Read Trainee Superhero (Book One) for Free Online

There are no lights in my helmet or on my gloves but
surely, surely they wouldn’t just drop me out of the sky without
something to stop me.
    Right?
    I tumble clumsily through the air, falling
head over heels.
    “Help!”
    I scream until my throat hurts, but I get no
answer. I fall through a thin layer of clouds and see the ground
racing towards me. The city of Perth was beautiful once, but now
it’s a wasteland of ruined buildings and deserted streets filled
with rusting cars. I can see black streaks and craters where the
first missiles hit, and a huge flat area that looks like glass off
to one side of the city. There are trees – mostly dead – and open
areas that may have once been parks. There can be no doubt that
this is a corpse of a city.
    I wonder what the radiation count is around
here, and then I wonder if I’ll live long enough for that to be a
problem. It looks like the ground will get me first.
    My helmet beeps and my suit whirs into life
as the lights on my gloves start glowing. My body jerks so that I
am falling with my feet to the ground and my fall slows. I look up
to see a parachute above me. Thank you, unknown technician in
charge of parachutes, at least now I won’t arrive as a pancake.
    I scan the ground for a good landing place,
but there aren’t many in the clutter and rubble of this ruined
city. It doesn’t matter, really, because I don’t know how to
control my descent. I can see movement below that must be the
aliens, but I can’t see the saucers. I’m still a few hundred meters
high, and I don’t know where to land, or even how to land.
    My parachute cords cut and I drop with a
lurch.
    “Saucer!” I swear.
    The ground is getting bigger every second and
I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do about it. I don’t know how to
fly these suits, and I don’t have time to learn.
    “Help!”
    A bright light flashes by my shoulder and a
superhero appears. I don’t recognize him, but I’ve never been
happier to see anyone in my life. The superhero reaches out and
grabs my arm, moving us until we are face to face, falling
together. I can see into his visor; he seems to be shouting at me,
but I can’t hear him.
    “…Hold on, kid,” I hear faintly over my
radio.
    The world twists and jumps so that I am no
longer high in the sky but now only seconds from hitting a
skyscraper. I panic and lose hold of the superhero beside me just
as he teleports away, and I am alone again. I slam into the side of
the skyscraper and into a concrete pillar. The building starts to
collapse around me, and I scramble through a rain of glass shards
and metal hail. My shield crackles and bursts as I fight my way
through to an elevator shaft, force it open and drop through. I
catch the cable on my way down and use it to slow my fall.
    I reach the lobby and exit the building as it
crumbles around me. I should have been dead, but I’m not. I shake
myself free. I’m… fine, surprisingly.
    But I’m also alone again.
    “Hello?”
    The roads around me are lined with dead trees
and abandoned cars. The buildings around me are tall and mostly
still intact, but their windows are dirty. There is no immediate
danger, and the adrenaline rush I felt during my fall is draining
out of my body. My legs start shaking uncontrollably, so I drop to
my knees and force my visor open. I take a breath of musty air,
remember where I am and slam the visor down.
    “This is crazy!” I scream.
    Something moves in my peripheral vision. I
spin and find myself facing a scout ball. We look at each other for
a second in a strange standoff but I shoot first, a green spark of
light that hits the scout right in its center mass. The walker’s
laser hits the building behind me, burning through concrete. The
scout topples over onto the ground and falls still. It’s my first
kill, but I’m shaking too hard to enjoy it.
    I walk over to investigate my fallen foe,
stepping over its legs to look at its ruptured head. I’ve never
seen a saucer