Five Minutes Before Disaster...

  Aiden sighed and wiped the beads of sweat off his brow. His back ached from bending over nearly the entire day, scraping grime out of the pavement in front of a hair salon. People had been walking in and out as he worked, throwing him odd looks, likely because no one liked having an ex-[Villain] outside their property. But it was a necessary evil to have perfectly clean curbs.

  Sure, the rest of the streets were machine-cleaned each morning, but human intervention was often needed to get the grime in the corners. It was a low-paying strenuous job that no one wanted to do. So why not assign it to ex-cons and ex-[Villains] alike?

  Luckily, it only had to be done once every six to eight months, and he was almost done with this stretch.

  He glanced at the salon just as two heads snapped out of view and the curtains fell.

  No one had confronted him yet, so that was good at least. They’d all just watched him work through the glass walls, with various contraptions in their hair. Like he was a spectacle.

  Aiden cracked his neck as the heat bore down even more on him. He wondered why the sun chose this particular day to blare down with all its vengeance. To make this worse, Eddie was supposed to be here two hours ago to help, but the man was late as usual.

  Ever since he discovered that Aiden would cover for him in front of their parole officer, Eddie had stopped making a concerted effort to show up on time. Of course, this was partially Aiden’s fault for allowing this behavior. It was just that Eddie already had so many problems and Aiden often felt sorry for him and didn't want him to get in trouble too. He was a nice guy–for a three-time armed robber–and to be fair, he’d agreed to cover for Aiden weeks ago so he could take Lexie home early.

  Plus he was covering for him on Lexie's birthday too.

  But his tardiness was getting out of hand.

  Aiden groaned a little as he cracked his back. And then he pulled up his system screen, noting that he had a text message from Eddie.

  Sorry! I’ll be there soon. Got caught up in traffic.

  Aiden frowned. You don’t drive Eddie, he responded.

  The answer came after a few seconds. No, but my girl does. She’s giving me a ride today.

  His girl? Which one?

  One of Eddie’s biggest problems was women. In that he had way too many of them, concurrently and consecutively, and each one he told Aiden about was more toxic than the last. During their last conversation, Eddie had told him about the recent girlfriend, who’d chased him around his house with a gun while he was in his underwear. And twice more, she'd stabbed him with a knife because he'd done something to annoy her.

  Eddie was thinking of proposing to that very same woman.

  Aiden had spent hours talking him out of it, trying to show him that what they had wasn’t love and wasn’t something sustainable. He'd asked Eddie, "Do you want someone that unstable to be the mother of your children? Can you trust her to take care of your daughter or son while you're not there? What about if something were to happen to you and she had to take care of you and not stab while she was at it? Can you trust her with that?"

  Aiden had also pointed out Eddie’s many flaws and showed him how he wasn’t ready for a relationship yet. And Aiden thought at the end of his lecture, he’d gotten Eddie to see sense.

  The problem was that Eddie could only stay sensible for so long.

  Evidenced by how he replied to Aiden’s message now with a guilty-looking upside-down smiley face.

  Which meant he was with her, the stabber, and she was the one driving him here.

  Aiden rolled his eyes. I don’t know who’s worse. Him or Max.

  Just be careful, Aiden texted. With the stories he’d heard of this girl, he wouldn’t be surprised if one wrong word would have her veering her vehicle off a bridge in an elaborate murder-suicide.

  Awww. Is the big bad wizard worried about me? was Eddie’s response.

  I’m worried about not finishing our quota and having to do extra work to make up for it.

  Yeah, yeah, quotas, schmotas. I know you love me.

  Eddie attached a bunch of kissy faces that made Aiden shake his head in consternation. He uses more emojis than my daughter.

  Just get here as soon…and safely as possible.

  Alright, I will. You want to say hi to Mirabel? She’s in a good mood today.

  Aiden really didn't but he couldn’t figure out a way to turn him down without offending Eddie. And truthfully he wasn’t actually worried about offending Eddie, but he was concerned that Eddie would relay his refusal to Mirabel leading her to mark Aiden on her list of enemies. Maybe she would even include him in that murder-suicide she was likely planning.

  Aiden didn’t want to be her friend either because that seemed almost as dangerous as being her enemy.

