The OK Team (16 page)

Torch shrugs, not one for arguments. He lights his index finger for the hundredth time that hour and points it at a gum tree on the other side of the lawn. Nothing happens.

An hour or so ago, Mr Fabulous stood in the middle of the lawn with his wrinkly hands on his hips, the aged material of his costume hanging under what's left of his shrivelled biceps, and gave us a little speech.

‘OK, you lot. The crooks aren't getting any weaker, they're getting tougher. So you need to get tougher too.

Tougher and better, which is why we're going to get straight to it. You all have powers but they're undeveloped. It's time to train your skills, just like a tennis player has to work on his serve or a baseballer practises batting in the nets. Got it? Good.'

He wanders over to Cannonball. ‘Show me what you do, helmet head.'

Cannonball poses in pre-flight mode. ‘Let's fire the cannon!' he yells confidently and zooms, a metre off the ground, straight backwards into a tree.

Mr Fabulous nods slowly. ‘Right, lose the tag line, and focus on flying from where you are to the mailbox.'

‘But that's only about two metres,' says Cannonball.

‘Exactly. Small flights first . . . and like I said, lose the tag line. It's circa 1980.'

Cannonball hangs his head but nods.

Mr Fabulous's voice softens. ‘More to the point, son, you're putting too much pressure on yourself by saying it.

Golfers don't tell you which blade of grass they're going to land the ball on. They just concentrate on hitting the damn thing straight. All I'm saying is, fly first, then pose.'

Cannonball nods again. ‘Thanks.'

Mr Fabulous turns to Yesterday. ‘So, you can see into the past, huh? Well, as of now, we're working on making you see into the future. Watching your brother is as good as anything. Each time he aims for the mailbox, I want you to decide beforehand whether he's going to get there. Count how often you're right.'

‘This shouldn't be hard.' Yesterday gives the old man a look, cocks her hip with arms folded, and watches her brother. He takes a deep breath and aims for the mailbox, eventually slamming into a car on the other side of the road.

‘Hey, I was right! I thought he'd miss and he did. This is easy,' Yesterday grins.

‘Yeah, well I'll only be impressed when you vote for him getting it right and he does,' Mr Fabulous says. ‘Much longer odds. Who's next?'

Liarbird also has her arms folded across her chest, looking defiant. Mr Fabulous smiles. ‘I like your spirit, kid. You're all right, even if your superpower makes me wonder whether you shouldn't be trying out as a super-villain. You don't want to lose your ability to lie convincingly. That's a handy skill to have if the team needs somebody to come up with a quick story under pressure. Hell, if your Hero career doesn't work out, you could be Prime Minister. But we need to get you telling fibs when you choose to, and that means being able to also tell the truth. Training ain't hard: just look at the sky and tell me what colour it is.'

Liarbird squints up at the cloudless sky and says, ‘Green.'

Mr Fabulous smiles. ‘What was that?'

‘Red,' she says, frowning. ‘Green! Yellow! Purple!'

‘Keep at it,' he says, patting her shoulder. ‘Focus. You told me that you become invisible when you're terrified, embarrassed or nervous. Is that right?'

‘I told you that in confidence, yes,' I say through gritted teeth, feeling more than seeing Cannonball's smirk.

‘Yeah, whatever. At least you don't wet your pants like some trainee Heroes, isn't that right, helmet head?'

‘What? Hey!' says Cannonball.

‘The point,' Mr Fabulous continues, ‘is that your power's pretty good once you can control it. You
can
actually turn invisible, pass through walls, stuff like that. Not to be sneezed at. All we have to do is train you up so you choose when to do that stuff, and when to be solid. Let's start with something small. Try to turn your right hand invisible, but not the rest of your body. Just your hand.'

‘I have no idea how,' I stammer, looking at my hand as though it is some kind of an alien creature – which, now I think about it, would be pretty cool as a Hero feature. Alien Hand!

‘Just think about it,' Mr Fabulous says, bringing me back to the task. ‘Pretend the hand is holding a rose for your girlfriend, Liarbird, over there and you don't want her to see it.'

I gulp and glance at Liarbird. Then I zap out of sight, before warping in and out of focus wildly. She is looking wide-eyed at me too, a look of astonishment on her reddening face.

‘I didn't hear that,' she says. ‘I didn't hear a thing.'

‘Good,' I say, turning back to glare at our mentor.

He smiles broadly and gives me a wink, his eyes pure evil enjoyment. ‘Even at my age, X-ray vision all but gone, super heat ray only luke warm, I can still see what I need to see.' He turns from me and looks around, at the trees, at the mailbox, at a garden gnome next to the porch stairs. ‘Switchy, what or who are you at the moment?'

‘I'm 900 per cent right here,' says Switchy in his gangly, acne-ridden teenage version, standing behind the ageing Hero.

‘Oh, right. It's not exactly an improvement, is it? Well kid, your talent will take time to master but it's worth it, if we can get it right. The good news is that roughly three per cent of shape-shifters learn to control their skill and have Hero careers.'

‘Three per cent!'

‘Better odds than Heroes who can eat their own heads.'

‘Euugh, really?' says Switchy.

‘Training for you will be fun.' Mr Fabulous hands him a postcard. It is a signed autographed photograph of Mr Fabulous himself, circa 1940, in his youthful prime. His outfit shines, the golden F on his chest gleams and he is all muscle and attitude, soaring through clouds.

