How to Date a Superhero Read online

  She stopped and blushed so hot, she almost took off her mask to cool herself. Her silver gloved hands twitched; she wanted to fan herself, but she didn’t dare. Not when she couldn’t, daren’t reveal the details of her vision.

  “Um ... it was such a strong vision, I, ah, don’t think there’s a way we can avoid it. I mean, I literally couldn’t see anything else, when normally I’m at least peripherally aware of my realtime surroundings.”

  Not that there’s any way that I would want to avoid it, she thought, still fighting the urge to fan herself with something. She did unfold one arm, but only long enough to pluck the crumpled paper ball from her lap.

  “Well, that doesn’t answer the question. What did you see?” Oversight asked her. “Was it the effects of the powder?”

  Oh God . . .

  The heat drained out of her face. What if it’s an aphrodisiac? What if the only reason that he makes love to me is because he has no choice in the matter?

  That was a horrible thought. Squirming uncomfortably in her chair, arms refolded tightly against her chest, she shrugged. “I don’t know. But it could be. It, um, we look like we need to be isolated for a little while. A few hours. Maybe a full day. It’s nothing really harmful. I doubt we’d need medical observation,” she added quickly as Hindsight drew in a breath to speak. “It’s just. . . potentially embarrassing, I guess you could say. The sort of embarrassing where observation would just be a bad idea all the way around.”

  “What, like you break out in massive pimples, or something?” Backhand asked, wrinkling his nose at the possibility.

  “Uh . . . something like that,” Carrie muttered.

  “In that case, I think we should avoid it. If it’s not harmful, but serves no purpose other than to isolate us for a while, we’re not going to be free to do our jobs in patrolling the city,” Steelhand pointed out. “And if it happens right after we leave the baseball game, then we should definitely avoid the baseball game.”

  “Nice try, Steelhand,” their supervisor quipped, “but the two of you are still making a public appearance tonight. Be on the alert as you leave the ballpark though. Choose a different route, leave at a different time, but I do want you to go and make nice with the civilians. Try to ward off the powder and limit any direct vectors for contamination. Try to see who attacked you, Foresight.”

  Nodding, she unfocused her eyes, attempting to return to the point in time when they were assaulted with the powder. She focused on following their futures, and strained hard to follow the two men. She caught a glimpse of cement walls, metal shelving and glass instruments. “I’m seeing ... a lab of some sort. Ah! Dr Mockery,” she realized, catching a glimpse of the Rescindant. “I’m pretty sure it’s him; he usually has those purple goggles of his and I can see them perched on his head. It’s definitely his minions who are trying to dust us with the powder he’s been making.

  “He’s . . . He’s watching something on a monitor. He’s yelling at them. He’s not happy. Whatever the dust does to us ... ow ... I don’t think it gives the results he was looking for. I’m sorry, I can’t see any more right now.” Closing her eyes, she rubbed gently at her temples, trying to ease the headache that came from pressing too hard against time.

  “All right, you have your assignments. Do keep in mind that Foresight can’t see everything, so stay sharp, keep your eyes open and be safe. There are old Ascendants, and there are bold Ascendants, but there aren’t any old, bold Ascendants . . . except for Mr Invulnerable, of course,” Oversight joked. No one laughed.

  “Dismissed!”

  Everyone gathered up their briefing reports and headed for the door. Carrie/Foresight turned to her partner. He looked like he was frowning behind his blue mask and, every once in a while, he glanced her way almost warily. She had no idea what he was thinking or why he was frowning. But she knew he was spoiling for a fight.

  The door closed behind the others, leaving the two of them alone in the briefing room. She stood, but he didn’t move. Clearing her throat in the awkward silence, she offered, “Well, just in case we do go through with what I foresaw, I think we should go grab a couple of old uniforms to stash somewhere in the city before we head for the ballpark. In case that powder is some sort of contaminant.” When he just studied her, she prompted, “What do you think?”

