NINETY-ONE: Forty Pineapples, part 2

The party did pick up pace after that. The sun set. More guests arrived. Delivery people and drones brought snacks. The projection screen in the middle of the living room switched to famous superhero fight footage, and music started to play.

Kon put caution tape over two of the bedroom doors, but he gave everyone free access to the rest of the apartment. He might have been regretting that decision, since his parents’ king sized mattress was being used for random power demonstrations in the living room. Half the girls present were standing on it at the moment, trying to pep talk their admissions group’s Object Shaper into lifting it up like a flying carpet. He was eager to oblige, but in over his head. So far he’d only managed to lift one half or another of the mattress at a time, and the girls were falling all over each other and laughing.

Alden was hanging out in the kitchen, where the other partygoers were too distracted by food and adding nasty things to Extra Spicy Bonding Potion 2.0 (no broken glass edition) to bother with more than small talk. About an hour in, he was sitting at the table by the window, having a strange but not terrible conversation with a Shaper of Life named Jupiter, who was really into the historic value of Kon’s family’s apartment.

“Some old guy designed this tower in the late 1900’s,” she said, wafting purple polished fingernails over a fried crab wonton to cool it off. “And he was so upset that the future had come and it didn’t look like the future he had imagined. So instead of building something contemporary, he flashed back to the past and built this place. It’s the only Googie-style skyscraper on the island. You need to make sure to take a good look at it when you leave. It looks great at night. It’s got these impractical spikes sticking up from the roof and the big neon Nilama sign. But it’s ancient, and it doesn’t really hold enough people to justify its footprint for a great neighborhood like this. They’re definitely going to tear it down sooner rather than later. Oh, hello! Kon’s brother!”

<<I have a name. It’s Lexi,>> he said in Russian as he stepped over a crushed chip. He was wearing a gray sweater with straggly pieces of yarn hanging from the hem and cuffs, and his dark hair looked about like you’d expect for someone who’d been out boating in high winds.

<<I’m Jupiter! We’re all glad you didn’t drown,>> she responded in Spanish. <<This is Alden. He’s not from Anesidora, so I’m making sure he knows important things. Be really nice to him okay?>>

“We’re actually going to be roommates,” Alden said.

At the same time Lexi asked, “Why does he need me to be nice to him?”

Jupiter fixed Lexi with a look Alden couldn’t decipher at all. Her hazel eyes were wide, her lips were pursed, and she kept bobbing her head up and down in time to some unheard rhythm.

“Are you trying to mental text?” Lexi asked after watching this strange behavior for almost a full minute. “I only got six disconnected words. If you want to talk about him behind his back, you’re just going to have to use your fingers.”

“Haha!” Jupiter said nervously. She waved a hand at Alden. “We’re not talking about you.”

She then proceeded to air text Lexi.

[People are talking about me behind my back right in front of my face,] Alden reported to Boe. He felt more curious than offended at this point. [Bets on what it’s about?]

[If you’d brought forty pineapples like I suggested, they would forget everything else about you.]

“Yeah,” said Lexi to Jupiter. “I know. Thanks for the warning.”

[There’s a warning about me.]

Jupiter grabbed another wonton and left. Lexi was staring at the sign beside the blender that said, “Fill me up. I’m hungry!”

“What is this?” he asked in a disgusted voice. “It smells like chili sauce and toilet bowl cleaner.”

“You should smell the rest of it,” Alden said. “It’s in the fridge in a punch bowl.”

“Why?”

“We’re going to be forced to drink it later. For social reasons.”

“I should have known it was one of the weird parties when that guy with the mohawk refused to let me into my own house until I guessed the ‘secret password.’”

So that’s how Kon got Jeffy to stop challenging every other Brute here to squeeze his hand as hard as they could.

“I should just sleep on the boat,” Lexi murmured as he looked at the chunky, separated contents of the punchbowl in the fridge.

“Kon has plans for the two of you. They sound good.”

The brothers’ parents had a call scheduled for tonight from Artona II. It had been pre-planned because the cost of making daily phone calls was impractical and because if one or both of the brothers had failed to get into the hero track, this would be the day when they received an admissions notice from the sciences program. Their parents were expecting to hear their news and congratulate them. Kon wanted them both to be in their school uniforms surrounded by new classmates.

