Super Villain Academy 2: Polar Opposites
Polar Opposites
[Super Villian Academy Book 2]
by
Kai Strand
WHISKEY CREEK PRESS
www.whiskeycreekpress.com
Published by
WHISKEY CREEK PRESS
Whiskey Creek Press
PO Box 51052
Casper, WY 82605-1052
Copyright
Ó
2014 by
Kai Strand
Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 (five) years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.
Names, characters and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
ISBN: 978-1-61160-835-9
Cover Artist:
Angela Archer
Editor:
Rick Reisinger
Printed in the United States of America
Dedication
Super powers show up in my world in strange and glorious ways. For example, my oldest daughter, who has the amazing power of achievement. Congratulations on the Bachelor of Arts in Music, honey.
Chapter 1
They never talked about how they ended the world. Twice. Jeff glanced at Oceanus, bent over her phone in the passenger seat of his car. A curtain of black hair shielded her profile from view, but he thought he saw her smile.
He reached over and tucked her hair behind an ear. Yep, she was smiling. So was he. He felt his skin heat, but not as a side-effect of his super power ability to create fire. This heat was due to thoughts of Oci running her small warm hands down his back and tilting her face up to accept his kiss.
“How about a movie?” Oceanus asked.
“Which one?” Jeff replied, scanning the traffic and then his girlfriend.
Oci’s thin arms, delicate wrists, and bird-like legs that barely reached the floorboards, all gave the impression she needed protection and caring for. Whereas, with her super strength, she could lift the car they drove in onto two wheels if someone were trapped underneath.
“Oh, perfect!” Oceanus flung her hair over her shoulder and straightened in her seat. Her smile illuminated Jeff’s peripheral vision as he concentrated on traffic. “The one I want to see starts in forty-five minutes. That gives us plenty of time to get there, get popcorn and some good seats, and watch the previews. I love the previews, don’t you?”
Jeff glanced at her again. The devilish glint in her eye made him frown. “What movie?”
Oceanus peeked through thick black lashes. Jeff was pretty sure she even batted them a bit. “What movie, Oci?”
“
Accidental Hero
.” At Jeff’s groan, Oceanus chuckled. “Come on, you have to admit the storyline looks kinda familiar. Besides, the special effects look amazing. You love that crap.”
Jeff stared at the traffic and said nothing. He knew it was useless. He could mount the best argument against seeing the movie, but Oceanus always got her way. Cursing his Oceanus-shaped soft spot, he turned at the next intersection and headed toward the theater.
The whiny guitar tones of the heavy metal song
Super Villain
erupted from his cell phone. He looked at the display and saw Mother’s number. “Can you answer that?”
Reaching for his phone, Oceanus said, “You know, now that we aren’t technically super villains anymore, you should consider changing your ringtone.”
Jeff rolled his eyes and slapped his phone into her palm.
“Hi Sarah,” Oceanus said. Her grin fell to a frown. “Uh huh.”
“What’s she saying?” Jeff asked. Oceanus held up her hand to hush him, and her brow furrowed. “Yeah.”
“Is everything okay?” Jeff considered pulling over so he could just take the phone and find out for himself what Mother had called about. “Put it on speaker.”
Oceanus glared at Jeff. “Right away?”
He regretted not answering himself. What could be so important?
“Sure, sure, Sarah. I’ll tell him.” Oceanus clapped the phone closed like a castanet.
Jeff stared at her as long as he could without crashing. “Well?”
“She wants you to pick up a gallon of milk on the way home.”
“What?” He pulled into a parking place at the theater and stamped on the breaks harder than he meant to. They rocked forward in their seats, straining against their seatbelts and then bounced back into place. “All that for milk?”
“First she explained that since you moved back home, she hasn’t been able to keep enough milk in the house, then she shared a rather heartfelt story about how you drink directly from the jug and effectively assure she will never partake in the milk unless she is the first to open it. She seems to be developing a new peeve.” Oceanus arched an eyebrow at Jeff and then swung out of the car.
Disappointment washed over him when he realized picking up a gallon of milk wouldn’t get him out of seeing
Accidental Hero
. With a deep breath, he pushed open his car door and unfolded his six-foot, four-inch body from his creaky old Skylark. He’d grown half a foot in a year, and the only reason he wasn’t a bumbling giant was due to the extensive physical training he received at school that kept him in control of his ever-lengthening limbs.
“Oci, can’t we see
Bombanator
or
Ever Love
instead?” Jeff whined. He caught up with her in three long strides and wrapped an arm around her.
“Ooo, you’re even willing to see
Ever Love
in order to avoid
Accidental Hero
?” Oci tucked up under his arm and slid her hand into the back pocket of his pants.
Jeff nodded and scanned the faces of the people in the long line in front of the theater. He recognized a couple guys and a dozen girls from his old high school and one kid from his new academy.
