Milly whistled while she dragged a big, comfy chair through a clothing store.

After another Milly-day of heroically patrolling the city, Milly had decided to take a little break.

It was half past seven in the evening, and by now she was on her seventh cycle of Milly-time. A little over seven weeks on her own all together. For the past five, she’d been making an effort to act more like a hero. The minutemen had been a good start, but in a big city there was always something going on somewhere. Too bad she had no real way of finding most of it other than blindly stumbling across some while she patrolled.

With only half an hour until her appointment with Miss Arkwright, Milly tried to keep herself distracted, but she’d felt like she’d been in a holding pattern for a while now. Just doing whatever she could to pass the time until the meeting. It felt uncomfortably close to how she’d tried to cope with Milly-time at first, just waiting for it to end. What if the meeting was as pointless as Biology had been? She wasn’t sure what she was hoping to achieve.

Never mind all that! She was on break!

The problem with taking a break was finding some place in the city where Milly could comfortably sit still for a bit without getting spotted. Niki had helped her figure out the limit to how long she could hang around in the same position before anyone would notice her presence. About twenty-five Milly-seconds; a tenth of a regular second. The human eye was a lot faster than Milly had ever given it credit for.

Fortunately, just about any clothing store had plenty of unused fitting rooms.

Milly pulled open the curtain to reveal a small stall with a short bench made of hardwood. Practically, it might as well be an old-timey prison cell squeezed into a quarter of the space. Not exactly the most comfortable place to relax.

That’s where a little planning came in. Milly smiled while she slid the chair in, then pulled the curtain shut. The leather cushions felt cool on her back while she put her feet up against the wall.The chair was ‘borrowed’ from a fancy bank, but they surely wouldn’t miss it for a couple seconds.

Thus comfortably curled up, Milly pulled a bag onto her lap and dug out a water bottle and a comic book. Milly had a drink while she paged through.

The comic book featured the adventures of a speedster. Each panel first pictured the hero arriving at the scene of an incident. These ran the gamut. There was one where a boy had run into traffic. Another had a cat up a tree. There were several robberies. One had a mugging in an alley. Another where a little girl had dropped her ice cream on the floor. A couple of different break-ins. A pickpocket at a movie theater.

Most of them were minor incidents.

Regardless of how serious the first panel looked, the next panel immediately showed the speedster leaving the scene with the problem of the day solved in her wake. People had moved on the page to be out of danger. Crooks were tied up. Ice creams were replaced and money left on the till of the nearest ice cream cart.

The art was a little rough and devoid of color. There was no dialogue other than the little notes left behind on the second panel. Like one that was stuck to a burglar to notify the police of what he’d been caught doing. Those were obvious, but later on there were also notes on the more mundane events. An old lady was moved out of the path of an oncoming cyclist, and she was left a note purely so she wouldn’t wonder why she didn’t remember walking those last couple steps. It had struck Milly as a good idea.

“Geez, already?” Milly asked as she reached the last panel. Not the end of the book, though. The latter half of the page was just blank, as were the following pages. Milly lifted her water above her then let go. It hovered there in midair as if she were in space; one more use she’d discovered for her speed. No sense putting anything down temporarily if she was fast enough to just ‘drop’ it and catch it later.

Her hand thus freed up, Milly pulled out a pen and bit the cap off. She spat it out so it too just spun in the air for later. Meanwhile, she drew the border for the next panel.

The comic was about her. A diary was all well and good, but how many people had the time to write one in comic book form?

Drawing the scene of her last encounter was easy. Her visual memory had always been good and her art had been gradually improving with all the practice she was getting. Nowhere was that more apparent than the first page of the comic which was more of a rough sketch than what she now considered to be a real drawing.

Milly grimaced.

Her art wasn’t entirely at fault for that one, or she’d have simply redrawn it already. She didn’t remember the details of the scene with the boy and the car anymore. Even though it happened this morning, that was already over a Milly-month ago. She wasn’t even sure what color his shirt was.

That was why she’d started the comic.

The new panel soon showed an image of one man stabbing another. Milly paused, staring at the scene while she reached out to give her lowered water bottle a tap from below, effectively hitting the reset button on it.

Real life had no reset button, and Milly had arrived too late. The stab had already happened. All she could do was damage control. The next panel would show the paramedic Milly’s plucked from two blocks away suddenly on the scene. A rough ride on his own stretcher.

[Please help! Stabbed in the arm. - 00:00:01] The note Milly had left stuck to his hand read.

When Milly finished the drawing, she flicked her pen away, letting it spiral. She was sure the victim survived. His injury wasn’t that bad, and his assailant was tied to a lamppost in the background.

Still, that could’ve been better.

A light shone through her pocket, alerting Milly to her phone. The ‘disco’ app didn’t quite work as intended, but it was still better than everything else she had tried. Such as recording her own voice as audio for an alert, only to find the microphone didn’t pick up the frequency she spoke at.

The alert was a text from Niki, reminding Milly of their appointment. More than that, it was a reminder to come back before her superspeed timed out in five minutes or so.

