Seven Steps to Becoming a Superhero

Rachel entered her dorm with a flurry of emotions still running through her mind. Zack Keslter, now attending Innshadow University. Her ex-boyfriend certainly picked a great time to pop back into her life. Was he even her ex? They’d never officially broken up, but then again, Zack’s disappearing act two years ago made it very clear they weren’t a couple anymore.

Not knowing how Zack truly felt about her hurt more than all the pain and fear of her then-boyfriend’s initial disappearance. When she saw him standing there, like nothing happened, she reached for his mind, searching desperately for answers. But Zack pulled back, resisted her, showing a fear he’d never shown when they were together.

What happened to him in all that time that he’d react that way?

What was he so afraid of?

Then again, Rachel probably should have never probed into his mind so directly or so harshly. She would have never done that with anyone else. She felt beyond triggered but, whatever Zack’s faults, it wasn’t her finest moment either.

Her dorm looked relatively small - barely the size of two rooms, with just enough space for a small kitchenette sandwiched between the beds and the bathroom. At least they had a private bathroom - a rare commodity in the dorms.

Rachel was greeted by a loud and particularly wet sneeze as she entered the dorm.

“Ugh!” she heard her roommate cry after the sneeze.

“How’s it going?” Rachel asked.

Rachel turned to see her roommate sitting on the bed, her blonde hair damp from the shower. She wore a loose-fitting T-shirt and shorts, with her long legs running down to a pot of hot water at her feet. She looked up to Rachel with a miserable expression.

“Just peachy, roomie,” Blake said.

Blake had been giving a tour of the campus to a new student when she’d been caught up in the supervillain attack earlier today. She’d been on the receiving end of one of the ice blasts, and was now recovering from the ordeal. Rachel noted the pot of warm water Blake rested her feet in.

“Should you really be using that given your powers?” Rachel said.

“I’m fine,” Blake said with a shiver. “Haven’t fried myself yet. Though getting fried might be an improvement.”

Blake’s electrical powers were a relatively new development. Rachel could pick up surface thought since she turned twelve. Blake received her powers barely eight months ago, and still struggled to contain them.

“Is Perry around?” Rachel asked.

Blake wrapped her in the bed’s blankets as she shivered. “He went to get me a few supplies. He should be back soon. What’s up?”

Rachel paced around the dorm a bit. She considered not telling her roommate what had happened, but she’d already given up the ghost by her erratic pacing. She looked up to face Blake.

“I saw my ex today,” Rachel said.

Blake looked confused. “I thought you and Collin ended things pretty amicably last year. What’s the issue now?”

Rachel had met Collin at the newsroom. He was sweet - one of the few student journalists there who actually cared about reporting - and they hit it off, but the relationship had run its course by the end of the semester. Rachel met Blake’s gaze.

“Oh shit,” Blake said. “It was him.”

Rachel relayed Blake her sordid history with Zack over cocktails a couple of months ago. Rachel liked Blake - she was good for Perry, and her boisterous personality was starting to grow on her. She looked back to her roommate.

“What did he say?” Blake asked.

“Not much that I wanted to hear,” Rachel said. Blake gave him a questioning look.

“Did you read his mind?” she asked. Rachel looked away.

“Girl, that’s an invasion of privacy,” Blake said.

They were both quiet.

“What did you see?” Blake broke the silence.

“Nothing helpful. He pulled away,” Rachel said.

“Could he do that before?” Blake asked. Rachel turned to her.

“He usually didn’t have to. He was…scared of me…and I don’t know why,” Rachel said.

The door to the dorm opened before Rachel could go further. Perry walked in, holding a bag of groceries. He was a mousy young man, with glasses beneath a mess of brown hair. He handed the contents of the bag to Blake.

“Best boyfriend ever!” Blake exclaimed as she pulled out the chicken soup and Gatoarde. “Now I can get rid of this cold.”

“I feel it’s my solemn duty to inform you that being cold doesn’t in fact give you a cold,” Perry said.

