Read Nobody Likes Superheroes, Anyways! :: Vol 3 - The Doctor of Rage [PAGE 1]

“Jae, go left. I think I saw one sneaking around behind the statue on the upper level,” Arin said through her mic. JaeHai09 followed the directions. As soon as her foot touched the second level of the office building, she was buried in gun fire.

“Get out of there! Don’t be a hero,” Arin commanded. Jae jumped back down the stairwell to safety and attempted to heal.

“Speaking of heroes,” Pwolfe’s voice rang through Arin’s headset. “I hear our hometown got themselves a vigilante, Arin. He stole our team name. What’s up with that?”

Arin rolled her unseen eyes and ignored him. She wasn’t about to humor him with an answer. Pwolfe always distracted everyone from the game play.

“For real, though. Red Electrons are totally our thing. I wonder if we can sue,” CollinItQuits93 said.

“You can’t sue a superhero, unless you want to sue the Ultimatum. That’s a suicide mission. Even after the destruction Dark Star caused in Urban City last year, no one could get a cent from them.”

“Guys, shut it! You didn’t even like that name, and some of us are trying to win!” JaeHai09 squeaked. She was running away from the other team, full speed, unable to heal as fast as they could hit her.

Arin needed to pull her team together. “Superheroes are overrated and, I’m sure Red Electron, whoever he is, will disappear like all the other amateurs. Now can we all just focus?”

Just as Arin said these words, JaeHai09 took a shot to the head and went down. Jae let off a long strand of inappropriate words, and sounds rang through the computer as if she repeatedly smacked her headphones against a monitor before her mic went silent.

“I don’t know. If I had superpowers, I would definitely use them. Do you have any idea how much money those guys make?” Pwolfe asked as Arin saw him shoot an enemy in the distance.

“You think?” CollinItQuits93 asked.

“Hell yeah!” Pwolfe yelled. “It’s all those rich-ass non-heroes who buy their way in; they support the whole thing. Plus the government feeds them funds. I learned about it in my History of Superhero Laws class a few years back. You can’t sue them and they make bank off of it.”

“Seriously guys, we need to win this one,” Arin begged. “If we lose this, and don’t make it to semi-finals, I will personally find Red Electron and send him after both your asses!”

That seemed to shut them up.

Arin spotted the last enemy standing on a distant ledge. Her opponent was focused on shooting down Pwolfe and didn’t see Arin sneak up behind. She lined up one good shot and clicked her mouse.

“Head snipe.”

Arin’s screen faded to green and displayed “Victory.” A flurry of “GG”s scrolled through the chat box, disappointment from the opposite team raging through those two letters.

“We did it!” CollinItQuits93 cheered.

Once the game ended, all the words her teammates said registered. She adjusted her microphone and spoke softly. “Patrick, do superheroes really make that much money?”

“Oh, now you want to talk superheroes?” Pwolfe chuckled.

Yes, because while we were playing was a much better time for the discussion, Arin wanted to say.

Pwolfe replied before she got a chance. “If you’re so close to Red Electron why not ask him yourself? But, yeah they certainly do. Why?”

“I was just thinking. Red Electron if sh–er–he really had cool superpowers, then he’d probably not be in this small town. His powers must be something pretty weak…like, maybe he can only really turn things on and off, you know?” Perhaps she shouldn’t have used the actual truth as an example. At least she left out her knack for blowing things up; she could never control when that was going to happen, anyway.

“In today’s technological world, that’s probably more useful than a lot of other powers,” CollinItQuits94 said. “A wide margin of crimes take place online these days, or at least use some kind of electric-powered device.”

“Yeah…” Arin trailed off.

JaeHai09 tapped in with a loud groan. “You guys are boring. Only you all would rather talk about superhero finances over how hunky they look in spandex. I’m going to go celebrate with a bottle of whiskey and the two guys from my Bio-Chem class. Peace.”

“I’m off too. Good luck and stay safe out there. Now that there is a superhero, I hope you don’t start seeing villains.”

Only Pwolfe remained. “I kind of hope you do see Villains. How dope would that be?”

“Bye Patrick,” Arin clicked out. She rolled her chair away from her desk and leaned back, wondering what it would be like to be one of those superheroes.

No—she wasn’t thinking about that. She hardly had powers and they certainly weren’t super. Real superheroes had amazing abilities; they were way stronger than her walking-light-switch one.