Super Jaded 2 - Chapter 9

Chapter 9: Diego

Diego Torres knew that his life would be forever altered the moment his baby sister flew into town taller and stronger than he could ever hope to be, but he didn’t expect mass pandemonium to shoot him awake at four in the morning. Still, he rose to the challenge, leaping out of the comfy trap of his bed without a second thought, briefly stumbling into the frame of the door as his legs almost didn’t get the memo.

His athletic body saved him from total humiliation as he ran outside, any semblance of exhaustion fleeing from his mind as his eyes bore witness to a horrifying sight, one that had left his mother and father equally stunned on the front lawn as they struggled to make sense of what they were witnessing.

Buildings, toppling over, sinking into the earth like dominoes. Buildings that had been a staple of the horizon since before Diego could walk. Screams that refused to cease haunted the air, new ones replacing old ones before they could even finish. The ground felt like it was about to crack open at any moment, as tectonic plates deep below the earth had been disturbed, violated in ways not possible by mere nature.

[“Mom, dad, what’s going on!? Wh-what do we do!?”] Diego asked, shaking his parents out of their stunned states to look at their frightened son. Usually, he could rely on Alicia and Miguel to give him guidance in the world as the ones who brought him into it, but even their usual stalwartness had faltered in the current circumstances. They seemed just as clueless as he did.

But then, two rays of hope streaked past in the sky, leaving a trail of blurry colors in their wakes like a rainbow as they did their best to undo the horrifying situation unfolding in the city of Bogotá. While the infrastructure couldn’t be salvaged, it could be rebuilt. The lives of the Colombians couldn’t be rebuilt, so the two faster-than-fast streaks of light prioritized those without a moment of hesitation. Various frightened, confused people suddenly found themselves practically teleported to the sidewalk in front of the Torres residence, which was far enough away from the massive ravine-sized crack that was swallowing the earth around it. As thick as the five-lane road that it had opened out of, it stretched beyond what Diego or his parents could see from their limited vantage point on the ground.

The blurs then both stopped in front of the three stunned members of the Torres family, revealing themselves to be Iris and Anya. Their clothes were in shreds, not as durable as their bodies when it came to blitzing through the air and tearing through walls to save as many people as possible.

Neither girl bothered with introductions, time was of the essence. 

[“Miguel! Alicia! Diego! Tell all these people to get as far away from the fault line as possible! Keep them organized and together!”] Iris barked, her voice louder than the commotion surrounding her, yet she somehow didn’t sound loud enough to hurt anyone’s ears.

Even in the heat of the moment, the Torres family were caught off guard, surprised to see how much Iris’ Spanish had improved since she first arrived with Anya. She was essentially speaking as if she was born and grew up in Colombia the entire time. 

Anya’s voice followed the same surreal pattern. [“And make sure Abuela is safe! This is as far as we can move people out of the danger zone if we want to save as many people as possible, but this won’t be a safe zone for much longer!”]

Understanding that this was a moment of crisis, Diego, Miguel and Alicia got their asses into gear as soon as the two supergirls zipped away to save more lives. They rallied people around, leading them down a nearby double-wide street to get them as far away from the fault line as possible.

Amidst the chaos, Diego heard the wailing of a little girl, frantically fighting against her mother’s steady hand. [“Winnie! He’s still in there! No! No! I want to go back! I need him!”] Those were the only intelligible words Diego could make out beyond pained crying, but all he had to do was follow the direction of her outstretched hand to find out what she was screaming out in desperation for.

A nearby house had been opened up like a dollhouse from a collapsed front, exposing the leftmost room on the second floor. Given the pink wallpaper and bed sheets that retained their bright colors through the caked dirt and debris, Diego could figure out which room was the focus of the little girl. Sure enough, contained within a tiny fish bowl with a lid placed on top of it, was a little yellow gecko. Winnie, for sure.

Am I really about to risk my life for a lizard? Diego thought to himself. But before he could talk himself out of it, he was already running towards the house. He tuned out the angry shouts from his parents. If his little sister was already risking her life to save the people of her hometown who she hadn’t seen in years, the least he could do was live up to that standard with his comparatively limited capabilities. Even while sleepy and starved, Diego hopped around collapsing infrastructure and held his breath well against the clouds of dust he was leaping into.

Getting up to the room in question was the easy part, the hallway staircase retained its stability just long enough for Diego to scale it before it collapsed. But now came the hard part of getting back down with no easy exit. He was effectively trapped in the little girl’s room, a spectacle for most of the crowd to uselessly gawk at as he tried to make the most of his squeezed options. He could jump thirteen feet down into a pile of exposed rebar and risk breaking his legs or stabbing himself, or he could retreat back into the rapidly collapsing house.

His inaction ultimately spelled his doom as the ground gave way under his feet, with him closing his eyes as he braced for impact—an impact that never came.

