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A Myriad of Possibilities
Chapter 3. The cost of Power

Chapter 3. The cost of Power

I ran out of the locker room barely holding it together.

Though all things considered, I was fine.

My eyes itched a little, but I could tell they no longer glowed or shot lightning out of them. My stomach turned relentlessly as I walked, but I bulldozed through that… wanting to get as far away from that locker room as possible. My hands started to hurt the second I left; but like everything else, it was minor.

I've never hit anyone before, not like that.

I probably looked almost uninteresting. Black pants, black shirt with a large tear on the collar. Dried blood sat on the collar, burned. No one would suspect that I went all avenging god on my childhood bully.

Was he moving when I left? I left so fast. Was he moving?

Worse despite my pretty impressive final word to Bobby I was still reeling from what had happened. What I had done. I had crossed a line that I hadn't even known I was capable of crossing.

I crossed it once, what happens if I cross it again?

Halfway across the field I started to slow down. Not by my own volition, but because it was getting harder to breathe. A cold sweat had slowly started rolling down my back at the thought. My hand started to shake and I looked back at the door. Nothing. Was he too afraid? To hurt? To traumatize to even get up from the fetal position that I left him in?

I grabbed my wrist trying to make it stop. I feel something happen and for a second my hand stops… before I feel a shock between my eyes and it starts shaking again.

Curiosity and questions filled my head, for a second; at least. before I remember the cost of my curiosity now. I've always been someone who gets caught up in their own head. Never really conceptualizing the whole “curiosity killed the cat” narrative, but now it was different. It felt different.

A part of me, the normal frightened kid part; had hoped that after leaving the locker room I could just pretend it was just a dream. But that wasn't in the cards with me it seemed.

Nothing is the same.

Everything was crystal clear. The entire sequence of events of the past hour were etched into my brain. Discovering this new power, letting Bobby’s anger take over me, beating Bobby and using whatever it is I can do on him with no reservation. Even the way I left wasn't my greatest example of good decision making, Leaving Bobby like that.

All there. And with a thought I could go back and relieve it.

I closed my eyes and put that out of my mind. A task which was much easier than it should have been. I walked past the goalpost. I reached my hand toward it on instinct and was surprised to see a flash of gold static between my fingers and the metal. Another change.

At this point I did have a small understanding of what was happening. Some way or another the earthquake gave me superpowers. There wasn't really an alternative answer anywhere close to realistic that I could think of. Hell without perfect memory I'd call the superhero thing unrealistic but that ship has sailed.

I brushed my hand through my hair. Superheroes, supervillains, superpowers. These were things I had an understanding of, but by far wasn't an expert on. Lincoln was a fanboy for this kind of thing. I tended to nod my head and zone out whenever he got really into his talks about the specifics of how the green lantern powers worked. Anne Marie was a lot more into that type of stuff.

My interest has always been real people. Studying them, watching them, figuring out how they ticked. Something i got from my mom. She was a reporter for the Gibbering Gazete the local newspaper here. Came here from the city to follow my dad to his home town in order to raise me. She won awards, broke nation wide stories, practically made the G.G what it is today.

My mom was a people person, she got her stories by enchanting and engaging people into wanting her to tell their story. I sneak around, spy on people. I am enough of her son to want to know the truth, but my strengths have never rested in that of a social butterfly. My shining achievement of exposing my schools corrupt politics was anything but that to her. When she and my dad were brought in to discuss the article I wrote, I could see the pride in here eyes dim with every sordid detail; The stolen files, the breaking and entering, the pictures. Everything I did in order to get my scoop left her looking at me for the first time like she didn't know who I was. she had seen, maybe for the first time, the darkness I had in me.

Despite that she stook up for me. She argued till she was blue in the face, and then took a deep breathe to argue some more.

She was amazing. She was one of a kind. And she died in her room while i was in school unable to say goodbye.

