Part 1: Get Ready
Ch. 1...
“Ten weeks?” Emma’s hologram is positively indignant, and her heart-shaped face is scrunched up in horror. Bells can’t see anything other than her face in the projection above his wrist, but he knows her arms are probably crossed and she’s about to—yep, there she goes. A little furrow pops up between her eyebrows, as it does whenever she’s annoyed. “Bells, that’s almost the whole summer!” The hologram flickers in and out as Emma moves. She shakes her head; her curls bounce.
“I know. I know. I just—it was a last-minute thing. I mean, I was on the waitlist and then someone dropped out, and it’s a really cool opportunity, with a scholarship and everything! I’ve never been in the North; it’ll be so cool!” Bells grins, hoping his excitement will be infectious.
“I know it will be cool and I’m happy that you got into this art program, but I wish you would have told me! Ten whole weeks without my best friend! What will I do?”
She’s pouting, and Bells sighs. The effect of the Emma Robledo pout can be devastating. He touches the holo, and it blips, distorting the image. Emma does the same, and the tiny blue pixels of her fingers reach for his.
A pang of longing courses through him. He’s going to miss her terribly. It’s awful lying to his friends about where he’s been these past few summers. Last year, he told them it was a soccer camp. The year before that, he said he was visiting his cousins in the California region.
“Well, you have volleyball practice and aren’t you learning to drive? I mean, you haven’t stopped talking about it since your moms agreed to teach you, and they were gonna get you your own car, right? And Jess—”
“Jess! Have you told Jess?” Emma shrieks.
Bells barely has time to shake his head before Emma rolls her eyes and flicks at her wrist, and then he hears another comm link connect. Jess’ face blooms out of shimmering blue light.
Jess waves, and her ponytail bobs. “Hey! Are we still on for movie night?”
“No,” Emma says. “Bells is leaving us for ten weeks!”
“What? Why? When?” Jess frowns. Her hologram glitches and flickers, and the sound fizzes in and out. The reception in the Tran household is always shoddy for some reason.
He starts over. “I got accepted to that summer art program in Aerial City. You know, very prestigious, dorm rooms, classes every day, field trips to museums…”
“What program? I didn’t even know you applied to one!” Jess raises her eyebrows.
“Uh… I didn’t know if I would get in.”
That much is true, but there’s no art program. The fictional summer camp does sound cool, but not as cool as what he’s actually going to do, which is learn how to be a hero.
Meta-Human Training is a huge, secretive business; there are applications and waitlists, even after the arduous process of registration. That took Bells long enough to complete because his parents didn’t like the idea of Meta-Human Training, but after Bells started shifting accidentally, they agreed that training was a good idea. He’s been going to the training program for the past three summers, but he’d been waitlisted this year. Yesterday, Bells got a message assuring him there was a spot for him if he wanted to take it—and he did.
“Aerial City is so far, Bells,” Jess says, frowning.
Technically, Bells won’t be in Aerial City. He doesn’t know exactly where the Meta-Human Training Center is; no one does. But his hovertrain ticket is for Aerial City, and he’ll be picked up there to go to the training center.
“Yeah, but it will be cool! I hear that all the buildings are built right into the trees.” Bells imagines giant trees, living and growing around stout little buildings on the ground. He hasn’t had time to go through the holopages the training center sent him about Aerial City. He’s been busy trying to finish his duties at his family’s restaurant and their farm, and packing.
“You better call us every night! I want to hear everything about what it’s like!” Emma says.
“Don’t forget about us,” Jess says. Alarm flits across her face. “Brendan, what are you—oh no, oh no—sorry, gotta go put this out, bye!”
Jess’ holo blinks and disappears.
Bells laughs. After last week’s incident with the pineapple, Jess’ little brother Brendan is restricted to only non-flammable experiments. Apparently he’s taking advantage since their parents are out of town this weekend.
“Ten credits says Jess comes back with no eyebrows again,” he says, snickering.
Emma snorts. “One eyebrow, and make that twenty credits.”
