e 3 w10

Think having superpowers would be cool? Think again. Strict legal

guidelines must be followed to the letter, public opinion molded by

PR campaigns in glossy, serial form, and you’ll never get any thanks.

The Union of Superhumans has everything under control. Almost

everything.

* * *

America of superheroes and super villains is not the romanticized

world of your childhood comic books. Here, people with superpow-

ers—or, as they are known, Supers—are taken from their families and

given a choice: they can get trained to become superheroes and live

out their lives to mirror the comic books that share their likeness, or

they can spend a lifetime of isolation in Antarctica. Those who choose

training receive a new identity, get brainwashed, and live according to

a complex set of rules designed to protect regular people, the

Normals, from the Supers, and the Supers from the Normals. There’s

no way out of the contract.

Jeffrey R. DeRego

AN EXCERPT FROM

ESCAPE CLAUSE A Union Dues novel

ESCAPE CLAUSE © 2012 by Jeffrey R. DeRego

All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without

written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in criti-

cal articles and reviews.

For information, contact ENC Press at [email protected]

ENC Press

P.O. Box 833

Hoboken, NJ 07030

ISBN 978-0-9752540-9-7

Printed in the United States of America

FIRST EDITION 2012

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Design and cover art by Mom & Pop Design Shop

THE BABY AND THE BATHWATER

I’d forgotten what it was like to sit in a living room.

Not plan. Not debrief. Just sit and talk. The subject could have been

better, but I didn’t choose this assignment, so complaining seems both

pointless and counterproductive. The mother, Maria, enters with a tray

dominated by a large copper urn filled with what they tell me is

Turkish coffee. Manny, the father, hasn’t taken his eyes off me since

I rang the doorbell—and he isn’t happy.

I can’t blame them for being wary. My costume is probably the least

inconspicuous of any the Union marketing department has designed. I

am a Super-Agile, so they capitalize on that by accentuating every curve

of my body, and boy do I have a hell of a body to accentuate. My cos-

tume is yellow form-fitting spandex with a layer of Armorgel over my

vitals, not that anyone can see it, enough to stop a rifle bullet at point-

blank but still virtually invisible. A pink starburst on the right side that

wraps around from my back and ends with two points up just under my

breasts. They don’t even give me a cape. My pink-tinted and mirrored

eye-shield is affixed to a half-head cowl that hides my eyes but lets my

shoulder-length blond hair cascade down. All they can see of my real

body is my mouth, part of my nose, and my chin.

Like all Super-Agiles, I am wired with a secondary nervous sys-

tem to drive over a hundred woven layers of Fast Fiber muscle tis-

sue, ten times as many as a normal human. We twitch and shiver all

the time and literally can’t stand still. It’s worse when we’re nerv-

ous, much worse.

This is the first time I’ve ever felt completely exposed and all I’m

doing is trying to sit still on a red velvet sofa in front of a kidney-

shaped glass coffee table. The Union should have sent a suit, a lawyer,

or one of the Luminaries, they’re always better with the PR stuff. And

right now we need all the PR help we can get: a dead teenage genius

in Wyoming, dead heroes on the Mir and in Antarctica. The media has been all over us.

Comic and toy sales have bottomed out, the Union of Superheroes Power Hour cartoon show was just canceled, every public appearance turns into a near riot. InterCity Police Incorporated has asked for spe-

cial powers to arrest us, a clear violation of the Charter, after the

fiasco in Miami where Magnus went nuts and killed three undetected

Supers who were trying to rob a bank—and now this? How the hell

can they spin this into something positive?

The Union figures an active character better imparts a feeling of

calm and confidence at first contact with potential recruits. The

lawyers will come later, probably next week. All I do is probe the par-

ents’ receptiveness and try to put them at ease.

Recruitment is always a risk. There’s always a chance that the sub-

ject will snap and try to fight us off physically, that’s why they send a

member of a First Team. If some nervous sixteen-year-old who can lift

a loaded dump truck doesn’t want to get in the Jump Jet, you have to

have the appropriate force there just in case. Worse, the whole process

is secret, or supposed to be. Otherwise we’d have a hell of a time gen-

erating origin stories for the comics. We pay well for new members, a

cool million most of the time, sometimes a little more, sometimes a lit-

tle less. The Luminaries have a sliding scale or something: if the par-

ents are dirt-poor then two hundred grand will set them for life; if the

parents are wealthy, well, it gets a lot more expensive. Hush money.