This was such an inescapably sweet idea that Alden was now committed to staying for at least two more hours so that he could put on a paper hat and wave with everyone else at the designated time.

“I know,” said Lexi. “I’m going to go to my room and finish packing. You’re moving into the dorms tomorrow, too, aren’t you?”

“Yep. I’m packed. I’ll be hauling all my stuff over in the morning. By the way…” Alden scooped some more hummus onto his plate, trying to think of how to phrase a criticism without making Lexi angry. “Springing Lute Velra on me because you thought I would be too ignorant to know about his family was maybe not the most neighborly thing for a new roommate to do.”

Lexi looked around with raised eyebrows. “You’re the one who asked to stay with me. If you’ve got a problem, get another room.”

“I don’t have a problem with Lute. We’re partners in Convo IV. It’s a neutral relationship. But you deliberately checked to make sure I was still in intake and brand new to the island before you agreed to room with me.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’m just saying that when you happen to know some Anesidoran social dynamic that’s going to affect me and you deliberately hide it…well, Lute himself was much cooler than you. He actually asked if I minded rooming with someone that ninety percent of the school seems to hate.”

“He needs help moving his concert harp tomorrow if you want to thank him for it,” Lexi said in a flat voice. “Fine. I will not deliberately hide ‘Anesidoran social dynamics’ from you. There’s nothing wrong with Lute Velra. Everyone who enjoyed bullying him in middle school is just excited to relive the experience now that his family has done something insane enough to give them an excuse to start back up.”

“Thanks.”

Lexi grabbed a bottle of plain club soda. He looked around for a bottle opener and when he couldn’t find it, he lifted his sweater and removed his whip from where he had it belted around his waist. The thin chain, in its shortened form, started to glow. Lexi flicked his wrist. The tip of the chain wrapped around the throat of the bottle, and then melted through, neatly cutting the glass.

Lexi poured the contents into a plastic cup.

“That is a very superhuman way to access your beverage.”

“You thought it was some kind of a torture device, didn’t you?” Lexi said, tossing his bottle at the recycling box in the corner and ringing it dead center.

Alden stared at the whip as the Meister hid it beneath his sweater again.

“No? It seemed strong and versatile during our combat assessment. The fact that you have mental control over its motion is probably going to be a huge advantage. I thought it was a nuanced weapon.”

Lexi straightened up and faced him. He didn’t look happy, but he did look not ill-tempered for the first time since he’d entered the kitchen. He pointed at Alden. “Finally,” he said. “Thank you. Everyone else must have their heads so far up their asses that they can’t see Nautilus Needle.”

He was referring to the tallest skyscraper on Anesidora.

“Writher is a puncturing, cutting, cauterizing, and control tool. I don’t know whether I should blame Kon for making stupid BDSM jokes every time I pull it out or that Wright who brought an actual torture device to trials. Of course the gymsuits hurt a lot when I use it in certain ways! They hurt when everyone else uses their weapons on you, too! Just because I picked this instead of some brainless stabbing implement, it doesn’t mean I’m a sadist.”

He does have a certain rage and intensity on his face when he’s hitting people with it that probably contributes to that impression.

It didn’t seem necessary to mention that.

“There you are!” Kon jogged into the kitchen holding a lumpy pillowcase. He dumped its contents out on the floor. It looked like it might once have been a record player.

Lexi stared. “Is that Grandpa’s—?”

“No,” said Kon. “Shhhh..it’s fine. I’m almost positive I swept up all the little broken bits. Guard the door so nobody interrupts me. You know the spell won’t repair its own damage if I get hit mid-cast. Hi, Alden! Stay there and don’t throw stuff at me or this while I fix it.”

He was frantically nudging every last piece of the broken player into a pile. “Dad loves this thing. It’s lucky I heard the crash as soon as it happened.”

“Why didn’t you put it in Irina’s room?” Lexi went over to stand in front of the door.

“I did. A couple of our new schoolmates ignored my caution tape.”

“To do something that involved turning a record player into rubble?”

“It’s fine. There are some large scratches and dents on the floor, but I think I’m almost out of spell uses for the night, so I had to pick… Iri would like a new rug. A turtle-shaped one! She’s into turtles right now. And if she doesn’t tell Mom, I’ll buy her a real turtle. Two turtles. I will officiate a turtle marriage for her if she wants.”

