LJ Idol Three Strikes: Prompt 3 - Morgenmuffel
His heart is thumping painfully, like it’s about to burst from his chest. His breath is coming out in shallow gasps, his lungs refusing to cooperate. He slowly - like slow-motion slowly - raises a hand, feeling the ends of his hair, singed and probably blacker than normal, before dragging his fingers down the side of his face, searching for the blood he imagines is pouring out of him.
It’s a miracle he’s alive right now. A god damn miracle.
Not actually finding any blood, he glances down at his new pair of jeans, now with a huge burn mark on the side. His leg feels numb, but he’s standing, so it can’t be that bad.
Or maybe it needs to be amputated and he’s just in shock. He saw something like that in one of Paige’s medical shows that she is always obsessively watching.
He’s probably dying. He should go get someone to check it out.
But he can’t.
He glances at the door beside him and lets the wave of dread wash over him.
He doesn’t want to do this. He absolutely does not want to do this.
But he has no choice.
He has to go back in.
--
Twenty-two minutes earlier
The vibration of the red cell phone on the table beside his bed might as well be a blaring alarm with disco lights and a voice shouting, “You are about to die!”
Peter wakes instantaneously at the first vibration, his world collapsing around him.
Or so it seems.
He glances at the clock on the wall across from him, the one that matches the clocks in all the bedrooms. The one with the horrible red numbers that practically scream at him.
5:57.
Why, why, why do they choose this time of day? Why? Why can these people not come up with their ridiculous plans at a more reasonable hour?
Peter lets out a stream of curse words that would send any sane person into hiding, but he’s dressed in less than two minutes and barreling down the hall to the elevators.
They have five minutes to make it to the meeting room - officially anyway - but everyone knows that three minutes is the unofficial count.
He finds Paige and Josh already in the elevator. They both look how he imagines he does - like they would really rather be anywhere but here.
Or, truthfully, they’d just really rather be back in bed.
Margaret Hobbstein is waiting for them all in the meeting room. She stares at them as they enter, one by one, until the five of them are sitting before her. Peter notices Mandy is still in her pajama bottoms - pink with little bunnies - even though she has her work shirt on for the top.
At least he managed to be properly dressed.
Margaret Hobbstein, of course, looks like she’s been up for hours. Her hair is perfectly styled in the bun she always wears. Her makeup is flawless. She doesn’t even have a cup of coffee.
He could really use some coffee right about now.
Margaret Hobbstein raps on her podium for attention, doesn’t wait to make sure they are paying attention, and launches into her spiel.
Peter tries to pay attention - bomb threat, possible hostages, something about a watergun that sprays acid - but his stomach is already beginning to turn in on itself. He has been dreading this moment for the last two weeks, since the last time he was in this position.
How is it possible it’s his turn again? And why did he make a bet with Avery over that game of pool? He knows she always wins every bet she makes. He’s pretty sure it’s her superpower. Why did he think this one time he would be special enough to beat her and that he would be the one who got to skip a turn?
It should be her waiting to go face death right now, not him.
He is an idiot.
He reminds himself of this as Avery catches his eye and winks at him.
He really hates that girl.
Margaret Hobbstein is done speaking. She is now glaring at them all from behind her podium, like they are the ones preparing to launch an attack of waterguns full of acid on the unsuspecting people of the city.
“Go!” she commands, like she can’t believe they are all still sitting there.
Honestly, knowing her, she probably can’t believe they are all still sitting there.
The five of them scramble from their seats, heading to the door like they are one, before bursting through and dashing to the elevators.
It’s been eighteen minutes since the alarms sounded. In forty-two minutes, the jet is taking off, and everyone who is supposed to be on it better be on it, or there will be hell to pay. Peter is not really sure what paying that hell would be like, since no one has ever missed the jet, but he does not - he most definitely does not - want to be the one to find out.
The elevator starts its ascent. Josh exits first today, then Mandy, then Paige at the third stop. It’s now just him and Avery.
The elevator stops at her floor. She glances at him, and for a second, he sees sympathy cross her face.
“Good luck,” she says and pauses. Peter starts to wonder if maybe she will offer to go instead of him, but then she is gone, racing down the hall, and he curses her again. And then curses himself. What the hell had he been thinking?