They grin at each other until the joke doesn’t seem so funny. He won’t be able to laugh and joke with Emma for the whole summer. He’ll have access to the Net, but holocalls are strictly prohibited due to the secrecy of the location.
Emma sighs. “Okay, when do you have to leave? We should hang out before you go. Jess has been going on and on about Vindicated 5. It just came out. Do you have time for a movie?”
“Em, I’m leaving in an hour.”
“What?”
The data exchange device beeps with the low-battery warning; Bells was too caught up with packing to charge it. He plops the slim device into the dock on his desk.
The DED expands Emma’s hologram until her indignant face is life-size. He gestures at the pile of clothing he’s had varying degrees of success stuffing into his duffel bag. “See? Packing.”
“You can’t leave without saying goodbye!”
“That’s why I called? To say goodbye?” Bells says, but Emma’s hologram blips and disappears.
He flicks at the projection to call Emma back, but she doesn’t pick up.
Bells scowls, then turns on the desktop projector. The gleaming keyboard projects onto his desk and hums to life, and the DED buzzes, signaling its transition from mobile mode to desktop mode. Holos from all of Bells’ open programs are thrown in the air: the book he was reading for Meta-Human Training, some pages on the Net of old art gallery archives, the group chat with Emma and Jess, and his main messages.
Bells cracks his knuckles and opens a new message.
He’s in the middle of typing a ridiculous, over-flowery essay about how he’ll miss his best friend and looking up sonnets to prove how sappy he can be, when his dad knocks on his door.
“I still have ten minutes before we have to leave!” Bells says.
“Yeah, that, and also—” Nick Broussard winks at him and steps aside.
Emma bursts into Bells’ bedroom and flings her arms around him. She barely reaches up to his shoulder, so her face smashes into his chest.
“Five minutes,” Nick mouths before closing the door and heading downstairs.
“Aw, no, this is why I just wanted to call, Em. If you cry, then I’m gonna cry, and it’s gonna be a huge mess.”
“I’m gonna miss you so much.” Emma’s voice is muffled. She squeezes him tighter. “I can come visit you.”
Bells’ heart jumps. “I—that—” that would be nice, he doesn’t say. If he was actually going to a summer art program, it would be amazing for Emma to visit. They could go around the city, just the two of them, eat strange foods on terraces and see the wonders of Aerial City together, like the tourists who flock there for the sun and the sea and the… romance.
He reluctantly slips out of the hug and steps back. He takes her hands in his and squeezes them. Her brown eyes are bright.
“I’d like that,” Bells says. “But, um, it’s a very strict program. We’re not supposed to leave the campus other than for field trips. Outside influences and all that. It’s a very rigorous schedule. I’m sorry; I wish you could visit.”
“You’ll call me and Jess every night, though?”
“Yes, of course. And messages and everything. Look, there isn’t even a time difference. It’ll be over before you know it. You have volleyball practice every day, and Jess will probably come to a lot of them—”
“You mean all of them, so she can moon over Abby.”
Bells snickers. “Seriously, that crush of hers is ridiculous. She ever gonna try talking to the girl?”
Emma laughs. “Maybe one of these days she’ll make eye contact.” She sniffs, wipes her eyes, and smiles at Bells. “You’re right. It’ll be fine, like last summer when I got grounded for a month after I crashed my moms’ car.”
“See? And it all worked out. We talked every day even though we weren’t supposed to hang out. It’ll be fine,” Bells repeats. “And you also have all your fancy prep classes, and I can’t believe you’re taking a college-level ecology and evolutionary science class—”
“Hey, I like science, and we don’t have any of those programs at our school—”
“Nerd,” Bells says fondly.
“Don’t get a big head, okay, Bells? Going off to the city, hanging out in galleries. You’re probably gonna meet some museum director who’s absolutely impressed with your work, and then they’re gonna whisk you off for art shows, and you’re gonna become famous and never have time for your small-town friends again.” Emma sighs dramatically, places her hands on her hips, and shakes her head.
