Free SuperZero by Jane De Suza Page B

news that someone is planning an attack on our city. I wonder just what it would take to stop them now?’
    I shrank into my pink-striped hospital pyjamas andsaid miserably, ‘Tell them I’ve gone away, and am never coming back. Tell them that there is no one now to ruin things at the Superhero School, and all the superkids are going to be back to their strongest and best—and to look out! Tell them—tell them I’ve gone.’
    Masterror straightened up and smiled. ‘I knew you would do the right thing, boy. I always had faith in you.’
    ‘But where will I go?’ I asked, feeling really sorry for myself. ‘I can’t go home—I’ve let them down so badly.’
    ‘You should never give up on your dream, boy.’ Masterror actually put his arm around my shoulders. Was he actually getting to like me—just a little bit? He smiled. ‘You wanted to be a superhero like Spiderman, right? You were searching for something powerful enough to bite you, right? I happen to know just where a certain mutant species is right now that may be just the thing.’
    ‘Where?’
    ‘The zoo,’ Masterror whispered. ‘The city zoo has a new Lanther. It’s a mutant, a cross between a lion and a black panther. I hear it’s brilliantly black with a big golden mane.’
    Ulp! ‘It sounds scary. Are you sure it will work? Won’t it just eat me up?’
    ‘Only one way to find out, boy. What if it works? What if you become Lanther Boy? What’s a spider in front of a black-panther-lion?’
    I began to shiver a bit, because I realized there was no other way out. I swung my feet on to the floor andwas about to pull off my hospital pjs, when a shrill shriek cut through the air. ‘Poppypooh! Where’s my brave, wounded soldier?’ I could hear Mom’s high heels tapping across the gleaming corridor outside. I heard a nurse say, ‘Please don’t shout. This is a silent zone. Who is Poppypooh?’
    I cringed even more. Just when I thought things couldn’t get worse.
    ‘Here,’ said Masterror, ‘jump out of the window. Get out before your family gets here, or you’ll never get away.’
    ‘But this is the fourth floor,’ I cried, ‘I’ll fall and smash my head on the concrete below.’
    ‘Perhaps you’ll finally learn to fly? Sometimes superpowers come out in times of distress. Look at the Wolverine . . . Or you could always try climbing down the wall.’
    ‘Powder puff!’ I heard Mom shout outside, ‘Is that you in there?’
    I heard a door open and then suddenly a man’s scream.
    ‘Oops,’ I heard Mom say, ‘I’m so sorry. It must hurt to get an injection down there.’
    That did it! Masterror raised his eyebrow at me, and I leapt over to the windowsill. The drop down was scary. Four floors!
    ‘Be brave, SuperZero, do it for your school!’ said Masterror. (The cheat! He was just stealing lines from Gra’s TV movie too).
    ‘Are you here, Pippop?’ Mom was twisting my room’s door knob now. I threw myself out of the window.
    I heard Masterror’s steely voice then telling my mother, ‘I’m afraid you’re too late.’
    Mom shrieked, ‘Late? For what? Where is he?’
    Masterror’s voice once more: ‘I have no idea whether he is in the land of the living or the dead. But we’ll know in a minute.’
    Then I heard a voice that brought tears to my eyes. ‘If I find out that you had anything to do with my son’s disappearance, I’m coming back for you, Masterror.’ My dad. My hero.
    Gra joined in, complaining loudly, ‘Why is everyone crying? Are there onions around?’
    There was silence. I guess Mom had just fainted. That was perfect. Now she would be put in pink-striped hospital pyjamas on the bed near Vamp Iyer. I was sending people to hospital at lightning speed.
    Gra continued to grumble, ‘I thought we were coming to the hospital for my bunions. Look at those painful bunions on my toes! No one said anything about onions. Is everyone deaf here?’
    And then I wondered, like you’re probably wondering, why I could