The Stupendous Springer

Episode 2: Detour, Chapter 1

It was the final review week at West Albion Secondary School. It was Friday, and the last period of the week was about to begin, and the halls churned with the chaos of latecomer students trying to reach their classrooms. They would rush into the room where the early arrivals were already enjoying a bit of last-minute studying and note-sharing, adding to the controlled chaos that was already prevalent. The shoes struck the tiled floors in a clatter. The pencils tapped against desks in an arrhythmic blanket of clacks. Voices elevated as the class period inexorably approached, only serving to further stress and confuse the students at perhaps the least helpful time to be stressed and confused. It was maddening. It was overwhelming. It was all-consuming. It was almost enough to make Sophie Ritchie forget she had a meeting with literal Superheroes the next morning.

Sophie's thoughts occasionally wandered back to this crazy idea, even as the class period started and the chaos that filled the room quelled almost immediately. The first sessions of the week were always hard to wrangle, but the last ones were easy. Everyone involved, students and faculty, simply wanted it to be over, and reached an unspoken truce with ease. That relaxed Sophie's mind a bit, but not much. How was this really going to happen to her? Why was some high school student worth the attention of the Super team employed by the Canadian National Enhanced Response Division, the team known as the Guardians?

The team leader, who called himself Vindicator but whose legal name was Leonard Tennyson, had called Sophie's mother Nicole the previous night to discuss the meeting. "Discuss with Nicole" in this context really meant "inform Nicole that it was already set up and let her know attendance was expected", but Nicole had handled this sudden news like a champ, only freaking out after the call was over. After Nicole freaked out, she passed on the news, and the family as a whole freaked out in response to that. After that, however, real life settled back in, except with a new weight over their heads. What would come of this meeting? What did Lenny want? Was it even his decision? Was Sophie in trouble? Were they really going to meet the Guardians? Would they even be friendly people, or would this ordinary family be a bother to them? Each of these questions felt like it weighed fifty kilograms.

For her part, Sophie bore three hundred and fifty kilos of unanswered questions through her school day admirably. At the very least, one welcome distraction had been calling into work to let her manager, Mrs. Strongs, know she would not be able to make it Saturday morning. The shrewd manager, like clockwork, had brought up the fact that last week, Sophie had called in sick, implicitly accusing her of slacking off. Sophie had let her know that it was a government-related issue, which seemed to shut Mrs. Strongs up, though Sophie could hear her curiosity rising under her tone. Sophie had no time to worry about how her manager would react to her employee's new powers at that time, only to move forward with the rest of the anxious day.

New powers - that was at least part of why Lenny had called the meeting, Sophie and her family were sure. Her classmates' videos of Sophie stretching her elastic body to save her classmate from a fire had been posted publicly. Maybe Lenny had found them? Once again, Sophie hoped she was not in trouble for whatever reason. She had been a Super for only a week, and she had no idea what the rules were, if any. Maybe she needed a permit before her powers were publicly revealed? If so, hopefully it was clear she was outed, and that she had no intention to go public.

Sophie had to take a deep breath to calm herself. She breathed in, then kept breathing in, until her shirt began to feel constrictingly tight, then finally let it out through her nose, the air taking as long to leave as it took to arrive. As she exhaled, her body slackened and her torso sank down in her seat under its own weight. Sophie took a moment to enjoy it, embracing the comfort her mutated body incidentally offered. Glancing to the side and seeing one of her classmates watching her, Sophie tightened herself back up, as she somehow could these days, and resumed her original posture. She was going to spend all morning tomorrow in the world of Superdom. Today needed to be normal. She did not need the attention drawn to the things her body did.