“Yes,” Lexi said in a toneless voice. “Our mother will never think to look under the brand new rug her son bought out of the goodness of his heart right after inviting several dozen strangers into the house.”

“I do things out of the goodness of my heart all the time!”

“Buying household furnishings?”

“Shut up. I’m dolphining.”

That’s never going to stop being cool, thought Alden, watching in silence as all the broken pieces were surrounded by Kon’s glittering cloud of magic, and they miraculously became a vintage record player again.

Kon frantically checked it all over, then he set it down and collapsed onto his back with a relieved sigh. “Thanks to every soul from here to the last moon of Vevezeck. It’s all there.”

He sprang up. “I’ll go put this back and put up more caution tape.”

“Let me,” Lexi said, taking the player. “I don’t want people doing perverted things in our sister’s room.”

“It was a Shaper and a Brute trying telekinesis versus superpowered stomp. It was stupid, not perverted.”

“I’ll throw them out for being stupid then.”

“Ummmm…” Kon clasped his hands behind his neck and stared up at the ceiling. “Yeah. That’s fair. I’ll toss them myself. Don’t worry about it. Hey, did you and Haoyu get some good fireworks?”

“No.”

“Really? The Wrights are usually so easy to persuade. Well, for most people…”

“We didn’t talk to any Wrights.”

“I thought you guys were going out to see the barges they’re setting up for Diwali?”

Just then, Lexi stepped aside, and a boy with equally wind-scrambled hair and dark brown eyes appeared. Alden had seen his third roommate before and heard a few things about him—mostly that he was going for a Dura Brute build like his hero parents and that he’d managed to get into the program despite a rough start on the combat assessment.

But they’d never spoken.

Haoyu was wearing a half-unzipped windbreaker over a shirt with a familiar logo on it.

“I go to that gym, too!” said Alden.

“So you are definitely a rich kid,” Kon whispered, grinning at him. “We have a decent gym at school, you know.”

“I don’t think you can be called a rich kid if you’ve only had access to money for two months,” Alden protested.

Haoyu looked at him curiously. “The membership was my affixation present.”

“He got a Shit Affixation present even though he’s still fifteen,” Kon informed Alden. “Because his parents are both S’s, and he only got A.”

Lexi glared at him. “Really?”

Konstantin took a step back and held his hands up. “I’m not picking on you two. Someone mentioned Shit Birthday presents earlier and our new citizens thought we were a bunch of silverspooners who complained about luxury gifts. I’m educating, not insulting.”

“It was a disappointment.” Haoyu sounded completely unbothered by Kon bringing it up, though. He stepped over toward Alden and held out a hand. His name tag popped up without him gesturing, so he obviously had some mental control over his interface already.

[Haoyu Zhang-Demir]

[Preferred: Haoyu]

[Year 1 at Celena North High School]

[Please contact my parents through their agents at Pacific Pinnacle Representation, not through me.]

“It’s very nice to meet you,” he said earnestly while Alden stood and leaned over a platter full of baklava to shake his hand. “Lexi says you have a cat. I don’t mind watching him or her for you when you’re away on summons.”

“Victor’s a dude. He’s going on a vacation to visit one of my friends while I get settled into the dorms, but he’ll be coming back,” said Alden. “And thanks! I do have six months off for now, though.”

Haoyu nodded. “For a Rabbit, balancing summons with a career will be hard. If you need advice, you can talk to my mom. She was already established when she started receiving more frequent missions from the Artonans, but she’ll know more than most people.”

This is amazing, thought Alden, beaming at the back of Haoyu’s head as the other boy turned around to speak to Kon. One of them is polite, mature, and thoughtful. Not angry or exhausting at all.

Haoyu was officially his favorite roommate after only a few sentences.

“We didn’t go see the fireworks barges. We went to Matadero,” he was telling Kon.

Matadero? Alden was startled. People can just go there?

It was the off-shore facility where the demon fight took place.

Kon gave his brother a look. “You guys went all the way to The Slaughterhouse? In your boat on rough water? And you’re worried about what our parents are going to say to me about some scratches on the floor?”

Lexi shrugged. “We’re Avowed now. If the boat capsized we could just ET ourselves back.”

“Emergency teleporting only works if you’re conscious to initiate it,” Kon grumbled. “I’m not sure if I’m mad you went or mad you didn’t take me. What did it look like?”

“You’ve seen pictures.”