  Folding his arms across his chest in a pose reminiscent of her earlier one, he tilted his head a little. “I think you should tell me what you foresaw. The thing that requires ‘isolation’ and is ‘potentially embarrassing’ to both of us. As one of the potentially afflicted, I have a right to know.”

  And have you screaming and running for the hills at the mere thought of being intimate with me? The woman you cannot stand outside of business hours?

  She shook her head. At least she had a better excuse to use than her fragile ego. “You know why I can’t do that, Steelhand. Foreknowledge of an incompletely foreseen event can potentially lead to an even worse situation. League rules.”

  “Fine. Then let’s talk about you trying to dump me as your partner. What is up with that?” he demanded, shifting in his seat to look at her. “I thought we were good together.”

  Good together . . . The words flashed through her, leaving behind an entirely different connotation than the one he meant. Once again, she could see their bodies intertwining, vulnerable and intimate, reducing her from Foresight, heroine of the city, to Carrie, lonely, longing woman. Flushing, she cleared her throat and dragged her mind back to the more neutral aspects of life.

  “You and I do make a good team out in the field. I don’t deny that, I have never denied that, and I swear that what I said just now in front of the others stands,” Foresight repeated. “You are an excellent addition to the team. I just . . .”

  His dark brown eyes had narrowed at her blush. They narrowed further now. “You just . . . what? You just want to get rid of me? You just want another partner? You just want to go solo? Is that it?”

  I just want you to look at me like you look at Farshot! But that wasn’t entirely accurate, so she bit back the words, frustrated. He was polite to their red-suited teammate, even flirted a little with her, but Foresight - Carrie - wanted more. She wanted more than he was giving her; she just didn’t think there was anything more within him for her, and was afraid to find out for sure.

  Aware of the passing minutes, she shook her head. “We don’t have time for this argument right now. We’ll talk later.” Then swallowing the unpleasant lump of her discomfort, shoving it deep down where it wouldn’t interfere with her job, she headed for the ladies’ locker room.

  It didn’t look like Steelhand the Uninterested was going to try to get himself into her armour-reinforced stretch pants anytime soon. Shame.

  “I’d be happy to. It’s one of the few perks of the job,” Foresight/Carrie said to yet another citizen wanting to have a picture taken with her and her partner.

  Steelhand’s smile was definitely looking strained, and hers was beginning to feel that way. She smiled a little more, posed with a giggling young woman between the two of them while the girl’s eye-rolling boyfriend took the picture. Over Steelhand’s shoulder, Carrie spotted a mother and a little boy coming out of one of the doors in the concrete-block wall. The moment the pictures were done, she gave the crowd around them an apologetic smile.

  “Thank you all for your continuing support, but I see that the bathroom is now free, and even superheroes need to, well, you know. Steelhand? Shall we?” she asked, indicating the door behind him. The bathroom trick was really simply a ruse to get away from all the people. Sometimes it was the only thing that worked - the public could be so demanding.

  “Please do excuse us,” he said graciously, wading through the crowd with an eagerness that betrayed his dislike for the press of people. As he had explained during the interview process for this job, it was one thing if he initiated the contact and could brace himself against a person’s thoughts, but an unexpected touch was unnerving and unwanted. She
would’ve liked to believe that his disinterest in her was due solely to his dislike for inadvertently reading other people’s minds, but he didn’t seem to hesitate when it came to being close to Farshot. After all, today wasn’t the first time they’d gone to the movies together.

  Thankfully, the citizens parted way, and the pair made it to the bathroom door. As soon as the two of them were inside and Steelhand had thrown the lock, he faced her, guessing her intention. “You’re going to read the future?”

  She nodded. “It’ll be easier now that we’re closer to the events.”

  Leaning back against the wall next to the door, she stared across the room and unfocused her eyes. Her awareness of the crowds out on the mezzanine level faded as her attention twisted itself inside, then out, and she saw —felt - once again the scene of her and her partner being attacked. This time the image changed. They weren’t ambushed unknowingly, and coated in the yellowish powder by surprise; this time, she watched herself fling up a protective bubble, then lash out telekinetically, capturing the two attackers as they tried to flee.