When Covid-19 started showing up, my mom went out of her way to try and lend a voice to people who couldn't be heard. She was gone months at a time, trying to get in touch with the people who couldn't use a phone to get in contact. Homeless, undocumented, poor, she went across the country trying to make sure the world knew how this disease was hitting the people that didn't have what we had. She wore a mask, she washed her hands, she took every precaution. But a week back in this small town with bigotted views and a distrust of "left winged politics" and she suddenly cant taste food.

My dad has underlining condition, a heart murmur and serious asthma. He couldn't be in a room with her, she wouldn't let him. I fed her, told her jokes, made her comfortable.

My mom always said i got my dads jawline and serious nature. That all i got from her was a passion for the truth, unrelenting curiosity, and sharp tounge. An inside joke meant as a dig on the seriousness that I've had even as a kid. She made that joke the night before she died. She wanted me to laugh and i was scared.

But that night she made me put on our favorite movie, West Side story. Dad watched via Zoom in the living room. We laughed, told stories, I pretended school was going well. I went to bed that night thinking things were getting better. I even only said goodbye through the door that day. In a rush to meet Lincoln for are walk to school. I think she could see the writing on the wall.

Two hours later, in-between science and English I saw my dad at the end of the hall. Saw him for the first time with tears in his eyes.

That was the worse day of my life.

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Today is feeling like a close second.

I looked the same. I walked the same. I had the same neurosis I had before, but I wasn't the same. Inside there was a power in me. The light, the lightning. On some level that even I didn't understand I felt that I had barely scratched the surface of what it could.

Now though I wish I could remember a lot more on how these kinds of superpowers worked. My brain was working differently. All the other powers I’d displayed, the cool ones anyway, were gone.

I was no faster or stronger than I had been before today. My lackluster stamina, the scraps and bruises on my fist, the lack of invasive emotions. All the evidence was gone except for one. The lightning that flashed through my eyes was no more, but I could feel this was the easiest to rectify.

I could still feel the lightning, now concentrated in my head. It felt weird looking at it. Like focusing on your heartbeat, you listen for it, feel for it, but the second you stop looking at it. It vanished into a part of your body that moved on autopilots. It buzzed almost soothingly in the back of my mind. still followed my every whim, but there was a limit now.

I tried to move the lighting to my hand. Suddenly like opening the floodgates, the lightning flew from my head toward my arm. I could feel it circulate my arm, and then my hand. I saw the lightning glow underneath my skin traveling through my arm. A small spark of golden static bounced between my fingers, and for a second I felt it. The power, the confidence, the lightning. For a split second Then it was gone.

In its place was a sharp pain. Like before it was a shock between my eyes. Unlike before it was more insistent. I closed my eyes, annoyed and wanting it to stop. Suddenly I felt something shift and the pain was gone.

That wasn't right, the pain was still there but the same block I had put on Bobby’s emotions had separated the pain from me. Another power I seemed to have? A version of some kind of super multitasking? The thing I did with the lightning worked… but didn't work? There must be something I’m missing-

“Hey are you okay?” Someone asked from behind me.

I stood back up, noticing where I was for the first time. The crosswalk between Mission and 5th, a few blocks away from the school. I looked behind me and saw a paramedic, a couple years older than me standing there. Dressed in a slightly bloody white button down and blue pants. He smiled at me but the upturn of his lips didn't reach his eyes. Instead his eyes scanned over me looking for any injury, taking a second glance at my bloody hands.

I slipped my hands into my pocket feeling exposed ….or maybe embarrassed, The only evidence of what I'd done, written on my hands. It didn't hurt any pain I had before disappeared with the block,, but who knows what kind physical changes occurred with these powers.

“I’m fine.” I said curtly. He looked at me unconvinced and took a step toward me.

“Are you sure?” He asked gently. “We haven't been to the high school yet but if you hit your head you might have a concussion.”

I raised an eyebrow at his insistence, until I looked around.

See the thing you need to get about me, something that was consistent about me even before I developed superpowers. I have immense tunnel vision.

Along the middle part of the street from the old drug store to almost a block away was a massive crack in the road. Most of the cars were parked haphazardly to the side, with a few unlucky ones having crashed into other cars nearby. Most of the buildings nearby seemed fine, though a carpet store had a light post fall on it. Other people were around of course. Some bloody and disoriented, clearly confused, others were helping the police and paramedics take control.