  I have to get back to work. But send my regards to her, Aiden texted back and then closed out his system interface to crack his neck again. His joints were killing him. He turned back to observe the traffic-choked street as the sun finally began its descent.

  Aiden supposed there was one good thing about this assignment. On the horizon were rows of buildings that covered the street where Lexie’s school was nestled.

  He smiled.

  She was waiting for him in school today. He could tell from the dot that blinked at the corner of his map at all times. It was from the nifty little tracking device he’d ‘borrowed’ from Max and snuck into Lexie’s favorite hairpin. He felt bad doing it but the tracking device was necessary. It was also how he knew that his daughter frequently took trips to the town center after school, instead of waiting for him on campus like she was supposed to.

  Sometimes, he felt a little bad about keeping tabs on her this way. It was the sort of thing parents weren’t supposed to do right? It was an invasion of privacy and he knew that as a teenager, it was the exact type of ‘controlling behavior’ that drove a wedge between him and his father.

  How ironic.

  Then again, this was the only way he could ensure his daughter's safety. Lexie was a special sort of child and far too inquisitive for her own good. He didn't know where she got it from, but he did know she had a knack for getting into trouble and he needed to be prepared.

  So far, though, she hadn’t gone anywhere worrisome. She mostly went to the mall, probably to play games with her friends, and then sometimes to the stadium, where they held AFC matches. He imagined that was for Xena’s benefit. Lexie insisted that she wasn’t friends with Xena but Aiden wasn’t so sure about that, especially after Xena came to visit her that night.

  Sure the two might have had a rocky start, but so did he and Max and they were friends now. Or something like that. Anyway, Aiden didn’t stop Lexie's excursions because it was all in this general area and it was probably safe. It was good that she was making friends and doing more than obsessively studying every day. And there were worse things that she could have been doing than wandering a few kilometers away.

  But today she was at school, waiting for him like she was supposed to.

  It made him even more eager to finish his work so he could go see her. Excitement bubbled up as he imagined going to pick her up. She usually smiled when he approached. Her pigtails would often bounce as she trotted over to him and took his hand. Her eyes glittered like her mother’s used to.

  Sometimes, he got really depressed with the turns his life had taken. But then he only had to think of his daughter to cheer him right back up. She was the only thing that made life worth living.

  Aiden stretched for the last time during this break. He needed to at least finish this pavement before he went home. And then Eddie could finish the rest as a way to make up for not being here on time.

  But as he worked for the next few minutes, Aiden began to feel something. A skittering at the base of his spine. Almost like a warning.

  He instantly tensed.

  Aiden didn’t have premonitions nor did he have magic, but being a [Hero] for so long, he had a sixth sense for when disaster was about to strike. It was something many heroes had and wasn’t linked to their powers so much as it was to their instinct. Like soldiers who had spent too much time in warzones.

  He straightened and looked around, trying to perceive where the danger was coming from. Horns blared in traffic. A mother and son jogged across the zebra crossing ignoring a man in a taxi yelling at them. At the coffee shop across the street, two men stood and shook hands, as their business concluded.

  None of it was out of the ordinary.

  And then he heard it, the thing that was likely what raised his alarm in the first place. A light whistling sound that was almost imperceptible, blending in with the general noise of the busy street.

  But the more he tuned in, the louder it got.

  Right as he heard it, he saw something whizzing through the air, arching in the sun.

  It was heading behind the building that shielded Lexie's school.

  “No.” The word left him in a rush of breath, but the whisper of horror was all he could manage. He couldn't scream out a warning, couldn't move. Couldn't look away.

  In an instant, his breath seized. His heart stopped beating. His muscles all sagged as every strength fled him and he could only track the trajectory of the tiny dot in the sky before it landed.

  Run.

  But he couldn’t. He was far too logical sometimes and he knew he wouldn’t make it in time.

  While he was frozen, he felt the delay, felt that the explosion wasn't going off. He almost began to believe that he was wrong, or that he was seeing things.

  But then it went off.

  Boom!

  “No!” The word burst out of his mouth

  The sound galvanized him with an energy borne of pure terror. Chaos hit the crowds. People screamed and horns blared more aggressively.

  Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

  His legs shook, even as his lungs drew tight. He couldn’t breathe.