  She saw Steelhand stripping off his gloves, saw him touching the face of one of the masked, struggling captives. But then the vision switched off without warning. That was the frustrating thing about her gift; she only ever saw in glimpses and snatches, incomplete pieces. It was like trying to grasp the image printed on a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle with only a dozen pieces to go on. Sighing, she closed her eyes and shook her head.

  “All I can see is the attack happening again. But I put up a shield bubble and we catch them. Nothing else.”

  “Well, what about the ‘potentially embarrassing’ stuff?” Steelhand asked. “If we aren’t touched by the powder, thanks to your telekinesis, does the other stuff still happen?”

  Paling a little at the thought of the two of them not . . . she quickly unfocused her eyes and returned her attention to the future.

  “I see ... us letting the minions go ... We change clothes anyway? We’re in street clothes . . . travelling . . . Oh! Oh God . . .”

  Her power had hopped ahead, like a stone skipping across the surface of a lake. Now it plopped beneath the waters, dragging her down into the depths of her vision. Gone was the bathroom, gone was Steelhand’s silver-and-blue masked face. All she could see was his real face, lips slack from panting, eyes shut, neck arched and muscles straining as he ...

  ... as he invaded her vision? Sensations doubled, trebled abruptly, spiking desire sharply through all six of her senses. Bodies and minds collided, muscles flexed, pleasure seared. The image shifted without her conscious control; he shifted it, grabbing and lifting her thigh, tilting her hips just that little bit more for the perfect stroke, exactly what she craved most in her foresight-swamped thoughts . . .

  Carrie gasped, jerking back from his touch. The back of her head thumped painfully into the wall, breaking up most of the lust clouding her senses. Blinking rapidly, panting for air, she found him staring at her with eyes so wide she could see the whites ringing the chocolate brown of his irises.

  “What the . . . ?” he mumbled, still visibly stunned.

  “What the hell do you think you were doing?” she hissed, barely remembering to keep her voice down. The last thing they needed was for any civilians to overhear the two of them arguing through the restroom door. “That was an invasion of my privacy. You are not supposed to scan your partners without their prior consent.”

  Her embarrassed anger snapped him out of his daze. Frowning, he focused on her. “I thought I had probable cause. At the last place I worked, my partner turned Rescindant. I thought he was acting strangely beforehand, secretive and not quite right, but I didn’t exercise my right to scan him under probable cause. He nearly blew up half the team as he tried to make off with millions of dollars in bearer bonds. I thought it was happening with you. When you refused to say what you had foreseen, after acting like you didn’t want me as your partner any more, I got a little suspicious.”

  Hands shifting to her hips, she gave him an annoyed look. “I am not turning Rescindant, Steelhand. And I didn’t tell the others what I’d seen because it was none of their damned business!”

  “Well, you could have told me!” he demanded, then winced, catching himself and lowering his voice as it started to echo off the hard cement blocks around them. “Dammit! This is not the best place for an argument.”

  “Well, we’re not going to avoid it this time,” she muttered. Somehow, she knew they would get through this misunderstanding; her vision had been too strong to suggest otherwise. She took a deep breath.

  “I wasn’t sure if that powder was an aphrodisiac. But if I keep it away with a shield bubble, and we still make love . . .” She stopped and trained her eyes on him. “Why the hell won’t you flirt with me? Let’s start with that, shall we? Why won’t you flirt with me?”

  He gave her a duh look. “Because you’re my partner? League studies have proven that if two League members in the same city start dating each other, the partners become distracted whenever one or the other gets into danger. Because of that, I don’t date fellow Ascendants.”

  “You are dating Farshot!” Carrie hissed, incensed.

  “I am not! We’re just friends,” he whispered back defensively.

  “Oh, friends, really? Then why is it she keeps coming on to you like a love-struck puppy? Or didn’t you notice that, Mr Touch-Telepathic?”