And apparently I had apparently walked right past them unblinkingly like some weirdo.

“Oh I wish I hit my head.” I closed my eyes and snarked under my breath.

The paramedic took another step towards me, and suddenly I felt it. Unlike with Bobby where it was all sudden; The second the paramedic got close enough I could feel it. The electric impulses of his body. From his head where it was concentrated to the rest of his body where the signals were sent to. I could feel it.

I stared at his hand as he reached for me and took a step back.

“I’m good.” I say again, more insistent this time. I couldn't trust myself. I hated that, but it was the truth. Here and now, in front of who knows how many people. The last thing I needed was to lose control and hurt someone. “I needed to get out of the school. Clear my head. I zoned out that all. I'm heading home. You should take care of people that actually need it. ”

The paramedic looked at me concerned but not taking another step. “That isn't something you can be doing right now. That was a major earthquake, there might be aftershocks. I can take you to the hospital if you need to go. Get yourself checked out, wait for your parents.

Dad. I had opened my mouth to say some witty retort when it died on my tongue.

Did you really forget about him?

“Um… can you just give me… um. A second?” I asked, turning as I started patting my pockets trying to remember where I put my phone. My heart was beating hard and my hands started shaking again. I think the parametric asked me something but it didn't matter. My head was too full of worse case scenarios.

I dug in my pocket and tried to pull out my phone. It was burnt and blackened from obvious electrical damage.

Destroyed by my tantrum.

But maybe I could fix it? The lightning sparked at the thought and spurned down to my arm stopping at my fingertips. I didn't know what the lightning could or couldn't do…. But that didn't matter. My phone had to work. It just had to.

My feet moved at their own accord as I kept pushing the button. Less me going somewhere, more just a need to move. I could feel something happening but for the first time I didn't care to examine every detail of what was happening. All I needed was for the lightning to turn the phone on. Dad or Uncle Leo would have texted me, or called, or something. The paramedic was saying something, not that I cared.

I pushed down on the power button desperately, trying to make it turn on. It soothed the internal chaos of my powers. I was doing it wrong. Whatever way my power was supposed to work this wasn't work, but my desperation made me… well desperate. My hand started to shake, but not the normal anxiety kind of shake. .

The lightning did what I wanted. Moved to my hand and attempted to enter the phone, but there was a disconnect. The unpleasant shock that followed like before was dulled by the wall in my head, so I kept going. Back and forth it went. From my head through my arm dissipating in my hands, with the occasional spark between my fingers.

In the back of my head I could feel the danger of what I was doing. The pain from the backlash of my power was getting worse. It was separate from me, but there all the same.

The shaking in my hand was so bad I had to grab my wrist with my other hand. My face felt wet but I had to make it work. Lightning had started arcing around my entire hand now. It was in the phone, digging into the circuits and cord. No longer burning it, but melding with it. It was working.

Then the phone exploded.

The back of the phone suddenly got excruciatingly hot, to the point where the wall once again broke in my head. I dropped the phone in pain from both my head and my hand. Not that it mattered. The glass of the phone exploded hitting my forearm and cheek.

“Fuck!” I screamed collapsing on the ground holding my hand. There was a bad burn on the palm of my hand. Blood streamed my arm and I couldn't move my fingers. But the worst I could feel was down the back of my hand. Tracing down from my fingers to my elbow was a tree-like burn on my skin. Sparks of gold and black lightning skated under the skin, making my arm spasm uncontrollably.

Worse than that, the backlash was making the pain of everything worse. Everything hurts. The burn on my hand felt like a hot coal stuck to my palm. The cuts on my face were like claws digging into my skin. I could barely think through the pain in my head. Barely even noticed when my face hit the floor.

And it was getting worse.

My body spasm from the pain and my vision becomes blurry. The thought of putting another wall in my head died on the spot, the pain being too much.

I needed it to stop.

In the back of my head I felt my power spark once again. Then, everything went black.

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