SUPERO ACADEMY: PART ONE

SUPERO ACADEMY: SCHOOL OF THE SUPER FOR HEROES AND HEROINES

The Staff and Students

Arcus Baraban, Head Instructor and Founder, Supero Academy

Alter Ego: “The Master”

Ability: Superhuman strength and astral projection

Hobbies: Meditating with relaxing tape-recorded talking guru, tennis, ping pong, swimming, soccer

In his own words: “Happiness can be found through a place within the mind and heart; just think of the place and you will be in two at once.”

Aeneas Pericles, Instructor and Founder, Supero Academy

Alter Ego: “The Trainer”

Ability: Incredible agility and athleticism

Hobbies: Running, gymnastics, pole vaulting, high jumping, anything with the words “track and field”, playing his bugle early in the morning to get the students out of bed

In his own words: “Athleticism is one of the only things in life that doesn’t come with a price tag.”

Achilles Aros, Instructor and Founder, Supero Academy

Alter Ego: “The Seer”

Ability: Precognition and premonition

Hobbies: Crystal-gazing, palm-reading, tea leaves, Tarot, fast prediction of students’ futures (and sometimes death, although it’s rare)

In his own words: “The future is never complete.”

Some Students in this Book:

Paris Cooper

Alter Ego: “Miracle”

Ability: Healing others with the power of touch

Occupation: Medical doctor

Currently Resides: Chicago, IL

Narayan House

Alter Ego: “The Human Shield”

Ability: Force fields

Occupation: FBI agent

Currently Resides: Washington, D.C.

Zephyr Musing

Alter Ego: “IronBoy”

Ability: Self-morphing into liquid metal

Occupation: Construction worker

Currently Resides: Los Angeles, CA

Jessica Kent

Alter Ego: “Luna”

Ability: X-ray vision, premonition, and power absorption

Occupation: Museum technician

Currently Resides: San Francisco, CA

Lars Maguire

Alter Ego: “Twilight Traveler”

Ability: Teleportation

Occupation: Historian

Currently Resides: Oakland, CA

Aika Delaney

Alter Ego: “Hypno”

Ability: Laser-jet eye beams

Occupation: Welder

Currently Resides: Reno, NV

Simon Hartley

Alter Ego: “Apparition”

Ability: Phasing through solid objects

Occupation: Magician’s assistant

Currently Resides: London, UK

Chloe Fine

Alter Ego: “Astral”

Ability: Telepathy

Occupation: Psychiatrist

Currently Resides: Boise, ID

Hayden Stitch

Alter Ego: “Zappa”

Ability: Lightning fingers

Occupation: Electrician

Currently Resides: Vancouver, BC, Canada

Lena Montana

Alter Ego: “Sound Siren”

Ability: Anti-sound waves

Occupation: Cheerleader and sound-proofer

Currently Resides: Cheyenne

Craig Keller

Alter Ego: “Invincible Man”

Ability: Rapid cellular regeneration

Occupation: College swim coach

Currently Resides: San Francisco, CA (although his home planet is Zurcon)

Nicole “Niki” Kaester

Alter Ego: “Tsunami Girl”

Ability: Self-generated tsunami waves

Occupation: Student

Currently Resides: San Francisco, CA

Rodney “Zeke” Ezekiel

Alter Ego: “Oculus”

Ability: Invisible eye-darts

Occupation: Television-viewing rater

Currently Resides: Omaha, NB

Phanton Gregory

Alter Ego: “Psychon”

Ability: Telekinesis

Occupation: Auctioneer

Currently Resides: Philadelphia, PA

Claude Shreck

Alter Ego: “Jet”

Ability: Self-propelled flight

Occupation: Airborne thrill-seeker

Currently Resides: Austin, TX

Ada Jude

Alter Ego: “Cannon”

Ability: Mind-generated explosions

Occupation: Coal miner

Currently Resides: San Antonio, TX

Vincent Valentine

Alter Ego: “Hydro”

Ability: Water movement control

Occupation: Champion swimmer

Currently Resides: Baltimore, MD

Calleigh Newly

Alter Ego: “Elastic Water Woman”

Ability: Elasticity and self-morphing into a pool of water

Occupation: Firefighter

Currently Resides: Miami, FL

Betelgeuse McGee

Alter Ego: “Shadowfly”