And so far all but a few of the parents have taken it without causing a

Jeffrey R. DeRego

2

fuss. It’s worse when the parents are wealthy, because they have an

education, and lawyers. They have lots and lots of lawyers. At least the

Charter gives us a little insulation. It’s virtually against the law for the

parents of a Union Member to go to the press. The “Protection of

Identity and Practices” clause in the Charter keeps everything after

first contact behind closed doors where it should be.

All I have to worry about now is Mom and Dad: they aren’t dirt-poor,

but this place certainly isn’t a mansion, and according to the dossier

both parents are only high school graduates, so the chances of them

knowing the law, or a good lawyer to interpret the law, are slim to none.

Mr. Fernandes’s anger radiates off his squat, powerful body like

waves of heated air—I can tell that he wants to smash my head with

a baseball bat.

The Union can’t send Mind Readers on recruitment trips, can’t look

like we’re influencing, have to keep all appearances above board. The Normals fear Mind Readers the most and that makes sense, I guess. No

telling what sort of hell would break loose if a bunch of Supers got it

in their head that the only reason they have the life they do is because

some Mind Reader tinkered with Mom and Dad’s brains and made

them want to give their children away. I don’t blame them, we all have secrets, we need them, and a trained Psych can pull those out like an

anteater at a termite mound. I’m lucky to be a Super-Agile: the world

can see what I do and they don’t bother asking too many questions.

Maria pours three tiny cups of the coffee. Her hands shake violently.

The acrid smell of the brew fills the room—I’ve never had Turkish

coffee before, and, for a second, I let the thick, strong, bitter aroma

permeate my sinuses.

Manny Junior snoozes in a playpen draped in thick black rubber. He

fusses now and then but doesn’t wake up. They’ve kept him away

from me since I arrived, but he has all the telltale physical signs of a

ESCAPE CLAUSE

3

classic Energy Manipulator: completely hairless, iridescent white

skin, almost glowing blue eyes—a stunning contrast to the tangle of

thick black hair, wiry mustache, and eyebrows of his father.

“You have to understand the implications of Junior’s condition.” I fan

out the Standard Agreement and a sheaf of brochures beside the copper

coffee urn. I flip through the brochures; the cover shows the Luminaries,

the first true superheroes, in all their costumed, fifty-year-old glory, smil-

ing beneath two intertwined flags—the Stars and Stripes and the tricol-

ored Union banner. The same picture hangs in the main foyer of every

pyramid in North America. The rest of the material is more current and

features the best known of us posed in various pyramid facilities,

Magnus standing beside a gang of smiling policemen and firefighters,

another shows Captain Colossal reading to a classroom of preschoolers,

Megaton instructing new recruits in the gymnasium, and Kindred com-

forting a family as their house burns down in the background.

It’s never really dawned on me that the brochures manage to beau-

tifully portray events and activities I’ve never seen as long as I’ve

worn the tights and mask. The brochures don’t show the InterCity

cops taking potshots at our Jump Jets, they don’t show the protesters

outside a school when Magnus makes an appearance, or the new

recruits worked to the physical breaking point for a year before they

are even allowed third-string uniformed status, they don’t show how

we didn’t put out the fire or didn’t rescue the family.

But since when has a marketing campaign ever focused on truth and

reality?

None of the brochures even mention the Village, our very own

Island of Misfit Toys, built in the middle of Antarctica, where the non-

functional and noncooperative Supers convalesce, safe from the

world and her problems until they choose to serve the Union, die of

old age, or go insane and walk out into the subzero cold.

Jeffrey R. DeRego

4

“Your son is not like you. He’s very special. He needs the kind of

care that only the Union can give him.”

“It’s only been a few weeks,” Maria says. Her voice cracks on the

last word. “Junior was fine, then started shocking me, just a little, like

I walked across the carpet in my wool socks then touched a doorknob,

or a light switch—” She glances into the playpen.

