A Night in the Life of Glassman

How to Catch a Glassman

(Takes place shortly before A Night in the Life of Glassman.)

How to Catch a Glassman

(A Superhero Short Story)

by Deborah O'Carroll

Superpowered people break things. It's just a fact. That's where my power comes in. Another fact: I can only make things remember what they were before they broke. I can't make new things. That's where my sister's power comes in.

Unfortunately, she often breaks things to make new ones. And I, being her brother and therefore the nearest target, am often the one whose things she breaks.

"Techra, what are you doing?" I demand as I take in the scattered metallic and electronic parts strewn all across the stone floor of our cave. (Side note: a cave may not sound nice, but believe me, as home to superpowered siblings able to repair anything or build anything technological, it has all the comforts of home. Which is what it is for us.)

She doesn't even glance up at my question, focused on her work, her eyes just visible under her short sheet of blue hair with the black streak in it. "I'm making something for you. You need it."

"What I need," I say, picking my barefoot way gingerly across the room through the metal pieces, "is for you to not get broken things everywhere and completely decimate my—my—is that my headlamp? And my workbench surface? And my...motorcycle? Please tell me that is not my motorcycle."

"Was your motorcycle," she supplies helpfully. "It's not like you go out in public. Except to fix things after big supers battles. So you don't use it."

"There's a point and that is next to, as in beside, it," I say.

"Don't be a baby," she says, completely ignoring the fact that I'm the one who's thirty minutes older than her. "Anyway, I told you: you need this. So I'm trying it out. You'll like it, trust me. And if it doesn't work, you can always repair it back to how it was."

"Remember that metaphorical point I mentioned? This is another thing beside it. They're just lining up," I say, and sigh, running my fingers through my black hair with the blue streak—our mirrored-opposites hair. "I need coffee."

She glances up at me. "On your workbench. Or—" She glances between it, currently missing the table part, and where said surface is propped on some rocks which are part of the floor. "Oh, right. It's somewhere over there, then." She waves a hand in the general direction of the corner kitchenette.

I head that direction, calling over my shoulder, "I thought you had, you know, actual paying work to do instead of destroying my belongings."

"Eh, that project fell through. Turns out the company couldn't get the funding to hire me after all."

I shoot her a searching look. Well, that's less than super.

Even superheroes have to pay the rent.

Even when they live in a cave in a remote part of the world, to avoid— Well. Anyway. Our friend and fellow super, Portia, had found us this place, as far away from everything as possible, which is perfect for us. But we still rent it from someone.

"It's fine. Something will turn up," Techra says with forced lightness. "And I've been meaning to do this, so I might as well do it between jobs. I was going crazy with nothing to fiddle with."

I know how that feels.

After some hunting, I find the coffee maker—full of steaming coffee—resting on the floor beside a tray piled with chipped dishes that look like they were once a fancy tea set. A shattered teal-colored coffee mug and a few taped-shut cardboard boxes are also strewn about.