Shortcuts

A paranormal superhero story with a supernatural twist

The least of all evils

Comments have been blocked for this story but kudos and private messages are always welcome. Even highly critical private messages are welcome. I don't mind criticism when it's private.

Shortcuts
by Terry Volkirch

Chapter 23

Later that same Saturday, Golden Girl floated about a thousand feet above Springfield, Illinois. She'd just visited Vanessa and was using a throwaway phone that she picked up in the city below. Actually, a young man with red hair and a face full of freckles had let her borrow one from the store where he worked and she eagerly accepted, saying that she'd bring it back very soon. She entered a local, seven digit phone number and the call connected after only one ring.

"Who is this?!" the man on the phone bellowed.

Crystal had to suppress a giggle. "It's me, fearless leader. Golden Girl. I have a proposition for you."

"How did you get this number?! Who gave it to you?!"

"I have my sources. Didn't Ace, I mean agent Derek Johnson tell you? Yes, I know all of your names, Mister Wells. But don't get your undies in a twist over it. I keep telling you that I'm one of the good guys."

"Impossible! No one can hack our network! This is impossible! Someone told you!"

"Will you please stop yelling? You're going to have a stroke or something. No one told me. I promise."

"Wait," he said. "You promise?" He remembered how honest the girl had proven to be. In spite of being a possible threat to national security, she was honest if nothing else, and her promises were better than ironclad agreements.

"I promise. And you should know my promises are gold. I've read your files on me. I must say, I don't much like being referred to as subject Goldbrick. Yuck."

The man growled but at least he respected her honesty. "Okay then. What do you want? You mentioned a proposition."

"Yes, well, you should know that I don't make threats. I'm not going to blackmail you with my information about your agency. And goodness knows I don't want to interfere with your ability to protect the nation. I'm not going to out you and your agency."

"Just tell me your… hang on. Where are you?!"

"You traced me that quickly? I'm impressed. If you tracked me to about a thousand feet above Springfield then give yourself a gold star." She giggled. "I really am there. Oh. Please don't invade the store where I got this phone. I'm just borrowing it from a very nice employee."

"Okay. I'll be serious. You're in a lot of trouble, young lady. Turn yourself in now and…."

"And what?!" she interrupted. "You want to capture or kill me! Forget that. I am not expendable, I'm not stupid, and I'm not going." She giggled at her sci-fi reference. She couldn't help herself, but it didn't help her cause.

"I'm telling you to turn yourself in!"

"And I'm telling you that I'm not a test subject for your lab, Mister Wells. But if you want agents with my abilities, why not just use me? I'll gladly cooperate if it'll get you off my back. I'd really like to stop Operation Gold Fever before someone gets killed."

The man sighed. "How do I know you'll cooperate?"

"Because I'll promise if you will. And I can hold you to your promise so I'm not worried about that."

"What do you mean?" he blustered.

"I mean, I can tell exactly what all of you are up to any time of day. You fart and I'll know it. And don't think I don't know all about your intense dislike of women. I don't much care for you, but I'll work for your agency if it'll both do some good for the country and stop you from using me as a lab rat or killing me."

"How could you possibly know that about me?! Do you read minds now?!" he said, sounding a little nervous.

"No, I don't read minds. That would be unethical. I can track you another way, and since this concerns me, I think I'm justified in seeing everything about you and your agency that can help me defend myself. I've seen your profile, Mister Wells, and I can tell you that your boss knows all about your personality quirks."

"I don't have a boss! I'm my own boss!"

"You answer to highly placed government officials who shall remain nameless. It's no secret to me. Was it a secret to you?"

The man sputtered on the phone and Crystal worried that he might actually be having a stroke. But he soon regained his composure. "Okay. Fine. You've got me. We'll cut a deal. Just come into the office and…."

