Part 15: New Methods, POV: Sheila

I woke up and immediately checked my phone. I got a text from Sage earlier in the morning that read, "Don't forget to meet here at 9:30!!!" that had a google maps link attached to it. I rubbed my eyes and yawned then finally just sent back a thumbs-up emoji. 

It was only like 7:45 right now, Hmm more than enough time. That's like a ten-fifteen minute subway ride at most I thought while getting up and doing a couple of stretches. 

I stepped outside of my room and saw my younger brother, "why are you up?" I asked him. 

"Watching Youtube" he said, I just rolled my eyes from the boredom of that statement. 

"Alright have fun," I sarcastically responded, "Did you eat anything?" I asked. 

He nodded no. 

"Okay, I'll heat up two croissants. You better eat one," I pointed at him. I walked into the kitchen and grabbed two croissants out of the box of twelve my mom bought yesterday and then put them in the toaster oven for three minutes. After I put them in the toaster, I went to turn on the coffee machine and refill the machine with enough coffee beans. 

I brewed myself just a cup and added a bit of creamer, but not enough where the coffee was sweet. I like my coffee being mostly bitter. 

The toaster-oven went [Ding!] I took the two croissants out using some mini tongs and put them onto a paper plate. 

I sat next to my brother on the couch with my coffee and set the plate down on the coffee table in front of us, "you better eat one." 

He just nodded while watching something on Youtube. I leaned a bit over him to see what he was watching, it was some stupid mobile game that I never played when I was young. 

I just sipped my coffee and chomped my croissant enjoying the cold morning. 

I jumped up from the seat after I finished, "Alright, I gotta get going. If mom or dad ask where I went, I have an early morning art club meeting this weekend for a field trip." 

He just nodded, so I nodded back and then turned around to open the door. But then he said, "y'know" I immediately turned to see him, "Mom and Dad don't care where you go. You're old now!" He smiled at me. 

"... thanks," Damn am I really that old? I used to have to lie through my teeth to get out of the house. I turned back and left the apartment making sure to shut the door behind me. 

I took the usual subway to the same old labs. Thankfully when I paced down the halls to the locker room I saw no one there, but I did hear some clanging and welding noises coming from Andrew's "lab".

I changed then quickly got the hell outta there because frankly, I don't want to see any of them from yesterday because… actually I won't talk about it. 

Now off to, who knows where. Well Google knows where but I don't! I joked to myself. 

I just followed the address and then had to go up like seven flights of stairs. I opened the door to the rooftop and saw Sage there with her mask flipped up on-top of her head like a weird hat eating a granola bar. 

"Sup," she messily nodded while chewing through her food. 

"Hey," I slightly waved my right hand, "ready to go?" 

She popped the rest of the granola bar into her mouth, "Yeah I'm ready to go." she chewed through her food again. 

"Cool, give me a second," I stretched my arms up in the sky and bent back a little bit. Oh there's the tiny pop in my back, "Okay now I'M good to go." I called out to her right after putting on my mask.

"Great." At that moment Sage flicked her mask back onto her face and then leapt off the side of the building, "Let's go!" she shouted from… probably in a fire escape. 

"Alright, coming!" I did a quick run-up from the door to the rooftop and leapt from the ledge all the way over the alley to the next building, "You gotta jump farther if you want a better head-start!" 

"God damn it," I heard Sage mutter from under me climbing up the fire escape, "How'd you learn to jump that far anyway!?" she said as she got up and I let her catch up to me. 

"I had to do this a lot with Zack and Sam… I don't like them leaving me in the dust so I had to be much faster." I said while leaping across a long alleyway and clutching onto a fire escape. 

"Alright," Sage jumped to the same row next to me, "I'll follow you as a challenge then. Adam usually just tails me," then she whispers into my ear, "I think it's so that I can think I'm faster than him. It's actually pretty demeaning."

"Why did you have to whisper that?" I asked as I was climbing the fire escape like the rungs to a ladder. 

 "Because…" she looked out into the busy street of cars going by, "I don't know. Maybe comedic effect?" 

I just nodded, "Okay. Alright then." 

I tried to make some small talk by asking, "What do you think about Richard so far? The annoying rich guy." I hopped over an air vent. 

"From you calling him annoying, you want me to not like him, yes?" She strayed left from the air vent and just kept running. 

I lightly hopped over the small jump to the next building, "I'm hoping so. I don't like how he just flaunts his money all the time." 

"Well," Sage made the same jump, "I can't exactly hate him, he gave us all five thousand dollars." 

"I- yeah that's kinda true," I nodded my head side to side a bit, "I just think he's a bit annoying." 