Peter closes his eyes as the elevator shoots upward, almost wishing it will just keep going, shooting out of the building and into the sky, but it doesn’t. It stops on the correct floor, and the doors open, and Peter’s feet walk him off the elevator and steer him down the hallway even as his brain yells and begs and pleads for him to turn around.
He arrives at the door - so innocent looking with its mahogany-stained wood and its little black doorbell - and lifts his hand to push the button.
He takes a quick moment to cast a prayer - “Please let me live” - but there isn’t time to be scared, and he presses the button. Over and over and over.
As expected, there is no answer.
He pulls out the key card and uses that instead, waiting for the sound of the electronic beep that will let him into the suite of rooms.
It’s dark inside, as it should be since it’s just past six in the morning, but he unfortunately knows the layout by heart. He crosses through the sitting area, takes a left down the hall and stops before the closed bedroom door.
There is a button here too.
He closes his eyes again, whispers the same quick prayer - “Please let me live” - and presses the button.
A sound that could wake the dead blares through the suite of rooms.
Peter presses it again, then jumps out of the way.
But he’s not fast enough.
The door explodes, shards of wood flying everywhere, as two beams of light appear beside him. One chars his hair.
A second later, as his entire body freezes in fear, his brain forgetting to tell his legs to move, the lasers appear again. This time, one burns his jeans.
Peter yelps and takes back off for the main entrance. He shoves through the door and leans against the wall outside, waiting for death to take him.
But it doesn’t. Instead, as the thundering of his heart slows and his breathing returns to normal, he remembers that the walls can absorb the heat and power of the lasers. Peter still doesn’t understand why the doors aren’t built to resist them either, but the one time he asked, he only understood about every fourth word of the explanation, and he has zero desire to ask again.
He also has zero desire to go back inside, but this is the job he signed up for - under the mistaken impression that it would a bit more glamourous - and he’s not going to quit on it now.
--
The second attempt goes a tiny bit better than the first. Peter manages to avoid the laser beams this time.
“There’s a bomb!” he shouts during the third attempt. “They need you!”
“They can do it without me!” comes a very, very, very cranky voice.
“No, they can’t!” Peter shouts back.
“They we can do it later.”
And once again, the laser beams come flying out the door.
On the fourth attempt, Peter finally steps inside the room. The man is still in bed, the covers pulled up over his head.
Or what’s left of them anyway.
“Oh, come on!” Peter says. He’s starting to get a little angry. “Are you a superhero or not?”
“No,” comes the snarled reply.
“No?” Peter says. “Just yesterday you were telling everyone how saving the world is your life’s calling.”
“I was wrong.”
“What if I promise you a nap later? And a huge mug of coffee now? The kind you like, with the hint of mocha?”
The covers drop an inch. Peter can see tousled blond hair.
“I hate mornings.” The voice is now whiny. “Why doesn’t the world let me sleep?”
“Because the world sucks,” Peter says. “But you can make it suck a little less by getting the people who woke you up early.”
“Hmmmm.” The covers drop another inch or so. Now Peter can see a green eye.
“You really want to stay sleeping when the rest of them are out saving the world? You know Copper Man is going to take all the credit if you aren’t there.”
The covers are thrown off the bed. Green eyes glare at Peter.
“Fine. You win. I will go save the world,” he snarls. Lasers shoot out of his eyes and into the wall, not even leaving a mark. He turns his glare back to Peter and practically growls, “But I am not going to like it.”
Peter smiles. “That’s the spirit!”
--
With one minute to spare on the official time clock, Peter sits down beside the other superhero interns and buckles himself in. The roar of the jet fills his ears. Avery hands him a Styrofoam cup filled with coffee and nods her head toward the complete team of superheroes behind them.
“Looks like you survived,” she says. She almost looks impressed.
“Yeah,” Peter says. He grins at her, subtly shifting his leg to try and hide the hole in his jeans. “It was nothing.”
Fiction.
This was written for therealljidol Three Strikes Mini Season. If you liked my entry, please consider voting for me! You should also go read all the other amazing entries. You can find them all here. Voting should be up Sunday night!