Superhero1

1

Waves crash in the background, as I open the newspaper, hearing the slight rustle, and the comforting scent of freshly printed paper wafts up to my nose, mixing with the fragrances of the tropical flowers I'm surrounded by.
This is by far my favourite spot, I think to myself as I scan the headlines. It's very quiet, no humans, only the odd animal.
I used to read the newspaper with my dad when I was little. Well by read, I mean I drew all over the pictures while my dad tried to read through the pen marks, but it's a habit that stuck. Not the scribbling part, just the reading part.
When my dad became too busy to read it with me, he would bring a newspaper home every day for me to read.

My eyes squint as I see a large headline, claiming the mayor of London, Jessica Hilmont, was recruiting superheroes from other towns to combat their growing villain problem. Apparently, the heroes were outnumbered six to one. Which was, understandably, a bit of a problem.
From what I could gather, it seems the mayor has some secret way to tell supers apart from normies (non-supers). Hopefully they won't come my way. I'm quite happy with my life at the moment.

-

I stomped down the stairs, following the smell of beef, hallumi and... Roasted vegetables with a tinge of... Rosemary. As you can tell, I never had to ask what was for dinner, I just followed my nose.

"Smells good." I comment, sitting down at the beech wood table, where my mum and brother are already seated. "Where's Iz?"
"Your sister is out with her friends. Again. She's out almost as much as dad now." Mum replies, digging in to her meal.
I didn't even bother asking where dad was. He's at work, no doubt about it.
We continue to converse about our day, the radio playing a melodic tune in the background.

After dinner, we put our plates in the dishwasher while Jack, my brother, switches on the TV to watch his beloved Scooby-Doo. I used to love it when I was his age, but he takes obsession to a new level. Whenever he is home, I can hear the sounds of Shaggy and Scooby eating lorry-loads of food, or Fred setting up his traps. It's gotten to a point where I have seen almost every single episode, from all the different variations of the show, even ones my parents used to watch in the seventies!

"Not that again Jack" my mum says, exasperated. "Put on the news instead."
"But muuuummmmmmm..."
"No buts, Jack. News, now."
Jack grumbles about it for a bit, before sinking into the tan sofa and switching the channel.

A piece about the shortage of heroes in London comes on, and Jessica Hilmont's wrinkly face pops up. She's not exactly old, but you wouldn't call her young.

"-result of our hero shortages, and the abundance of villains wreaking havoc, we are having to take measures to recruit supers unneeded in their own areas, or supers that have not yet actively been a hero or villain, known as halvies."

Yes, we are known as halvies. Because we act like normies but are technically supers, so it's like we are half and half.

"And how will you convince the halvies to, well, come out of hiding? And how will you even find them in the first place?" A balding interviewer questions.

"There is a considerably large sum of money that will be paid as wages for every superhero that comes to London to protect its citizens. For each crime they stop, and each villain they take down, they will get paid. The amount of money they receive corresponds to how bad the crime or villain is.

"We also have a way of detecting where super powers are being used and who has super powers, so we can track and identify supers." She finishes, leaving me shocked. I thought there was no way they could find me, and make me become a hero, but now, apparently they can track and identify us.