The OK Team 2 (14 page)

‘Yep, one monkey, downsized from giant gorilla.'

‘Game Boy! Nice work!' I say, genuinely impressed.

‘That's not all.' He grins and holds up a small glass jar.

‘I also got this off him.'

We step closer and peer at the small label that is made with white paper with black lettering. There are five letters with a full stop between each one.

The label reads:
S.T.O.M.P.

‘Gamer! That's fantastic!' say Logi-Gal. ‘Now we'll be able to run tests and find out what this stuff is. Maybe even find an antidote.'

‘An anecdote? Like, the long, rambling stories my uncle tells after Christmas dinner?' Cannonball says.

‘No, I said antidote,' says Logi-Gal. ‘As in, a cure. A potion to counteract S.T.O.M.P. At last, the Heroes of the world can fight back.'

But even as the last word is leaving her lips, Blink appears unexpectedly in front of the Gamer's outstretched hand.

‘I'll take that,' he says.

He grabs the jar and – blink – he's gone.

‘Well, it was good while it lasted,' says Torch.

‘At least we've still got the monkey,' says The Gamer.

From inside the rubbish bin, Monkey 2.0's muffled little voice says, ‘Ook.'

Logi-Gal says, ‘Switchy? Are you okay?'

Switchy is still a human boy, but he's down on all fours, sniffing a pile of old dog poo on the ground. He sits and tries to scratch his ear with his right foot.

‘That's just wrong,' says Torch.

Nobody disagrees.

From
the Daily Cape
newspaper:

HERO BALL: FLYING
TIGERS FAIL TO FLY

Flying Tigers captain AutoMan admits his side needs a Super make-over after being trounced by previously under-performed side, the Roller-Elephants, last night.

In a shock result, the Flying Tigers were beaten 5-0, with little to no contribution from much-hyped recruit Cannonball.

Cannonball, a member of mild Melbourne Hero squad, the OK Team, appeared hesitant to become involved in the action, flying above the play without diving in. Even a rampaging run through the midfield by Roller-Elephant star Hero, Bulldozer, couldn't coax the usually aggressive Cannonball into action.

Despite some neat now-you-see-me moves by another OK recruit, Focus, and strong performances by AutoMan and GlueStik, too much was left to too few.

AutoMan told the Daily Cape: ‘I think our team needs a retread, or at least a full service. It's only running on three cylinders. Hero Ball is supposed to be five against five, so the Flying Tigers need to match-up Hero-on-Hero more effectively. Freeze Frame's tactics might need to be reassessed.'

The Flying Tigers' next match is against Queensland side, the BrisVegas High-Rollers, in two weeks.

CHAPTER 14
A QUIET NIGHT IN
FRONT OF THE TV

I
love being a Hero. It's the best thing that could have happened to me in the whole world. It has changed my life completely. But I have to admit that trying to combine Superhero duties with everyday life as a schoolkid is incredibly tiring. After battling the Bushranger and his S.T.O.M.P.ed-up crew, we had to make sure Switchy got home safely without sniffing any dog bums. So it was very late by the time I got home. And then I had homework. Maths and Science.

I finally got to bed at about two o'clock in the morning, and I was up again at seven, staggering around, looking for my school socks and a clean shirt. I was unfocused in every sense; not just physically. School was a blur – pun intended – and I almost got a detention for nodding off at my desk during English.

So tonight I stay in and email the Team via Hero Hints to say I can't face another night of prowling the Melbourne streets on the lookout for S.T.O.M.P.-fuelled bad guys. Given the Super speed of their replies hitting my inbox, I think they are all as happy as I am to put their feet up for an evening. Except The Gamer who says he has some business to take care of at the shadow metal-world on Level 43, whatever that means.

I have a quiet dinner in front of the TV. Mum and Dad don't say much to me, or to each other. Dad asks me politely how school was today and Mum hands me my dinner and says I can watch anything I like on TV.

Dad and I munch our tacos. Mum goes back into the kitchen to eat her dinner and watch re-runs of that celebrity chef who swears a lot on the little TV. I'm too tired to even attempt asking why we're not all eating together and Dad's face looks as drawn and strained as I feel.

We watch the Tour de France. It's the world's greatest bike race and the cyclists ride all over France. Dad says he used to compete in bike races when he was younger. I think he must have been pretty good. He was on the Australian semi-professional circuit. He still rides his bike most Sunday mornings with a bunch of his friends. They all wear colourful, skin-tight lycra that is so ridiculous it makes most Superheroes look dull. Sometimes they ride all the way to a local café about two kilometres away. Then he eats a huge breakfast and rides back and lectures me on the importance of exercise. I usually try and fade into the background when he gets out his heart rate monitor to prove how fit he is. I think that his low heart rate just proves how slow he rides – but I don't tell him that.

Dad loves ‘the Tour'.

‘How far do these guys ride?' I ask, nodding at the TV as I bite into my carrot taco. Despite my ‘condition' (as my parents still call my power) being well advanced, they continue to hope enough carrot tacos will improve my visibility.

‘Some days they ride more than 150 kilometres,' Dad says. ‘Each stage is different – depending on how hilly it is.'

‘They have to ride 150 kilometres uphill?'

‘Not just uphill. Over the Alps and the Pyrenees mountain ranges – they ride up and down some of the steepest mountains in the world.'

