Being A Superhero

Time: 2:45PM

Location: Chemistry Classroom

Everything has been great so far. Throughout the day, the other bullies were avoiding me after they heard, or technically, what they saw earlier today. For the first time ever, I felt that there was no danger, and I wasn't even called in for a scolding or suspension. Well, now that I think about it, this doesn't seem right. Well whatever… I'll enjoy this win. We're almost dismissed anyway. Just a few more minutes and I'm out of here. Then I'll deal with whatever comes tomorrow.

As the teacher was discussing, the speakers of the classroom started to emit a static sound. Then a woman's voice came sounding in. "Will Mr. Dan Stevens come over to the principal's office… Now…" The whole class stared at me and started Oohing.

Great… just the attention I needed.

"Mr. Stevens you may go. Here's your hall pass." The teacher said as she was handing me a card.

I hesitated before I stood up and walked over to her slowly, and grabbed the card from her hand and headed out while resisting the jeers from my classmates.

As I headed towards the office, I contemplated on what I needed to say and what would happen when I get there.

The idea of running away came in to mind. But if I do, I'd instantly become a fugitive. How am I getting out of this?

Well whatever… Let's just take things as it is for now. I'm getting roasted either way.

Standing in front of the principal's office didn't make me feel any better at all. In fact, it only made me more terrified of the situation. Thinking about it now, I could probably get suspended or worse, I could be probably be expelled!

Expelled?

I can't get expelled!

While I was still deep in my thoughts, a voice came sounding in from the office, "Mr. Stevens… you may come in now."

I gulped to the sound of the principal inviting me in.

This is it.

Whatever happens, happens. I already made up my mind the moment I fought back. Let's just get this over with.

Beyond the door was the entire basketball team with casts, crutches, neck braces, and bandages on their bodies. On the other side of the room were some of their parents and guardians.

The person that caught my attention was the one sitting in from of the principal's desk. With one look, I knew who he was. My dad help him get this job and that's how he got this position now.

This guy, Gen. Jacob Williams, was the father of Blake and is the head of security of the City.

The moment I entered, all eyes were on me. This meant only one thing – this, not ending well for me. My fate basically is to die here.

Right now. I'm just waiting for the principal to declare her judgement.

"Mr. Stevens, please take a seat." She said in a serious tone.

I slowly walked towards them and sat on the chair in front her desk and across the General.

The room was very silent and the atmosphere was very tense. No one spoke for a few seconds before the principal broke the silence, "Do you know why you are here?"

I didn't respond to her and thought about it for a while. Does she even need to ask me that? I wouldn't be called here for nothing. I'd end up being the bad guy anyway.

But the General wasn't having any of this. He immediately and impatiently butted in and said, "Let's just cut to the chase Principal Collins. This guy-." He was cut off by Miss Collins as she raised a hand to stop him from speaking.

"Mr. Stevens, I asked you a question. Do you know why you are here?" She asked me again.

I guess there's no way out of this now, is there? Breathing in, I gave a very heavy sigh before I spoke, "The general's right Principal Collins."

Everyone was surprised to what I said. They were looking at me with a puzzled look. Seeing this I gave a smirk before I continued speaking.

"Let's just cut to the chase. I wouldn't be called to this place unless people THINK that I did something wrong."

"YOU!" The general rose from his seat and glared at me.

"SIT. DOWN." Principal Collins ordered.

A drop of sweat rolled from the side of the general's forehead. He had no choice but to obey the principal's command. Wow… This woman is not so bad. She can keep the general in line.

"Mr. Stevens, I'll be direct. You were called because you beat up people, and in this school, we don't tolerate violence." She said.

A gave her a wry smile pretending to not know anything. "Miss Collins, I didn't do anything. Please tell me, do you have any proof? If not, tell me, how could a kid like me beat a team of healthy and strong men?"

"Well, I'm glad you asked that." She then opened a video file on her phone and projected the hologram for everyone to see. There was a video of me carrying a bat and going in basketball team's locker room and beating everyone black and blue. Apparently all the cameras in the locker room "caught" the whole thing. That was what she said.

This is obviously an edited video. At this day and age, editing a video at this caliber is child's play. Any good hacker with video editor can do it. A ten year-old kid with the right equipment could do this.

I stared at this for a while. "Who did you get this from?"

"The security personnel from this school. Who else? Now, is there anything you want to confess?" Miss Collins said.

