Due to the nature of the mid-year tournament contests, injuries were unavoidable. Hence, all school nurses were on duty that morning, and were even aided by peers from other districts. They needed all the help they could get ; while immaturely-inflicted acid burns, electrifications, frog-spitting curses and so on were no match for healing abilities, the latter were almost always at their most efficient when used immediately. The older the injury was, the least efficient they got ; even just half an hour was a crucial time loss.

For the competition’s entire four-hour period, the nurses, abilitied or otherwise - for milder injuries, modern medicine was just fine - were completely overworked. In compensation, they got to go home right around half past noon or so.

And therein lied the catch. By lunchtime - in other words, when Catherine pulled her ‘prank’ on Felicio, the nurses were all long gone.

The contest winner had to be transported ASAP to the nearest hospital - a one-hour drive away. Coupled with emergency care waiting times and the critical nature of his injuries, healing abilities were barely any help. The boy was stuck in bed for weeks, knowing full well that some of the scars on his face would likely never fade away. His parents and brother were distraught enough over that, but two other sequelae were even more tragic ; the permanent loss of vision in his right eye, and the - hopefully temporary, or at least, doctors seemed confident that it would only be temporary - loss of his ability.

Brett, Fabrice, Brimmie - they were all torn and creased over Felicio’s painful condition. Though, as was in their character, the twins’ parents were almost just as concerned with the fact that, if he failed to recover, their son may just be kicked out of hero school. After all, though abilities weren’t ‘technically’ required to become a hero, they certainly were to attend GHH schools. ‘Was expelled from’ would likely be an even worse weight on his resume than never attending hero school at all.

Felicio was fairly indifferent to it all. Or, rather - he had very mixed feelings to it all. On one hand, he’d be scarred for life - and even now, he was suffering. But on the other… finally, some calm. He’d always wondered what it would feel like - just laying in bed, day in and day out. It was… peaceful. Felicio let his mind wander. A particular memory tugged at his otherwise calm mental state.

----------------------------------------

Brett dragged his brother through the backdoor, and urged him to sit with him in the muddy soil of their house’s long-abandoned vegetable garden. Felicio pouted, but let him do as he pleased. With the mid-year tournament just around the corner, the spunky fanboy had been all over him for weeks now - even more than usual. His excitement was fun in small doses, but when it was this intense, Felicio had considered, a few times already, just kicking him in the nuts and being done with it.

Visibly unaware of his twin’s sour mood, Brett went back into the house, then stormed back out, imprudently carrying the glass recycling bin. The hazy, tired blur they were known for left Felicio’s eyes, as the boy went from sleepy to worried in half a second.

“B-Brett, what- You’re not supposed to-” Far from being discouraged, Brett emptied the bin in a corner of the garden, picked out an empty beer bottle from the sharp mass of empty containers and broken silverware, and put it down, standing straight and proud in the middle of the tiny backyard. He then ran back over to his brother.

“Come on! Shoot it! Er- Zap it, whatever!” Felicio starred at him with a jaded expression.

“...it’s glass. That’s not gonna work.” He pretended to wipe the mud off of his pants and stood up, but his brother stopped him presto.

“Just doooo iiiiit! I wanna show you something, come on, come oooon!” Brett was shaking him by the shoulders, practically bursting with energy. Felicio let out a dramatic, elongated sigh as he targeted the green-ish bottle with his electric current.

Brett pushed his brother and himself to the floor as a loud bang reached their ears. The bottle blew up into a flurry of pieces, stabbing into the walls and fence. The two dirt-covered boys struggled back to their feet - to see the bottle’s base on its own, the rest of its structure shattered all around it. Felicio blinked, trying to recall if he’d ever read anything about this on some blog or other.

Brett broke down into laughter, happily giggling his heart away. “See! See? Did you see that? I told you! That’s my ability!” Felicio raised an eyebrow. That hardly explained anything. He retorted, getting fed up with Brett’s nonsense again.

“But I did that. Which… doesn’t make sense, actually.

- Well, yeah, dummy! That’s the point! That’s my ability! I can change OTHER PEOPLE’s abilities into the ability to make shit explode!” Felicio immediately let out a short ‘ooo’, as if that made perfect sense - because, to him, it did. Felicio was quick on the uptake - that, and sort of just went along with whatever people said so long as it wasn’t blatantly impossible.

“So is that why it took so long for you to realise you had one?

- Hey, I’m eight! That’s not long, jerk! But. Yeah. I guess it is?

- Uh. Wait, how did you even realise it?

- You know the neighbour? Yasmine? Esper brat?

- Wha, the one who yells inside of everyone’s heads at the lake beach so she can skip the line at the ice cream stand?

- Yeah. Well, she was using her ability to chase off pigeons - poor things, seriously! and, I dunno, I was mad at her, and I kinda felt weird, and then...

