Eli woke up bleary-eyed in a snarled tangle of bedding messed up so bad his sheets had been pulled from under the mattress. He kept his eyes closed as he felt around the room with Spatial Control. Silhouettes cast shadows everywhere in his perception of where empty free space was before it became a minuscule array of endless points. It wasn't perfect though.
In fact, his senses through his spatial field was beyond blurry if he wanted anything more precise than where everything was exactly in relation to himself. He focused next on Body of Light and grimaced at the melodious bands of glimmering radiance that crawled across his floor and wall from the cracks in his blinds. Diffused light gave him a bit more detail than spatial field, but where the direct light touched his floor and wall? He felt and saw it with stunning levels of detail even with his eyes closed.
But shadows lurked under his bed, behind his dresser, and everywhere else the light didn't touch. Eli prodded ever so gently at the closest pool of darkness he knew must be close by with Voidshade Control and gasped as he broke out into a cold sweat. Cramps knotted in his stomach as he felt a rising tide of chilled darkness swirl in accordance with his will.
Eli bolted upright and looked down at himself with an incredulous cringe as his skin began to mottle with a patchwork of growing bruises as puffs of gray mist popped free from his skin in little bursts from a series of cracks oozing blood. He frowned as the sensations stopped once he eased off of Voidshade.
After a few moments, the dark mottling faded to nothing but red splotches of irritation. Light flowed into him as Body of Light allowed to greedily drain all of the light around him. He watched each of the bloody cracks shine before they sealed back together.
Okay. That was unpleasant.
Eli leaned over so he could grab his old alarm clock that he had to pull out of his closest last night and groaned as he checked the time.
8:47 AM
Well. He'd already slept a full nine hours. Might as well start the day with some more practice somewhere else. He’d rather do it on the roof. A few moments later he dressed himself with liberal use of Spatial Control to teleport his clothes onto his body and he was ready. A push upwards with his spatial field was enough for him to feel past the ceiling, up to the attic, and then onto the roof.
Eli wobbled as he landed at a tricky angle on the slope of the roof, but another teleport corrected himself so he was sitting cross-legged by the eave banked full of shadows from the rising angle of the sun. He leaned back against the shingles of the roof and sighed with contentment as he glanced out into the horizon. He took a few minutes to enjoy the crisp air, the twinges of rosy orange that faded into bright blue.
It was nice, but he was done with that now.
Now that he had Voidshade Control it was time to crack that last level on Spatial Control and hope he could pump out some easy levels for Voidshade while he was at it. If it continued to hurt him he might even be able to get a level or two out of Rapid Recovery once he got around to equipping it.
First, he reached out with his Spatial Control to a point far, far above him and opened the void right in front of him, and smiled into the yawning tunnel that passed through the void. Instead of focusing on the closest darkness to him, he focused on the abyss inside of the void and pushed forward with Voidshade Control then grunted as he felt his power sink its clutches into the pure unadulterated darkness of the void.
Pressure didn't build or slowly mount, it clamped right through his skull straight into his brain matter with a harsh buzz. Eli could taste his thoughts with a classic coppery lemon twist as he watched the voidshadow draw towards him in a rolling wave through his void tunnel. Spatial Control and Voidshade harmonized at a harsh thrum that quickly grew to a screeching drone that made his bones feel like they were grating together.
Voidshade Control's hook to the void's darkness snapped and everything went dark.
Eli crashed back into consciousness with a warm glow as Body of Light cannibalized his internal storage of light to bring him back to awareness. He'd collapsed backward and smacked his head against the siding of the eaves. Spatial Control had held firm even though Voidshade hadn't.
Neither power had leveled, but he still felt like he had learned a lot from his first real attempt.
Mainly that Voidshadow wasn't just darkness or shadow, but the shadow inside of his void. The voidshadow that was normally held back by the tunnels of hardened space that appeared whenever he teleported himself or anything else. He had a strong feeling that every pinprick of space that he felt in spatial field that allowed him to teleport tied back to voidshade. Somehow.
