The next morning, the school was abuzz all over again, and all on three major topics.
Topic One: the five
Spektrum Color Codes: Silver, Red, Yellow, Blue, and now Black. People were
actually listening to The Spektrum Fan Club—which after the fifth fight,
expanded considerably—and the school had accepted these as their official names,
to Cyndi’s delight.
Topic Two: last night’s
news report about those other mysterious sightings, like Catgirl from Alameda
and the dinoshark from Ohio. Everyone was so excited to learn there was more
sci-fi come to life out there, but everyone here defended that The Spektrum was
the best of them all.
And finally, Topic
Three: the revelation that Craig Foster was planning on black-mailing their
hero into only God and Craig knew what. Students couldn’t help but be furious
with Craig, especially his friends, who thought he was better than that. Craig
could barely show himself around school with all the glares and insults.
Cyndi wondered if The Spektrum’s origins were connected
to any of these other stories. For that matter, what were his origins anyway? She
remembered hearing about a crazy electrical power surge hitting several places
all over America, but no one’s reported being hit by it.
Duh, Cyndi thought to herself. Superheroes
never know when they’re gonna become super, and once they realize that they are
super, they can’t tell anyone because of “The Rules.”
Despite this, Cyndi
knew that the best logical explanation for all these things was that power
surge somehow granted these people their powers and abilities. Although,
becoming part cat was a bit odd, but not impossible. Same went for that mutated
half-shark, half-dinosaur, most likely.
“Does anyone have pics of the catgirl from Alameda?” a
new member, Dale, asked the other club members.
“I didn’t see any good, clear ones,” answered one of the
others. “She moves pretty fast, almost
as fast as Code Red.”
“Yeah, but from what I hear, she’s pretty smokin’ hot!”
replied another member. Greg, if Cyndi remembered correctly. “And she can kick
some serious ass! Took out 10 thugs all by herself.”
Simon was
absorbing this giant amount of conversation with fervor. The more he learned about these others who
were--most likely--also hit by the electric surge, the more he wanted to meet
them and prove it. Of course, he and
everyone else at San Leandro High School were just assuming these stories were
real, and not hoaxes. But even the small
chance that they were true was enough to keep doubt from dominating Simon’s
mood.
Meanwhile, on the bridge of their spacecraft, Zorb and
his gang of alien criminals were sitting around, thinking and brooding.
“How?” Pu-ao mumbled in disbelief and shame. “How could I have lost?!” Now the big leathery brick of muscle was
filled with loathing.
“Maybe it’s because you’re a stupid lummox!” spat
Korak. This insult brought Pu-ao’s anger
around on the yellow refrigerator-sized humanoid.
“Like you did any better! Despite being bigger than me,
you couldn’t squash that human runt!”
“Actually, I think Korak got squashed by The Spektrum,”
Smooth recalled, which did nothing but help anger Korak.
“Shut up, neon head! He was fast! What’s you’re excuse?!”
As the shouting match expanded to three participants,
Zita turned to the group’s leader.
“Zorb, are you really going to let them go on like this?”
“Maybe for another moment or two, yeah.” Zorb, completely indifferent to his men
quarrelling, picked fuzz and lint off his slacks as he sat in his chair, his
purple button-up shirt completely unbuttoned, exposing his white undershirt.
“Oh, getting swung into the back of a vehicle, so
painful!” Korak responded to Smooth’s excuses. The bickering went on like that
for several minutes, complete with recaps of each individual’s fight, Smooth
versus Yellow, Korak versus Red, and Pu-ao versus Black. Smooth got back hand chopped, Korak got his
knee jammed between a steel fence and a fast-moving Red’s feet, while Pu-ao got
kicked in the knee, punched in the chin and cheek, then kicked again, but in
the face. The incongruous infighting irritated Zita, yet Zorb was just watching
a nearby digital clock. The time was 2:30, Solar cycle.
“That’s good enough.”
Zorb stood up from his seat and looked at the three
idiots he had for henchmen.
“I said that’s good enough!”
Zorb’s yell overpowered the growling and snarling of the
idiotic debate.
“We’ve all lost, so we’re all to blame. Smooth, Korak,
Pu-ao, Graw and Gnarl--”
“Hey, yeah, both of them lost to the blue one,” Smooth
interrupted.
