Impulse: Triple Trouble!
by Shaun Barrow

Episode 2: "Mysterious circumstances! Who is Brenda?!"

Bart yawned somewhat as he sat in Mr. Snodgrass’ seventh period history class. Bart didn’t get much sleep the night before, as he was up half the night wondering about the boy he had battled in front of the supermarket, Kinetic. Bart was also wondering about the silent boy, who had used his strange teleportation power to defeat Bart. It was occupying his thoughts so much, he failed to hear Mr. Snodgrass calling his name….that is, until Mr. Snodgrass smacked his pointer stick onto Bart’s desk, startling the young speedster.

"Mr. Allen!!!" yelled Mr. Snodgrass. "How many times have I told you to pay attention!! Now, can you tell me what the answer to the question I posed to the class?"

Cold beads of sweat began to form on Bart’s brow. He looked around for an answer until he saw Roland on the other side of the room, lip synching the question. After a second, Bart caught on to what Roland was saying and said, "Um, where did John Wilkes Booth meet his untimely death?" Bart smiled proudly, thinking he pulled a fast one.

"Mmm, yes Bart, that’s it." Said Mr. Snodgrass. "I’m glad to see that someone was paying attention-"

"Yup," Bart said proudly, "And that was-"

"-Roland." Cut in Mr. Snodgrass. "Bart, this is the fourth time today. See me after class."

"Crap!" thought Bart, as he shook his head. Mr. Snodgrass resumed teaching the class.

***************

"So, that concludes the tour of our school." Said Vice Principal Sheridan. He was showing three new students around, a tall, well built boy with brown hair, a skinny pale boy with black hair, and the girl Brenda (see last episode), who smiled as she looked around.

"This school is great, Mr. Sheridan!" said Brenda. "I can’t wait until I get to go to class!!"

Mr. Sheridan smiled and said, "Call me Randy, Brenda, Mr. Sheridan makes me feel old. I haven’t seen too many people your age excited about going to school!"

"I sure am!" said Brenda, "Especially because I’ve never been to one before!"

Sheridan looked at the girl strangely and said "Eh? You’ve never been to one before?"

The brown haired boy, who was named Kenny, looked sternly at Brenda and said

"Um, Brenda means she has never been to a school quite like this one." Sheridan realized what he meant and nodded his head. He looked at the pale boy, who was named Peter, and said "And what about you Peter? You don’t say much do you?"

Peter sighed and said "I-I just don’t have anything to say, M-Mr. Sheridan." Peter looked quite nervous, as Sheridan put his hand on Peter’s shoulder. "Well Pete," said Sheridan, "I can see you’re a shy fellow. That’s cool. Say, if you, or your brother or sister need any help adjusting, just knock on my door, or give me a call. You have my number. Say, where did you guys say you came from?"

Brenda blurted out; "France!!!". Sheridan looked at her strangely and said "Well, you all don’t look French." Kenny glared at Brenda and said "Um, she means our father comes from France. Er, we were all born in New York."

"New York?" said Sheridan, surprised. "Well, let me each direct you to your classes."

***************

Bart yawned as Mr. Snodgrass’ class dragged on towards the final five minute stretch. He wanted to fall asleep, but he knew Mr. Snodgrass was keeping an eye on him, so he had to be alert. Suddenly, Sheridan walked in, and after him came Brenda. This barely caught Bart’s attention.

"Everyone," Mr. Sheridan said, "I would like to introduce a new student in the freshman class, please welcome Brenda Haims. Her and her brothers hail from New York, or France, or whatever."

"Hi!" said Brenda, who got mostly a cold response from most of the class. Sheridan looked around and saw Bart, fiddling to keep his hair out of his eyes. Sheridan smiled, and brought Brenda over to Bart.

"Hey Bart." Sheridan whispered. "This is Brenda, she’s new here, and I need you to do me a favor today. I need you to take her around, you know, show her the ropes."

An image of Bart presenting Brenda a rope popped into Bart’s head. "What do you want me to do?" said a confused Bart.

"I want you to be her student guide for the day, okay?" said Sheridan. "She’s new, and you’re practically new, so I think you two would get along."

Bart thought for a moment. "Um, I can’t Mr. Sheridan….er, I have to stay after class because I got in trouble for not paying attention."

Sheridan thought for a moment. "Hmm, okay, I’ll tell you what." Said Sheridan. "If you’ll act as Brenda’s guide for today, I’ll get you off the hook with ol’ Snodgrass. We got a deal buddy?"

"Deal!!" Bart whispered quickly, and the two shook hands.

"Brenda," said Mr. Sheridan, "This is Bart Allen, he’ll be your student guide. You take the seat next to him. Have fun now you two." With that, Sheridan walked up to the front of the class, whispered something to Mr. Snodgrass, and he exited the room.

"Hi," Brenda whispered, "so what class is this?"

"It’s History," said Bart, "And it’s boring. So, you come from France?"

"Uh…." Thought Brenda, "Sorta."

"You sure don’t smell like you’re French-Ack!!" Bart was cut off by the sound of Mr. Snodgrass’ pointer stick smacking against his desk. "Mr. Allen!!" he yelled, "This is the fifth time today!!!!"

Bart put his face in his hands and said "D’oh!" Brenda smiled at him and said "You’re pretty strange there, Bart Allen!!"

"You don’t know the half of it.." said Bart, as he shook his head.

***************

In the boys bathroom, Peter and Kenny were talking while washing their hands.