Ability: Dark camouflage

Occupation: Night-time crop irrigator

Currently Resides: Detroit, MI

Kristin Swann

Alter Ego: “Slip Girl”

Ability: Snake-skin shape-shifting

Occupation: Reptilologist

Currently Resides: Jackson, MS

Buck Mazz

Alter Ego: “OptoBoy”

Ability: Mirage-like illusions

Occupation: Hypnotist

Currently Resides: Cleveland, OH

Daphne Casey

Alter Ego: “Judo”

Ability: Elastic legs

Occupation: Martial-arts instructor

Currently Resides: Portland, OR

*PROLOGUE*

Shall We Build a School Here?

The forest was never the safest place to be after dark. Too many stirrings of nighttime creatures and surprises waiting to happen barricaded even the bravest of people from doing so. It was a time when all little boys and girls should have been sound asleep in their beds.

Such a time was right now. Overhead, the dark blue sky shone with millions of tiny stars. The moon was in waxing crescent. Occasionally, the sound of a hoot-owl echoed all throughout the thick woods. The first would call, and the second would answer.

Hoo-hoo, hoo are you, hoot-owl?

Hoo-hoo!

There seemed to be a chorus of hoot-owls tonight, although the third sound was well above the others. It was louder. And it echoed from the ground.

Bushes rustled. Footsteps scurried. Human footsteps.

Darting every which way were three beams of light, as if from flashlights.

Yes, all little boys and girls should have been at home asleep in their beds. Most little boys and girls.

Three were not.

The dancing flashlight-beams belonged to three teenage boys: Arcus Baraban, Aeneas Pericles, and Achilles Aros. Best of friends. Blood-brothers. They had escaped unknowingly from a boarding school after their classmates had gone to bed, and were still clothed in their uniforms.

Arcus led the way. His flashlight beam fell across tree trunks, stones along the ground, and sharp-edged bushes. He’d been the one to think of the escaping idea first, and his two friends, since they had nothing else on their minds, had fallen closely behind him like dogs.

He whispered violently for his friends to catch up as he moved further and further along the dusty path. Their school had to be miles behind them by this point, and he felt that if anyone thought about catching him, he or she’d be way too late. No way was Arcus Baraban ever going back to boarding school. He’d been slapped, swatted and beaten too many times for his young body to count.

He wanted freedom.

“Over here, over here! Hurry up!” His voice was excited, the voice of a child eager for adventure. “There’s got to be something up here we can use!”

Aeneas bounded right up behind him. Only Achilles remained behind. He was slow, not speaking. He looked as if the entire world had just been weighed across his shoulders. He kept clutching his head and occasionally looking behind him to see if anyone had followed.

“Ach, come on,” Arcus coaxed, beckoning to his friend out of fighting desperation. “We don’t have all night! You want Headmistress to see yah?”

He was joking, of course. Headmistress was far behind them, at the boarding school.

“I’m coming. Just give me a second. You guys go on ahead.” Achilles hated making people wait.

“Say whaaaa?” Arcus. Disbelief was moving in to this clan, and fast.

Achilles repeated himself, but with modified phrasing.

“Go on. I’ll catch up.”

Slowpoke. Arcus’s mind screamed it at him, but he held on to it.

“Dude. What’s up with you?” Aeneas spoke. “We’re never going to get out of here if you keep dawdling like that. Didn’t your mother ever tell you to exercise?”

Aeneas was an exercise nut. Not only was he agile, but he was in great physical shape because of it.

“I exercise.” Achilles mumbled the words, but he sounded insulted. “I’m just not Agile-Super-Gymnast like you are. So excuse me.”

Truth of the matter was that no one they knew could be Agile-Super-Gymnast like Aeneas. Aeneas was the cream of the crop. He was entitled to the name.

“Yeah, and what do you do?” Aeneas meant the question as a joke. “Run? Walk? Leap tall buildings in a single bound?”

“Ha-ha.” Achilles chose to ignore it.

“Where are we going exactly, Arky?” Aeneas directed his next question at their leader. “I don’t recollect seeing any of this part of the forest before.”

The boys in Arcus’s “field gang” all had nicknames.

“I don’t know.” The excited voice that belonged to Arcus. “It’s an adventure, right? The excitement lies in not knowing where you’re going. You just go. One reason I decided on this was to escape the evil wrath of Headmistress. If I stayed one more day in that awful place, I would’ve gone completely doofy.”

