Dreams of the Golden Age (Golden Age 2)

Sam spotted them first and, obviously startled, pulled into a fighting pose—feet spread, knees bent, arms raised, hands pointed. The others came up beside him and braced in their own poses, with whatever gestures they needed to use their powers. A lick of wind ruffled the hair that peeked out from under Anna’s mask. She was the only one of the bunch who wasn’t surprised or put off balance by the encounter.

“Lady Snow. Stormbringer. Blaster. Hello,” she said calmly.

Fortunately, none of the Trinity let loose with their powers; even Lew’s breeze faded away, once he realized who they were.

Teia put her hands on her hips. “Anna, what are you—”

“Compass Rose,” Anna shot back. “And what are you doing here? Don’t you guys usually patrol the harbor?”

Lew laughed, Teia shook her head, and Anna wondered what she was missing. He said, “We’ve cleaned up the harbor. All the crooks have moved on because they know we’re watching the place. Pretty cool, huh?”

Sam blew on his fingers like they were the barrel of a gun, and Anna rolled her eyes.

“There’s crime all over the city, why’d you come here?” Anna said. “This is our territory.”

Sam looked around dramatically. “I don’t see your flag planted anywhere.” He turned to the others. “That’s car’s going to be coming up this way any second, we don’t have time to fuck around.”

“What’s going on?” Anna asked.

When Sam pointed at her, a shiver of fear twisted her gut—he wouldn’t really blast her, would he? “We’re busy, you kids step back and watch the real supers work.”

Teia shook her head at that. “There’s a car full of gangbangers tearing up the neighborhood. We came this way to try to cut them off.”

Exactly the kind of thing they could do with their powers. Anna and Teddy, not so much. She was inclined to walk off, leave them to it, and find easier pickings. No matter how degrading that would be.

Teddy stepped forward angrily. “We’ll take care of it, this is our territory.”

“How are we supposed to know that? We don’t know what you do, you never make it into the news,” Teia said.

Did she have to keep rubbing their faces in it?

Lew pointed at the gun. “Paintball? That’s what you guys are reduced to?”

“Cut it out, it works,” Anna said. At least, it worked that one time.

“Tag and bag,” Teddy said, like it actually meant something, and hefted the gun like it actually meant something.

“Look,” Anna said, wanting to get away before she said something stupid, or rather more stupid. “There’s plenty of trouble for all of us. We’re wasting time standing here arguing—”

The slide and wail of a police siren echoed down the canyon of tenement buildings. They all perked up like hunting dogs.

“We didn’t call the cops,” Lew said. “What are the cops doing here, poaching our catch?”

Teia turned to Anna. “This is exactly what I was talking about. We don’t even have to call the cops to clean up our bad guys because they’re always already there!”

“Guys, incoming!” Sam yelled.

The siren was getting closer. A car’s tires squealed against the asphalt, turning a corner at high speed.

“Let’s go,” Lew said and took off running in the direction of the presumptive car chase. Teia and Sam followed right behind.

Anna and Teddy looked at each other. Teddy shrugged. “I wouldn’t mind seeing what they do next.”

“We might want to back up a little,” Anna said. They pressed back against the brick wall.

Another siren joined the first. The Trinity was strung out along the block when the squealing tires rounded even closer than before, and a battered SUV swung onto their street. The pair of men visible in the cab—the vehicle’s headlights were off—must have been trying to lose the cops in the grid of empty streets. But it wasn’t working; the sirens were getting louder. And now the SUV raced right toward them.

What happened next might have been choreographed, an elegant display of what everyone who didn’t actually have superpowers thought it must be like to have them. Teia—Lady Snow—acted first, jumping into the street. Anna almost screamed at her to get out of the way of the rocketing SUV. But Teia had a plan. Kneeling, she put her hand on the ground and a sheet of ice thick enough to skate on expanded away from her, covering the street to the next sidewalk and for a block in either direction, right before the SUV careened onto it.