SuperZero (5 page)

The next morning, we hadn't even begun class when Masterror sent us right out, and not even because we were punished. Yet. He sent us out on an urgent job. There was a government building burning in the eastern part of the city. People were stuck on the fourth floor, the Department of Marriage Registrations.

‘Go out, superkids, and save the people! Make me proud!' he shooed us out, and then muttered at me under his breath, ‘SuperZero, stay out of trouble. Or you're in even bigger trouble when you get back.'

I gave him my biggest smile of reassurance, and then turned and ran out smack into Blank, who was waiting for me at the door. We both tumbled over each other and down the stairs. My last glimpse of Masterror was of a very worried-looking man. He was twirling his moustache at super speed, which is something he does when he is stressed out.

The building was old and brown and smoke was
pouring out of the lower windows. A huge crowd had gathered outside, howling and shouting, but no one was doing anything. There were vans with people from the media too, talking about how serious the situation was.

A reporter known for making up her own stories wherever there weren't enough, stood in the middle of it all. ‘This is Tara Rumpum from the scene of the crime. Someone has set fire to the building that is home to millions of . . . of . . . of government files. At great personal risk, with the flames leaping out at me, I report that millions of . . . okay, hundreds of . . . okay, maybe eleven people are stuck in this building. They are crying out to be saved. Is anyone listening? Is anyone helping? Oh, who is that now?'

The superkids had arrived. And wow, did everyone get to work.

Anna Conda lengthened her tail to make a huge lasso and she threw it up to the fourth floor to circle a frightened woman and pulled her right down. Vamp Iyer flew up and when people saw him, they just fainted with fear. First fire, now vampires. That helped though, because the muscled Hulket could then just throw them down where the equally muscled Hulkette could catch them. Slime Joos tried to spurt slime at the flames to smother them.

The crowd was going wild. ‘The superkids are here,' they shouted, clapping and trying to take pictures of the heroes with their cell phones.

The fire raged on even as the rescue operation was going on. Big orange flames were shooting through most windows now, and it was getting REALLY hot.

Tara Rumpum was screaming, ‘Oh, for a drop of help from the skies. Oh, for a drop of water. Will no one hear our cries?'

She looked so pretty and so sad there that my heart bled for her. ‘I will hear your cries, Tara Rumpum!' I shouted bravely.

She turned to me, surprised. ‘Who are you?'

I puffed out my chest. ‘I am SuperZero. I will save the world.' And with those very silly words, I went zooming off. You see, I had got an absolutely brilliant idea. I'd seen
the park fountains just beyond the building wall. Water! Get it?

I swiped a helmet off a biker nearby, gathered water from the fountains, and went running over to the building and threw the water at it. It didn't help even a tiny bit. The crowd burst out laughing. I ran up and down with my helmet till I was quite exhausted, but the fire kept growing larger, oranger and angrier.

‘Finally, a completely useless superhero,' said Tara Rumpum into her microphone, ‘but he's cute.'

Cameras clicked pictures of me puffing and panting while I leaned on the wall to get my breath back, turning my back to the leaping flames for a moment.

‘Fire!' shouted Tara Rumpum.

‘I know, I know,' I replied grumpily. ‘Everyone knows the building is on fire.'

‘No!
You're
on fire!' she shouted.

I turned back slowly and saw the end of my long cape burning. Of course, I went totally ballistic.

‘Help! Fire!' I shouted madly while running out to the crowd. People began to run away from me, and there was quite a stampede as I barrelled through the crowd, and some people got squashed. A trail of smoke followed me and made those who weren't already squashed double up choking.

I was in a complete panic, and ran helter-skelter through the scared throng, almost setting fire to a whole lot more
people. All I wanted to do was to get to those fountains—that glorious, cool water. Since I was feeling so hot, my head was like a volcano about to erupt—and then I tripped on my stupid burning cape, and the last thing I saw before blacking out was a high fountain leaping out and coming at me like a wave.

When someone finally shook me awake, there was no fire any more. So why were people still running away? And then I saw water gushing out from the park fountains towards the burning building, which wasn't burning any more, but was now flooded. The street outside was also flooded, and the media persons in their vans were trying to stay afloat. Tara Rumpum was up on a tree, still screaming into her mic.

Omigosh, I'd finally done something super, but in a really bad way. I'd turned the fire into a flood. Now, how would I stop the flood? Fortunately, I didn't have to, because a tiny little buzzing thing flew in and stood in front of those raging fountains. The Fly got the fountains to calm down. How much greater could the little master's super-awesomeness get? Was there anything he couldn't do?

Later that day, while sitting wrapped up in a blanket at home, with Gra making me hot chocolate, I heard my name on Dad's TV.

