Harry Gale didn’t understand cars until recently. Sure, he’s licensed to drive, but that’s for practical reasons. You never know when a runaway bus, construction vehicle, tractor-trailer rig, and so on will go out of control. He’s one of the very few people who could get on board such a vehicle in time, take control, and steer it to safety. He’s even got some training on propeller-driven planes, jet aircraft, and helicopters.
What he hasn’t got experience with is car culture. For example, ever since he got the new car, he’s been stowing stuff in it. He can’t just run back and forth to grab stuff from where he left it. He needs it nearby now, and that’s an adjustment. But he’s seen other people with cars almost live out of them at times. He just never got it. Now he does, because he has to.
Advertising never really got to him either. He could just run past the billboards and jumbotrons at ultra-speed. Every so often he might read one out of curiosity, but he didn’t have to look at it for second after second as this car crawled along the road. Now the signs are in his face. Buy this. Call me. Were you hurt in a supervillain incident? Is your wife unfaithful? Our food is delicious. Rex Tyran. Rex Tyran. Rex Tyran.
He’s been driving all over town, researching the Seven Wonders. The villain team fought the previous generation of heroes, and were captured and put in stasis by AEGIS - they were considered just that dangerous. During the Invisible Invasion from Atlantis, the stasis facility was attacked, and the villains were let loose in the chaos. Now they’re moving forward with some kind of plan. They raided an aerospace research corporation and stole tech. They attacked the remaining HHL members too, but it feels more like they’ve been toying with them than anything else.
Dr. Wissen’s books are part of the stuff Harry keeps in the car. Every so often, when he has time, he’ll just sit in the car and read through them.
Jason Quill has been funding an ongoing conference of nanotech professionals, to help with whatever nano-virus Harry’s been infected with, the thing that may hurt or kill him if he uses his super-speed too much. He takes the opportunity to ask some of the experts about D-SOL-8, one of the Seven Wonders’ members, who Dr. Wissen’s book says uses nanotechnology. They have some interesting things to say - but Dr. Wissen has already covered this territory, and their conclusions are in his books.
The usual suspects - HHL staff, historians, and so on - have also been interviewed by Dr. Wissen, and Harry learns nothing substantially different from what he reads.
Yet the old generation was able to capture the Seven Wonders. The people who have the answers Harry wants, who won’t talk to Harry about it, are the ones who actually did it. The HHL, including his father and mother.
Why?
In addition to the weekly meetings he’s in with the HHL, the Chosen (the former JHHL), the Irregulators, and other teams operating in the city, Harry has a daily sync-up with Stingray, A10, Ninjess, and Mirage. Nothing that is discussed with his “anti-Seven Wonders task force” is for anyone outside the team.
The HHL member Vigil asks permission to join Harry’s meeting. Since Harry doesn’t know how Vigil learned about it to begin with, he’s curious about that. But he’s also curious what the veteran hero can tell the team about the villainous subjects of the meeting. For these reasons, and with the blessing of the others, VIgil’s request is accepted.
The two strategists of the team, Mirage and Ninjess, have begun building an experimental toolset for dealing with the six known Seven Wonders. Stingray, the technologist, is in charge of building any necessary equipment for it, with Mirage shadowing his work. Harry is feeding them data from Dr. Wissen’s books. A10 asks questions, pokes holes in bad ideas, and brings tacos.
As the team brainstorms, Harry takes the opportunity to talk to Vigil.
“Why isn’t anyone in the HHL talking about the Seven Wonders with me? I’m starting to feel like a kid again. Do they have a plan that they aren’t sharing, or what?”
Vigil, as always, is coming through a screen or display of some kind. “It’s not like that, Mr. Gale. Rather, I feel that there is indecision about how to proceed, based on the circumstances of the Seven Wonders’ capture.”
“Do you wanna tell me about that?” Harry asks.
“I suspect your uncle Chase is the proper person to do so. Out of respect to him, I cannot explain why.”
Finally, some kind of progress, Harry thinks in annoyance. Only it sends me back to the family that isn’t talking.
“Fine. What can you tell me about Dr. Ken Wissen?”
Vigil thinks. “Not somebody I had thought of in a long time. I am familiar with his work, of course. The foremost researcher on the Seven Wonders.”
“But his books don’t say how they were beaten.”
Vigil says nothing.
“Why would that be?” Harry asks. “Wouldn’t they tell him? If he was so useful to tracking down the Seven Wonders, if he was the foremost expert on them, why didn’t the HHL tell him how they did it?”
Again, the older hero stays silent.
Harry throws his hands up in frustration. “I do not get this silence! Does nobody trust us, just because we’re younger than them?”
“Mr. Gale… we should focus on your preparations,” Vigil says quietly.
The team has provisional tools and techniques to possibly deal with Glom, Motormouth, and Veneer. The Hand and D-SOL-8 are a mystery, Khyrrsz is literally a god, and while A10 thinks she might be able to deal with one of them, they always work in pairs or threes.
Most of the tactics they were developing assumed Harry would have his speed. Harry notes with pride that the team is still developing those.
They think I’m gonna get better. I hope so.
A day later, Vigil contacts Harry. It happens while Harry’s driving, and he glimpses Vigil’s presence in his rear-view mirror.
Almost casually, the reflection relays the following message. “A slender thread of credibility informs the rumor that an assassin has been contracted to kill your family, including yourself.”
Harry blinks. “Uh. Please tell me you got more than that.”
“The attack will be mystical in nature.”
“Is it always like this, when you’re an adult hero?” Harry asks in a grim tone.
“Sometimes,” Vigil admits. “The life of a superhero demands constant vigilance. Human beings are naturally unsuited to being in a perpetual state of tension. Failures are emotionally costly. Burnout is a distinct possibility.”