- Wait, wait, did the bird-

- Yeah!

- Ew!” Felicio couldn’t help but laugh. Sure, it sounded gross, and it was sad for the pigeon, but it also sounded kinda funny. Especially the part where Yasmine must’ve whined her heart out, covered in bird bits. “Did they find out it was you?

- What? Of course not. I mean, I was hiding a bit like mom and dad always ask me to. Plus, how they have known? I didn’t know right away either! Glad she wasn’t screaming at me though… “ Felicio gulped at the thought, then thought for a bit.

- Uh-uh. So, you can’t explode things yourself?” He’d asked out of innocent curiosity - nonetheless, Brett gave him a murderous stare.

“No. I can’t.” Felicio gulped. He hadn’t meant to offend him...

“…So what are you gonna do now that you know? Won’t you tell the parents?

- Well, duh! But, not now.

- ...Why not?

- Cuz! I wanna practice! And, and! It has to be dramatic.” There was that word again. If Brett had to give up the use of all adjectives save for one for the rest of his life, he would’ve picked ‘dramatic’ in a heartbeat. “Just, imagine it. You win the year turney! And then boom! I tell them I have an ability too, and we can attend together! Mom, Dad, they’ll be crazy happy!

- Yeah right. Pft! I’m not gonna win.

- Um, you better? I’m extra, ultra counting on you!

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

- Else what? You’re gonna blow up a bird in my face?

- Well, what are you gonna do if you can’t even win a stupid contest?

- Oh, it’s stupid now? Guess I don’t gotta win then.” Their nonsensical arguments escalated, and the two began play-fighting each other like cubs, rolling in the mud, having completely forgotten the garden was now a minefield of glass shards.

“WHO’S THE DELINQUENT PLAYING WITH FIREWORKS THIS TIME?” Thankfully, the neighbours’ shouting stopped them before they endured serious harm. Shit! they both thought as they ran back inside, tail in between their legs.

Brett didn’t speak a word about his ability to his parents, not for Felicio’s entire hospital stay. Even being so young, he understood it would’ve been in poor taste.

The newly one-eyed kid recovered relatively quickly from the bulk of his injuries ; soon enough, the Shaw family was all back together in their home. With one exception ; his ability was still left unusable. At best he could produce the occasional sparks, and even when he managed to, they manifested as little more than static electricity.

Since he was out of the hospital, the implications were clear. His ability may just be out for good. Ergo, expulsion was imminent. Demand was high, places were few, and the GHH was strict ; they couldn’t afford to let unabiltied kids take up space, even if Felicio’s situation theoretically wasn’t terminal.

Brimmie and Fabrice were openly devastated. First a non-abiltied kid ; now a disabilitied one, failing school just two years in.

Ah well. Felicio, in turn, could deal with this. Sure, he lost an eye. He likely wouldn’t get to use his ability again for a while, either.

But leaving behind hero school… was a huge weight off his shoulders. He didn’t even have to feel guilty on his parents’ behalf, either ; Brett could just- go instead! If he didn’t up and confess to having an ability already, Felicio would just have to tell the parents himself. He couldn’t bear being the only one content with this situation, while the rest of his household sulked in their own misery.

On the day he was released from the hospital, and ate dinner with his family again for the first time in weeks, he waited. Waited and waited for Brett to bring it up. No luck.

Fine then.

“Hey, bro! Did you tell mom?

- Tell what?” Brett looked clueless. No, he was faking it.

“Your thing. Did you show her your thing?”, Fel insisted.

“What thing?” Brimmie assertively joined in. Brett glared at his brother, then sighed, defeated.

The family had all gathered around the coffee table, happy to leave behind the undercooked spaghetti that served as their dinner. The parents, dubious and confused, but characteristically curious, sat bundled up together on the couch, while the twins wracked their brains figuring out a setup that would enable them to display off the ability without… too much damage. A makeshift city scene with some bits of old toys and tabletop games, with a house and some random rubble, then topped it off with an upside-down plastic box, serving as a semi-translucent dome, to minimise damage. Their parents’ love for needless artistry and drama had not been lost on them - they’d even been remarkably considerate. Then, being as professional as eight-year-olds could be, they repeated the experiment from a few weeks ago, with Felicio focusing on the toy house instead of a bottle this time. Everything was blown to pieces, contained within the dome… which did not protect the surface of the coffee table itself. Crap.

Even putting aside the damage to their already rundown furniture, Brimmie and Fabrice weren’t nearly as impressed with their little performance as their sons had hoped. With diligent patience, they explained why to the two brothers - or rather, they explained two of their three reasons.

For one, while Brett did have an ability, it wasn’t one he could use by himself - it was more… sabotage, if anything. And they had doubts on whether it would be enough for him to enrol in a GHH school, especially mid-year.