"He probably is, but I won't judge a person unless I get to know them a bit y'know." Sage commented right before jumping down to a fire escape on the side of the building. 

"So is it hard for you to just kill off the aliens that come for us?" I just took the ladder instead of jumping.

"I-... jeez that's a super hard question to ask right after trying to gossip about a guy!" She looked down a bit to avoid me and to also land on a dumpster, "It makes it a little harder, yes." 

"I think it's very… disturbing to me." I said as I landed on the same dumpster and ran across the alleyway road and then continued to say, "We've had to kill people from other worlds for the sake of our own world." I climbed up the fire escape Sage was climbing, "I don't know if I can handle doing this for maybe the rest of my life. I've asked the guys: Sam and Zack, before if they were just okay with practicing magic till they lay down and die."

"And?" Sage led on, "What did they say about it?" 

I had to take a deep breath, "They told me that they do it for the sake of others. They took up the positions to protect those they love. They called me a bit selfish for even considering these because they chose the community over themselves." 

"Wow." Sage was clearly taken aback. 

"RIGHT!? I said the same thing!" I threw my hands up in the air. 

"Wow is right. They're more good-natured than I thought," Sage acknowledged, "I think that's not their whole reason." 

"How so?" I'm REALLY curious now.

"Not one-hundred percent sure, but… actually I don't know I'm not great at psychology or whatever. I just know that this opportunity will give us a much more permanent meaning to life and maybe even make us famous." 

"Making you famous? Isn't that a bit of a superficial reason to learn magic and fight aliens?" I noticed. 

"You aren't in a much better boat either. You are teetering if you want to because of your own selfish dreams." She threw up a peace sign with her right arm. 

"I can tell you're grinning across your whole mouth right now even with your mask on," I rolled my eyes as I ran across a rooftop. 

When Sage caught up to me she said, "Well I can tell you rolled your eyes as you said that." 

"How?" 

"A magician never tells their secrets." She closed into me and leaned in and whispered, "because you roll your eyes after almost every snap back at us." 

"I do?" I sarcastically asked. 

"You rolled your eyes again, didn't you?" she snarkily commented. 

"... damn it." She's right. 

Sage chuckled at my statement, "hey wait who the hell is that?" 

"Who?" 

"The one on our right a couple buildings away." she told me. 

I turned my head all the way to the right, "Where?" I asked because I didn't see who she was talking about.

Hey what? She grabbed me and turned me to the right a bit, "There, that person," she pointed ahead of me. 

"Oh. hey. You're right," I turned to face her again, "Why do you care?" 

"It's strange," she tilted her head to the right, "I've never seen anyone on the rooftops whenever I went rooftop running." 

"Really? Now THAT'S strange. I've seen people on roofs before." I shrugged. 

"Like what kind of people?" 

"Like people watering rooftop gardens for the building, influencers getting a cool drone shot. People who use the roof like balconies I don't know." I listed off, "I generally just avoid them when I go running because running face to face with superheroes isn't something most people want." 

"Uh huh uh huh," Sage nodded, "Yeah I want to get closer and take a look at the person!" she stated while completely ignoring my point I just made. 

Sage started to run ahead of me, "Hey wait!" I called out to her and had to follow, I don't wanna do this. 

I made sure to catch up and told her, "make sure we're not seen okay?" 

"I'll try." Sage nodded as she leapt on top of another roof. 

We kept sneaking up and eventually we got close enough to say "Wait is that Richard?" I asked. Oh great, just exactly who we were talking about. 

The hairstyle was the same as we saw on him, but his clothes were a bit different. He was in a black suit… or tuxedo? I don't know the difference, but he was in a black one instead of navy blue and he has silver highlights like a pocket-watch, buttons etc instead of gold. 

"I… think so? He has a different suit on," Sage also noticed. 

"True, he does have a decent sense of fashion." I nodded side to side. 

"It's a bit much for this part of New York though, if it was Wall Street and he was on the floor trading then that'd be a bit better," Sage rattled on and on but then asked, "Should we go say hi?" 

"Well, considering I don't like him very much-" Sage jumped ahead anyway, "And you're just gonna go anyway, understood." This might be how Sam feels. 

I chased after her, when I finally caught up I heard her say, "What's up man!" she said, slapping his back. 

"MMF-" he choked and then coughed, "Greetings companions." he nodded at her. 

"Whatcha up to?" she asked.

Richard pointed across the street, "That is a famous Cheesecake shop according to reviews on the internet. I was eating one before you rudely and uncomfortably interrupted to greet me." 

"Oh, haha sorry," Sage put her right hand and rubbed the back of her head. 

