VELVETEEN vs. Gainful Employment #3
“He took you from your bed, brushing through our security as if it were nothing at all, and you were lost to us, again,” said Torrey, with less sarcasm and more quiet dread than Vel would have expected.
“We rushed to recover you, but not before he had committed some act of perfidious science upon your defenseless form. He was waiting for your return. His laboratory had been divested of all items which even the most generous view could equip with faces.”
“Meaning I’d be effectively powerless,” said Vel, and took the open seat at the table. “Well, that’s always fun. If we didn’t have a supervillain to stress about, we might actually start enjoying our lives.”
Torrey frowned. “You seem remarkably untroubled by this information.”
“Oh, I’m freaking right the fuck out on the inside,” said Vel, amiably enough.
“But I’m back, and that means I have to go and talk to the licensing department about how I’m going to serve the city going forward, and if it’s a choice between worrying about my license and worrying about a supervillain whose code against killing has always kept them on the low end of the threat level, I’m going to panic about the paperwork. ”
“Already?!” asked Yelena. “You just got back!”
“Technically I’m overdue for a renewal and review,” said Vel. “I was able to get an extension due to medical reasons, but if I’m well enough to get abducted, I’m well enough to fill out some forms and argue for my right to arm bears.”
“You mean bear arms,” said Torrey.
“I meant what I said,” said Vel, and took a bite of waffle, expression almost disturbingly serene.
Yelena and Torrey exchanged a look, and didn’t argue. There didn’t seem to be any point.
* * *
“Name?” The clerk sounded profoundly bored, like there had never been anything less interesting than the name of the woman in front of her.
“Velveteen,” said Vel, trying not to fidget.
Some people thought that the Department of Superhuman Licensing was a natural counterbalance to the more mundane but equally frustrating Department of Motor Vehicles.
Since she still needed to visit the DMV if she wanted to keep her car, she felt like this was a little unfair.
It should have been the DMV or the DSL, not both, and certainly not for the rest of her life.
The clerk made a sound that could have been understanding or could have been a catch in her throat, and turned her attention to her keyboard, laboriously typing something into the system.
Vel shifted her weight from one foot to the other, feeling suddenly grubby and small.
This kind of grinding bureaucracy was the sort of thing she had no defenses against, and no desire to endure.
Finally, the clerk asked, “Legal name?”
“Velma Martinez,” said Vel.
The clerk glanced up, showing a flicker of humanity for the first time. “You don’t look much like a Velma,” she said.
“I don’t feel much like a Velma these days,” Vel admitted. “I’m trying to find my way back to her, but it’s harder than I ever expected it to be and I have no idea why I just said that.”
“Sorry,” said the clerk, still laconically. “I have that effect on people.”
“You—wait.” Vel snapped her fingers, then pointed at the clerk. “That’s why you seem so familiar. Exposé, right?”
“Not for a long, long time,” said the clerk. “I retired from the hero business a few years after you got clean, and now I work here, and I have no intention of taking up the mantle again.”
“You could, though, if you wanted to. The Super Patriots are under new management. I’m sure they’d work with you to find an out from your contract that would let you return to superheroics, if you just asked for help.”
“Not interested,” said Exposé. “I got out, I got a degree and a life and a mortgage, and I like the work I do here. I get to make more powerful supers squirm all damn day long. Why would I give that up to go back to being the punchline of every joke about empaths?”
“Because you could help people,” said Vel.
“I do help people.” Exposé pressed a button, and the printer behind her came awake, spewing out a sheet of paper. She ripped it free and passed it to Vel. “I’m helping you right now. Your assessment will be in review room three.”
“Thank you,” said Vel. “You should give me a call sometime. I’m sure Yelena would be thrilled to see you.”
Exposé blinked and then smirked, a flicker of amusement in her eyes. “You really are trying to gather up all the toys The Super Patriots broke and threw away, aren’t you? I’ll keep it in mind, all right? For right now, you know where you’re supposed to be. Next!”
There wasn’t anyone waiting. Vel glanced back and frowned, then looked uncomfortably back to Exposé. “I’ll just go now,” she said.
