Just Super

The first thing I do when I appear in my room is message Emily.

Me: Made it home safely.

Em: oh good. I was worried

Em: I did too

Me: oh good. I was worried

We message back and forth for a while, neither of us actually saying anything. 

Em: I can stay awake for a couple of days if I need to, but you need sleep

Em: go to bed

Me: I am in bed. You go to bed

Em: already here

Me: wish I were

I can’t believe I just sent that. I fumble for the delete option, but before I can use it—

Em: me too

Aaaah! It takes all my willpower not to flicker there. A couple minutes go by with no messages.

Me: goodnight

Em: night

I put my phone on my nightstand and try to go to sleep.

I am very lucky that my aunt and uncle don’t expect me to get up early to go to church with them; they know that I’m not interested. So I’m able to sleep in. I finally drag myself out of bed around noon, and I doubt that I got more than six hours sleep. 

I started trying to get to sleep by one, when Emily and I stopped messaging. It didn’t do a lot of good. I couldn’t stop thinking about her. I was half afraid I’d flicker to her in my sleep. I didn’t, as far as I can tell, unless I flickered back here in my sleep, too.

I’m looking through the fridge for something to eat when I get a message.

Em: want to get lunch?

That may be the most ridiculous question I’ve ever read.

Me: sure

I’m about to message to ask her where she wants to meet when the doorbell rings. I’m still in my pjs, so I flicker to the front door and into daytime clothes. I glance down at myself. I’m in my Wednesday Addams dress, which is probably not what I would have chosen, but is apparently my standard Sunday morning outfit now. I open the door.

“What’s good for lunch around here?”

Emily is standing there, trying to look innocent. I blink. She’s not wearing her normal jeans and t-shirt. She’s not even wearing her leather jacket. She’s wearing a knee length skirt and a loose, sleeveless blouse. There’s no way that outfit survived a supersonic flight.

I step out of the way. “Come on in.”

She comes in and looks around the room. It’s smaller than her living room, but it’s fine. I hold out a hand toward the messenger bag she has slung over one shoulder.

“I can hang that up for you.”

She hands it to me.

“Two things,” I say. “First, you look beautiful—” She blushes at that. “—Second, how?”

“You know my friend Jade?”

I admit that I do. I remember that she’s a teleporter, but not like me.

“She can use any plant as a portal to any other plant that she knows about, and the selfie you sent me the other day had a good view of that big oak out front. She’s going to pick me up later this afternoon.”

A question occurred to me. “Why didn’t you get her help when you brought me pizza?”

She looks a little embarrassed. “I didn’t want anyone to know, yet. She would definitely have guessed how I feel about you, and I wasn’t ready for that.”

I don’t know what to say to that, so I hug her, which turns into a kiss. We’re still kissing when I hear a key on the front door. We both pull away as my aunt and uncle walk in.

“Hi,” I say. “This is my friend Emily. Emily, this is my Aunt Kate and my Uncle Keith.”

Emily and my uncle shake hands, but Aunt Kate pulls Emily in for a hug.

“Frank has told us how amazing you’ve been to her. Thank you so much.”

“I like helping her.”

I let the small talk go on for a minute or two, then break in.

“Emily and I were about to go get some lunch. See you this evening?”

“That’s fine. But you two be careful, we’ve already had two incursions this weekend,” Uncle Keith says.

“We will, but don’t worry. Even if I couldn’t teleport, Emily could get us out of the way as fast as anything.”

That seems to satisfy them both. I don’t mention that Emily is a lot more likely to fly toward an incursion than away from one. After another quick hug, we walk out the door.

Outside I ask Emily, “Would you be okay if I see if Denise can join us?”

“I was hoping you would. I want to meet her,” Emily replies, “but I hope we can spend a little time on our own, too.”

“Me too.”

I message Denise.

Me: Are you free for lunch?

Denise: so much homework. next weekend?

Me: Aw, that’s too bad. Emily wants to meet you

Denise: Where and when?

We arrange to meet at a sandwich shop in my old neighborhood—the same one where Denise and I had our lunch after our little reunion. I don’t want to risk her getting stuck on the L again.

I’m standing on the roof of Denise’s building watching Emily approach at a couple hundred miles an hour, decelerating rapidly. She’s wearing a sports bra and bike shorts, which she’d been wearing under her other outfit.

“You could just wear this, you know,” I say, when she lands. I’m trying not to stare at her abs. She holds out her hand. “Spoilsport,” I say.

I hand her her neatly folded skirt and blouse, which she slips on quickly. Then I hand her her messenger bag. We walk to the edge of the roof nearest the sandwich shop.

“Would you like a lift?” Emily asks.

