The alarm clock beeped.
A brunette stirred lazily on the bed. She tried to find the snooze button all to no avail.
She clenched her hand into a fist and knocked the alarm clock away from her bedside table, sending it up in the air and crashing into her room's wall, making a big dent and destroying the alarm clock along with it.
Suzanne turned to her other side to resume her sleep.
This was Herotapolis, where the heroes lived.
In this city there lived real, breathing heroes. You could tell already by the name of the city right?
Hero League was an organization that pooled together normal people and trained them to become heroes. From chasing of bank robbers to extinguishing of fires in burning buildings, to serving as body guards to important people as well as getting stranded animals down from trees, or odd places, the heroes were ever available.
Duties were always assigned to the heroes according to their rankings.
Slads were what the newbies at the hero league were called. All they basically did was train and foster a great team work among themselves.
Normally, when students were 13-14 years of age, they voluntarily signed up for the Hero-League exam. An exam that allowed the Sequins (that's the major heads in the Hero League) to find out which teenager had the capabilities needed for a true hero.
This exam was called the Thriox.
Most teenagers failed this exam and hence proceeded on to live their normal lives...being a teacher, a doctor, a carpenter, or whatever career they had in mind. Only the few that were selected would be transfered to different schools which the Hero-League had established in order to train those who passed on how to be a proper hero.
Then the Slads would be grouped in fours and this was known as a Squad.
Each Squad had a number of its own used to identify its members.
"Get up, Loser!" Shane hissed angrily as he barged into his twin sister's room.
Suzanne glared angrily at him as she sat up on her bed.
Shane hadn't taken the exam simply because he wanted to become a soccer star.
"Mum said to wake you up!" he snorted, rather annoyed. He was running late for his practice. His team had just qualified for the finals and he was the star player of his team.
Suzanne stretched lazily and got out of bed, ignoring her brother who then marched out after making sure she was fully awake.
She looked at herself in her vanity and smiled indulgently.
I'm in E-rank now. Finally. She thought, much pleased with herself.
E-rank. That was the lowest rank that came before the Slads; it was a bit higher than a Slad though as the E-ranks, they were given small missions that earned some money for the Hero league. Slads never got any mission.
Civilians came to put in their petty requests which they were normally too lazy to do by themselves (more of domestic stuffs really) and paid to have them done for them by the E-ranks, who got these domestic chores assigned to them by the Hero-League as their missions.
A notification alert popped up on Suzanne's phone.
'Please tell me you're awake,' It read.
She rolled her eyes.
It was one of her team mates, Ethan.
'You are....right?' Another message again.
She hissed and went to the bathroom to freshen up and get dressed. The last year when she was a freshman at Superhero High, the school asigned to her by the Hero League, she had to dress strictly in the uniform provided whose color mainly consisted of black and the category of hero one belonged to.
Now, the categories and rankings were two different things entirely.
Categories depended on one's skills like for instant now;
The Jornins; they were good at anything technology, creating it, breaking it, fixing it....most of them were smart. They were extremely intelligent and their code color was green. (That's a category color.)
Then we have the Wintex; These were the gadget experts, only that they never invented the gadgets. They were used in attacking oppositions. Their gadgets differed one from another: One could have a gadget that manipulated electricity while another could have another gadget that could explode into larva balls.
Their code color was purple.
There was also the Turds; What these set of people were skilled at was using diverse weapons. Any weapon you could name, they could use it extremely skillfully. They could even find a thousand ways to injure, or perhaps even kill with a roll of tissue paper. They were also masters at stealth.
The code color for this category was blue.
Next was the M.D Corp; Fully they were called Medical Corp but most people just called them M.D Corps. They were those who were extra sensitive to injuries. They could pinpoint all the vital locations in an opponent's body that could shut down one's body systems.
When you hear of M.D Corp, we're talking of poison and antidote makers too. And when well trained, they could be great at accurate aiming too. They also could also treat wounds effectively and quickly too. Their code color was yellow.
Finally there was the Rolex; This category was not always seen much in the Hero-League owing to the fact that the people that were tagged Rolexs had been experimented on when they were much younger, hence they had extraordinary abilities, all thanks to science.
Their code color was red.
Now these five categories could be found in any ranking.
