“We never weaken, we never yield!”

–Super Corps Propaganda.

“So. Damn. Tired.”

–Extract from Cold Comet’s ’s diary read at Dark Fire’s trial

“Dear Stace,” I say into the camera in my room, “being a superhero is exhausting. We fight, we train, we eat, we sleep, we repeat. It’s been two weeks of hard work since our last battle, but we haven’t had any time to relax. I don’t mind because I feel like I belong here now. Having made a few friends makes things a lot better, too. Little Voices and I train together both on and off the Cerberus. We make a good team, but it’s clear that he’s much better at this stuff than I am. He gets to level twelve on the infinity wall but never hits the bell.”

I pause and think of what to say next. I send video messages to Stace whenever I get a chance, and she generally sends me some sort of mail every few days. Her latest gift was a box of cookies she baked herself – they weren’t very good compared to the ones Chef makes, but I was just happy that she remembered me. It’s ironic that we barely talked in high school and that it’s taken the two of us nearly dying in a saucer attack to bring us together.

Her father, The General, still blames me for getting her mixed up in all that, and apparently still wants to kill me. I’m not too worried about him – if he wants me dead he’ll have to get in line behind the saucers, Firestorm Commando, and members of my own team.

Little Voices knocks on my door and then sticks his head in without waiting for a reply. I hit ‘send’ and my message is away.

“Time for training,” Little Voices says, and takes a cookie from the box on my desk. He starts to eat it, then wrinkles up his face and passes the unfinished cookie to me.

“Yuck,” he says.

“Stace made them,” I say defensively, and force myself to eat the rest of the cookie.

It’s not great, but it’s the thought that counts.

“She is a great computer programmer, but a terrible baker,” my friend says, and then sends a steward for glasses of orange juice.

We head down to the training deck where a few rookies are climbing the infinity wall. They don’t come close to ringing the bell at the top. Come to think of it, I’m the only one who ever has, which is a distinction of some kind.

“I don’t know how you did it,” Little Voices says as he drinks his juice.

“I jumped off the wall, hit the bell and fell,” I say, “and snapped my arm. I had something to prove, but I don’t think you need to bother with that.”

Little Voices is a natural. He spends an hour a day fighting the multi-armed sparring machine on the maximum difficulty, and he draws a crowd. I used to draw a crowd, too, but only because people enjoyed seeing me get hurt.

“Jealous?” whispers Pet Shark in my ear.

I don’t turn or jump at the shock, so perhaps I’m used to him sneaking up on me. We watch Little Voices stab the sparring robot right in its heart and then backflip over a trio of arms. He fights with a double handed pain stick that Second Best made just for him. The blade is so long that it should be impossible to use, yet Little Voices makes it dance so fast that I can barely see it move.

“A little jealous,” I admit, “I wish I was that good.”

“We all wish we were that good,” says Never Lies from beside me.

She sighs loudly and crosses her arms. I’ve seen her take out a whole team of superheroes with only a knife, but it won’t be long before Little Voices is better than that in close combat. I don’t think it really matters as plasma beats swords nine times out of ten, and no-one is better with a plasma cannon than Never Lies.

Past Prime walks up to Little Voices and bows. They draw their pain sticks and start sparring, slowly at first and then with blinding speed. It’s quite something to watch, but after a few frantic minutes it becomes clear that Past Prime is winning. Eventually he stabs Little Voices in the leg, and they stop. They bow, and start again.

“Has anyone ever beaten Past Prime ?” I ask.

“I can, one time out of ten,” says Never Lies. “Silver Shadows wins three times out of ten, and his sister used to win about half the time. She was faster than Little Voices and tougher than you.”

Wow. That would be quite the killer combination.

“That didn’t stop her biting a plasma bolt,” says Pet Shark with a thin smile.

“She saved the Earth,” says Never Lies.

“And died. Idiot.”