Richard looks beyond Sage's left, "Water one," he nods to me. 

"Hey," I slightly waved. 

"Oh, Master Richard," I heard to the right. It was Richard's butler holding a tray of more slices of cheesecake, "Would either of you care for a slice?" 

"Oh sorry," Sage waves, "I'm allergic to dairy so I can't-" 

"I prepared for this, I have brought a dairy-free substitute Cheesecake," Richard's butler immediately states. Holy shit, how did he know? I didn't even know…

"How did you know!?" Sage asked, "Did you go through my records or something?" she pointed at the butler. 

"If you excuse me pushing on your behavior, but pointing at another person is rude, madam. Though, I am just good at providing service. I must be ready for any opportunity." 

"Oh… then yeah sure I'll have a slice," Sage care-freely flipped up her mask and walked toward him. 

"Wait Sage!" I called out. 

"What?" She was perplexed. 

"Shouldn't we be more cautious of removing our masks cause y'know, keeping a secret identity 'n all." 

"... Too late!" she grabbed another slice the butler put out for her. 

"Ah hell, give me a slice too!" I waved my hand at the butler. After I got my slice I sat down next to Sage and Richard and just ate alongside them. 

"Richard, why did you decide to eat on a rooftop?" I asked him. 

"Because I learned that a common cardiovascular exercise for this group is running on top of roofs. In my opinion, this practice is a highly intelligent decision because it practices both real experience in a city and building your stamina." he praised. 

"Cool." I nodded. For a bit the three of us were just silent, I'm pretty sure Sage and I just didn't really know how to talk to Richard… really damn awkward.

To fill the silence, I just said "It was Xeno's idea to have us do this exercise and by now it's just spread throughout all of us." 

"Remarkable. The extraterrestrial had a truly remarkable idea," he acknowledged. "Jeeves!" he snapped his fingers with his right hand. 

"Yes, master." Richard's butler sped to Richard and bent down to be at eye-level with the currently sat down rich boy. 

Richard tapped the front of his lips with his right index finger, "hmmm, seek Xeno and grant him a five-thousand-dollar bonus courtesy of the Adlehardht name."

"As you wish." his butler just nodded and immediately went to make a couple of phone calls. How can he just throw away so much money?

"Okay," Richard stood up, "Let's make our way back into the labs!" he snapped his fingers. "Jeeves! Call for an SUV!" 

His butler, even though he is taking a call, gleefully bows in acceptance. I don't get rich rich people's lives. The three of us waited for all of the calls that Richard's butler had to make and then we decided to get down to the street using the fire escape. Richard went down first then his butler. 

I pulled Sage aside and asked, "do we wanna follow them or just continue doin' our own thing?" 

"To be honest," Sage started to walk towards the fire escape ledge, "I think it'd be fun if we followed them- Ah shit." 

"What?" I walked up to the ledge too. 

"Look out at the street," Sage pointed as she put her mask back on. 

There were a few guys up front looking pretty bulky all in similar colored navy-blue suits with gold rings. Their hair was combed back with so much gel their hair could function as a mirror, "What? It's just other rich guys, right up their Richard's alley, I'd say." I also put my mask back on, "Nothing to worry about." 

"Those guys are mafia Sheila." Sage stated. 

"How can you tell?"

"In the part of town I grew up in, there were a few buildings that the mafia own. Trust me growing up there you just know." she explained. 

"And what of it?" At this point I think I know what point Sage is making but I need to be sure. 

"What if Richard and his butler get jumped." Sage whispered to me, "even worse, what if they were waiting for those two and had been watching them then saw us." 

"Okay okay I understand," yup I was right! "Let's keep to the shadows and watch them closely." I said as I started to slowly climb down the fire escape while hugging the wall making sure I'm not seen. 

"That's probably for the best." Sage followed. 

Richard and his butler both got down to the ground and started to walk to the sidewalk. Before they got to the street the guys at the front, "ay ay where ya walkin' ah?" one of the four guys said while filing his nails with a gold file. 

"And who may you be good sir?" Richard asked calmly. 

The guy just smiled, "We're with the people who own these streets y'see." 

"Yeah!" The three behind him raised their voices. 

"Y'see we're new with those people and we'd like to bring up our name." He explained, "Now here's the unfortunate part… in order to bring up our name there has to be some sacrifices made. And that sacrifice will be you and your gramps here." he pointed the file at the butler. 

"Listen, we don't have to do actions like those in here. We're in the great city of New York! The big apple! The city that never sleeps! The melting pot of the world now!" Richard spoke highly of our city. 