Manny interjects, “I found her three weeks ago on the nursery floor.

She was out cold. Junior lay beside her, crying—”

“I don’t remember anything but a tingle in my breast. He was fussy

and hungry. And when I put him to my nipple— He— I blacked out.

Manny drove us to the hospital, that’s when the doctors told us that

Junior was different, he was special.”

The emergency room doctors called the Union. They had to. The

Charter says so. Any manifestation has to be reported. The Luminaries learned a long time ago that the Normals will almost

never actively drop a dime on their own kids, but don’t seem to have

a problem turning in someone else’s. The Union’s recruitment efforts

are pretty thin, especially now that we’re the scapegoat for just about

everything wrong in the USA. Crime running rampant? Blame the

Union for not working with the cops. Hey, we didn’t force the

Normals to dismantle the civil and social service organizations that

helped give them a sense of community. Economy in the crapper?

Blame the Union. But hey, we didn’t mangle the trade pacts and

agreements that kept things in balance. And now that so many people

have slipped into abject poverty, the Normals complain that we don’t

clamp down on the poorest of them?

“He is a Fernandes. He stays with us. He is my son.” Mr. Fernandes crosses the room and picks up a gilded silver frame with Junior’s birth

picture inside. The boy in the frame is hairy like his dad, smiling and

wide-eyed.

ESCAPE CLAUSE

5

Maria adds, “You have to understand, Miss—?”

“Kinetic Girl—”

“We can’t have another child, Kinetic Girl. Manny’s birth was a

miracle as it is—” Maria’s voice trails off and she turns slowly to look

at the baby in the playpen. “I’m barren now.”

Manny says, “There has to be an exception.”

How do I respond to that? I wish the Union had sent someone with

me. If the Union lets even a nine-month-old avoid service then it sets

a precedent. Suddenly thirteen is too young, then seventeen, then just

until he finishes college. The Union can’t let that happen. There’s too

much time for a Super to go evil, go freelance, or worse, entertain

notions of divinity.

“Look what you’ve done, Kinetic Girl!” Manny slings his arm

around Maria’s shoulders and pulls her almost under his arm as she

weeps. He growls, “You cannot take him, I will not allow it.”

“You have to understand, Mr. and Mrs. Fernandes. You don’t have

claim to Junior. Not anymore. We offer a compensation package—in

this case, because Junior is so young, twice the normal amount. You

don’t have to take it—but we do have to take him. If he was allowed

to stay, what would that tell every other Super who manifests? That

they have a choice? That their life is more important than their respon-

sibility to put that power to appropriate use?”

“His responsibility is to be here and grow up in a safe and healthy

household with parents that love him. For God’s sake, he’s nine

months old! What responsibilities to ‘use his power appropriately’

does an infant have? If this wasn’t my son we were talking about I’d

laugh at the stupidity of it all!”

“What if he gets better—if this goes away?” Maria pleads. “Can’t

we wait—”

“He doesn’t have a disease. This isn’t a condition or illness to be

Jeffrey R. DeRego

6

treated. It doesn’t get better because he’s not wrong. He needs to be raised and nurtured in a safe environment until he can be trained to

control his abilities. You talked to the pediatrician.”

Maria argues, “He needs to be loved and raised here, where he

belongs.”

“Please try and understand. The Charter makes it clear.” I slide the

document across the table. “Read it. It’s the law now. He has to come

with us. It’s better for you, for everyone, that he does.”

“To hell with you and your Union of baby-stealers!” Manny slams

the picture back on the mantle. “Now get out of my house.”

“Mr. Fernandes, I wish you wouldn’t make this any more unpleas-

ant for either of us. I empathize with your position. I was there too,

once, and I know exactly what you are going through.” I can’t lie to

them and say the separation gets easier over time. It doesn’t. I cried

for months, even when I was too tired to speak, and so sore from train-

ing that I used to lie in my bunk and hope to die in my sleep. I wanted

my parents back, and I know they wanted me back just as much,

which made it all the more difficult.

“You don’t know a thing!”