Once he mustered up the courage to open his eyes, he almost couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Iris had caught him and Winnie, holding the frightened twenty-something with an athletic build in a bridal carry as if he were no heavier than the little girl whose Gecko he was rescuing. She slowly descended to the ground, clearing a spot for Diego to be dropped off at with her superbreath.

Diego couldn’t focus on any of that. His spellbound eyes watched as the giant supe’s figure threatened to tear through her clothes revealing her muscular form and curves. Her nipples poked out, straining her poor t-shirt to its limit. She was literal perfection. He wasn’t sure how long he found himself staring at Iris, but Iris was very aware of how long Diego was staring.

[“Dude, you alright? You’re shaking like a leaf.”]

[“I’m more than alright now~”] Diego admitted with almost dream-like whimsy, unable to contain his spontaneous true feelings about the situation—only to be met with confusion from Iris.

[“Ah, okay, cool. Was worried for a second that you had a heart attack or something. Anyways, gotta go save more lives now!”] She replied, clueless to his unintentionally blunt advances.

Iris put Diego down with all the grace of an empty cardboard box before bolting off again, rippling the trees within a block’s radius as she did. Thankfully, the butterflies in Diego’s stomach allowed his brain to make a graceful landing regardless. 

He reunited Winnie with the little girl and her tears turned grateful. Miguel and especially Alicia were not so grateful, but that didn’t matter. Winnie was safe.

Eventually, Anya and Iris managed to contain most of the damage, boasting an impressive 97% survival rate in the capital of Colombia alone. In a way, Anya had prevented another Nina-related destabilization of her country. That was enough for her to sleep soundly that night.

There was still much cleanup to do, but the people of Bogotá did not have to live displaced lives sparsely assisted by ineffectual, stripped-down governments. Now, they had protectors. Protectors who could break the sound barrier as easily as cracking their neck. Protectors ready to drop anything and help the citizens at a drop of a hat.

Iris and Anya were superheroines, no doubt about it.

~

[“What… Did this? How… how did the apocalypse happen so fast…?”] Mimi pondered to no one in particular, shivering profusely as Miguel tried to calm her down. With an apocalyptic earthquake still fresh in everyone’s mind, no one could blame the elderly woman for still being shaken up about what had just transpired, even if her house had undergone exclusive same-day repairs from the two supergirls living under her roof. With the worst of the destruction already mitigated, Iris and Anya had struck many deals with the local government to begin the long repair process. But nothing would happen overnight—much as Iris pushed for it—and Anya wanted to understandably spend more time with her family.

So here they all were, standing in the family living room, all too stunned to sit down.

[“It… wasn’t you two, right?”] Mimi then rather pointedly asked Anya and Iris, accusing them with tears in her eyes, as if she didn’t want to believe that her own granddaughter could be the harbinger of destruction, even if her superstitions were getting the better of her, telling her otherwise.

Thankfully, the two supers had an explanation, as ridiculous as it was. 

[“You heard what I heard back there in your head, right?”] Iris asked, Anya nodded.

[“Yeah, that was definitely Nina’s voice.”]

[“What are you two talking about?”] Alicia demanded, pushing through her fear to ask.

[“If you lived close enough to Fern, you could hear her thoughts.”] Iris explained. 

[“Sometimes she’d project them into your head if she was careless enough, mostly horny thoughts. People on the Eternals’ Ending forum ranted about it all the time. If you were from America, her thoughts were like an EMP blast.”] Anya added.

[“And now, our ‘range’ is increased since we’re supers, so we heard Fern again during the earthquake, which means this only happened because she was having sex.”] Iris said with vitriolic spit in her clenched teeth.

[“Your generation is gross.”] Mimi spat with disgust, completely missing the graver implications. [“Too obsessed with sex.”]

The rest of Anya’s family shared sane, nervous glances amongst each other, but the most terrifying revelation had yet to occur.

[“But it wasn’t just Fern’s moans of pleasure we heard… Nina’s moans were mixed in, and sometimes were even louder.”] Anya said, her breath getting shakier with every exhale. A palpable fear was rising in the room again. [“And that means… that means she’s got the same amount of serum as Fern now. They’re both more powerful, each more powerful than both of us combined. Since Nina was near-death after what we did… that means Fern must’ve…”]

She trailed off after that, but the entire family knew what she meant.

[“So, you two failed to kill Nina, and that means she just got stronger!?”] Mimi said, scolding the two supers with such anger it caused both of the massive women to shrink in their stances. Sympathy spread across Alicia and Miguel’s faces, but neither of them said anything to talk Mimi down. Instead, the person to come to Iris and Anya’s rescue was the last person who would’ve done it prior to the supers arriving in their home.

[“Mimi! It’s not their fault, they tried their best! It’s… not easy to kill someone, I get that. And, look at what they did today! They saved so many lives, and they’re going to help rebuild the city tomorrow. They’re stronger than ten thousand men, they’ll have this city back in shape in no time! In fact, they’ll probably have the damage in Ecuador rebuilt by the end of this week!”]