"Forget that. It's not that I don't trust you, but I don't trust you. Give me a public place to work from and supply me with a smart phone and maybe some spy gadgets. We'll leave the phone in a protected but public place like a storage locker or something. It'll be like my office or something. I'll help you but I'm not giving up my secret identity and I'm not working directly from your office. I also won't accept any payment. I'm volunteering for the good of the country. Deal?"

The man went silent for nearly thirty seconds before he finally responded. "What about other agents? Will you work with other agents?"

"Sure."

"Okay. That might work. Just a minute. Let me think about it."

She sighed. "I'll give you a day. In the meantime, here's some incentive for you. Agent Johnson and I have exchanged intel for our mutual benefit. He's a bit crude but he's still a good agent and deserves a raise. Agent Birdwell? Not so much. That man has been skimming money from your transportation funds. He needs to be stopped and prosecuted."

"What?!"

"Who watches the watchers?" she asked, then hung up on him. She took the phone back to the red-haired young man at the phone store, thanked him and took off for home. She only hoped senior agent Wells would accept her proposal because she didn't like the alternatives.

'You've always got choices,' she mentally quoted Brian. 'It's just that most of them are bad.'

* * *

That same night at work, Sarah didn't do so well. Too many things competed for her attention. Besides, no one was taking the sales crown from Ms. Cranston in the shoe department. The woman was a shoe selling machine, and shoes were so easy to sell anyway. There were better goals to aspire to than becoming sales queen at work.

Sarah took Erin home with her after work and changed into Golden Girl. They briefly split up while Crystal turned invisible, met up at the park and launched into the night sky. Both girls needed a nice, relaxing flight together over the city. It was something they started doing fairly regularly to unwind and bond. They liked to keep close together and occasionally stare into each other's eyes for what they called a soul cuddle.

On the way back to the park, Golden Girl updated her friend about the shadow agency and Erin wished her good luck with them. There was nothing else to do on that front except wait and hope. Luckily, Sarah didn't have long to wait.

After seeing Erin off and finally getting to bed, she did finally learn from the Akashic records that the kill order was canceled and Operation Golden Fleece had begun. It should've been a time to celebrate but she felt numb. It shouldn't be so difficult to be on the side of good. She shouldn't have the so-called good guys after her when she was good herself.

She woke up Sunday morning and told her mother the good news. Her mother cheered enough for both of them. Her father was off at the shooting range as usual, taking his frustrations out by killing as many target sheets as he could. The poor man had never been more stressed but at least he'd get a little relief when he finally got home and learned the news. Golden Girl was safe - from the government at least - and the whole world would breathe a sigh of relief.

The only problem was that she now had two jobs, one of which she wasn't getting paid for. She hoped her super secret job didn't require too much time. That could wait for the moment though. Mister Wells could wait. She had her priorities.

Sarah texted Brian as soon as possible. "meet me in park in ten? got good news! SARAH!"

He texted back almost immediately. "k," followed by a smiley face emoticon.

She imagined the smiley face having Brian's black hair and piercing blue eyes. She had it bad. 'I'm chasing Brian, he's chasing Golden Girl and Golden Girl is me. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.'

She applied a little daytime makeup, dressed for the cold weather, grabbed her favorite long black coat and headed out to the park. The short, brisk walk and cold air livened her up enough that she thought she could handle the oblivious boy. She hadn't given up on him.

When she arrived in the playground area of the park, Brian surprised her by already sitting on his usual swing, waiting for her.

"Hey. Been exercising," was all he said.

"Hey," she said back as she walked to the swings across the frozen sawdust crunching underfoot. She sat on her usual swing next to him and made a decision at that moment. She felt her luck turning. The time seemed right and she decided to go for it. "I think I love you," she said, looking sideways at him, not quite daring to face him.

"What?! Where the hell did that come from?!"

He turned to face her and she saw a look of shock on his face that disappointed her, but she wasn't ready to give up, not by a long shot. "Language!" she shouted, then giggled. "Okay. Let me spell it out for you. You're infatuated with you-know-who. Right?"

