Chapter Text
Jeremy and I stood with the other theatre kids outside of Mr. Reyes’s classroom. In general, I was cautious about lumping myself in with them, but as the lead sound techie for the musical (and theatre band percussion first chair) - it did seem like I was squarely in the group this spring.
The excitement in the air was palpable as we waited for Mr. Reyes to make his announcement. The spring musical was always more popular than the fall play - and this year Mr. Reyes had promised it would be good. Something written in the last fifteen years - and not written by him.
“Alright everyone,” Mr. Reyes said, holding a large poster in his arms. “I have an announcement! The spring show will be…” he paused for dramatic effect after hanging the poster on the wall. “... Brooklynite!”
A couple people groaned. Christine gasped.
“I was born to play Astrolass! She’s the coolest superhero ever!” She squealed, making Chloe roll her eyes.
“Well, I think the Legion of Victory is a little full of themselves. A whole musical about them tearing down a wall they built,” Chloe said.
She wasn’t entirely wrong - they were full of themselves, but they didn’t exactly write the musical. They just licensed it when they were asked.
Christine, however, looked shocked.
“The musical is about what led to the Brooklyn city walls falling, not about them falling. Besides the Legion does so much to protect everyone in and around New York, the least they deserve is a musical!”
“Ze Legion of Victory? What’s zat?” Madeline appeared next to me, adopting her horrible french accent as she spoke
Madeline had transferred to Middleborough High during our sophomore year and had told everyone she was from France. However, she and I had been in the same Sunday school classes since age five and we had an internship together.
We both knew she wasn’t french.
But our bosses liked that she had a cover story, so I entertained her delusions in exchange that she didn’t talk to me at school and that she shared a rumour whenever I needed her to. It had worked out for both of us, until recently.
“The Legion of Victory is a group of superheroes. They were the only superheroes in the world for a while, so I’m surprised you didn’t hear about them in France,” I said.
She narrowed her eyes to a glare.
“Nah Michael,” Jake said, jumping into the conversation, “you gotta be sensitive to cultural differences.”
He wrapped his arm around her and pulled her in for a kiss.
“Anyway, they’re the premier superheroes for New York, the whole United States really. The Legion’s made up of a couple of people, you can kinda divide it into like B-list and A-list though.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“A-list and B-list?”
He ignored me, starting his explanation.
“There’s Kid Comet: he’s super-fast. There’s El Fuego, he sets things on fire. He’s a former line cook, if that adds any context. Captain Clear is invisible duh. Oh, and Blue Nixie, she controls water through a magic whistle or something, she used to be a marine biologist.”
That wasn’t quite right, but nothing so wrong it was worth correcting. Besides, Madeline knew the truth anyway.
“Are those the B-list?” I asked.
“Yuh huh.” He waved me off. “And then there’s Astrolass… and her boyfriend. Astrolass’s parents died in the impact. So she went and founded the Legion to give herself a family.”
“It’s really sad actually,” I said.
“What do zey do?” Madeline brushed me off
“They’re your classic hero package - kinda. Astrolass and her boyfriend Astrolad were closest to the asteroid, so they got the best powers. Flight and superstrength. But something happened and both Astrolass and Astrolad lost their powers. I think they use suits to replicate superpowers but maybe they got them back.”
Yet again, Jake was wrong. Astrolad had never had powers, but he wasn’t wrong about the suit thing.
Madeline feigned confusion.
“What is zis asteroid?” she asked.
“The Gowanus asteroid. It gave the legion their powers,” Jake said.
“And that is way more than you needed to know to understand the musical,” Chloe said.
“Not even close! You haven’t told her the full story,” Christine said, talking so fast I could barely pick out each word, “Besides the people Jake mentioned, there’s a couple others that are important to understand the Legion and the musical.
“Avenging Angelo is like super important! He was a member of the Legion that went rogue and became the villain Venge. He had the power to see the future! Well - I mean - it was limited. He could only use his precognition to see empty parking spots, but still he could see the future!”
I stifled my laughter.
“He felt like the others thought finding parking spots was a bad power, and when the others didn’t let him have a position of power in the group, he quit and became Venge. He then tried to recreate the Gowanus effect to give him and a group of students superpowers so that they could destroy Brooklyn. Fortunately Trey - that’s Astrolad - stopped him with help from the Legion. Or well - they didn’t stop him but he didn't get any powers and then he went to jail but the students all became superheroes.”
“Now that is all you need to know about the musical,” I said, stepping in before Christine ran through the entire plot or started singing.
“Well shouldn’t she hear about the wall too?” Chloe asked sarcastically, clearly tired with Christine already.
“Everyone knows about zis wall, Chloe,” Madeline snapped back.
She wasn’t really defending Christine - she was just attacking Chloe - but Christine responded well to what Madeline said anyway.
“Right? Anyway, do you want to know more? They’re still active, they’ve done tons since the events that the musical is based around,” Christine said.
“I would - how you say - love to know more!”
“You forgot the word love? Really?” I asked.
“Don’t be mean! It’s her second language Michael, you should have some empathy for that!” Christine elbowed me. “Okay, but what else should you know…” She trailed off.