"So, have you found him yet, Pete?" said Kenny.

"No, I haven’t seen anyone who even resembles him." Said Peter. "Are you sure he even goes to a normal school? I mean, with that long hair and those huge feet…."

"He has to have another identity." Said Kenny. "And he’s about Brenda’s age I figured when we fought. So, he must go to this school."

"Do you think Brenda had luck in finding him?" said Peter. "She’s pretty fast."

"Brenda’s a stupid hyperactive twit." Said Kenny. "I doubt she even remembers the mission that father sent us on."

"To find and eliminate Impulse and Max Mercury?" said Peter.

"Exactly." Said Peter, slyly. "Those are the main threats to father’s plan in this town. The other known costumed hero, Arrowette, is powerless and we can handle her easily. Even Brenda could take her down and- damn! Someone’s coming!"

Evil Eye walked in the bathroom and pushed both boys out of the way. "Outta my way, you two queers." He said, as he lit a cigarette.

"Uncouth [jerk]," said Peter under his breath, "He wouldn’t dare talk to us if we were-"

"In our fighting costumes?" said Kenny. "Don’t worry bro, we’ll get him, but we have bigger footed fish to fry."

***************

Bart and Brenda were in the lunch line, as they were waiting to be served.

"So Brenda," said Bart, "er….um, uh…"

"Yes Bart?" said Brenda, as she smiled at Bart.

Bart noticed that her fingers were tapping the lunch tray at an amazing speed. A hole was starting to wear through the tray due to Brenda’s tapping.

"Er," said Bart, "I was making a bad attempt at trying to make conversation. Um, you’re wearing a hole through your tray."

Brenda noticed what she was doing and stopped immediately and smiled. "Oops," she said, "Bad habit, ya know?"

Bart took the tray and examined it. "Yea….really bad habit." He said. "It could cost the school a fortune."

"Yea," said Brenda, "Maybe an arm and a leg!!".

The thought of the school giving away arms and legs to a salesman popped into Bart’s head. Bart thought; "I didn’t know school’s had arms and legs…"

Brenda then quickly realized what she had done and thought "Oh no! I might be exposed!" Brenda pulled Bart out of line and whispered to him; "Hey, um Bart…please don’t tell anyone about this, okay?"

Bart had basically forgot about the entire thing. "Um, okay." He said. "But look, now we lost our place in line, it’ll take a good 5 minutes to get our food!"

"I know," said Brenda, "5 minutes feels like an eternity. I’ll tell ya what Bart, I’ll get the food for us, and you go sit down!"

Bart liked that idea. "Okay! Much obliged! I’ll be sitting next to the guy with the blonde hair and the dark haired girl with glasses, okay?"

"Okay!" Brenda said, and ran off towards the line. Bart then went over to the table wear his friends Carol and Preston were sitting, eating their lunches.

"So Bart," said Carol, "How’s things with Brenda?"

"She’s pretty hyper." Said Bart, as he stole one of Carol’s french fries. "And she did something pretty weird back there that I only thought I could do!"

"What was it?" Preston said, as he turned the page of his "Fangoria" magazine.

Bart tried hard to think about what it was, but he had forgot. "Eh, I forgot." He said. "But, she’s French."

"She’s French?" Preston asked. "Wow, she doesn’t look it. And plus, she seems so nice ya know, I mean because my dad says the French are a bunch of-whoa, there’s Brenda now!"

"What?" said Bart, surprised. "And she has both trays of food?! But how?? She was at the back of the line, and in no less then thirty seconds, she’s got everything, including straws, napkins, and those little cook ketchup packets that I haveta open with my teeth!"

"Hi Bart!" said Brenda, smiling as she presented Bart with a tray of food. "Here ya go!"

"My, that was fast." Carol said. "Hi Brenda, my name’s Carol, and this guy who has his faced buried in that horror magazine is Preston."

Preston looked up and waved hello. Bart sat there and was perplexed as to how she got the food that fast.

"Say Brenda, how did you get our food that fast?!" asked Bart.

Brenda smiled and said; "Oh, that’s just a little talent I have there Bart."

Bart sighed and took a bite into his cheeseburger, while staring at Brenda, wondering about her. She just smiled back at him and started to talk to Carol.

***************

It was around five o’clock when Max forced Bart away from his Nintendo 64 and made him patrol the town. Bart, in his Impulse guise, ran at lightning speed around the town, stopping two hold ups on the way along with saving a cat from out of a tree. At this time, Impulse was speeding through a park, because was about to quit his patrol and head over to Carol’s house when suddenly a foot came out of nowhere and tripped him. Impulse fell flat on his face. He quickly got up and searched around to see who tripped him when suddenly he was blind sided and received four lightning fast kicks to his back. The impact of the blows felt as if someone had been smashing a two by four over Impulse’s back. Bart fell over in pain, as a feminine figure, dressed in all black, appeared in front of him. Impulse tried to get to his feet, but his super fast reflexes wouldn’t respond. The punishment he received was too much unexpectedly.

"W-w-who are you?" Impulse said as he gasped and wheezed.

"The question is not who I am," said the girl, "But it’s what I am going to do to you!!!"

To Be Continued…..

In the Next Episode of Impulse: Triple Trouble!!, Impulse is in dire trouble as he is up against a mysterious assassin, and Max Mercury deals with Kinetic and Portal!

All this and more in: "The Master Plan is Revealed!! It’s time to die, Impulse!!!"

[Read Episode 1] [Read Episode 3]
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