Girl Power

  Chapter 9

  Elise braces herself as she stands on the pier. She’s not sure what to expect when she dives into the water. For the last two weeks the only water she’s been around has been in the shower and the only fish in the mess hall. There are a pair of Navy rescue divers on the pier with her just in case this doesn’t go well and she needs rescued.

  “Here goes nothing,” she says with more confidence than she feels. Then she dives into the water. Owing to her new physique it’s not as graceful a dive as before, but not a belly flop either.

  She takes a few practice strokes above the water to test the suit. She can’t feel it on her body at all; it’s like she’s swimming in the nude. She giggles at this and then dives underwater. She feels the same freedom of movement under the water. At first she holds her breath like a normal human, until her lungs begin to burn. She closes her eyes before she blows out the last of the air she’s been holding in.

  She remembers when her father, the previous Lord Neptune, took her for her first swim. Back then Ellis Pate had been ten years old and until that time had thought he was an ordinary boy, the son of the American ambassador to New Zealand. Then a grizzled old man with a white beard like Santa Claus had shown up, claiming to be Ellis’s real father.

  Ellis wanted nothing to do with the old man; he had run away when his parents confirmed that he was in fact adopted. The people he thought had been his parents had found him washed up on a beach, surrounded in seaweed like a blanket. When they’d first seen him, Ellis had sported gills along his neck and webbing between his fingers and toes. They weren’t sure what to do with him, so they’d kept him hidden in the embassy until the gills and webbing went away. Then the ambassador set up the paperwork to make it seem as if Ellis had been adopted by them from a local orphanage.

  Ellis managed to sneak out of the embassy and made it down to the harbor. He’d always liked to watch the boats, but now tears came to his eyes. He stared at his fingers, waiting to see the webbing appear. He stared into the water so he could check for gills, but so far he was still normal.

  He had never gone swimming before. His parents had forbid him to get near the water. At the time he’d thought they were being overly cautious; now he understood they knew he was a freak and had wanted to keep him from finding out.

  He felt the pier shake and turned to see the old man coming towards him. Ellis wanted to run, but his legs wouldn’t work, so he curled into a ball and peed himself like a baby. “There’s no need to be afraid, my son,” the old man said.

  “Go away!” Ellis shouted. He hoped someone would come to his aid, but no one did.

  “My son, it is time to claim your birthright,” the old man said. He stopped to cough violently. He shook his head. “This ‘air’ of yours is vile. I don’t know how you can stand it.”

  “Are you…are you a merman?” Ellis asked. He had seen The Little Mermaid the year before, which had increased tensions between him and his parents about their no swimming rule for months.

  “I am the king of Pacifica and you are its prince,” the old man said.

  “I’m a prince?” Ellis perked up at this; it was like something from one of the storybooks his mother had used to read at bedtime.

  “Yes, and it is time to return to the land that will one day be yours.” The old man stopped to cough again. “I am getting old and my health is declining. I need an heir to the throne—a capable one.”

  “But I can’t leave here. Mom and Dad—”

  “They are not your real parents. Your real mother waits for you in Pacifica. She’s worried about you every day since she sent you away.”

  “She sent me away?”

  “For your own protection. There were some who wished to kill you at birth to deny me an heir. To spare you, your mother sent you here, to the surface. I have long sought you, but now that I’ve found you, it’s time to go home.”

  “I can’t—” The old man shoved Ellis into the water. At first he flailed his arms and legs around uselessly. He held in what air he’d been able to take in before he hit the water. His lungs burned and his vision began to darken. The last air escaped his lungs as he screamed, the cry muffled by the water.

  Then a strange thing happened: he could breathe! He was still underwater and yet his lungs no longer burned and his vision returned to normal. His eyes boggled to see the webbing between the fingers of his hands. He kicked off his shoes and socks to find his toes with the same translucent material between them.