“Oh, yeah.” Bells holds back a laugh. “I’ll be the most famous artist in the Collective and become so rich that I can travel all over the world. And I’ll be like, ‘who were those girls I used to know back in that little desert town… oh, Jemma and… Ess…’”
Emma snorts. “That one got away from you, didn’t it?”
“I was gonna switch the letters and then… yeah, it did.”
They laugh, and the moment stretches until Bells is hyper-aware of how close they’re standing. Emma’s lips quirk up, and details jump out at him: the pinkness of her lips; how her hair falls into her eyes; the way their hands look, fingers intertwined, brown and black skin together.
Bells always wondered if this would happen, if they’d just flow naturally into a romance. Still, he’s not prepared. He has to leave for the whole summer and is he really going to tell Emma he loves her now?
It’s all he can think about: the warmth of her hands in his, her proximity. Emma steps closer. She looks up at him. Her lips part—
Bells’ DED buzzes with an incoming call and vibrates furiously on the charging port balanced on the edge of the desk, until the entire thing falls over. The multiple holograms projected onto Bells’ desk disappear. A new hologram projects, sideways, onto the floor, and an image of Jess forms. She’s covered in soot and catching her breath.
Bells and Emma let go and spring back. It’s not weird that they were holding hands; Jess wouldn’t think it’s weird, but she’d definitely think something was up if Bells acted like it was weird that they were holding hands. Maybe he should move—
“Okay, I’m back! Oh, hey, Emma! Wait, why am I sideways? Did your DED fall off its dock again?”
Emma runs her hand through her hair. “Yeah, it did; you know he never leaves it in a stable place.” She glances at Bells and then back at Jess’ hologram. “I, ah, just came over to say bye to Bells. Did you know he has to leave today?”
“What? Nooo, I’m babysitting. I can’t leave.” Jess moans. “I want to come see you off. Are you taking the train? I guess if I take Brendan with me we can—đi ăn cứt, Brendan, seriously. I’m trying to say bye to Bells, can you not—Brendan, I’m serious, not the house programming—” she looks to her right and then back at them. “I’m so sorry. I think the basement is on fire now. I love you, and have a great time in Aerial City, okay? Call me when you get there!”
The hologram disappears. Emma is only a few feet away, but she might as well be on the other side of the room. Had he imagined their almost-kiss?
He steps forward…
“Bells, we’ve got to leave now or we’re gonna be late for the train!” his dad calls.
“Sorry, I gotta…” Bells stuffs the rest of his clothes in the duffel. Emma turns the bag on its side and sits on it so Bells can zip it closed. Huffing a bit, he picks it up. “Thanks for coming over, Em.”
Emma follows him out into the hall. Bells’ parents and his brothers are already waiting by the car. Bells can’t ask one of them to stay behind so Emma can come along. It’s better this way, he guesses. He doesn’t want to say goodbye to her in front of them.
Bells goes for one last hug, and Emma sighs, squeezing him.
“Hey,” she blurts. “What Jess said. Me too.”
“Definitely. I’ll call you when I get there.”
“Yeah,” Emma says quietly. “That.”
Bells is squished in the back seat between his two older brothers, who keep trading glances while his parents chat about the farm. It’s an hour drive to Las Vegas, an hour more of teasing, but Andover doesn’t have its own hovertrain stop. While Bells could have taken the bus, his family wanted to see him off properly.
“Did you have a nice goodbye with your girlfriend, little bro?” Sean asks, knocking his shoulder against Bells playfully.
“Emma’s not my girlfriend.” Bells folds his arms and scowls.
“Sure she isn’t.” Simon laughs, elbowing Bells. “She just came over because she’ll miss you so much,” he says, his voice high-pitched and syrupy sweet.
“Oh, Bells,” Sean says in falsetto, “I love you so much; call me every night when you’re gone!”
“Stop it,” Bells says, but his brothers are on a roll, and there’s no stopping them now as the Emma impressions get more and more ridiculous.