“I assume you’ve told the rest of my family already?”
“I have done so.”
Nice to know there are some things you’ll tell me, Harry thinks, but does not say aloud.
Instead: “Alright. Thanks. I’ll ask around.”
Once Vigil has departed his rear-view mirror, Harry indulges in another new experience - car radio presets, tuning in radio stations. What the hell is this? You don’t just open Spotify and pick what to listen to? Someone else is DJing for you? It’s like a 24-hour livestream. At least he gets to pick a station. He could pair it with his phone, but this is a fun thing in its way. It’s got ads on it too, but everything has ads these days.
He pulls up at home - just another stop on his round of errands - and leaves the car in the driveway. Sure, he could pull it into the carriage house. Leo hasn’t been there in years, and it’s never been cleaner since his dad had to grow out of the habit of dumping stuff in there. But he’s got other things to do. It’ll be fine here.
He jaunts to the mailbox, opens it with a practiced motion, and pulls out the thick wad of mail the family always gets. He walks to the door, rifling through it. Bills - bills - bills - invitations to yet another gala event, promotion, or opening - IRA and 401(k) and other stuff Harry lumps under “retirement” and therefore “irrelevant to me” - and yet more bills. Offers for house care, lawn care. Some letters from Harry’s own charity, Chip In, which he always likes reading himself.
Harry gets inside, wipes his feet, and shouts his hellos to anyone home. He tosses item after item from the mailbox through the expensive beige dingus that scans for anthrax, nanotech, bombs, and related hazards. Everything comes out clean on the other side, and Harry sorts the mail into the hanging baskets attached to the shelf adjacent to the door.
Apple juice, a protein bar, and an anti-inflammatory prescription are part of Harry’s new regime, as he lives with the nano-virus. His schedule is free for a bit. He watches some YouTube, lays down, and stares at the ceiling to think.
Harry and A10 have silently agreed to do something new. Previously, they’d run and fly somewhere, see the sights, that sort of thing. But they don’t seem to want to talk about Harry’s current condition.
Just like people won’t talk about the Seven Wonders, Harry thinks to himself. But now it’s him staying closed-mouth.
Instead, Andi is trying her hand at cooking, and she wants Harry’s help with ingredients and prep. They go shopping together at local farmer’s markets. They taste-test the ingredients. They build a wood-fired grill, the lowest of low-tech cooking tools. They cook. They eat. And they talk.
Cooking is something that by its nature can’t be hurried, no matter what your powers are. It’s a choice by both of them to eschew speed. And it’s tough, because they’re also not supposed to talk about “work” during these times, but work is so pressing on both of them.
Finally, it seems to Harry that Andi can’t handle it. “Listen, about the Seven–”
“Go ahead,” Harry says with a quiet smile. “But this is supposed to be us time, right?”
The girl hangs her head. “I know. Listen. The pulled pork nachos were fucking amazing. You were right about the cheese, okay, go ahead and be smug. We did good. But it feels like we’re fucking around. The Seven Wonders are out there doing who knows what, and they aren’t respecting us.”
“They” means the HHL, and Harry knows it.
He doesn’t want to tell her about the threat of attack that Vigil mentioned, not right now.
Fuck it, I know why people sometimes keep secrets, he realizes. But it’s so frustrating to have it done. There’s no good answer here, is there.
Andi has more to say, and Harry listens.
“You are the only guy I respect, that I like, you know, and like like, and… well, it’s because you are the only guy that can calm me down without talking down to me. You help me stay who I wanna be. You listen, and you talk, but you don’t talk over me.”
She shovels more nachos into her mouth, and munches thoughtfully before going on. “But sometimes, I think you aren’t talking enough. Come on, man. It’s okay to be angry about this.”
Harry sighs. “I am angry. No, I promise. But it’s like, uh, it’s like a slow-cooker of anger. The anger crock-pot. 8 hours of simmering. That’s a weird analogy. But I promise I feel it. If I’m not talking more, I’m just not sure what to talk about. I can’t just bully the HHL into doing what I want.”
Andi lets out a longer, stronger sigh. “See, this is why I talk with my fists. I hate it that I can’t just tell someone, ‘do the right thing’ and they’ll do it. I hate that I have to summon up the right words to persuade someone to, you know, help save lives. Because I am so bad at that.”
“You’re good at more things than you think,” Harry says, in what he hopes is a reassuring tone.
“I’m not helping you all with your toolkit prep,” Andi says, sounding miserable.
Harry shakes his head. “You are probably the only person who will be able to carry out half of it. You’re so important to this. Your part just hasn’t started yet. It will soon, because you’ll need to practice. Let this cook, okay?”
This seems to be the magic word choice that gets Andi’s attention, and she acknowledges it with a smile.
The nachos, and the rest of the night, turn out perfectly.
Harry walks in the door late. He finds his parents looking at a letter.
“Sorry, I didn’t check the time–” he starts, automatically.
His dad holds the letter out for inspection.
There’s a date on it, a week from now.
There’s a message. “The Gales are cordially invited to an exclusive event. The Sentence is Death.”
Harry looks up. “Vigil told me,” he says - the first thing he thinks they’ll want to know.
Dad nods. “Good. Then you need to prepare yourself. This is the big leagues, k–”
He stops himself from saying “kiddo”, and tries again. “Harry. I want you to go learn as much as you can about this in the next three days. Come back to us with what you’ve learned. We’ll fill in what we know. Think of this as training. We’ll see if your networking is up to par.”
Harry nods in understanding. “You got it.”
If I can prove I can handle this, maybe they’ll finally tell me about the Seven Wonders.
