Chapter Forty-Four - No One Special

Emily was nervous about heading to class the morning after summoning Maple. Mostly because she didn’t know how Miss Headerson would react to a fourth... or technically sixth new student in her class. Fortunately, Maple was quiet as a mouse most of the time, and seemed outright anxious about anything social.

Finally, a sister who was averse to conflict as Emily herself. Maybe Maple would rub off on her other sisters and they’d all calm down a little.

Her classes passed by slowly. She couldn’t help but look over her shoulder the entire time, and when she saw a pair of students a few rows down ignoring the lecture to watch some videos on one of those mask-news sites--videos of her and her sisters fighting with and against heroes just a few days ago--she almost gave in to the urge to run out of the room.

How had no one recognized her? Her costume only masked the upper half of her face. Just narrowing down the population of Eauclaire based on her hair-colour, gender, and profile--too thin girl with no muscle--would be enough to point the finger right at her.

But nothing happened, and it was with a relieved sigh that she left the campus and headed over to pick up her sisters.

She gave profuse thanks to Miss Headerson, who said that her sisters were unusually well-behaved, then after gathering up the gaggle of brats, they headed back home.

“Did you learn a lot today?” she asked.

“Yeah!” Trinity said. “We did numbers again. It was fun. Then we did history, which wasn’t fun, so I didn’t pay any attention to that part.”

Emily shook her head. “You should pay attention to the entire thing, at least if you can. You’ll need some of the things you’ll be learning. What about you, Maple, did you enjoy your first day at school?”

Maple nodded. “It was nice,” she said. “Steffie was scary at first, but she was okay.”

Emily couldn’t imagine Steffie scaring anyone, but then, she was old enough now that she wasn’t afraid of what children thought of her. At least, that’s what she told herself. “Steffie seems like a nice friend to have, so I’m glad you’re all getting along.” Not to mention Steffie was sane, which her sisters could definitely emulate.

From what Emily could tell, Athena was the sister who was doing the best academically. She had a sharp mind on her. Teddy was doing the worst. She wasn’t unintelligent, but she was rather uninterested in anything but history. Trinity was doing worse than Teddy in some subjects, but was much better in others, mostly maths where she excelled even past Athena, and she was a decent artist. Emily would have to see with Maple, but from the first hints she got, Maple was a quick learner, she was just terrible with group work.

They continued to talk about nothing much until they neared the dorms. There they found a familiar face sitting on the ground next to the entrance, looking at her phone. Sam glanced up to them and bounced to her feet. “Heya, Bo-- Emily,” she said.

“Hi,” Emily said. “Is something wrong?”

Sam grinned. “Yes. We can’t go in there. Let’s take a walk?”

Emily weighed the possibility that Sam was lying to her, then dismissed it. Sam had proven trustworthy so far, and Emily had all of her sisters with her. She was about as ready for trouble as she could be, on such short notice. “What’s going on?” Emily asked as she followed along next to Sam.

“You have people loitering around your dorm room,” Sam said.

Emily felt an electric jolt coursing through her. “People?”

“Yeah. A couple of girls, mostly. Our age. They didn’t care to explain why they were around when I asked.”

“Do you think they’re working with the heroes?” Emily asked.

“Maybe, but I don’t know,” Sam said. “Bet they’d ping that something weird was going on if you showed up with the brat brigade here. You could pass as someone other than the Boss, but these six... Emily?”

“Yes?” Emily asked.

Sam kept staring at her sisters. “Did some random kid join your group by accident?”

Emily blinked, then held back a chuckle. “Right, I should introduce you. Maple, come here please.” Emily extended a hand back for Maple to grab. The girl did, but she seemed reluctant to get any closer to Sam. “Maple, this is Sam, she’s...”

Emily tried to think of a way to introduce Sam that wouldn’t scare Maple. Telling the truth--that Sam was an overly confident extrovert that didn’t understand boundaries and who lacked common sense--would just scare Maple more. In the end, she settled on something a little less complicated.