  The old man—his real father—took him by the back of the shirt. He demonstrated to Ellis how to paddle through the water and then how to glide through it like a fish. Out in the harbor, away from the pier, Ellis began to see strange images. Father explained these were the thoughts of the sea creatures nearby. “All of our ancestors, we of noble lineage, can communicate with our aquatic brothers and sisters. We can command them to do our bidding, but this must be used wisely. The other creatures of the sea are our comrades, not our slaves.”

  Ellis nodded his understanding and then followed Father far away from the home where he’d grown up and to his native home.

  Elise goes through the process again now, only this time she’s alone. Her lungs get to the point where they’re about to burst and then there’s a rush of oxygen into her system. Her gills have returned to let her breathe in the water as naturally as she breathed air on land. She holds up a hand to see the webbing between her fingers.

  She doesn’t need Father to demonstrate how to swim this time. She knows the mechanics of it well enough. She paddles with her arms first to get some momentum and then begins to furiously kick her legs. Before long she hurtles through the water faster than any torpedo.

  She’s moving faster than she ever has before as a man. It must be because of her smaller, lighter body; it allows her to move with speed and agility she’s never thought possible. She begins to laugh as she zips through the water. She hasn’t had this much fun swimming since she was a child first learning to swim.

  When she shoots through a school of tuna, she can sense their annoyance. She sends an apology to them that she hopes they understand. There’s no time to talk, though, as she has to get to Pacifica. She has to stop Killer Whale—her brother.

  ***

  When she’s a few miles from the gates to Pacifica, she can see signs of damage. There are no fires or smoke underwater, but she sees ruts and black patches along the coral fence that rings the city. From the way the clamshell gates—“the pearly gates” Midnight Spectre had called them—hang ajar, Elise knows Killer Whale has already breached the city.

  She pauses near the gates, where she finds a crab that’s burrowed deep into the sand to hide. Its mind is a mash-up of confused images, but from these she ascertains Killer Whale came with an armada of sea creatures he’d bent to his will. As his moniker implies, many of them were orcas from farther north in the Pacific. There were also a hundred or so Pacificans loyal to her brother; they had never accepted the rule of someone who’d been raised on land for ten years.

  Elise swims through the gates. She can see the whales and their Pacifican handlers around the city, herding loyal Pacificans into the town square. Anguished cries for help call to Elise, but she can’t help them yet. She has to reach Killer Whale to break his control over the orcas, sharks, and other creatures he’s pressed into service.

  As a man, Elise had often yearned to escape the palace and its guards to meet up for a rendezvous with Paul or another boyfriend. He had used a channel that ran beneath the city, one only the royals knew about. It was maintained to allow the nobles to escape should the city be about to fall to invaders. But this time it will be helping the invader.

  Elise coasts between houses, careful to avoid any sentries Killer Whale has posted. On the northwest corner of the city, near a statue of Elise’s great-grandfather is a patch of coral that appears to be natural. The coral is actually some kind o
f elaborate plastic Allison had cooked up back when they had often gone out to the Love Shack. It looks and feels real enough, but easily lifts up to reveal the opening to a tunnel.

  Elise makes sure no one is around before she jets into the tunnel. A soft orange glow comes from the floor, where the rock is heated by magma beneath the earth’s crust. As Elise swims along the channel, she wonders if Killer Whale has found this entrance, if he will have a guard posted.

  This seems unlikely as Father never entrusted Killer Whale with any secrets. That was why Father had gone to such lengths to find Elise; he’d known his other son was a psychopath who would lead Pacifica to ruin. Codgers like Baron Triton would argue Ellis Pate had not done much better, but Elise had learned from Father that Pacifica could largely govern itself. It only needed someone to sit on the throne to make people feel like someone had a firm hand on the till.

  As she gets near the end of the tunnel, Elise stops to peek up through a slit in the rock at the throne room. As expected, Killer Whale sits on the throne in his black suit with its white stripes to resemble the name he’d given himself. He has Father’s crown on his head, the crown Father never saw him fit to wear.

