A Guide to Being Super

Rule #17

Rule #17: Never take a day off. As soon as you take a day off, things go bad. Villains never sleep (okay, I don't know for sure but just go with me on this) and the second you get complacent the second the villains get the upper hand. So put off that vacation until after you fake your own death to get out of the superhero game.

For the next few weeks, all I did was train. I'd go to school, spend time with my family, and do my homework but my entire life was always devoted to training. Dan had continued to let me work on my own, which was nice, but he didn't give me the chance to get complacent. He would leave notes for me in the lair with things I need to accomplish by certain times so we could stay on track and I had no choice but to follow them.

Part of me wanted to ignore the notes and do whatever I wanted but I knew that would be stupid. Dan wasn't giving me these instructions to annoy me or in an attempt to control me in any way, he wanted to keep me alive. Also, we'd have to present my progress to the heroes again at some point and if we embarrassed ourselves (or if I embarrassed both of us), we'd be in deep shit. No, it was better to ignore everything else around me and focus on training rather than condemn the city to ruin. Yeah, I wasn't feeling the pressure at all.

It's a wonder that my grades didn't completely drop during that time. I was still doing my homework but I wasn't actually learning or absorbing anything, I might as well not been there at all. Luckily for me our public school system has become completely test-centric and I could take tests pretty well, it was all just memorization. My one problem was Miss Fetzer's class, where we were being assigned a project. This would require a lot more attention on my part, especially since we were supposed to work in partners and I couldn't be the guy who made his partner do everything.

This is where the teen angst part of my story comes into play.

(I'm sorry, I know we already talked about this stuff but I also know that you guys are tired of this. But just so you know, we're more than halfway through our story and this teen angst part will lead directly into the end and be very important. So please hold on a little longer, I'd really appreciate it.)

You guys remember me talking about Miss Fetzer before, right? Evil bitch teacher who hates me? Cool, then we don't need to recap. If you don't remember, then just go read near the beginning, it's there somewhere. Then come straight back here once you're done. We'll wait.

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Everyone caught up now? Good.

Anyway, Miss Fetzer was a special human being who never wasted an opportunity to make me (or anyone else miserable). Usually she'd do this by preventing me and Ike from pairing up, because she knew we only really wanted to work with each other. But now, since she had noticed that Ike and I were on bad terms (it wasn't hard to notice), she decided to flip the script on us. It was kind of an obvious choice but it was devious all the same.

"Matt," she said, as everyone rushed around the room to find their partners. "Don't choose a partner, I've already chosen for you."

"What?" I said.

She shot me a look. "Don't look at me like that, as the teacher it's my right to choose partners for my students if I want. Besides, I think you'll be happy with my choice."

"I will?" Stupidly, I started to have a little bubble of hope growing in my belly. Maybe Miss Fetzer wasn't going to be a completely bitch this time. Maybe we could turn over a new leaf.

"Yes, I think you will. You'll be working with Ike."

Or not.

Immediately, you could tell that Ike was pissed. He knew better than anyone that Miss Fetzer was not someone you could negotiate with but he tried anyway. She let him say his peace, smiled, then promptly ignored him. I wasn't that upset, the situation wasn't going to be fun but at least I'd actually get to spend time with Ike, but I put on a pissed face as well so Miss Fetzer would leave me alone and so Ike wouldn't feel like I was getting anything out of this.