And just when he thought public school couldn’t get any more frustrating, it happened. He had started 9th grade a few months ago, and because someone decided being sent to a new school at seemingly random times was a good idea; he had to leave the Middle School he had all his friends at and had gotten used to navigating, to start going to a new school that not all of his old friends would go to, with more than five times as many people attending it. But that wasn’t what made his day worse this time.
Joe Smith had gotten used to being “the generic one” wherever he went, he had gotten used to people teasing him for things that made no sense – half the time not even to the people teasing him – and he had even gotten used to being only average in grades, looks, height, and everything else. No, what happened this time to make school life worse was something else entirely. He was stuck in yet another math class, though they finally stopped calling it 6th Grade Math, 7th Grade Math, etc, and actually gave it a name this time: Algebra. Maybe they would finally get some creativity in math? In any case, the day went as it often did, the teacher taught them the same thing they learned the day before with only a little bit of added complexity, and then started calling on random people in the room to work out problems based on the new information.
As happened about as often to him as to anyone else, he had been called on to work through a problem on the board. As always seemed to happen, he made an average number of mistakes, and his teacher used this chance to teach the rest of the class the nuances of the new technique they were supposed to learn that day. Looking bored and slightly annoyed, trying to keep the embarrassment from showing, he read the various posters around the classroom for the umpteenth time. However, this day had a new way of making High School difficult for him.
No, today was different, today was a new kind of trial for Joe. Today, his Words had Effects on the world around him. No, not like words always effect the world around you, though you should always make sure to be kind to those around you, it costs you nothing and more people spreading good throughout the world makes the world easier to live in in general. No, this time his Words had become True.
“Joe, what did you do wrong in this part right here?” His teacher asked, trying to help everyone learn through the power of shared embarrassment.
“…. I don’t know …?”
“Joe… at least try to figure it out...” His teacher sighed.
“That negative before the ‘b’ in the quadratic solution thingy wasn’t supposed to be there?”
“No, of course its supposed… wait, you’re right? That shouldn’t be the case...” A look of confused contemplation started growing on the teachers face.
And that was when Joe learned just how poorly things could go when superpowers change the rules of how math worked. It started off with little things. The edges of the walls didn’t quite meet up right with each other. The desks didn’t look quite right. Other things started happening in strangely logically illogical ways.
“Of course the negative belongs there! I was just kidding!” he said, unnerved by the distinct wrongness he was seeing.
“Right, I thought so. Yeah, see, it even says so in the textbook.” The teacher rushed to say, confused. “That wasn’t what I was talking about. On the third line there you seem to have written a plus sign where a minus sign goes.”
“Oh, yeah, I do that more often than I’d like.” Still trying not to show how weirded out he was by what had just happened, Joe continued the conversation. “So now that I’ve corrected that… the answer I get is … 3 and -2.”
The day continued on, and little coincidences kept adding on to each other throughout the day. That night, after dinner, Joe tested his theory as to what was going on using his family’s fridge. “There is an ice cream bar with my name on it waiting for me in the freezer.” He said. ‘No use testing it on something I won’t enjoy’ he thought, opening the door to the freezer.
And there it was. A Joe Smith brand ice cream bar, sitting among the ice in the tray for the built in ice maker. That was rather odd, as such a brand didn’t exist, as far as Joe knew. ‘I guess I won’t be the most average Joe around anymore, eh?’ he thought to himself, as he grabbed the ice cream bar and ate it. Next, he went to his room and checked his dresser first, then said “There’s a candy bar in my top drawer.” Opening it excitedly, he saw that there was indeed a candy bar in his sock drawer.
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The next day he had a rather bad stomachache, and had not really slept very well the night before, making school a bit of a chore. He still used his new Power to play little pranks on his classmates and teachers. “None of the dry erase markers work today.” was one of his less well thought out pranks. The news a few days later even had a short story about the strange worldwide coincidence that resulted. After a few other major and minor miscalculations, Joe soon learned to avoid saying anything as though it was a fact out loud on purpose. He still made a few mistakes from time to time though…
“And in other news, we have James Cameron Cameron on site to tell us about the mini giraffes that have recently turned into quite the scourge in Russia; James?” The newscaster started.
“Yes, thank you Karen. As you can see behind me, even farmers’ fields have not been spared, and”(gunshots in the background) “somewhat typical drastic measures have been taken. There is some good news, as some locals have started pet and food industries surrounding the new phenomenon. But if you are listening from anywhere near Russia, you might want to reinforce your fences, buy a guard dog, or build a pasture. Because these cute little guys don’t seem to be going away anytime soon.”