“Everyone dies… and you’ll be next if you don’t shut up!” snaps Never Lies with uncharacteristic anger.

Pet Shark smiles uneasily but takes a few steps so that I’m a shield between him and Never Lies.

“Anyone else ever beat Past Prime ?” I ask, trying to defuse the situation.

“Small Talk did, once. That was something to behold,” says Pet Shark.

“How?”

“We don’t like to talk about it,” says Never Lies, but Pet Shark just rolls his eyes.

“He didn’t use pain sticks, but grabbed the blades of Past Prime ’s sticks with his bare hands and pulled Prime in. He head butted him so hard that they were both in hospital for a full day. I don’t think Small Talk ever got full feeling back in his hands and Past Prime still has a dent in his skull. Dark Fire banned the senior officers from fighting after that.”

“Sounds… crazy. Why would Small Talk do something like that?”

“Small Talk refused to spar before then, and you know how much weight Past Prime puts on sparring. Prime kept pushing Small Talk until it was on,” explains Pet Shark.

I still don’t know what to make of him, but I certainly don’t trust him enough to simply take his word. I’m going to have to find evidence of that fight.

“I have the video,” Shark whispers to me, and I wonder if he can read minds.

The alarm on my wrist buzzes, calling me to the armory. I get suited up and sit down with my team, and it isn’t long before a saucer is seen on our territory.

“You’re up first,” Bad Memories tells me.

I jump into the capsule and strap myself in. Bad Memories hands me a bomb, and I strap it to the side of my suit. I’m sweating a little, and it’s not just nerves.

“Why is the armory so hot?” I ask.

“We are having some problems with the cannons… they weren’t designed to shoot more than six times an hour, but we’ve had to send the whole team out twice now. We are a little worried about them, to be honest.”

“Okay. But they’ll still send me to the saucer, right?”

“Probably… maybe not. That’s why we’re sending you first.”

The capsule closes before I can reply.

“Typical,” I say to myself.

The launch knocks me out, and I only wake when I’m a few hundred meters above a city center. I’m far lower than my normal arrivals on the battlefield, and my parachute kicks in immediately. I slam into the roof of a tall building of tired red bricks, scattering flecks of red and cement downwards. I rise into the air and see people and cars racing away from me, a sure sign that the city hasn’t been fully evacuated yet. A couple of spinning discs are already heading my way, so I cut my parachute and power up my color cannon. I shoot one of the discs down and the other sprays me with plasma before I wing it with my color cannon and it explodes.

I search the sky around me; I am alone except for the saucer. It’s one of the smaller ones I’ve seen, but it’s still more than capable of turning this city to rubble. It’s close, too: less than ten minutes away from the city. This doesn’t look good at all.

“I hope someone else shows up soon,” I mutter.

A battery of laser blasts hit me in the chest and my shields light up. I fly in a zig-zag between buildings as I try to figure out what is shooting at me.

A flying medusa attacks me from behind, but I pull it off and cut it into pieces with the cutting rays mounted on my shoulders. I start powering up my cannon again as a flock of flappers armed with rockets swoop down on me. They don’t do much damage, but I’m definitely starting to wonder where the rest of my team is. I drop a flare to show where I am but a squadron of triclops chases me away from it. We play hide and seek amongst the sky scrapers as I take them out one by one, but the last one catches me in the head with a plasma bolt that blinds me. I fly right through the windows of an office block and I land in a pile of broken glass and shattered office desks. The office is abandoned, but my crash-landing sends paper flying everywhere.

“Where is my team?” I yell at the office photocopier, but it doesn’t know either.

I launch myself into the sky, blast an octoape and punch another in the head as it cuts at me with its many arms. A second charges onto my back and we fall together. I hit the street hard, roll to my feet, blast the apes and then trip over a gutter and fall onto my back. I roll clumsily to my feet and see a policewoman trying to herd people out of a broken-down bus and down into a subway. A pair of spider-mines run out of the subway and I shoot them before they hurt anyone, but it’s clear that the subway is no longer safe.

