The Superhero's Son Omnibus Volume 2

Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight

I ran up to the window of the escape pod's door and looked out. I expected to see the artificial rain generated by Tornadess, but instead I saw nothing but dark water passing us by as our pod zoomed through the deep, dark ocean to who knows where.

I turned around to face Mom, who was now sitting on one of the seats built into the wall of the pod. “Mom, why did you do that? We were supposed to stay on the Spinner.”

“I know,” said Mom. She rubbed her forehead and looked quite troubled. “I was just … well, I panicked. I thought that ugly witch was going to get us before Ted could save us. I didn't want them to take you away or kill me, so I thought I could save us both by ejecting our pod out into the ocean.”

I sighed in frustration. “But now Dad and Mimic are all alone against two very powerful superhumans. Even if they survive, how will they ever be able to find us? Do you even know where this pod is going?”

Mom shook her head. “No, I don't, but it's at least better than where we were, wouldn't you agree?”

“If we knew where it was going, yeah,” I said. I walked over to the seat opposite Mom and sat down on it. “But for all we know, we could just be going toward the ocean floor and we don't have any way of contacting the outside world.”

“Don't you have Valerie in your earcom?” said Mom. “I saw your father give you your earcom earlier.”

“Yes, I am here, Ms. Jason,” said Valerie, “but unfortunately, I am unable to connect with Genius's own earcom at the moment due to the distance between this pod and the Spinner. Nor can I contact any other vessel or satellite that would allow me to call for help.”

“Valerie just said that she can't help us,” I said. I rested my face in my hands and let out a sigh. “That means that we're on our own, unless the escape pod happens to have a pre-programmed destination in mind. Val? What do you think?”

“Unfortunately, I cannot help you because I am not as familiar with Pokacu tech as I could be,” said Valerie. “The best that I can tell is that you are indeed going deeper, but I do not know your exact destination or if your pod is going anywhere at all or if it is simply drifting aimlessly through the sea.”

I sighed again and raised my face out of my hands to look at Mom. “Valerie just said she doesn't know where we're going. So we could be going anywhere.”

“I'm sorry,” said Mom. “I just … I wasn't thinking. I got panicked. I was worried that Tornadess was going to kill us.”

“I know, Mom, I know,” I said. “You're even less powerful than me, but this is still a pretty dumb mistake to make. What if we get caught in a current and dragged to the bottom of the ocean? Or maybe just dragged far away from land and lose all our air?” I looked around suddenly. “Speaking of which, how come we aren't out of air yet?”

“Perhaps the escape pod is equipped with a few air tanks,” said Mom with a shrug. “But it doesn't really matter. I think we'll be safe regardless of what happens.”

“How do you know that?” I said, looking at Mom skeptically.

“I just do,” said Mom. “Your father will find us. He would never let us get away out of his sight like this, not for very long anyway.”

“But Dad was distracted by Ring Out and Tornadess,” I said. “Do you really think they would let him search for us?”

“Oh, I am more worried about those two mercenaries than I am about your father, actually,” said Mom. “Your father may not look like it, but he is still a strong neohero in his own right and never showed mercy to supervillains during his youth.”

“Do you mean he is going to kill them if he finds out that we're gone?” I said.

“Possibly, if they keep fighting,” said Mom, “but in all likelihood, he'll just break every bone in their bodies, tie them down so they can't escape, and then wait for the government to come and haul them away. He will probably find us before then, though, because his technology is a lot better than whatever the government has.”

Mom spoke very calmly and confidently, as if she was doing nothing more than stating a simple fact. I didn't understand how she could be so confident, though, especially when I looked out the window again and saw very little but darkness. All I heard was the sound of the escape pod moving through the water; aside from that, it was eerily quiet.

“So you're saying that all we need to do is just sit back and wait for Dad to find us?” I said, looking at Mom in disbelief. “Really?”

“Really,” said Mom. Then she leaned against the wall of the pod. “But if you want, you and Valerie can at least try to figure out our destination, if possible.”

I shook my head and slumped forward. “No, Valerie said she can't. So it looks like all we can do now is just sit back and wait and hope we don’t crash into an undersea cliff or something.”

“I know this is frustrating for you, Kevin, especially since you don't like waiting, but this is all we can do right now,” said Mom. “Think of it this way: At least Robert can't get you down here.”

I looked up at Mom with worry. “How do we know? What if he's stolen water breathing powers from a neohero who can do that?”

“Kevin, you're starting to sound paranoid,” said Mom. “If Robert had that power, Cadmus would have told us.”

“But he himself said that they don't know what all of Robert's powers might be,” I said. I glanced at the ceiling, picturing Robert standing on top of the pod and punching his way through the ceiling, sending ocean water cascading into the tiny space. “If Robert attacks now, there's literally no way that we can fight back against him.”

“Then we are lucky that he hasn't chosen to do that,” said Mom. “And until he does show up, I think we should just try to keep calm and wait. There's no point in getting worried or wasting air, especially when we can't do anything about it.”

