Categories > Movies > Sky High > I Am Not My Parents
Ch. 01: Bus Ride and Power Placement
1 reviewLillith wakes up and heads to her new school, Sky High, and watches her fellow students get placed into hero or sidekick land.
0Unrated
Disclaimer: The concept of Sky High belongs to whoever owns the rights to the movie, this is just my own fic that I came up with on my own. Oh, and I'm going to include some powers in this chapter that were in the movie because I like them and they looked pretty cool or funny, or I altered one or two slightly, so I'm not trying to steal anything. And I own Lillith. And any other characters I choose to introduce I own, even if they exist for only one chapter. And I am definitely not making money off of this, so please don't sue me.
"Marie! It's time to get up!" Lisa yells up the stairs.
"No shit." I mumbled, throwing back the covers and getting out of bed. Pushing my mussed hair out of my face I shuffled down the hallway to the bathroom and I did my business and then I took a shower. Walking back to my room carrying my pajamas in my hand I concentrated my power to heat me up and dry me off so that I was completely dry by the time I opened my dresser and got underwear on. I grabbed a pair of black jeans and put those on and I put on a new pair of shitkicker combat boots. I put on an Avenged Sevenfold tank top and grabbed a zip up plain black sweatshirt and my new backpack (I got pissed off at a bunch of preppy girls on the last day of middle school and instead of beating the shit out of them, the way I wanted to, I burnt my backpack to a crisp) and I headed downstairs.
"I hope you have time for breakfast." Lisa said as she handed me an empty bowl and a box of Lucky Charms (I am addicted to this shit worse then a 100% pothead is addicted to weed).
"I'll make it." I said, pouring the milk in and attacking the cereal.
"So, you nervous about starting high school, Sky High, no less?"
"Nope." I said through a mouthful of cereal.
"Really? I would be if I were in your shoes."
"Well, Lisa, I've already lived through worse, how much worse can a high school full of kids who have powers be?" My aunt and me had long ago agreed to me calling her by her first name instead of calling her aunt Lisa.
I ate my cereal and brushed my teeth and I was out of the house a good ten minutes before the bus came.
I sat down on the curb and pulled my MP3 player out of my backpack and started listening to Cradle of Filth. I was drawing designs in the dirt on the side of the road when the bus pulled up in front of me.
"Are you Lillith MacLeod?" The bus driver asked, reading from a piece of paper and pronouncing my last name wrong. I swear, only other Scottish people could pronounce my last name.
"It's supposed to sound like MacCloud." I said, enunciating the last half of my last name as I walked on the bus and grabbed a seat at the back of the bus.
I sat in the back of the bus because that's what I always did. Kids who don't look like the rest of the general populace and who are fingered, as troublemakers or problem children when they're not are destined for the back. Back of the bus, back of the classroom, back of the line, the back of everything. It had been that way since I had started school at the age of three. My pre-school teacher pretty much ignored me because she knew who my parents were, the same with my kindergarten and first grade teachers. Hence why my handwriting sucks and I read slower then is normal for someone my age. But I got used to it and my mouth got even worse because of those three years of my life. I could speak well, I learned it from hearing adults talk and picking up what they said and storing it in my brain, it's just that the reading and writing were bad. So I sat there silently and looked around the bus, at everyone holding conversations with everyone else. We picked up the last kid and I noticed things happening. The bus driver ripped something off of his arm and panels that you would normally find on a plane were pulled out of the air practically. And then the seatbelt came flying over my chest.
"Oh shit." I said, sitting up straighter. Well, as straight as those damned tight straps would allow. The bus increased speed and went flying off of an unfinished highway ramp and then it did a sheer drop for a few feet in which I almost lost my breakfast (and I wasn't the only one) before the bus started flying off.
I stared out the window as we rose through the clouds, sorta like an ungainly bird or dragon. Something that could fly anyway. I watched the clouds split as we flew through them faster then a hot butter knife slicing through butter. A few minutes later, after the screaming had stopped, I spotted the school before anyone else. Good eyesight from my mom.
I saw the bus driver say something from his reflection in the rearview mirror and I grabbed my bag as the seatbelt came off and we landed, albeit roughly. All the kids on the bus filed off and we walked across the commons, me bringing up the rear. I told ya, the back of everything. All of a sudden we were herded closer together by something, a person, running around us. I stuck my foot out as she zipped towards me (I thought it was a girl at least) and she went flying, getting a mouthful of turf and dirt of the commons.