  This couldn't be happening.

  Then he began to run, fear racing through him as he screamed, “Lexie!”

  Five Minutes Before Disaster…

  Lucy Frank frowned at her computer.

  Well, she called it a computer, but it was more so a screen connected to a series of servers, with which she was running permutations and combinations on the likelihood of disaster striking in the next five minutes.

  Arithmancy was a relatively new affixation, and so very few people understood exactly how her powers worked. And she supposed it was partially her fault because she liked to keep it simple with the whole “can figure out an enemy’s next ten moves” schtick that was basically her catch phrase. As the associations’ brand manager, Lola Gherkin liked to say, 'simplicity is the key to perfecting a hero's brand.' And so Lucy had kept hers simple, using that catchphrase whenever she was asked.

  But it wasn’t as easy as it sounded.

  In reality, her enemy's next ten moves could be anything out of trillions of possibilities, and Lucy had to calculate the likelihood of every single one. And yes it was a lot of work and her powers merely cut down that time by nudging her in the right direction. Rather than divination, her powers worked by setting up mathematical formulas for each of her enemies. It was a bit more than that, but that was the long and short of it. It often took her forever, especially at the start of a mission when she was collating data.

  Luckily, she’d had a tehcnomage build this system for her, so she could visualize the algorithm as she worked, rather than just have zeroes and ones running in her mind, giving her a headache.

  Despite her powers, Lucy wasn’t all-knowing, not even close. She worked with probabilities and likelihoods and only acted when a certain score was above 80% accuracy. Her power was also governed by a few rules. She was better at figuring out the moves of individuals than groups. The more she knew about the target, the more accurate her prediction was too. And usually, smaller-scale events that were close to happening, were easier to predict than larger-scale events that further down the timeline.

  She’d run the calculations over and over again today and so she knew that, a few minutes from now, a small-scale event was set to occur in Arcadia, really close to the coffee shop she sometimes liked to work in because they had the best lattes in the city.

  It was probably going to be triggered by the GLITCH gang, an anti-government terrorist group who had claimed responsibility for the disaster in Alpeco. There were hints that they were planning something similar, but bigger in Arcadia.

  It was Lucy’s job to figure out exactly what.

  Here was what she knew:

  The gang had struck thrice in the last six months.

  They’d struck highly populated wealthy areas, governmental buildings, or historical landmarks. They caused chaos and then looted the surrounding areas. But they always scattered right before the [Heroes] arrived.

  That meant that Lucy had to time everything exactly right, and the [Heroes] had to arrive before disaster struck.

  That was why they relied on Lucy's power.

  Luckily, Lucy lived in Arcadia and had a bunch of information about the city which made things easier for her. She’d been able to use the information on population density, traffic patterns, travel logs, and a bunch of other things to narrow down three possible locations for the bomb.

  She had a [Hero] staking out each location, giving her more information that would help her with her calculations.

  She tapped a button on her earpiece, connecting her to one of them. “Eagle.”

  “Yes ma’am,” the girl answered instantly, anxiety in her voice. “Is it happening?”

  “No, not yet. But I need you to tell me what you see. Any funny movements?”

  “Um...I’m not sure exactly what counts as funny.” Eagle was currently in Longview, a heavily populated shopping district with rows of designer stores. "A lady just walked by with a tiny dog wearing tiny headphones. It had purple fur too.”

  Yup, that was typical for Longview. It was where the rich and powerful got clothes for themselves and their strange-looking pets. “No, that’s not it. Keep an eye out for abnormal behavior. Anyone looking extra watchful or tense, or lingering around the same area for too long.”

  “Yes can do, boss lady!”

  “I’m not your boss,” Lucy reminded the girl for what felt like the thousandth time. “Just Lucy is fine.”

  “Yes Ms. Lucy! Sorry about that.”

  Lucy sighed and disconnected the call. While the extreme deference was grating, Lucy reminded herself that Desert Eagle–real name Isobel Aureliano– was still just a student, a senior at the Arcadian School for Late in Life Heroes (or as most people knew it, Hero Community College).

