When Shego, Hego and Mego left Dennis‘ room that day, they looked immediately into the eyes of a very tall, but also very overweight man. They were rigid with fear and didn’t know what to do. They didn’t know if and what the man had seen. Never mind who he was.
Hego lifted a hand and said reluctant: „Uhm, we...“
The man said silent: „Be quiet or he’ll hear you. Come with me, before more people see what you did.“

„Looking back, it was more than stupid to go deep in the night with this stranger, but we did it anyway. Fortunately. Well, particularly.“

The man led Shego and her brothers deep into the basement vault of the orphanage.
Hego touched Mego’s shoulder.
„Hey, Mego, I got a bad feeling about this.“
„Maybe you should have thought about this, before we followed you, because you followed him.“
„Are you going to blame me for this?“
„Hey, be quiet“, Shego chipped in on the sparking dispute of her brothers. „What’s going to happen? If he is hungry for fried children and wants to put us on the barbeque, we just use our powers and get out of here.“
„And what if he puts us into a cage of kryptonite?“
„What for one night?“
„Yeah right, you know about nuclear fission, but not about the really important things in life“, scoffed Mego.
„Kryptonite weakens Superman and neutralize his powers.“
„I will remember this next time, when I have to fight against Superman again. Thank you.“
„I’m just saying that he maybe knows a way to steal our powers.“
Suddenly the man stopped and shouted: „Stop!“
The siblings stopped too and looked around. Around them were dozens of pipes. Some of them were dripping, others were fizzling and steaming. It was dark. One flickering lightbulb seemed to be the only source of light in this part of the basement.
Hego got down to his siblings and whispered: „Okay, let’s see what he wants from us, but when I give the signal, we run away, okay?“
Shego and Mego nodded. The man stood right before them and crossed his arms.
„So, you glow in the dark and like to scare little bullies, am I right? I like that. What do you think of doing this professionally?“
Over the siblings‘ head floated a huge, invisible question-mark.
The man went on: „You didn’t seem to do this, because you are little bullies yourself. No, because then you had chosen a weaker victim. Was it because of the soothers?“
„How do you know about the soothers?“
„So it was because of the soothers. Sense of justice or revenge?“
„Uhm...“
„Looked for me like a mix of both. This is good. But you should learn to forget you desire for revenge. I can teach you this. This...and more.“
He clapped his hands twice and a bright, shining light turned on. Now, in this light, the basement didn’t looked so uncomfortable anymore. It reminded more in a huge fitness studio.
Mego made a step forward.
„Sorry for asking, but...huh?“
The man smiled.
„Well, I was looking for someone like you for years.“
„Orphans?“ Hego asked.
„Superheroes“, the man answered. „Human beings, who got supernatural powers and a sense for justice, but don’t know what to do with it yet. Don’t get me wrong, the ghost-show was really good. Damn, if I were in his shoes, I had to change my underwear right now, but you can’t jump out of bad kids‘ closets for the rest of your life.“
Shego lifted her hand up.
„Can I ask some questions, this time? How do you know about all this? The soothers, our powers and what we did with Dennis. And, what is maybe more important, who are you?“
„My name is Vince. Vince Bigelow. I’m the janitor of this orphanage. And I see a lot of things.“

Julian interrupted Shego’s narration.
„Hey, we had a deal! You should tell us the truth.“
„What is your problem“, she hissed back at him.
„My problem is, that you’re telling us the worn out cliche of the mysterious janitor, who is on one hand so inconsiderable, that you easy look over him, but who seem to know on the other hand anything about everyone and everything and is apperently the teacher of the heroes!“
Shego smiled and answered: „Yes, you are right. It’s a cliche. But cliches originate from using them often and what do you think is the reason why there are so many movies, series, comics and books that use this cliche? Because it’s true!“
Washington shrugged his shoulders.
„Makes sense to me.“
Julian shaked his head: „Not me. How about Vampires? The vain counts, dressed in dark capes, who live in old castles, which are usually near some old villages. Is this cliche true, too?“
„I never had the doubtful pleasure to meet a Vampire, so I don’t know how they live. I don’t even know if they exist. If you think about it, it doesn’t sound likely, does it? But you know what? Once I saw a pandimensional vortex-inductor. And a great working brain-switching machine, a good film by Joel Schumacher, as well as some children, who got hit by a meteor and not only survived, but also got some hardly probable superpowers. And I know a mysterious janitor. Do you give me the permission to go on with the story of my life?“
Julian hemed and nodded his head.
Washington got suddenly scared of vampires.