Diego had never sounded so impassioned in his life, especially about his sister, and especially especially toward his abuela.

[“That’s right!”] Anya said, taking the conversational foothold provided to her by her brother and running with it. [“And we talked to the mayor and everyone in the city is agreeing to a media blackout so Nina and Fern don’t find out that we’re here.”]

[“We’ll save as many lives as we can,”] Iris declared definitely. [“That’s how we save the world, by reminding everyone that there are still good people in it willing to do the right thing.”]

Diego wanted so badly to call her corny for that, but he was a changed man after being held in her embrace. Now, Iris could tell him to buy an expensive jewel and he’d take out a loan just to do it.

[“So this may sound stupid but why don’t you guys just save the world by injecting yourselves again? One up the other supes!”] Miguel offered.

The two musclebound women looked at each other nervously. Anya squatted down a little to level with her family, noticing how long they have been craning their heads upwards to stare at their titanic stature. She hated feeling like that infamous “how to talk to short people” meme, but Miguel had been battling a bad neck for years.

[“Papi, we, uh, don’t know how to get more. And the one person who does besides Nina and Fern is, well… we don’t know where they went.”]

[“We… kinda have no means of contacting them and I think that was their plan.”] Iris added.

[“Dr. Loken, oh, that no good…!”] Mimi said, immediately knowing who they were alluding to. [“They totally scammed you! They were probably hoping something like this happened!”]

Alicia shook her head at the whole situation. [“Forget that! You two are lucky you are both alive. That serum could’ve killed you! I don’t want you guys to risk taking more.”]

This time, Anya stood back up to emphasize her point. 

[“But Mami, if it’s available, we have to. So long as Nina and Fern have more serum in them, they WILL take us out. We have become a major threat to them. The only way to stop them is to either be on their level or get more than them. No matter how much our bodies change.”]

[“Your daughter is right, Alicia. We got ourselves into this mess, we need to deal with it.”] Iris nodded, standing up to meet her best friend. [“This was probably just warmup sex or something. At any point in time, these two could destroy the world and they probably wouldn’t even care that they did it.”]

[“Pfft ‘warmup sex’. Ridiculous,”] Mimi rolled her eyes. 

[“So why don’t we get some serum? If and when you do find it.”] Diego offered, emphasizing himself and the Torres family, eyes suddenly firing at him from every direction. Iris cocked an eyebrow, intrigued by the idea, which Diego tried not to get giddy over. [“That way, y’know, we don’t risk Anya and Iris’ bodies blowing up and we at least have the numbers advantage.”]

[“Told ya, he’s the best.”] Anya giggled with excitement toward Iris. Even when she was more powerful than him possessing the powers of a literal god, her big brother still looked out for her safety.

[”Absolutely not!”] Alicia blew up. [“I will not have another kid mutated into a… a Hulk!”]

[“Gee, thanks.”] Anya deadpanned.

[“You know what I mean, mija!”] Alicia replied. 

[“But think about it, you’d look hot, Mami! I mean… consider these.”] She smirked as she flexed her arms in quick succession. [“Reason one, reason two!”]

[“Knock it off!”] Mimi sparked up. [“Keep it up and I’ll invent that serum myself just to inject it into my sandal!”]

Anya giggled, and in no time at all the family had laughed off what would have been a major anxiety for them in the coming weeks. Iris found herself joining in the comradery out of surprise when she noticed Alicia’s heart rate increasing at the thought of herself becoming as large as her daughter. 

Iris remembered back when she was nervous about being so big and powerful, now it was basically second nature. Plus, Alicia was by no means unappealing given her middle age. Just one serum alone would be enough to upgrade her into an immortal Amazonian model. And then there was Diego… for some reason her mind pictured him all muscular and towering… with that awkward, nerdy and adorable personality. She bit her lower lip. She couldn’t lie, hearing about how he saved Winnie through the grapevine definitely made him more appealing. He really did have a heart of gold, verifiable proof of what humanity was capable of against all odds. 

She imagined him having one batch of serum to her two. Diego—all powerful—but with her still towering over him. Every member of the Torres family would be irresistible. Shit, was this how Nina and Fern felt at any given moment? Her horny brain was getting the better of her! It glommed on to her ideals of true equality like some sort of addictive drug, turning any topic back to it.

Then she imagined Mimi with the serum. That frightened Iris out of her train of thought for good.

Maybe she was thinking too grand. Right now, all that mattered was covertly saving whatever lives and livelihoods she could under the watchful senses of Fern, and now Nina. They’d probably scour the earth for her and Anya any second now, but letting that get to her would just lead to unnecessary anxiety.

She needed to take this one day at a time. Rebuilding the world that Nina Eternal was carelessly ruining would take time—and it was time she would love to spend with the Torres family.