“It was interesting,” Haoyu said. “We only got close enough to see it well through binoculars. Our interfaces warned us not to go any farther, and SkySea Guard is patrolling out there.”

“I’d probably have been turned away before I could even spot it if Haoyu wasn’t with me.”

Haoyu shrugged.

“Oh. That’s true…” Kon looked at Haoyu. “I haven’t been keeping track this time. Is it your mom or your dad?”

“It’s Battle Group 3’s turn, so it’s dad. We had dim sum together a couple of nights ago before he headed over.”

Alden watched the other three boys from his spot by the food table, trying to follow the discussion. “Do the people participating in the demon fight go to Matadero early?” he asked. “I thought it was still a pretty long time until the execution.”

They all looked at him.

“Official Demon Day is probably a fake date,” Kon answered. “Everyone knows it, but it feels better to have a mark on the calendar.”

Haoyu nodded. “It’s an added layer of security. Most of the people going to Matadero stay in residence there for a few weeks. My parents can’t tell me much, but they say they spend a lot of time talking about strategies and getting to know the new members of their group.”

“And it’s an open secret that one of the university combat gyms is always ‘closed for repairs’ during demon season so that Avowed working on Matadero can teleport in and out to practice more dangerous skills,” Kon added. “It’s usually Li Jean because their hero college has the largest training space.”

“The official date is when they announce that it’s over and how it went,” said Lexi. “Not necessarily when the fight will actually happen.”

Running into points of ignorance that supposedly “everyone” knew about was getting tiring. Alden assumed it would be the same if he moved to any other foreign country, but he hoped he’d find the limits of outsider inexperience soon and start feeling like he was actually getting the subtext of casual conversations again.

“Thanks,” he said. “Just curious.”

“Lexi and I were talking about going back soon. The weekend after next maybe. You can come with us if you want to see it,” Haoyu offered.

Lexi and Kon both made sounds of protest

“I don’t want to be a water taxi!”

“You should offer to take me, too! I’m your brother.”

Haoyu blinked at Lexi. “If we’re going anyway, it would be fun to take Alden. And Vandy might like to be invited, too? Since her mom’s in residence this time.”

“Hellooo?” said Kon, waving his hands in Lexi’s face.

Lexi’s arms tightened on the record player and he shot a look at Alden before sighing. “You too?” he said to Haoyu. “Yeah. Maybe we can do that.”

“Don’t put yourself out or anything,” said Alden.

He wasn’t sure he even wanted to see Matadero. But since Haoyu was shaping up to be his good roommate, he wasn’t going to outright reject his idea.

The volume of the music in the living room suddenly shot through the roof, and the sound of a K-pop group backed by a strong bass beat made everything on the table and countertops vibrate. Alden and Haoyu slapped their hands to their ears, and Lexi’s shoulders drew up like he was trying to retract his head into his spine.

“How did they find the remote?!” Kon screamed before racing out of the room.

Astrid skidded past Lexi into the kitchen a second later, her socks slipping against the floor. Rebecca and another girl were hot on her heels. “Alden!” she shouted three inches from his face while he stared at her eyebrow ring. “Alden! Raccoons! Have you ever seen real raccoons?!”

Hands still clutched to his head, he nodded. “Yeah! We have raccoons in Chicago.”

“Are they rabid?! Are they cute?! Were you scared? Have you ever pet one?!”

“Probably some of them! Yes! No! And no!”

The music cut off suddenly.

“Hell yes, my supersisters!” Astrid yelled, throwing her hands up to high five her friends. “I interviewed someone about dangerous wildlife! That’s BINGO!”

*******

Astrid threw hummus in the blender and cackled like a witch. Rebecca asked Alden how long he’d been going out with Maricel. A girl named Njeri told him he should come with her and her friends to join the school’s ice hockey club after gym class on Monday.

Jupiter wandered into the kitchen, told everyone to be nice to him, then wandered back out with her cheeks stuffed with wontons.

Before Alden could finish completely abolishing the rumor about Maricel or decide what to do about the ice hockey invitation, Jeffy appeared carrying a familiar green plaid shirt.

“I brought this to give back to you!”

Alden assumed he was the target of that announcement, even though Jeffy’s eyes were fixed on the girls.

“You know I’ve been living in the building beside yours all this time, don’t you?” Alden asked, reaching for the shirt before one of its trailing sleeves could get hummused. “You could have just brought it over anytime instead of carrying it all this way. Or we’ll be on campus together tomorrow night?”

