Velveteen vs. the Junior Super Patriots (15 page)

Most of the questions were soft, easy, and almost cliché. What was it like to have super powers? Did they ever miss going to regular school, with regular kids? Did they feel like they were better than the regular kids? Was there ever any fighting amongst The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division? (The correct answers were, of course, “it’s wonderful,” “sometimes, but I know this is for the best,” “no, not at all, just different,” and “no, never, we’re like a family.” It was okay to change the wording enough to keep the interviewers from realizing just how well-coached the kids were; that didn’t mean it was okay to go off script completely. Once, Velveteen said that having super powers was better than Christmas, and got a long lecture on maintaining the proper image, followed by two weeks of extra lessons with Marketing. She wasn’t planning to do it again, but boy, it had been worth it for the look on the interviewer’s face.)

The questions got harder toward the end of the interview, and Velveteen found herself taking Sparkle Bright’s hand, as much to comfort herself as to comfort Sparks. The man from Marketing who’d been monitoring the entire process from the discrete distance signaled for the interviewer to wrap it up, probably sensing that something inappropriate was about to be asked. The interviewer ignored him, leaning forward conspiratorially as she asked, “So, girls, tell me—are the rumors true? Does one of you have a crush?”

Sparkle Bright turned an immediate and vivid red. Velveteen squeezed her hand, and the red shifted to an equally vivid purple as panic made Sparks turn her powers on.

“I believe this interview is over,” said the man from Marketing. And then it was back into the van and back to the compound, with Sparkle Bright staring resolutely out the window the whole way, refusing to talk to anybody, even Velveteen. Vel watched her friend, worried. She hadn’t known Sparks had a crush on anybody, much less one that big.

What if it was Aaron?

But before she could dwell on that strangely, deeply upsetting idea, it was time to change into the special Halloween versions of their costumes and spend the night handing out candy to wide-eyed kids who couldn’t stop staring. The whole thing made Velveteen’s chest ache. Maybe her home life hadn’t been the best, but she’d been able to spend Halloween nights in a costume that
she
chose, not one designed for her by a committee and approved by a series of focus groups, and she’d been able to go from door to door, asking strangers for candy, without a news crew following her every step of the way. She was a superhero now. She
liked
being a superhero.

She just didn’t like anything about it.

*

Even on Halloween, lights-out was set for nine-thirty, no argument or negotiation. For once, Velveteen went willingly, grateful for the chance to get away from the rest of the team, from Marketing’s constant assessments, and from the way Sparks had been watching her own feet all evening long. Things were weird, and Vel didn’t like weird. She liked it when things stayed the way they were supposed to, and all the enemies were ones she was allowed to hit.

She brushed her teeth while the teddy bears made her bed and put her laundry into the hamper. They put themselves back on the shelf when they were done, and Vel crawled under the covers, pulling the pillow over her head. There was a click as one of the toy soldiers flipped the light switch, and everything went dark.

After a little while, Velveteen slept.

*

It was Halloween morning, and for some reason she couldn’t quite identify or name—“couldn’t put her finger on,” as David always said, usually while looking mournfully at his own massive claws—Velveteen was uneasy. She walked through the back halls of The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division housing compound, almost coming into sight of the training room before she stopped, frowning.

“Aar—Action Dude’s going to be in there, playing catch,” she murmured, and started walking again, faster now, practically jogging by the time she reached the door and peeked inside. There was Aaron, racing from one side of the field to the other, chasing the ball he was throwing to himself. Vel froze. She didn’t have any psychic powers, and she liked it that way. The last thing she wanted to do was start testing precog. Precogs went into a whole different training program. Precogs wound up on a whole different
team
.

Coincidence. Aaron spent a lot of time in the training room, since his powers were strong enough that he could seriously hurt somebody if he didn’t have them under careful control. So it was just a fluke, that was all. Anyway, she needed to head for makeup. Still . . .

“The Claw’s in the science wing arguing with his dad about genetic therapy,” she whispered, and looked to her left as she passed the door to the labs. There was David, waving his claws wildly as he tried to convince his father to try another means of curing him of his, um, lobster-ness.