“Josta, shut up!” Zorb shouted at the instigator.
But now that Zorb’s momentum was stopped, he now noticed
that neither the lion Animisian nor the panther Animisian were present in the
room.
“Where are those two?”
Graw and Gnarl came out of the ship’s pantry, shaking a
food package.
“We’re almost out of food,” Graw grumbled meekly.
A giant groan came out of the entire group.
“How could we be out of food?” Zita whined.
“Maybe it’s because we’ve got two giant swine who gorge
themselves at every meal!” Smooth barked, aimed at Korak and Pu-ao.
Both big men glared at the upstart.
“Josta,” Zorb began, “I seem to remember telling you to
SHUT UP!!”
“Zorb, what’re we gonna do about food?” Zita asked.
“We’re too far from any market planets, and the COIS are bound to be waiting
for us just outside this system, in units much larger than a simple two car
squad.”
Zorb knew this to be true. The had had many run-ins with
the Committee of Intergalactic Security, COIS, and they were sure to be smart
enough by now to know not to send only a handful of officers to stop Zorb’s
team, let alone just Zorb by himself.
“Very true, my lovely logistics specialist,” he complimented
Zita. “But you forget, there is a nearby planet that has various markets, and
best of all, NO COIS!”
Zorb was beaming with his genius idea. However, Zita was
just plain confused, and Zorb could see it on her face.
“Zita, I’m talking about Earth!”
Recognition sparked in
Zita’s eyes, and she gasped with excitement.
“Oh, of course! COIS officers aren’t allowed on Earth
anymore than civilians and criminals are.”
“Exactly.”
Zorb turned to his
men.
“Boys, we’re going
grocery shopping!”
“Which one do you want? The yellow package or the black?”
Zita asked, holding up two bags of something called “Lays potato chips.”
“Both, obviously. Not like we have to worry about cost.”
Zorb strolled down to find Korak, head veiled under a
towel and the rest of his skin completely covered, filling his cart with slabs
of meat.
Graw and Gnarl, also covered up, were too busy salivating
over the several pieces to help him.
Pulverize and Smooth were pushing carts full of breads
and other essential foods, namely fruits and vegetables. The Earth market known
as “Sa Fe Way” had quite the selection in its produce section. “Ap-ples”,
“o-ranges,” and “bananas” were among the assortment Pulverize decided to load
the carts with. Smooth had also found drinks for them: “duh-eerie milk,” “jui-say,”
and “sow-duh.” The group met up at what was known as the “check out area,” with
little conveyor belts and scanners that would process the purchases, but
obviously Zorb had no intention of he and his people worrying about that.
The group walked
pass the little conveyor belts casually, heading outdoors because the ship’s
teleporter wasn’t strong enough to accurately teleport through buildings. Of
course, the employees weren’t going to take this open thievery so easily.
“Excuse me, but you can’t just leave with those.”
The security guard moved between Zorb’s team and the
exits.
“Well, we knew that coming in here, sir,” Zorb explained.
“That’s why I brought this.”
Zorb’s hand swiped past his pocket and withdrew a small
object made of gold metal. Zorb flicked his wrist and opened the object,
revealing it to be a butterfly knife.
Reaching back, Zorb took aim at the guard, and flung the weapon at the
man. All this was done within a span of mere seconds.
The blade plunged into the guard’s shoulder, below his
collar bone, all the way up to the rune-like Z etched into the base. The guard
staggered and fell, mostly from the shock of what had just happened to him. The
customers and other employees panicked and screamed. But Zorb’s people strolled
by, pushing their carts.
However, they’re shopping trip wasn’t done just yet, for
the Earth police squad car a few yards down had gotten a call from
headquarters, who had received notice from the store’s silent alarms. The
officers had left their vehicles and were already close enough so that, if need
be, their guns would be able to hit Zorb, the only armed member of the group. Unfortunately,
they were within Zorb’s target range long before then.