He nodded, though he still looked confused.

His reaction was so cute that it was all she could do not to rough up his hair and kiss him silly. Somehow she focused back on her original train of thought. "Well, I'm you-know-who. We're the same person. And boy or girl, you and I have been good friends since like forever. We know each other very well. We get along great and we owe it to each other to explore the possibility of a relationship. It really is that easy."

"What are you talking about?"

"Are you ready for the next level, Brian?"

"No! I mean, no, I'm not sure I'm interested. Call me shallow but…."

"Shallow," she interrupted, not liking where the conversation was headed.

"Right. You're right. You're the same person, and maybe I'm a little too fixated on looks, but it's more than that. She's a super hero and I strongly associate her appearance with her super hero abilities. You? You're just a friend. In fact, right now, you still look too much like Lester."

A tear ran down her cheek as she stared back at him.

He noticed. "I'm sorry. I guess I still have a problem with who you used to be. It wasn't that long ago! I miss him. You. Whatever! I see you on the bus in the morning. I see you at lunch. You look like Lester, but you're not, and you're slowly changing. It won't be long before you look more like a girl than Lester at school." He paused to sigh. "This is all so confusing."

"So you're putting me in the friend zone. I can't believe you're putting me in the friend zone."

"Yeah."

"Well, I was going to ask if you wanted to try a movie. Hang out at the mall. Something."

"You know what?" he said, raising his voice. "I would've said yes before you went and used the 'L' word on me."

"Silly me," she said quietly, with little emotion. Her luck abandoned her and she felt worse than numb. She felt empty. No boyfriend. No love, not the kind she craved anyway. Just work and an otherworldly spiritual soul mate who could never satisfy her physical needs. She needed a strong shoulder to cry on, lips to kiss, a warm body to embrace. She needed more than soul cuddles.

Brian slowly got up off the swing and started to walk away but she stopped him.

"I haven't given you the good news yet."

"What? I thought your declaration of love was the good news."

"No. That was just bad timing."

"Give up, Sarah."

"Never."

Brian sighed. "What's the good news?"

She stood up and told him all about how she dealt with the shadow agency and now worked for them. It was more of an uneasy truce but she'd take that over a kill order any day.

Brian agreed, and he even got a little worked up and forgot himself. He hugged her, lifting her up off the ground and spinning in a little half circle before he caught himself and slowly set her back down.

She gave him a coy smile and kept her thoughts to herself, at least for the time being. Her mother would've told her she was moving too fast but she was just being herself, moving at her own pace. She watched him as he finally turned and walked away after an awkward moment of staring at each other. 'I'll never give up on you.'

* * *

Sarah came home to find her father, sitting on the couch, staring at the blank television screen. He held the remote in his hand but hadn't bothered to use it. That was a bad sign.

She plopped down next to him. "Hi Dad."

"Hi... Sarah."

The pause hurt. A little. But it was understandable. He still missed having a son. "How'd the shooting go?" she asked him.

"Fine. Shot the center out of seventeen targets before someone suggested I stop."

"Oh. So? Wanna talk? I've got good news. The shadow agency shouldn't be a problem any more."

"Oh?"

"Yeah." She'd already told him about digging up information about the agency, including some things that weren't exactly legal. She could've stopped them cold, except they also did some good. They started with good intentions and she wanted to hold them to it. She only had one thing to tell him that he hadn't heard yet. "I guess I'll sort of be working with them now."

"What?!"

"Don't worry! I'll be careful. I'm not even going into their building. I'll be working with an agent outside, in a public place."

"I don't know, Sarah. I'm not sure I like it."

"If it keeps them from trying to kill me, isn't it worth it?"

"I don't want them corrupting you."

"More like I'm keeping them honest. I already pointed out an agent who's been stealing from them."

Matthew sighed. "I still don't like it."