Blake gave a particularly wet and throaty sneeze.

“So you’d like to immediately resume our lengthy make-out session?” she said as she sucked in the snot through her nostrils in a decidedly dramatic fashion.

Rachel grinned. For a guy who could operate like a human microscope, Perry remained understandably squeamish around germs.

“Point taken,” Perry said before noting Rachel and Blake’s postures. “Did I miss anything?”

Blake looked to Rachel, gesturing for her to tell him. Rachel didn’t want to. She didn’t want Perry to get his hopes up, but Blake made it impossible for her to do otherwise.

“Zack Kestler is here,” Rachel said suddenly. Perry nearly dropped the coffee he was making.

“Here?” he asked, if Zack would suddenly pop out of the closet.

“On campus,” Rachel said. “I saw him when I was gathering quotes for the Icer story.”

“That ice-cold jerk,” Blake swore. “Who uses ice powers in the middle of September? If I ever see him again…”

Perry ignored his girlfriend, keeping his focus squarely on Rachel.

“Where did you see him?” Perry asked.

“He’s renting a house just off-campus,” Rachel said. “On Seventh Street, I think.”

“And you approached him?” Perry said. “Rachel, that could have been dangerous!”

Rachel sighed. This is why she didn’t want to tell Perry in the first place - because of their theories.

“For all you know, it could have been a trap,” Perry said. “A clone. A robot. Maybe even someone wearing his skin..”

“Babe,” Blake urged. “Let her finish.”

“It’s not, Perry,” she said. “I read his mind, or tried to anyway. But I got enough to know it’s Zack.”

“It’s not conclusive though,” Perry said, throwing his arms across his chest.

Perry always held out hope that there was a logical conclusion behind Zack’s disappearances. Maybe one of Knightbrand’s enemies got a hold of him. Maybe he was abducted by aliens. Maybe he was chosen by an omnipotent being to compete in a contest of wills.

In their line of work, these things happened.

And she couldn’t fault Perry for wanting that explanation. The guy could see down to a molecular level. He wanted a logical explanation for what had happened - almost everything else in his life had one.

But people were messy. Complicated.

But Rachel knew the truth about what happened to Zack. Not all of it, but most of it, she believed. She had known the truth about Zack for a long time. She hadn’t told anyone - not Blake and certainly not Perry or Scott.

The truth cut into her like an open wound, untreated for all these years. What good would giving it to someone else do? So she helped with it, even though she wished things could be different.

“It’s him, Perry,” Rachel said. “He’s here.”

“I need to see him,” Perry said.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea, hon?” Blake spoke up. “Maybe he’ll fry you with his robo-death beams.”

Perry shot his girlfriend a frustrated glare.

“I’m sick, remember?” Blake said. “I can’t be responsible for what I say.”

“Or your taste in men,” Rachel said.

Perry turned to her. “When did this turn into two against one?”

Blake and Rachel both laughed.

“You picked a sharp one,” Rachel told her roommate.

“Didn’t I?” Blake smirked.

“You’re just trying to distract me,” Perry said. “Don’t change the subject!”

It was Blake who spoke up.

“Per-Bear…I know this is your friend but…he’s been gone for a long time,” Blake said, using her nickname for Perry. “Maybe he doesn’t want to be found.”

Rachel also backed her up on this. “I told her you were going here too. If he wants to meet up, that’s in his court.”

“Did you give him your address?” Perry asked.

Rachel rolled her eyes. She wouldn’t be that comfortable with Zack Kestler for a long time.

“No, Perry, I did not,” she said.

Perry sat down on the bed next to his girlfriend. He put his hands together. Blake reached up and began rubbing his shoulders.

“I just wish we knew what happened to him,” he said.

Rachel shrugged. She considered saying more, but she knew this really wasn’t the time.

“We do know what happened to him,” she said. “He changed. He’s not the same person we knew.”

The silence returned once more, and this time, no one in the room fought it.

Until Blake gave a long, hard sneeze.

“Ugh!” she cried in frustration once more.