Tears springing to her eyes, Velveteen broke into a run, not stopping until she reached makeup. Sparkle Bright wasn’t there. She remembered Sparkle Bright being there. She stopped, feeling as if a great weight had been lifted off her chest . . . and nearly broke into tears as Sparks walked up behind her, saying bemusedly, “Did you run all the way here? Gosh, Vel, are you okay?” (“Gosh” was, of course, on the team’s list of officially allowed “strong language.” They were all encouraged to practice it, so that it would sound natural during fights.)

“I’m fine,” said Velveteen, swallowing heavily. “Just fine.”

“Okay.” Sparkle Bright threw herself into her own makeup chair, starting to chatter happily about the upcoming appearance, and the brief freedom it would allow them. Velveteen didn’t pay any attention. She didn’t need to; when Sparks paused, she just made the appropriate noises and waited for the babbling to start up again.

What was going on?

*

The interview was hell the second time through; without the acting lessons and coaching she’d received, Velveteen wouldn’t even have been able to fake having fun.

Halloween was worse.

When bedtime finally came, she tumbled into bed before the bears were even done smoothing out the sheets, praying that this had just been a fluke, or a supervillain playing tricks, and that it would all be better when she woke up. It would all be okay.

*

It was Halloween morning.

Velveteen pled food poisoning as an excuse to stay in bed. She was pale and shaky enough that Marketing believed her, and allowed it, just this once.

*

“—hear me? Hello, can you hear me? Please, if you can hear me, do something. Nod your head. Better yet, open your eyes. Opening your eyes would be
awesome
.” The voice sounded calm until you listened closely; then it became clear that the speaker was somewhere pretty close to the verge of panic. She was working hard to hide it. She needed to work harder.

Velveteen didn’t recognize the voice. Or, she realized with relief, the words—if she was going precog, she hadn’t managed to precognate this. She was relieved enough to do as she was asked, and open her eyes. Then she blinked. That wasn’t her ceiling. She pushed herself up onto one elbow. This wasn’t her
room
. This was a big, vaguely creepy-looking room, with cobwebs in the corners and boards over all the windows. The wallpaper was flocked and peeling, which was normal enough, except that it was in a bats-and-pumpkins pattern. And this wasn’t her bed, unless she’d somehow acquired a four-poster overnight.

“Oh, thank the Great Pumpkin,” said the voice, now filled with its own measure of relief. “I wasn’t sure I could call you over.”

“Over
where
?” Velveteen looked to her left, and blinked again as she saw the girl sitting there. “And who are you?”

“Oh. Right. Hi.” The girl offered a wide, slightly sheepish smile. “I’m Hailey.”

“Vel.”

“I know.” Hailey looked about sixteen, with the sort of figure Velveteen was pretty sure she’d never have. Her hair was pale blonde, streaked with green and orange, and her clothes were weird, even by the standards of the superhero world. Striped purple and orange tights, a tattered black skirt, and a bright green tank top, with elbow-length fishnet gloves and bat-shaped hairclips wasn’t exactly what anybody was going to call “marketable.” She managed to clash with
herself
, and that was without accounting for the pumpkin-orange eyes and the green and purple nail polish. “Thanks for coming.”

“. . . I came somewhere?” Velveteen sat up the rest of the way, looking down at herself. She was wearing something that looked almost like the special Halloween costume Marketing had designed for her. Which was almost as weird as waking up somewhere that wasn’t her room, since she never went to bed in her costume. “Am I awake?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

Hailey blinked. “Not complaining, but you’re taking that pretty easy.”

Velveteen shrugged. “It’s part of the Heroing 101 lesson plan. If you find yourself in an altered reality, don’t fight against it. You’ll just hurt yourself and be stuck there longer.” She paused. “Am I stuck here? Is the rest of my team here? Are they okay?”

“Um, not exactly, no, and sort of for right now, but that’s why I need your help, and that’s why I’ve been trying to call you.”

“Okay.” Vel swung her feet around to the floor, focusing her attention on Hailey. “Where are we?”

