Just in Time

“We're here.”

The car jerked forward and came to a sudden stop. Thomas was tightly gripping the sides of the seats and just slowly turned to stare at the girl who was now checking herself in the review mirror. The high school stood still. No busses or cars were there, but he ended up being only a hour late. She stopped and realized something.

“I didn't even ask if you had things at home.”

He did but he wasn't going to risk another speedy drive to his house, let alone be even later than he was, “no I'm good.”

She nodded and Thomas turned and opened the door. Though she had to quickly add that she'll be back this afternoon to pick him up. He stopped and looked back at her checking her teeth in the mirror this time. It was kind of scary how much she acted like his sister. Though she wasn't the athletic or pink wearing type. She stopped again noticing his shocked look. He was almost in the home stretch though it was too good to be true.

“Thomas, you do realize just what we are right?”

“Can I say I don't believe you and leave it at that?” she only stared back. He knew the answer. He sat back on the nice seats and rubbed his face with both of his hands.

“Look, I can't make any promises but I'm going to figure out something okay?”

“Yeah, yeah yeah.”

“Now get out of my car. You're late enough as is.”

The office lady didn't care to know why Thomas was late. She gave him the tardy slip reminding him that one more and it was after school detention. He was late for the bus one time and his mom had a fit. She'll probably have another once she finds out about this. He stuffed the pink slip in his pocket and went to class. Thomas thankfully didn't have any early classes with Zane and Ben. He really wanted to freak them out with his presence and scare them. To get them back for leaving him in that place, but his mind was on other things. Mainly the thought of super heroes.

Just who could be there?

Many TV shows and movies took these heroes and marketed them when he was younger. Goodness, he still probably had all of the recorded movies and collectable cards hiding somewhere in a box at home. He and his sister were obsessed. Why wouldn't you be? Most of the heroes that filled the screen, fictional or not, were fairly young. Teens running around at untouchable speeds and soaring to new heights all to fight against Alliance and their armies.

Old childhood memories flooded back into Thomas's mind as he found his way to gym. He had forgotten his fresh pair of gym clothes at home, so the ones rotting in his locker had to do.
“I'm serious Mike, he was there then he was gone!”

Voices echoed across the large dated locker room. Thomas looked up to see Ben talking with a friend of his from class. They just rounded the corner of the old forest green lockers. Ben looked frantic trying to get someone to listen to him about the freaky night before. The one he called Mike was an acne faced kid with long hair. Thomas hadn't met most of Ben's friends before and obviously they weren't interested in learning about him, no matter the bizarre story.

“Riiight, he looks fine to me.”

Ben's look was priceless. He stood there like a pole and just stared bug eyed. Thomas gave a sarcastically cocky smile and gave an exaggerated wave with his fingers. The one called Mike patted the shocked Ben and went on to wherever his gym locker was.

“You almost had me going there, Ben.”

He walked off and Ben just continued to stare at me. Zane's voice quickly filled the locker room as he called out to Ben.

“Mrs. Andersen didn't believe me Ben, what are we going to...”

Zane turned the corner and held tightly onto his giant backpack. He was already sweaty looking well before they took the first lap. He followed Ben's stare to Thomas and dropped his backpack with one huge thump on the ground. Thomas was just soaking this in. He smiled as he closed the locker door feeling like he could just run the mile today. He pretended to tie his shoe, but turned to scare them with a loud shout. The boys screamed like girls and scrambled out of the locker room as Thomas just laughed.

It wasn't really until lunch did Thomas's friends finally talk to him. They both tried to talk at once asking what happened. Zane poked Thomas a few times, Ben mentioned something about him being a zombie, but Thomas ignored them and their questions. He was still quite ticked, but they also sat at the other end of their lunch table away from him.

Thomas kept rethinking the last night for a while in his head. Sure, they did scare them really well, but ever since fining out about the super powers, it made more sense. If they were in a small - and apparently unstable - pocket dimension, it kept the rest of the house unaware of their screaming. The girls just passed through the walls to the other hallway they were closest to. He recalled there being an episode of “The Comet Family” being quite similar.

Thomas gasped aloud in the middle of his science class and got a weird glance from the guy who stood right next to him. The teacher had spontaneously decided to go outside in the cold for class so he stood out there in someone else's coat still thinking about this. Thankfully, the teacher was too busy talking to notice Thomas or the other shivering students.

Thomas hadn't watched that show in forever! Was that where those girls could have been? No that wasn't it. Unless they made a guest appearance on the show. He remembered the mom on the show fell in love with a superhero and the rest of the show was about the kids. Two had super powers and the youngest didn't... “supposedly”. They even had Din and a few others from the group MK there guest star a few times. Man he had to watch that show again!

When the end of the day came along, his friends finally apologized. Thomas kept a big smile on his face the entire time. Ah, he wanted to tell them. He wanted to go back home and force them and his sister into a marathon of shows. The guys kept talking as they left their lockers and followed Thomas outside.

“Ah, I forgive you!” He exclaimed finally, “you guys won't believe what I found!”

They were quite confused with his expressions. This was definitely not the look of a guy who was nearly kidnapped by ghosts. He opened his mouth to start saying something when another voice called out his name. He looked up and around where it could have came from, but then stopped at the tiny girl surrounded by two very tall men dressed in black suits. Audrey's outfit changed too. She no longer was wearing pink but a black dress with three inch heals. She looked like a completely different person. A completely stunning older woman calling out his name.

Thomas would have probably questioned if he was dreaming, but when the two large men started walking over to escort him to the car, fear started to set in. Wait, was he going to be shot or something? He couldn't, couldn't he?

“Thomas?” Ben called out as the two guys came up to meet them.

Thomas still had his smile on his face, but his eyes were scared. He gave a dry laugh and looked back to his friends.

“I... guess I need to go...”

“Hey, what's going on?” Zane called out.

He tried to reach out and take one of the large man's arm. He maybe had thought of being brave, but after receiving a hard look from the man, Zane retreated. They took me back over to the Mercedes as Audrey got in the car.

“It's okay, guys... I know them...”

Ben and Zane looked at each other not really sure what to believe. One guy opened the back door for Thomas to slip in.

“Then, we'll talk later?”

Thomas didn't answer. For he truly didn't know if there would be a later.