When I nod, she turns away and I wrap my arms around her shoulders. Once I’m securely in place, she steps forward into the open air. She mimes pressing a button in front of her, and we begin descending. We’re moving downward quickly, but at nowhere near a falling rate. Emily is humming quietly, and it takes me a second to realize it’s “The Girl from Ipanema.”

I put my lips right next to her ear and whisper, “Dork.”

We’re both almost done giggling when we land, and I look up to see Denise watching us from the front of the sandwich shop. She rolls her eyes and I can’t help but start giggling again.

Denise smirks as she watches us approach.

“Frank didn’t lie,” she says, when we’re close enough to talk.

“About what?” Emily asks.

“About how gorgeous you are.”

Emily and I both blush at that.

“Are you sure

you’re ace?” I ask Denise.

“I told you, aesthetics. Beauty is beauty.”

Thankfully, Emily changes the subject. “What’s good here?” she asks.

“…and she shrugged and said ‘don’t blame me, I wasn’t even there.’”

Denise laughs as Emily finishes telling her about one of the many things from The School that I am embarrassed to have done.

I’m happy that two of the most important people in my life are bonding, but couldn’t it be over something other than embarrassing me? 

“Wait, wait,” Denise says, “there was this time in third grade…”

Apparently not.

After a few more stories, they finally get tired of embarrassing me, and the conversation moves on.

“What are you going to do after high school?” Denise asks Emily.

I’m interested in this. It’s a topic that neither of us has brought up, even though I’ve wondered. The idea of me bringing up what happens after high school feels dangerously like asking her how long she sees us being together. Denise asking doesn’t feel like that.

“I’m definitely going to college, but I haven’t decided what I’m going to study yet. Right now I’m thinking maybe biology or paraphysics. I’m not sure what I’ll do after that.”

“From all the stories Frank’s told, I sort of assumed you’d get a spot on one of the top incursion teams.”

Emily hesitates before she answers, “I’ll probably work with the local team wherever I end up, but hopefully just as an on-call person. That’s not what I want to do full time.”

Emily returns the question to Denise. It turns out that Denise wasn’t kidding about the anthropology thing. That’s really what she wants to do. That’s cool. Before either of them can ask me the same question, I change the subject.

“What did you think of the latest Marked Hearts?” I ask Denise. By the time we’ve exhausted that topic, the question of what happens next has safely been left behind.

“I like her,” Emily says.

She and I are walking through the park in the neighborhood. Denise had to get back to her homework.

“Oh, good,” I reply. “I thought you would, but you never know.”

“She’s nice, and interesting.”

I nod.

Emily casually takes my hand as we stroll and pulls me a little closer to her.

“Can you stay for dinner? I’m sure my aunt and uncle would love it if you did.”

“Ugh. I want to…”

“But?”

“I feel like I’m already pushing—like I might be crowding you. Jade thought you might think I was being pushy showing up here already.”

This brings to mind something I’ve been worrying about—especially last night when I couldn’t sleep. With my mark, I could spend pretty much every waking minute that I’m not doing something else with her; part of me very much wants to. I’m afraid I’ll overwhelm her, drive her away. But I’m also afraid of seeming like I don’t want to spend time with her.

I don’t know what to do about this. When I tried to figure it out last night, my mind kept bouncing off of it. I don’t know how to avoid a break up, my specialty has been causing them. Aha. 

“I promise I don’t think you’re pushy.”

“Are you sure? That was a long pause, there.”

“I’m sure. I was trying to figure something out.”

“What?”

“I’m worried that I’m going to screw this up, because I don’t know how to make a relationship work. But I do know how to make one not work.”

“Um…”

“This is going somewhere; I promise. If I were on the outside, trying to break us up, the first thing I’d try to do is to keep us from talking to each other. I mean really talking—telling each other what we really want, and how we really feel. I’d say ‘Tell her what she wants to hear,’ or ‘Keep your worries to yourself.’ So I’m not going to do those things.

“So one thing I need to talk about is how much time we’re going to spend hanging out together.”

“Why not just wing it?”

“Because that will drive me crazy. Like, last night, when you said you wished I were there with you, it was so hard to not flicker right to you.”

We talk for a good half hour. I tell her about my worries that I’ll either smother her or push her away. She tells me how worried she is that I’ll get hurt because of some danger she puts me in. I even tell her about Cat flirting with me Friday.

“Did you flirt back?” She seems amused rather than upset or worried.

“I wouldn’t know how if I wanted to.”

“Did you?” she asks, “want to, that is. They are pretty hot.”

“No, I didn’t want to. But you’re not wrong. And she’s so nice.”

“I know, right?”

There’s a pause while we both look embarrassed for a moment. We move past that, though, and get back to talking about us.