Next was that he could harden space.
This whole time he thought that the last level could have to do with figuring out portals or expanding space in a stable way, and sure, it still could be. But now he felt almost certain that he should be able to create hardened bits of space just like he did whenever he teleported.
Eli stared up through his void tunnel to his teleportation point high in the sky with narrowed eyes as he focused on another point farther above before he chained the two together. Space warped and distorted farther inside of his void tunnels, but they held stable otherwise. A tug shortened the tunnels enough so that when he shoved his hand through he felt the glacial screaming gusts above bite against his fingers.
He took a moment to wonder why the wind didn't blast out of his void tunnels and nearly yelped as the cold wind whipped past his arm straight into his face from the open teleportation point. Then it stopped right when he wished to not get a ton of freezing air in his face. Small mercies then. It was probably better left alone.
A quick push of his will only expanded the space outside of the teleportation point. Pinching it was just folding it. Trying to move space around that point did nothing other than fold or expand space all around it. He withdrew his hand before he shook it out to clear off the crawling tingles that buzzed across his skin.
No. This wasn't how he'd achieve what he wanted. He had to think differently. What was he doing wrong?
Okay. Space. Spatial Control...
He thought about how it had changed from when he'd merged it with Teleportation and Telekinesis. First off, he had to manually teleport using his spatial field by diving in-between the space between points. While there I had full control of the void and everything in between, but that wasn't real space... unless if it was?
Telekinesis had a whole kinetic field that had been malleable and adaptive. It moved how he wanted and it had moved what he wanted the exact way he wanted it to. But it wasn't until he'd doubled his kinetic field with extreme opposing forces inside of it was he able to figure out how to break into force constructs. Was that it?
Eli closed his eyes and redoubled his focus on the space outside of his chained teleports. Instead of relying on touch or sight, he let his spatial field fill in the gaps without holding it back. He winced as the clarity doubled then tripled. Uncountable dark points floated everywhere around him in one layer, but another layer showed the spots of space that existed inside and through objects. Then silhouettes clouded his spatial field even further.
Every silhouetted shingle of the roof was packed with so many smaller fragmented silhouettes that surrounded the tiny spots of empty space. They seemed to vibrate at multiple frequencies. Not to mention how faintly translucent breeze carried with it spots of its own.
A growing headache started to bloom as the information continued to stream in unabated. Pressure mounted until his eyeballs seemed to quiver in their sockets. His tongue felt fuzzy as he swiped it across the roof of his mouth to get the rising taste of bile out of his mouth. He stopped.
His hand trembled as he brushed it across the beads of sweat on his forehead.
That didn't work. It was far, far too much information. Maybe he was close, but that wasn't it. He screwed his eyes shut while tightening his spatial field down to nothing. Everything but the open teleportation void tunnels were trimmed. A frown deepened as he studied the stable space outside of the teleportation points. It didn't even really mesh or interact with the innermost stable layer of space points he saw.
It was almost like...
Eli gasped as he dismissed both teleports and watched the surrounding space as they vanished. They didn't interact. Each layer was separate even as they were bundled together. A flash of radiant light sparked across his body as he beamed at the euphoric sense of how close he was.
He started and then canceled a teleport while he kept his spatial field leashed as close around him as he possibly could. His teleportation target was only half a pace forward, but with that tight of a zone his spatial sense could really pick out what was in the field. Two teleport-cancels. Six. A dozen.
Yet every single time he started and established the teleport nothing changed on the outside layers of space. When he started and went through his teleport it might as well not exist. That was why his folding and expanding space was so catastrophic. It was on the wrong layer of space entirely. He slowed the process down to a crawl that an inchworm would've been irritated at how sedate the pace was.
Only two layers of space existed.
The rigid foundation of black dots and the infinitely small spots that made up each and every bit and piece of matter and the space between.