“Oh, stop teasing your brother,” his dad says. With his broad shoulders and deep, gruff voice, Nick Broussard might seem an imposing figure, but he’s got a soft spot for his kids, especially Bells, his youngest, although Bells could do without the babying—from any of his family.
“But he makes it so easy.” Sean grins at him. “And I’ve missed him so much.”
“And you came all the way from Clairborne to make fun of me? It’s not like you can’t visit more often,” Bells says.
His mother looks up from the car’s computer console and levels his brother with a steady gaze. “That’s true,” Collette says. “We’d love to see you more.”
Sean shrugs. “It’s hard work maintaining all of our crops and making sure they stay hidden.”
“Ah, so it is close! I know it’s within an hour’s drive,” Bells says, smirking.
The glances between his parents confirm that he’s right. “You know we can’t tell you where Clairborne is just yet. It’s not because we don’t think you’re responsible…” Collete trails off, patting his hand.
Bells bites down on the sarcastic comment on the tip of his tongue. It’s frustrating, being the only one in the family who doesn’t know.
“Reduce the risk, I know,” Bells says.
“That’s right, son,” Nick says, smiling.
With his family’s secret farms and the government’s ever-watchful eye on meta-humans, going to Meta-Human Training is a risk. Bells would have started working at Clairborne, the secret farm, as his older brothers did once they turned fifteen, but he signed up for training instead. He’s only worked on the “official” Broussard farm, two miles past the solar fields outside of town, where the Broussards maintain a respectable number of acres for produce that’s sold to the North American Collective. Bells is pretty sure he knows where most of their crops grow, though. He tried following his brother once, but he was caught immediately and sent home.
“It’s somewhere in the mountains, right? Come on, you can tell me. I know all about Grassroots.”
“That they’re terrible for eating?” Nick says loudly.
Bells rolls his eyes. He really doesn’t think the NAC has the car bugged, but it’s better to be safe than sorry. Grassroots, the underground farmers’ market the Broussards manage, is important to too many people.
He plucks an apple from Simon’s bag and munches it. They’re good this year, sweet and just a little tart.
“That’s one credit, bro.” Simon raises his eyebrows at Bells and grabs the fruit.
“Hey!” Bells scowls, folding his arms.
“They’re going for twenty creds a bag right now in New Bright City,” Sean says. “Can’t believe the Collective is giving us only five.”
It doesn’t make much sense to Bells either, but an official looking holodoc arrives every year with the standard market prices. The Collective’s laws forbid farmers from selling their produce locally; instead, every farmer is required to sell directly to the Collective, which resupplies the twenty-four regions of the country. By the time everything is shipped and re-shipped, the price for consumers doubles.
“Well, I don’t have any extra credits.” Bells grabs the apple back. He blew a huge chunk of his savings going shopping with Emma last week; they found an artist who hand-dyed shoes, and he just had to have these green and blue ones. That doesn’t mean he can’t have the apple now, though. Bells looks Simon in the eye and licks the fruit very deliberately, all over the skin. “Plus, I’m family.”
“Simon,” Collette warns, grabbing the bag of apples and putting it in her lap. “We’ve got plenty to sell at—”
Nick begins singing at the top of his lungs.
Collette ignores him. “—Grassroots after we drop your brother off.”
“So you’re meeting them in Vegas?” Bells asks, hoping to learn more.
Like the location of Clairborne, he doesn’t know how his family evades Collective laws to sell local produce at affordable prices. His parents are paranoid; the fewer people who know, the better. He’ll be trusted with the secret when he’s finished with Meta-Human Training and won’t be going to government facilities anymore. That was an offhand thing his dad said once, but it needles at him a bit: that they think Bells’ desire to be a superhero isn’t going to be… permanent; that he’ll just come back to work the family business.
Simon reaches across Bells to poke Sean. “Hey, are you still using a drip system? In one of my agro classes we were talking about…”
Watching the landscape pass by, Bells tunes out the farm talk and eats his apple. The bright oranges and reds of the desert are familiar, yet the terrain is strange. The world outside his little desert town was just an idea, and all the places he only knew in holobooks and movies never seemed quite real until he traveled outside Andover for Meta-Human Training.