“I’m Jeffy,” he said, ignoring Alden in favor of ogling Astrid.

“I know! We met earlier! Love the hair. Have you properly greeted Lord Blender?”

“You can cook?” Jeffy asked, sniffing the blender. “That’s cool! It smells great.”

All three girls, Alden, and a Meister standing in the corner slicing cheese into shapes with his knife stared at the Aqua Brute.

Astrid looked from the blender to Jeffy then down at her own cleavage and back at Jeffy.

“I can cook,” she said, throwing her shoulders back and smiling at him. “You want some?”

“Don’t,” Alden whispered. It was too cruel.

Rebecca’s hand shot up to cover his mouth. Just a little too much force there, Brute girl, he thought as his head banged lightly against the cabinet behind him.

He wondered how many people wound up injured by brand new Avowed getting relaxed about their powers before they really should have been.

Astrid was pouring a dastardly quantity of her latest concoction into a cup.

Njeri, giggling, disappeared into the living room. Heads started popping around the kitchen door a moment later. Everyone was snickering and shushing each other.

“Bottoms up,” Astrid said passing Jeffy the cup with that same innocent smile on her face.

“Uh…what’s this drink called?” He looked uncertain.

“I made it up. So it doesn’t have a name yet. You can name it after you taste it!”

Alden shook his head. If Jeffy had been looking at him instead of at Astrid, he might have saved himself.

Of course he wasn’t.

Jeffy took a big gulp and then immediately started to choke.

“Now, now!” said Rebecca, lowering her hand from Alden’s face and shoving on the bottom of the cup as Jeffy tried to put it down. “That’s just the hot sauce tricking your tongue. The second sip is going to be way better!”

“DRINK IT, YOU COWARD!” a guy bellowed from the watching group.

“Drink it, drink it,” someone else started chanting from the back of the pack.

“Don’t give in to peer pressure,” said Alden. “A whole cup of that shit’s going to destroy your digestive tract.”

One of the larger hot sauce bottles they’d poured in there had had a coffin on the label.

“Who is that killjoy!?”

Alden flipped off the person who’d just shouted.

“BE A HERO!”

“I am a hero!” shouted Jeffy, punching a fist into the air. His eyes and nose were pouring. Pinkish brown blender potion was oozing down his chin.

He started to chug it and gag on it at the same time.

Oh well. Now I have a clear conscience. Alden gave in and applauded with everyone else.

[Just risked my future popularity to save a stranger I don’t really like,] he reported to Boe while Jeffy coughed and wheezed over the sink and Astrid patted him on the back. [Warned him off of a blender full of hot sauce, smoked oysters, cherry syrup, and hummus. So put that on your to-do list.]

There was a long delay before Boe’s reply. [That one doesn’t count.]

[Sure it does. Now you have to save an idiot from the error of his own ways, too. It’s fine if you fail. I did.]

[Get puked on, send me a picture, and we’ll agree to call it an actual Savior Alden incident.]

So not worth it.

People were surrounding him and the blender. He shoved his way through the circle and out of the kitchen before they could get any ideas about him being a volunteer for an encore.

He headed down the hallway and stood outside the bathroom door, waiting for whoever was in there to finish up. He waited. And waited.

Lexi, exiting one of the bedrooms by ducking between ribbons of caution tape, spotted him there.

“You’re going to want to use the one in my parents’ room. Some girl’s been crying in this one for twenty minutes, and she’s not emerging no matter what I say.”

“Oh.” Alden looked at the door. There were marks on the frame, with heights and ages for Lexi, Kon, and their little sister. She was four, if her last mark was up to date.

Lexi started to walk past him, then stopped suddenly. He sighed.

“Hey. Anesidora social dynamic for you, since you demanded it—there’s a group chat with a lot of the people here in it. They’ve been doing nothing in school for the past week except gossiping and getting to know each other if they didn’t already. All of you globies come up…for obvious reasons. They think the Scottish boy’s accent is exotic and they can’t get enough of it.”

The local group chat wasn’t much of a surprise. And good for Finlay. “I heard him showing it off for people earlier.”

“Most of them are enchanted with him. He’s very strong for someone our age. Started with a little more than normal for an S, probably, and worked hard at it on top of that.” Lexi looked at Alden. “Your accent’s boring. But nothing else about you is. You’re kind of a hypocrite, aren’t you?”

