Kayden and I stood for a moment in the moonlight in front of the store as the alarm continued to wail, though it had quieted somewhat. Pieces of glass crunched under our feet. I could feel small cuts piercing my shoulder from the glass lodged within, and my head throbbed from the hits the goons had scored on me.

“What happened here?” She asked, her expression turning more serious.

“They were breaking into the store.” I gestured to the scene around us. The wail of the alarm continued to whine on as the sounds of distant sirens reached our ears. As I noticed the sirens I was struck with the implications of what I had done. I wasn’t supposed to be using my powers outside, let alone stopping crimes like this. I must have had a fearful expression when I turned back to her because she seemed to make up her mind about something in that moment.

“C’mon,” she yelled, grabbing my hand and running off into a nearby alleyway. She looked back towards the entrance of the alley and upon seeing nobody enter after us, she vaulted her way up the fire escape attached to one of the buildings we were sandwiched between. Upon reaching the top level of the fire escape, she looked back down at me and sighed. “I know you have powers. Use them, girl,” she called out before vaulting over the siding of the roof. I looked back out to the street, my anxiety ratcheting up as the sirens approached. Before blue and red light could reach the street, I ran up the brick face of the building, utilizing what I had learned during my attempt at home the previous night to maintain my speed. Within no time, I stood face-to-face with her once more. It was hard to tell what her exact emotions were with her mask obscuring her eyes, but she seemed to be surprised judging by her frown.

“What was that?” She said flatly.

“What?” I replied.

“You know, that running up the wall. Is that a normal thing for you?”

“Er, yeah. At least it was since a day ago.” I shrugged.

“Wait,” she held her hand up, gesturing for a moment to process, “You’re telling me that you got your Alter form yesterday?”

“Uh,” I dragged out, suddenly embarrassed of the answer. She shook her head.

“Never mind. If you’re a first timer, I need to get you checked out,” She approached me slowly and began to look me over. She ran her fingers over my back, tracing the area where I’d been hit by something from the thugs as well as my shoulder where a faint stinging pain persisted. 

I groaned in reply. 

“You look like you took some serious damage back there, your suit’s got a bunch of little tears in it.”

“It has what?” I squeaked in fear. Tears in a school uniform were definitely going to get me busted. 

“Y-yeah. You got some glass in your shoulder,” she said, apparently shocked by my response. I reached back and flinched, a low groan emitting from my lips. This night was going swimmingly so far. I pulled my hand back and found a small amount of blood dotting my hand.

“Is there blood on the suit too?” I asked hesitantly, my voice catching in the back of my throat. Kayden nodded her head with a pained expression. Whether from the stress or the blow I took to my head, for a moment the world seemed to spin around me. I steadied myself against the roof wall.

“Just-- come with me. Okay? My friend can check you out,” she repeated, her tone starting to sound more anxious. I looked at her closely and despite searching for any sign of misdirection. I couldn’t sense any alternative motives from her. Not seeing any further reason to disagree, I followed her as she gestured for us to move silently across several rooftops away from the wailing security camera store.

“Who is your friend, anyways?” I asked as we moved.

“Her name is the Mechanic. She’s super smart,” Kayden replied simply.

“Mechanic? What, does she have free donuts with oil-changes?” I responded, hoping she’d elaborate. ‘The Mechanic’ wasn’t an exactly welcoming title.

“You’ll… see when we get there,” she added. Once we reached another gap in the buildings she dropped off the roof onto the alley pavement below.

“C’mon.” She waved towards me. “Jump down.” I hesitated. Could I jump from this high? I must have been three stories up.

“I don’t know if I can,” I called back. 

She sighed. “What’s your name? Do you have a supernym?”

I just stared at her. “A what?”

“A supernym. Your hero name?” she continued.

“Oh, uh… n-no. I don’t have one.” God, how green and new to all of this I must seem.

“Okay, first name then. I won’t tell anyone.” Her tone was sincere, and for some reason I trusted her. 

“G-Gabrielle,” I said, repeating the name I had fed to Mrs. Bittinboulder’s wife. I wasn’t sure why that name continued to stick in my mind, it was just… there. Kayden nodded.

“Okay, cool. Just jump, Gabby. I promise it’ll be okay.” I bit my lip. I guess I already had glass in me, a sprained ankle wasn’t going to land me in much deeper water. I inhaled sharply and stepped off the roof. The ground rose up to meet me in a rush, but like before time seemed to slow down. I landed on the pavement far more gracefully than I would have guessed I’d been able to with a solid THUD. I waited for pain from my knees or ankles to come, however none seemed to appear.

