> We're all drawn to danger since we were just kids

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> The tropes aren't so subtle, cliché as it is

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>       “Dollar Sign Sacks”, Bug Hunter

- Popper -

(January)

The day after Uncle Ray and I went out for milkshakes, I decided to go into town. At the time, I would have blatantly denied that I was looking for trouble, but looking back at all that happened, trouble was exactly the destination I had in mind.

It was a warm Friday evening and I dressed up nice and took time to prettify myself. Before leaving, I extracted the heavy box from the drawer, opened a new bottle, and removed two pills. I looked at them as I did the first time, although now I knew a little bit more what they were for. I had been thinking about this moment for a couple of days and decided to stick to my plan. I swallowed one of the pills while sitting at the desk and placed the second one in my pants pocket.

Again, I could feel the effects of the pill right away and it didn’t seem to matter that I had only taken one of them. I placed the box back in its drawer with no difficulty at all and stepped outside to see what would happen.

My next decision was whether or not to take my car, and I decided that I would. I had been a little worried about not being able to limit my strength, but I had no difficulty putting the box back in the drawer, nor did going through and locking the front door cause me any issues. I was stronger, but not clumsily so.

As I got to my car, I took a moment to lift the front end into the air, just to test the pill. As near as I could tell, everything was the same as before. One pill seemed to be as good as two, which was good to know.

Nothing much happened for the next few hours. I went to a couple of bars, but only drank sodas, since I didn’t know what effect alcohol would have on my powers. I did make sure to eat something at each place I went. A burger at the first place, then some wings, and then two more burgers.

Finally, just after midnight, I decided to walk around, to enjoy the night air, as I justified it to myself. It took a lot longer than I expected, but eventually, trouble found me. I heard what sounded like a gunshot and went to investigate.

I haven’t really thought about this story in a while, but it’s funny how much it mirrors Aiden’s adventure in the alley, although not perfectly so. There were two guys in each situation as well as one girl. And in each, one of the guys had a gun.

My girl was on the ground, bleeding, and I assumed she had just been shot.

“Give me your purse,” the gun holder ordered as soon as he noticed me, which still seems like a strange request, with a bleeding body nearby.

The guy was waving the gun around, probably to show me he was serious. Even though I had been expecting something like this for a few hours, I could feel my heart beating faster and I could feel my adrenaline surge and I knew my body was ready for whatever they decided to throw at me. Which felt good.

I decided to play it stupid, to act like I was in shock or something, so I just stood there as if I was frozen staring at the gun as it moved in front of me.

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“Hey bitch,” he yelled, “I said give me your purse.”

I ignored the words and simply stayed in place and after a moment the guy with the gun used it to wave the other guy towards me. As he got close enough to reach for the purse I punched him in the chest and he flew a dozen feet through the air before hitting a building and collapsing onto the ground. He didn’t seem to be moving.

I remember hoping that I hadn’t killed him and started second guessing the force I used for the punch. I really did try to hold back, but obviously not as much as I could have. I decided to try to do better with the guy with the gun, who had suddenly turned very serious.

The gun was no longer waving about, but was rock steady, pointed at my chest. I could see the guy thinking, going over his options. He could shoot me, of course, and take my stuff and help his friend. Or he could leave me alone and try to help his friend, or he could run and hope I wouldn’t follow.

Now that I look back on it, though, he really didn’t have much of a choice. There were many stories floating around, some more true than others, about what happens when a superhero interferes with your business. It never went well for the small-time crook.

I watched his eyes as we stood there, him about three feet away, him holding his gun on me, him making a decision. Time kind of slowed a bit, so when I saw his trigger finger start to pull, I was able to twist to my right, hoping to move out of the bullet’s path. It almost worked, but the bullet caught me, hitting my shoulder about three inches from where I had damaged it the night of the stupid jump. The force of the bullet pushed me back a bit and when I looked at the shooter, time had slowed even further and I saw him moving in slow motion, his hand still moving upwards from the recoil of the gun.

I saw a look of surprise on his face, combined with resolve. He would shoot me again, if he was given the chance. I didn’t give him the chance. I took two fast steps towards him and punched him in the throat. Hard.

I knew he was dead before he bounced off the ground twenty feet down the alley. And even now, months and months later, I can’t say I’m very upset by what I did.

My shoulder hurt, but I could feel the muscles putting themselves together, which is much more interesting to experience than it is to write about. I went to check on the lady on the ground, and she looked bad. Gunshot wound to the stomach.

I wanted to help her, but I also didn’t want to get involved, which is stupid, I know. I had just killed a guy and although I could arguably claim self-defense, I didn’t want to have to explain my super strength to some well-meaning cop.

But, I also felt like the lady would die if I didn’t help. So I ripped open her blouse to see what I could do, but all I could tell was that it looked very, very bad.

And then I looked down at my shoulder, which had just been shot, but was looking fairly good. The wound has closed and it still hurt, but not a lot.

I took the spare pill from my pocket and crumbled it into her mouth and coaxed her to swallow, which she did. A moment later, her bleeding stopped and the wound started healing itself. It was fascinating to watch, but I figured she still needed medical help, so I left the alley, broke the window of the first business I saw, and used their phone to call 9-1-1.

After that, I picked up a good pace and ran the eight or nine blocks to my car.

When I got home, I went immediately to the bathroom, threw away another bloody shirt, and looked at my shoulder. It looked a bit red, not fully healed, but there was no wound, no visible indication that I had recently taken a bullet there.

Next I went to my bedroom and sat on the bed and thought about what I had done and how I had done it. Getting shot was obviously stupid and I was very aware that it could have gone much worse, for me, anyway. I don’t think it could have gone much worse for them.

So I decided to plan better in the future, to figure out some way to drop the bad guys without killing them and before they had a chance to shoot. Only now, looking back, do I realize that I never considered not going back out, never considered avoiding such confrontations altogether.

I wasn’t nearly as tired as I had been with my first super-strength experience, nor was I as hungry, so I decided to sit at my dad’s desk, grab a pad of paper and a couple of pens, and figure out some strategies for how to do this whole superhero thing better.

That plan went away as soon as I stepped in the office. The big, heavy box was on the desk, sitting where I knew I hadn’t left it.

I walked cautiously around the desk and opened it. The bottles were gone and in their place was a simple note.

“We need to talk,” it said, “Tomorrow at noon.” This was followed by an address I didn’t recognize.