‘Then they have a week off ?'

Dad barks out a short laugh. ‘No. Then they do it again, or worse, the next day.'

The riders bunch up into a big pack. I'm surprised they can all ride that close to each other without crashing.

‘For how many days?'

‘Three weeks,' says Dad. ‘With a couple of rest days here and there.'

‘Wow,' I say. ‘Three weeks. How can they possibly do that? Are they Superpowered?' I ask. I sneak a glance at Dad as I say it. He's always refused to believe in Superheroes and I've given up on the fantasy of telling him about my secret life. He still thinks I'm just a freak – the third in our family's history – with my bizarre physical ‘condition'. And he chooses not to talk about it, apart from occasionally pointing out people he believes are even greater freaks, to make me feel better about myself. This used to drive me crazy, but since I discovered my physical state was technically a recognised Superpower, I'm a lot less hung up on my freak factor.

‘Superpowered,' Dad snorts. ‘Well, I guess that's close.'

‘What do you mean?' I ask, hopefully. Is Dad finally coming around?

‘“Superpowered” or “artificially enhanced”.' He watches the lycra-clad cyclists toiling up an endless slope. ‘Same thing really.'

‘These guys are artificially enhanced?'

‘There are all kinds of performance-enhancing drugs for sports people. And a heap of riders have been thrown off the Tour for positive drug tests over the last few years. It's hard to believe any of them are clean. It makes it easy to be suspicious of their amazing feats of endurance.'

‘Were there performance-enhancing drugs back when you used to ride? Competitively, I mean.'

He shrugs. ‘We'd hear rumours, but the drugs today are a lot more sophisticated. They're almost undetectable and they can make a dramatic difference. Riding was a lot less scientific when I raced. We spent our time hoping not to get a flat tyre, not wondering when we should inject the next chemical booster into our body. Some of these drug cheats have blood transfusions mid-race.'

‘A blood-transfusion. Mid-race! Extreme! How do they get away with it?' I say.

‘Well, some do get caught. Whole teams sometimes,' says Dad. ‘And it's always a scandal and they get disqualified and sent home in disgrace, but the Tour is such a big deal – and there's a lot of money in it, so it doesn't stop the next fella from trying to take a short cut to the winners podium.'

‘Dad?' I ask quietly. ‘When you were younger, would you have taken something, if you could win the Tour de France?'

Dad gives me a look that is harsh and shows that his competitive instincts are still strong.

‘No way, Hazy. No way.' He waves half a carrot taco at me. ‘Let me tell you this – if I finished fiftieth in the Tour de France, but knew that I was the first “clean” cyclist home; the first without performance-enhancing whatever in my body, I would consider that I had won the race, regardless of who stands on the podium wearing that yellow jersey.'

‘But why? Is it so wrong?'

‘Yes, it is.' Dad has steel in his voice now. ‘Because a bloke who wins the Tour with all this stuff pumping through his veins loses in the whole scheme of things. And do you know why? Because he has no idea how good he really is. He doesn't know his own potential. What if he could have won the race without artificial help? He'll never know. He's just cheating himself.'

We munch in silence.

‘I wonder how much those drugs cost?' I ask.

‘It's impossible to count the cost,' he says softly. ‘The whole sport's credibility, for starters.'

‘I was talking about money,' I say.

‘Yeah, I know.'

From
the Melbourne Super Times
:

OK TEAMER CLEARED
ON STRIKING CHARGE

OK Team member
Cannonball
was cleared, with a reprimand, last night on a charge of too-powerfully striking a low-category Villain in the recent battle against the Hardware Gang.

A spokeshero for the AFHT said, ‘At the time of the strike Cannonball was acting in the mistaken belief that his opponent was on S.T.O.M.P., and the evidence suggests the offence, while clearly illegal, was unintended.'

Cannonball was given a Hero-warning and will be monitored for any further breaches.

Cannonball released a statement saying he was withdrawing from Hero Ball for the foreseeable future, as well as taking a break from all Hero action.

CHAPTER 15
IN THE WAKE OF
S.T.O.M.P.

S
imon and I are hanging out in the library. Frederick is looking for his sister, Alexandra. She didn't get up in time to catch the usual bus to school with him today. His theory is that she probably slept in because of a late night in her guise as Tomorrow Girl, either fighting crime or – more likely – working on synchronised moves with the G
rl-Stars.

So it's just Simon and I, in a lonely back corner of the library. We deliberately sit near the non-fiction political biography racks, so we can be sure that nobody is likely to come near us, even if we sat here for years.

‘At least we know for sure that they were on S.T.O.M.P. so it's not like the Bushranger and his gang are too good for us. They're just cheating,' Simon says.

‘Yeah, and we got their monkey,' I say, thinking it's not often in life you can use a sentence like that. ‘I'm still not happy about this Blink guy.'

Simon smirks. ‘Don't like being part of a visibly-challenged double act, hey, mate? Only room for one invisible man in Melbourne?'

I glare at him. ‘You didn't look so thrilled when Morphul turned into Papa Torch and out-flamed you, smart guy.'

We both look around to make sure none of the normal kids have overheard a Super Argument.

‘Yeah, well, that was different,' Simon says, looking uncomfortable. ‘Anyway, more to the point, I've been thinking about Switchy.'

‘He was good,' I nod.