Sidekicked (2 page)

So today is Tuesday and I'm suspended by my wrists above a pool of acid, feet dangling below me in my gray, faded Pumas, my bandanna hiding my identity from the nose up but doing nothing to conceal my frown. The number of yards I am away from death can be counted on one hand.

And all I can seem to think about is how much homework I've got. Act One of
Julius Caesar
to finish for tomorrow and a big math test on Thursday. Not to mention I have an outline due to Mr. Broadside on the military tactics of Hannibal in the Second Punic War as part of a history presentation I have to give, and all I know about
that
guy is he rode an elephant through the Alps. I guess for some people a horse just isn't good enough.

My only consolation is that I'm not alone. Jenna is dangling beside me, long legs stretching well below mine, her silver spandex uniform clinging to her like aluminum foil, both of us suspended, just waiting to be rescued. She's not Jenna right now, of course; she's the Silver Lynx, sidekick to one of the most powerful Supers in Justicia, maybe even the world. But to me she will always be Jenna.

“I don't think gym teachers should be
allowed
to be health teachers unless they have a gnat fart's inkling of what they are
talking
about.”

That's Jenna. She is one of those girls who talk just as much with her hands as her mouth, which means between the three of them you don't get a word in. But she's a little restricted by the thick steel cuffs around her wrists, so right now she is just wiggling her fingers. Vigorously.

“I mean, the man doesn't know the difference between a femur and a tumor. He thinks iPods cause cancer and he still calls Coke soda pop.”

Jenna's long blond hair is a little matted, and there's a dark red spot below her ribs where she was stung resisting capture, but otherwise she seems nonchalant. As if dangling above a pool full of acid is just part of her after-school regimen—right in between gymnastics and dinner with the fam, though she seldom eats dinner with her parents. They work two jobs apiece and are usually not around, and even when they are, they aren't. I try to mimic her coolness, but she knows I'm faking it.

Besides, I have more to be concerned about than she does. After all,
her
Super is probably only a few blocks away. Somersaulting over taxicabs or leaping from rooftop to rooftop. Mine probably doesn't even know I'm here. It's because of this, I suspect, that she is trying to distract me with her rant about our new health teacher.

“It's middle school health. It isn't rocket science,” she says.

Jenna would know. She knows a few things about rocket science.

My fingers are falling asleep. The handcuffs are tight, and the way the steel cable is wound around them makes them bite into my skin even deeper, cutting off circulation. I'm a little dizzy. I take a look at the winch and hoist we are connected to, and then at the motor that is lowering us at the rate of about an inch every three seconds: a slow and deliberate pace designed to cause maximum suspense, I suppose. If I try really hard, I can actually hear the metallic click of the individual gears meshing together, but I am blocking most of this out. It is simply too excruciating.

That's my approach to most of life most of the time: to ignore it. I have to in order to stay sane. Until something like this happens, and I realize what I've gotten myself into.

I take a look at the pool of acid below me. Hydrochloric, I think. I've got pretty good senses—some of the best in the world, in fact. That's what got me into this in the first place, that led me to Mr. Masters. To H.E.R.O., training to be a sidekick. To become the Sensationalist.

And to dangling here.

I happen to be pretty good at chemistry, so I know that hydrochloric acid isn't the absolute worst thing you could be dipped into to death. After all, our stomachs are full of it, and in a diluted form, it was probably used to keep this same pool clean. But there's a difference between an ounce of hydrochloric acid and a swimming pool of it. Plus the murky stuff below me is bubbling and seeping a noxious green fog. All signs that the acid is probably mixed with something else, something even more horrifying. I drop another inch and conclude that supervillains have
way
too much time on their hands.

“I mean, why do I have to listen to him when I can just read the stupid book myself? You
know
I don't have time for all of this.”

Whether Jenna is talking about health class or dangling here, waiting to be rescued, I'm not sure. She's in all advanced classes, not to mention gymnastics
and
track, and then there's this
other
thing that we're both a part of. How she manages to balance it all without completely freaking out is beyond me.