‘I want you to turn into me, just like I used to be in this picture; not the broken down old geriatric standing in front of you now. Got it? Jeepers, if I could shape-shift back to my prime, you know I would, so try hard, son. I'm jealous.'

Switchy looks at the photo, concentrates hard, holds his breath, turns slightly pink and then POP!, just like that, he has changed into R2D2 from
Star Wars
.

‘Bleet. Whistle! 400 per cent Whirr!' R2D2 says, rocking on his two legs. Then he turns pink and POP!, changes into a crayfish.

‘This might take a while, Switchy. Keep at it. And don't wreck that photo in your pincers. I only brought a couple of dozen with me.'

Mr Fabulous gazes around at the various team members working on their skills. Cannonball misses the mailbox by a couple of metres. Yesterday frowns. Liarbird says ‘Violet', and I'm still staring at my hand – making very sure I don't look at Liarbird.

‘I don't want to get in the way, but what about me, Mr Fabulous?'

It is Torch, who has been standing quietly to the side, as is his style.

‘Kid Torch! You've got to stop standing in the shadows if you want to be a Hero! Embrace the fact you're special, son. Live a little.'

Torch flicks his right index finger into flame. ‘But that's it. That's all I've got.'

‘Says you, kid. Trust me, I've known your grandpa how long? If you're a Torch then you've got more than that going for you. For starters, what happens when you shoot the flame?'

‘Shoot the flame? I can't shoot the flame.'

‘Can't? Or haven't tried?'

Torch opens his mouth, then closes it again.

‘I thought so,' says Mr Fabulous. ‘So we have a starting point. See that tree there, the big gum tree? Set fire to it, from over here. That's about six metres away. Point your finger and set the flame to fry.'

‘But what happens if I actually manage to do it?'

‘Um, the tree burns. Was that a trick question?'

‘Is that all right, to burn a tree?'

Mr Fabulous chuckles. ‘It won't burn for long. Aquagob is on the porch, waiting to play cards. Isn't that right, Aquagob?'

An old guy with wrinkles on wrinkles, dressed in a blue and green suit and gumboots, nods and then opens his mouth. But instead of saying ‘That's right', he spits several litres of water across the porch, splashing Papa Torch from head to toe.

‘Aquagob, you idiot!' Papa Torch fumes. He briefly flickers into pale flame, the fire spluttering but lasting long enough to burn off the water. ‘Lucky you didn't hit Cardboard Man.'

‘Yeah, you're telling me,' says an old Hero who appears to be made out of grocery boxes and shoe boxes. ‘It reminds me of that time in 1954 when the swamp men of Snissangablaar managed to surround me with their watery ooze and –'

‘Yeah, yeah, yeah. It took you three weeks in the sun to dry out. We know. We've only heard that story about 500 times,' says the Human Magpie.

‘It's still a good story,' mumbles Cardboard Man.

‘Ah, it's great to see you guys!' Mr Fabulous celebrates by flying into the air, doing a slow-motion, arthritic-looking somersault and then drifting unevenly onto the porch. As he lands, he's panting as though he's just run a marathon. ‘I've said it before and I'll say it again, whose deal is it?'

CHAPTER 21
BACK TO REALITY

A
t school, I barely notice what class I'm in or what we are supposed to be learning. I spend the whole time staring at my hands, trying to make one of them lose focus while the rest of me stays solid – well, as solid as I ever am. After two days, I know deep down that it's never going to happen, but I keep at it, because our mentor has asked. I at least have to try, even if it's pointless.

One morning, at recess, I'm surprised to see Ali Fraudulent sitting on the far side of the school oval. She is lying on her back and staring at the sky. Strangest of all, it looks as though the girl who never speaks is moving her mouth, murmuring something to herself and frowning. I've never heard her even attempting to talk – I didn't know she was capable of speech – and I wish I could hear what she is saying. Frederick Fodder and Simon Fondue walk past, huddled in their own secret world. They are looking closely at Simon's left hand.

Then Frederick's little sister walks past, sees me and winks.

How strange, I think, but then remember what I'm supposed to be doing. I gaze again at my right hand, which steadfastly refuses to become any more or less out of focus than the rest of me.

Gee, that's a surprise.

At lunchtime, I head to the library, as usual, and bump into Simon Fondue and Frederick Fodder. As I walk past, Simon says, ‘Hey Hazy, when do we get to start making “one arm bandit” jokes?'

‘What?' I ask. ‘I'm not a poker machine.'

‘No,' he says, with a secretive smile. ‘But you're not Two-gun Pete, either . . . all going well.'

He and Frederick grin at me like idiots, like I'm missing some great joke, but I'm mystified, so I keep moving. A couple of desks on, my heart jumps because I see the white hair of Ali Fraudulent bent over a book called
Lies and
Truth
.

I'm too worn out from practising to bother feeling nervous, so I walk straight up and ask, ‘Excuse me, Ali?'

She looks at me with those grey eyes of hers and I feel myself becoming instantly fuzzy. But she looks welcoming and starts to smile.

‘Um, is anybody sitting here?' I manage, pointing to the chair across from her.

She nods enthusiastically, still smiling.

‘So it's taken? I can't join you?' back to reality

She shakes her head.

‘Oh,' I say in disappointment. ‘Oh well, never mind.'

I turn to go and am shocked to hear her voice, for the first time ever.

She says simply: ‘Go.'

‘Fine, I will,' I say. ‘I'm going. Jeez.'

The weird thing is that her voice sounds strangely familiar. I wander over to the other side of the library, looking for somewhere else to sit. The only place is near Frederick's sister.