A concussion of air hit Jeff and Oceanus just before a clanging fire alarm sounded somewhere to their left. A plume of thick black smoke bloomed into the air above a restaurant. Oceanus had barely slipped her hand out of Jeff’s pocket before he bolted in that direction.
He skidded to a halt outside the restaurant when he was assaulted by a wave of intense heat emanating from the door, which was hanging askew. He heard cries and screams from inside and tried to press in through the front entrance, but the heat proved too much for him to overcome. Another flash rattled the door and sent an oven blast of heat through the gap, driving Jeff further backward.
People stumbled out of the neighboring store, coughing and gasping for air. Jeff barged through the exiting crowd. Inside he saw where the explosion had buckled the adjoining wall. Thick gray smoke billowed into the store as if desperate for a clean breath of air. He peered through the fissure in the wall and blinked against the stinging smoke. No fire blazed immediately on the other side. The opening was only as wide as Jeff’s thigh, so he grabbed the wall with both hands and tore away drywall until the hole was large enough for him to slip through.
Smoke choked his airways, and Jeff coughed into the crook of his elbow. He entered into the dining area of the restaurant. Tables and chairs seemed to quaver like ghosts through the thick haze and flickering light of the flames. He nabbed a slightly singed cloth napkin from the floor and tied it like a bandana over his nose and mouth.
“You can get out over here!” Jeff yelled to the stragglers who stumbled around in the thickening smoke.
Concentrating inside himself, Jeff siphoned a small amount of magnesium from the muscle in his arm that helped his elbow to bend. He pooled the magnesium into his palm and ignited it. A small blue ball of electric fire spun in his palm. He held it high in the air. “Over here. Grab hands and come toward the blue light.”
Frightened cries and moans preceded a stream of limping and hunched over people who emerged from the dense smoke. Some were smudged with soot, and they were all drenched from the overhead sprinklers. Jeff pointed toward the hole in the wall and hurried them through. Even after all the people were ushered safely from the dining area into the store next door, Jeff could still hear moans from deeper within the restaurant. Tears streamed down his cheeks from the smoke irritation and water dripped from his hair. He extinguished the blue fire and dispersed the magnesium while he searched for the source of the moans. Stumbling over a chair lying on its side, he pushed through double swinging doors into the kitchen. Intense heat nearly drove him back out again. Now Jeff heard the moans clearly. Just in front of him, a man lay pinned under a charred and mangled stove.
“Hang on, dude,” Jeff shouted to be heard over the cacophony of flames.
He grabbed the appliance that lay across the man’s legs and rotund belly, but a searing pain burned his hands and forced him to pull them away before he had a chance to shift the stove. Jeff drew a breath from deep inside his lungs and blew on the stove, hoping to coat it with a layer of the frost he could produce, but the heat and smoke in the air snuffed it out before it could be conjured.
“What do you need?” Oceanus shouted over the din of raging flames.
Her super power was controlling water, making her Jeff’s favorite person at that moment. He pulled down the makeshift bandana and planted a passionate kiss on her lips. When they pulled apart, they grinned at each other until a loud creak rent the air and snapped them back to attention. Pointing to the flames that roared behind the trapped guy and licked up the side of the stove that lay across him, Jeff shouted, “We need this fire out!”
“That’s being fed by a broken gas pipe, Polar. My water won’t put it out!”
“Be ready to pull him free, then.” This time, Jeff ignited the hot, red fire in his fingers until his hands glowed and burned as red as the fire around them. He reached down and grabbed the stove and heaved it a couple feet into the air. “Now!”
Oceanus dragged the man out from under the stove. His groans escalated to cries of pain as she tugged and yanked him across the floor. Even with her super strength, she had a difficult time lugging the man’s excessive weight. When the injured man was clear, Jeff dropped the stove. He realized his error just as he made it and scrambled to catch the heavy appliance, but it slammed flat to the ground, no longer blocking the jet of flame that shot from the wall where the blast had broken the gas pipe. “Duck!”
Jeff dove toward the man and pushed with all his strength. The man slid across the tile floor and crashed up against the swinging doors, which popped open and promptly swung closed cracking him on the head. The man groaned, his eyes rolled back in his head, and he passed out.
The jet of flame licked straight over Jeff, who was sprawled flat against the floor. The heat scorched his jeans, making him thankful they’d been thoroughly soaked by the sprinklers. He suspected the back of his t-shirt was singed to nothing, and prayed all his hair was still there. He saw Oceanus struggling to drag the unconscious man through the doors into the dining area. Knowing he was on his own, Jeff let his body go slack and used just his arms to drag his body out from under the shooting flames. As soon as he was clear, he scrambled to his feet and stumbled through to the other room. He threw the unconscious man over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. “Run!”