"I'm sorry, Dad. But I don't have a lot of choices here."

He buried his face in his hands and Sarah got up, telling him one last thing. "I'm leaving soon to accept their offer. I won't accept any money from them and they're not getting my secret identity. They'll have nothing to hold over me."

Her father didn't say anything. He didn't move.

"It's the right thing to do," she said.

She left him on the couch to think things out, hoping he'd eventually find a way to handle it, and went to find her mother, sitting at the dining room table, sipping coffee.

"Mom?"

"Yes, dear?"

"I'm going to Chicago now to accept their offer."

"Have you finished your homework?"

She rolled her eyes a little. "Yes, Mom. Oh, and I told Dad."

Susan frowned.

"Yeah. He's not taking it well. Talk to him?"

Her mother nodded and the girl hurried to her room to change. In spite of the cold, she decided to wear her black leather jacket outfit. It seemed more appropriate for spy work. She did make sure to wear thermal underwear underneath though. No use freezing her cute little derrière.

She finished dressing, turned invisible and quietly left out the sliding glass door. All was eerily quiet until her sonic boom rattled the sliding glass door of the house.

* * *

Golden Girl once again floated high over Springfield, Illinois. She held the same phone that she got from the same red-haired boy for her previous call to the shadow agency, only this time she paid for the use of the phone. She didn't want to take advantage of the nice boy.

Mister Wells picked up after two rings. "Hello Golden Girl."

"Hello Mister Wells. I accept."

"What?"

"I accept your offer to work with you. You know. Operation…."

"Okay! Stop. Don't mention the name. Not on this unsecured line."

"Right. I guess I have a little learning to do about security."

The man sighed. "How did you find out so quickly?"

"About the offer? I told you. I have sources. They're very good sources."

"Yes, I'm sure. Can you meet with an agent today? We'd like to get started as soon as possible. We have an ongoing crisis that could use your talents."

Crystal agreed, returned the phone to the store and flew to the appointed rendezvous in Chicago, a public self-storage company. It was public enough for her and offered enough privacy for the agency. It was a good choice.

The superheroine touched down out front of the building when she saw a familiar face. "Hello Ace. Or can I call you agent Johnson?"

"What? Oh. Right. I've been briefed on your latest status. So you know all of our names?"

"Yep."

"And more?"

"Yep."

The man sighed. "Should I ask exactly what you know?"

"Nope. I don't think I should tell you anyway. Your bosses might get upset."

"Right. Strictly need to know."

She nodded. "Shall we go inside and begin Operation Golden Fleece then?"

"You…. Right. Of course you know the name of the operation."

At agent Johnson's request, Golden Girl turned invisible and they entered the facility, with the agent leading the way to a small storage unit around a corner at the end of a long hall. He left the door open and went inside, where the superheroine turned visible again.

They spent nearly an hour talking in the storage unit, where they discussed her availability and protocols for contacting her. She knew better than to accept anything to take home with her. It would be too easy to slip in something that could track her location. Only one way communication would be acceptable, and the best way to achieve that would be for her to use her clairvoyance. The agency could set up a white board just for her and leave her messages on it. They wouldn't have to worry about encoding the message or encryption or anything. It wouldn't be connected to the Internet or any computer network so it'd be impossible to hack. She'd periodically check the white board for messages and respond by changing into Golden Girl and hitting mach speed as soon as possible. The agency would listen for the telltale sonic boom to know when to expect her.

Confident that she had all the contact details worked out, Crystal asked about her first mission. "Mister Wells said something about a crisis. Shall we get started?"

Agent Johnson shook his head. "You're so eager. That's nice to see."

"Well, I am new at this, and I'm kind of excited to be helping out."

"As long as you don't duct tape me ever again," he said, chuckling.

She took out her roll of duct tape and shook it at him with a stern look at her face before breaking down and having a few giggles. Then they got to work.

