“There has been another saving today” said a news reporter on the city screen. “This has been the 48th report so far. A cyclist has been saved by an unknown hero. We have city camera footage; what you see is a crossing of Green Leaf Street and Green Avenue at 11:30 pm. This footage is a little dark because the street lights were out of order. A cyclist is now to be seen coming from Green Leaf Street. Soon after a form of a van was speeding from Green Avenue and was heading towards the cyclist. All of a sudden, blue electricity bolted towards the cyclist and moved the cyclist out of the way in a flash. The mysterious blue electricity came from a person wearing a dark hoodie. This mysterious person walked away. We interviewed the cyclist this morning.”
“I don’t know what happened,” said the cyclist. All I know is that I was driving in a dark street without any street lights. All of a sudden, I saw headlights on the left side of me coming at me. I was scared. I thought I was going to die. Next thing I know I was at the otherside of the road.”
Philip was staring at the city screen after hearing the news report. “Another saving report”.
“This is the 48th save already. I still remember the 1st one, like it was just yesterday. It has been 20 years since the first save. I was a kid back then. A kid was hanging on a 6 floor balcony of a 10 floor apartment crying for someone to help him. His parents were on the floor above him hopelessly praying for a miracle. All of a sudden, a man jumped from the ground floor up to the 1st floor with an incredible height. Abnormal for a normal person. He then leaped on the 2nd floor. With some sort of super jump he jumped from the second floor to the third, all the way to the kid and up to the parents who were crying from happiness that their kid was saved. The man then jumped off the 11 floor balcony and landed perfectly on his two feet without breaking his legs. People were cheering for him. I was one of those people. I was five back then. I remember being surprised and amazed. I wanted to be like him. I wanted to be a hero.
But I’m 22 now. When you get older your mind changes. Back when I was a kid I always imagined myself as a superhero. I wore a costume all day long, helping around the house because my mom says that’s what good guys do.
Now I’m in university, trying to survive my first year and my roommate who’s drunk every single night, who I believe is an alcoholic. What annoys me is that every night when he comes into the apartment. I’ll be in my bedroom with the door locked. The problem is he keeps banging my bedroom door yelling if I want to drink with him. Even though I told him millions of times when he was sober that I don’t drink alcohol.
All that aside, I’m jobless. Which is not a good place to be as a student. I’m barely able to pay the house bills with the money I get from my parents. When I watch the TV and see more stories about saves made by heroes I wonder whether I could actually be one, like I dreamed when I was a kid. Rumour has it that you can get paid very well depending on your rank. Heroes get ranked A to F. Heroes from rank F can earn up to 100 dollars per week. While ranked A heroes can earn millions of dollars. Of course everybody would be aiming to get to the top. But it’s hard to get there. To get to the top you’ll need to be super powerful and have the respect of the civilians. Or to be chosen by the A rank heroes themselves. However, no one has ever proved themselves worthy. There are only 4 A ranked heroes.
Billionaire Ben: The first A ranked hero chosen by the society. Also the richest person. He gains power by absorbing coins and dollar bills. The more money he absorbs the more powerful he gets.
Inferno: A pyrokinesis user. He is like a large fire that is dangerously out of control. He can blast fire out his hands and feet. But his signature move is Fire Breath. He breathes out a huge amount of fire out of his mouth that’s where he is also known as The Dragon.
Ms. Mystic: A dark magic user. She can summon vicious ghouls that would tear anything apart that she commands to. She’s a scary woman but yet a lot of men fall for her looks.
Wolfman: Self explanatory. A regular guy who transforms himself into a big bad wolf. Although, he also has the power to heal himself, muscle hardening that not even a sniper would kill him and his signature move Slash. With a swing of his arm he could break down half of Luminus city.
Being a hero is not a suitable job. The reason is because you have to deal with life threatening situations. Deal with villains that may be more powerful than you. But most of all, civilians need to depend on you and feel safe. And I hate attention.”
A kid was holding his new ball that his dad bought for him. The kid was so happy to receive the ball. He kept thanking his dad while jumping with euphoria. But he accidentally dropped it. The ball bounced towards the road. A truck was approaching. His dad started running and yelling to stop, but the kid was too focused on getting his ball.
The truck didn’t seem to stop. The driver was on the phone. The kid caught up with the ball but was too late to turn back. He couldn’t do anything but close his eyes. CRASH.
The kid opened his eyes. And saw Philip - who just a moment before had been staring at the city screen 500 metres away - standing in front of the truck was now in front of the truck. The truck had a serious dent.
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“Make that 49”.
The kid looked up at Philip, who was shaking shattered glass off his shirt. He then looked at the truck behind the guy. The nose of the truck looked absolutely demolished. The kid couldn’t believe what he was looking at. It was like someone used a huge hammer to smash the truck. That’s the only way the kid could describe it. The kid was shocked and amazed how the truck was destroyed yet the teenager looked completely fine. No bruises nor a scratch.
Philip realised the kid was staring at him. “You alright kid?” he asked.
The kid wanted to answer back but all that came out was a cry.