“Where do you think I came from? I was a child, a little older than

Manny Junior, sure, but I was still a child. The Union came for me too. Just like this. And, just like Junior is going to do, I went with

them. My mom and dad cried, I know they did, but the money took

some of the sting off. At least I hope it did—”

“Money? You think this is about money? We’re talking about our

flesh and blood, the sum total of everything Maria and I have worked

day and night to make possible. We struggled through a stillbirth, two

miscarriages, and only God knows how many false-positive preg-

nancy tests until we’d given up any hope of carrying on. But God

doesn’t let the faithful suffer for long, he tests but he doesn’t punish,

ESCAPE CLAUSE

7

not his faithful, not us. We’d given up, and then, like a miracle, Maria

was pregnant. We knew this one would come to term, because it had

to come to term! Manny Junior is a miracle, our miracle, humanity’s

miracle, and you cannot take him!”

Maria speaks in almost a whisper, “You can walk away.”

The baby begins to fuss in earnest, awakened, no doubt, by the

angry cacophony. Tiny flashes of light flicker up over the rubber mat-

ting. Tiny claps of thunder, like the sound of someone slapping a book

on a coffee table, echo out of the playpen.

Maria slips on a pair of elbow-length electrician’s gloves and pulls

the kid from his slumber.

Manny drapes a thick rubber sheet over her shoulder and breasts so

she can soothe the baby.

Maria strokes Junior’s bald head and he wriggles against the rubber

and leather fingers.

Junior makes soft baby babble while Maria coos to him.

“And then what? Maybe you and Manny are able to take care of

him, but what about the others? What about his grandmother, or his

cousins, what about the kids he’ll interact with at school, or strangers

at the store? They won’t be wearing electrician’s gloves when they

touch him—”

Manny glances at Maria. I can see the flash of recognition in his

eyes. He turns to me. “We’ll home-school.”

“It’s not fair to him.” Manny’s argument becomes an echo from my

past, the same argument my parents had with Magnus. Sure, I was

older than Junior, almost an adult, in relative terms, but the situation

wasn’t any less traumatic. I’d manifested two weeks after my first

menstruation. I was walking home from St. Mary’s School for Girls

with a group of friends. A taxi veered off the street and I jumped,

something like thirty feet almost straight up, and landed softly atop

Jeffrey R. DeRego

8

the telephone line as the car plowed into the pole below. No one was

killed, but they all saw me crouched up there like a frightened cat. I

made the news that night as the firefighters scratched their heads and

wondered how in the hell I ended up on the cable dead-center between

two poles without a tree in sight. A week later, the Union came to visit

with an armful of brochures.

“Don’t talk to us about fairness.”

“What sort of life will he have here with you, Mr. Fernandes?

Having to stay in the house all the time. No friends . . .”

“He’ll have friends. You don’t think we can do it because your par-

ents couldn’t do it. Maybe it isn’t us at all, maybe it’s you, jealous that

we will do whatever we can to make sure Junior grows up right and

happy while yours handed you over without—”

“You don’t know anything about my parents!”

Silence from them again. I start to breathe heavy. They’ve rattled

me. I need to get out of here. “You’ll get a visit from our lawyers early

next week. If you try to run, we’ll catch you. If you try to hide, we’ll

find you. This isn’t about you and the Union. It’s about Junior and

what’s best for him.”

Someone barks through a bullhorn outside. There’s a large crowd of

protesters gathered on the street at the end of the concrete walkway.

The media, too, waiting along the fringe of the mob, their cameras

pointed at the front porch. I can almost hear the saliva dripping from

their maws. Great, now it’s even more complicated.

Freaks and demons out of our neighborhood! Leave the miracle baby! Freaks and demons out of our neighborhood! Leave the mira- cle baby! Freaks and demons out of our neighborhood! Freaks and demons out of our neighborhood! Leave the miracle baby!

I ease up from the couch and squeeze into the corner by the big bay

window before peering through the curtains. I want to be away from

ESCAPE CLAUSE

9

the door and the line of sight of the crowd. “You called the media?”