  Lucy had needed a small number of lowkey, relatively-unknown [Heroes] for this stake-out mission because with high-profile [Heroes] on the case, news might have gotten out and it would have spooked GLITCH or had them changing their plans. She’d selected a handful of volunteers mostly from schools in the area. Eagle had been chosen because of her exceptional far-reaching eyesight and her high combat scores. But the thing about working with students was that they were eager to please, especially when they were from lesser-known schools like Isobel's.

  Because, unless they came from a good school like Victoire, they needed a list of recommendations to be able to join the Hero Association officially.

  Lucy had asked for help from Victoire too, but they were pretty picky about the missions they sent their students on and apparently, this one didn’t make the cut.

  Lucy connected to the second student at the second location, who answered, “Talk to me, pretty lady.”

  Lucy ground her teeth. She didn't have to remind him of her name. He knew it but he just chose not to use it. “Do you see anything strange?”

  “Other than this nerd crying his eyes out then no,” Tremor said languidly. He was at the Honeylake pier, close to the Arcadian Research College.

  “What does he look like?”

  “Pale. Skinny. Nerd-like.” He cocked his head. “He must have really bombed his test or something because he’s been bawling for the last thirty minutes. Ope, and now he’s climbing onto the guard railings in front of the lake. He’s probably going to jump but he’s taking a dramatic pause before he does it, just in case someone wants to stop him. Everyone is kind of ignoring him though. Do you think I should tell him that the lake bend is only about five feet deep? It would be pretty embarrassing if he tried to kill himself and only got submerged from the chest down.”

  “Do you see anything else?”

  “Nope. But I better go talk him off the ledge. He might hurt the fish. Hey buddy–!”

  Lucy hung up the call and rubbed her temples. Anxiety rolled through her but she wasn’t sure if it was mere battle-readiness or something else. Something bugged her about this whole thing. It felt like there was a piece of the puzzle missing.

  Before she could check on her third agent, her earpiece buzzed to life and a familiar, smooth tone said, “Luce.”

  Suddenly, her heart began racing for a whole different reason and her face flushed.

  “Hey,” she said, unable to keep the slight breathlessness from her voice. “I didn't know you were assigned to this case.”

  “I wasn’t.” Theo Firebringer sounded like he was flying as he spoke. “But I found out you were on a case with the same guys that plotted the Alpeco fiasco, and kind of invited myself on.”

  “How did you find out?” Her mission, as most of them were, was top secret. The fewer people knew, the fewer details she had to account for and the more accurate her findings were.

  “Used my mom’s access card to hack into case files.”

  “That’s dangerous, Theo. You could get suspended for that. Not to mention your involvement might mess with my calculations.”

  “I know. That’s why I haven’t done anything till now. And I’m talking to you directly because I found something out that I think might help. Forensics evaluated the bomb they planned to use in Alpeco that was caught before it detonated. They suspect trace levels of transient mana in its core.”

  Lucy blinked. “What? That wasn’t included in the file they sent over.”

  “Yeah, I know. Which is weird because that seemed like vital information, but maybe they only found out recently. Or maybe since they were sending over so many files, they missed one.”

  Lucy bit her lip and closed her eyes taking deep breaths. Great. Now she would have to redo her calculations all over again.

  But it was probably for the best. Maybe this would clue her in on what bugged her about his case. The niggling in the back of her brain was annoying and it wouldn't rest until she had a complete picture.

  She had to take the information apart piece by piece and put it back together again integrating the new details.

  Bombs were GLITCH’s main MO. Typically, though this only happened around election periods or to protest a new mandate the government was introducing.

  But there was nothing like that happening which meant there had to be another reason they were doing this.

  The motive could be just causing general chaos but then what was the end goal?

  Unless…the chaos was the goal?

  Transient mana in a bomb wasn’t a good thing at all. Even trace levels were dangerous enough to disrupt the external mana of the immediate environments. Mana bombs didn’t just cause temporary destruction, they destabilized the entire mana atmosphere. At best, they messed with the capes’ powers. At worst, they made it such that the environment was uninhabitable for mages for weeks to years. That was because they made the external mana in the atmosphere unstable which then caused pathway damage every time a mage tried to use their powers.

  And if it wasn’t just a bomb with transient mana, but a mana bomb….

  Lucy took a breath. The rest of the bombs were regular.