I can hear grunts and pops about three blocks away, and something like an
urrf
, which means
somebody
is on the way. Below me and to the right, there is a line of police cars keeping their distance, their uniformed contents spread out behind them like ants circling dropped candy. Their revolvers are drawn, but they won't fire. They're just here as backdrop. The fire department is here too, as are the EMTs, but there isn't much they can do either. They know the rules. This is clearly beyond their scope, and these guys are out of their league. They're basically here for crowd control. Besides, have you ever seen an EMT jump into a pool of acid to rescue two costumed teenagers? Do you even
know
what those guys get paid?

Then there are the bad guys. I guess I haven't mentioned them yet. After all, somebody had to capture us and secure us to this cable. A whole hive of somebodies, in fact. Scattered here and there across the gray sky, men in fuzzy yellow-and-black suits with mechanical vibrating wings. Seriously. Mechanical wings. And harpoon guns. They actually have harpoon guns. Like the kind from the movie
Jaws
. I wonder how they even managed to find that many harpoon guns in a town that is at least five hundred miles from the ocean. Jenna says they probably got them from Walmart.

They are the drones, those fuzzy, flying guys circling around us. The ones who ambushed us, who brought us here and chained us up. Though, as the name suggests, even they are only acting on orders. They aren't shooting at the cops, and the cops aren't shooting at them. Everyone knows his place.

The OCs—that's ordinary citizens, for those of you who happen to be one—look appropriately doe-eyed, with hands clasped over their doughnut-shaped mouths, waiting. You'd think they would be running. Ducking for cover. Crawling under cars. And many have. But the ones I'm looking at now are the believers. The devotees. The sky watchers. The ones who still possess an all-abiding faith in their heroes to show up and save the day.

Of course they aren't the ones on the hook.

I hear explosions from somewhere behind me, but I can't make out too much over the thumping of my own heartbeat. I try not to think about the words
acid, dissolve, flesh-eating
, or
sloppy joe
. We lower another inch. My feet are less than five yards away from doom now. I can hear buzzing all around me. I look down.

I can't believe I left my utility belt at school. Again. Not that I could reach anything on it. It's just a comfort thing. Like forgetting your watch or not putting on underwear. Without my utility belt, I am basically harmless. With it, I am at least somewhat potentially threatening.

I twist around. Still no sign of him.

Jenna is still talking, still not the least bit concerned, it seems. She has moved off health class and is now complaining about the cost of shoes. Jenna's always short on cash. Most of the time I spring for the french fries after school. I feel for her, but now doesn't seem to be the best time to worry about new shoes when the ones we are wearing are about to be liquefied with our feet still in them.

I crane my neck and scan the clouds for some glimpse of the man responsible for our impending demise, the one controlling the drones, the demented scientist with his own pair of mechanical wings and a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher who orchestrated our capture. He calls himself the Killer Bee. No joke. I have no idea what his deal is—though anyone who dresses up like a bumblebee and carries around a missile launcher is obviously several eggs short of a carton. Mr. Masters says that more often than not, today's super-villain is just some kid who was beat up too many times in middle school and decides the best form of therapy is world annihilation—and the freak in the bee suit seems to fit the bill.

Of course here
I
am, in my second year of middle school, nearly straight As, still wearing tighty-whities, incrementally descending to my death. I'm thirteen, I have a zit on my left eyebrow that hurts every time I blink, I've been beaten up four times (not in costume), and I haven't kissed a girl yet. Unless you count Suzie Walsh, which I don't, because it was three years ago, the bottle clearly got kicked, and the whole thing lasted, maybe, a nanosecond. Still, it does make you wonder how I'm going to turn out.

The Killer Bee is nowhere to be found, no doubt waiting to pick on someone his own size. Three drones buzz past us, harpoons in hand, and I'm guessing I won't be around to watch anyways.

Then, in the distance, I see her—long before anyone else can. Energy beams dancing in her eyes, samurai sword in hand, her wavy red perm holding up remarkably well in the humidity. Her white body suit looks glued to her. She runs toward us, nimbly hurdling the obstacle course of parked cars clogging the street, launching herself at the first wing of drones that spots her.