Zorb drew his gun made of golden metal, a “Z” etched onto
the side of the barrel the way the knife had on its blade, and took aim at the
officers. A double shot from the gun for each of them, all four bullets hitting
their human flesh as fast as rockets, one officer in his right thigh, and the
other in his shooting arm. The man who was hit in the leg collapsed and clasped
his injured leg, grunting in incredible pain. The other man dropped his gun,
and his arm hung limp from the shoulder.
Sirens were echoing in the distance, meaning that reinforcements
were on their way. By now, Graw, Gnarl, Smooth and Pulverize had teleported back
to the ship, food and all. Korak and Zita hung back, carts still present.
“You two go, I won’t be much longer.”
Zorb moved closer to the injured officers as Korak and
the last few carts were taken up by the teleporter beam.
“Zorb—” Zita began to say.
“Zita, I’ll be fine, you know who I was trained by.”
Reassured of her love’s talent and resolve, she
teleported herself away as a half dozen police vehicles came into view.
“Who… are you?” asked the human officer with the arm
wound.
“Before answering that, answer me: do you have a teenage
child?”
“Y-yes, but why—”
“Does he go to the high school here in San Lee-and-row?”
“Uh,” the officer hesitated as he decoded Zorb’s odd
pronunciation of San Leandro, “yes, but wh—”
“Then ask them.”
Zorb knocked the officer unconscious with a swift kick to
the face.
The police vehicles were pulling in to the narrow street
that led into the shopping center‘s main parking area. As Zorb spun back around
from kicking the man in the head, he took aim at the lead car, knowing the
other officer with the leg wound would be unable to stop him. The lead car was
racing towards Zorb, unaware of the golden gun’s impressive power, or of Zorb’s
impressive aim.
The lead car turned left, then right at the lane in front
of Safeway, a couple more following it. The lead was halfway between the
entrance and him, a good 100 feet apart, when he fired off another round. The
target—one of the rubber tires in front—torn to shreds, and the car swerved and
crashed into a parked SUV. The other police cars had to stop because the lead
didn’t leave room for them to get around.
However, the rest of the group sent to apprehend the
culprit had broken off earlier and had gone straight, up the lane to the left
of the store that Zorb and his people robbed of food.
The two other squad cars stopped 20 feet away from Zorb,
and the officers exited the vehicles, using the doors as shields.
“Drop the gun or we’ll shoot!” one of the officers
ordered, the barrel of his gun aimed at Zorb’s shooting arm.
“Actually, I think I’ll just go,” Zorb responded, standing
as if nothing was wrong. He quickly
pressed a button on his shirt, provoking a response from the authorities. As the officers’ bullets flew through the
air, Zorb was swept up in the same light as his crew, and without a scratch.
No one at San Leandro High had heard anything about this
appearance by Zorb until the end of lunch over the school’s Public Announcement
system. Many wondered why Zorb and his people robbed a grocery store of food,
although it should have been obvious to everyone: it was the food they were
after. Many more wondered why Zorb didn’t wait for The Spektrum to show, and
for that matter, why The Spektrum didn’t show.
The common answer to the first part was that Zorb didn’t
want to lose to him again and be taken in by Earth authorities. The answer to
the other part, which The Spektrum fan club members supported, was that The
Spektrum didn’t know because he was at the school as his real self, a student,
and wouldn’t have known about the raid either.
Unfortunately, not everyone thought the same. Some
thought that “their hero” should have known Zorb would go to other places, and
should have been able to stop Zorb from getting away with the food. These
upstarts were countered with the fact that The Spektrum isn’t Superman, who can
fly up to see all and use his super-ears to hear all, Batman, who has high-tech
systems that alert him to trouble, or a big signal someone can just turn on and
he’ll respond to it ASAP.
But despite their
argument being countered, such negative people continued to complain about Zorb
getting away with his crime. And that included Simon’s “friend”, Christian
Chen.
Christian would usually walk with Simon to Simon’s home,
where Christian’s mom would pick him up. They had done this all Freshman year
as well, and the reason for this arrangement was because Christian‘s mom would
first have to pick up Christian‘s younger brother and sister, who went to
elementary and middle school, respectively. Therefore, it would be rather
time-consuming for his mother to pick him up at the high school, and with Zorb
and his group invading the campus whenever the past few days, traffic was even
more clogged by worried parents picking up their children, and nervous students
leaving in their cars as quickly as they could.