But for the briefest of moments, there were three layers as Spatial Control snapped one of its own over both snapping it through the entrance to the exit. Then it vanished, still completely separate, but synced up to both original layers of space. Again and again, he watched as a bubble appeared and stretched out before it thinned out into a line connecting both points for teleportation.
Eli stopped and blinked his eyes a few times to reorient himself with a deep breath. Warmth radiated off the shingles of the roof from the streaming sunlight. Excitement wriggled deep in his core. If he got this right it might just be enough for that last level he needed. He let himself dream of all the dazzling possibilities. He could see the world from stunning heights without worrying about flight. Maybe even teleport around the ocean. Especially if his void kept whatever he wanted out. Actual spatial expansion!
"Alright Eli, now it's time to do it..." He whispered to himself as he drew his spatial field around himself as tight as he could until it was as close as a second skin. Then he imagined a bubble of space appearing in front of him. A snarl curled his mouth as it appeared by pushing at the space around itself in every direction. Instead, he thought of his void and how it was separate from everything but him.
Eli poked his finger out and watched as it vanished into the void around him anchored to his spatial field. He was vastly overcomplicating this.
The void simply existed. Nothing more, nothing less.
With a twist of his hand and without thinking about pushing or pulling, he simply willed a bubble of separated space to appear above his palm. His spatial field snapped out and fuzzed as it appeared to overlap his field. It was invisible to his eyes or other senses, but he could feel it as easily as his own hand. It didn't exist his spatial senses but was invisible to his eye or other senses until he allowed it to slot into real-space. Air distorted with a crinkle as he popped it in and out of real-space again and again.
It darted and whizzed around the air as easy as breathing without dragging on or exerting force on anything unless he willed it to exist inside of real-space. A push and pull on it ballooned it out to the size of a melon on the outside, but he sensed that he could control the space inside of it just as easily.
Space was relative after all. How would a bubble that exists as its own framework know how large or small it really was until he wanted it to exist for real?
He tilted his head as he willed air to teleport inside of it and blinked as he felt it fill up without any noticeable changes otherwise. Not only was the bubble intimately linked to his perception, but so too was the air inside of it now.
Eli started to lift the bubble up into the sky as he prepared to elongate it and pop all of that air back into reality when he paused.
Maybe this wasn't the best idea right now. Did he really want to explain to his parents how he blew the roof up practicing with powers the day after he went to the hospital for rushing into an active terrorist situation?
Without thinking about it he shunted the air-filled bubble into his void as he prepared to teleport back down into his room then he stopped dumbfounded. It floated inside of his void as if nothing happened. His grin turned into a radiant beaming smile.
Literally.
He teleported downstairs into his room where he turned to study the mess of papers, folders, and textbooks scattered all across his desk. Or his dresser drawers that were left in a state of limbo where some were closed, some left halfway open, and others left fully out. His ancient hand-me-down laptop that his dad had given him back in middle school that barely worked. A heap of boxes and other clutter that he'd collected over a lifetime.
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Dozens of bubbles appeared as he snapped item after item into bubbles. All of his school stuff? In a bubble now packed into the void.
His clothes? Into a pair of bubbles, one for clean and one for dirty.
A thrill of excitement started to thrum inside of him as he stared at his bed with wide eyes as he created another bubble—
"Eli, are you awake yet? We need to talk..." Mom asked as she opened the door and then stopped as she watched his bedding, bed, and bedframe all vanish before her very eyes. While to him, he felt his bed still distinctly in its own personal bubble now packed into the void.
He turned to smile at her, parts of his body glowing from his barely contained excitement that dimmed as he met her red bloodshot gaze. Tears rolled down her cheeks even as she blinked at him in astonishment and alarm. His bed appeared as if he'd never tucked it away accompanied by a level up notification that he ignored.
"Mom... are you okay?" He asked as he teleported next to her to try and reach out but she shook her head as she stepped back.
"What are you doing, Eli? You can't even take a break from this for one minute?" Sobs cracked her voice as she stared at him with broken eyes. “Why do you continue to treat this like a game? This is real life. People died and we were attacked. Your father and I had to fight to survive and here you are playing with your powers?”