Another trait of Arcus’s “field gang” was their unique use of words. Most of the time they made up their own vocabulary, but other times they took words that were already written down and changed the meaning of them.

‘Doofy’ had been Arcus’s word.

“I hear you on that one, Master Magician Man.” Aeneas.

“Something’s got to be up here.” Arcus was muttering now. “Something, something. Where is it? I know it’s got to be here.”

His flashlight beam danced across a fallen tree trunk. If they’d forgotten their lights, they would have only had the moon to rely on, and the moon wasn’t all the way full.

“Hold up.” The beam darted first to the left, and then to the right. It stayed on the tree trunk. “Here.”

He beckoned to his team in a wide sweeping arm gesture, and very carefully, the three of them stepped over the giant mass.

As always, Achilles took his fine time. Something was stirring in his head: an uncomfortable feeling. He saw colors swirling before his eyes, but what they were forming had no name. He raised one leg over the tree trunk, and then pulled over the other one. He reached his right hand out to grasp a nearby boulder in order to keep his balance.

Rush of wind. Fast. Like a sudden inhalation of air.

He squeezed his eyes shut. His head pounded. Images swirled through his line of vision. He saw towers and skyscrapers. He saw a humongous building that was so tall it disappeared into the sky. There was a green light far above, blinking slowly on and off. A beacon. A beacon emitting radio waves.

What was this about? He asked the same question as he did with all his other visions. He’d been having visions since he was a child and never could understand what any of them meant. He didn’t even know why he had them in the first place. They happened at random, so there was no way he could control them. He most likely had to be touching something to conjure one up.

“Arky,” he started. His voice came out small and weak.

He released his hand quickly from the boulder and the vision vanished.

Arcus was several feet ahead of him; Achilles could see his flashlight beam through the ground fog that was used to gathering in this area of the forest. He appeared to be moving around rather quickly, the expression on his face hard to make out. He was abnormally excited, and Achilles had no idea why.

“Dude.” Was Aeneas watching him? He couldn’t tell. He saw his hand go up, and that could mean anything. “You with us tonight, or do you want to go back and get your hand swatted again by Headmistress?”

No, Achilles’ mind was whispering slowly. I don’t think I’m ‘with’ anyone tonight. I don’t even understand why I had a vision when I touched a boulder.

“Hey. Ach.” Aeneas was walking towards him now, and judging by the sound of his voice, he was irritated. “Earth to woo-woo boy here. You coming? Arky and I haven’t got all night, y’know. Don’t tell me another one of those vision things came up again!”

Yep. Read my mind, bro.

“I don’t understand it,” Aeneas continued, shaking his head. “I mean: why tonight? Now? Why did it have to happen tonight of all nights, right when we were in the middle of a great escape? Isn’t there some way you can control these things when they come up? I thought we were doing great back there!”

“There’s no way to control them,” and here Achilles was honest. “I can’t do anything when one happens. It’s too random. I touch things, and boom. I see. Like that boulder back there. I touched it, and I saw.”

“Saw...what?” Aeneas waited for the verdict.

“I don’t know.” Achilles. “Saw. Something. But I don’t know what.”

“But you don’t know what.” Aeneas frowned, imitating the reply. “So you’re saying you had a vision, but you couldn’t make out what of? I find that rather fuffled, if you ask me.”

‘Fuffled’ was another Arcus term, and it was Barabanian (as he called it) for ‘a complete, total, utter waste of time.’

“I mean: I saw something.” Achilles let it out in a rush. “I saw skyscrapers. Buildings, you know. Then I saw this tower thing that seemed to reach the sky, it was so tall. There was this green light on top of it, sort of like a beacon, and it was blinking”—

“Blinking?” Aeneas quickly interrupted. “A light that was blinking?”

“Yes. A green beacon light that was blinking on top of a tower,” Achilles stated, quite frustrated.

“Weird.” Aeneas’s response to that was a shake of the head.

“You think I should tell Arky?” Achilles blurted it before he knew he was saying it.

Shrug. “Who wouldn’t?” Aeneas responded.

“Guys, come on!” Arcus himself shouted from his spot, despite the late-evening time when his voice echoed thousands of miles in each direction. “I found a rest spot. You can put your things down over here, and be quick about it. We’ve already wasted precious minutes just getting here.”