What it comes down to is that we both want to spend a lot of time together, but agree that we should probably set some limits. For example, she’s going to check with me before she visits Chicago again, and I’ll warn her before flickering to wherever she happens to be. Another example is that I’m not going to flicker to her room tonight after she gets home, but we’d both like her to stay for dinner.

“Let me check with Jade about when’s the latest that wouldn’t be a pain for her to come get me. If after dinner works, I’ll stay.”

After dinner works, and dinner goes well. I’m not surprised that Aunt Kate and Uncle Keith like Emily. How could they not? Once Emily and I are done with cleanup (she insists on helping), we go to my room.

At first I’m embarrassed that I left my bed unmade. Then I remember what her room looks like; I’m still embarrassed, but not nearly as much. We have about fifteen minutes until she needs to meet Jade out front.

“I’m already regretting the limits we set,” she says.

“Me, too.”

We sit on the edge of the bed, pressed up against each other. I glance at the bed behind us.

“It’s probably best, though,” I say.

“Probably.”

We sit quietly until Emily groans.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

“I’ve got to go.” I know from her tone of voice why.

“Really?”

“Really.” She pulls out her phone. “I’m letting Jade know. I don’t want her to show up and me not be here.”

“I’m coming with you.”

“No. I don’t want to put you in danger.”

“I’m a big girl, and I promise to stay out of the way unless I think I can actually be useful.”

She doesn’t look convinced.

“I’m going either way, but I’d rather go with you.”

“Fine. But be careful.”

She pulls her blouse and skirt off and hands them to me. I fold them and set them down on my bed. She opens her messenger bag and retrieves her jacket and a pair of pants and puts them on over the sports bra and bike shorts.

“I know it’s not the time,” I say, “but the sports bra under the jacket really, really works.”

She rolls her eyes, but also blushes.

Now that she’s changed, it occurs to me that a dress and tights are probably not what I should be wearing for whatever is about to happen. I flicker into a pair of wide-legged cargo pants that I bought the other day, and a t-shirt over a sports bra. The stompy boots go right back on. I stick my regular phone in one pocket, my otherPhone in another, and a taser Aunt Kate bought for me in a third.

Before we walk out of the bedroom, I look at Vance’s baseball bat, still sitting in the corner. I consider taking it—just in case, but decide against it. We walk out into the living room where my aunt and uncle are.

“Thank you for dinner,” Emily says to them. “It was lovely meeting you.”

She notices them looking at her outfit.

“This is better for flying in,” she explains.

They look a little dubious, but both nod.

“You’re welcome to visit any time,” my aunt says. Uncle Keith nods in agreement.

“I’m going to go out for a little bit. I should be back soon,” I add.

I have a feeling they’re going to want to have a talk with me soon about how much time I’m spending out, but I’ll deal with that when it happens.

Meandering toward danger isn’t nearly as annoying when I don’t have to take the bus. Being pressed up against my favorite person in the world makes it downright nice. 

Emily and I are flying above the city. Even keeping down to speeds that won’t dry out my eyeballs (I need to get some goggles), we’d be there by now, if we knew where there was. I’m in no hurry; being pressed into her back like this is better than being at home finishing up my homework.

“There,” Emily says, and points at something below. All I see is an empty intersection. That’s not surprising since we’re on the west edge of the Loop on a Sunday night.

In a matter of seconds she lowers us onto a roof overlooking the intersection.

“I’m going to call this in,” she says and takes out her phone. At that moment my mark does something that feels like vibrating, and an instant later a huge purple white disc appears in the intersection below.

“Oh, come on. Three in one weekend?” I say, just as the lights go out across the city.

“Ugh, I didn’t get the message sent.”

“I think there’s a bigger problem,” I say, and point to the disc.

“Really? It better not be them again.”

“Who?”

She points at the disc, where a giant metallic snout is emerging. “Them.”

She pulls an earbud out of her pocket and pops it in her ear. A second later, my otherPhone rings. I pop in my own earbud and answer. She removes her jacket and tosses it onto the roof next to us, leaving her in just the sports bra and her jeans.

“You stay up here and spot, okay? I’ve got to slow them down until the local Rapid team gets here.”

“Are you kidding? That thing’s twenty feet tall. A human sniper rifle knocked you out.”

“I wasn’t powered up that time,” she replies, and her eyes start shining with white light, as does the scar on her lower chest. I’ve seen the scar glow before, but never her eyes. Light is even leaking out of her clenched fists.

Before I can say anything, she crosses her arms over her chest and falls backwards off the roof. She is such a show off. That’s not a complaint; it’s a good show. She twists in mid air and flies feet first toward the half-emerged mech. She’s a blur by the time she intercepts it, and the whole thing staggers from the blow. I can hear a godawful clang through my earbud a moment before I hear it through the air.

