Napalm turned around and poked Johnathan. "Hey. Dude."

Johnathan looked up from his book. "Yeah?"

"We should be superheroes."

Johnathan sat up straight, pulling his legs off the seat - he'd gotten used to stretching out in the backseat now that Napalm and Lyric occupied the middle every day. "Superheroes."

"Yeah!"

"Is this some kinda spandex kink thing?"

"Guys," Tessa called back, "not in front of Lyric."

"No, it's cool, Tessa. She's listening to my iPod."

"She does that all day and night," Tessa noted. "Maybe we should disconnect her, get her interacting with us more."

"She interacts just fine! It's just - she only speaks in song lyrics, right? So I'm giving her new words. Expanding her vocabulary. It's good for her." Lyric nodded, but that could have just been a response to the relentlessly upbeat music. Napalm patted her hand, and she flashed a smile up at him, full of adoration. "She's okay," he said. "She's learning."

Tessa decided to let it slide."No headphones at lunch and dinner, though."

"Gotcha. So!" He turned back to Johnathan. "Dude. Superheroes."

"If this is a spandex kink thing, I really don't wanna hear it."

"Dude."

"I know way too much about you already, dude."

"It's not, okay? Totally not. I just wanna zip all over the place saving lives. Looking all gallant. I want to triumph over a world that is fraught with peril, vanquish evildoers, all of that stuff."

Johnathan rolled his eyes. "You have so practiced that speech."

"Have not!"

"Have too."

"...maybe a little. But dude, really. I think it would be awesome. You need to do it too!"

"What would I do? For this superhero gig?"

"You could... drop anvils on people!"

"Like in cartoons?"

"Yeah! Heh. We could call you RoadRunner. Your battlecry could be 'meep meep'!"

"Yeah, and yours could be 'oh shit, pass the fire extinguisher'."

"Hmph. Seriously, though. We could be a team. Lyric could be, um, Element Lass. Tessa can use her crazy brain powers. Adam...huh."

"I can drive the getaway van," Adam offered.

Tessa gently thwacked his arm. "Don't encourage them."

Napalm bounced excitedly in his seat. "Okay, so what should my sound effect be?"

Johnathan, having returned to his book, set it down wearily. "Sound effect?"

"Yeah, for my fireballs. Should it be like a whoosh? A fwoom?"

"Dude. You're not on TV."

"But I can say it. I can toss a fireball and say wha-BAM! Or whatever."

"You are such a dork."

"Yeah, but I'm a dork who can blow shit up."

"Not in the car," Tessa interjected on autopilot.

Napalm rolled his eyes. "Not in the car, not even out the window, I know. Hey, Tessa, where are we going, anyway?"

Tessa grinned. "Connecticut."

"Connecticut? Seriously?"

Johnathan snorted. "Connecticut. Whee."

"No no no! We're going - Tessa, we're going to Ellie's?"

"Sure are."

"Dude! Awesome! John - Ellie's my sister. I told you about Ellie."

"The one who practically raised you?"

"Yeah! Oh, man. When do we get there?"

"About an hour."

"Okay. That gives us plenty of time to work on superhero costume designs!"

Groaning, Johnathan shoved Napalm back into his seat, where Lyric looked up, startled. "You do your costume thing. Just shut up and let me read."