Free Sensation: A Superhero Novel by Kevin Hardman

air.  “Or, if you’re some kind of fakir, it might even be simple levitation.  Flight, on the other hand, implies speed and direction.” With that, the pen suddenly began circling around him at a dizzying velocity.
                For a second there, I thought he’d said “faker,” as if I were a fraud.  Even after I realized that he’d said fakir , the anger continued building in me.  Still airborne, I dashed forward and snatched the circling pen, then flew back to my original position.  I held out the pen and then let it drop.  I flew to the back of the room and then zoomed back, catching the pen before it touched the floor.
                Mouse looked at me stonefaced, while Esper raised an eyebrow in appreciation.  Rune clapped his hands and threw his head back in laughter.  “I like this kid!” he exclaimed.
                I turned and left the room.  I didn’t really know where I was headed - back to the waiting room, I supposed. 
                “Hey!” a voice shouted in my direction.
                I turned to look and saw the assistant who had shown me into the room.  She touched a hand to the side of her head and cocked her head slightly while walking towards me, obviously listening to an earpiece.
                “You’re in,” she said when she got close.  “Follow me.”
                She led me back down the hallway and through another two corridors before stopping at a nondescript door. She took a magnetic key card out of her pocket and slid it through a card reader set in the wall.  The door audibly unlocked.  I waited, looking at her.
    “Go in,” she said, raising her hands palm up in exasperated fashion.  I opened the door and stepped inside as she walked away, shaking her head and muttering.  
    I was in another holding area.  However, there were decidedly fewer people in here than the previous waiting room.  This was the short list, teens with powers or abilities worth looking into a little more.  There were chairs arranged in two sections, with an aisle down the middle of them.  I took the first seat I came to and sat quietly.
    Paramount, of course, was there, the center of attention as usual.  I was one of the few who wasn’t hanging on his every word.  Another was a girl who sat across the aisle from me.  She had straight black hair, a smooth complexion, and a simple appearance unadorned by makeup or jewelry.  It took me a second, but I quickly recognized her as Electra.
    Electra had an unusual backstory. She was allegedly an orphan who the League had found as a baby.  Because she exhibited super powers even as an infant, the entire Alpha League had gotten itself appointed as her guardians.  She actually lived here at League HQ on one of the residential floors of the building.  The only other person who had lived their entire life at League HQ was Paramount, and - like him - she was also expected to be a sure thing as far as being selected by a superhero team.
      Over the next thirty minutes a few more people trickled in.  Following that, no one came in for the next hour.  During all this time, Paramount talked incessantly and inanely about anything that came to mind.  Finally though, even he seemed to run out of mindless chatter and sighed grumpily.
    “When are we going to get this show on the road?” he asked. 
    Of course it was a rhetorical question, so we were all shocked when a voice answered.
    “Oh, I was just waiting on you to finish.  I didn’t want to disturb you in the middle of one of your anecdotes.”
    We all looked to where the voice had come from.  In a chair a few rows in front of Electra sat Rune.  I didn’t recall him being there before, and no one had come into the room.  Had he been there the entire time?  Briefly I wondered if he were a teleporter, but quickly decided it didn’t matter.
    “If you’re done, then,” he stated, pointedly