Triumph - Protectors of Central Illinois University, the city of Stevenson, and beyond!
Dragonfly, aka Aaron Majesky - winged martial arts master; The Adept, aka Rick Pennington - master of mystical movement; Cazmonster, aka Caz Greenbaum, super-strong cyber-werewolf; The Gray Robe, aka Sydney Koenig - Druidic mistress of the Earth; The American Attitude, aka Barry Stills - Hyper-sensory, skateboarding streetfighter; Bill Brown (no alias), super-strong urban defender; Magma, aka Jan Graylin, lava blasting demolisher; and Transcender, aka “Dorado” Estevez, controller of time and space.
It was the end of the semester of Aaron’s Junior year at Central Illinois University, and he sat with Caz Granberg at the student center, Aaron’s wounded arm still in a cast, but finally beginning to heal. After the ninja fight that had almost removed his arm at the elbow, the doctor had told him it would be a miracle if he retained even partial use of the arm after a year or so of rehab. Fortunately, The Gray Robe had been able to “assist” with the healing using her mystical druidic powers, but the arm was still far from functional. Aaron reflected on this as he answered posts on his tablet, typing with his good arm.
In addition to this being Aaron’s Junior year, it was Rick’s last. He was officially graduating, having come out of his coma just in time to finish his last paper. He was headed to graduate school at Oxford. His grades weren’t near good enough, Aaron knew, but he’d agreed to allow research on the Robe of Merlin in exchange for a more favorable view of his GPA.
“Well, another year, D-man,” Caz said, taking a drink of tea as students bustled all around them, heading to sell back their textbooks, catch a bus home, or have a final meal with college friends before the school year ended. Aaron acknowledged his friend’s comment only with a nod.
“Good news about your arm and all. Guess you’ll be able to re-join the team next fall, eh?” Caz tried again. Aaron continued to type.
“Holy crap, it’s Sampson!” Caz said, jumping from his chair.
Aaron flipped around in his chair, slapping his tablet on the small, round metal table and reaching for a weapon, which he wasn’t carrying. He saw nothing unusual.
“Sorry, man. Just trying to get your attention,” Caz grinned mischievously.
Aaron glared as he sat back down, but a smirk crossed his lips as he scooted his chair in once again.
“Sorry, just online with Celeste at the Deli,” he said. “Trying to line something up for the summer, but I’m not sure how much work I can do with this,” Aaron noted, lifting his casted arm at the shoulder for emphasis.
“Hey, just go up and relax, you earned it.”
“Earned it? Maybe. Need it? Hell, no. I’m bored to death of ‘relaxing’. My body’s in worse shape than it’s been in years, thanks to having to cut back all my training because of the arm. I’m going to have to train twice as hard come fall, just to get everything else back to where it was, and this arm’s not going to be 100% for years, if ever.”
“Yeah, I hear you,” Caz nodded. “The Attitude’s still deciding whether or not to take a full time job with the ERT and leave Triumph for good. I guess the last few months has a lot of people thinking.” Caz said, a slightly glazed look upon his face. For the past three years, Triumph, and The Infinite Seven before that, had pretty much been his life. It was intimidating to think it might all be going away, but the signs were there. He, Aaron, Rick and Barry were the last of the original 7, and Rick was definitely leaving. If Barry took that job with the Extra-normal Response Team, and Aaron ended up leaving because of his arm, he’d be the only one left. And while the “kids”, as he called them, were coming along, they were like a new generation of heroes at CIU. He wasn’t sure he wanted to be part of a team of newbies, no matter how much he liked them.
“Well, I gotta head out,” Caz said at length. “I’m going to drop by Rick’s place and have him zap me and my U-haul home to save the trip. I’ve got all your net accounts favorited. Catch you in August.” With that, Caz and Aaron both stood. Aaron gripped his friend’s hand with his own good hand, and said his goodbyes. Then he watched Caz walk away.
Aaron sighed as he sat down. He could have gone with to Rick’s place, of course. But somehow, he was looking forward to his bus ride to Chicago. He couldn’t wait to see his uncle, Celeste, and all the others at Heroes Deli. And a special friend from Tibet.
Syd and Rick had spent the entire day together, talking about the future. They’d grown quite close, closer than anyone else knew. While others had suspected their relationship, they’d kept the official part of it quite. As they walked along the lake on a warm spring day, Syd felt intimately related to all around her. The sun fed the plants that grew on the ground on which her shoes tread, and she felt Rick’s warm hand in hers as they walked along.
“So you’ve thought it over?” Rick asked hopefully.
Syd paused for a few seconds. “Yes,” she said. Looking at Rick, his face against the setting sun, she smiled, her lively face coming to a full smile. “I’m coming.”
Rick wrapped his arm around her, a warm joy filling his heart. After a few minutes of walking and smiling, feeling the warmth of the sun and each other, Rick suddenly, swore.
“What!” Syd shouted in response.
“Caz was coming over! He wanted me to send his U-haul truck home so he didn’t have to drive the whole way,” Rick said. Holding out his arm, he opened a portal into his apartment directly in front of him.
“Yo! Rick! Get your skinny wizard butt in here!” came a boisterous call from the other side of the portal. Syd grinned, and they laughed as they heading back to his apartment.
Meanwhile, in the Triumph Citadel...
Transcender, Magma, and Bill Black sat alone at the meeting table. The computer behind them was powered up, and various images from the Stevenson area circulated across the monitors.
“I agree,” Jan said to the conversation already in progress.
“It’s like, ‘here you go, welcome to Triumph! Oh, and by the way, we quit!’,” Bill said, clearly voicing his annoyance, as he was known to do.
“So, what do we do about it,” Dorado, the youngest member of Triumph, a short, slender Latino, asked. “I mean, as far as I know, we still have the HQ. That’s paid for by some kind of trust or something, some Asian guy.”
“Yeah,” Bill said, but kept whatever else was going through his mind to himself.
“Well, I say we don’t give up! Not yet. Who knows, Dragonfly and American Attitude might come back!” Jan said, with just enough doubt that neither of the other two believed her.
“Yeah,” Bill said again, obviously disingenuously.
“Yeah,” Dorado echoed. The three sat quite several more minutes, waiting for someone else to say something.
No comments:
Post a Comment