  It’s only a slight surprise to see Baron Triton beside the throne. The old-timer might have been in on this coup, or he might simply have seen which way the tide was flowing and gone with it. A much more startling sight is Mother kneeling at the throne with tears in her eyes.

  “Come now, Mother, you shouldn’t carry on so. I have come home at last.”

  “Your brother will find out. He will retake the throne from you.”

  “I doubt that. The fool is dead by now.” Killer Whale glides down from the throne to seize Mother by the hair. “I am your king now!”

  “Never.”

  Killer Whale has no compunctions about hitting an old woman. Mother cries out in pain, but makes no attempt to stop the blood flowing from a gash on her cheek. If it were possible, she would probably spit in his face. Killer Whale makes as if to hit her again, but then turns to a pair of guards. “Take her to the dungeon. A few days in irons should teach her some respect.”

  Elise watches the guards take Mother away. Then she coasts along the rest of the tunnel to pop up in a storeroom.

  Now it’s time to teach Killer Whale some respect.

  ***

  Since Killer Whale outnumbers her by probably two hundred to one, Elise sees no reason for subtlety. Her brother has one weakness, the weakness of most of the villains the Super Squad has tangled with: he’s terribly egotistical and insecure. He’s also dumb enough to let himself get goaded into a one-on-one duel.

  With this in mind, Elise swims up to the doors to the throne room. There are two guards stationed there. They gape at her, their eyes focusing on her breasts in the skin-tight wetsuit. She grins at them. “Hi, boys. See something you like?”

  They blush like a couple of horny fourteen-year-olds. “Um—”

  They’re still hemming and hawing when she bashes their heads into the wall. They float away, unconscious. Then Elise opens one of the doors to the throne room enough that she can slither inside.

  Killer Whale and Baron Triton are going over strategy at a table when she enters. Killer Whale turns at her approach. He takes a good look at her breasts before his eyes narrow. “Who are you, child?”

  “I’m the one who’s come to return the throne to the rightful king of Pacifica.”

  Killer Whale scoffs at this. “You? My cowardly brother would send a little girl to fight his battles for him.”

  “He didn’t figure he needed a man to take care of you,” Elise says. She gets closer to Killer Whale. She can see his face turning red. He doesn’t like to have his manhood mocked by a girl.

  “We’ll see about that, child,” Killer Whale growls. He takes a harpoon from a sheath on his back. The end of it is stained red with blood, probably from the Pacificans he’s murdered. He levels the harpoon at her. “Well? Have you anything better than insults to defend yourself with?”

  “Actually, I do.” Elise takes a seashell off her belt. It’s the kind of fan-shaped shell the oil company used for its logo. But with a flash the shell becomes a golden trident.

  Killer Whale’s eyes widen. “That can’t be. No girl can wield the royal trident!”

  “Except a girl of noble blood,” Elise says like she knew this all along. She had gambled the trident would still work and it had. “Now, you want to surrender or make this hard on yourself?”

  “This changes nothing.” Killer Whale lunges forward with the harpoon. Elise dances aside. Fighting underwater is like a form of dance, albeit a deadly one. It’s easier now that she’s lighter and more nimble.

  When Killer Whale swings the harpoon clumsily at her, Elise darts to the right and then jabs him in the side with the trident. He screams in pain and then backs away, blood dripping from the wounds. “You’ll pay for that, you little bitch.”

  With a war cry he charges at her. Killer Whale never has seemed to learn the principles of armed combat. For one thing, he lets his emotions get in the way to make him sloppy. Elise needs only to wait for him to get enough momentum before she dives beneath him. She loops around to run the trident through his left leg, to pin him to the floor.

  He tries to spin around with the harpoon, but she seizes it by the shaft. This is where he has the advantage now, in superior strength. The harpoon gets closer and closer, until the tip nicks her wetsuit. With a grunt, Elise twists the harpoon away. The blood Killer Whale’s lost weakens him enough that he can’t stop her from yanking the harpoon out of his hands. She lets it float harmlessly away.