Panic time, Kinetic Girl. They already broke the trust and opened a

whole new Pandora’s box of complications. I punch the mic controls

built into my gauntlet and start feeding the sounds back to my home

pyramid. “I need to be alone for a moment. Is there a spare room I

could use?”

The chanting drowns out Manny’s heavy breathing as he rushes to

the window. “You see those people, Kinetic Girl? They understand.

They know that a baby isn’t something that the Union or anyone else

can come and take away just because he’s special, different.”

Maria answers, “The bathroom, down the hall to the left, first door.”

I excuse myself and find the bathroom. It’s nice. I haven’t been in a

small bathroom since I was a kid. It’s funny to see only a single toi-

let, and a bathtub. The Union bathrooms are communal, toilet and

shower stalls. There’s privacy, but only if you stay in your little two-

room flat. I punch the code to Pyramid Control. “Kinetic Girl calling.”

Captain Colossal answers, “We’ve been listening. Did those ass-

holes really call the TV stations?”

“Affirmative.” I glance out the window. “There are five trucks, and

one of them is nationwide cable.” Why is Special Services hanging

around our control room? Usually we know when they’re coming.

“There’s no way to deescalate the situation now.”

“Back off. Leave them the Charter but take everything else.”

“Leave it to the lawyers?” I notice the tiles on the shower wall. They

are blue and white. I bet there’s plenty of hot water here. I bet I could

shower for forty-five minutes and never even worry about running

out. Captain Colossal hasn’t answered. “I said, Do we leave it to the lawyers?”

Finally he answers. “On second thought, take the Charter too. We

can deny this was related to the kid. We’ll wait. We have time.”

Jeffrey R. DeRego

10

“Time? Time for what? This kid’s flicking lightning like there’s no

tomorrow.” This is not usual protocol. I study the crowd outside; they

are even more agitated than before. “Someone’s going to get killed.”

“We’ll deal with the state when that happens. Until then it’s better

to stand down. No sense making things any more complicated. We’ll

wait until there’s a mistake and one or both of his parents are electro-

cuted.”

I’m dumbstruck. “Aren’t we supposed to take the kid to prevent that?”

“He’s a baby.”

“So goddamn what he’s a baby!”

“So, he stays until it’s a more opportune time for us to recruit with-

out a circus breaking out on the goddamn front lawn!”

“Jesus—”

“Save it, Kinetic Girl. You know this is the best way—”

“They didn’t fucking ask for this, Captain Colossal! They’re par-

ents! We have a duty to—”

“You have a duty to abide by the terms of the Charter. Make one

more protestation and I swear on the tricolor banner that I’ll have you

sent up for insubordination.”

“Go fuck yourself.” I snap the connection closed and tear the gaunt-

let off. I hope it’s enough to shut the mic down, then think better of it

and stuff the piece of gear into the toilet. Manny and Maria are still

sitting in the living room when I return. I drop into the seat opposite

them. They can tell I’m upset, because I’m shaking even more than

usual. I can’t even pick up the coffee cup.

Manny speaks softly, “What happens now?”

“I leave.” I want to shove all the Union crap into the trash, but if I

come back empty-handed I’ll be pulled in front of the Tribunal before

sunset.

ESCAPE CLAUSE

11

“That’s it? It’s over? Junior doesn’t have to go?”

I nod and lower my eyes while gathering the brochures, the Charter,

and the offer letter. I fold them and slip the paper into a little pouch in

my yellow belt. I can see the disbelief in their faces. “I’m sorry,” I

manage, my voice cracks, and I hope they don’t notice. “I wish it

could be—different. Better? I don’t know.” I pause and draw a thick,

deep, still coffee-tainted breath. “Thanks for your hospitality.” I offer

my hand for a shake, standard Union protocol for negotiations with

Normals, but neither Manny nor Maria moves. They know some-

thing’s wrong; that I shouldn’t just give up this abruptly. I pause at the

front door, my gloved hand rests on the brass knob. But I can’t leave

them without telling them the truth or I’ll never be able to look at

myself in the mirror. I turn slowly to face them. Manny’s eyes are

squinty now, and Maria’s victory smile droops and dies. I say, “You

don’t understand. The Union isn’t going away just because I’m leav-

ing. But you won’t hear from us again—unless you change your

mind.” I drop a card on the table with the 800 number of our phone

bank, it probably won’t help them if they decide to cash in, but at least

I left it. “There won’t be any lawyers. There won’t be any money. But

the Union isn’t done. We’ll be back, but you’ll probably never see us.”