  But they had trace levels of mana in one of the bombs that didn't go off in Alpeco.

  The rest of the information was organized around those two pieces almost as though trying to form a pattern to lead her in a certain direction. One and zeroes ran on screen.

  Suddenly her mind was flooded with images and pictures and numbers and information that threatened to blow her pathways wide open, but she took breaths and managed it.

  And then her eyes popped open.

  “It’s a distraction,” she said. “The other bombs were a distraction.”

  At the same time, her headpiece buzzed, cutting out her call with Theo. Freezeframe, the third Hero student she’d gotten for this case, suddenly announced loudly, “I found it!”

  “What?”

  “The bomb! I saw a strange-looking guy on top of a building and then I yelled at him. He had a launcher and he shot the bomb in the air, and it went off but I caught it in time. I already froze it, but only for less than thirty seconds. I need to get it disabled but I don't know where to–"

  “No,” Lucy said suddenly, her heart racing with the new information she just found out. “You don't have time.”

  “What?”

  “You need to head to the pier now and find the mana bomb. That’s the priority.” And her powers told her that time was of the essence. She quickly typed a message to the rest of the [Heroes] on standby, alerting them of a possible mana bomb on the pier. But she knew that Freezeframe in particular had to be there. His powers were needed.

  “But…”

  "Now, Freezeframe!”

  “Okay, but what am I supposed to do with this bomb? If I deactivate my powers it’s going to go boom! And I can’t port with it.”

  “Shit,” Lucy said.

  “Lucy?” Theo had come back on a second line and joined the call. “What’s happening?”

  “Give me a second.” She immediately opened up her system screen with a map of the area. Next, she opened up the basic building schematics and started typing as she worked. “Freezeframe, you're on the ground right?"

  "Uh yeah."

  Shit. It would be better if he were higher up but they didn't have time. "In a few seconds, you’re going to turn the bomb to target your twelve o'clock”

  “My twelve o'clock is a school building.”

  “Yes.”

  He paused and then his voice was partially shocked and partially horrified. “You want me to throw a bomb at a school?”

  “It’s an elementary school.”

  “Uh, yeah, I’m not sure how that makes it better.”

  “School got out hours ago. It’s Friday so today was likely a half day. I doubt there’s anyone still in the building, but just in case, I just had security turn on the alert to evacuate the building. We’ll give them a few seconds to do that and then you’ll let go.” She sensed his hesitation and she said. “It’s the only building in the area with reinforced absorbent walls. That will not only neutralize the blast, it will also partially contain it. And probably no one will get hurt in the blast as long as they’re not standing right by the windows, which the alert specifically says to avoid.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure, I ran the math.” And according to her calculations, if he threw the bomb in the next ten seconds and it hit the building the likelihood of everyone surviving was above 90%. The likelihood of everyone avoiding injury was 80%. That was as sure as she got. She could live with those odds.

  “Ten seconds. We don’t have time.”

  “Lucy, I'm headed your way,” Theo interrupted. “About to grab a teleport.”

  “No, go to the pier instead. That’s where I predict the mana bomb is. That’s the immediate danger.”

  “I’m not sure about this…” Freezeframe said.

  “We don’t have time!” she snapped. “Just do it and port to the pier. If that mana bomb goes off there, we’re all in huge trouble.”

  Freezeframe released a breath. “Alright.” But he didn’t sound happy about his assignment.

  After the line disconnected she took a breath. Her head hurt already and she was likely going to have some backlash from how hard she pushed her powers just then.

  “Luce…”

  “Oh, you're still here.” She was slightly embarrassed that Theo had heard her all panicked and bossy.

  “Yeah. Just wanted to let you know that I’ll head to the school first and make sure it’s evacuated. Help deal with the chaos the bomb might cause,” he said.

  “You don’t have to.” She read between the lines and knew what he meant by that. And she was fully prepared to take responsibility for whatever might happen.

  “You’re not handling this alone. And I'm not letting you take the fall for anything. I’ll be there soon."

  Theo hung up and Lucy shook her head. She reminded herself that Theo only saw her as a friend/student mentor and it was extremely ridiculous for her to have a crush on a self-confessed commitment-phobe who was two years her junior.

  So yeah, I'll read over the next chapter one more time and post it!