Tara Rumpum was reporting from up on the tree, ‘News has come to us that the day was saved by the superkids, except one in particular called SuperZero. The flood that SuperZero very cruelly brought on washed away all the records and documents from the Department of Marriage Registrations. Millions of . . . hundreds of . . . well, at least six young wives have run away from their husbands already, saying there is no record that they were ever married! Angry young husbands are searching for this boy called SuperZero. They have cricket bats in their hands. Does anyone know where this boy is?'

The boy climbed under his blanket and slept for the next twenty-four hours, until all the noise and anger had faded away.

Everyone looked at me coldly when I got back to school. It was a long walk from the school gate across the huge front field, up the stairs under the Egyptian-looking sign, to class, with angry superkids from all the classes and disappointed teachers staring at me.

Masterror made me write a 100 times on the invisible board:

I will not burn people up.

After that, he made me write another 100 times:

I will not drown people either.

Of course, since it was an invisible board, no one knew that I had written it a 100 times so he made me write it again. He seems to get a kick out of being mean. I tried over lunch break to get chatty with my old friends but . . .
Blank stayed blank and did not show himself to me at all. Vamp Iyer told me vampires were allergic to the smell of burnt capes. Anna Conda stayed stuck to the pea-brained TRex throughout, hanging on to his words, or growls or whatever.

At home, it wasn't any better. Mom acted like I'd cut up all her dreams into ribbons. Like it was her who was featured burning up the crowd and flooding up the building. Dad kept saying he'd told her so! (‘He's just a normal kid! Even the dustbin has more superpowers. C'mon, look how crushed he is with these ridiculous expectations you have of him. Have you looked at the kid?')

Gra hobbled in. ‘Oh, I saw the lid. The dustbin lid. I thought it would make a great hat.'

That's the way it went. Home to school to home. All equally miserable!

The classes were getting worse too.

There was this idiotic class called Super Sight. You were supposed to be able to look through the wall and see what was behind it—X-ray vision, kind of.

Slime Joos turned out to be really good at it. ‘Double-Headmistress is in her office, phoning your dad about chucking you out of school, SuperZero,' he said. ‘I can see through all the walls from here to her office, and can
hear through them too.'

Everyone thought that was really funny. What was this? Be Mean to SuperZero Day/Week/Month?

‘What's behind this cloak?' asked Masterror, holding up a red cloak over the table one day when we walked in. ‘Whoever guesses gets it! And I promise you it's really grrrrrrrreat!'

I'd show them! I glared hard at the cloak. I was bent on proving that I had as much super sight as the next guy.

‘Er . . .' started Anna Conda, frowning in concentration, ‘it's round with a handle at the end. It's a saucepan.'

‘No,' said Slime Joos squinting hard. ‘It's bouncing! It's a beach ball.'

‘A beach ball with a handle?' laughed Anna Conda.

Masterror shook his head. ‘No. Try harrrrder, class! Fow-cussss! Feel the red beams from your eyes drrrrill into that cloak!'

‘It's milk!' shouted Vamp Iyer suddenly, whooping with delight.

‘Milk?' Masterror snapped. ‘MILK? Milk which is round and has a handle?'

‘A cow, I mean,' mumbled Vamp Iyer.

Everyone else guessed, but no one was quite right. Some kids guessed it was a buggy, a spacesuit, a spinning
top. Lizzie Lizard thought it was the world's biggest bee. And then it was only me and Blank left. ‘Where is Blank?' shouted Masterror. ‘Boy, are you cheating now? Have you disappeared behind the cloak to see what it is?'

We gasped because we heard thrashing and growling and whimpering (from Blank) from behind the cloak. Masterror was right. The dweeb had gone behind the cloak. And then a very terrified Blank ran out. Gripping his ankle was the world's ugliest, fattest beast. It was built like a sausage on four legs and wore a look even more menacing than Masterror's.

Masterror turned to us, to me in particular. ‘Well, I guess only one person's left to guess and even SuperZero can't get it wrong now! And the meanest dog in the world goes to SuperZero!' The class burst out laughing once more. I suspect they were all really relieved they hadn't won the prize.

‘BigaByte is a superdog,' said Masterror, ‘because he can eat anything, anything at all. In fact, he's up for adoption here because he ate his last owner's car. We can only hope the owner was not still in the car at the time.'

I looked dismally at the fat, brown sausage. There was no way I was going to get out of this one. Maybe I could train him to bite huge chunks of Masterror out from time to time. Besides, I've always wanted a dog. And even Mom couldn't say no to a dog that my school had given me.

‘C'mon, BigaByte,' I said.

Reluctantly, BigaByte let go of a howling Blank's ankle and turned his attention to me.

‘No, BigaByte, not me, I'm your new owner. No, no, nooooo . . .' I ran out of school with BigaByte charging behind me and the laughter of the entire class following.