I was in the woods at my cousin’s house. There was a creepy old house we used to dare each other to go in all the time. Of course there was nothing in there, but we always liked telling ghost stories. This time around though there really are ghosts in the house. As I sat on some rotted wooden planks, the burnt specters of a young man and two adults were staring down at me.
The man’s face was split in half by burns, I could see the milky white of his skull on half of his face. His shirt was covered in soot and embers flaked off in the wind. The parents seemed to melt together as the flames engulfed them.
Their eyes black orbs as they stared at me, forever held together in their tragic embrace. I could hear the chirping of crickets and the whistling of the cool wind from the windows. The building was humid and covered in dust. Parts of the dark rotted wood were falling in as I sat.
“I take it you aren’t here to thank me for saving your loved ones?” I said with a smirk. They just swayed and breathed out smoke. Their coal black eyes stared at me, unwavering. “Thought so.” I murmured.
I heard footsteps coming from outside. Soon Danny, Mar, Emily, and Jack are sitting around me. Not long after, they were joined by the two kids I’d saved, and the pregnant wife, though they didn’t sit near me.
“Another job well done.” Jack said. It was both daytime and nighttime outside. It felt like everytime I turned my head it switched.
“If you call losing half ‘well done.’” Danny replied dryly.
“I think he did rather well. Right, Jacob?” Jack said. He looked right at me. The bruises and cuts and swollen eyes all appeared on his face as he grinned. But I’m struck speechless by the appearance of my friends.
I looked at Emily and her face was contorted, switching between apathy and sadness, tears streaming down her cheeks. Mar faded in and out. The children of the specters stared at me. I could hear their screams as they realized that no one would be able to save their parents.
More visitors arrived in response to my silence. An old lady in a nightgown, and her husband. They were holding hands as they approached. My mother walked in behind them. They stayed behind the specters and blocked the doorway so I couldn’t escape. My mother walked over to me and stood behind me, stroking my hair as everyone sat and stared.
“He saved their lives! He’s a hero! You expect too much of him.” Jack exclaimed.
“I hate that I have to remind you of this, but he almost died! He got shot and if it wasn’t for the suit he wouldn’t have survived!” Danny shouted. He stood up for a second but the specters took a step forward in response so he sat back down.
“Oh come on. He’s going to die regardless. Everyone is. He’s just doing what he can. Isn’t everyone?” Jack asked.
“Yeah. Other people make art, or they get a hobby. Jacob is going out every night and trying to get himself killed.” Danny was speaking in a low growl. I stood up and tried to run away but the specters grabbed me and my body erupted into flame.
…
I woke up clutching the couch. I was covered in sweat and panting hard. My head hurt like someone hit it with a hammer. I placed my hand on my forehead to try and soothe it, and the movement caused pain to shoot through my arm and shoulder.
This is what I get for trying to do the right thing.
I looked out the window. The sun had been up for a few hours. School would be in the second or third hour. I couldn’t go even if I wanted to, mom had left for work hours ago. I had skipped the whole week. Mom didn’t really care.
She was just happy I was still around. I checked my phone and saw that I had two messages from Mar and three from Danny. I placed my phone down in the space between the wall and the side of the couch. There was no reason to purposefully depress myself.
I turned on the news. In the last week there’d been a series of terrorist attacks in the city and surrounding suburbs. The hotel fire among them. It was the same story every time: explosions, shots fired at civilians, and escape.
At one point they showed my big interview with the news crew. It was surreal seeing myself on tv. I was covered in ash and dust. There was a big chunk of fur missing from the center of my suit. I switched to national news and even they were talking about me. Some guy in a suit was talking to a room full of fellow guys in suits and a woman, not in a suit.
“So this new ‘superhero’ that showed up last week.” The host used air quotes as he said superhero. I took only a little offense at that. “He shows up in the middle of the night at this elderly couple’s home. The husband had a heart attack, the superhero grabs him and carries him to the nearest hospital. Now the old man lived, but he’s got four broken ribs and no one to sue. What a hero.” The man snickered.
I left three children orphans. Ha.
“Well afterward this hotel is attacked by domestic terrorists and this guy goes in and saves a few people. News crew catches him.” As the host finished an image showed up on the screen behind him. It was a picture of me, covered in ash with a microphone shoved in my face.
“I think he’s just trying to do the right thing.” The suitless woman said.
“Oh please, he’s just a gloryhound. He doesn’t actually care about these people. If he did he would’ve stayed longer and made sure everyone got out okay.” The youngest man there said. He had brown hair in an atrocious bowl cut. He was wearing an ugly smirk.
Didn’t want to get in their way.
“Fair point. He’s new though. Maybe he was worried he might do more damage trying to save people. We have the clip of him trying to stop the van, right?” The oldest there, a black man with a mustache and greying hair spoke up.