“It’s not a game to me,” Eli said in a brisk tone as his smile flattened. “It never has been. Why do you act like I went there for anything else other than to help you guys? I’ve told you again and again and you still act like I’m the problem here when this is your fault in the first place.”
“What do you mean my fault?”
“I didn’t lose my arm fighting some random psychotic terrorists or whatever they were, but from fighting Dave. My godfather, apparently, was put in jail along with his wife because of you and Dad. I had to fight for my fucking life the entire time!”
Breath hissed between her teeth as her lip trembled. Fresh tears slid down her face as she shook her head. “No. I’m sorry. I can’t talk about this now. We’ll continue this later. That federal agent is here to see you."
She rushed down the hall where she shut her door with a firm snap.
Eli snarled at how his joyous exploration had been dashed instantly by the reminder of how he’d been tossed around and had his arm cut off like a doll. How she’d yelled at him and berated him endangering himself as if he were a dumbass that was out on the prowl for fights. He sighed as he started to walk down the stairs as slow as he could, not wanting to teleport there instantly.
Maybe Dr. Simmons had a point. He got everywhere so much faster with teleportation now. It was good to take his time more often and drive or even go for walks and bike rides again. Irritation fizzed in his stomach even as he tried to refocus himself.
His status menu opened as he considered equipping Rapid Recovery, but he closed it before he could. It was fine. He didn’t need it.
Turning his thoughts away from the short-term screaming match with his mom, he reoriented back to what he just discovered. Would this allow him to use Telekinesis again sort of? Put things in bubbles and move them around at will? What was his size and weight limit?
Could he fit his car in a bubble?
Steps creaked as he ambled down the stairs.
Mr. Daniels stood stoically with his hands crossed behind his back and his head tilted at a polite angle as he listened to Dad ramble on about his newest character in Eldritch Wars. Apparently, a necromantic storm demon lord that relied on heavy lightning AOE attacks which summoned two undead to fight for him on every storm magic kill.
"Ah, there he is! I'm glad to see you're doing alright, Elias. I was concerned when you left without warning yesterday," said Mr. Daniels in a warm tone once Eli came into view on the staircase. "May we talk somewhere in private?"
"Eli is still a minor, Mr. Daniels," Dad's voice turned frigid in an instant. "Whatever you want to say to him you can say around me."
"Of course, Mr. Newton." Red light began to glow through the tinted lenses of Mr. Daniels sunglasses as he waited for Dad to invite him in, but he didn't. Instead he stepped forward to lead them out on the porch.
Eli sat down on a seat while he studied both adults glare at each other. Both of their body languages were hostile with how they stood and shifted their weight from one foot to another. Dad's fists clenched even as he watched the agent warily.
"Well?" Dad prompted when nobody said anything.
"You almost had severe charges levied against you, Elias. I don't know if you are aware, but you skirted around several laws with what you did. Vigilantism, assault with a deadly weapon, obstruction of justice at least. There was talk of pushing for more charges, but I managed to talk them down and get all charges dropped entirely."
"Thank you, I—" Eli started to say before Mr. Daniels continued.
"If you adhere to some rules. You have a choice, of course, and you'll receive a warning. I need you to sign some paperwork saying that you received this warning, you'll need to update your threat assessment forms with your updated power portfolio and well, you'll need to attend more mandatory classes."
"I believe my son has had enough of your mandatory classes. Lana said there was far too much propaganda to try and encourage everyone in attendance to join the Federal Superpower Task Force. My children aren't going to fight and die like that, Mr. Daniels."
"They are mandatory by law for anyone above a Potentially Lethal rating. You would have known that if you weren't given special privileges for your work with the anti-technomancy encryption, but perhaps that should be revoked. After all, you do have a Massively Lethal rating. How much devastation could you cause right now if you happened to snap, Mr. Newton?"
"What happened to 'innocent until proven guilty?" Dad shot back.