Agent Johnson had a quick question for her first though. "Do you know any foreign languages?"

She shook her head. "But I can see about learning some. It probably wouldn't take long. Which ones would you like me to know?"

He shook his head in disbelief. "Arabic, Korean and Russian would be a nice start," he suggested. "Maybe Mandarin and Cantonese as well. I'll check."

"Okay. I'll start with them. Now let's do this."

The mission consisted solely of some reconnaissance in northern England, where a small terrorist cell was dangerously close to obtaining a working tactical nuclear weapon. She used her clairvoyance and clairaudience, dictating what she heard to agent Johnson, who took notes. When they'd learned enough, Golden Girl thanked agent Johnson for the opportunity, turned invisible and left to go to her next destination. She wasn't ready to go home yet.

The mission seemed a little dull - very important though still dull - but it was a lot better than having a kill order hanging over her head. Her next mission would be much more satisfying at least. Last night in the Akashic records, she'd looked for and found the private hospital that was used by the agency. She wanted to heal the men whose hands she twisted and broke, and since the hospital was nearby, she dropped in, turning visible and startling a nurse, a tall, slender young man with large brown eyes that brimmed with compassion.

"Hello, I'm here to heal some hands that I broke. Please take me to all the men with broken hands."

The nurse smiled. "Sure. Right this way, Golden Girl." He led the girl through a maze of corridors and up three floors to a large ward with a long row of beds. As agent Johnson had said, the men were still fast asleep from being gassed.

Golden Girl went from one bed to the next, carefully removing their casts and holding each man's hand, healing it within a matter of a few minutes.

The nurse watched, amazed at not only her ability but the speed at which she worked. "I wish I could to that," he said, more to himself than her.

"I wish everyone could," she said.

When she finished, she said goodbye to the nurse, turned invisible and found the nearest exit. She didn't have to heal the men but she felt it was the right thing to do. It also might be considered an act of goodwill. She hoped that the agency and the men whose hands she healed appreciated it. Golden Girl would always try to be a force for good. Always.

* * *

Sunday night in the Akashic records had Sarah learning several foreign languages, starting with Korean, Arabic and Russian as requested. She found and added Hindi as well before she woke up Monday morning.

Getting out of bed proved a little difficult that morning. Learning the languages took a lot of mental energy, which seemed backward to her. Paranormal abilities seemed like they should be more difficult to learn, but somehow, they weren't. Gaining an ability was more about adding and rewiring mental pathways. It involved using parts of the brain that normally weren't used, and gaining an ability as quickly as she did was only possible because of her first unusual ability of hyper learning from the Akashic records. It was Mister Guile's gift, a gift that was intended more for gaining paranormal abilities, since that's all he was interested in. Learning other things was just an added bonus. Normal skills and knowledge were more just facts to memorize, with language fluency taking more time and brain power to learn than most of her other skills. Learning four languages in a night seemed impossible. It was like she'd gone through years of schooling in one night and it nearly exhausted her brain.

She dragged herself through her morning routine and forced herself to shapeshift into her mostly boy self. She looked at herself in the mirror before getting dressed and nodded with approval. Her face looked softer and rounder, her hair was much longer, and she already got rid of all of her facial hair. That was a bit of a cheat but there was no way she'd suffer through electrolysis if she didn't have to. She'd have to be a masochist to do that.

When Brian showed up on her school bus, so many things went through her mind. At first, the idea of giving him the silent treatment popped into her head. She shook that one off though. Then her intuition kicked in and she smiled. She spoke to him, greeting him in Russian along with an authentic accent, and she kept speaking to him in Russian the whole way to school. Accents often seemed to attract attention from the opposite sex so she thought she'd see how Brian reacted.

The boy laughed at first, followed by him shaking his head. But she noticed that he kept his eyes on her for most of the trip to school.

'Operation Boyfriend has begun,' she thought with a coy smile.