I land beside the police officer and flick my visor up. She’s young, only a few years older than me. She has a pair of aviator sunglasses sitting on top of her hair, and she looks worried.

“You need to get back up there,” she says to me as soon as I land.

“I can help you,” I say.

A building in the distance explodes in a purple fireball, and I wince. I hope no-one was still in there.

“The city needs you more, so get going!” she yells.

I start to rise, but then I see something to freeze my heart: a pair of gigantic red humanoids with six arms is walking down the other end of the park. They are much bigger than a triclops, and look far meaner. They are armed with huge golden axes and maces that look deadly enough to break most superheroes apart with ease, and they have rocket launchers slung across their shoulders. Adrenaline pumps through my body and I can see every detail on their bodies from the talons on their toes to the armored plates where their heads should be. They have massive arms and legs, and thick tails that flick in the air behind them.

They look dangerous… so I guess that it’s only a matter of time before they come for me.

“Quiet!” the policewoman hisses, and the people around us fall silent.

I ready my color cannon and hope the red giants don’t notice us. They keep walking, and I’m just about to relax when one of the children in the crowd starts crying. One of the red and gold monsters stops and points an arm at us.

The policewoman shushes the child, but it’s too late. People start running, but the policewoman draws her gun and stands beside me.

“What happens now?” she asks me.

“Nothing good,” I answer, and pull down my visor.

I run towards the monsters, putting myself between them and the retreating civilians behind me. I hit the first one with everything I have and manage to cripple it with a blast from my fully charged color cannon that hits it right in the knee. Never Lies would be pleased with my accuracy, but the second beast is unscathed and catches me in the shoulder with its axes and bowls me over. I roll to my feet and cut across its legs with my melting blasters just like Past Prime taught me, but it shoulder charges me and we both hit the ground together. The creature rips one of my melting rays off my shoulder but I use the other to sever one of its arms. It punches me right in the nose, but I cut across its chest with my multiblasters. Our fight quickly becomes an ugly and chaotic affair of punches, elbow jabs and knee blows as we roll in the burning grass. The red-arms has the advantage of more limbs, but although I am useless with a sword, I am a master of inelegant combat and using dirty elbows to get my way. This messy brawl is not what you might expect from a superhero: there is no place for technique in this fight, time for strategy or finesse. It hits me as hard as it can, and I try to hit it harder.

In a lot of ways it’s just like my training sessions with Small Talk.

A blade pierces my shields and cuts into my chest armor. I feel a rib snap, but I roll and the blade breaks off before I get too badly hurt. My shields flicker uncertainly as we fight; the red-arms is cutting them away faster than anything I’ve ever fought before. A mace scrapes across my armor as I slam my forehead right into the beast’s chest and that seems to stun it, but it slashes across my arm and my color cannon explodes. My arm’s on fire, but I use it to burn the red-arms’ chest. The fire starts to engulf us both as the fight gets even uglier. Smoke fills my helmet but I ignore it and blast blindly with my multiblaster. I bring an elbow down hard on the creature’s head and feel something snap beneath me as the red-arms shudders. I get an arm free and punch and punch and punch until it stops moving. I get to my feet, stumble, and fall over.

The world goes dark for a moment, and when I wake up I’m lying on my back with the policewoman standing over me with my fire extinguisher. She throws the extinguisher to one side and bends down beside me. My visor is broken off, I can’t feel my left leg, and my suit is still smoking. I try to get up but the policewoman holds me down.

“Keep still, you’re injured.”

“Nothing new there,” I say, trying to smile.

“I think your leg is broken, but I managed to get the fire out. Where is your – ”

“The kids?” I interrupt.

“I got them into a nearby basement, and then I came back for you.”

“Good. Help me up.”

The saucer is close and I can see its path will take it right through the city. The policewoman frets over me as I try and regain my focus. Her face is blurry and occasionally she has a twin, but she helps me into a sitting position.

