Trigram: Black Iris - A Superhero Story - HIATUS

Chapter Two

"Three-oh-one, three-oh-one, three-oh-" Hechen muttered as he made his way through the corridors of SEMTOR, all brightly lit by white lamps on the high ceiling. Really, the corridors were incredibly spacious, many people liked it, but Hechen found it just a little empty.

"Two? No that's not right... Three-two-one? No... No, no. Three-oh-one, yes, that's it," he sighed, looking at the door labels, "Why didn't I bring a fricking map?"

Arms growing sore from carrying the cardboard box, Hechen continued pacing down the corridor, searching for Room 301, but stopped after a clang was heard.

Moments later, a muffled voice called out from behind a blue door marked with three green dots. Restricted access room. The door looked brand new, its smooth painted surface shining under the bright white lights, contrasting with the worn red doorframe. The scanner lock normally present on other doors was absent, apparently not yet fitted.

"Tony! Give me a hand! Where are you?"

Hechen let out a small yelp of surprise, jumping at the voice, then stabilised his box to prevent it from falling.

"Tony? Give me a hand with this, man!"

Hechen took a step in front of the door. He eyed the three dots nervously. The dots were still, unblinking, as if staring at the young man before them.

"Tony?"

Deep breath.

A workshop of sorts presented itself before Hechen's eyes. Wooden and metal workbenches were scattered around, with pieces of wires and tools littered across the workbenches, the most important machinery was mounted against the walls neatly like pawns on the chessboard.

In the centre of the room was a skinny man in a burgundy pinstripe suit kneeled beside a... quantum comparator? No, too big. A steady state engine! Back turned towards the door, his long brown hair was twisted over his shoulders as his arm propped open the thermal regulator.

"Ah, Tony! There you are! I think the sensor's broken and I've got to keep this compartment open."

Hechen glanced back to the hallway, then back at the man. He opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted.

"Come on Tony, get the polariser! Quick!" the man paused, "Wait! Get the argon pipe first... and the proto-"

"Proton detector, gamma filter, a new tesla coil and," Hechen lowered the last item on the floor, "the moving coil galvanometer, that's probably it?"

The man looked up at Hechen, surprised. He quickly picked up the components to fit them back into the machine with expert precision, screwing on the argon pipe, connecting the wires, inserting the filters in fluid motions. He was done within minutes.

"Thank you," the man turned to face Hechen, smiling, "you're not Tony."

Hechen studied the man before him. Fairly young, couldn't have been older than thirty, seemed to be Spanish, with oily black hair curling in every direction and freshly shaven beard.

Hechen grinned, "I'm uh, new... here..."

The man raised an eyebrow, "Oh?"

"University research."

"Ah," he rose up, hand outstretched, "Gabriel Sanz, assistant head of Engineering."

Hechen cheerily shook Gabriel's hand, "Hechen Huang."

"Engineer?"

"Yes...Well-" Hechen dragged the 'well' dramatically, "I do dabble."

"Pretty good dabbling I see," Gabriel gestured to the steady state engine, "impressive."

"Ah..." Hechen searched for words. None came. He grinned even wider.

"So what brings you here?"

"Sorry?"

"To this room, restricted access, do you need anything?"

Hechen looked back at the door, "I..."

"Yes?" Gabriel crossed his arms.

"I think..." Hechen let out a nervous chuckle, scratching his head, "I may be a little lost... Sorry..."

Gabriel laughed.

"No worries," he said, "I won't report you, as a thank you for the help."

"Thanks so much, guess I've slipped a cog before," Hechen smirked, "I'm so sorry, I just had to..."

-=+=-

London.

The air and the Thames waters were cleaned up throughout the years, yet the city's industrial past still managed to cling on to the present in the form of blackened bricks on old buildings. A fortunate thing, to have the climate change crisis (mostly) solved along with a handful of other threatening issues such as nuclear and super viruses. An unfortunate thing, to have people still being people, to have the incident...

Thin clouds covered the sky, blocking out the afternoon sun. Hechen liked cloudy days: not too hot and bright; not too cold and wet.

After a few more turns from the bridge, Hechen moved away from the river, past the crowds of people, past the arguing and the shouting, into the quieter streets. London had changed.

Taking a deep breath, he stepped into a quieter street. Narrower. The light grey bricks and pale grey glass of buildings either side blended and blurred with the dark grey concrete of the pavement and asphalt of the road, the monochrome peace disturbed only by the odd blades of withered grass.

In the distance, a siren wailed. Loud, but not enough to drown out the sounds of traffic and chatter. Closer, the jets of an airplane in the sky. Closer, jumbled footsteps knocked on the ground, gradually with more intensity, until the taps became more like thumps.

Hechen paused. He felt his muscles stiffen as he passed a junction. On the other street two large men aggressively tugged the sleeve of a young girl. They looked drunk. Hechen paced away from them. Trouble will come. No trouble.

Bad neighbourhood.

There were always sirens at any time of the day. Yells. Fights. Occasionally blood.

Never quiet.

Regrettably, Hechen needed to travel through this area to return home. It was hard to feel safe.

The world got more violent soon after the incident. Superpowers. With the arrival of people with abilities straight out of comic books, fear spread. Understandable. How would one react if suddenly people around you can run as fast as cars or generate fire from thin air? Fear bred conflict. Conflict bred catastrophe.

The age of superheroes and supervillains came. Always new villains rising from the woodwork to make a buck, always someone to fight.

Fear is a powerful.

Poster of a fast food restaurant still hung on the red wall. Half ripped, showing half a burger. Graffiti were sprayed over the entire wall, of laughing faces and capes and flags and those fancy blob letters and purple and black spots.

There were quite a few villains dressed in purple and black, Hechen mused as he glanced at the spots. He never got why so many 'supervillains' exist. Don't they have anything better to do? Perhaps because people's newfound powers make them more reckless? Perhaps they wanted recognition? No idea.

He remembered hearing about a 'villain killer' dubbed by the media as 'Lunatic' who brutally murdered several minor figures in the criminal world. Hechen shrugged. None of his concern.

Perhaps this 'Lunatic' was one of the guys who wanted to make a name for themselves. Perhaps life forbade other paths to fame for them? An understandable pursuit. Recognition, after all, is one of the reasons why Hechen aimed for Oxford, now the famed SEMTOR labs.

He pondered at the thought of the smart people in that facility, how they would achieve so much more than he ever would in a lifetime, how all the nights scratching equations on papers and reading in the library would lead to something so mundane as being just another researcher, nobody would care.

Hechen shook his head, dispelling the idea.

Home. Make it home. Make it home and rest.