Twenty hours of Milly-time represented a huge margin for error, but better safe than sorry.

“I reckon there’s time for one little detour, though.” Milly checked her conversation with Ruth. “The party started half an hour ago. I wonder how it’s going.”

————————————

Somehow, ACE had gotten permission to host the party in the music room. Milly couldn’t hear anything, but she could see the big speakers in the corners of the room were switched on.

The party was already in full swing when Milly arrived.

At least, Milly assumed it was. To her, she might as well be walking through a still painting of one. A dozen girls of various ages were present. Some chatting in small groups and holding red cups. Some played games. Others were enjoying the snack table. One pair was even sharing a smoke near an open window.

Milly recognized a lot of faces that she couldn’t place. Maybe she’d walked past them in the halls. Although there were only three who she knew by name.

Orchid Bramble caught Milly’s attention first. Despite her affinity with plants, Orchid wasn’t a wallflower. She laughed with some of the other girls while throwing a dart at the wall.

There wasn’t a dart board, though. Just a cork board with mugshots of the Minutemen gang.

“Welp, that there’s one way to let off some steam.” Milly walked up to the board, passing the dart with ease. She had seen screen doors with fewer holes in them than some of those pictures. “Ain’t that a bit excessive, Orchid?”

Orchid must’ve been throwing these almost nonstop to get a result like this. Was this really the time for it?

It was then that she noticed each of the girls in Orchid’s group were holding their own darts. Had they been helping?

Then it hit Milly where she knew their faces from. She’d seen them while going through the phones of the Minutemen. Everyone here had been roped into their involuntary spy network.

“Well shoot! Carry on then.” Milly stepped out of the way. “Huh, I wonder if this is what Ruth meant when she said the party was in my honor?”

Milly almost felt bad for blowing it off. It was actually a pretty nice idea to gather everyone to celebrate the arrest. No doubt the past year had been tense.

“Speak of the devil… where is Ruth anyhow?”

As far as Milly could recall, Niki had mentioned something about ACE having to work that evening. Or something. She really should have written it down. Anyway, whatever they were doing must have been done already because Stella and Terra were here.

Stella was by the snack table with a tray of drinks and a bowl of nuts in her hands, playing hostess by the looks of it. She looked to be having a good time, smiling brightly. Then again, Stella was usually the most chipper person in the room, anyway. Maybe it was a consequence of knowing that she could always teleport away if she embarrassed herself or made something awkward. A consequence-free “Nope Out!” button like that had its perks.

On the other end of the spectrum, Terra was off to one corner with someone else, broody as ever. It could be because Terra’s power had the opposite effect of her sister; her sandy skin was always awkward. A small pool of sand had collected around her feet. a sign perhaps that Terra wasn’t concentrating on her control as much as she usually was.

Milly pondered whether that was the problem with her own power. Could she accelerate and decelerate by concentrating? Or were all powers controlled differently? There was also the question of what it even meant to focus on something like that.

“Just by looking at you, I’d wager that ‘think happy thoughts’ isn’t the trick to it.” Milly strolled up to Terra and her companion. They were having a conversation. Milly wished she knew what was so engrossing that Terra was leaking sand. “Wait a tick. I know you.”

Even though it had been ages, Milly recognized the girl she’d seen her first day at school! The one who had the power to turn a page with a look! In hindsight, that was not terribly interesting, but it had made a big impression on Milly at the time. Big enough to remember her ‘months’ later.

Speaking of pages, the girl was holding one.

Milly took a peek and discovered that it was a sign-up sheet for ACE. “What? Is this whole thing just a recruitment drive?” Milly snatched the page and read it over. Multiple people had already signed up! Annoyingly, it was just a title and list of names with no details.

The sales pitch was obviously verbal.

“Really?!” Milly returned the page before she could crumple it in outrage. “How come I never got one of these? I mean, I probably wouldn’t have signed. But, they could have at least left me a pamphlet or something while I was in quarantine instead of ghosting and replacing me!”

Agitated, Milly paced in a circle around the room. It was dumb to get upset about this. She knew that. That didn’t make her feel any better. Worse, actually, like she was falling into a pit that she knew was there.

She felt like yelling at someone. Whether they could hear her or not.

“Where the heck is Ruth, anyway?” Milly looked around. “Why is Terra doing the recruiting?”

No sign of Ruth.

“Fine, I’ll just use the same trick I used for the Minutemen then.” Milly turned back toward the snack table. She was fairly sure that Stella and Ruth were close. There ought to be something in their texts that could point her in the right direction.

There was just one problem.

“...Where did Stella go?”

Milly stared dumbfounded at the empty spot where Stella used to be. Even during Milly-time, Stella’s teleport let her go up in smoke. Literally, as it turned out when Milly came closer and noticed a foul smell. A thin wisp of smoke hung in mid air.

“Cigarettes?” Milly’s nose wrinkled. Over by the open window, the smoking pair had turned into a trio. Stella was now over there with the tray. “If the smoke is now here… does that mean her teleport swaps places with the air? Interesting.”

