The Power of Light - A Richmond Super Story

The Beginning

English, Maths and SuperStudies straight away. Not a bad way to start off a Monday morning. I'm actually quite looking forward to SuperStudies. The weeks of petitions and strikes all to have it included in our syllabus have finally payed off. You see, people thought it must be important for us to learn about one of the weirdest and uncanny mutations to ever of happened to mankind.

Getting through English and Maths quite easily, I slide into a seat in SuperStudies next to Liam Fisher, a guy I met about three years ago, and we've been friends ever since.

"Bout time ya got here, I looked like a loner sittin here by myself."

"You are a loner." I laugh back at him, resulting in a soft punch to my shoulder.

Just then, Mr.Egan walks into the room. None of us had known who would be teaching this class, and honestly, I'm glad it's Mr.Egan. One of the best and nicest teachers in the school.

He sits down in front of the computer, clicking on a button to turn on the projector. As it whizzes and stirs, he starts.

"I presume all of you know about supers, so right off the bat I'm going to get you to call all of those you can think of out to me, just the ones in Richmond for now."

A flurry of hands shot up through the room. Mr.Egans eyes look around, picking out a student from the back of the class.

"The WeatherMan." She calls out excitedly.

"Nice, I presume ye all know of him." Everyone nods. "Good, you'd have to be living under a rock to not know of him, the most powerful in the city, and actually, one of the first. Any one else?"

"ChromoFlux!"

"Good, not aswell known as the WeatherMan, but maybe even more powerful. Although he's right, the power of time should not be exploited, he only uses it in extreme situations, such as his battle with Hex. Any one else know any others?"

"WindWoman."

"Yes very good, an example of her work would be the takedown of CyroKiller, with help from...?"

An awkward silence falls over the classroom. Everyone seems to be looking around, searching for anyone who knew. Mr.Egan looks slightly deflated, maybe disappointed.

My hand climbs into the air.

"Yes, Aiden."

"WaterWiz." I say, only half-sure.

"Yes!" Mr.Egans eyes light up once more. "WaterWiz, very underrated, very powerful, very unknown."

More introductions were made to some other supers, but people mainly only care about the ones in their own city. Soon the class was over, and off we headed to Lunch.

"Thunder and Lightning outside man, can't go out there." Liam points out. We usually eat lunch under a large tree near the teachers parking lot, but occasionally we're forced to eat in the cafeteria with the other few hundred students.

Pushing through the crowds of teens mostly younger than me, I finally find a seat, and we sit down.

"Pretty cool idea, but I knew most of the stuff we were told." Liam says.

"Yeah well, maybe some people aren't as insanely clever as you." I respond sarcastically.

"I mean come on, if you don't know who the WeatherMan is by now, you're kinda ....." He trails off.

"I suppose, anyone could look up at anytime and probably see him." I look up towards Richmond Networks Tower as I say it, and squint. "Look, there's someone up there."

Liam turns to look aswell, but turns in frustration a moment later. "I need to get my eyes checked, it's all a blur."

The rest of the day passes as usual, and soon I'm heading home on the bus. We're not allowed phones in class, so I take mine out now in freedom and check for any message.

One missed call from my dad from ten minutes ago. Probably nothing important, and so I stuff my phone back into my pocket. That should have been the first sign that something was wrong.

The second sign was the police car parked outside my driveway. Slightly worried, I take my bag and hop down the steps of the bus, preparing myself for what this could be. I'm pretty sure I didn't do anything wrong, maybe it's a survey. No, the police wouldn't be sent to hand out surveys. Unless maybe it's a special one,very important, I tell myself, unconvincingly.

Unlocking the front door slowly, and stepping inside, the first thing I hear is my dad mumbling from the other room. Unable to pick out any words, apart from "man" and "justice". The thought that maybe my dad is a superhero and was found bounce through my head, and I push open the door.

All happy thoughts of having a superdad vanish. Two cops are standing in the middle of the room, and another sitting beside my dad. I recognise the sitting cop as one of my dads poker buddies.

"Aiden.." My dad whispers. Looking at him, I notice streaks of dried tears on his cheeks.

"Dad... what's happening?" I say, tears forming in my own eyes.

"It's um... it's your mother.." He manages to say, choking back more tears,"She's been attacked, she's not well.. They've taken her to the hospital... I've been waiting for you to get here.. so we can go see her." He tries to put on a faint smile, but it seems to upset me even more, as if he knows that she won't be getting better.

"And ye should be heading over there straight away. The sooner the better." One of the standing policemen say.

"Yeah, Aiden, come on, lets go." My dad says.

"Please, let us bring you, right now you're in no condition to drive." The policeman says, glancing at an almost empty beer bottle next to the couch.

"Thank you."

All the way to the hospital, I sat in the back seat of a police cruiser. Kinda made me feel like a criminal, with the caged window up front, but all I could think about was who would attack my mother? I was told it was a mugging, and that my mother must have resisted or tried to run, because a stab wound was found and she had brusing on her face.

Eventually, after was seemed like hours, we arrive at the hospital. My dad and I burst through the front door, followed by my dads cop pal, who tells the confused receptionist what we were doing, as we had just raced past her. Only after we had passed her did I realise we didn't even know where she was.

"Room 302." The policeman calls down the hall.

Bursting through the door of room 302, we are met by an older looking lady, who I presume is a nurse.

"I'm sorry, no visitors at this time, she's not in a good cond-"

"I'm her husband!! This is our child! Please, let me see my wife."

The woman looks from me to my father, and with a sad looking face, stands to the side to let us through.

And there she is, lying unconscious in a hospital bed.