"Yes yes all those names may be true," The guy put his gold file into a pocket and grabbed four silver rings and put them on his right hand making one ring for every finger including a gold ring he was already wearing. He got in a stance and said "but that city still has crime and bills to pay!" as he threw a punch. 

Shit, I should help!- 

Richard's butler leaped in front of him, not only took the punch, he smacked the side of the guy's arm with the side of his right hand stopping the momentum and using his left arm to push the arm away and turn the guy backwards, "That's enough out of you sir." the butler stated. What the fuck was that!? 

"What the fuck was that?" Sage whispered. 

"I don't know!" I told her. 

"Jeeves," Richard grabbed the shoulder of his butler, "Teach them a lesson. Minimal force and prioritize not damaging your clothing and theirs. They have a good sense of fashion afterall." 

"None needed sir. I shan't need you to use force on humans." His butler replied. 

"Yeah!" one of the other guys shouted, "Cause the only thing he can use force on and work are dogs!" He threw another punch. 

The butler used both of his hands to catch the punch.

Another guy came from the butler's right with rings on his fist. The butler leaned back while taking a step back making the guy in his arms stance weaker. He then pulled on the guy right in front of the other throwing the ringed punch so the punch landed on him instead of the butler. 

"Woah." Sage just commented. 

To make sure the guys didn't land on him, he used his right leg and kicked both of them onto a trash can. 

"I apologize master Richard. I have just dirtied their clothing." he stated. 

"It's okay Jeeves. It was unavoidable." Richard acknowledged. 

The first guy came at him with a dagger in his hand swinging recklessly. He swung and pulled both his arms back to swing again. 

"Your mistake." the butler snarkily said, he grabbed the guy from the collar, pulled him closer and quickly started rapidly jabbing and chopping the guy's torso leaving not even half a second for him to understand what is even happening. 

[Bam!] The last jab was using his palm knocking the guy away and on the ground now. 

"Are we finished here?" the butler asked confidently. 

"NOT YET!" The fourth one charged at him with two daggers and the butler responded by simply just kicking his legs, stopping the movement of the last one and tripping him to the ground. 

The guy who tripped and the guy that the butler knocked away both got back up and got ready to shank the butler. 

The butler looked at both his sides and then at the right moment did a split kick, kicking the both of them in the face and knocking them both back where they were just previously: on the ground. 

The butler's suit looked completely untouched and it was amazing!

"Get back up here, let's beat it before any cops make it." Sage immediately started climbing up the stairs.

"What got you so worried?" 

"Public-ish fight. We gotta scram!" Sage exclaimed, she peeked her head out of the fire escape and yelled at Richard and his butler, "come on, get out of here too! We should head back to the labs!" 

Richard started to climb up the fire escape and the butler just nodded then followed along. We all scrambled to a rendezvous point where a black SUV was waiting for us in a back alley. The driver told us that the cops are sorting out the incident and arresting the people that attacked Richard and his butler. 

When we made it back to the labs we were told to wait in the meeting room because there would be another meeting today. Yay, I can't wait for this upcoming awkwardness. That or another shit show. 

Everyone started to file in, "I wanted to quickly call a meeting and I'd like to apologize for my behavior yesterday." Quinn stated, "I saw footage from Sage and Sheila's masks today and… I have some information to say from it along with a new schedule I planned which will go into effect once this meeting is concluded." 

"What is it?" Andrew leaned back and kicked his feet up on the table, "I want to get back to my lab. I have some pretty important stuff to make ASAP." 

"Well, Mr. Jeeves, should you explain?" he pointed to him.

"Understood." he bowed and when he stood back up straight he stated that, "to put it simply, I have trained in martial arts for most of my life. I have mastered several applicable arts for practical combat. I have practiced because I have trained to be the best butler possible. Including keeping my master here," he patted Richard's shoulder, "as safe as possible." 

Quinn nodded, "That's correct. Richard and Mr. Jeeves were attacked by people from the mob. People I know are currently cleaning up the situation, but the important part is that from Sage and Sheila's cameras I was able to witness a demonstration of his prowess." 

"So? What does this got to do with anythin'?" Cyrus asked. 

"What I'm saying is, if Mr. Jeeves so chooses, he can give each member some pointers and teach everyone here some martial arts." Quinn looked to him, "what do you say?" 

Jeeves then looked at Richard, "master, should I?" man he really doesn't do anything unless Richard wants him too.

"Hmm," he thought aloud for a second and then gave his response, "I am beyond selfishness where only I can shine. I am so selfish that it must be that those surrounding me must also shine in their own unique way different from mine. For the sake of their abilities, you should teach them all!" 

