anything, and once he started moving, he didn’t look like he wanted help.
At any rate, he didn’t need it, and he didn’t ask for it.
Plus, Camille stepped out of the van and joined him.
Off Campus: Part 3
Camille smiled at the group. “Someone talked about going dancing.”
Hunter raised his hand. “That’d be me. My mom has friends who own a club in Denver. It’s called Club 32. It used to be an old factory. We can walk right past the line if we want to. Vincent Sucks is playing, but they’ve got a DJ after that.”
Keon rolled to a stop next to the van. “I’m in. I love dancing.”
I’d been thinking Keon would be my best potential ally for going to a movie instead.
Evidently, I made too many assumptions about paralyzed people.
Off Campus: Part 2
“Uh… A bunch of us being who?”
“People in my class. I don’t know everybody who’s going, but a lot of first years. I invited Courtney and Camille. Gifford invited me and Hunter.”
She had my full attention. “Gifford? The guy Jaclyn and I took out?”
She nodded.
Then something else occurred to me. “Wait, he asked you? Does he know that we’re dating? He wasn’t um… after you?”
Haley frowned. “He wasn’t asking as a date, but he does like me.”
Burning: Part 4
Camille grimaced. “That’s horrible. That shouldn’t happen to anyone.”
She turned, following Tara with her eyes to where she sat. Gordon stood next to her. I couldn’t hear him, but from the expression on his face I guessed he must be apologizing.
Tara’s face didn’t show any emotion, and after a moment Gordon left.
Camille let out a breath, and shook her head. “We should do something for her.”
I found myself imagining it as an episode of a a children’s cartoon–“My Little Pony” or something. Camille would throw a party for her, and Tara would say, “Thanks Camille, now I don’t feel bad about my dead parents anymore!”
Come to think of it, that sounded more like the Simpsons satirizing children’s cartoons.
Burning: Part 3
Camille nodded. “I don’t think I’d overthrow a country, but it would be nice to be able to do something. I don’t know how many people the regime killed, but it’s a lot.”
She glanced over at Haley and me. “Right?”
“Hundreds last night,” Haley said. “That’s what the TV was saying when I turned it on.”
Gordon nodded slowly. “Thousands over the last few weeks. Look, I know we’re not going to do it, but we’ve got the power to end it right here–definitely in the room, but maybe even at this table.”
I looked up at down the table from the side where the sun streamed in, bringing out the redness in the rocks all the way to the far wall where the stained rocks glistened.
I guessed there might be fifty people at the table. He had a point there. Fifty people with powers could do some damage.
Not that the world needed or wanted more damage.
Burning: Part 2
“Go ahead,” I said. “We’re not saving space for anybody.”
Even if we had been, there were plenty of spaces on either side of us. Gordon sat down.
He’d loaded his tray down with breakfast food–french toast, eggs, sausages, bacon, hash browns, fruit salad and a chunk of beef.
Evidently he was one of those supers who needed more food than average.
Burning: Part 1
People were talking about Turkmenistan the next day. Around noon, Haley and I were sitting in the compound’s cafeteria with Camille, one of Haley’s friends and a Heroes League recruit. We’d taken the van to Castle Rock’s Catholic church—St. Francis of Assisi.
I still wasn’t sure if that had been a good idea.
We’d gone as ourselves, and not in costume. All it would have taken to blow our identities was pictures placing us near the very well publicized Stapledon summer program while the Rocket wasn’t appearing much in Grand Lake.
Still, the Castle Rock church was on the list of churches that the program said were safe, so we went.
Don’t ask me what made them safe. Given the program’s reliance on mental blocks for it’s students, I probably wouldn’t be happy to know.
The Battle of Grand Lake: Part 9
“Where?” Haley asked. She wasn’t whispering.
“Above the forest. Right in the middle. It’s kind of close to the forest entrance to HQ.”
Haley’s eyes dipped toward the instrument panel. “The AI sees it, and it thinks it’s going to move…”
On the screen, the League jet exited the water, covered in panes of darkness, aiming toward the forest. The white beam, painfully bright even on the screen, aimed off to the side of where HQ’s scanner had identified it as an anomaly.
Above the forest, a silvery shape flickered, resolving into the aliens rectangular landing craft with a long burn down the craft’s side, and a blackened hole three quarters from the back. Continue reading The Battle of Grand Lake: Part 9
The Battle of Grand Lake: Part 8
Then the man appeared. Wearing a black helmet with a transparent faceplate, the alien commander had thick features, somewhere between handsome and Neanderthal. Kayla wouldn’t have looked twice at him on the street.
Then he opened his mouth. His teeth were like a wolf’s—all points, ready to rip and tear.
She thought about how much it would suck to be his dentist, choking down a giggle while reprimanding herself in her head. What was she, ten?
The newscaster’s voice said, “The alien ship hovering over New York City broadcast this message moments ago.”
In a scratchy voice with an unidentifiable accent, the commander said, “You will give us the alien devices. They are not yours, and will only cause you trouble. Give them to us, and we will tell no one. Keep them from us, and we will burn your cities to the ground.”
His nostrils flared and he sniffed in a movement that reminded Kayla of Travis and Haley.