They pass through a swath of solar fields shining in the afternoon sun, and Bells marvels at how many panels there are.
“It looks like a huge lake mirroring the blue sky,” Sean says, and Bells remembers his older brother has never seen him off for training, has never come this way.
Simon nods. “Neat, isn’t it? The Vegas solar fields generate power not only for their city, but for cities all over the Western regions of the Collective.”
Bells tunes them out to focus on the sparkle of the sunlight on the panels. How do cities that aren’t next to perpetually sunny areas get their energy? Bells has some understanding of other power sources—geothermal, tidal generators, wind, steam—but he hasn’t seen them. What will Aerial City be like? Is it really in the trees?
The single-lane highway passes old signs and new. A billboard that features Captain Orion smiling heroically down at them reminds them to drive safely.
“As if this is driving.” Collette watches the car’s computer panel tick down the estimated arrival time.
Nick pats her shoulder. “Calm down. We’ve already removed the car’s access to the Net; we’re not being logged.”
“I know, but I hate not controlling the car.” Collette frowns at the panel.
The discussion is an old one; the need to keep Grassroots and their organization secret is coupled with a strong distrust of the Collective and, in turn, the League. Like every year since Bells started Meta-Human Training, this year the League asked Bells to participate in the ongoing research and development the League conducts at the center. In fact, the League came close to insisting. Bells knows they’ve never had a shapeshifter to test and that with their help he could learn much more about the extent of his powers, but the idea made his parents uncomfortable because the League increased the pressure every year.
Las Vegas seems to happen all at once. Hotels, casinos, metal and chrome skyscrapers, and walkways spring up all around them like a spindly metal forest. Bells looks up and up and up at their height; it never fails to fascinate him— Is that building shaped like a castle?
The lights and facades of the hotels and casinos are bright and fanciful in every possible color, a constant distraction. There is indeed a castle, and a pyramid, and a replica of the Eiffel Tower: love letters to places only the absurdly rich can go. Apparently, people used to fly internationally, when fossil fuel engines were still prominent. It’s very rare for people to travel outside the Collective as boat travel is incredibly expensive. These replicas of places abroad might be the only chance to be an international tourist.
The car slows to a stop in the middle of the street. “You have arrived at your destination,” the cool computer voice says.
“No, this is not our destination.” Nick flicks furiously at the car’s computer panel and brings up the keyboard.
They’re definitely not at the train station. The car behind them honks angrily. People stare.
“Come on, fix it!” Nick says as Collette tries to reprogram.
Finally, the car whirs to life and drives them to the train station. It’s bustling with noise and people and luggage.
Walking through the station, Bells trips a few times over his own two feet and bumps into Simon and Sean more than once as they bicker over who gets to carry Bells’ bag. At the platform, people are saying goodbye to their loved ones.
“Final boarding for northbound from Las Vegas, stopping at Middleton, Redwood County, and Aerial City,” the automated voice announces.
Gleaming silver, the hovertrain is larger than life.
Air rushes from the bottom of the train, and it hovers above the magnetic track, ready for hi-speed travel. Bells knows it’s just maglev tech, but somehow, the way the train floats effortlessly always seems magical.
“Final boarding!”
A high, sharp whistle blows.
Bells glances around the busy hub. Most of the other passengers have already boarded, leaving only a few well-wishers on the platform. He turns to his parents.
“We’re so proud of you,” Nick and Collette chorus.
“It’s your last year, right?” Nick asks.
“I don’t know for sure, but I think I can finish this year,” Bells says. He stands a little taller, certain that he’ll be doing actual missions for the League before the year is out.
“Your DED is fully charged? You’ll call us when you get there?” Nick asks, his brow furrowed.
“Yes, Dad.”
It finally registers that he’s going to be away for the whole summer. He tries to memorize his mother’s soft and serene smile, the severity of his father’s eyebrows, the way his mother towers over his father. Dad will be the shortest in the family soon, but for now, Bells and his dad are eye-to-eye.