“Sam is my minion.” Maple’s shoulders relaxed. “Sam, this is Maple, my newest little sister.”

“You just pop them out, don’t you,” Sam said. She either ignored or missed the way Emily’s cheeks flushed. “Hi there, Maple, I’m Sam. Pleased to meet you.”

“Hi,” Maple said.

“So, what does Maple do?” Sam asked.

It was an innocent enough question. “We haven’t tested her powers yet,” Emily said. “For that matter, we haven’t tested Menagerie Family yet either. But Maple’s a gadgeteer. She can tinker things up for us, I think.”

“Oh!” Sam said. “Gadgeteers are, like, the ideal force multiplier. Give them enough time and junk and they can become powerhouses too. I bet you’re going to be a great addition to the team, Maple.”

Maple blushed and held onto Emily’s hand even tighter.

“So... where are we headed to?” Emily asked.

“Well, I was thinking, we could draw suspicion away from you by making it obvious that you’re not the Boss,” Sam said.

“But... I am?”

“Well, yes, you are, and if you’re spotted with this bunch, it’ll be obvious that you are. I was thinking more something along the lines of disguising you in a way so that you look less like your heroic self. A reverse costume, I guess. Think of Lark Ent’s glasses in that one comic book.”

Emily considered it for a moment, then nodded. “Fine, I guess that could work. What do we do with my sisters?”

“Barracks? The one that Alea found?” Sam asked. “That's where I’m heading now. I have my makeup kit with me, and a few other essentials.” She patted her purse, which did seem quite full.

“How’re you going to hide the Boss with just makeup?” Teddy asked.

“That’s easy. We’ll break up her figure a bit. I’m thinking a skirt, some lipstick to make her lips look more full, and a few more layers. You’re pretty thin, Emily, which looks great when you’re dressed as the Boss in that suit. We can make you look bigger around the waist no problem. Can’t do much about the hair, but you wear that hat as the Boss anyway.”

“Okay?” Emily said. She was suddenly a lot less certain about things.

“In the meantime...” Sam started. “Did you get into contact with that Handshake guy yet?”

“Oh, not yet,” Emily said. “I wanted to call him yesterday but--” But she had entirely forgotten. “But something came up and I had to put that on the backburner. I’ll call him later, if there’s time.”

“Cool,” Sam said. “I’ve started making a list of all the places we can hit up for protection money. There’s a decent number of them, you know. We’ll have to organise some time to start hitting places up soon. Our little gadget-maker here’s going to need a working budget, right Maple?”

“Um?” Maple asked. She looked up to Sam, then right back down to the ground. “I... I don’t know how much things cost.”

Emily felt a bit bad for the girl. “It’s fine. We’ll figure things out as we go. Sam, maybe you can take... um...”

“I’ll go,” Athena said. “I’m good at reading people. And I need to practice my new skill anyway.”

Emily had almost forgotten that. Athena’s ability to read minds was going to be useful. “That’s a good idea. Maybe you can take Alea Iacta along too?” More adults... or adult-ish people in Alea Iacta’s case, would only help.

They reached the overpass soon enough, and they all filed into the cement bunker hidden behind a wall covered in graffiti. The sisters, once free, immediately started running around with various levels of enthusiasm.

Sam, meanwhile, pulled Emily to the bunker’s bathroom and had the mortified Emily change into something else right there. Emily was most comfortable in her loose jeans, but Sam had her in a knee-length skirt to ‘break up her form’ and then she had Emily put on a loose knit sweater over a blouse. “We should buy one of those wraps actors use to make themselves look bigger,” Sam said.

“I don’t think I need that,” Emily said. The sweater, once stuffed with a few socks underneath, already gave her belly something of a ponch. She was one of those fortunate people who lost weight when stressed or anxious, and since she was always both, she tended to just naturally keep the weight off.

“Alright!” Sam said before giving Emily’s backside an inappropriate smack. “Let’s go see what’s what, and convince the world that you’re no one special, shall we?”

***