Startled, Alden uncrossed his arms. “How am I a hypocrite?”

“You think I owe you a warning about a Velra and you don’t owe me one about everything you’ve got going on? Your reputation may not be toxic like Lute’s, but it’s going to be just as inconvenient. I’ve barely interacted with you, but four people, including my brother and my friend, have already scolded me for not being gentle with you.”

Alden opened his mouth, but he couldn’t come up with words to express the potent mix of embarrassment, disgust, and oh no he was suddenly experiencing.

“Be however you fucking like with me,” he finally said. “I don’t need special treatment. I’m not one of those goats that faint when people yell at them.”

Lexi squinted at him. “Is that a real animal or is it some American saying that makes no sense?”

“They’re real! I saw some on a farm when I was little. I don’t know how they work or why, but that’s not the point! The point is, I am not one of those goats. And you should be as ungentle around me as you want.”

“Yeah okay.”

“Just because I spent time on another world with some chaos in it, it doesn’t mean I need to be managed! By my fucking classmates! I just saw one of them drink homebrewed lava while the rest of them cheered. I am fine.”

Lexi smiled for the first time Alden had seen. It made him look shockingly Kon-ish. “You sound really fine. Also, you said that loud enough for some of the people here to hear you.”

Alden clenched his teeth.

“And for your information, since you want honesty, almost everyone is way more fascinated about you being orphaned by a supervillain of the twisted and evil variety. They’ve spent the past few days reading all about it.”

Oh. Body Drainer. That’s actually… that should have been obvious.

Moon Thegund was what was at the forefront of Alden’s mind. But this was a group full of freshly minted superhero school students. Half of them were probably getting excited about the opportunity to go into protector mode and the other half were probably trying to think of ways to ask him for gorey battle details without pissing off their own friends.

“I told Kon that he, at least, should know better. Nobody wants people to be extra nice to them because of things that happened when they were eight years old. But he liked hanging out with you the other day, and he gets caught up in group activities. That’s the gist of it. If you want to insert yourself into the secret Anesidoran social dynamic somehow and change it, go for it.”

Alden was conflicted.

On the one hand, everything Lexi had said was something that he was glad to have out in the open or that he agreed with. Even the hypocrisy accusation…was…

Totally fair.

Ugh. Shit.

But the Meister had such a cold way of dropping phrases that really shouldn’t be dropped at all—like “orphaned by a supervillain”—that it felt like they were having an argument.

“Thank you for telling me,” Alden said, resisting the urge to inject sarcasm into the words. “I appreciate it. And I’m sorry for complaining about Lute when I am just as inconvenient as him.”

“Okay,” Lexi said dispassionately.

Then he left.

Alden let himself slump against the wall. Well, that’s not really a big deal. Or big news. And people being nice to me for no reason is so much better than them being assho—

Lexi had stopped at the end of the hall. He turned around suddenly and came back. He stood a couple of feet away, and Alden braced for whatever else he’d thought of to say.

The other boy glared down at his own socks. “Haoyu thinks we should all get along if we share a suite,” he said grudgingly. “He was already talking about doing something with you and Lute anyway. I shouldn’t have implied that he was being like the others.”

Oh. Well, that was actually a relief. “He seems cool.”

“He’s too nice. He volunteers me for things.” Lexi grunted. “Have fun destroying my house with everyone else.”

He stalked away.

“I’ve barely left the snack table!” Alden called after him. “I’ve been cleaning up spills all night!”

This time Lexi kept walking.

Alden looked at the bathroom door again. I wonder if it’s…

[Hey,] he texted Maricel. [I haven’t seen you around in a while. Are you still at the party?]

She didn’t answer.

[If you decide you want company for the trip back to intake, let me know.]

That’s the right thing, isn’t it? It’s better than outright asking if she’s the crying person.

He didn’t want to insert himself where he wasn’t welcome. He waited until he was sure he wasn’t getting a reply, then he headed toward the other bathroom. Before he’d made it through the door, Jeffy ran past him, clutching his mouth with one hand and his stomach with the other.

Guess I don’t need to pee that bad after all.

********

“What I’m trying to tell you,” Alden said, raising his voice so that his chosen target could hear him over the beat of the music in the crowded living room, “is that you should just treat me normally. Or…however it is you treat everyone else.”