“I’m… fine?” I whispered. Kayden extended her hand to me.

“Figured as much. Remind me to have you test out your powers later, I’m curious to see what you’re packing.” She smirked.

We walked over to the middle of the ally and stopped at a manhole cover emblazoned with the words “Crescent City Metro”. I was about to ask her where we were going when she opened up the heavy metal cover with one hand.

“No,” I stated adamantly, “I’m not crawling through the sewer.”

“Geez, don’t be a wimp.” She frowned. “You’ll see some of the coolest things underground.”

“Ugh, what a worn out trope,” I groaned. “There’s always crazy stuff underground, that’s where supervillains always build lairs. Is your friend’s place underground too?” She looked slightly hurt by my insinuation of her friend’s moral orientation, though also didn’t seem wholly surprised by my assertion.

“No, actually,” she mused, emphasizing the end while shooting me a defiant look, “My friend’s place isn’t far from here. I can’t really say anything further, I don’t want to betray her trust. I don’t think I’m even supposed to bring people in that general direction.” She began to lower herself into the gaping hole in the pavement. She landed on the cement below and looked up at me. “Well?”

I sighed and obliged her request, moaning all the way. “This is so stupid. I better not catch cholera.” I dropped down after her and was immediately assaulted by he foul stench of the sewer. It certainly lived up to its namesake. We walked for a while on a small path next to a river flowing in the opposite direction, surrounded by cement on all sides. The passage was illuminated with LED’s placed along the floor, no doubt one of the city initiatives implemented to fix sewer damage once it had begun to attract more evil Alters some time ago. As we continued forward, the ceiling began to slowly raise higher and higher before it was about twenty feet above our heads. Kayden took a short lead in front of me, calling out our turns as we came up to intersections. Eventually she cleared her throat.

“So, I was watching you fight back there. I only arrived after you all crashed into the store, though,” she said. I nodded along, unsure where she was going. “You seemed to be doing okay at first, but you started, I don’t know, freaking out a bit? Like suddenly you couldn’t see anymore or something. Is that how your powers work?”

“What- no, no. I could still see when I was fighting them,” I replied.

“Then how come you went from seeming like you had the situation in the bag to it being such a knock-down drag-out of a fight? Those guys weren’t anything too nasty.”

“I… I don’t know what was going on there. Everything just got...” I paused for a moment, considering the ordeal before continuing. “It was too much. Too much input.”

“What do you mean?” she replied, her pace slowing down to keep even with me.

“Like everyone was suddenly in jelly, but I was too and I couldn’t focus on anyone. It was hard to keep my mind on any one of them.”

“Interesting. Maybe my friend will be able to help with that. I’d like you to mention that to them, would that be fine with you?” she asked, placing a hand on my shoulder.

I nodded. “Yeah, that’d probably be a good idea.” In all honesty I still wasn’t sold on whether I could even begin to trust this “Mechanic”, but at this point they seemed to be my only option for getting my wounds looked at and getting my suit fixed. If I couldn’t get it repaired, I didn’t know what I’d be able to do. 

“So I’m guessing you’re from the Academy?” she continued quietly.

I shot her a glare. “What makes you say that?” I snapped, suddenly feeling like this was all a mistake.

She held her hands up in defense, “Woah, woah. Sorry, didn’t know that was a touchy subject,” she consoled. I softened my gaze but continued to look at her, expecting more of an answer. “It’s just, well, I used to go to the Academy. I know their gym uniforms.” She snuck a gaze at my chest before continuing. “Guess they changed the design somewhat.”

I relaxed somewhat, “Used to?” I asked.

“Not any more, not my thing,” she replied simply. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone about this. Not like I have any contacts there anymore to talk to anyways.” 

I sighed, I could feel myself calming down and relief pouring in. My secret was safe again, for now at least.

“Why not anymore?” I asked after another few moments of walking. She didn’t reply right away, instead she seemed to be working over how she should answer.

“That’s kind of personal,” she eventually said. “If you’re cool I just might tell you later, though.”

After what seemed like an eternity we approached a curious sight. Whereas there had been the occasional simple metal ladder attached to a wall leading up to another manhole in the ceiling every several dozen or so feet, here there was a simple black panel about the size of a book embedded in the wall. Had we not stopped here with the specific context of meeting someone deemed “the Mechanic”, I wouldn’t have paid the lack of a ladder or the panel itself any mind, but under the circumstances I found my curiosity piqued. Kayden stepped forward and placed her hand on the panel. A faint blue light rolled over the screen beneath her hand and dinged once it reached the bottom. Kayden lightly shook her hand and stepped back.