You could be a Rolex and be a Slad or a Rolex and be a D-rank; the same was applicable in every category.
Categories were kinda like genders; now you wouldn't say because he's a boy he won't be in kindergarten or because she's a girl she's not allowed in the university.
So Ranking was similar to the classes in our schools.
"Suzanne! Get down here! Your Squad's here!" Shane annouced from downstairs. "And I'm leaving!" he added a bit hastily.
Suzanne threw on a red hoodie to complete her outfit and started heading downstairs hurriedly. She was always the turdy one in her group because she hated waking up early.
Since they were no longer Slads, they could afford to put on any outfit of their choice instead of the uniform, as long as their outfit had their category color and they wore the crest that stated which rank they were in.
"Hey guys!" Suzanne said with a smile, a bit amused as she joined her Squad.
She glanced briefly at Andrew whose head was buried in his laptop, too busy to pay her any attention. Normally he was the one who came to hurry her up because he lived close by but now the whole team was there.
Her eyes roamed around and rested on a certain blue-haired boy who gave her a scowl in place of the winning, sweet smile she beamed at him.
"Hey Ryan!" Suzanne exclaimed joyfully and rushed to his side to welcome him.
"Shut up!" Ryan retorted coldly as he turned away from her.
She stood still in disappointment and sulked.
"Suzanne! Just tell me this! You were planning on showing up late again, weren't you?!" Ethan demanded hotly as he walked into the sitting room from the bathroom.
"We just have 15 minutes to meet up with CIN and Coach," Andrew informed them in a bored tone as he finally closed his laptop and looked around at his Squad members.
Ethan snorted, "Well let's get going already! We'll be late if we don't head out now."
"Like we care what you think," Ryan told Ethan in a frigid tone.
"Look here--!" Ethan started rather annoyed as he turned to face Ryan but was quickly interrupted by Suzanne.
"Quiet, Ethan!" she yelled at him, getting into the defensive mode. She was always defensive when it came to Ryan. Even if he did deserve being attacked.
Ryan scoffed and walked past her, not in the least bit thankful.
"Ryan, wait up...!" Suzanne called sweetly and rushed after him to walk by his side.
Ethan angrily walked after her, still fuming about the whole episode. Andrew raised his bored gaze to the figure that leaned on wall by the stairs.
"Let's go," he said and turned towards the door.
Ashley stood straight and laughed. Suzanne hadn't even noticed her presence. She walked up to Andrew.
"Are they always like that?" she asked, a bit curious.
Andrew merely shrugged as he used his device to lock Suzanne's house up for her.
She had forgotten all about locking the door in her excitement of being with Ryan.
"CIN! CIN!!" Ethan shouted in an excited tone.Aiden faced him. "What?" he asked indifferently."Say, when do we get our first mission?!" Ethan asked with a big grin."That's right!" Suzanne stood up from the desk she sat on. She moved to where Aiden was seated."When's our first mission CIN?!" she asked leaning a bit closer to him.Aiden rolled his eyes."Back away," he told her, frowning slightly.She laughed nervously and stepped back a few paces.Andrew continued using his laptop, unconcerned.Ryan rolled his eyes. "Suzanne, you act like you'll even add any good contribution when we're given a mission. You know you're quite a disturbance," he said.Ashley turned to him and clasped her hands around one of Ryan's.He raised a quizzical eyebrow at her.&nb
"Good morning LIN!" Ashley bowed shortly.Alex patted her head as he walked by. The rest greeted him with less vigour, Andrew way less than the others."I suppose you are Squad 10, aren't you?" he looked at them."Yup! That's us all right!" Ethan affirmed, smiling widely.Alex adjusted his glasses and smiled back at him. He turned to them all. "Okay then. Let's get down to business as I have somewhere else to be."Suzanne moved a little closer to him.Andrew rested his chin on his palm.Alex looked very serious now."Squad 10, you have been assigned a class C-mission file!" He brought forth the file he was holding.Ashleys' eyes glowed with pride. She and Ethan exchanged excited looks."All five members are needed for the total completion of this mission. A report on the mission must be mad
