As Fiona flails about. Screaming shrilly like only a child can. With all the heavy machinery in here, I discover the floor above us is soundproofed to hell and back.
"Mommy! Daddy! Help!" Fiona shrieks.
A moment later, our kidnapper decloaks as he kicks out a large vent.
Seriously, this is why all the vents in my old lairs were only four inches in diameter and lined with traps.
He leaps out into daylight and that's when I notice it.
The utility pack on his back is one of mine. A stealth package I whipped up for robbing banks. It even had my fucking logo on it- a gear that was also half-explosion, back from my IED days.
"You cheap knockoff son of bitch!" I punch for the man's face. "Give me back my stuff!"
I land one hit on his temple before he glares at me, and suddenly my head feels like it's being squeezed. "Shut up and go to sleep you little shits!"
Oh shit. He's one of those telekinetic types...
I notice through the pain that Fiona is also screaming; before a growing ringing in my ears and blood crawling down my neck indicate that my eardrums have burst.
I hate this.
Being helpless sucks.
Something within me breaks as a thought occurs to me.
Asshole didn't go out to hire kids for the party. He didn't have to if his coworkers were bringing them.
Which meant he hired someone to kidnap us.
For what? A bump in the hero rankings and polls?
An anger I never knew was in me swallowed my hatred of the situation and returned it to its rightful source.
That was why the kidnapper had my tech! That stealth kit had been in my main lair on the night I died!
Even if I can't hear myself, I start swearing as something surges within me.
"That god-forsaken bible-thumping shitsuit fucking ASSHOLE!"
For a second I see something weird. A shadow of the man's face tilting back in surprise like a ghost, before his actual face follows it as lightning surges out of my body, electrocuting both him and Fiona.
As soon as I see Fiona suffering, I try my hardest to shut down my newly discovered Talent and it works. But the next moment she'd fine, better than fine, as she thrashes her arm into the kidnapper's ribs. I can't hear it but I feel the crunch of his bones breaking as his arms loosen.
Yes! He dropped us! Time to see if I can fly...
I stretch out my arms and concentrate...
Oh no. He dropped us... and I can't fly.
The realization drops about as fast as my freefall, twisting my guts and inducing hyperventilation as I realize this is about to be the second time I die from grounds. After all, it's not the fall that kills you...
Suddenly, however, we begin to slow. I see our kidnapper above us, one hand on his shattered rib as he grimaces in pain, trying to keep us alive.
Good, he knows basic physics, I sigh with relief at being decelerated instead of abruptly stopped. At terminal velocity, that would be just as crushing as landing.
"Hold on. I got ya," his voice blooms in my mind. Those are not the words of a villain.
"Oh, so you're telepathic too?" I think loudly at him. "Who hired you?"
Something flickers behind the man's shoulder, a camera drone.
Oh no...
"No one was supposed to get seriously-
Whatever he was thinking is cut off as a blur of mostly gold takes the man away.
"Fucking Asshole!" I shriek as I watch Crusader plow the man into a rooftop before punching away at his face until nothing is left but a conical smear.
Before we start to fall, Destiny appears beneath us, her arms gentle as she takes over where the telekinesis left off.
I can't hear what she's saying but she's crying. And for the first time, I genuinely felt that she loved us.
At that moment, while I watched the shadows of what I realized were a momentary form of precognition, I changed my mind.
I was still definitely going to kill Asshole one day, but first I would ruin him. I would outshine him in a way he couldn't just sweep aside like every other rising star who mysteriously died in this city.
I would save my mother from his evil clutches.
And with my newfound electrical powers, I'd never have to worry about power supply for my tech again!
As mom took us away from the "battle" and back to our rooftop home, I caught a glimpse of Crusader eye-beaming the corpse into a black stain.
There goes the evidence. I hope you had a good time with that cash before you died, I eulogize the man.
The PR team and kids all clap as Destiny lands with us, the camera drones buzzing circles around the scene for their precious footage.
Destiny skips the bullshit with a few words I can't hear and takes us right to our rooms before whipping out her cell.
She doesn't know... She wasn't in on the plot.
Within minutes, a female Heroics Inc. doctor is up in our room, looking at our injuries before he takes out a pair of needles with some kind of red-gold substance in it.
I dutifully provide my arm and he makes the injection. Within seconds, my hearing returns as I realize what he just gave us was a drug to induce a healing factor.
Why haven't I heard of this before? Something like this would be revolutionary!
"Now that you can hear me, girls, this medicine is proprietary to Heroics Incorporated. By receiving this dose your parents are obligated to sign a non-disclosure agreement on your behalf. If you talk about this medicine to anyone, you and your parents will be in big trouble."
Ugh, a doctor who speaks lawyer.
"What's a nond closure agreement?" Fiona asks.
"One day it will be your best friend," the doctor, whose nametag reads Dr. Conover, replies.
"How long will it stay in our systems?" I ask.
"About one month, at the end of which I will return to see if there are any side effects. Side effects to watch for are rashes in regenerated areas, sudden tissue loss, weeping open sores, and sudden death."
So much for revolutionary...
"Doctor!" Mom raises her voice at the woman. "You're scaring them."
"I'm not scared," I say, but Fiona clearly is so I scoot over and hug her with one arm.
"Oh, and congratulations on receiving your Talents. Heroics Inc. expects great things from you!"