Jeremy gave her an affectionate smile. They had decided not to date, but he still had feelings for her. He found her distractedness charming.
“Nix maybe?” He offered her.
“Oh, yeah! During the past year or so, there’s been another superhero fighting with the legion. Like Jer said, he goes by Nix, which is the masculine form of Nixie, so everyone thinks he’s just Blue Nixie’s son. He has the same powers as her with water and stuff, so there’s actual evidence. This isn’t just speculation on my part. Although, nothing’s been confirmed by the legion.”
Madeline gave me a look.
She and I could both confirm that Nix was Blue Nixie’s son - but we had the sense to keep our mouths shut on that. Nobody besides the Legion, a handful of Legion employees, and my step-mom knew who Nix was. If it was confirmed that Nix was Blue Nixie’s child, our identities would be narrowed down to maybe a hundred people.
Astrolass, Astrolad, and Captain Clear had abandoned their civilian identities, but the rest of us hadn’t. Basically every hero that had passed through the Legion maintained a normal life. It was only once a hero died that their identity was revealed.
My mother Blue Nixie and I were no exceptions. She worked as a scientific consultant by day and a superhero at night (and sometimes during the day too.)
Mr. Reyes stepped away from the poster and our conversation immediately dissipated. Jeremy and Christine signed up for the first two audition slots on next Thursday. Everyone else signed up behind them. The fall play never generated that much interest, but the Musical was full of Choir kids who can’t act and Theatre kids who can’t sing.
“You gonna sign up, Michael?” Rich asked, handing the pen to the person behind him in line.
“Do I look like I sing?” I gestured to myself.
“You do look a little gay, so yeah, you look like you sing.”
“Har-har - no I do not.”
“You do look gay, Michael, and you used to sing in church choir all the time,” Madeline said, miraculously losing her accent.
“Wouldn’t you know,” I said.
She grabbed Jake and ran towards the student parking lot before I could expose her.
“Anyway. You don’t look like you play instruments, but you do,” Rich said.
“Yes! I do ‘play instruments’ and I have to teach other people who ‘play instruments’ how to play their instruments for the musical.” I made air quotes with my fingers as I spoke. “So I’m going to be too busy to play a part.”
Jeremy hugged Christine and walked over to me and Rich.
“Thank god. Looks like I got to go. Bye,” I said.
Jeremy had been grounded for “doing drugs” during the fall play all winter break, and now that he was finally ungrounded from the SQUIPcident, he was gonna actually spend time with me. Not that we hadn’t hung out in the six weeks after the play, but it was always with either Jeremy’s dad or one or more of the SQUIP squad members.
Christine wasn’t so bad, and Rich and I had started to find common ground - but the rest of them were basically the same people they’d been in september: awful.
For once I wouldn't have to be social to hang out with Jeremy - we were just going to go back to my place and play video games.
But the universe hated me, and it always seemed to have a trick up its sleeve.
Everyone’s phone dinged with an emergency alert.
“Breaking News: super-villain known as Fever Storm attacking Brooklyn Bridge. Legion of Victory nowhere to be found!”
The Legion hadn’t been notified. My phone hadn’t buzzed with an alert, so the police hadn’t asked for our help. Fine with me - but annoying when the news blamed it on us. The Legion worked with local, national, and international law enforcement basically every day. Astrolass had negotiated Fridays as a day off, but we still had to step up against supervillains when they struck.
Lately, the police had been asking for help less and less, taking down weaker supervillains on their own when they could. Usually that only led to more property damage but sometimes it worked out okay.
Weirdly enough, villains like Fever Storm with destructive fire based powers were usually the easiest to take care of for the police. Probably because they were authorized to kill (not that they let that stop them otherwise) and everybody had fire insurance these days. As for civilians, the fire department would solve it.
Still, the Legion would be called in for the investigation if nothing else.
I turned to Jeremy with an excuse and an apology ready - but he cut me off before I could give it.
“Shit - I can’t hang out today then. My dad is gonna want me home if there’s an attack. Sorry Mikey,” He said.
That was fucking bullshit.
“It’s cool, I’ll catch you later,” I said as I pulled up my headphones and walked away.
At least now I could help the Legion.
I pulled out my phone and called my mom as I started walking towards my car.
“Hey, should I - “
“Come straight home - Trey is sending us some transportation,” she said, the sound of an engine audible in the background.
I grinned.
Ten minutes later, Blue Nixie, Kid Comet, Captain Clear and I stood watching the fight unfold. In the short time it had taken to get pre approval, a team of superheroes I'd never met before had shown up.
The bridge had already been evacuated - so it was just the seven heroes against Fever Storm.
“They’re not very good,” Kid Comet said.
He was right: they sucked. Water would be incredibly beneficial for this situation, but none of them could control it, so they were fighting fire with more fire.
Literally. The shortest member of the group was facing off with Fever Storm and both were sending fire everywhere.
Another hero was creating “bubbles” or force fields of some kind to stop the fire from spreading and keeping the others from being burned. A third was sending electricity towards the villain.
The other four weren’t using their powers much and were mostly just in the way.
They didn’t seem to notice us yet, so we watched and discussed strategy for a few minutes.