“MAX! Thank god you’re ok” said the dad hugging his kid worried. What felt like minutes. He then looked at Philip. Tears were running down the man’s face. “Thank you for saving my son.”
A crowd was starting to form. People were taking out their phones. Philip was creating attention. Something that he did not want to have. “What a hero!”
Just outside of the city was a military science building called ‘SciTech’. A science institution where they experiment on criminals with super abilities. However, this information is not open to the public. Behind the building was the prison.
BANG. Jay woke up from a nightmare —. He remembered being in a room that looked familiar. It was his living room. He was in his own home. Beside him was a little girl crying. She looked to be 4 years old. She had caramelised skin and black hair. She looked familiar too. It was his youngest sister. She had a look of fright. It wasn’t towards Jay but at a man who seemed to be in his fifties that stood at least a few metres away. The man was saying something but Jay couldn’t figure what. However, the look on the man’s face showed rage. Jay knew immediately who this man was. It was his abusive dad. This isn’t just a dream. This was an actual moment.
When Jay was 18. His father secretly signed him up for military training. Not because he thought it would be good for his son but rather it would be beneficial for himself. He always got scolded for being a bad father. He gets mad at his own kids when he’s drunk, saying it’s their fault for him being in a drunken state. Smokes inside the house, even when the kids are around. His dad felt Jay was a nuisance. He couldn’t stand the look on Jay’s face every time he got schooled. When a military advertisement popped up on billboards saying they will be training teenagers 17 and above for 10 weeks. It was like a light in the tunnel.
10 weeks had passed. Jay arrived back at his home when his neighbour waited for him at the door. She said that his younger brother was in the hospital and that she hears screaming and yelling in the house. At that moment Jay had enough. His dad had gone way too far. In fury Jay opened the house door. On cue, his little sister embraced him with tears and fear in her face. He saw his dad approach him in pure anger. Seeing his face made Jay feel nothing but disgust. He clenched his hands but felt something solid. He looked at his hands and saw a gun. Contemplating if he should use the gun, his dad was already a few metres closer and gave out a yell “I’m going to kill you!”. With those words Jay lost it. He pointed the gun towards his dad and pulled the trigger. BANG.
— Jay sat up. His back felt stiff caused by the hard mattress that he was laying on. Half asleep, he looked around trying to remember where he was. The sight of metal bars made him realise that he was in prison. The awful scent of urine on the toilet beside his bed made him more awake. On the opposite side he saw his prison mate, Louis, who’s still asleep. From a distance he could hear the sounds of mattresses scraping the metal bed frames. Other prisoners were starting to wake up. “Alright wake up maggots!” a guard yelled. Behind him were 3 other guards.
“Wake up you slugs!” yelled another while banging the jail bars with his baton. The others followed him. You could hear the moans of irritation. Soon later the cells open. Jay and Louis stepped out of their cells. All the prisoners were forced to stand in line.
Two cell’s away from Jay’s cell was a prisoner laying still on the bed. Pissed, a guard walked towards him. Soon as the guard leaned over the prisoner; the prisoner gave him a headbutt, took his police baton and placed it around his neck. Two guards tried to help him out.
“Back up! I will kill him!” the prisoner threatened.
The struggling guard reached down his side pocket, took out a taser and stabbed it at the prisoner's arm. The prisoner finally let go.
“The hell did you just do?” the prisoner said, confused.
The prisoner fell to the ground.
“What’s all this ruckus?” yelled a man in a camouflage suit walking towards the guards who were surrounding the prisoner. When he came into the scene the whole atmosphere changed. Everybody felt a dark aura out of him. Jay knew this person before. He was at the military training camp as the commander. Everybody called him ‘Commander Richard’. He never gave out his full name. Jay remembered him being heartless as he didn’t really care about other people’s emotions.
“Richard Sir, one of the prisoners fooled us by playing dead and got guard Williams on a chokehold,” said a guard.
“IDIOTS! That is the most basic trap! I couldn’t believe you guys fell for that old trick! Alright all of you get in line and no more games!”
The prisoners followed Commander Richard to an empty spacious room. High above a wall was a thick glass window; the window is known to protect against any magic. Behind the window were scientists who were examining the prisoner’s abilities.
“Alright listen up!” commanded Richard. “We’re at the test room and you know what that means! You’ll be showing off your abilities! See those scientists behind those windows; they will be examining your abilities! For what you might ask. That’s a top secret that I can’t reveal. However, what I do know is only the powerful one will be chosen and is allowed to ask that question to the scientist and even leave to the outside world”.
Hearing the word ‘leave’ got everyone hyped. Prisoners were saying, ‘finally I can get out of here’, ‘screw this place’ and ‘I’m going to win this’.
“SILENCE!” he shouted. “Today we will be playing a little game. The game is called ‘King of the throne’. It’s a 1v1 match where one player is a king and the other is battling to be in that position. The catch is the battle is only over if one dies or begs for mercy. The winner of the battle stays and battles other players until there’s none left. The loser unless dead or would never get to leave this place. It’s a death battle for your freedom, people”.