"That's what I mean. We all have a duty to be educated about the changing world order. Sticking to old archaic ways will get everyone killed when someone like you or your children goes on a rampage because they have the powers to put themselves above the law." Mr. Daniels nodded at Dad before turning to look down at Eli. "Like you did yesterday."
Dad opened his mouth then closed it with a frown. His eyes had that glazed look he had whenever he dug his teeth into a thought and really started thinking it through. Eventually he sighed and shook his head. "I get what you're saying, but this is still wrong. Eli and Lana are teenagers and I don't want them to be indoctrinated in some crazy regime."
"It's not like that at all, Mr. Newton. The Superpowered Threat Assessment Indicator or STAI is a newly founded branch of the Federal government that is doing its best to ensure everyone, especially young people, are aware of the danger their powers and that of others poses. Do I need to remind you that two of your children have killed? In self-defense, sure, but they both pulled that trigger with supernatural abilities that I've seen grown men and women unable to do. They have powers that we do not understand, as everyone does now, but they are a proven element. Your son could have easily injured or killed a bystander or the very people he was fighting when he shouldn't have been anywhere near there."
"It was self-defense." Eli mumbled then looked away as both men turned toward him. Beeps sounded as Mr. Daniels unlocked his phone and swiped his fingers across the screen before he clicked something on it causing Dad to swear vehemently. "Look at what you did to twenty-three year old Gavin Smith. He was an escaped convict involved with the attack, but look at what you did and what you are capable of, Elias."
A far too crisp picture glowed with the backlight from his phone revealing a wound carved all the way through a man's stomach out his back. The slanted walls of the wound were blackened and crispy like a seared steak. Around the outside of the wound was a massive ringed series of crimson burns that went from the hole out to a diameter as large as his fist. Swollen white and yellow blisters rippled all over it.
He winced at the picture as Mr. Daniels swiped again.
Now it showed the backside. Here it looked as if a chunk of flesh and muscle had been burned out entirely. The same hole remained, just as crisp as before. Now however the burns covered almost all of his back.
"That isn't self-defense. You could have killed them. The only reason I was able to talk down prosecution is because of your involvement with my mandatory class and I was able to vouch for you and because the only case of you actually murdering someone was in self-defense and those records have been sealed. If you don't want to see me every week on Saturday until the course is concluded I'll be happy to call for the police to come take you."
"Why did you handle this and not a lawyer?" Dad asked while Eli studied the picture with growing horror.
"Why wouldn't I? This is serious. Besides, I don't want an emotional situation to ruin a young man's life. This is his last chance. Otherwise, he'll either have to go to jail or be conscripted into the Federal Superpowered Task Force. Come to the classes, live a clean life, go to college and settle down. Do whatever it is you want as long as pictures like this don't get attached to your file. Are we understood?"
Eli nodded. Horror dug its claws in deep. He almost instinctively opened up his status so he could equip Rapid Recovery, but before he could, Dad spoke.
"Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We appreciate all you have done on our behalf. If you leave us the paperwork we'll have our lawyer send it to you if everything is agreeable."
"Excellent. Well, that's all. Good luck, kid." Mr. Daniels reached into the folds of his suit to pull out a thick wad of paper with a binder clip holding it all together. Eli blinked at the discrepancy in space, but when he reached out with his spatial field he didn't sense anything to explain how that fit in his suit pocket. "See you next Saturday."
They watched as he walked over to his black car and drove off in silence.
"I'm so sorry Dad..." Eli whispered as he closed his eyes to try and forget the gruesome images that kept popping up in his mind with the clarity of a spotlight.
"It's okay." Dad squeezed his shoulder as he sat down beside him. "It's okay. Everything is fine. We'll all be better now."
Eli bit his lip as he fought to keep his emotions stable. Light rippled and beaded across his skin and space warped a bit all around him as he struggled to keep it all in. He turned to his dad with a wince, “I’m not so sure. Mom and I had a fight before I came down.”