Damn it! Security personnel my ass?! Gen. Williams is obviously falsifying the evidence. Every security personnel on the island works for him! He probably paid him to give this fake video to place the blame on me!

Well, to be fair, I am partly at fault.

I guess this is it for me then.

"Well? What do you have to say for yourself?" Gen. Williams smiled angrily as he said that.

I didn't say anything and just kept silent. There was no way out for me. Should I just buy a smoke bomb from the system's shop and throw it here? Afterwards I can flee with the invisibility hoodie.

I probably can't. It would still make me into a fugitive. Besides, the general is sitting beside me. I can't escape that easily.

The principal didn't say anything else and just gave off a heavy sigh before she gave of her final judgement.

She had to comply with the evidence at this point. "Since the evidence is very clear and the student who had cause this has nothing else to say, I can now make my judgement." She paused before continuing, "Mr. Dan Stevens, you are now hereby expelled by Sky City High School."

Hearing this, the parents clapped their hands and the students were cheering on the results. Pleased with his victory the general leaned closer to me and said, "I'll deal with you personally." He smiled at me and chuckled lightly.

But before everyone continued their celebration, a voice from the doorway left them in silence. "And how are you going to deal with the kid? Please, enlighten me general."

Everyone looked at the source of the voice. A man on his late twenties was leaning on the doorway and was crossing his arms. He was smirking and closing his eyes. This was weird, I couldn't sense his presence at all. Did he just come in?

"Who the hell are you?! And it is none of your business!" Gen. Williams yelled.

"Oh please do tell me. My boss would definitely love to hear it." The man said.

This in turn, only angered Gen. Williams. He walked towards the man and grabbed him by the collar and said, "You… Do you know who you're talking to?

The man just smiled at him and chuckled.

"You dare mock me? I'll show you!" The general was preparing to punch the guy but the next few words that the principal uttered stopped him and made everyone silent.

"Secretary Sun, what brings you here?" The principal said in a surprised tone.

She immediately recognized the person. But me on the other hand, I was still confused.

The room became so silent that if a pin was dropped right now, it would be heard clearly.

One of the parent's must have realized who he was as well as he broke the silence saying, "Se-secretary Sun? As in Secretary Ren? The secretary of the president of Mega Dome?"

Mega Dome is the country where Sky City resides. There are a total of seven major cities in Mega Dome: Sky City being the largest and the most progressive city in the country, Fire City, Cloud City, Rain City, Thunder City, Wind City and Mist City.

The secretary looked towards the direction of the parent that asked him that and replied, "Yep." With a grin that would make every hair in your body stand.

When Gen. Williams heard this he immediately let go of Secretary Sun and knelt on one knee and bowed his head. "Secretary Sun! I'm really sorry for disrespecting you! I didn't immediately recognize you. And also this hooligan-." He started ranting and making an excuse while pointing at me. But he was cut short by another voice coming from the hallway.

"This hooligan that you are referring to is my godchild." The woman's voice said.

Everybody in the room turned their heads to the door. We were all anticipating to see who this person was. When she finally showed herself, everybody in the room straightened themselves and bowed deeply towards her. I on the other hand, didn't know what was going on. I slowly stood up from where I was sitting and tried to process what was going on.

"President Lancaster! What a sur-."

"Save it." Gen. Williams tried to smoothen things but was cut off by President Lancaster. This was Jasmine Lancaster. She is currently the president of the entire country of Mega Dome.

But wait a minute…

Did she just say that I'm her godchild?!

She walked towards me while ignoring everyone else. I was about to bow when she stopped me. "Oh you don't have to bow towards me child." Then she the weirdest thing happened. Imagine, the person with the most prestige and the person who controls the largest country in the world, would hug me... ME?!

Then she said, "You've grown so much Dan. It's been years since I've last seen you."

I just stared at her with an ambiguous look. She looked at me and smiled before she continued speaking, "We'll catch up later. There's so much that you need to know. For now, I'll deal with this problem."

The room became quiet as she scanned the room with her eyes. It was like a lioness eyeing its prey. When everyone saw this, they began to shudder and diverted their gaze elsewhere. A smirked appeared on the president's face before she called for the secretary to play something on her holographic ring.

A series of videos were shown. It was all the times that I was bullied by the basketball team this year. After some time, the last video was shown. It was when they tried to attack me earlier in the hallway.