Secondly, this didn’t solve their first problem; Even if Brett went and enrolled, Felicio would still lose his spot. He still would’ve failed. Worse, he’d be directly put into comparison with his twin, who’d upstage him.

Lastly - and they omitted from bringing up that reason with kids that weren’t even in their teens - though they wouldn’t have admitted him to themselves, they’d… concealed Brett’s existence over time. Just slowly transitioned to only ever show themselves in public with one son at a time, addressing him either by their collective last name, or as Felicio. The reason was simple. They’d loved both their children since they’d birthed them. But they’d lived for heroism and abilitied antics for the entirety of their own lives. It was an undeniable part of them - more than an unhealthy obsession and the source of much of their income, it was the reason they’d found each other, and the meaning they’d found to their lives. Against their better judgement, it affected how they’d treated their two children - only one of which served their passion.

Knowing this… suddenly re-introducing him into the world by enrolling him, right as his brother was taken out of school, would not have reflected well on them - and would likely have consequences. They lacked the guts to face them. Keeping things flowing as they had was more comfortable. Safer. Even close neighbours, who knew the two had, at some point, parented two children, had enough emotional sense and tact not to bring up what they figure could only have been a tragic subject.

These arguments cemented their position; they would not enrol Brett into a GHH school. There was no convincing them otherwise - immature as they were, their primary school sons weren’t going to win that conversation.

Not that they knew that. They were determined to ‘help’ - that’s how Felicio saw it. He was finally happy ; it stood to reason the people he loved should be as well. The two brothers struggled for an alternative.

The Shaws couldn’t find any.

Not Brimmie, Fabrice, or Felicio. Brett was the only one who, in his childish nature, saw a clear way to ‘fix’ the situation.

“Can’t we just, like, switch places?”

The adults glared at him with dejected surprise. They would have thought him old enough to understand that, just because the two were twins, did not mean they were interchangeable - though perhaps they were to blame, having slowly assimilated the two brothers into one in public. But, then, they… well, they actually thought about it, their knowledge of crazy schemes pulled off by past heroes combining with their own imagination and desire for fantasy, and concluded - Yes.

With some effort, it could be done.

The plan was… well, relatively simple.

Felicio would still attend most classes, but whenever abilities were involved, Brett would go instead. As for how they would sneak Brett in, there was no need to ; The campus was gigantic, and the students plenty. For the sake of saving time, checks at the gate were considered superfluous and skipped entirely, so any kid could enter, really. As long as the two were never seen together in the same place, it would be just fine. Brett would just have to spend a lot of time hiding in the toilet or empty halls. He could still follow online classes from there anyway, so his parents saw no issues with it.

Now, there was still the issue that Brett’s ability was not anything like Fel’s : They could get around that too. He could sneakily turn someone’s ability into that of exploding things, just for a bit, then claim that was him using his ability to short-circuit whatever unfortunate thing had blown up.

Yes, the system was flawed, and almost certainly going to fail ; they had to artificially ‘scar’ Brett’s face with makeup every morning so that he could pass as his brother, and the two had to somewhat tone down their respective personalities, though fortunately, being kids, they didn’t have too much of one anyway. But even all that considered, Brimmie and Fabrice were confident ; it only needed to last until Fel could reliably use his own ability again, which should be anywhere between two to eight weeks. They just needed to pretend that had happened much earlier by using Brett as a stand-in, to avoid Felicio’s expulsion.

What they did not account for was that, once they knew this was an option, the boys weren’t about to let it go. This was not only incredibly exciting and fun, being all secretive and mysterious right under their classmates’ noses, it was an ideal arrangement for the both of them. Felicio got to work less, and pursuing short term interests and his nonchalant nature, and Brett got to play hero, flaunt around his ability and openly socialise with kids his age again. Instead of slowly transitioning back into the way things used to be, the brothers started to switch more and more, thanking the existence of public bathrooms for the discretion it offered them. If anyone asked, they had bladder problems. Most people weren’t rude enough to ask for more details. And, somehow, doing it so often meant they actually got quite skilled at playing the same person. So good, that their parents couldn’t find a good enough reason to slap them out of it. After all, they were utter hero nerds themselves, and this excited them too.

And so, Brett and Felicio became more or less one, planning out the way “Felicio”’s day would go every morning - though over the years, Brett ironically ended up being the one who played him most of the time. Felicio would follow around, just hanging out in the shadows, enjoying himself and his supporting role in his own life, while his brother enjoyed venting out his extra energy and ambition to his heart’s content.

Still, this did come at a cost ; since it was harder for them to directly use Felicio’s electricity without giving away the trick, their grade average fell from S to A tier. But that was all bureaucracy. The ranking system was as flawed as any other. In truth, their teamwork as Bolt, their future hero alter-ego, was so flawless that it easily gave them an edge worth more than the sum of their parts. All that, without the high and mighty GHH suspecting a thing.