“I know. She already texted me about it. Do you want to talk about it?”
“Why does she distrust me so much? Lana and Lyra use their powers all the time.” Eli started to shake his head then he leaned against the wall in a slump.
“They didn’t run into a fight and lose their arm, Eli. Of course she’s more focused on you right now. Lyra’s over at her friend’s house right now because she said she wanted some normalcy and Lana wasn’t even there. Your mom is really upset like we all are.”
“I guess.” Eli bit his lip again before he blurted out, “It was Dave who hurt me. Him and his wife are after both of you. They hate you and want to hurt you guys anyway they can.”
Dad cringed as he turned to look at Eli with horror before he seemed to crumple in on himself. He opened and closed his mouth half a dozen times so that he practically looked like a fish. “...I didn’t know that. Why didn’t you say anything earlier?”
“I was too busy being yelled at about how dumb I was.”
“That’s not fair.”
Silence stretched between them uncomfortably. Right as Eli was about to go teleport to his room Dad stood up with a stretch and turned to look at him. "Come on. Let's go do something. Just us two."
"Like what?" Eli scoffed at the sudden topic change.
"Anything."
"There's nothing fun to do around here." He shook his head even as he started to latch on the idea of actually doing something instead of staying cooped up inside wallowing or practicing his powers non-stop.
"If you insist." Dad shrugged with a growing smirk. "What if we went swimming?"
"Are any pools even open?" Eli asked with a frown even as a part of him skipped at the thought of diving into the water again. He really didn’t want to keep having this conversation, but he knew it was going to come sooner rather than later once Mom worked herself up.
"We'll go to the beach then. It's only an hour or two of driving. Come on, let's go." Dad insisted with growing fervor as the door banged open with Lana marching out the door. Her stare stopped on Eli with a mix of irritation, pity, and anger.
"No. Eli is coming with me, Dad." Lana passed Eli as she started to walk towards the sidewalk. "We need to talk."
"What's going on?" Dad asked as Eli shrugged and started to follow after her.
"We'll be home by dinner."
"Alanna!" Dad called as she started to jog without looking back over her shoulder. "You better go with her Eli, but I swear to God if anything bad happens..."
"I know, I know, Dad." Eli waved goodbye before he a couple of teleports caught him up to the now sprinting Lana who was running in the street nearly as fast as a car.
"Lana! Jesus Christ!" He teleported again a dozen paces in front of her to shout before teleporting again. She slowed to a stop to turn around and glare at him. "What is this about?"
"We have a lot to talk about, Elias. You left me behind! What if my whole family died because you couldn't fucking look out for your sister? What if you went to jail? You are so unbelievably lucky that Mr. Daniels stood up for you and all you do is whine about it? Grow the fuck up. You need to get stronger, so we're training. Don't teleport. I'll meet you by the old supermarket."
"The one on Grover St?" Eli blinked as he tried to process everything she said.
"Yep. You need to meet some friends of mine. Now come on and run with everything you have." She shook her head at him like he was a lost cause before she tucked her head down and slowly started accelerating over the course of half a mile to a sprint. He watched her disappear in the distance before he realized that she wasn't sprinting. For her newfound strength, she was jogging.
Eli absorbed as much light into his body as he could before he turned his entire body to radiance and began to run with everything he had. Mailboxes and houses blurred past him as he focused on moving as quickly as possible while still maintaining control of his form. After a few minutes, he felt himself hit the limits of his Body of Light and forced himself to slow to a steady trot... for his new level of speed. He was a golden streak as he bounded down streets with more stamina, speed, and dexterity than he'd ever had before.
Focusing on his spatial senses to keep from wiping out, he pulled up his status notifications to check what he got from his practice earlier and to see what options he had.
Spatial Control You may now select from one of the following options: Evolve Power Obtain New Power N/A N/A> Hydrokinesis Ev.0 Force Construct Ev.0 Geokinesis Ev.0 Enhanced Anatomy Ev.0 Dynamic Vitality Ev. 0 BACK>