"Here!" Ashley closed her eyes and smiled as she handed over an ice cream cone to Ryan.He looked at the vanilla flavored ice cream she held out for him to collect."What?" he asked in confusion.Ashley was one human being that confused him so much.She opened her eyes and blinked, "It's yours!""Why?" Ryan questioned her, annoyed. They came to the park to solve a case not to bask in the warmth of the sunshine."Cos I got it for you, silly!" She laughed."You wasted your money," he snorted coldly and looked the other way.Ethan folded his pants up to his knees and plunged into the frosty fountain water.He folded up his blue shirt sleeves and crouched to pick the pennies that had been thrown into the water.Andrew was already using a device to track footprints beside the berry
Andrew narrowed his eyes at the woman who sat at the table opposite his.The small café had a tinted glass window which he sat beside. He could watch people come in but they could hardly notice him where he sat even as they came in.The café was a street across Green hill Park.The woman smoothened her straight black skirt and glanced at her wrist watch.Not too long after, a small, bubbly girl putting on all pink and holding a lollipop, raced over to the woman as soon as she sighted her from the entrance of the café.The woman bent and scooped her up in a hug.Then she tickled the girl.The little girl's squeals and laughter rang out around the small and cozy café that smelled of minted syrup.A teenage girl of sixteen years strolled in leaisurely with a fake stroller that obviously held a
"And then we went to the kiddies pool but Sally won't let me take a dip cos I didn't bring my swim suit along but I insisted and she gave in," the small girl narrated in an excited happy tone as her mother's car parked in front of their driveway.Linda laughed at her daughter's enthusiasm."Settle down Betty," she chided as she turned off the engine.Soon enough they made their way inside. Linda unlocked the door while Betty pushed her doll stroller inside the house rather cheerfully."Well, well, well," came a rather cold voice from the middle of the room.A curtain was raised and light flooded into the small apartment.Betty stepped near her mum who clutched her shoulder with a protective hand and she held her phone on the other hand in a tight grasp."Who are you?" Linda asked, a bit tensed.Ryan whirled his chair
Alex smiled."I'm glad you completed your first mission early; it'll be put down as a good record for you guys. I'm guessing you're free for the day. Maybe you should train; your Coach did inform me that you are facing your CIN some weeks away, is it?" Alex said as he brought out a document."Here, sign this, all of you."Suzanne picked up the pen and signed underneath her name, the others did too, one after the other.It was the documentation of their mission file. In it was the evidences gathered on the case and the way it was solved. Also short personal statements of themselves were written down."You're right; we should train." Ryan nodded curtly."Alright, I'll leave you to it. If there's a new mission, I'll let you know." Alex nodded at him and walked out of the empty classroom."Ashley what's your skill?" Ethan asked as he turned to her.
"You work at a dog shelter Ashley?!" Ethan asked with wide eyes.Ashley laughed lightly as she replied him, "It's actually a volunteered act, and I don't get paid. Besides, It's only on weekends.""Cool! Can I volunteer too?" Ethan asked her eagerly."Sure! The more, the merrier!" Ashley nodded as she beamed him a wide smile."Anyway," Andrew said and all their attentions returned to him."That was when Ashley suggested we went to the park to look for clues, I needed to check out some things so I agreed to it. The thing I didn't know was how Sally and Betty took the dog from right under the owner's nose, so I wanted to find out."Suzanne adjusted herself in her seat. "Wait a minute, you mean you knew all this before we headed to the park and you didn't say a word about it?!" she asked Andrew incredulously.Andrew shrugged."It was a hypothesis. I had to be exactly sure and as I was still missing some
"Heh....if it isn't Squad 10," a voice scoffed.They all looked in the direction of the voice.They saw Luke approaching with his Squad mates some distance behind him."Hey Luke!" Suzanne waved gaily at him. He had on a pompous look as he addressed Ryan and ignored Suzanne."Pity you didn't stay long enough in the E-rank exams; you'd have witnessed me being victorious," he smirked, as he eyed them all in derision. His focused attention settled disdainfully on Ryan. "Anyway, it's a good thing you were rushed to the hospital, everyone saw how weak you were. I bet if it was me, I could witstand a bullet or two." Luke bragged as he poured his mouth at Ryan dismissively.Ryan just gave him a cold look, then ignored him."There's Luke, bragging away as usual," Ava snorted as they arrived at the spot where Squad 10 was."How's your arm Ryan?" Snow asked, as she looked at Ryan and smiled briefly at him."It's fine," he re