I hated to admit it, but Mom was right. I couldn't do anything about this situation. Even if I had my powers, I wouldn't have been able to do much, because my superpowers didn't include the ability to breathe underwater. Then again, if I had had my superpowers, maybe I would have been able to help Dad fight those mercenaries.

I sat against the back of the pod, not saying anything, just listening to the sound of the water rushing by. I kept wondering whether we were going to crash into the ocean floor or into something else, but Mom didn't look nearly as worried as she did before. In fact, she looked quite relaxed, even humming a soft tune under her breath. That was a habit Mom did whenever she was bored, but I thought she should be taking this situation more seriously, even though I wasn't sure how to convince her to do that.

Valerie was pretty silent, too, probably because she was just as powerless as Mom and I at the moment. Or maybe she was trying to connect with Dad or anyone else who could help us who might be nearby, but regardless, I didn't think it mattered much in the end. This pod was probably just going to keep drifting through the water until it either hit a whale or the ocean floor and killed us both.

Because I didn't like sitting around, I stood up and started pacing the length of the pod. It wasn't very long at all, but pacing back and forth made me feel like I was doing something and I did not like feeling powerless.

But that seemed to annoy Mom, because she said, “Kevin, will you please sit down again? You're making me nervous.”

I stopped and looked at Mom in disbelief. “So getting launched from the escape pod of a re-purposed alien spaceship into the deepest parts of the ocean doesn't make you nervous, but me pacing back and forth in front of you does?”

“I just think it isn't helping you relax,” said Mom. “I can tell it's making you agitated. You're scowling, which is always how you look whenever you get agitated like this.”

I hadn't realized it, but I was indeed scowling. I wiped the scowl off my face, however, and said, “But I hate sitting down. I like being up and active. Even if it doesn't actually help us in this situation, it does make me feel better.”

“I know, but you're using up our air and we need to preserve as much as we can,” said Mom. “We don't know when your father will save us, so until he does, we need to be careful about preserving what air we do have.”

“If Dad saves us,” I said, though I sat down anyway. “I'm not sure anyone will be able to find us at this point. I think we're just going to … well, you know.”

Mom nodded, but I could tell that she was worried about me. Of course, she was my Mom, so it made sense that she was worried about me, but I didn't want her to be, even if I appreciated it, because I didn't want Mom getting stressed out in what was already a very stressful situation.

That was when Mom said, “Kevin, did I ever tell you why I married your father?”

I blinked. This seemed like a strange subject to bring up at this time, but I said anyway, “No, you haven't. I just assumed it was because you loved him.”

“That's true,” said Mom. “I do love him. And I did marry him because I loved him. He's a wonderful man, but we didn't necessarily get along when we first met each other.”

“What do you mean?” I said. “Was it a personality clash or something?”

“Not really,” Mom said. “While your father's personality was a little hard for me to get used to, since he can be rather cold and impersonal at times, that wasn't the thing that kept me from loving him.”

“Then what was?” I said. “What do you mean?”

“It was his superpowers,” said Mom. “You see, Kevin, I used to be prejudiced against superhumans, whether they were heroes, villains, or whatever. I didn't like any of them.”

“Really?” I said. “But your brother was the Crimson Fist, right?”

“Yes, Uncle Jake was a neohero, but …” Mom looked away. “He was a big part of the reason I hated neoheroes, actually.”

“What?” I said. “I thought you and Dad respected Uncle Jake a lot. In fact, you gave me my middle name in honor of him. I don't understand what you mean.”

“It was silly,” said Mom. She was starting to look embarrassed. “Jake's powers developed when we were both teenagers, not long after the first superhumans showed up on Earth. Lots of people back then hated and feared superhumans, but a lot of people also loved them and thought they were great, including my own parents.”

“You mean Grandpa and Grandma,” I said. Then I caught myself, remembering my parents' less than cordial relations with Grandpa and Grandma, and said, “Oh, sorry. I shouldn't have mentioned them.”

“No, it's all right,” said Mom. “Your grandparents loved Jake. They showered him with attention and praise for his powers and how he used them to fight crime. It was your grandfather, actually, who designed Jake's first superhero costume for him and who also gave the NHA some money to get started.”

“What? Really?” I said in surprise. “But then why are my grandparents so hostile to Dad?”

“Because they think he is at least partly responsible for Jake's death at the hands of Master Chaos,” said Mom. “But it doesn't matter. What matters is that I got jealous of Jake, because I didn't think he'd done anything to earn my parents' praise except be born with special powers. I even believed my parents didn't love me as much as Jake.”

“Did they?” I said.

Mom just sighed. “I don't know, because it has been a long time since I last spoke with them, but I don't think they really did. I was just jealous of the attention he got, which made me hate neoheroes, even though they had never done anything to harm me.”

“Then how did you end up falling in love with Dad?” I said. “Wouldn't your hatred of neoheroes make you hate him, too?”

“I didn't know he was a neohero when I first met him,” said Mom. “Jake introduced me to your father, but it wasn't until we were dating for a year that he actually revealed his secret identity to me. He wasn't sure how I'd take it, but he told me anyway because he wanted to marry me and didn't want to keep any secrets from me.”

“How did you react?” I said.