Simon ruffles his hair, and Bells scowls, but he doesn’t really mind. He gently tucks his hair back into place, and, on a whim, changes it from blue to purple, which earns him a shoulder bump from his older brother.
“Watch it, we’re in public!” Simon hisses.
“No one saw,” Bells says. Everyone on the platform is too busy saying hellos and goodbyes.
He takes in his family: his brothers’ height; the way Sean leans on Simon; his parents’ watery eyes. At the sight of everyone beaming at him, his heart catches.
“Well, come here,” Nick says, opening his arms.
Bells swallows the lump in his throat. He walks into the group hug and inhales the scent of basil and mint that always follows his mother, the cinnamon-apple scent of Sean, and Simon’s spicy hair gel. Their arms wrap around him like a protective cocoon.
“Call the minute you’re in New Vancouver,” Nick says.
Bells hushes him. “You don’t know the training center is in New Vancouver. No one knows that.”
“Right. Well, I’m pretty sure it is. I narrowed it down to all the possible places that the—” He glances around before dropping his voice to a whisper. “Look, there are only so many places outside of Aerial City, and because they need so much room in a Class 1 area, there’s only—”
Bells laughs and breaks free of the hug. “I’ll call you guys every day.”
“Yeah! Show ’em who’s boss!” Simon pumps his fist into the air.
A nearby couple and their toddler eye the Broussards warily.
“Soccer camp,” Sean says to them, winking.
“And call me if you can’t handle the T-shot by yourself,” Nick reminds him.
Bells flushes. “Da-ad, I’ve got this.”
He’s a bit squeamish with needles so his dad has been helping him with his monthly hormone shots ever since he started them. The last two years, he switched to the patch for the ten-week training session, but this year he didn’t have time to order them. Bells will have to administer at least two shots. He practiced last night and has it handled, though. He definitely doesn’t want his dad coming to Aerial City to help him.
“Okay, kiddo,” Nick says.
Simon and Sean squish Bells between them in a tight hug, then lift him up in the air the way they used to when he was a kid.
“Losers, put me down!”
“No way, Baby-Bells!” Simon gives him a particularly tight squeeze, and Sean does the same, until Bells is laughing. It’s been a long time since they were all together like this; he’s missed it.
“Not a baby,” Bells protests.
“Let us know when you’re a big hero,” Sean says as they set Bells down. “I’ll buy all your comic books.”
“Shut up.” Bells shakes his head in amusement.
“Here, take a snack for the train.” Simon puts another ripe apple into Bells’ pocket.
Bells shoves playfully at Simon’s shoulders before straightening his clothes. He gives his parents one last hug goodbye and gets on the train.
Bells finds a window seat and watches the oranges and reds of the desert as they speed by. He can barely grasp how big this country is, how much land exists outside the populated regions in the swaths of Unmaintained zones too close to the original meltdown points for habitation.
The X29 flare not only knocked out the entire global power systems, but also caused many nuclear power stations to fail. The Nevada region was lucky; the nearest nuclear meltdown zone was in California. But several meltdown points dotted the East Coast. Las Vegas was one of the few cities untouched by radiation, and people flocked to the city and its desert counterparts. Some cities, like Nuevo Los Angeles, were rebuilt after the Disasters where the original city once stood, and others, like New Bright City, were redesigned with the future in mind.
The desert gives way to mountains and then lush, tall trees. He pulls out his sketchpad and tries to capture the shifting landscapes.
Most of the other travelers get off the train at the Middleton stop, and Bells is left alone in his compartment. Only two more hours to go.
He falls asleep in the soft glow of comforting holos on his DED and wakes up groggy. He looks out the window and then sends Emma and Jess pictures of the forests and mountains, expanses of green, and blue, blue skies.
Jess responds with a series of amazed emojis. Bells laughs as they float above his wrist and then checks the time; Emma must be at volleyball practice.
He wishes he could tell Emma and Jess about his powers, how excited he was when he first discovered he could change himself, and how hard it was to hold the shift at first. But he can’t tell them, neither about his struggles, nor about his triumphs.