Another of the more minor mistakes ended up creating a bit of a stir … As Joe was riding back from school he asked a friend about the amusement park next to Lane Park downtown.
“What? There’s no amusement park in that part of town. Stop being silly.” His friend scoffed.
And before he could stop himself, he blurted out; “Of course there is. It’s got roller-coasters and everything!” And then everyone heard a faint, but deep THUNK, and turned to look towards downtown, and there, where an empty lot used to be, was a brand new, shiny, owner-less, amusement park. Amid the cries of “Woaaahhh”, and “That’s so cooool!” and such from the other students in the bus, his friend turned to him with a weird look in his eyes, and stopped talking.
Joe never managed to find his friend after that point in time and later learned his friend’s family moved out of the city because the father was a very suspicious type and was worried about builder ghosts kidnapping his kids.
This wasn’t the end of his troubles, and let’s just say that while everyone knows about leap days, few remember that February used to have 30 days before a certain unfortunate conversation Joe had with his sister. There was also the time when Joe claimed to know karate to show off in front of a girl he liked, and suddenly had a bit of a migraine as knowledge flooded his brain. His muscles were sore for weeks after as well, as they were forced to adapt to his training that seemed to take effect much more gradually than most of what his power did.
As one might guess, waking up in the nurse's office an hour later with a splitting headache is not the best way to boost one's confidence in front of a girl one likes. As such, Joe didn't find out until later that the girl in question hated violence of any kind, and his attempt to show off had landed quite poorly indeed. But at least now he knew karate, which was awesome even if the way it happened was not at all like how they showed it in that movie about human powered machines and mind bending reality in the simulation of life.
He kept making mistakes like that, frequently paying with a bad headache or some time unconscious, and he thought he had mostly gotten the hang of giving himself abilities until he made another big mistake:
“You know, George, I am incredibly strong, like super-humanly strong!” Joe claimed one day. He wasn't really trying to give himself extra powers, but was just bragging like any other average teenage boy. “In fact, I can lift more than anyone else at school!”
This was, from his perspective, a hundred percent true. Unfortunately for Joe, his newfound power didn't see it that way, and he was quickly made aware of his muscles' increasing levels of pain. They remade themselves right then and there, constantly tearing themselves apart, and healing, over and over until he was visibly “ripped and shredded”. Which is to say his muscles had grown so noticeably that by the time he could focus on what was going on around him again, George was sitting back, practically laying down, as he scooted away from the freakish display in front of him.
“Owwowowow.... that hurt. Shit, I have super healing factor to!?” Which then caused another round of pain, though this was more like ants crawling through every nerve he had, slowly making them all itch, and before he knew what he was doing, he had already scratched patches of skin off his arms, which quickly grew back. This then resulted in a rather odd sight of a perfectly healthy boy sitting surrounded by bloody skin with no sign of a scratch on him, aside from all the blood.
“Ok, yeah, that was actually somehow worse. Yeouch. I guess I should go to the showers or something.” He rambled, more in shock than practical. George had at this point fainted, not ready for what he saw that day in the slightest. So Joe just went to the P.E. locker room, and showered, clothes and all, ending the experience by turning to a confused face nearby to say; “I'm all dry now.”
While events like this happened quite rarely, it started to happen often enough that other people began to take notice, and Joe was forced to make another factual statement that fundamentally changed reality on purpose once more. Those around him kept mentioning the weird things going on, and he knew sooner or later they would figure out the source was him, so one day, he turned to one of his classmates as they walked to their next class and said:
“Wanna know something awesome? It's super secret, and I'm sure the government has been trying to cover it up, but... Superheros are real now!”
“Shut up, Joe! That can't be real. Everyone knows that those are just internet rumors and doctored videos.” His classmate replied, moving further away from Joe as he dodged a puddle from the rain the night before.
“So you say now, but they won't be able to cover it up for much longer. You'll see.” Joe said, making sure to double down so that his power had to activate. “I hope I awaken a really cool ability, like flying or telekinesis.”
“Yeah, right, you'll probably get something dumb like glowing when you hold your breath hard enough.” His classmate joked back, enjoying the topic.
“That'd be weird, why would anyone want that? If I got something that bad, you'd probably get stuck only able to heal plants or something like that.” Joe cracked, as they continued towards their next class.
This was right before “The Great Awakening” began, and the rest of that particular effect Joe's power had you all know all too well. Things kept going in a similar fashion for a while, and Joe quickly stopped being a topic of interest, as other new super-humans started taking the focus off of him. But there exists a file in a secret government database somewhere that lists him as the first known super-human, and one of the most dangerous.