Milly came wandering over. It was too bad that she hadn’t observed Stella in the act of teleporting, but it certainly happened quickly. Milly smiled at Stella while she picked her pocket. “You’re the first person to move and surprise me. Thanks for livening up this party.”

The sense of gratitude didn’t stop Milly from snooping through Stella’s phone, though. Facial recognition let her dodge the password, since Stella was right there.

While Milly waited for the phone to open, she plucked the cigarette from the other two girls. She’d never held one before.

At home, Dad had implemented a strict No-Smoking rule. Milly had always been a little bit curious about it, though. From old photos, Milly knew her mom and dad used to smoke when they were younger.

Milly left the phone hovering in the air while she moved over to lean out onto the windowsill. She stared at the cigarette between her fingers.

Nobody would know, right?

She brought to butt to her lips and sucked like she would on a straw. It tasted a little funny, but otherwise nothing happened. No smoke, nothing. Inspecting the other end, she noticed the fire had gone out.

“...It was a stupid idea anyway,” Milly groused while she flicked the cigarette out the window.

Milly returned her attention to Stella’s phone. Though, At this point, Milly was more curious than mad. Wasn’t this whole thing Ruth’s idea?

It didn’t take long to find what she needed.

@❤Ruth❤

Ruth:

Ugh. I can’t find anything!

Orchid moved all my stuff.

It’s all neat and orderly now.

Stella:

Aw! But that’s so nice!

I bet it’s her quiet way of saying “thanks”!

Or maybe “sorry”.

Ruth:

Oh yea. Speaking of spineless cowards,

How is the party going?

Stella:

Wish you were here.

“Charming.” Milly returned the phone. “I guess that means Ruth’s in her room. Weird.”

Well, that was easy to check.

Milly walked on over to the fourth year dorms. She already knew which room was Ruth’s. She was the one who’d tidied it up for Orchid.

Sure enough, this time the room’s other inhabitant was home. Ruth was laying on her bed, above the covers. Her shoes kicked off.

By the looks of things, Ruth was just watching YouSupe videos. She couldn’t look more bored. No sign of any actual work either.

“Either you are lazing about, blowing off work,” Milly said while she strolled around the room, “or you are grounded.”

That was a strange thought. Almost too mundane to entertain. Could superheroes get grounded? Secret identities, yes. Ruth was about as public as it was possible to get, though. Not to mention she always seemed to get away with whatever she did. How did you even ground someone who could make you change your mind?

“Should I ask about it?” Milly ran her thumb along the stack of post-it notes in her jacket pocket. “...Nah.”

Logic prevailed in the end and Milly left.

————————————

Outside the principal's office.

Milly and Niki looked at one another then up at the shiny wooden door. The front had been carved to display ‘Arkwright’ and the school’s spoke wheel logo. It was pretty, but Milly couldn’t help ponder the practicality. Whoever would one day replace Principal Arkwright would need a plaque or a name change. That was, if Principle Arkwright would ever retire.

At exactly eight o’clock, the lock made a metal scraping sound, and the door was pulled open.

A raven-haired young lady wearing a beige trench coat opened the door. She couldn’t be over twenty. She wore an almost comically big polaroid camera on a sling around her neck. Like something a tourist in an old movie might use. The collar of a typical Hawaiian shirt was just peeking out at the top where the coat was slightly undone.

Of course it was.

Milly shared a look with Niki, then both stepped out of the way to let the woman through.

The woman smiled and took a step back into the office instead. “Oh, no no! Come in. Come in. You must be Milly and Niki, correct? First-year students here for one and five weeks, respectively.”

As they entered, Milly noticed a dark brown hat on the coat rack along with a gray sock that could fit an entire head. A mask, Milly corrected herself. She nudged Niki.

“Yes,” Niki answered for them while her gaze followed Milly’s. Her eyes sparked with recognition. “Aren’t you Big Picture? From NYMPH?”

Milly wasn’t familiar with Big Picture, but she’d heard of NYMPH. Much like sports teams, each state had at least one superhero team. Without needing to know anything else about the woman or her team, Milly already knew that VORTEX, the Texas team, could kick their butts.

“That’s right, Miss Krishna,” Miss Arkwright called out from her desk, fingers steepled together while she watched them enter. She briefly raised her eyebrows when she saw Milly before she motioned to a pair of chairs in the middle of the room, the invitation unspoken. “She’s an alumna of our fine institution, here to provide her professional opinion.”

“But, you can just call me Abigail if you like.” Big Picture, Abigail, smiled at them while she circled the desk to stand behind Miss Arkwright. “I trust you can keep a secret.”

Niki and Milly nodded.

“Good, now that we’re all acquainted,” Miss Arkwright pushed her glasses up and stared down at her tablet, “Why don’t you two start by telling us everything that happened this past Saturday, leading up to your encounter with the supervillain, Meatcrawl.”

“Actually. I’d like to start a little further back.” Abigail pulled out a notepad and flicked a couple pages. “I’ve heard you two had a rough first day.”

Understatement of the year.

“Well,” Milly started. “It was around lunchtime when…”

And so the tale began.