“That was my first question when this happened to me,” said Hailey, shaking her head. “This may seem a little weird to you, and I’ll completely understand if you need a few minutes to wrap your head around it, although you can’t have much more than a few minutes, because we need to get moving as soon as we can. And I know this is going to seem like it’s just crazy talk, but—”

“We’re in Halloween, aren’t we? We’re in the place that Halloween comes from.”

“Well, technically, we’re in the Autumn Land. It’s just that it’s Halloween a lot of the time, because Halloween has a lot of power here.” Hailey was openly staring at her now, expression torn between “impressed” and “I don’t believe you just said that.” “But . . . how did you
know
?”

“Oh. That. I guess because of the cobwebs. And your tights. And the scarecrow that’s coming up behind you.” She paused. “Is it supposed to be there?”

“No!” shouted Hailey, whipping around. “Get out of here! I’ll hold him off!” The scarecrow—a huge, hulking thing that shed bits of hay and squiggling things with every step—moaned and lurched toward her as she moved her hands through the air in an arcane pattern.

Velveteen ran.

*

The house was a crumbling old Victorian, the sort that was always occupied by Vincent Price in the black-and-white movies the cable access channels all showed at midnight. Velveteen ran out the front door and down the porch before she turned around, staring wide-eyed at the building. She could see the boarded-up windows of the room where she’d woken. They were easy to spot; those were the only boards with beams of orange and purple light bursting out from between them. The light somehow managed to be nothing like Sparkle Bright’s. Sparks shot lasers, and this was more like . . . like glitter caught in smoke. It was strange. It was a little scary. And she really hoped it meant that Hailey was winning.

A hand grabbed her wrist. Stifling a scream, Velveteen whipped around, frantically reaching out with that weird toy-radar of hers to find something, anything, that she could animate. What she found was strange, and difficult to get a handle on. It was like everything was waiting for her orders, and nothing was waiting for her at all. And she had no idea what that meant.

The hand belonged to a little boy, six or seven at most, wearing a black cat costume and watching her gravely, eyes very green in his painted face. “You’re her,” he said, revealing several missing baby teeth in the process. “You’re the one Hailey went for.” Still grave, he looked her thoughtfully up and down. “Hope you’re worth it. C’mon.”

“What about Hailey? And who are you?” Velveteen pulled her wrist out of his hand, eyes narrowing. “What’s going on here?”

The little boy sighed, looking briefly much older. “I’m Scaredy Cat, Hailey can take care of herself, and what’s going on is an attempted takeover that we need to stop, unless you feel like finding out what happens when the monsters under your bed get rabies.”

“I—what—you—wait, what?”

Scaredy Cat sighed again. Speaking very slowly, like she was a particularly stupid child, he said, “We are standing in the middle of a big, wide, undefended street, surrounded by big, dark, scary buildings that could have just about anything inside of ’em. And this is Halloween, so ‘anything’ really means it. I don’t mind answering questions. Answering questions is pretty normal. But if we don’t go someplace safe for answering questions, we’re probably going to get attacked by something really nasty. Do you want to get attacked by something really nasty?”

Velveteen shook her head mutely.

“Good. Now come on.” Scaredy Cat turned and started walking down the street, leaving Velveteen to follow him.

Glancing back over her shoulder at the beams of light still bursting through the window, Vel followed.

*

“Autumn’s always been here,” Scaredy Cat said, apparently comfortable with giving her a history lesson as long as she kept on moving. “It’s changed a lot over the years—all the Seasons have changed a lot, since people change all the time—but it’s always Autumn Land underneath it all. The place where the leaves fall off the trees and the air goes cold and the walls get a little weird and thin. We have the hardest time keeping things under control here. Well, us, and Spring Land. At least they have Persephone to help when something goes wrong. We only get her passing through on the way to Winter, and she’s usually not in a fighting mood then. More in a ‘go away, leave me alone, I’m going to see my husband, take care of your own problems’ mood.”

“But this can’t be Autumn.” Velveteen ducked as she followed him through a hole in a long wooden fence. There was a barren field studded with haystacks on the other side. Haystacks, and scarecrows. That made her walk a little faster. “Autumn’s not a place, it’s a time.”