My jaw drops just watching her. The Fox. By far the hottest, coolest Super to grace the cover of the
Justicia Daily Trumpet
—which is saying something when you think about how Venus looked back in the glory days. But the Fox ups the cool factor by hundreds. Only a year into her career and already considered the best there is at what she does. The kind of Super eight-year-old girls dream of being and twelve-year old boys just dream of.

Our hero.

Or at least Jenna's hero. I'm not her sidekick, so I'm not
technically
her responsibility, though I am keeping my fingers crossed. Or I would if I could feel them anymore.

The Fox dispatches the first wave of drones without even breaking stride. Slices her way through the onslaught as a half dozen more swoop down from the clouds. I can hear the split of the wind with each swing of her sword. I can see the aura of energy radiating from her pores. Watching her in action, I kind of forget that I am only a few feet from a really unpleasant death. Then the crank turns and I drop another inch and it all comes rushing back to me.

Eleven feet and counting. I look around frantically.

As if reading my mind, Jenna says, “Don't worry. He'll show.”

And I just give her a dirty look. For all of her talents—extraordinary athleticism, super strength, lightning-fast reflexes, gorgeous green eyes—Jenna's not a great liar. We both know the odds aren't really in my favor. But even after all of this, even with everything I've been through in the past year, I have to give him the benefit of the doubt. Have to trust that he knows what he's doing. It's part of the Code.

“He's got two more feet,” I tell Jenna, who flashes a glance that is somehow sympathetic
and
condescending, as if to say, “Okay, and then what?”

I don't know and then what. I haven't figured out
how
I would save myself. Unlike Jenna, I don't have extraordinary physical abilities. Unlike my friend Nikki, I can't just phase through solid objects. I can't shoot lightning or breathe fire. I'm not even double-jointed. In fact, at this point, I would trade my powers for those of just about anyone I know.

“Just hang in there,” Jenna says. I really think she is trying to be funny.

The Fox is battling right outside the pool's entrance now, moving quickly. The crowd gathered behind the yellow caution tape is cheering like it's the Super Bowl. Sometimes I wonder if they even care who wins, so long as they get a show. The last four drones surround the Fox, thrusting their harpoons. I figure she'll just pound her fist into the ground and create a shock wave to bowl them over. Or maybe she will spin around super fast, creating a whirlwind that will knock them back on their fuzzy little butts. But instead she just does this thing with her eyes, where they roll back in her head and little bolts of red energy start arcing back and forth between them. It's really pretty intense, and it's just the kind of thing Supers do when they want you to know that they are totally cranked off. I've seen that same look on my mother's face, even though she's not a Super, and I know what it means.

The drones are smarter than their name suggests, and they take the Fox's electric eyeball arcing act as their cue to retreat, flying up, up, and away.

While I keep going down. Eight feet.

He's not going to show.

Even now. It's one thing not to make it to training. Or to neglect to take me out on the weekends. But now? Here? When I'm really in danger?

The Fox looks up at the two of us dangling like minnows, and I know what she is thinking. She is thinking that it's a trap. That the moment she tries to save us, the Killer Bee will come out of nowhere and blindside her. And she's probably right. Otherwise, what's the point in even capturing us?

But I really don't care. Because, frankly, I just want her to rescue me so that I can go home, put bags of frozen peas on my wrists, and forget that this day even happened.

Seven feet. I think the crank is going faster. Jenna looks at me expectantly. I look back at my toes. I happen to like my toes. I really don't want to see them dissolved.

And then my ears are suddenly filled with a high-pitched buzzing, much stronger than that of the drones, and I know that the villain is above us. I crane my neck to see him, the Killer Bee, hurtling our way, his multifaceted goggles reflecting a hundred versions of my own freaked-out face, his rocket launcher perched on his shoulder. Before I even have time to take a breath, he fires a stinger missile at the only Super who bothered to show up today.