Manny’s face twists. His eyebrows rise slightly. “We’ll never see

you?”

Maria’s eyes dart back and forth from Manny to me. She stutters,

“B— but— but you said . . .”

I stare at them for what feels like a whole hour. “You blew it. You called the news. You arranged a protest. You had to make it diffi- cult. Complicated. Now you’ve won. Congratulations. When Junior

gets old enough to throw a tantrum, when he gets old enough to be

angry at you, like all little kids get, when he can focus just enough, he’s going to kill you both. Oh, it won’t be murder. Two-year-old

Jeffrey R. DeRego

12

kids don’t commit murder. They have tantrums. They get into a

rage. They don’t know any better. And when Junior does, and one

or both of you dies—” I pause long enough to see the color drain

from their faces. “Thanks for the coffee. It was nice meeting you.”

I walk out the door. The crowd is bigger now, and angrier. I step to

the porch. They seem surprised that I’m not carrying the baby. The

Union has a car waiting at the end of the block. I walk down the

steps. I should’ve slipped out the back, but whatever, it’s not like

this day can get any worse. The family follows; they stare at me,

dumbfounded.

I take a quick look at the happy little baby cradled in Maria’s rub-

ber electrician’s gloves, then stride down the walkway. The crowd

cheers when they realize I’m leaving Junior behind. I greet a tide of

catcalls and hands waving protest signs and, inside that mass of

angry humanity, a sea of frightened faces that can’t be camouflaged

no matter how loud they yell. That’s the clincher. The Normals fear

us now, and what they fear they have to destroy, even at the cost of

their own lives. I wonder if a shepherd ever died at the hooves and

teeth of his flock?

The minister opens the gate, brushes past me. “Heathen,” he whis-

pers, “abomination.”

“Save it for the parishioners, reverend,” I say and push out into the

crowd.

The Normals think they’ve won, but next week, or next year, when

we come back, there won’t be any smiles, or crowds, just a meat

wagon, some police maybe, and a special container for the baby—

unless the parents call and ask us back, but they won’t. Manny and

Maria will go back inside, put Junior down for a nap, and lie awake

wondering if they can ever stop being afraid.

The media rushes the gate, a dozen cameras whir into focus, a por-

ESCAPE CLAUSE

13

cupine of microphones waves in front of my face. “No comment. The

Union will release a statement through its official channels.”

I glide through the throng, feel their hands brush against me, see

smugness drawn across their faces.

The telephone wire runs along the road down towards the seashore

a half-mile away. I leap up, twist twice, and flip. My feet land softly

on the cable thirty feet over the crowd. I crouch there like a cat.

The Normals don’t even look up.

Jeffrey R. DeRego

14

From Jeffrey DeRego, the author of Union Dues stories, which have

enthralled over 1 million fans and gained critical acclaim among the

independent science-fiction and comic literary community, comes

ESCAPE CLAUSE

A Union Dues novel

A mosaic novel that uses comic-book imagery in prose, Escape Clause tells the stories of the Supers who make up the Union of Superheroes; not the benign, PR-approved tales that American kids

read in their comics but the grittier truth about the beginnings and

goals of the Union, about superheroes who can’t catch a break

whether they try to follow the rules or go rogue, and about what

really happens to those who have the misfortune to be born with a

little too much talent.

Set in the framework of our legalistic society, each tile of the mosaic

shines a new light on the relationships between powerful lobbies and

the government, between those who make the rules and those the

rules are made for, between people who are different from one

another. Superpowers or not, Union members have to cope with the

same sort of frustrations that any employee or civil servant would

instantly recognize.

And, as Supers and Normals alike learn again and again, when

bureaucracy and superpowers collide, nobody wins.

Find out more at

http://www.ENCPress.com/EC.html