“What now?” I asked when nothing had happened for a moment.

“Just analyzing my biometrics, be patient,” she said, gesturing to her hand. 

“Like… fingerprints? Right?”

“And more,” she replied. More? What else could it be analysing? Before I could ponder further a ring of light circled around the space beneath our feet, forming a full oval in the concrete. Slowly it began to rise, causing me to jump in shock.

“What the fuck?” I yelped, though her hand gently pulled me close.

“It’s cool, just watch.” She smiled. The ring of concrete rose further still as we approached an identical circle of light in the ceiling. The material inside of the ceiling circle started to fade somewhat, increasing in rate the closer we came. I reached out expecting to feel the cement beneath my fingers, however they passed through the last wisps of the image followed by our heads and bodies as well. There was a loud KER-PLUNK as the ring of concrete we stood on appeared to lock into place. A single ray of light illuminated us in the otherwise dark room.

“What is this place?” I asked in a hushed whisper.

A voice bellowed around us in a synthetic tone. “My lab.” Flood lights flickered on all around us, drowning us in pale-white light. I tried to look further into the lab but found my efforts fruitless, the lights were just too damn bright. A soft clicking resounded off the walls of the room, making it difficult to determine the source of the sound. After a moment I recognised that I’d heard the same clicking sound when Mom had worn high heels around the house. I couldn’t get a read for whether the person was upon me before oscillating green light erupted from the floor between Kayden and I, separating us. The light rose up to my waist and halted, holding it’s pattern. I reached out and touched it with the tip of my finger, resulting in a sharp shock running through the length of my palm. I let out a loud yelp, yanking my hand back and began to nurse it.

“Kayden,” a different, less synthetic and more sultry voice commanded in a stern tone, “Why have you brought this unfamiliar girl to my lab? Do you know how many enemies I have as the Mechanic?”

“Hey…” I heard Kayden trail off as a figure came into view. The flood lights around us dimmed and other lights scattered around the room began to turn on. A very tall, very pale woman, likely hovering somewhere around 5’10” to 6’ tall with long white hair and piercing white eyes stood in front of us wearing pristine black clothing and a white waistcoat. She looked particularly cross. Behind her was a large room covered floor to ceiling with shiny pure-white tiling with black grooves running between them. A large amount of equipment lay in various states of disarray around us, each at a different stage of construction or deconstruction. The place was kind of a mess.

“Don’t ‘hey’ me, you are well aware that you are not to bring other people here, especially after last time.” She scowled and crossed her arms. As she did, I thought I could hear a faint whirring sound, but I wasn’t certain.

“I know, I know. But this time is different, and she’s hurt!” Kayden pleaded. The Mechanic shifted her gaze to me, evaluating my presence.

“And what in the world are you doing out and about at night? Judging by your uniform you’re obviously with the Academy.” She leaned towards me, her hands on her hips. I really needed to ditch this suit, I had no idea it was made me stand out so much.

“Uh…” I murmured, unsure what to say with the newfound attention.

“Uh-huh. I don’t have time for this,” she scoffed and turned around.

“You owe me, though!” Kayden called out. The Mechanic turned around with an incredulous look on her face.

“Seriously?” she replied.

“Y-yes. I helped you solve that one problem with C0.NWAY-6,” Kayden retorted, confidence appearing to return to her voice.

The Mechanic cast a glance over her shoulder. “Ugh, here we go. For the last time, registry file 894c-1 was literally the next file I was about to check. You got lucky.”

“Maybe so, but even still! You owe me,” Kayden asserted, her tone hovering between pleading and commanding. They were silent for a moment before the Mechanic groaned.

“Fine, fine. I’ll give her a quick eval and that’s it.” She approached me again and reached through the green energy, seemingly unaffected. Was she immune to it? “Don’t get any funny ideas, I can restrict this field to an inch above your limbs if I wanted to, missy.” She stepped behind me and began to look over my shoulder, though oddly her prodding didn’t seem to hurt as much as my own had earlier. She looked up at Kayden, none too pleased. “You brought her here for this? She’s got 4 small shards of glass poking into her shoulder, no more.” The field around Kayden diminished, allowing her to move unrestricted.