“We need to get you to a hospital,” she says.

“Nah… I’ll be all right… I’ll fly it off, no problem. You should get back to the kids.”

I ignore her and she ignores me; neither of us is willing to give up. The saucer is getting closer and I am the only one who can do anything about it. I need more power.

“You are brave to be out here,” I say as I try to think of what to do.

She shrugs and wipes some of the blood off my face with a bandage.

“My dad was a cop for thirty years. He used to say that bravery is just duty overcoming fear. Now, what are we going to do?”

I try to think, but I can only come up with one answer and I don’t like it very much.

“Duty over fear?” I say.

She nods sadly.

“He died in a saucer attack when he was a week away from retirement.”

Another victim of the saucers. At least this time I have a chance – a slim chance – of stopping the saucer getting any closer. I try to open the control panel on my arm, but my vision is too blurry to see the dials clearly. I’m going to need a little help.

“We have one option,” I say, “but I can’t do it without you. Open the panel on my arm. Press the blue button,” I say.

I guide her through the process of disabling my suit’s override procedures and she turns the power settings to dangerously high. I’m expecting the suit to explode, and when it doesn’t I sigh with relief.

“What?” the policewoman says.

“I thought that was going to kill us both. Let’s keep going.”

I have her direct all the power to shields and flight, and then I float into the air. I am now unarmed, and it’s only a matter of time before my suit power source overheats. Talented Brat will probably be furious that I’m messing with his beautiful suit, but I don’t have any other way of stopping the saucer. I try to close my helmet visor but it’s broken, so I settle for adjusting my sweatband.

“Can I have your glasses?” I ask.

I fly down to her and she puts her aviator sunglasses over my eyes.

“Thanks.”

“What’s your name?” she asks suddenly.

“It doesn’t matter,” I say.

“It matters to me,” she insists.

She has beautiful blue eyes. It occurs to me that she might be the last human I ever see, and I don’t even know her name.

“Danger Magnet, but it’s classified. And accurate. What about you?” I say.

“Carol, and it’s not classified. What are you going to do now?” Carol asks.

“Something stupid. You better run.”

I take off as fast as I can, rising upwards. I feel the bright sun on my face and I’m glad for the sunglasses. The saucer is only minutes away from ripping the town apart.

“No time for subtlety,” I mutter to myself as I arm my bomb.

I am a superhero with a mission to complete.

I am going to save this city.

And I am not going to screw up in front of Carol.

I launch myself on a direct course to the saucer. I don’t bother taking evasive action – I’m not that agile in the air at the best of times – so I’m relying on my shields to save me. Silver plates of solid shields form around me as I become a target for every triclops and rhinotank in the area. The silver plates pop and burst as they absorb hits, and I wobble in the air. My sunglasses shield me from the flashes far better than my visor ever has, and it’s liberating to feel the wind on my face. I hit a wave of missiles that feel like turbulence and warning alarms start ringing it my ears.

My legs are numb, but even that’s not as worrying as the trail of smoke that’s coming out of my chest plate. My suit is really heating up, too. I can feel sweat flowing down my arms and face, but I ignore it.

It looks like I might not make it.

A medusa drops out of the air and onto my back, but it explodes before it can hurt me.

Dark Fire swoops down beside me, clearing the skies with waves of meteors that shoot from his fingers. I stabilize my suit and keep flying.

“You look like you’ve been through hell and back, kid!” he yells.

I shoot him an annoyed look, but he ignores me and clears the skies. He blasts a triclops with flame from his finger and whistles to himself. I realize with a shock that this is easy for him, and that he isn’t even sweating as he brings down every enemy that comes close.

I wish I could be that powerful.

He flies in a tight loop and then joins right beside me.

“You should have waited for backup, idiot. Do you know there is an axe stuck in your back?” he says.