"Wow, that sucks, you must have tripped on a rock. You might wanna go see the nurse for pain meds or something." I said, barely containing my laughter.
The girl glared at me as me and the rest of my bus moved up the steps and into the school. We followed, well, actually, I read and directed the rest of them like sheep into the school gym. We milled around with the about three hundred or so other freshman, waiting for someone to come in and tell us what was happening.
A few minutes later, we got what we wanted. I was sitting on the seating all around the walls of the gym, listening to Fall Out Boy this time (I like what I like, if you don't like that then that's your own problem), when we got silver and white swirly lights flying over the heads of the freshman, freaking them all out. I just made a 'pssht' noise and pulled out one headphone. I'd seen much more impressive entrances from my parents friends. Whoever the flying shiny mass was, she wasn't doing anything new.
The lady coalesced and came together behind a podium complete with microphone and there was no doubting that this was Principal Powers, apparently she'd been there since my parents had attended the school. Which meant she was older then dirt. To me anyway.
"Welcome to Sky High. My name is Principal Powers and I am your principal." She said, with a grin so sugary sweet I threw up in my mouth. I hate people who are falsely sweet, it bugs the living shit out of me. "In a few minutes you will all be going through power placement. It's nothing big to worry about, but this will determine where and how you spend your next four years here at Sky High. But I assure you, whether you leave this door going down the hero path or the hero support path, you will all enjoy your experiences here. Comets away!" And she flew away in that same whirl of lights and our attention was brought to behind the crowd. I saw your stereotypical looking 80's clothing style gym teacher rising out from the floor.
"Wowww." I said quietly. This guy was definitely overcompensating for something.
"My name is Coach Boomer. You may call me Coach or Coach Boomer, that is it. And before we go any further in power placement, let's get one thing straight: My word is law. Whether or not I say hero or sidekick, you will accept it and not complain. But, of course, every year I get a few who feel the need to protest and complain about their placement. We call these people 'whiner-babies.' This year, there will be no 'whiner-babies.' Is that clear?"
The assembled freshmen mumbled a reply and I plugged my ears, I'd been forewarned about Boomer.
"I said is that CLEAR?" And he just shouted the word, putting his power behind it so much that it knocked over one slight freshman.
"Yessir, Coach Boomer, sir!" The freshmen shouted.
"Good. First up, Gaston DeLacourt." Boomer says, reading from his clipboard and totally butchering this kid's name.
I watched this thin, literal pizza face kid walk up on the platform.
"Well, what's your power?" Boomer demanded.
Gaston just inhaled, making that noise you make when you hock up a loogie and he spat the loogie up onto a supporting column.
"Your power is you can hock a loogie really far? Sideki-" Gaston tapped Boomer on the shoulder and pointed to where he'd spat. And Boomer saw what I was already seeing. Gaston's spit when used in this capacity was acid that could eat through walls. Five bucks says he ends up as a bank robber.
"Acid spit? Hero." Gaston smiled and walked off the platform.
And so power placement continued. Some hippie looking chick made the plants outside the gym grow to block the light from coming in the windows before making them shrink again. She definitely got put in hero territory. And the next three kids were put into hero class. One guy could make eleven copies of himself and they functioned on their own like they were the real thing. Some girl turned herself into a purely electrical being and made a couple light bulbs blow. And this girl made herself stretch from one side of the gym to the other.
"You! Platform!" Boomer barks, pointing to a punk looking guy.
The kid got up and the platform and stood next to Boomer.
"Well? What's your power?"
"I shapeshift." He said.
"Then shapeshift!" Boomer shouts. The kid lets out this affected sigh and then he shrinks into- well, I can't tell because I couldn't exactly see him. But that was resolved a moment later by none other then loudmouth himself, Boomer.
"A rat?"
"I'm still a big rat." The kid said, his voice super squeaky.
"Not even a swarm of rats? Like the ones in the New York subway?"
"Nope." The kid said.
"Sidekick." Boomer says, imitating the kid's voice.
"Go bite me." The kid said.
And it went on. Two more kids got put into sidekick class and I actually started dozing off and before I knew, about forty kids had been put in hero or sidekick class. And that was when Boomer decided to notice that I was not sitting with the rest of the class.