“What do you mean? I looked at her shoulder myself and counted no less than 10 shards.” Kayden maintained, walking over to look for herself, though she stopped just short of the energy field surrounding me. The taller woman gripped my shoulder and turned me towards Kayden. I tried stealing a glance to see for myself, however the wounds lay just beyond my line of sight. They were quiet for a moment before Kayden coughed gently.

“Hey, Gab?” Kayden said, “What powers did you say you had?”

The Mechanic halted her ministrations and joined Kayden in a combined stare, waiting for me to give them an answer.

“Uh, s-speed? I’m a speedster,” I replied quietly. They exchanged a glace.

“No, seriously,” Kayden continued, “What’re your powers?” They didn’t believe me? Maybe demonstrating would convince them. I noted that the Mechanic had a bobby pin in her hair, holding back part of her fluffy white hair behind her ear. Time slowed down as I quickly reached up and plucked it right out of her hair. When I pulled my hand away however I was shocked to find the Mechanic’s hand reaching for my own with surprising speed. Still no match for my own speed, I moved my hand out of the path of hers and left the bobby pin in my open palm while time resumed it’s normal march. Sure enough their jaws were agape in awe.

“See?” I said.

“Holy crap,” Kayden whispered quietly. The Mechanic snatched her bobby pin up and placed it back in her hair, though her earlier frown was replaced by something altogether creepier. Fascination. 

“Gab-, I assume that’s short for Gabrielle,” the Mechanic began, “My oh my, how long has everyone waited for you to arrive, young lady. Finally a counterpoint speedster to Markus Miller.” 

Kayden shot her a look. “How do you know his real name? I though the school’s records were sealed?”

“Let’s say I know the people involved with Alter Academy system security, and I regularly patch their flaws to prevent total doxxing of the students at the Academy. Total imbeciles if you ask me.” The Mechanic shrugged. The green energy field around me dropped and she began to shepherd me towards a wall with an empty counter attached. She reached out with her free hand and and snapped her fingers, causing tiles to open up across the counter revealing assorted medical supplies. She sat me down on a stool that had barely finished rising from the ground and turned me towards the counter.

“What is all of this?” I asked.

“Science!” She beamed and reached out to grab a pair of pliers.
“This doesn’t look like any science I’ve ever seen before, except maybe in the movies?” I countered, still feeling overwhelmed and somewhat peckish. I guess it had been a few hours since I last ate.

The Mechanic waved her hand dismissively, “Don’t even get me started my dear. The movies are downright low-tech compared to the unbridled potential of my intellect.” 

So that’s what was going on. One of the powers you can receive as an Alter is enhanced intelligence, essentially increasing your IQ and processing power for raw information input allowing you to pick up new concepts incredibly easily. Alter geniuses were responsible for some of the greatest inventions of the last forty years from reducing televisions to meer glass panels to kickstarting the space tourism industry back in the 90’s with reusable rocket boosters. There were even some who could create fantastical unimaginable machines that could teleport you or augment you cybernetically, however these individuals seemed to be incredibly rare and most of the time they could never adequately explain exactly how their technology worked, to the point where if they tore down their own tech even they’d experience trouble putting it back together again. Word was that when they shifted back into their default form even they couldn’t fully comprehend how to use their own technology.

The Mechanic was obviously part of this category, but what I couldn’t comprehend was how she was able to move so fast earlier, nearly matching my own speed. My train of thought was interrupted by a sharp sting from my shoulder, eliciting a cry from me. I turned to see the Mechanic dropping a sliver of glass into a silver tin.

“Don’t be such a baby,” she said. “If you continue on with this daring-do lifestyle, you’ll find yourself full of this stuff much more often if you don’t get better protection.”

“I kind of thought this suit might offer some protection,” I mumbled, now somewhat ashamed of my choice of outerwear.

“Right, because with ol’ Bittinboulder there you’d really need to worry about flying glass with those shields she’s always slinging around,” Kayden cut in with a smirk.

“Here, let my pet distract you while I work,” the Mechanic said as she applied more pressure to my shoulder to keep me still. An 11 inch tall blue illumination appeared on the bench opposite from the Mechanic in the shape of a blue dog with two heads and two tails and splotches of dark and light fur dotting him all over. Both of his tails were wagging furiously and despite the two heads, it actually looked pretty cute.