“Those forcefield bubbles are strong, she should put one around Fever Storm, choke out the flame,” I said.
“I don’t think so,” My mom responded, “She could accidentally kill him too easily. Besides, I don’t think he is so limited in the range of his pyrogenesis that he couldn’t just create fire outside the bubble.”
Twenty years of experience evidently made a difference in strategic thinking.
We continued like that, pointing out potential uses of their powers and deconstructing the tactics they used. Eventually, a blast of fire flared over the ‘sidelined’ heroes, making them jump.
“This is just sad to watch. You should put an end to it,” Kid Comet said.
He was - again - correct. These guys were clearly new superheroes and probably had had zero formal training.
“Alright, but snap a couple pictures of these guys?” I asked him.
“I will get it,” Captain Clear said, reminding me he was here.
The four of us were assigned to tracking down potential superheroes. We didn’t have to unmask them, just find a way for the Legion to stay in touch, but tracking down their civilian identities was the easiest way.
Photos would help with that part.
Blue Nixie and I ran to opposite guard rails. She blew her whistle, directing me to copy her actions. While I could figure out what to do on my own, I was still a probationary member of the Legion - being 17 and all - so I had to be given permission to act.
Together, we summoned the water from the East River to douse the entire bridge and the young heroes standing on it. At the same time, Kid Comet had grabbed Fever Storm, subdued him, and put him in handcuffs next to a police officer.
The seven soaking wet superheroes turned to us in confusion. Even though they didn’t seem like they’d be trouble, and even though they were under Legion jurisdiction, the police would still want to arrest them.
“Get out of here,” I said.
The superheroes scrambled to get off the bridge. Kid Comet came rushing back over.
“Any clue who those guys are,” I asked.
“Nope, but I’ll bet Captain got close up pictures of them. But like four of their masks don’t cover most of their face, so with some digging you can find out who they are.”
“‘ I’ can find out their identities? Not ‘ we ’?”
“Yep, you. Blue Nixie and I have a different project - related to your briefing in November. So it's just you.”
The SQUIP. We’d all agreed I’d been too close to that situation to investigate further. No point in arguing here.
“Isn’t Captain Clear following them?”
“He will for a little while, but if they’re smart they’ll catch on.”
I nodded.
Captain Clear was the best infiltrator in the Legion - for obvious reasons. If he wanted to stay hidden, he could. But since the heroes were clearly young, the Legion liked to go easy on them. Partially to see what they could do, and partially so that they knew they were on our radar.
But since he wasn’t actually hunting them down just yet, that part fell to me. This probably wasn’t the first time they used their powers, so I might be able to narrow them down to a town or neighborhood. If I figured out the identities of the heroes with bad masks, I’d be able to find the others.
My phone buzzed shortly after Blue Nixie dropped me off at home. Captain Clear had sent over the photos from the bridge. I sighed, there goes my excuse to relax for a bit. Now I’d have to get started right away.
Hunting amateur superheroes was a depressing way to end a Thursday night, but since Jeremy had bailed, I had nothing else to do.
I took my previous project off the bulletin board in my room and started hanging print outs of the pictures Captain had taken. Sure, I could have laid out all my evidence virtually, but the bulletin board fit my aesthetic more.
After pinning up everything I got from the bridge, I started an automated deep web search for stories about these superheroes. Not just news sites and google, but forums including dark web sites that had been reliable before.
My search turned up about two hundred posts and articles that I had to go through by hand. I was on the seventieth result and about to give up the search for the night when I finally found something worthwhile.
“7 young heroes put an end to string of cash register theft in Middleborough, New Jersey.”
The suits in the cover photo were the same as the ones they wore on the bridge.
I breathed a sigh of relief. The lack of digital footprint so far had made me worried, but now I had a lead.
The attempted robbery was in some preppy boutique on the rich side of town, where Jake, Chloe, and Madeline lived, which is why I hadn’t heard of it. With that in mind, I adjusted some of my parameters and borrowed down my search.
A few minutes later I’d found more articles and some forum posts that included videos, photos, and even a close up photo of one of the heroes wearing a Middleborough High spirit bracelet.
It seemed like they’d had a total of about ten fights, all over the past month. They were clumsy but the videos I'd seen suggested they’d steadily improved each time. Each event took place within two miles of the boutique from the first article, with the exception of the bridge incident this afternoon.
On reviewing all the evidence, they were definitely in high school and at least one of them went to my high school. Which meant all I had to do was watch and see who acted suspiciously tomorrow. But first, I had to give them a reason to act suspiciously.
Madeline could be annoying and rude, but she was my friend and worked with me at the Legion. She and the other ‘social media’ interns were the only people my age who knew I worked there. Even though they all thought I was just an intern like them, it was important that I had some people I could share that part of my life with.
Plus, she was the only thing that had made Sunday classes bearable back when I still went, so I did care beyond using her to spread gossip.
I sent her the link to an article published this afternoon about the bridge and separately sent her the picture of the one hero wearing a spirit band.
I sent her a :P back and decided to call it a night. I wasn’t going to be able to track these guys down until tomorrow anyway.