  “She’s not in love with me. She’s in love with Oversight. But he’s gay!” Wincing, Steelhand covered his masked face with his bared hands. “Oh God, I did not mean to reveal that. God, this is another reason why I don’t date people ...” Dragging his hands free, he sighed. “Look ... I like you. A lot. Too much to treat you as anything more than a colleague, because League policy prohibits partners from dating. I’m good at my job. I love my job. I will do whatever it takes to adhere to the rules.”

  She eyed him askance. “The League prohibits partners from dating? Since when? Where did you hear that piece of drivel?”

  “When I first joined the League as an active-duty Ascendant, I was given the lecture that League members on the same team do not date each other,” he explained patiently. “Adding a relationship to the situation is too much of a distraction, given the potential danger in our line of work. That means that, no matter how attractive, intelligent, funny or competent I find you - and you have no idea how much I do — I cannot date you. Statistically, it increases the danger on the job, and it puts a dual strain on the Ascendant in question, because if their date and their partner are ever both placed in peril, they’ll be torn in two different directions as to who to go help first. The partnership has to come first!” Steelhand seemed to know the entire League manual by heart.

  Memory of the study came back to her. Foresight rolled her eyes. “Did your superiors ever tell you about the second study they released? The one encouraging partners to date? Yes, to date someone who isn’t your partner is a potential problem in an emergency, but if you’re dating your partner, the study found that you tend to fight harder to protect them. The Spartans at Thermopylae were all lovers as well as partners, and they held off a massive invasion force for days back in ancient Greece -and I’ll remind you that very few of them were Ascendant heroes! If it works for regular citizens, it’ll definitely work for us.

  “Look, why else would Oversight go to all the trouble of pairing us up male—female, if not to encourage dating opportunities? With your steel-skin ability, you’d actually be a better partner for Bomber, but he didn’t pair you two together,” she said. “That’s because the League’s policy is to encourage Ascendants to date, marry and produce more Ascendant-potential offspring. Stable families come from couples who have a long-term friendship and know how to work well together in times of adversity. Teammates who get along well fit that bill very nicely.”

  He frowned at her, confused. “If that were so, then why didn’t I hear about this?”

  “Maybe your former supervisor just didn’t
want to deal with the headache of couples dating and breaking up, and partnerships constantly having to be rearranged. Did you ever think of that?

  “Backhand is patrolling the Riverside where Nearsight is working undercover. Between his super-strength and his ability to turn invisible, he can keep an eye on her at least part of the time. He wouldn’t do any less for an assignment because they’re dating each other. And Oversight knows it. That’s why he has never reassigned Backhand to partner with anyone else.”

  Steelhand gave her a puzzled look. “Backhand and Nearsight are dating? Are you sure? They act so ... professional around each other.”

  “You knew that Oversight is gay — which I didn’t even know — but didn’t know that Backhand and Nearsight were going out?” she asked.

  A blush spread across his lightly tanned skin. Steelhand cleared his throat. “The only reason I know is because I caught him leering at me in his thoughts at my interview.”

  “Well, you are rather handsome,” she told him. “And I have been flamingly jealous of Farshot because you’ve flirted with her, but not me. That’s why I didn’t want to be partnered with you any more. Because you weren’t interested in me. And it’s been killing me.”

  He moved closer to her, not quite bringing their bodies together, but close enough that she had to lean back against the wall. Not because he intimidated her, and not because she didn’t want him to touch her, but because of the rising warmth in his dark eyes. “It’s been killing me too. I didn’t dare flirt with you, because I thought it was forbidden.

  “When I date someone, it’s very . . . intense for me. At least at first. I cannot touch someone without getting flashes of their thoughts. And when we make love—” his gaze drifted down to her mouth, and the corner of his lips curled up on one side “—everything feeds back on itself until I’m nearly mindless with our mutual pleasure. Of course, it does mean I’m a very good lover, because I’ll know exactly what you’re craving.”