Chapter 44

Michael

An eruption of applause filled the air. Angela looked at me nervously, forcing a smile. The governor of Arizona had just walked on stage. We couldn’t see him because we were backstage, waiting for our turn to be called up, butterflies in our stomachs.

It was pretty much impossible to keep our powers off with the amount of adrenaline coursing through us. I’d just accepted the fact that millions of people will just have to get used to my glowing eyes because I couldn’t turn them off when I got nervous.

Dad rested a hand on my shoulder, reading my thoughts. “You’ll do fine, Michael.” Mom and Sarah smiled at me proudly. Angela’s dad gave me a thumbs up. I was grateful our families were allowed to be backstage with us, their support was more than helpful.

Phoenix always seemed to feel hotter than Tucson. The Arizona State Capital building loomed behind us, its light-colored brick reflecting the morning sun down on us. The courtyard to the capital had been transformed into an outdoor stage meant for a huge press conference. A couple hundred news reporters were here, listening to the Governor speak, and millions of people were watching over a live broadcast. He was explaining some of the facts of what happened during the superhuman fight that tore through Tucson a few days ago.

“We have come in peaceful contact with two of the… super humans, or Starlings, as they call themselves,” he said. “They spoke with me and other State Executives at length, fully explaining themselves and their intentions. After much debate, we have found them to be reasonable, peaceful, helpful, and we have come to a mutual agreement with them. As long as they, or any other Starling, abide by our stipulations, we allow them citizenship in our state. Further details of these stipulations will be published later.”

I bounced on my toes, trying to calm my nerves. Angela held my hand. “You ready?” Her eyes were glowing too, which meant she was as nervous as me. That was comforting to know.

“Yeah,” I said, squeezing her hand. “You?”

She took a deep breath. “Sure…”

The governor explained to the audience that we will give our statement and won’t answer any questions at this time. Then he said our names. That was our cue. A lady with an earpiece motioned for us to go on stage. Okay, I thought. Here we go.

I held my breath as we rounded the corner. Suddenly, we were looking at hundreds of people sitting in metal chairs and a dozen cameras aimed right at us. They didn’t clap, but all sat at the edge of their seats. The silence was painfully uncomfortable as we made the long walk to the pulpit at center stage. People didn’t know whether we deserved an applause or not. They didn’t know anything about us, except that we destroyed a lot of buildings, cars, and even got some people hurt in the process. Fortunately, nobody died. It was a miracle that the governor let us speak at all; that is, without demanding we go to prison instead.

We finally made it to the pulpit that had about ten different microphones pointing at us. “Good morning, uh…” I recoiled from the sound of my voice being amplified a hundred times. The audience wasn’t huge, but they all seemed to be attempting to pierce my soul with their judging eyes. The video cameras aimed at me threateningly—saying they will catch every single mistake I make and publish it to the world for all to laugh at. I’m sure they were staring at my glowing eyes that I couldn’t focus enough to turn off.

Angela squeezed my hand and gave me an encouraging nod. I cleared my throat and tried again. “My name is Michael Stone,” I said. “But you already knew that.”

The audience stared at me expectantly. I paused, building up the courage to say the next thing. “You can also call me Orion. I am—we both are—Starlings.”

“You can call me Cygnus,” Angela said. She went on to explain what Starlings were and how we found meteorites that granted us powers. She left out everything about MARS per request by her dad—he didn’t want us to go revealing details about a secret society because they would probably hunt him down for it. She also left out details about how she found her stone long before I did. “We are not the only two Starlings,” she said. “There are others. Dozens of Star Stones have already been touched and there may be dozens more still untouched.”

“Ray Simmons and Zack Larson are also Starlings,” I said. “You are well aware that we recently had a fight with them, and we are deeply sorry for the damage that was done to the city.” I noticed a few reporters shifting in their seats, looking unsatisfied. I swallowed. “Ray and Zack were dangerous; they threatened to kill us and others in the city, so we fought to get them out of the city and we won. Ray has not been seen for days and Zack is locked up in an extra-secure prison, built to hold him as long as he doesn’t have his stone.”

I decided to leave out the part that we couldn’t find his Star Stone. We’d searched tirelessly for days but couldn’t find it anywhere. We assumed someone had picked it up. We asked the police to transfer him to a different city to avoid the risk of someone accidentally bringing the stone within range for him to use his powers. He should be transferred in the next couple days.

“We wish to speak,” Angela said, “about what we want to have happen now.” She took a deep breath. “You know our names. You know that we are super humans. We know that we will be treated differently because of that. But we want to remind you that we are still teenagers with our parents watching us closely from backstage.”

That actually drew some laughter from the crowd. Angela was good at this public speech stuff. “We wish to have somewhat normal lives,” she said. “We want to live among you. We actually want to go back to school. Well, sorry, I lied—our parents want us to go back to school.” More laughter. “Yet we know that we will always be different because of our powers.” She looked at me. “That’s why we made this proposal to the governor.”

That was my cue. “Basically,” I said. “We want to help. We want to help fight crime with the police, but more importantly, we want to help other Starlings out there.” I chose a camera directly in front of me to stare at while I spoke. I spoke boldly, no longer feeling nervous, passion taking over. “If you have touched a meteorite that gave you powers, we want you to know that you are not alone. We know you have questions… we have answers.

“Our invitation is for you to come to Tucson and meet us. We will teach you how to use and understand your powers. And most importantly, we want you to join us in our effort to fight crime and help other Starlings. We hope to create a force of Starlings that will work together for the same cause.

“Now… to you Starlings who use your powers to steal, hurt or murder people, we give you this warning: stop, or we will stop you.” I let that settle in the air for a moment. “We know that no normal human can stop you, but we have proven that we can. And we will stop you.”