Vince paced up and down like a general, in front of the siblings.
„Well, here is my plan for you. I will teach you everything I know...“
„I’m not very excited about learning how to clean blocked up toilets“, interrupted Shego, in her well known, charming way.
Vince stopped and looked at Shego.
„Right, because I’m the Janitor, I’m just good at cleaning toilets. I would like to show you something.“
„I hope you won’t fall on me.“
„Oh, jokes about my weight, how original. But instead of giving an answer, I’ll show you something.“
Vince made immediately a long flip backwards, pushed himself with his feet off the wall and jumped over to the next. From this wall, he jumped over Shego’s, Hego‘ and Mego’s heads and seemed to be light as a feather. He landed in front of a sandbag, which he hit fast as lightning with some karate chops and kicks. His last punch was so heavy, that the chain, that held the sandbag on the ceiling, severed and let it flew through the basement. It landed on a table, on which was for some reason a knife block. The knifes in it flew right at Vince, but he was able to catch all 12 of them with his bare hands, without being cut a little. Then he turned around with the speed of a Tornado, threw the knifes close past the siblings, grabbed an instant camera and made a picture of them and their wondering faces.
„Well“, Vince said, „That shut you up, so I think I’ll start over. I want to teach you everything I know. I’m training you in every kind of martial arts, but I won’t teach you only the techniques, but also their philosophy. As consideration I demand from you, of course only when I think that you are ready for this, to go outside and free this city, both with the knowledge I told you and your own powers, from all kind of crime. If you say yes, the training starts tomorrow. If not, you have nothing to fear from me. You secret will be my secret, too and I will never ask you again. So what do you think?“

„We had to talk to each other and sleep on it, although it was abolutely unnecessary. It was easy to see that Hego and Mego had already made their choice.“

„So, what do you think?“ Hego askes excited, as soon as they were back in their room.
„I think it’s a good idea“, Mego said.
Shego looked at the twins, who were still sleeping peacefully, and then she sat down on her bed.
„I’m not sure“, she said. „Do you think it’s a smart move to trust a man, who we don’t know anything about, but who seem to know an awful lot about us?“
Her brothers just shrugged their shoulders and replied at the same time: „But did you see how high he can jump?“
„Frogs can do this too, but I’m not being taught by Kermit.“
Hego sat next to his sister on the bed.
„Shego, I know how you think about this superherostuff and I understand that you think, we weren’t be able to do it, but know we got someone who will tell us, what to do. As tragic the circumstances were, from which we got our powers, don’t you think we should at least use them to do good? Even because of our parents.“
Shego took a deep breath.
„I admit that I really would like to do what he can.“ She shook her brother’s hand. „Good, I’m there, but we won’t accept before he makes sure, that we can break the training up whenever we want.“
„Superhero-training is no magazine-subscription, but okay, I agree.“
„I still think that this is a stupid idea.“
Hego smiled. Shego smiled back at him. Her smile was more reserved than his.
„Okay, so tomorrow, we’ll be superheroes“, Mego said.
Hego got up, began to pose like Superman and said proud: „Right, Superheroes.“
„Apprentices“, added Shego quite, laid down and closed her eyes.

Old Shego drummed with her fingertips on the left armrest of her weelchair.
„The whole superhero-thing was a bit fishy to me. It came too suddenly. I just wanted to do nothing but live my life in harmony. At home, with my parents, without superpowers. Then my parents got bombed away, my hands began to glow and a janitor made a martial arts-expert of me. It began the next day.“