Blog of a Teenage Superhero

Chapter Thirty-Two: Three Musketeers and The Ethics of (Super)heroism

"Hey, Dad," Percy says after uncovering a rotary phone in the cottage's creaky attic and storming down to the inexplicable girl's bedroom for the call. Her fingertips are pricked and bleeding from the curves of the plastic dial. She's hunched by a downstairs window, her eyes flickering and falling as the bubbles rise from the lagoon. The warehouse has been raided by the heroes, and after calling the police, Percy digs her chin into the collar of her bloodied dress and speaks to her father. She doesn't want to get in the way of the others.

After all, she'd thought she'd saved Monet, and that Percy could protect her, too. But then, there Monet went, karate-chopping her way through broken windows, saving Percy by way of action-hero hijinks of the likes that left Percy in a bit of wide-eyed, half-drooling shock while she lay useless under a van for cover. It's like the heroes didn't even need their powers. Like they just kind of add to the hero aesthetic, like a brand of spandex or a particularly grizzly scar.

"Persephone!" She flinched. Her father wasn't prone to yelling. He spoke in a low voice, the type where the Parental Authority oozed; yelling simply wasn't something he had to do. "Where are you? Are you safe?"

"Um." She glances at the dried blood on her pale, still-trembling fingers. "K-Kind of."

"What do you mean 'kind of!'" His voice breaks. "Young lady, do you know what time it is?"

"N-no. Sorry about that—"

"Where are you?" His voice steadies and falls to its usual pitch. Low, and even and smooth. "Percy, are you okay? You've never done this before. Honey"—he says it like a plea—"you're worrying me sick."

Percy closes her eyes. Pressure behind her eyes falls like a heavy fog. "Dad, did you know Mom's a superhero?"

There's a crackle of static on the end of the line. The man draws in a breath, then asks carefully, "You're okay, right?" His voice is shaky, but Percy hardly notices. She's tearing her fairy wings from the back of her dress with a few slow, sickening rips.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm fine. But Mom's Red Comet, you know? I'm just curious if she told you."

The pause is longer now. One heartbeat, two. Then she hears the quiver of his breath, the tremble of a painful sigh. "She can't be Red Comet. If she was she wouldn't have hidden it from us." And he says it so calmly, the words pronounced so clipped and low and precise, that she knows he's mulled this over before.

"Dad, I just saw her with her mask off, and she told me, and she's in costume and—" She draws in a long breath. "I just wanted to know if you knew is all. That's it."

And then she hears a boy's shriek from outside and whips her attention at the open window, when can she see the flutter of black capes and the splash of red-white sludge. It splatters the side of the house with a hiss. She yanks the phone card taunt, springing to her feet, every muscle groaning in protest. Below, gloved hands reach up from the bog, the air filled with a smell of acid and burnt paper. Fingers outstretched, wriggling. Percy's heart is slammed into her stomach with the weight of horror.

"Just come home. For now, all that matters is you and your mother being okay. We'll talk about it later."

Percy hesitates, staring down at those sinking glove and then at the smudged handset gripped in her fingers. Then she swallows, her throat suddenly dry. Her head is pounding. "Okay, Dad. We'll be home in a little while, I guess, we're kind of in the middle of a hostage rescue...so..."

Percy's father chokes on the phone. "No, come home right now!"

Percy flinches. As an obedient child, model citizen, and perfect student, a teenage rebel she is a role she's out of practice playing. The fingertips are almost submerged now, and throwing her head back with a steadying breath, she says, "Sorry, Dad, love you. Uh, think I might have a girlfriend too I'll have to introduce you to later. You'll like her. Bye." She slams the phone down on the hook before she can cave. She's going to be grounded for years. She'll be an old cat-less lady by the time she's allowed out of the house for a first date. But might as well give her dad her new interest to chew over. If she pretends she's a normal girl and she's in a totally normal situation by throwing him a normal sort of bone, he won't be caught in the trap of thinking solely about her and her mother getting hurt. In consequence, he's going to hate Monet.