"If that is the case," Jeeves bowed at Quinn, "I will humbly accept this gracious offer." 

"Perfect!" Quinn clapped his hands, "Now let's work on the next schedule." he pressed a few buttons and a hologram image of each of the nine of us appeared, "Xeno has informed me that an efficient way to quickly boost your powers is to work on combination spells that take more than one person to do, is that right?" 

Xeno stood up, "That is correct. Combination-spells, combi-spells, tied spells, there are many names to it, but essentially it is combining two person's magic power at the perfect ratio to certainly multiply the damage the spell commits." 

"The perfect ratio?" Zack took the words out of Xeno's mouth, "what is the perfect ratio?" 

"There exist many kinds Zack, depending on the spell," he replied. 

"If there are many it should be 'at a perfect ratio' not 'at the perfect ratio' then." Zack you fucking nerd- 

"In any case, I wanted to pair up everyone into pairs of two." 

"Nope." Andrew stood up straight and confidently exclaimed, "I work alone." 

"I knew this would come along," Quinn sighed, "We have nine members, and if I want to pair them into twos. That leaves one over, which is you. I'll be pairing you up into these pairs." Quinn sorted out the nine images of our faces. 

The pairs were Sam and I, Sage and Adam, Zack and Will, Richard and Cyrus. Great, I have to work with Sam again, "These, by Xeno's design, are the most effective pairs. Combination spells are supposedly easier to conduct when done between two friends and even better between two siblings." 

"So that's why Zack and I are paired huh," Will commented. 

"How did you know that siblings and friends would be better at doing these spells?" Zack asked to be sure. 

"On my home planet, t'was just a consistently known fact," Xeno stated, "And I did a lot of spells together with my own male sibling." 

"Your brother?" Sam asked. 

"Yes, that is the word isn't it." Xeno stated and everyone pretty much just awkwardly nodded. 

"Was he older than you or younger?" Sage asked. 

"He was my elder brother, he was proficient in fire." Xeno said. Wait… was? The room was just silent after that. 

"In any case," Quinn broke the silence, "These are the four pairs. And now I wanted to cover the teaching schedule. Each of you will have one day per week for the whole day to work with Xeno to better your magic. The same will happen with Mr. Jeeves but a different day of course. Every two Sundays we will have a bi-weekly meeting to discuss each pair's progress. Each day you do not have a professional lesson day, then you are free to practice however you see fit. As long as you make consistent progress. Is that clear?" Everyone in the room nodded. 

"Perfect, then I can go," Andrew stood up. 

"Hold up mister," Quinn reached his hand out stopping him, "you will still have lessons too and I have to explain our schedule." 

Quinn did so and then we were dismissed each with a piece of paper that he just printed so we can remember our schedule better. Seems simple enough. 

On my way out to a gym Sam caught up to me saying, "hey. It looks like our lesson with Xeno will be every Monday and our martial arts lesson with Mr. Jeeves will be Tuesdays." 

"Yeah, it seems very easy to remember. Pretty sweet of Quinn to make every lesson for everyone like Mon/Tues or Tues/Wed y'know." 

"Yeah I do," then he asked, "so what should we do first?"

"Take an empty gym and practice I guess," I muttered to him. 

The both of us walked into gym number three and said, "so how do we want to practice combination spells?" 

"We can check the book that Xeno quickly wrote for all of us. Check if there's any combinations in there to make." 

"How about we," I started moving my hands and forming a ball of water, "figure out our ratio together is." I said while smirking with the blue-glowing ball of water swirling in my left hand.

"Alright," Sam nodded and started to create a red ball of fire that still had whispers flying off of it. Seems that Sam has some work to do with controlling his magic, "whatcha staring at?" he asked me. 

"Oh, nothing. Let's try blasting them together in a single direction for now and see how it reacts." 

"That wall work?" he jerked his head to the wall on the opposite side from where we entered. 

"Yeah sure, alright on three." I told him, "one… two… three!" The both of us shot our hands outwards and our water and fire ball collided with each other. Hopefully they sync up well- 

[BOOM!]

Sam and I crashed onto the ground, "Agh!" he exhaled. The water and fire balls exploded into a big rush of crashing waves turning to steam with roaring flames at the center.

"Well that was shit," he said while standing up, "try dialing back the amount of water you use." 

"And what if that doesn't work?" I asked him. 

"Then you go back to regular amounts while I dial back the amount of fire I use." he calmly said, "trial and error!" then yelled with his arms fanned out like he's big and confident. 

"Alright then, sounds like a lot of work is ahead of us." I rolled my eyes.

"You'd be right." And then the both of us started to charge up another round of fire and water balls.