“I was angry and hurt at first because he had been keeping secrets from me,” said Mom. She shook her head. “But when I realized that your father was just being honest, I forgave him. I loved him too much to reject him because of his powers, because I had seen just how great a man he was and I realized it would be foolish if I rejected him because of something he was born with.”

“What about the fact that he was a superhero who put himself in life-threatening dangers, though?” I said. “Didn't that ever worry you?”

“It did, especially after you were born,” said Mom. “Before you were born, I was able to tolerate it, but when you were born, I didn't like not knowing if your father would get killed by some crazy supervillain. Especially after Jake was killed by Master Chaos and your father went after him; I worried that Chaos would kill Ted, too.”

“But he didn't,” I said. “And Dad retired, right?”

“Right,” said Mom. “He realized that you would need a father in your life if you were going to grow up better than he did.”

I frowned. “Better than he did? What do you mean?”

Mom shook her head. “Oh, it's nothing. You don't really need to know about it.”

“Yes, I do,” I said. “How was Dad raised? Why didn't he want me to be raised that way? What were his parents like?”

I asked these questions because I honestly didn't know much about Dad's parents. I knew about Grandpa and Grandma, who were Mom’s parents and who I had met when I was younger, but I had never met Dad's parents. I was always under the impression that they had both died sometime before Dad met Mom, but when I thought about it, neither Mom nor Dad ever actually confirmed that for me.

Mom again looked away. She started playing with her blue necklace, like we were getting into territory that she didn't want to talk about. That, of course, just made me even more curious than before.

“Mom?” I said. “Why are you not answering my questions about Dad's parents?”

At first, I thought Mom was just going to keep ignoring my questions, but then she looked at me and said, “Because I promised your father that I wouldn't.”

“What?” I said. “Why would you promise that to Dad? What—”

All of a sudden, the escape pod shuddered and came to a stop. The stop was so abrupt that I was thrown to the floor, while Mom instinctively grabbed onto the arms of her seat to keep herself from falling down with me.

“What's happening?” said Mom, looking around the still pod in fear. “Why did the pod stop?” She looked down at me. “Kevin, are you okay?”

I pushed myself up and rubbed my forehead, which hurt from where I had hit it on the floor. “Yeah, but I don't know what's happened. Valerie, can you tell if we've stopped somewhere?”

“Unfortunately, Bolt, I am unable to do that,” said Valerie. “We are still too deep underwater for me to connect with a satellite or something else that could help me figure out where we are.”

“Maybe the pod has finally reached its destination?” said Mom. “Perhaps there is a secret underwater government base that it is supposed to go to when it is launched.”

“Maybe,” I said as I got into a sitting position. I looked up at the door, but I did not see anything except water through the window. “Let me go check—”

The pod shook again and started moving, causing Mom to redouble her grip on the seat's arms, while I grabbed my seat and looked around in alarm.

“Why is it moving again?” said Mom. “Where are we going?”

“I don't know,” I said. “But it feels like we're going up, doesn't it?”

“It does,” said Mom. “But what does that mean? Where are we going up to?”

“Guess we're about to find out,” I said.

Soon, I heard the pod rise out of the water, followed by what sounded like a metal opening being closed underneath us. Then the pod stopped rising, but I could not hear anything on the outside that might have told us what was out there. Mom and I sat very still for a couple of minutes, listening in silence, but it was absolutely quiet on the outside, so quiet that I couldn't even hear the water.

“Are we … in some kind of underwater base?” Mom whispered. She was gripping the arms of her seat so tightly that her knuckles had gone white.

“Not sure,” I whispered in an equally low voice. “Let me go check.”

I stood up, but then Mom grabbed my arm and said, “Kevin, please don't. What if it's a villain or something dangerous out there? You don't have your powers anymore, so you couldn't defend yourself.”

“Mom, it's fine,” I said. “I'm just going to peek out the window. If I see anyone, I'll duck so they won't see me.”

Mom looked extremely reluctant to let go of me, but she must have trusted me, because she finally let go and said, “Okay, Kevin, but please be careful. We have no idea what is out there.”

I nodded and then slowly made my way over to the door, keeping doubled over so that no one on the other side would be able to see me.

Reaching the door, I raised my head just high enough to peer through the window. I couldn't see much due to how small the window was, but I could see we had been pulled into the interior of what looked like some kind of ship. It looked like a spaceship, reminding me of the interior of the Spinner, but it looked entirely empty, almost lifeless. A blinking red light came from the right, but I couldn't see the light itself.

“What do you see?” Mom whispered. “Is anyone out there?”

“No,” I whispered back, shaking my head. “It looks abandoned. Maybe there's no one—”

All of a sudden, I saw fast movement on the other side and the door to the escape pod was jerked open. Before I could react, something hot and sticky struck me in the stomach and knocked me backwards onto the floor at Mom's feet.

“Kevin!” Mom shouted. “Are you okay?”

I was about to answer, but then a shadow appeared in the entrance to the pod and I forgot how to speak when I saw what it was:

The creature standing in the entryway to the pod was a real, live Pokacu alien. And it was aiming its organic cannon at us.