"Who are you?"
"A freshman." I answered, intentionally trying to annoy him. This guy was just such a dick, acting all big and intimidating and giving off such a damn attitude.
"Well, why aren't you with the other freshmen?"
"Why aren't you wearing longer gym shorts?" I countered.
"Marie! It's time to get up!" Lisa yells up the stairs.
"No shit." I mumbled, throwing back the covers and getting out of bed. Pushing my mussed hair out of my face I shuffled down the hallway to the bathroom and I did my business and then I took a shower. Walking back to my room carrying my pajamas in my hand I concentrated my power to heat me up and dry me off so that I was completely dry by the time I opened my dresser and got underwear on. I grabbed a pair of black jeans and put those on and I put on a new pair of shitkicker combat boots. I put on an Avenged Sevenfold tank top and grabbed a zip up plain black sweatshirt and my new backpack (I got pissed off at a bunch of preppy girls on the last day of middle school and instead of beating the shit out of them, the way I wanted to, I burnt my backpack to a crisp) and I headed downstairs.
"I hope you have time for breakfast." Lisa said as she handed me an empty bowl and a box of Lucky Charms (I am addicted to this shit worse then a 100% pothead is addicted to weed).
"I'll make it." I said, pouring the milk in and attacking the cereal.
"So, you nervous about starting high school, Sky High, no less?"
"Nope." I said through a mouthful of cereal.
"Really? I would be if I were in your shoes."
"Well, Lisa, I've already lived through worse, how much worse can a high school full of kids who have powers be?" My aunt and me had long ago agreed to me calling her by her first name instead of calling her aunt Lisa.
I ate my cereal and brushed my teeth and I was out of the house a good ten minutes before the bus came.
I sat down on the curb and pulled my MP3 player out of my backpack and started listening to Cradle of Filth. I was drawing designs in the dirt on the side of the road when the bus pulled up in front of me.
"Are you Lillith MacLeod?" The bus driver asked, reading from a piece of paper and pronouncing my last name wrong. I swear, only other Scottish people could pronounce my last name.
"It's supposed to sound like MacCloud." I said, enunciating the last half of my last name as I walked on the bus and grabbed a seat at the back of the bus.
I sat in the back of the bus because that's what I always did. Kids who don't look like the rest of the general populace and who are fingered, as troublemakers or problem children when they're not are destined for the back. Back of the bus, back of the classroom, back of the line, the back of everything. It had been that way since I had started school at the age of three. My pre-school teacher pretty much ignored me because she knew who my parents were, the same with my kindergarten and first grade teachers. Hence why my handwriting sucks and I read slower then is normal for someone my age. But I got used to it and my mouth got even worse because of those three years of my life. I could speak well, I learned it from hearing adults talk and picking up what they said and storing it in my brain, it's just that the reading and writing were bad. So I sat there silently and looked around the bus, at everyone holding conversations with everyone else. We picked up the last kid and I noticed things happening. The bus driver ripped something off of his arm and panels that you would normally find on a plane were pulled out of the air practically. And then the seatbelt came flying over my chest.
"Oh shit." I said, sitting up straighter. Well, as straight as those damned tight straps would allow. The bus increased speed and went flying off of an unfinished highway ramp and then it did a sheer drop for a few feet in which I almost lost my breakfast (and I wasn't the only one) before the bus started flying off.
I stared out the window as we rose through the clouds, sorta like an ungainly bird or dragon. Something that could fly anyway. I watched the clouds split as we flew through them faster then a hot butter knife slicing through butter. A few minutes later, after the screaming had stopped, I spotted the school before anyone else. Good eyesight from my mom.
I saw the bus driver say something from his reflection in the rearview mirror and I grabbed my bag as the seatbelt came off and we landed, albeit roughly. All the kids on the bus filed off and we walked across the commons, me bringing up the rear. I told ya, the back of everything. All of a sudden we were herded closer together by something, a person, running around us. I stuck my foot out as she zipped towards me (I thought it was a girl at least) and she went flying, getting a mouthful of turf and dirt of the commons.
"Wow, that sucks, you must have tripped on a rock. You might wanna go see the nurse for pain meds or something." I said, barely containing my laughter.