"Principal, I think that this speaks for itself." She said as she looked at the principal.

The principal sighed and said, "You haven't changed a bit Jasmine. So… how do you want to deal with this? It's far bigger than I thought."

The president smiled and nodded to the secretary. Secretary Sun then tapped her watch and it projected a series of information. He then began reading them. "The entire Basketball team will be expelled and will face a year in a rehabilitation center in Fire City. They will face community service throughout the year as part of their rehabilitation process."

When everybody heard this, they began complaining. The room was getting noisy. Meanwhile, the general just sat on his seat with a dark expression on his face. He knew that his life was basically over. While the noise was starting to get louder, Gen. Williams suddenly stood up and wanted to protest as well. But President Jasmine raised his hand to stop everyone from talking.

"If you've got something to say, come to the palace." She paused for a while before she raised her hand as if she was signaling for them "come at her" anytime. She then continued speaking, "But, I assure you, how your children treated Dan, I will return it to you a thousand fold." She said in a serious tone. There was a familiar dark aura coming from her that was enough to silence everyone. Even I shivered at the feeling.

When everybody didn't say anything else, she looked at the general and pointed at him. "And you, give your badge to secretary Sun. You won't be needing it after today." She said.

Holy cow! Is this really happening right now? Pinch me! I must be dreaming!

"Anyone who doesn't treat people right, doesn't deserve a position in my country." She paused before she continued to speak towards the basketball team. "You should be ashamed of yourselves. All of you don't deserve a place in the most prestigious school in the country."

There was nothing anyone can do.

The most powerful woman in the country just slammed her ultimatum on their faces.

?

Nobles?

General?

Their status meant nothing in front of this woman!

She stared at the ceiling with a tinge of sadness in her eyes. It was like she was recalling a painful memory. After a short pause, she ended with these lines. "It doesn't mean that you have the wealth and the power you can already bully the weak." She looked at me with a smile before continuing the last part of her message. "You have that power because you have the calling to protect them."

President Jasmine looked at the principal before she gave her a smile and said, "Deal with this accordingly Nica. You know what to do."

"This will be hard Jasmine. You know that… but alright." Principal Collins said. "After all these years, you're still a woman of justice." She continued.

"Of course! How do you think I got this job in the first place?" She replied.

"Because Chloe and Richard offered you the job as mayor?" She sarcastically answered.

"Shut up Nic. I'm going now." She chuckled. President Jasmine then grabbed my hand and we walked out of the office together.

We surrounded by men in black suits as we were walking through the hallways. They were really stiff and uptight. Some were signaling something over their communications. Others were observing the surroundings with caution.

"We should head to the car Jas." Secretary Sun said.

"I told you not to call me that when we're at work. But yes, that would the best option for now." She replied.

I have so many questions in my head right now. I don't even know where to start! We've reached the doors of the school and are now walking quietly towards the limo in front of us. I was afraid to talk since the atmosphere was really intense.

The people were giving us looks of awe, jealous, and envy and it was starting to make me feel uncomfortable.

When we arrived inside the car, the secretary made sure that the windows and doors were locked. It was just the president beside me and the secretary in front of us.

"Philip, can we have some privacy please." The secretary instructed the driver to roll the window separating the driver's view and the passengers view inside the limo.

When the coast was clear, the secretary gave the president a nod and she looked at me and smiled. "So, I'm pretty sure you have a lot of questions. What do you want to ask?"

I was still in shock after all of this, but she acted like everything that happened inside was nothing.

There were a lot of questions rushing to my brain, but the question that came out of my mouth was, "Who are you?"

The two of them chuckled when they heard me ask this.

"Really? After all that happened? You're still asking that?" Secretary Sun chuckled.

"Well… I honestly don't know who you are nor what's going on. So…" I replied in a meek tone.

"Alright, alright, fair enough." President Jasmine said. "There are a lot of things that you need to know, but let's start with this."

After she said that, a screen appeared in front of me.

When I saw it, my eyes widened and I was having trouble in trying to get the words out of my mouth.

"you- your- wha- how?" I stammered and didn't know how to say it.

On the screen it said.

[A MEMBER OF A FACTIONLESS INVITES YOU TO AN ALLIANCE:

Ice Queen has added you as a friend. Do you Accept or Reject?]

___END OF CHAPTER__