“Emily!”

“I’m fine,” she says in my ear. “Anything else coming through yet?”

Unfortunately, the answer to that is yes. As the mech emerges fully from the portal, I see that it has six legs, not four, and a bunch of smaller figures are visible by its light. They look like humans, but I can’t really tell from here. It looks like there are six of them so far. I let Emily know.

Now that I can see the whole thing, I recognize it. I’ve seen its kind on videos of other incursions. I’ve never seen a good explanation of what the people who send them want. As far as I can tell, they show up, cause mayhem, then get beaten back through their portal. 

Emily is moving so fast down there that I can’t really see her for a second, then one of the giant legs buckles, and I can see that she’s ripped a huge bundle of cables and tubing out of it. The thing keeps shambling forward on its other five legs. Another mech snout begins emerging.

“Is there any way we can shut down the portal?” I ask.

There are streaks of light flashing from the figures on the ground toward Emily, but she seems to be mostly ignoring them.

After a couple of grunts, Emily answers, “Nothing we can do from this side. The Rapid team should—” She grunts and another of the legs buckles— “have something though.”

Considering that they’ve had to deal with two incursions already this weekend, I’m a little worried about how fast the locals will be able to respond. 

I’m trying to relay information to Emily, but it’s too hard to see from up here. I flicker to a lower rooftop on the other side of the street. From here I can see that most of what few bystanders were in the area have gotten to cover. Most isn’t all, though.

I see one of the humanoid invaders—as far as I can tell it’s just a guy in light body armor—is chasing down a fleeing couple. Emily needs to focus on the mechs, since there’s obviously nothing I can do about them, and there’s no telling when help will arrive. This part is up to me.

I flicker back to my new room, grab the baseball bat I failed to grab earlier and flicker back to the rooftop. Over the past couple of weeks, my encounter with the sniper on other Earth has gone through my mind so many times. 

In the end I’ve decided that I did the right thing by not trying to fight him. I wasn’t armed, and I was already freaking out about Emily’s injury. I kept him busy, and that was enough. I did the right thing, but I could have done more.

I’ve gamed out so many ways I could have tried to take that asshole down myself. I’m not big or strong, but I can be wherever I want almost instantly. And it’s more than that. When I knocked Alex out of the way of the falling ceiling, I hit her as if I’d arrived at a fast run.

I can’t deal with this guy the way I dealt with the sniper. There are too many of his comrades, and too great a chance that one of them will be able to shoot me if I call attention to myself. 

I know what to do.

It’s been a while since I played baseball, but I haven’t forgotten how to swing a bat. I flicker to the side and in front of the charging soldier, with the bat already in full swing and inch from his right knee cap. There’s a sickening crack and I flicker forty feet away, mostly hidden behind a car I’ve already picked out.

From there, I see him tumble and lose his grip on his high-tech-looking rifle. Before he rolls to a stop, I flicker to his dropped rifle, scoop it up, and flicker away to another rooftop. He’s not looking for me; he’s too busy clutching his knee and groaning. The fleeing couple are nowhere in sight.

“You okay up there?” Emily’s voice comes over my earbud.

I watch her for a moment. She’s dodging, but still taking a lot of hits. From this closer viewpoint, though, I notice that every hit I can see is striking bare skin.

“I’m good. How are you holding up?” 

“Fine. I just need to—” She grunts and another bundle of tubes and cables comes free, this time from the third leg on the thing’s right side. The huge mech begins to tilt to that side, and Emily darts out of its way. It topples with a thundering crash, invading soldiers scattering out of the way barely in time. Maybe that will slow the second one down.

Back on task, I scan the streets for any more bystanders. I don’t see any, but I can’t be sure from up here. I pick out a set of locations that should allow me to see most, if not all, of the area, and rapidly flicker between them. I see a few more soldiers scattered about the street, but no more bystanders.

I flicker back to a rooftop and can see that the downed mech wasn’t much of an obstacle to the second one. It’s already past it, and a third is mostly clear of the portal. They’re arriving faster than Emily can deal with them.

We have to close that portal. If we can’t do it from this side…

I know I should tell Emily my plan; that would be the smart thing to do. But I also know how protective she is, and that she’d distract herself trying to talk me out of it. She might even succeed. I can’t let that happen.

Another mechanical snout is emerging from the portal, so this is the perfect time. I’m not going to be reckless here. If anyone spots me, I’ll flicker right back to the portal and step through it—piece of cake. 

I flicker to a crouching position on top of the metallic head ten feet back from where it meets the portal; I remember what happened last time. As soon as I appear I can feel my mark reacting to the closeness of the purple-white disc. I don’t give myself time to think about that; I might change my mind. Moving as fast as I can in a crouch, I pass through the portal.