The Betrayal

In the basement, past the laundry room, we plot our secrets.
Or, could, if we ever got around to it. The convention this Friday of five or six supers doesn't mean much, since there are nine total and everyone in the group has to be present to accomplish anything. Right now, those present are goofing off. Becca and Laila are playing foosball, Amanda's eating popcorn and watching Doctor Who, Mary's practicing the dance choreography from Chicago...No one shows even a hint of paying attention when I ask them to look over the plans with me. I slink over to the corner and slump onto the floor in defeat. They do not realize the gravity of the situation, the dark brooding matter spinning under my skin. I want things to be taken seriously. I am just about ready to split, to abandon this worthless cabal-- a mere splinter of obligation remains between loyalty and villainry.

 Danny, a newer member of the group, saunters over and decides it'll be fun to mess with me. He waves his beautiful Native American locks in my face like a feather duster on crack. "Hey, hey, Hannah- don't sneeze!" he chuckles maniacally as I jerk my head away. I pull my knees up to my chin and sit huddled in frustration.

"Leave me, alone, Digger. I'm not in the mood for stupid games. If you're going to address me, be mature, and use my codename. I'm The Weaver, not Hannah, to you."

He rears back in farce. "Geeze, some fangs you got there, snakey. But can you bite?" I can see he wants to joust or banter with words, or both, but my patience is just about drained, and I can feel something else inside me boiling up to take its place. If he'll just walk away, maybe nothing bad will happen...

He doesn't. He saunters up until he is so close my nose touches his chin. He smiles, and the corners of his mouth twitch annoyingly. He pokes at my gut with a finger, looks into my eyes, and says: "You need to lighten up a bit," and, so saying, stomps his left foot so that the ground raises up under me and throws me into the air. He laughs at his little trick. He is just barely learning how to control the earth and move through it, but is not above using his limited talents for practical jokes. I am so sick of it. I'm sick of all of them...

I use my momentum and leap over to the weapons cabinet, yank open the badly locked wooden door. It splinters. I grab out two katanas from the top rack, throw one to Danny. "Defend yourself, you jerk!" I yell. "You've messed with me too much this morning, and now you're going to pay!"

Danny grins, thinking I have finally relinquished to his sport, but I am not fooling. His face grows shocked as I slam into him with my first blow. The ricochet of the metal knocks us both back and echoes throughout the base, bringing silence at last. Laila and Becca stop playing foosball to stare at us.

"I'm sick and tired of having to babysit you guys and wait around on your whims to get anything done!" I shout, slashing the air where Danny's organs were half a second before. "I'm the youngest member of the team, and it shouldn't be me that has to plan everything and get you all off your sorry derriers!" Smash. The flatscreen TV we got from the Superhero's Sustainability and Starter Support Fund dies under the piercing judgment of my angry blade. "What are you even doing, sitting around and watching TV all night? You're not heroes, you're friggin' bums! And not the cool kind, the purposely-leeching-off-society kind! You're not even motivated to come out of the basement because you're always getting takeout delivered to the door! I'm so SICK of you all!"

Something splits inside me. The growing thing. I can feel it, peeling itself apart from my soul, curling in smoky trails through my heart and lungs, resting its claws confidently upon my brow. A cold, murderous haze descends over me like rotten cotton candy. The monster within me is awake. It wants to come out... And I am bloody relenting.

I raise my arms and open my mouth wide, and begin sucking the power from all the lights in the building. With a flash, Becca and Mary and Laila are around me, but I funnel my energy into a spinning explosion that knocks them across the room.

I dash up the stairs, leaving a trail of disarrayed telekinesis behind me, whipping dryers off their cords and plates out of cupboards.

I race out into the street, and am momentarily disoriented by dancing people, balloons, music. I'd forgotten it was carnival weekend. *snicker*... These Portlandian fools. Always willing to celebrate one thing or another while the world comes crashing down around their heads...And soon, it will be.

I duck behind an ice-cream vendor's stand. Taking a moment, I change my face and form so that my friends will not recognize me when they come out at last, if they even try to search for me. As if they care. I step out, and hear the rushing of the first of the evening's fireworks. An idea strikes. Flying over the display, I wait until the timing is perfect-- until the next rocket has just been launched-- and direct it to the little underground base of my so-called associates. I wait, legs crossed and hovering calmly. BOOM.

I fly over the devastation, but see that they are already outside and unharmed. They spot me, and start running towards me. Silly little supernobodies...Waving their limbs frantically as if to ward off the Second Coming. They do not know what I have become, they are useless things. I will shape the world now, to my liking. They have already lost. 

I land on the pavement with a sonic crash, and take a moment to look them all in the eye. "Goodbye, friends. you will not be seeing me again."

Then, I slow down time.

They rush forward pathetically, their little muscles nothing against the ravages of time. I rocket away into the atmosphere, and by the time my spell has worn off, I am sitting cross-legged on the wing of a passenger jet headed towards my new destination, reading A Tale of Two Cities for the third time. The relative concepts that guide my balance here ebb gently away from the aura burning inside my new soul.

How long it has waited to awaken.