Jupiter’s arms were in the air over her head, and she was swaying in time to the music in a floppy kind of way that probably shouldn’t be called dancing.

“I promise I am already!” said Jupiter. She’d found glitter to apply to her face since the last time Alden had seen her. It was awfully slick looking. He thought she might have just smeared lip gloss all over herself. “I haven’t been talking about you at all!”

“No.” Alden didn’t know how to break through. “I’m saying it’s fine if you have been! I understand you’re trying to be considerate. Stop telling everyone here that they have to be nicer to me than they want to be, though! It’s unnecessary!”

Jupiter swayed so far to the left that Alden reached out reflexively to catch her in case she fell. She wobbled then popped back upright.

“Snake plants are the best!”

What in the…?

She was smiling at something behind him, and Alden turned to see a tall green-striped plant by the window wriggling in a very Jupiter-like way.

She is befriending vegetation.

“You’re…a unique person,” he said, giving up on getting his point across. “I’m glad you’re having fun.”

Blue light flashed across the ceiling as the fight scene on the screen changed. Alden wandered over to hover among a crowd of people who were discussing the battle between a Wright decked out in laser cannons she’d made herself and a small gang of non-Avowed criminals who’d somehow gotten their hands on Wright-made weapons of their own.

It was a cinematic battle. All of the ones that had played tonight were. Most day-to-day superhero work wasn’t so flashy. An Anesidora-trained S-rank chasing down some C-rank unregistered who’d been found out by their nosy neighbors wasn’t usually a major event.

But it’s the big flashy ones that make people think of you as a real superhero. Maybe Max is more right about battle theater than I want him to be.

The other B-rank was standing on the edge of the room, wearing a too-tight shirt Kon had loaned him. The one he’d come to the party in had been deemed cursed after a third incident involving a girl and a virgin strawberry daiquiri.

The group watching the television was trying to analyze the Wright’s weapons. Some of them sounded semi-knowledgable. Most sounded like they wished they were. One of the Brutes was arguing that lasers were “the same as cheating” for reasons so convoluted that Alden couldn’t follow them at all.

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“Ooo…that’s going to leave a scar!” a guy called out as one of the Wright’s smaller lasers flashed.

<<She just severed his arm, Sanjay. It’s going to be a little worse than a scar. We don’t waste Healers on random bad guys, you know.>>

“Ohhhh right.”

“Any Healers will help injured Avowed first, local victims of the magic-caused event second, and then, if they have time, they’ll assist regular people on their waiting list,” Vandy told everyone.

Maricel’s roommate had been in the battle-discussion group for the whole party. The Sky Shaper was in the same dark blue pantsuit she’d worn to interviews. She’d chosen to start classes this week, and Alden had seen her a few times. She was one of those people who wore the full school uniform every day even though it wasn’t required.

She’s not completely stiff though.

Vandy’s hands, held down beside her legs, had been twitching back and forth for the past hour. She was directing a pair of paper airplanes overhead. Alden was sure she was doing it mostly for practice, but she also seemed to want everyone to enjoy them. Whenever one got swiped out of the air by a partier, she smiled and folded another.

“Armless gets a human surgeon if he survives,” another girl said.

“Did you get a Healer?”

At first, Alden didn’t realize he was being addressed. He was watching the Wright pursue the last runaway bad guy down a street. She shed her heavier weaponry, it teleported out of sight, and she went with pure strength for the final chase and grab.

“Hey, I asked you if you got a Healer?”

Alden looked around. To his surprise, the person speaking to him from the other side of the group was Winston Heelfeather. He’d noticed him lurking around the party, drifting after Finlay and glaring holes in the back of the more powerful speedster’s head.

“What?” Alden asked.

A few people were looking between the two of them now.

“Everyone’s saying you were part of some big deal hero/villain fight or something,” said Winston. He took a sip of his mocktail. “When you were a kid.”

Now it was more than a few people.

Why is he glaring at me?

Admittedly it was a half-powered glare compared to what Finlay had been getting all night, but it made a lot less sense. This is good for me anyway. Thanks for bringing it up so that I have an excuse to be visibly fine with it.

“They did take me to the House of Healing.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and smiled at Winston. “It wasn’t a Healer-class Avowed that helped me, though. It was the wizard who runs the Chicago House.”