“C0.NWAY-6, do a few tricks for our guest here, please,” she asked. The dog hologram barked and walked around on its front paws, did a few backflips, and flopped down on it’s back. “He wants you to pet him.” the Mechanic added. “You can touch him. Kind of, anyways.” I hesitantly reached my hand over to the hologram, not sure what she meant. I began to make a scratching motion over his stomach and was shocked to find that I could actually feel a slight tingle at the tips of my fingers as they moved through his blue form. “Originally I purchased him in the form of a Tamugatchi toy at a flea market, and he occupied my fascination ever since. I’ve given him a series of upgrades since then, though.” Virtual drool began to leak from his mouth onto the surface of the bench. Before I knew it stifled giggles began to erupt from my throat, causing yet more to materialize. God I loved my voice in this form.

“C0.NWAY-6, go check on Audrey and Maridel. I hear they were having a date night and I still haven’t paid them back for shorting out my porta-battery last month.” The Mechanic smiled wickedly. C0.NWAY-6 righted himself and barked happily, blinking out of existence before me. I winced as she pulled another shard from my shoulder.

“You wouldn’t know how to fix my suit, would you?” I asked suddenly, hoping that I could get out of tonight spot-free.

The mechanic scoffed. “Know how? Of course. Can I? Of course not.”

I furrowed my brows. “You can’t?” I asked, my voice hitching as she pulled out another shard.

“Unfortunately no, I’m afraid.” She sighed. “It seems simple enough, it’s just a poly-spandex blend with carbon fiber woven in every third thread for added durability, though not much as you can plainly see.” She plucked another shard out. She paused before continuing and stared at my suit for a moment. When I looked at her, I swear I could see the pupils of her eyes sort of constrict before they snapped back to their earlier default. What exactly was she?

“And a layer of anti-bacterial perspirant resistant on the inside for longer wear without accumulating odor. Child’s play, really. Easy to mass produce. The rub?” She pulled some of the fabric between her fingers, “The layer of anti-bacterial coating is corrosive to this particular type of fabric. There’s an additional coating between the two that neutralizes the interaction between them. And, try as I might, I cannot identify what that substance is.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Because,” She continued sounding a bit annoyed with my questioning, “It’s a specially created formula designed by someone of similar intelligence to myself, and even if I could figure out what the chemical ingredients were I’d have no way of knowing what the catalyst involved, nor do I have the time or whimsey to do so. If I gave you an equation to solve but didn’t tell you if you needed to add, divide, subtract or multiply in a specific section do you think you’d be able to find me the specific answer I wanted on the first try?”

I sullenly shook my head.

“That’s right.” she huffed. At the same moment, my stomach growled obnoxiously loudly, clearly indicating to everyone present that it was empty.

“S-sorry,” I stammered, “I ate a few hours ago, not sure why I’m so hungry.”

The mechanic stifled a laugh. “You’re clearly new to this whole thing, huh?”

“Yeah, you could say that.”

“While speedsters are considerably one of the rarer power sets in the meta-human range, speedsters before you by no means stayed out of the limelight in regards to scientific study.” The Mechanic placed the tin containing the glass shards into a vial and closed the drawer. “You’ve got a whole different metabolism in that form young lady, something ravenous that’ll require you to eat a large caloric intake to fuel your abilities, which includes fast healing as well as running. That’s why most of the glass not embedded too deeply had already fallen out. Good news for your figure, though.” She lightly elbowed me and pulled a stool up while a blush consumed my face. She gestured for Kayden to give us some privacy, who proceed to wander away from us. “By the way, I’m willing to bet you’ll wake up tomorrow with next to no marks left over, though if you change back that may slow the process somewhat.”

“How much do I have to eat?” I asked, the thought seemingly sticking on my mind.

“Huh? Oh, well considering your shape and size, I’m guessing one hundred and forty-five pounds is your weight?” My blush returned and I found myself unable to form words into my mouth. That was definitely not my normal weight. “Right, sorry. I know girls your age are sensitive about their weight. By my calculations your daily caloric intake, and this is dependant on you maintaining your alter form for twenty-four hours mind you, should be at least ten thousand calories, though probably closer to fifteen thousand. If you’re maintaining it for say, a few hours like tonight, I’d say roughly doubling your daily amount to four thousand should suffice.

“Okay.” I nodded. How the hell was I going to get food like that?

“My turn to ask a question.” The Mechanic scooted her chair closer, leveling her eyesight with my own. “Why hasn’t someone talked to you about this? Every Alter needs to know how to deal with their particular set of quirks, you shouldn’t be using your powers without this information.” Her voice was stern and her eyes were full of worry.

“Well-” I began.

“Has the Academy still not given you that information? I swear, so help me I am this close to storming in there and deposing the principal of her duties,” she seethed.