I did not, but that would explain why I’m having such a hard time flying in a straight line. I wince and keep flying, trying to ignore Dark Fire. He melts a pair of incoming rhinotanks with fireballs and they explode, showering me with chunks of metal that bounce off my suit. Dark Fire seems to wince as one of the shards hits me right in the forehead.

“That spot in Mercy is still available, you know,” he says.

“Bite me. And get that axe out.”

He flies over and pulls the axe out of my armor. It has a huge blade.

“I’ve seen one of these before, but only once. Was it a big red beast that nearly did you in?” he says.

“I got two of them,” I hiss.

“Nicely done. So, what’s your plan?” Dark Fire asks.

“Get to the saucer and drop the bomb,” I explain.

He waits for a few seconds before realizing that that’s all I have. Then he shakes his head and waves me on.

“Simple but effective, just like you. Keep flying and I’ll run interference.”

Nobody runs interference like Dark Fire – he is worth a full team all by himself. His body forms a comet that moves so fast that I can barely keep up with him as he burns through the saucer’s creatures as they try to stop me. He melts a rhinotank with a ball of blue flame, annihilates a trio of octo-apes with a wave of fire and brings down a huge gunbird by ramming right into it. The gunbird explodes right above me and I pass it without stopping.

Dark Fire flies parallel with me and opens his helmet.

“How you doing, kid?”

“Great,” I lie.

“As long as you can fly straight, that’s all that matters. And look, more of the red armed brutes have come to say hello.”

There are four of the red monsters heading right for us. These ones have long white wings that seem almost translucent, but they also have the golden axes that nearly killed me last time. Dark Fire speeds up and heads right at them. He explodes into black fires that leap and twist like serpents that wrap themselves around the red creatures. The fires burn away in a second leaving Dark Fire alone in the sky. There is no sign of his adversaries, not even ashes.

“That was incredible,” I say.

“Thanks. Never Lies and The General might do a better job of rampant destruction, but I can’t think of anyone else who could. Simon Smith, maybe, but only if he gets his head in the game.”

I haven’t thought about The General for ages. I wonder if he’s still angry with me? I’m sure he is. If only I had –

“Focus! We have company,” orders Dark Fire.

It’s a flock of glowing red spheres coming right at us. I can’t tell whether they are creatures or missiles of some kind, and perhaps it doesn’t matter. Dark Fire gets half of them and then drops out of their way. I go right through the rest and they explode around me in bursts of multicolored sparks. The sparks burn right through my shields and into my armor, but I keep flying. The saucer looms above me, its thick metal skin covered in turrets and spikes that point out in all directions. Dark Fire gets there before me and starts burning a hole through the armor.

“You weren’t meant to be out here alone… but you seem to have a knack for surviving,” he says as he takes the bomb from me and pushes it into the hole.

“At least I’m good at something,” I say.

“Or maybe you’ve just been getting lucky. Can you keep flying?”

I nod.

“Then go.”

I head up and away as hordes of monsters close on his position. I get to a safe distance and land. I power down my suit and turn to watch. Dark Fire waits until the saucer starts to explode before leaving. He flies faster than anyone I’ve seen before and then lands beside me.

“The cannon only had two shots left in it, so I’ve called in our biggest guns. Your suit is on fire.”

He’s right: Never Lies and Simon Smith are flying towards us and I have fire burning up the side of my leg. I borrow his fire extinguisher and put the fire out, but I don’t turn my suit back on. It was painfully hot, and I want nothing more than to take it off.

“I think I might have burnt my power source out,” I complain.

“It happens. Wait here, then.”

Never Lies and Simon Smith don’t stop to talk to us but get right to work. It doesn’t take long for them to complete the clean-up, and for once it feels good to be watching the fight rather than being in it. I know that my crazy attack would have saved this town even without Dark Fire’s help. I’m a hero, I’m still alive, and I’m feeling pretty good about myself.

And I’m keeping the aviators.