Arcus had ways of making even the gloomiest places seem worth adventure-seeking.

“All right, we’re coming!” Aeneas shouted back. “Ach had another vision, but we’re coming over right now to join you.”

He eyed Aeneas.

“Say whaaaaa?” Arcus asked again.

Aeneas and Achilles placed their flashlights down on the rocks Arcus indicated and sat down beside them. It felt good to rest their feet, and they all agreed.

“Now what?” Aeneas, eager for fun.

“Now what?” Arcus frowned as if his friend had just spoken Martian. “Now what? I’ll tell you now what, Mr. Now-What. Now, what we do—is summon the Great Spirit from Beyond! That’s now what, so not another ‘now what’ out of you!”

“Ooooooooh,” both Aeneas and Achilles said immediately.

Arcus Baraban was a wild one for rituals and native dances, and the second he spoke to his friends about it, it didn’t take him long to tempt them into joining his ‘cult ritual of the ancient ones.’

“We must join hands. Quickly!” he added to get them going.

The three of them joined hands. And quickly. They weren’t allowed to keep the Great Spirit of Beyond waiting for too long. Arcus had been very clear on that the first time he’d organized his cult.

“Great Spirit of Beyond, we summon you!” Arcus closed his eyes and raised his head towards the heavens. “Awake from thine long sleep, o Great Spirit of the Past, and send news. The Cult of Forest Three has requested your presence!”

Achilles and Aeneas felt their palms sweating as they clasped them to one another’s. They tightened their grip. They loved chanting rituals just as much as Arcus did.

“The Cult of Forest Three requests to speak with thee, O Great Spirit of the Past!” Arcus shouted to the sky. His eyes did not open. “We must chant in the long-forgotten song of ancient times! Brother Starry Night, thou hast mine permission to begin the ritual drumbeat!”

Aeneas, who was dubbed Brother Starry Night, picked up a thick branch and began banging it on a tree stump.

Boom...boom...boom. A slow, steady rhythm.

“And thou, Brother Stormy Skies, hast mine permission to begin the chant of long ago!” Arcus ordered Achilles.

Achilles began chanting softly in an unknown language and gradually got louder with each verse.

“And I,” Arcus finished. “Chief Brother Moon Warrior, shalt complete the ritual by sending the Great Spirit our final idea!”

Final idea? Aeneas and Achilles tossed one another a puzzled look as they continued their assigned ritual tasks. This was getting good.

Neither one needed telepathy to figure out what the other was thinking: what does our chief brother have in mind this time?

“Great Spirit,” Arcus shouted over the steady drumbeats and the low chanting. “Send us a sign from above! The Cult of Forest Three has come to its conclusion! Here, in this exact spot, as you see all of us tonight”—and Aeneas and Achilles grew tense with the suspense—“shalt be the future location of a very powerful, very mighty, superhero training school!”

Superhero training school? This was better than anyone thought.

Achilles thought of his vision.

“We shall be its founders as well as its builders, O Great Spirit,” Arcus continued. “The Cult of Forest Three will be responsible for generations of superheroes-to-be as they come to our school to learn the ways of heroics. It will be the only superhero school in all the world, and it will have floors and floors of rooms, and a tower so high it will disappear into the sky! And at the very top, there will be a green beacon of light that will shine down as a reminder to any lost soul trying to find his way back to school. Furthermore, it will be just out of reach of downtown San Francisco, California, United States of America!”

Skyscrapers. Buildings so tall they seemed to vanish into the sky. A green beacon of light blinking on and off, helping any student who got lost in the woods find the rightful way back to school. A bustling city, although he didn’t realize it was there at the time.

San Francisco. One of the largest cities in California. Who knew anyone would build a school like that there? And for superheroes.

Suddenly, just seconds after Chief Brother Moon Warrior had spoken those words to the Great Spirit of Beyond, Achilles Aros’ latest vision made perfect sense.

He’d seen the school. Years before it was even built. Premonition, precognition, call it whatever you want. The vision he’d had just seconds before arriving here was no longer a mystery. It meant something, just like all his other ones, but this was the first time he actually understood what his powers were showing him. Already, he was beginning the planning process in his head, beginning with the ground foundation and ending at the very, very top.