The girl glared at me as me and the rest of my bus moved up the steps and into the school. We followed, well, actually, I read and directed the rest of them like sheep into the school gym. We milled around with the about three hundred or so other freshman, waiting for someone to come in and tell us what was happening.
A few minutes later, we got what we wanted. I was sitting on the seating all around the walls of the gym, listening to Fall Out Boy this time (I like what I like, if you don't like that then that's your own problem), when we got silver and white swirly lights flying over the heads of the freshman, freaking them all out. I just made a 'pssht' noise and pulled out one headphone. I'd seen much more impressive entrances from my parents friends. Whoever the flying shiny mass was, she wasn't doing anything new.
The lady coalesced and came together behind a podium complete with microphone and there was no doubting that this was Principal Powers, apparently she'd been there since my parents had attended the school. Which meant she was older then dirt. To me anyway.
"Welcome to Sky High. My name is Principal Powers and I am your principal." She said, with a grin so sugary sweet I threw up in my mouth. I hate people who are falsely sweet, it bugs the living shit out of me. "In a few minutes you will all be going through power placement. It's nothing big to worry about, but this will determine where and how you spend your next four years here at Sky High. But I assure you, whether you leave this door going down the hero path or the hero support path, you will all enjoy your experiences here. Comets away!" And she flew away in that same whirl of lights and our attention was brought to behind the crowd. I saw your stereotypical looking 80's clothing style gym teacher rising out from the floor.
"Wowww." I said quietly. This guy was definitely overcompensating for something.
"My name is Coach Boomer. You may call me Coach or Coach Boomer, that is it. And before we go any further in power placement, let's get one thing straight: My word is law. Whether or not I say hero or sidekick, you will accept it and not complain. But, of course, every year I get a few who feel the need to protest and complain about their placement. We call these people 'whiner-babies.' This year, there will be no 'whiner-babies.' Is that clear?"
The assembled freshmen mumbled a reply and I plugged my ears, I'd been forewarned about Boomer.
"I said is that CLEAR?" And he just shouted the word, putting his power behind it so much that it knocked over one slight freshman.
"Yessir, Coach Boomer, sir!" The freshmen shouted.
"Good. First up, Gaston DeLacourt." Boomer says, reading from his clipboard and totally butchering this kid's name.
I watched this thin, literal pizza face kid walk up on the platform.
"Well, what's your power?" Boomer demanded.
Gaston just inhaled, making that noise you make when you hock up a loogie and he spat the loogie up onto a supporting column.
"Your power is you can hock a loogie really far? Sideki-" Gaston tapped Boomer on the shoulder and pointed to where he'd spat. And Boomer saw what I was already seeing. Gaston's spit when used in this capacity was acid that could eat through walls. Five bucks says he ends up as a bank robber.
"Acid spit? Hero." Gaston smiled and walked off the platform.
And so power placement continued. Some hippie looking chick made the plants outside the gym grow to block the light from coming in the windows before making them shrink again. She definitely got put in hero territory. And the next three kids were put into hero class. One guy could make eleven copies of himself and they functioned on their own like they were the real thing. Some girl turned herself into a purely electrical being and made a couple light bulbs blow. And this girl made herself stretch from one side of the gym to the other.
"You! Platform!" Boomer barks, pointing to a punk looking guy.
The kid got up and the platform and stood next to Boomer.
"Well? What's your power?"
"I shapeshift." He said.
"Then shapeshift!" Boomer shouts. The kid lets out this affected sigh and then he shrinks into- well, I can't tell because I couldn't exactly see him. But that was resolved a moment later by none other then loudmouth himself, Boomer.
"A rat?"
"I'm still a big rat." The kid said, his voice super squeaky.
"Not even a swarm of rats? Like the ones in the New York subway?"
"Nope." The kid said.
"Sidekick." Boomer says, imitating the kid's voice.
"Go bite me." The kid said.
And it went on. Two more kids got put into sidekick class and I actually started dozing off and before I knew, about forty kids had been put in hero or sidekick class. And that was when Boomer decided to notice that I was not sitting with the rest of the class.
"Who are you?"
"A freshman." I answered, intentionally trying to annoy him. This guy was just such a dick, acting all big and intimidating and giving off such a damn attitude.
"Well, why aren't you with the other freshmen?"
"Why aren't you wearing longer gym shorts?" I countered.
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