“And there was nothing natural about it,” quipped Harley.
“I thought it was sort of fun,” said Wonder Woman, brushing the snow off her golden shield.
“I did my part and created the snow and ice,” Frost said defensively. Her cool blue hair was pulled up into a ponytail on top of her head, making it look like a cascade of sleek, shiny ice was falling down her back. “It’s not my fault that you two couldn’t get the avalanche to go in the right direction.”
Wonder Woman and Hawkgirl glanced at each other.
“Well,” Poison Ivy said, wanting to head off an argument between her friends, “the good news is that before it did permanent damage to the school grounds, El Diablo was able to melt the snow, and then Supergirl created irrigation ditches so that the runoff could water the cornfield I’m growing.”
“It made for great video,” Harley added. “Especially when it looked like the school was about to get buried in snow.”
“You posted that already?” asked Bumblebee. Harley never ceased to amaze her. A lot of kids at Super Hero High were like that—doing the seemingly impossible. But then, what did you expect from a school of the best of the best? Sometimes she couldn’t even believe she went to Super Hero High.
“Posted it the sec I got out of class,” boasted Harley. She did a vault over Hawkgirl’s chair, followed by a cartwheel, and landed on top of her desk with her hands raised in the air. No one blinked. They were used to it.
The woman in the front of the room with the blond hair and a bell on her sweater shook her head. “Harley Quinn,” their teacher, Liberty Belle, cautioned, “we’ve talked about this before. Save your gymnastics for Coach Wildcat’s P.E. class. In Super Hero History, you’ll learn best by sitting down and looking up front.”
Batgirl turned on her new Scribble Scrawler, a mini-computer she had designed that translated handwriting into type and then automatically organized it, adding footnotes and citations. Big Barda gripped a pen. She had a dozen more at the ready, since she tended to press too hard when she wrote and often broke them. Poison Ivy whispered to the Candytuft flowers in her backpack.
“Ivy,” Liberty Belle said gently. “No talking to your plants in class.”
Poison Ivy sat up, her face turning the color of her red hair. “Sorry,” she said. “It’s just that I’m training my Candytuft flowers to listen and play back what they hear.”
Liberty Belle nodded. “In that case, fine,” she said, then turned to the class. “I know you’ve been studying natural disasters with your other teachers,” she began. “So I’ve decided to continue this trend by going over some of the more famous incidents in history. Who can name a catastrophic natural disaster?”
Lots of hands were raised. There were the usual—Wonder Woman, Batgirl, and Hawkgirl. Liberty Belle scanned the room. “Big Barda,” she said brightly. “Let’s hear from you.”
Barda looked around. Frost and Cheetah were whispering to each other and giggling. “On my home planet, Apokolips, there was a huge earthquake,” Barda began. She shut her eyes, remembering it. “The ground shook so hard that everyone was tossed around, slamming into walls, toppling off bridges. I was little when it happened, but I can still remember the devastation. Buildings fell and whole towns were destroyed, and they were never rebuilt even though Darkseid, our ruler, promised they would be.”
When she opened her eyes, everyone was staring at her. Barda pressed her lips together and said softly, “Um…earthquakes are a type of natural disaster.”
“So are villains who pretend to be super heroes,” someone who sounded suspiciously like Frost said loud enough to be heard by some, but soft enough for the teacher not to notice.
“Big Barda is a true super hero,” Supergirl said, shushing Frost.
“And she has fought bravely in battle,” Wonder Woman added.
“I challenge anyone to prove otherwise!” Supergirl exclaimed.
Liberty Belle cleared her throat loudly. The room went silent. The teacher said, “Thank you for sharing a firsthand experience, Barda. That must have been very hard to do. I appreciate it.”
Big Barda nodded and looked at Supergirl, who gave her a warm smile. Everyone knew that Barda had once tried to overthrow Super Hero High, but it seemed like a long time ago. Since then, she had changed her ways, and she was now one of the school’s most loyal students.
Barda smiled back at Supergirl as their teacher continued.
“Now, class, we are going to learn about Earth’s natural disasters, then discuss what we could have done to help, had we been there. Let’s start with the Lake Nyos limnic eruption. Does anyone know what that was? Yes, Batgirl?”
“Limnic eruptions are rare, and this one occurred in a lake in the Cameroonian jungle,” Batgirl began. “A magma chamber leaked carbon dioxide into the water, changing it to carbonic acid and causing the lake to erupt.”
“Excellent research!” Liberty Belle exclaimed. “Now, who can tell us how we could have prevented this?”
Raven raised her hand. Her ruby-red lipstick matched the red gem on her forehead. Bumblebee admired her short, dark hair with red tips. She had thought about cutting her hair that short, or even getting a buzz cut, but in the end decided she liked her long, wavy hair. “It couldn’t have been prevented,” Raven said. “I’ve been to places like that, and it would be nearly impossible to monitor them all.”
“We could try, couldn’t we?” asked Miss Martian meekly.
“That would be difficult,” Liberty Belle said as Miss Martian began to fade from sight. “Though it’s a great idea. However, on Earth, there are around 117 million lakes.”
“So what do we do?” Bumblebee asked. One hundred and seventeen million was a lot.
“I was just about to ask all of you that very same question,” said Liberty Belle. “You will pair up alphabetically. Each team will have twenty minutes to come up with a solution. Batgirl and Barda, you’re a team. Beast Boy, you’re with Bumblebee. Cheetah and Cyborg—”
Bumblebee would have rather been partnered with Poison Ivy, or Batgirl, or anyone but Beast Boy. He was so annoying! Now, as she glanced at him, he morphed into a frog, then a rabbit, and then a skunk.
“Can you please just settle on one animal—except the skunk—so we can focus on our assignment?” Bumblebee asked him. She prided herself on getting things done quickly and efficiently. That was probably why Principal Waller had handpicked Bumblebee as one of her office aides.
“Aw, okay. Fine,” Beast Boy said, settling on being himself.
“Thank you,” said Bumblebee. “Now, let’s start with the givens.”
“The Givens?” Beast Boy asked. “Who are they?”
Bumblebee wasn’t sure if he was serious or teasing her. “ ‘The givens’ means the facts,” she explained.
Her partner burst out laughing. “I knew that,” he said, nudging her and rolling his eyes. “Duh!”
Bumblebee tried not to fume. As the twenty minutes rushed by, Beast Boy seemed to have a joke for whatever she said. “Don’t you take anything seriously?” she asked.
He grinned and raised both hands in the air as if to surrender. But before he could reply, Liberty Belle called out, “Time’s up! Beast Boy, you’re raising your hands. Does that mean you and Bumblebee would like to go first?”