He’s been going to the program since he was twelve. He likes the camaraderie of the classes; he likes catching up with Christine and the twins summer after summer. He wonders whom he will see back at training. Last session, there were about twenty students: some teenagers and some in their twenties. Having realized they will never be chosen for the Heroes’ League of Heroes, most of the older students move on. Last summer, no one from the summer session was selected for the League, and only two students from the other training sessions were accepted into the Associated League. That’s a record low for new heroes. Almost everyone knows their likenesses won’t be on cereal boxes anytime soon… or ever.
Some meta-humans finish the program and no one knows for sure what happens to them, but some people with powers must become villains.
Bells shudders, thinking of Dynamite and his latest face off with Captain Orion in New Bright City. It was nearly the sort of disaster the country hadn’t seen since WWIII: Dynamite planned to set off a bomb with his pyrotechnics, but Captain Orion confronted him before he could. The battle was brutal, but she won in the end, and Dynamite was cuffed in ability-dampening tantalum and sent to Meta-Human Corrections. Captain Orion was so brave, saving all those people. Bells wants to stop crime, just like Orion does.
Bells brings up the official message from his advisors.
We are pleased to welcome you back to Meta-Human Training. After seeing your progress, we are considering you for the Heroes’ League of Heroes…
Bells will be a hero; he knows it—the first hero since Powerstorm to join the League, young and brave and powerful. People will cheer for him, and there will be comic books and everything.
His daydream is interrupted at the next stop in Redwood County when a nervous-looking kid with a backpack and paintbrushes crammed into his front pocket slides into the seat across from him. He barely looks twelve years old, but that doesn’t surprise Bells. It’s easy to navigate all public transportation in the Collective. Bells started using buses and trains by himself when he was younger than this guy.
“Um, excuse me, is this… is this train going to Aerial City?”
“Yeah,” Bells says.
“Oh, good.” The boy slumps into the seat. “I’ve never taken the hovertrain, and this is the first time I’ve been out of Redwood County by myself.” He beams at Bells. “Hi, I’m Derek. I’m going to art camp.”
Bells chuckles. He made sure there were art programs that existed in Aerial City before he made his excuse to his friends, but he was so wrapped up in the excitement of Meta-Human Training that he forgot that art camp was a real thing. “Bells,” he offers.
“Cool name!”
“Thanks, I picked it out myself,” Bells says, grinning.
* * *
He remembers the day clearly; it was his first day at Little Muffins Pre-School. He was five years old, and his parents were more nervous than he was. Ma kissed him on the forehead, and Dad told him that, if he wasn’t having fun anymore, they could come pick him up.
He laughed at them. He’d been ready ever since Simon and Sean started school and came home with stories.
He was late today because of traffic, but he was very excited and nervous. He liked to draw and brought a new set of color pencils, though most people just use the colors on their DED. He liked drawing on his DED, too, but he loved the way things look on paper.
“Oh! Hello, there. You’re just in time for art! What’s your name, sweetheart?”
He didn’t say anything, just looked nervously at his feet and tugged on the edges of Simon’s jacket. It was a cool jacket, the kind that Starscream wore, and he’d begged Simon for forever to let him wear it, and finally his brother just gave it to him. He thought he looked very cool.
The teacher smiled at him. It was a nice smile, indulgent, and she shook the holo on her DED. There was a list of names, with little check marks next to all of them except one. He saw the letters and knew what they were. It was his name, but not really. He didn’t know what name he wanted yet, and Ma said that was okay, but this lady didn’t know that.
“Could that be you?” she asked in a gentle tone.
“No.”
“Okay,” she said, putting a check mark next to the name. “What do you want me to call you?”
He didn’t know! He was still picking! He wanted to explain to the teacher that he couldn’t decide between Starscream and Fireheart. But he got messed up, stumbling over the words. And it was all too much, so he just stuck his tongue out at her.
He spent his first hour of his first day of school sitting in the time-out corner for being rude.