I wrapped my arms around myself. “No, no, that’s not it at all. I actually haven’t told anyone that I received my Alter form,” I admitted.

“Why in the world not?”

“I-I just have my reasons,” I grumbled.

The Mechanic sighed. “Fine, fine. I won’t press. Do you have any way to get food with that amount of calories?” I shook my head. “Right. One moment.” She rose from her seat and walked over to an adjacent wall. She snapped her fingers and the white tiles separated again to revealing a stainless steel box. She opened it up and pulled out a few small items wrapped in plastic. She returned to her seat next to me and handed me the items, little brown bars.
“What are these?”

“High-caloric intake supplements, I have them for a few acquaintances. They each contain an additional thousand calories which should be enough to supplement your diet until such time you decide your ‘reasons’ are no longer sufficient to hide your alter form from the school administration. I don’t want to empower you to be running out at night so recklessly, so I’m giving you a controlled amount for now.” She began to herd me back towards Kayden with the food bars in my arms. “Now get the hell out of my lair.”

Kayden jerked her head up from the pile of parts she was inspecting. “Time to go?”
“Yes,” the Mechanic said. “Long overdue.”

“Wait!” I said as we approached the circle on the floor where we had entered. Kayden had said the Mechanic might be able to help me. “I’ve been having this… weird thing happen. My senses have been going wild, even when I’m not in my alter form. It’s like everything is just so slow.”

The Mechanic stopped her pushing and looked at me curiously. “Slow how?”

“Well, when I’m in my Alter form, sometimes I accidentally speed up and it feels like everyone is speaking and moving so slowly. When I got in a fight earlier tonight, it was as if someone was shining a flashlight into my eyes. Everything was slowing down and speeding up so fast I could barely think straight.”

The Mechanic began to stare off into space. “Any this happens in your default form too?”
“Y-yeah,” I admitted. “When I was walking behind a really slow group of people yesterday, it was like my skin was crawling all over. I just felt this burning desire to keep...” I paused as the memory of the sensation flared, “...moving, I guess. I needed to keep moving.” The Mechanic nodded her head and walked over to yet another wall and pulled out a black object from a newly materialized drawer. When she returned, she placed it over her eye. It was a black cylindrical device with a glass piece on the end. To my surprise, the object started snaking small black tentacles onto the skin above her eyes before blending in perfectly as the same color as the rest of her face.

“Okay, enhanced visor installed. Can you take the pin out of my hair again?” She asked and leaned down to my level. Hold on, were we just going to ignore that?

“W-what was t-that?” I stuttered, bordering on incoherency.

“Oh, the eye thing?” She tapped on the visor that was now attached to her face. I nodded slowly. Kayden and her shared a chuckle before she explained, “I’m a cyborg, young lady. Adding parts to my body is what I do.” 

“Seriously?” I gawked.

“Yep. Got into a minor accident a ways back, decided to take the plunge,” she explained as a whirring noise sounded from her new visor-eye. Now that I looked at her closely I could see faint symmetrical lines running from under her eyes and running around all visible parts of her skin down to her fingers. Her remaining visible white eye glowed slightly. “Okay, now go ahead.” Time slowed down once more when I shot my hand forward to grab her hair pin. Her visor eye tracked me closely, watching with apparent intent. I snatched the pin and, like last time, she jerked her hand up to catch mine, and like last time I moved mine out of the way. This time, however, her hand quickly followed mine and made another grab at me. It was harder to dodge her this time but I still found myself able to evade her movements and pull the hair pin back. I held it in my open hand as I did last time. She sat for a moment looking thoughtful. I glanced over to Kayden. She simply shrugged back at me, unsure as I was. Finally the Mechanic spoke up in a reserved tone.

“Okay…” she trailed off. She stood up and walked a few feet away before doubling back towards us, whispering to herself all the while. After repeating this for two more rotations she looked up at us. “Got it.”

“Got what?” Kayden chimed in. 

The Mechanic pulled the visor from her face and placed it into her long white jacket. “You have two quirks. Completely normal, honestly. Your optic nerves are transmitting signals to your brain far, far faster than they would in your default state. This is causing your pupils and iris’ to expand rapidly, overloading your optic nerves and interfering with the retinal blood vessels that runs along the same path in the eye interior.”

“English, Mel,” Kayden groaned.

The Mechanic, or Mel, rolled her eyes. “Your senses are lighting fast, but the equipment that’s receiving the info isn’t up to snuff to process it. You need something to help you block out everything but the essentials.”