  “Now, you’re going to release the sea creatures you enslaved and then tell your minions to clear out of here. Understand?”

  “This can’t be. No girl can best me!”

  “Well, one just did. And unless you want the entire kingdom to know about it, I’d suggest you surrender.”

  Killer Whale looks her in the eye, trying to decide. In the end he nods. “Very well. I will release them. But this isn’t the end of it.”

  Elise knows he’s right. She could end it by taking the harpoon and stabbing him through the heart, but she can’t. Killer Whale is still her brother. Despite everything that’s happened, all the terrible things he’s done, she can’t kill her only sibling.

  Once a pair of loyal guards show up, Elise follows them down to the dungeon with Killer Whale in tow, his hands and feet in shackles. The guards unceremoniously shove him into a cell. “I’ll have someone stop by to take care of those wounds,” Elise says.

  Then she swims down a few cells, to where she sees Mother in her cell, sitting idly on a coral bench. Elise takes off her mask and then opens the door. Mother turns to face her, eyes narrowing. Elise darts forward to slam into her. It’s been so long since she’s hugged her mother. “Hello, Mother. I’m home.”

  “Ellis?” Mother runs a hand through Elise’s long hair. “What’s happened to you?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  Chapter 10

  There were some people who wrongly thought Velocity Man could walk on water. There had been a cult who believed him to be the second coming of Christ because of this. The ringleader of the cult had been put in jail when he tried to kill Velocity Man, believing him to be the Messiah who would spring back to life in three days.

  Allison had tried to explain to that man and everyone else that no one could walk on water. The second you tried, gravity would pull you down and you’d be looking for dry clothes. The trick is to run fast enough that you can outwit gravity. She had given reporters the simplistic example of cartoon characters; they were able to walk over a cliff as long as they didn’t look down. Once they stopped to do this, gravity took charge.

  Allison thinks about this as she paces the pier. She has to be able to build up enough speed when she runs off the pier that she can escape the forces of gravit
y. First she has to be able to do anything in these damned boots. Whoever heard of trying to run in heels? You didn’t see Olympic sprinters wearing spike heels in the hundred-meter dash.

  “Believe me, this wasn’t my idea,” Major Dalton had said. She gestured to the hole in Allison’s costume that exposed most of her ample cleavage. “Neither was that. I think the boys they got to make these haven’t been out of the basement for a while.”

  Allison would love a new pair of shoes, but there aren’t any that will work. She can’t wear a normal pair of shoes; the soles would melt before she got two miles. She had created her own special friction-resistant polymer for her old boots. What had happened to those? They probably wouldn’t have fit, but they would still be better than these damnable things.

  “It’s not that difficult, sweetheart,” Ms. Cash says. “You have to glide, nice and easy.”

  She does a catwalk strut on the pier for Allison. “That’s not very helpful. Have you ever had to run in those shoes?” Cash only stares at her. She’s probably never had to run anywhere in her life. Men wouldn’t think to abandon her, plus she always had assistants and sycophants surrounding her.

  Allison takes a deep breath. She needs to relax. She thinks back to when she first discovered her ability. Back then Alan Bass had been a nineteen-year-old research intern at Grant Laboratories. He had been part of a project to find a cure for asthma, something Alan had a personal stake in.

  His supervisor, Dr. Folds, allowed him to work as late as he wanted in the lab. Alan kept a cot in there so he wouldn’t have to go home. He could work until he was too exhausted to see and then crash on the cot. He was nearing that point when the accident happened.

  They had been working on a stimulant for the respiration system, a sort of steroid that would allow the lungs to become strong enough to resist the asthma. Alan hadn’t been stupid enough to try the stimulant on himself. It was a simple mistake. He had been about to put a sample in storage when it slipped from his fingers. The vial shattered on the desk, the contents forming a noxious blue cloud.