True Sidekick - *Sequel to Hero by Day

Chapter 1 - Can you say conspiracy?

"I . . . I just found out about my powers and you expect me to be a sidekick? Don't you think I'm a bit underqualified?"

~ Aden Dashner (Kratos)

:Ian:

"I can't believe Elise's parents let her stay out of school today." I exclaimed, "I mean – that's just not fair!"

My long-time best friend, Oliver Storm, gave out a hearty laugh. "Yes, because it's not like you haven't suffered a traumatic ordeal involving a super villain kidnapping you to use as bait for a superhero."

I frowned. "How would you know? What if White Lightning also saved my life once and I just never told you? Huh?"

Oliver scoffed.

"Trust me. If White Lightning had saved you, I would know." He paused, as if thinking for a moment. "Plus, you would never stop babbling about it. Sometimes I swear you're just as bad as your sister when it comes to supers."

I punched his shoulder in response. Oliver chuckled at my betrayed expression, but we both knew his words were true.

And, yes, you heard right before. Superheroes exist. Superheroes like White Lightning, The Marvel, Sonic, The Doctor, Merman, and so many more saved countless people in countless cities every day. They had superhuman abilities, like electricity manipulation, telekinesis, super speed, super healing, flight, super strength, and the list can go one and on. The point is, we had supers, and they were as cool as you would expect.

I mean – one wouldn't think parading around in spandex all day would make a guy hot, but the girls loved the supers. Well, mostly only the good ones.

What would a good superhero be without a super villain, am I right?

Super villains like Andromeda, Venom, The Manipulator, The Butcher, Two-Face, and so many more raised havoc and chaos in countless cities every day. They had the same super human abilities as the heroes, and there were far more of them. For some reason, the bad people with the worst intentions were always the ones who got the superpowers, not the heroes.

No one knew how they came into existence. As far as anyone knew, super powered peoples only started to show up around 1975. For some reason, accidents that would normally result in death gave people super human abilities instead. Oh, you fell in a vat of toxic waste? Here's some super strength. You got struck by lightning? Here's some lightning powers. You got experimented on as a child? Here, now the surgeries worked and you're part animal.

I couldn't name the countless theories on how super suddenly popped into existence. All I know is that once the governments of the world started to actually acknowledge that these supers were real, the heroes all signed the Super Ordinance of 1978, which held them to the agreement that they would help take down the supers who chose to become villains. It was also rumored that each country started their own government agency to deal with these new powered beings. MASKED (Monitoring of Abnormal, Strange, or Kaleidoscopic Events Department) is one of the rumored agencies. Calico, a member of the League of Legends based out of Empire City, is rumored to be an agent, as well as Tornado, another member of the League of Legends.

I wasn't what you would call a fangirl, like my twin sister, Mary. I was a conspiracy theorist. I was a little bit obsessed with finding out the identities of the supers in our town. I had a wall in my room dedicated to sightings and theories. I also owned a police scanner and got regular phone alerts on media mentions of any supers. I guess you could call it a hobby.

It might have been a strange hobby for someone like me, though. My mom was the Secretary of State. Like, the Secretary of State who works in the White House next door to the President of the United States of America.