Mom, I'm Bulletproof

Chapter 12.3: We've Got Ghosts

Amy and Future Girl waved at Dreamsmith. He saw them and headed upstairs to join them at their table.

Future Girl was not impressed. "You're wearing a cape with a white scarf under it, and you think that works?" she asked.

"Why do you have a cheerleader outfit?" Dreamsmith said. "Not exactly representative of the great Mirai Academy, is it? Shouldn't someone from the future be wearing futuristic battle armor?"

"A future with battle armor is not the future I aspire to," she said.

The waitress came around, and Dreamsmith ordered a chicken sandwich and asked the waitress to set two more place settings at their table.

"You expecting someone else?" Amy after the wait staff brought out a fifth chair.

"Somebody else is already here."

Amy raised an eyebrow to say, "go on."

"Last night, I dreamt I was in a playground, surrounded by little kids."

"Creepy," Future Girl said.

"No, no, I was a kid too. It was a whole revert-to-childhood type of dream."

"Still creepy. And when you woke up?"

"When I woke up, two of the kids were in my room with me. Turns out they're ghosts from sometime in 1920s London. This is Violet and Rose." Dreamsmith motioned to the two empty seats at their table.

"I think your boyfriend's crazy," Future Girl said to Amy.

"He's not, I mean, we are, I mean, Dreamsmith how is that possible?"

"Obviously only I can see or hear them," he said. "They made a mess of my flat this morning, so they're able to interact with the physical world if they're motivated enough. They've been a handful, to be honest. They don't want lunch, they just want old-fashioned English toffee cake. They've been demanding this toffee cake all day long."

Future Girl folded her arms. "There's no such thing as ghosts. All your powers are manifestations of your psyche, given physical form through means we don't yet know."

"I won't disagree, and yet here they are."

"Fine, we've got ghosts," Amy said. "Let's get to work. The Temple attacked this building, nearly burned it down. Any idea why?"

"I've Googled and Googled, and no luck yet," Sam said.

"We use our powers," Amy said, "to, like, sneak in behind the scenes and find out what this place is hiding."

"How?" Dreamsmith said.

Amy shrugged. "Dig down under the ground and up through the museum archives?"

"How do we know the archives are in the basement?" Future Girl said. "How do we even know there is a basement?"

"And that would destroy sewers, subway tunnels, basements of surrounding buildings, and so on."

"A frontal assault, then," Amy said. "Fight our past security."

"We don't know that they've done anything wrong," Future Girl said. "They could be ordinary guys doing their jobs."

"Tell them we're superheroes and we're investigating the attack," Amy said. "Maybe they'll let us see this object."

Future Girl frowned. "Just saying 'superhero' doesn't give us any kind of authority."

"Dreamsmith, get your imaginary friends to do some snooping for us."

Dreamsmith held up his hands in caution. "They don't like being called that."

Amy considered the two empty seats. "Will you please help us?" She hoped she asked at least near the right direction.

Dreamsmith shrugged. "They just want their cake."

Future Girl frowned. "When I thought my school's headmaster was up to new good I flew to her office and confronted her. So let's confront the person in charge here. That's what, the curator?"

"We don't know the museum staff is behind this," Dreamsmith said. "Why would they blow up their own workplace?"

"To throw off suspicion?" Future Girl said.

Dreamsmith shrugged. "We're just guessing. We need real facts."

All three of them leaned back in their chairs, each thinking silently.

"Isn't being a superhero supposed to be easy?" Amy said. "If someone is in danger, we fly in and save them. If there's a criminal, we punch them. When there's danger, we respond. We act on instinct. But this? Actively looking for bad guys? Investigating anything? I'm not used to this."

"Being a superhero is about the bigger picture," Future Girl said. "Every time I have to fight an abomination of science, it's with the goal of making the future a better place. It's my hope that everyone who sees me in action will be inspired to do the same."

"I used to have a message," Amy said. "It was like that. I thought I could reach out to kids, inspire them. Then I tried turning superheroing into my own marketable brand, and it ended up going nowhere."

"I'm not a superhero at all." Dreamsmith removed his hat and placing it on the table. "I never meant for any of this to happen. What you call powers feel more like an affliction of some kind. I can't leave my flat on most days."

"Proscenium could help us if he were here," Amy said. "I get the sense he's been at this a lot longer than us. But he doesn't want anything to do with me."

They sat there. It was afternoon by now, and a small crowd of teenagers snickered at the three of them while on their way into the museum no doubt as part of some school program.

"What do we do?" Amy said. "How do we find the bad guys before they start causing trouble?"

"No clue," Dreamsmith said.

Future Girl attempted a smile. "We... follow our hearts?"

Amy lowered her eyes. "Face it. We're just not the team I hoped we'd be."

"You're giving up?" Dreamsmith said. "Whoever or whatever the Temple is, it has something to do with why Friday died."

"But we're stuck here," Future Girl said. "What more can we do?"

Dreamsmith shook his head. "This sucks. I'm supposed to be a scientist, dealing with pure data. But now I've got powers that make no sense, caught up in some conspiracy that makes no sense. How did I even get here?"

She put a hand on his shoulder. He closed his eyes and gripped his hat.Future Girl blushed and turned away from the two of them.

# # # # 

Next: Animal roar.