“And you can help me with that?” I took a step forward with a hopeful smile.
Mel turned around and cast an imposing shadow over me from the fluorescent lights overhead. “Maybe. But I’m not in the business of equipping two high school dropouts with hero tech. If I do anything for you, you had better promise me it’s to help you with school business only, got it missy?” she warned. I nodded quickly.

“Good. I’ll have Kayden fetch you when I have something for you. Until then...” She reactivated the lift, causing light to rise from the edges of the platform as we began to lower.

“W-wait,” I replied. “How am I supposed to find her when you’re ready?” Mel’s face scrunched in confusion. Kayden coughed awkwardly as we lowered.

“Kayden, feel free to explain your pronouns to her, I’ve got other things to attend to. Ta-ta!” she called as we lowered back into the sewer, the disgusting smell once more hitting my nostrils. The platform lowered back onto the cement of the sewer, sealing in place. Try as I might, I was unable to pick out the fault lines between where the platform ended and sewer concrete began.

“They/them, by the way.” Kayden said as they turned around and headed back the way we had come.

“Oh, those are your pronouns?” I replied, staying on their heel as we made our way back.

“Yeah. You cool with that?” I could detect a faint edge creeping into their voice as they spoke.

“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be? I’ve already got a trans friend at school.” I smiled, hoping to lift up their spirits.

“Really now?” They cast a curious glance my way. “Pretty accepting friend you must be. Good on you.” I nervously agreed to their sentiment. 

“Hey, Kayden?” I asked.

“Yeah?”

“What are quirks?” I had been getting the sneaking suspicion since we spoke to Mel that that word meant something bad, but I’d had no frame of reference to compare to. 

“Quirks are… hard to talk about,” they said after a moment. “They’re like these minor disabilities we get when we become Alters. For me, I, well…” they seemed to drop their voice to the volume of a whisper, “Er, Mel’s quirk is that she can’t stop building stuff. It’s a constant drive to build. And when she’s not in her Alter form? She can’t remember how her technology actually works.”

“And for me it’s my reaction times and my metabolism, right?”

“Right,” they replied. We continued on through the sewer making small talk until we emerged a couple blocks away from where we first entered the sewers on Market Street. The night air felt crisp on my skin as we re-emerged. I couldn’t help but sigh in relief to be free of the stranglehold the sewers held my senses in.

“Aw, don’t worry. You’ll get used to it.” Kayden chuckled as they hoisted themselves out after me. “Do you have your phone on you?”

I patted my pocketless suit. “Nah, no pockets on this model. I’ll have to ask for a better version when I come up with some crazy story for how this happened and beg Bittinboulder for a replacement.” 

“Crazy story, huh?” Kayden mused. They grabbed a piece of flyer off a nearby wall and began to write on it with a small pencil they had concealed somewhere on their being, maybe their gauntlets? Kayden continued, “I’m going to guess whatever reason you have for not coming forward to the school is pretty stupid, but you seem to have a whole ‘heart of gold’ thing going on, so I’ll give you a pass.” They stepped up to me in the amber light of the alley porch lights which washed us out in their glow. For the first time I realized that they were without a doubt taller than me, though not by too much.

“I-I, well,” I mumbled, unable to give voice to my reasoning.
“Right. Here’s my number, text me when you get home safe, try not to crash into another storefront. We’ll do this again later this week so we can test out your abilities to see what makes you really tick.” I blushed and accepted the number. This was the first I had received from a-- well. Anyone like them, really.

“S-sure. I can do that.” I agreed. I looked up at the night sky and found that it was particularly dark, and the moon was high in the sky. I took a few tentative steps out onto the street, happy to no longer be creeping around. A few strangers stared at me while they passed around me, but continued on their way. A small movie theater was just across the damp street playing some movie called “Fall of the Ballerina”. Wait, ballerina? Why was that ringing a bell? I looked over to Kayden. “Hey, what time is it?”

Kayden pulled out a phone from a slim pocket on their black and white trousers. “About 11pm. Why, got a curfew? Should’ve known you were a follow-the-rules type of girl.” They teased. Regardless of my stammered replies they continued, drawing my face in ever redder shades.

“I-I just need to get home! My mom said she’d be back at 11pm and I’m supposed to be watching--, the words caught in my mouth, held at the very tip of my tongue. I couldn’t reveal too much about myself to Kayden, I still barely knew them.

“Watching… what? Your favorite TV show?”

“Psh, like you’d ever know what kind of TV I watch,” I countered, hoping to throw them off their previous line of questioning.