“You do that,” said Exposé, and watched as Vel walked away, heading for the room where her authority to continue presenting herself as a hero of the people would be reviewed.
It wasn’t really a surprise that the other woman was starting to experience slippage between her heroic and civilian identities; if anything, it was a surprise that it had taken this long.
Most people who survived the Junior Super Patriots training regimen eventually developed a degree of disassociation, becoming more and more distanced from one or the other of their personas.
It could be hard to remember that you were Carole who had to go to the Whole Foods after work when you were spending most of your time as Exposé, empath hero of the city.
There was counseling available, of course, and it would be mandatory if the slippage was bad enough. No one really wanted people who could bench-press buildings to lose track of their own humanity, however inevitable it seemed.
Then Vel was gone, and Exposé turned back to her paperwork. It wasn’t the heroism of her youth, but it had fewer injuries and, ironically, a better medical plan.
* * *
Review room three was small, devoid of decoration, and empty, save for a plain metal table bolted to the floor and a chair on either side.
There wasn’t even a clock on the wall. Vel took a deep breath and moved to sit, trying to get comfortable.
It wasn’t really possible. The chair had been designed to guarantee discomfort, and designed well.
In the end, she had to settle for perching in a way that didn’t cause her active pain, watching the door as warily as a rabbit watches the entrance to a fox’s den.
Minutes ticked by. Vel’s frozen watchfulness became fidgeting, and slowly melted into the motionless stupor of deep and overwhelming boredom.
She had no way to measure the passing time, as her phone had lost all signal as soon as she stepped into the building; all she could do was sit, and wait, and try to stay awake.
Finally, she began to slump forward, until her forehead hit the table with a soft thumping sound.
“Ms…Martinez, is it?”
She jerked upright, blinking blearily at the man in the three-piece suit who was seated across from her.
He probably controlled her license, and hence her ability to continue to live in Portland as an acknowledged superhuman, which meant he controlled her entire existence, since she couldn’t put the genie back in the bottle, and she didn’t want to move.
She moved to wipe her eyes, then froze as she remembered that she was wearing mascara.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t hear you come in. ”
His lips thinned in what she read automatically as disapproval, and he made a note on the sheet of paper in front of him before he returned his attention to her face.
“Interesting,” he said. “There’s only one door, and you appear to have two sets of ears; I would have expected more active listening from someone who models themselves after an animal famous for its hearing. ”
She wanted to protest, to tell him she hadn’t modeled herself after anything; all the modeling had been done by the Marketing Department, and she’d simply gone along with it, too tired or too frazzled to deal with the stress and effort of rebranding herself.
Besides, at this point in her life, if she wasn’t Velveteen, who was she?
She swallowed the objection, forcing herself to smile.
“It’s less about being a literal rabbit—I’m an animal-themed hero, not an animal-aligned hero—and more about having the symbolic ties to the Velveteen Rabbit, from children’s literature. In that regard, I’m a lot like Dotty Gale, or the Fairy Tale Girls. I represent, I don’t embody.”
The man made a noncommittal noise, and another note on his paper. “According to my appointment book, you’re here to discuss your license.”
“Yes, sir. I’ve been on medical leave, but I’m currently the official hero of Portland, Oregon, and I’d like to renew my standing.”
“The position has been held in your absence by Polychrome, a photon manipulator with an impeccable arrest record, and Victory Anna, a gadgeteer and scientific genius. Will you be requesting that they cease their operations?”
“They live with me, so no.”
“Do you feel that Portland is large enough to necessitate a full-time superhero team?”
Vel shrugged, fighting to keep a scowl off of her face.
“Honestly, I’m not sure any city in the world needs a superhero, much less a team.
We tend to attract supervillains. We’re like pinatas to them.
They see us, all colorful and shiny, and they want to hit us until the candy comes out.
Is there enough crime to keep us all busy?
Not of the sort we’re allowed to punch. Wage theft is a way bigger threat than the occasional mugging, but it’s hard to fight that sort of thing.
But really, you don’t want us to be too busy to sit down and take a deep breath. ”
“We don’t?”