Action Figures - Issue One: Secret Origins by Michael Bailey Read Free Book Online Page A

thought about getting one, since I never thought about becoming a super-hero.
    “We should think of one for you,” Matt says. “And we should think of a decent team name. Something catchy and dynamic.”
    “And not lame like Captain Trenchcoat,” Stuart says.
    “I’m not seeing any biting of me.”
    “What’s the point?” Sara says. “We haven’t actually done anything as super-heroes, and we never will as long as the Protectorate is around. Why call a bunch of kids for help when you can call a real superhero team?”
    “You’re looking at this all wrong,” Matt says. “First of all, the Protectorate’s going to get old someday, and someone’s going to have to step up to replace them, and why can’t that someone be us? Second, they’re, like, the SWAT team of super-heroes, and you don’t always need a SWAT team, do you? Sometimes you only need a few cops. We can be the ones who handle the smaller stuff while they’re off saving the whole world.”
    “So we’d be the like the minor league team,” Stuart says distastefully. I have to agree. Being the second choice for anything is never fun.
    “At first. You have to walk before you can run, right? We can’t dive head first into saving the world. That’s nuts. I mean, come on. Realism here.”
    “Yeah, right, let’s be realistic about our pipe dreams of becoming super-heroes.”
    “Right here,” Matt says, gesturing at the TV. “This thing with the robots. Concorde shows up to save the day, fine, but what is he doing to stop it from happening?”
    “Aren’t the police investigating?” Missy says.
    “They have nothing to investigate. No one’s actually committed a crime.”
    “If the cops have nothing to investigate, then we have nothing to investigate,” Sara says, and that kills Matt’s momentum. He talked himself into a corner against his own argument.
    And yet...
    “My dad has a favorite quote,” I say. “It’s from Goldfinger , one of the real old James Bond movies. ‘Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action.’”
    “Do you exshpect me to talk, Goldfingah?” Matt says in an exaggerated Scottish brogue.
    “No, Mister Bond, I expect you to die!” Stuart says. The boys laugh. The girls smile politely but they don’t get the joke. I do, because I used to watch James Bond with Dad all the time. The moment is simultaneously comforting and depressing.
    “I don’t get it,” Missy says.
    “It’s a scene from the movie,” Stuart says.
    “Duh! I got that. I mean the ‘three times is enemy action’ thing.”
    “It means the exact same thing can happen only so many times by accident,” I say. “One robot busts out of the ARC lab and goes haywire, okay, it’s weird but weird stuff happens. The same thing happens a second time, it’s harder to say it’s nothing but an accident, but it’s still possible. If it happens a third time...”
    “Then chances of it being the exact same accident are practically nil,” Matt says, finishing my thought. He sits back, pondering this, while the rest of us remember we have textbooks in our laps and homework that’s due tomorrow.
    “Okay,” Sara sighs. “Who wants to help me figure out the value of X?”
    Nine o’clock rolls around and we call it a night, despite the fact some of us are leaving with more completed homework assignments than others (yes, I was the first to finish everything, and no, I don’t know if that earned or cost me friend points). Matt, Stuart, and Missy take off, but there’s a mess to deal with and I don’t want Sara to get saddled with it all.
    “You don’t have to,” she insists.
    “It’s not fair to stick you with the clean-up.”
    “That’s usually how it works.”
    “I see. So super-heroes are great when it comes to fighting crime but make poor houseguests is what you’re saying?”
    Sara snorts, a restrained snicker. “Yeah. Pretty much. At least as far as Matt goes,” she says, plucking one of his discarded