Josefer Martin - Growing up Super - Chapter 4

I shook the old memories from my mind. Now was not the time to dwell on the past. That would come at the debriefing. It was about thirty seconds before the end of class, and I had just enough time to stash my books, notebook opened to a blank page, and textbook worn almost to the point of falling apart, into my backpack.

Since I was at the back of the class, I was the last in line to leave the classroom, though I had much more left in my day then the rest of my classmates. Even though the live feed was cut off when we entered the vault, there was still the recording from Jessica's glasses to dissect during the debrief.

I was almost out the door when I turned and noticed Ms. Delarosa crouched over her keyboard, staring at the screen. "Ms. D, see you tomorrow."

"Yeah," she said, obviously distracted.

I walked a step closer to her, "Ms. D, you alright?"

She shook her head, "Yeah. Just trying to grok the algorithm you discussed in class."

I smiled, and strolled over to her desk, "I just made it up. I doubt it'll even work. That whole thing, from the 3D model to the basic program was just some smoke and mirrors. I made it up on the spot, whole-cloth, BS from start to finish."

"But," she began, a strained look in her eyes, "it wasn't BS. It worked, at least, the two-dimensional treesort did."

"Really?" I asked, pulling a chair from around her desk.

"Really," she said. She then smiled and pointed to a chunk of code on her screen, "See this. I had to finagle it a bit, but I got it to work."

I plopped myself down in the chair, forgetting even the backpack on my back, and began to look over the code. She had taken a basic idea that had come out of nowhere and built it into a coherent program. Sure it didn't do much, but that's because it was just a test.

I pointed to a line of code, and she described what it did. We began to work with the code, solidifying it as it was, then bringing it further, and further, until, just on the cusp of creating an n-dimensional treesort, we were rudely interrupted.

"Josefer Martin to the office, please," the intercom buzzed. I could hear it from the hall as well, which meant that instead of the usual room-only call I had come to expect since my Freshman year, they had gone with a broadcast throughout the school.

"Sorry," I hastily apologized, jumping out of the chair towards the door, "maybe we can finish it tomorrow?"

"Yeah" she said despondently as I ran down the hall towards the main office.

Since it wasn't a briefing I ran past Ms. Studney's office and waved to the secretary as I opened and then jumped inside of a supply closet. It began to descend as soon as the door closed. It did so slowly, incidental music from last summer's super hero blockbuster playing softly in the background. I chuckled to myself as I was slowly lowered the three levels to the training complex beneath the school, thinking back to the first time I had to take the secondary elevator, a week before the start of my Freshman year.

Jessica and I were scheduled for a tour of the facilities, but because of traffic the bus I had relied upon to get me to the school had arrived late. So, after a hastened and confusing conversation with the secretary, I had entered the supply closet elevator and made my way down to join the tour, already in progress.

As luck would have it, I arrived just as Matt, a senior and the new leader of the Garder Fox Senior High team, was belatedly begun the tour without me.

"As with Parker Junior High, Fox Senior High was built with supers, and our training, in mind. Unlike Parker, we've got a fully-featured facility equipped to handle eight supers as well as our various instructors and support staff. We've got a martial arts training room, a battle simulation room, a debriefing room, and even our own gymnasium."

I came up behind Jessica and assaulted her with a hug. She, of course, expected it, but Matt was surprised.

"Ah, Mr. Martin," he began.

"Joe," I interrupted to correct him.

"Joe then, how nice of you to finally join us."

"My pleasure. The traffic was horrendous."

"Your girlfriend got here on time," he commented.

"But," I countered, "she didn't have to take the bus, now did she?"

"No," she chimed in, "she didn't. Instead, she ran here, and arrived five minutes early."

"Enough," he exclaimed. "We don't have time for excuses. You're here, and so I won't have to do this a second time." He then turned and walked down the hall. It looked like the halls three stories up, only without the lockers.

"As I was saying, Gardner Fox Senior High was built with supers in mind."

I shook my head as the elevator stopped. "Why" I said to myself as I ran through the well-lit halls, "do I keep thinking back to past?"

"Maybe," said an oddly familar voice from out of nowhere. I stopped, but it continued, "because those that don't remember their past are doomed to repeat it."

I frantically looked around, but could not find the source of the voice, nor could I place it's familiarity. I shook it off, and continued to the debriefing room. I stopped right before the door and caught my breath, then casually opened it.

"Ah," came that same familiar voice form inside the room. I continued in. They were replaying old mission tapes on the main screen. Underneath the image was the name of the person wearing the camera. It was then that I placed the voice I had heard to a name, the same name that was on the screen, Mike. He continued to speak on the tape, "So nice of you to finally join us."