Walking along Bancroft Avenue, Christian always occupied
himself with talk, and a large part of the time, Simon didn’t even care what he
had to say since it was only things Christian wanted to talk about, namely
things related to him. But this time, Christian’s dribble truly irritated Simon
so that he had to listen.
“Zorb sounds like a pretty good shot, hitting the tire
with a hand gun from 100 feet. I’d have to wait until they were 75 feet away.
“For him to have gotten up after Spektrum Silver slammed
him, Zorb’s pretty tough, although I could’ve probably slipped off The
Spektrum’s shoulders in time and avoided it completely.
“Heck, he must be even tougher than that, if he’s able to
command those two big guys, regardless of money. I know I wouldn’t be bribed,
so he must have impressed them into following him through a display of fighting
skill. He’d have to be a master at several martial arts to stop those guys. … I
told you I have self-defense training, right?”
Simon’s response to the question was a simple nod and a
“yeah.”
“Right,” Christian continued. “I don’t think The Spektrum
has any real fighting training. Even his more refined forms are rather
unorthodox.”
The compliments Christian was giving Zorb, whether
unintentional or not, where wearing on Simon’s nerves. And Simon didn’t care
for Christian’s occasional boasting much either. Even if Christian wasn’t aware
of his slight arrogance, Simon wasn’t going to let him claim he could do any
better.
“What’re you trying to say, Christian? That you could do
better against Zorb and his men than m--”
Simon stopped himself
before spilling the secret.
“Better than The Spektrum?”
Christian thought a moment about his friend’s question.
“On paper, I’d probably make a better Spektrum.”
That remark made Simon go
from irritated to offended.
“What?!” came sharply out of Simon’s mouth without
hesitation.
“Well, like I said, I actually have martial arts
training,” Christian explained.
“Oh, so just because you’re belt is black it means you’d
be a better Code Black, is that it?”
“Well, no,” Christian defended, “because I’m a red belt,
and that would make me a better Code Red.”
Christian’s complete
oblivious idiocy to Simon’s point was the most infuriating thing yet.
“My point,” an exasperated Simon continued, “is that you
think you can beat The Spektrum at his own game just because you have a
colorful belt that makes your skills ‘legitimate.’”
“No,” Christian defended again, “I know I can.”
Simon thanked God that he made it to his front porch
without hitting Christian upside the head with his clarinet’s carrying case.
They got inside the door to find the twins, James and Josh, already playing
video games in the living room. Simon’s brothers weren’t much for Christian
either, so they only said hi to their brother.
“Hi, Si,” they said, using his nickname.
As Simon went into his room directly behind the living
room to put down his things, Christian asked him, “Hey, can I call you ‘Si’?”
“No,” he responded.
More like “Hell no,” Simon thought with
attitude much like Code Silver’s.
“Why not?” Christian asked, confused as to why he
couldn’t call a friend by a nickname.
“Because,” Simon said, because he didn’t care to respond
with more.
This feeling seemed
more like Code Blue’s kind of response; or Black’s.
Christian and Simon sat down on the long green couch
facing the television, which was unoccupied since Simon’s brothers preferred
the floor.
Get here already! Simon yelled in his head in an
attempt to get Christian’s mother here faster so Christian could leave sooner.
For now, he and Christian were sitting and watching two
younger brothers playing a 2-dimensional fighting game. By 2D, it was a
traditional fighting game where the characters stayed in a linear area. Basically,
the characters could only move forward, back, and shuffle in “circles” around
their opponent at the center. 2D had nothing to do with the graphics and
animation.
Simon watched the game, but wasn’t paying complete
attention. He was too busy wondering if a game like this, or this very same game,
gave powers to one of the others out there that were hit with the same
electrical power surge. His mind drifted towards the “Alameda Catgirl,” who was
reported to have appeared around the same time as he did. What game was she
empowered with? Was it the same 2D fighter game his brothers and Christian were
always playing? Which character? And her origin aside, what about the
others?
“What game has a half-shark, half-dinosaur?”
“What was that?”
Simon hadn’t realized he had said anything. Christian was
looking at Simon like he had said something, so he had to say something more.
“Oh, just thinking to myself, sorry.”
No comments:
Post a Comment