“You strike me as a dweeb that watches anime,” they snarked. Dammit, they were right! 
“Totally off base, stop projecting your weeaboo-ness onto me, Kayden.”

“Don’t be jealous because I have kick-ass hair.” 

I grumbled. Their hair was pretty kick-ass. “I just- I need to go, I have to beat my mom home in a few minutes.”

“Okay, see you around,” they said in a sing-song tone. They expertly leaped up a level on the fire escape above up us.

“Wait!” I called out. There was something I needed to ask them.

“Yeah?” They leaned over the railing above.

“What was this tonight?”

They attempted to subdue the ensuing laugh, but didn’t do a very good job of it, likely on purpose. “Patrol. Congrats, Gabby, you’re an unlicensed hero now.”

* * *

I made my way back home quickly, once more staying off the beaten path and keeping to back roads and streets. I was only a few blocks away from the house when I passed a familiar car in a blur. Looking straight ahead were Mom and Jules, both seemingly engaged in an animated conversation, abelt in slow motion. A smile crept onto my face as I passed them and finished my trek to the house. Running up walls was beginning to be like child's play, however aiming for an open window was something different all together. Clumsily I fell back onto my bedroom floor in a whirlwind. 

“Ow…” I mumbled through a pained breath. I could hear the garage door begin to open at the same time Parker’s bedroom door opened up roughly. I could feel everything slow as I quickly stripped out of my suit and undergarments and donned the same clothing I had worn earlier in the day. I went to reach for the my bedroom door knob when I caught sight of myself in the attached mirror that rested on the back of the wood. Boobs. Cute eyes. Definitely don’t want to go out like this. And yet, my hand hesitated, neither jerking back nor pushing ahead. Instead, it hovered. The opening of the door from the garage snapped me out of it, and I quickly reverted to my default form. I swung my door open and walked downstairs. I entered the kitchen at the same time as Mom and Jules. 

Surprisingly, a pizza from Planetarium Pizza sat on the counter missing a few slices.

“Hey, honey,” Mom said while she hung her purse up on the wall-mounted key rack, “Yum, you got some Planetarium?”

“Y-yeah, same as Parker and I usually order,” I lied. Did he buy this?

“Always did like Mr. Stavros, such a nice man that one.” She turned as if to hide a soft smile while she took her coat off. Jules swiped a slice of pizza from the box and chomped down.
“Gav, you should’ve seen it, the dancers were dressed in such crazy elegant dresses.” She snickered and shook her head. “Beautiful.”

I leaned back onto the counter. “What was it about?”

She took a bite of the slice and looked thoughtful. “Y’know, I don’t know. There was a lot of dancing and moving and well… it was a lot, conceptually.” 

Mom echoed her sentiment. “Yeah, it was just… yeah. Sure was pretty, though!” She said, seemingly adding a cheery tone to mask her evident confusion at what they had witnessed. “What’d you do tonight, hun?” I bit my lip and forced out a laugh.

“Just video game stuff, same as usual.” Mom turned her attention to me for a moment as if inspecting me before walking over. 

“You’ve got a bruise on your forehead.” She clicked her tongue and at me suspiciously. “So you say you were playing video games. What does the truth say?” If you flew under Mom’s radar, you could generally get away with a fair bit of shenanigans, but if you pinged on it she homed right in on you. I’d have to be careful.

“O-okay. I ran down the stairs to get the pizza earlier and slipped. I ended up slamming my head onto the wooden banister.” That should work, embarrassing enough that I would have withheld it at first, but serious enough to throw her off and not make her look further into it.
“Oh, geez, you boys.” She brushed my hair aside and began inspecting it. Either from nerves or something she said, I felt tired. As if someone had thrown water over a flame. She seemed satisfied after a few moments. “Take it easy for me, please?

I sighed and nodded. “Sure.” Her eyes lit up for a moment.

“That reminds me, we really need to get you out with me this weekend or the next to grab some new clothes for you.” I hated clothes shopping. It was all just so boring; I mean, who had time to try on five different pairs of boring pants and shirts that all looked the same and underwear that came in a package. It was more akin to torture, really. She russled my hair and made her way into the living room with Jules, leaving me alone with my thoughts. 

Had Parker ordered the pizza? Did he know I was gone all night? Who are these Kayden and Mechanic people? My thoughts were interrupted my stomach grumbling loudly. Remembering what Mel had cautioned regarding calories, I grabbed the last four slices and focused on the only remaining thought. 

What was I going to do about my suit?