His mother’s old boss. Rynez-yt. He’d only met her a couple of times before that night. She was a morose person with a dreadful bedside manner, but he’d been inclined to like her anyway because his mom did.

“I’d rather be healed by a human than an Artonan,” Winston spat.

Everyone in the group was looking at him instead of the screen now.

“That’s…a little xenophobic,” said Rebecca.

“It’s very xenophobic,” said Vandy, staring at Winston in shock. One of her airplanes crashed into the back of Mehdi’s gelled hair, and he grabbed it. He was watching the discussion with an unreadable expression.

“It’s also stupid,” said Alden. “When you’ve got shrapnel in your intestines, you’ll be really glad to see any kind of healer of any species.”

Everyone’s eyes were still on Winston. His ears were reddening.

“Yeah, yeah! Sorry I didn’t mean it like that. I was just running my mouth too fast.”

“You should apologize to Alden, too,” Vandy said.

Alden didn’t know whether Winston had meant it or not, but he was pretty sure the speedster hadn’t meant to say it out loud. Does he really want attention so much that he’s jealous of the variety I’m getting?

Well, whatever. I’m still going to use this for project Alden-is-not-a-poor-baby.

“Thanks, Vandy,” he said. “It’s fine, though. The Body Drainer incident was a long time ago. It’s not my favorite convo topic, but I don’t mind answering questions about it.”

Most of the eyes fixed on Winston turned back to him.

“What was it like?” Rebecca asked immediately.

“You had shrapnel in your intestines? Did it hurt?”

<<Sanjay, are you serious right now? You absolute—>>

“It hurt super bad,” said Alden. “And I lost a ton of blood. I would have died if not for one of the heroes on the scene.”

“Hannah Elber,” someone said. “I read about that.”

“She went missing last year.”

“The Gloom’s daughter.”

“Do you know the Gloom?” Mehdi asked.

“Not really.” The crowd had shifted so that Alden had to stand on his tiptoes if he wanted to see the other boy clearly. “I’ve only met her once, and it was just for a few minutes.”

“But what does shrapnel feel like?” Sanjay said, staring at Alden avidly.

“Sanjay!” Astrid entered the discussion by shouting from all the way across the room. “Monday in Combat class, we’ll ask the faculty to turn the gymsuits all the way up. Then we’ll take turns stabbing you in the guts. How does that sound?”

<<Can I help?>>

“It’s not combat class. It’s pre-combat class. Physical education and self defense, right?” a girl wearing a fiberoptic headband said nervously. “They’ll keep the suits powered down, won’t they?”

“You hope they will.”

“Oh don’t remind me about MPE,” Tuyet moaned from her seat on the sofa. “I’m so nervous about it.”

“What was the worst thing about being in a supervillain incident?”

Alden blinked at the Meister who’d asked. “My parents dying. And long-term tinnitus.”

“My dad has tinnitus from getting hit real bad by a Vocal!” Jupiter suddenly called from over by her plant friend. “Healers have trouble fixing that. Sometimes the magic repairs it, and sometimes it just doesn’t.”

Telling her dad to try to find a Healer as good as Rrorro didn’t seem like helpful advice, so Alden left it alone.

“Where in the intestines—?”

“If you’re that curious, I could show you my scar…”

Several people said “yes” or some version of “cool,” and nobody said “no.”

Pretty much the same as when I offered to show it to people in sixth grade homeroom, thought Alden, lifting up his sweater just enough to show off the whole scar without revealing the tattoo above it. Though I guess we’re all old enough now that nobody is going to say something dumb, like ‘I want one, too.’

“I want one, too,” Jeffy—fresh from his karmic bathroom experience—said a minute later after staring at Alden’s stomach.

Alden sighed.

Astrid, who was leaning really much too close to finish her own examination, popped upright. “I like it!” she announced.

“He has a nice stomach,” said Rebecca.

“It’s not bad at all,”Astrid agreed.

“Hey, I’ve got a nice stomach!” said Jeffy.

“We’ve all seen yours. Pretty average to be honest.”

“Jeffy got in!” someone yelled. A jacket flew through the room and slid down the screen.

Astrid turned back to Alden and narrowed her eyes. “Appeal or effort?”

He dropped his shirt.

“Both,” he confessed. “But mostly an alien plant-based diet for months and an overzealous healer. There’s only one point in Appeal.”