The other kids were coloring and drawing, and every so often one of them looked at him curiously. He stuck his tongue out at them too. He didn’t like the corner, and it was unfair that he had to be there.
He wished he was home on the farm: running through the fields, laughing as the water sprinkled over him, pulling up vegetables, eating tomatoes off the vine, watching Dad teach his big brother to cook jambalaya.
His stomach rumbled. He’d forgotten his lunch. He remembered exactly where he left it, on the kitchen table—a little box of rice and beans.
The kids weren’t drawing anymore. They were sitting at their desks, pulling things out of their backpacks, and eating. One kid ate grapes noisily, slobbering and dropping them clumsily.
He closed his eyes, trying to ignore his tummy.
“It’s snack time.”
“Huh?”
“Snack time. Ms. Pike said to come get you. Where’s yours? You can eat now. My name’s Emma.” She said all of this in one quick jumble, and he had an impression of warm, brown eyes and big, brown curls shaking enthusiastically as she swayed back and forth. There was a bright red bow in her hair.
“Don’t have a snack.”
“You can have some of mine,” Emma said. “Come on.” She held out her hand, and he took it, following her to her desk. She pulled a whole apple from a little bag. “Oh,” she said, her face falling. “My mom forgot to cut my apple today. My other mom always makes my lunch.”
He nodded. In all his five-year-old wisdom, he knew many things and that some grown-ups are better at some things than other grown-ups, like how Dad is really good at cooking, but Ma burns the food.
“You can have all of it.” She made a face. “I can’t start it.”
He took a big bite, crunched into the apple, and handed it back at her.
Emma’s whole face lit up. “Oh! Thank you!” She munched happily on the fruit and gestured for him to sit down.
There was an empty spot at the desk next to her and a projector where he could put his DED. He sneaked a look at her desk; her projector showed Emma’s letters in a careful scrawl: E, M, M, A.
Emma showed him how to connect his DED to the projector, and it flickered to life, scattering pixels into the air. He laughed as she swirled her fingers to draw shapes. “You put your name here. So everyone knows this is your desk.” She handed the apple back to him.
He shrugged, biting into it. “I don’t know. I’m still picking.”
Emma nodded. “What do you want? Do you know?”
“Um, I want to be Starscream when I grow up,” he said matter-of-factly.
“That’s not his name name,” Emma said, laughing. “You’re silly. You can have a hero name but you also need a name name.”
He nodded, chewing his apple thoughtfully. It was good, crunchy, not as sweet as the ones they grew on the farm, but still nice.
“Michael?” Emma offered.
He shook his head.
“Joe?”
No to that too.
“Simon?”
He laughed. “That’s my brother!”
“Jeremy?”
He shook his head, and Emma kept running through names.
“Sean?”
“My brother.”
“Wait—how many brothers do you have?”
He held up two fingers. “You can have one of mine. Or both of them.”
Emma giggled. “That would be fun. What about you?”
“I just don’t want to have both brothers. They are loud and smelly and always eating my food.”
“But you always have someone to play with! I don’t have anyone when I go home.”
“You can come to my house, and we can play together.”
“That sounds like fun!”
He laughed. He’d never been called fun. Annoying, yes, by his older brothers, but never fun.
“I like your laugh. Sounds like bells.” She said it with a happy grin.
“What?” He’d heard bells, but they don’t sound like anyone’s laugh.
“I learned that yesterday. You can say that something is like something else and grown-ups think you’re very smart. It’s called a—” she leaned close, as if it were a Big Secret. “Met. A. Four.”
“Okay.”
“Shhh, listen.” Emma pointed to the ceiling, and a chorus of bells, light and chiming, rang out a melody, and then a deeper one pealed in harmony. They’d sounded earlier, at snack time, but he’d been too frustrated to notice.
They were pretty. He still didn’t see how his laugh sounded like them, but that was okay. He had a new friend.
She smiled at him. “Every time we do something new, they make a pretty melody.”
“Bells,” he mused. “I like that.”