As soon as they left the bus, Brian tried to tickle her into speaking English and she ran to try to escape. But she didn't try very hard. She wanted him to tickle her, wanted him to touch her wherever he wanted. In their fun, they lost track of time and were almost late for class. They hit their lockers and flew to their first classes with only seconds to spare.

The girl flopped down at her desk in Government class and looked up to see Mister Guile shaking his head before launching into a normal lecture. She didn't remember any of it, not with her brain still tired. She could handle the physical activity with Brian but the words of the lecture were just white noise, and the bell to signify the end of class surprised her, adding just enough volume and higher pitches to mentally wake her up.

She waited for everyone to leave ahead of her. Running with the herd didn't appeal to her. But when she finally stood up, she watched as the door swung shut and sealed her inside with Erin and Mister Guile. Time for another private conference.

She sighed and sat back down, not expecting to be part of the conversation.

"What the hell is she thinking?!" the teacher stood much closer to Erin, shouting down at the redhead in her desk seat. "Does she think she can turn the whole world into a bunch of goody-goodies? Because it ain't gonna happen!"

Sarah cocked her head, not quite understanding what he meant. Erin knew though.

"She's special. I keep trying to tell you that."

"Ah, yes. The wager."

Erin tried to shush him.

"Don't worry. I'm not going to give the game away." He looked over at Sarah and smirked. "She's not really able to understand much at the moment anyway."

"What do you mean?"

"She kept quite busy learning four languages last night. A little greedy in my opinion."

"Four languages?!"

Sarah snorted. "I'm right here you know. And I'm following most of your conversation. But by all means, say whatever you want."

Mister Guile moved over to Sarah and stared down at her. "I was so close. You should've learned telepathy."

The mentally tired girl gave him a grim look, moving her eyes up without tipping her head back. It should've been a warning to the man but he kept after her.

"I'll give you one more chance to explain yourself, Miss McHenry. But if you can't, I'm going to step up my game."

"Mister Guile," Erin warned. "Keep to the rules."

He glanced over at the redhead. "Oh, I will, dear Miss MacCloud. I will. I'll keep within the lines. Barely." He looked back to Sarah. "I'm waiting," he told her.

"Do you understand ethics?" she asked him. "Is it even possible for you to understand? I think it might be possible for you someday but I'm not sure about right now."

"Nothing wrong with a little mental hanky-panky," he said with a smirk.

"It wouldn't be ethical to listen in on someone's private thoughts without their consent. It's like an unreasonable search and seizure. I don't know how to make it any clearer than that."

He shook his head. "You'll have to do better than that."

"Whatever, Mister Guile. Do your worst. I really don't care."

The dark being didn't say anything to that. He just flashed his creepiest grin and both girls hurried out of the room as soon as the door began opening. They were out into the hall before the door could even swing fully open.

When they were over halfway to their next class, Erin stopped Sarah for a little talk. "How could you provoke him like that?! Please! Don't provoke him. You don't know what he's capable of."

Sarah sighed. "I have a pretty good idea. Dark beings, light beings and your games with human beings. Are we really just playthings to you?"

Erin gasped. "Don't say that! You're not a plaything."

"I'm sorry. I've been through a lot lately. I feel like I barely got the best of that shadow agency. It took a lot of work and it had me pretty worried."

Erin frowned and single tear rolled down her cheek.

Sarah reached out to dab the tear, giving the redhead a faint smile as she did so. "I think you mean well. I don't have anything against you so don't worry. Let's just go to class. Okay?"

Erin nodded and they walked slowly the rest of the way to Advanced Literature.

Sarah wasn't sure what they'd be covering but it had to be better than the private conference she just finished.

* * *

© 2015 by Terry Volkirch. This work may not be replicated in whole or in part by any means electronic or otherwise without the express consent of the Author (copyright holder). All Rights Reserved. This is a work of Fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional and any resemblance to real people or incidents past, present or future is purely coincidental.