They played a clip on the screen behind them. Surveillance camera footage of the street outside the hotel. A van was driving down and a figure appeared moving insanely fast, colliding with the van. Two wheels of the van left the ground, but it didn’t fall over.
I was moving that fast? Wow. I rotated my arm, feeling the pain in my shoulder as I went through the memory of colliding with that stupid van.
“So what? He’s more inclined to hurt people than help people. What a hero.” The young man replied sarcastically.
“I don’t know. Like Joel said, he’s new. Maybe fighting is just all he knows right now.” The woman said.
“Oh you’ve got to be kidding me, Terry. There’s no such thing as superheroes! This guy is just as much a criminal as those people in the van.” The young man responded.
“No such thing as superheroes, but there are superhumans.” Joel said impassively.
“Oh yeah. What’d the last three do? One started a battle with the US Army that ended in sixty seven casualties, one froze his entire family, and the last one created a giant lizard monster that killed a bunch of kids on spring break! Is that really the kind of person you want defending your town?” The young man said indignantly.
“To be fair, Tommy, that last one was proven to be an accident.” The host chimed in.
“Sure, doesn’t change the fact that the only three superhumans we have on record all have blood on their hands. How much blood do you think this one will accumulate?” Tommy said.
“We don’t know that he’s actually a superhuman.” Joel said.
“Oh please, you saw how fast he was moving.” Terry said.
“No faster than an Olympic runner.” Joel replied calmly.
“Can Olympic runners tackle vans without hurting themselves, or climb the sides of burning buildings? The guy’s clearly some kind of freak.” Tommy accused.
“I’m pretty sure he was moving faster than an Olympic runner.” Terry said.
“Experts that saw the video say he was moving around forty miles per hour, give or take.” The host commented.
“Okay, he’s one of these new superhumans that keep popping up. Last week you were calling for genocide because of the damage they cause. Maybe this is a sign that they’re not all bad.” Joel added.
“Not all bad? What happens when this kid snaps too? He’s fast, strong, and we don’t even know who he is! How exactly are we supposed to stop him?” Tommy said.
I’m not going to snap, you idiot. I just want to have fun.
Which feels less true every time I think it.
I flipped channels back to local news. The terrorists had been cornered. They were in some old warehouse not far from my lab. They had six hostages. Random civilians kidnapped from a bus in the city. Cops had the place surrounded but they weren’t going near it until they could get the hostages out of there. The hostages weren’t leaving until the terrorists got their demands met. Their demands included enough explosives to level three city blocks.
I could still feel the pain from the damaged ribs. They were healing up fairly well but they still hurt. I grabbed my phone and looked at the messages. Four from Mar, three from Danny. I laid my phone back down in the space between the couch and the wall. Then I grabbed my bag that I’d placed there. My parents were at work. I pulled the suit out from the bottom of my bag. Then I grabbed the mask.
I opened up one of the side pockets and I grabbed the battery. I was ready.
…
I spotted the warehouse while on some guy’s roof. He was watering his lawn while his kids were playing tag in the front yard. I looked down at him and waved. He stared at me with wide eyes and an open mouth and waved back. The rest of the neighborhood was focused on all the cops down the block surrounding the old warehouse.
After ten minutes of running I was in the field leading to my destination. Cop cars were surrounding every inch. They were in a full circle, guns out and ready. SWAT teams were also starting to pile up. I approached a police officer.
He was a young asian guy, didn’t seem like he’d been a police officer very long. He was leaning against one of the cop cars watching an older officer. I walked up behind him and tapped him on the shoulder. He spun around as if I’d just set a firework off underneath his feet.
“You!” He yelled. The other officers all started turning around to see what he was yelling at. “You’re the guy from the hotel fire. I was there!” He whispered, obviously trying not to gather anymore attention. I nodded my head.
“Look, I need some information.” I made my voice sound deep and heroic.
“Dude, you’re amazing. Anything you want, seriously.” He said.
“What’s the situation exactly?” I asked him.
“There’s five terrorists in there. They’ve got five hostages. We’ve got them surrounded on all sides, but they say if we don’t give them the explosives they’ll kill one hostage every hour.” The cop explained. The older cop he was watching looked over at us and gave him a disapproving shake of the head.
“Thanks, dude.” My voice continued to sound deep and booming.
I leapt onto the top of his cop car. I sprinted full speed and leaped onto the next cop car, one closer to the warehouse. Then the next, and the next. All the way to the back of the building. I managed to freak the hell out of the cops at the back of the building. They all pulled their guns on me at once.
I put both hands up with palms out in a ‘don’t shoot’ gesture. They lowered their guns but kept a close eye on me. When I hopped down and made my way to the back window of the warehouse one spoke up.
“You can’t go in there!” A young, short, platinum blonde woman said. Her face went pale when she heard a gunshot within the warehouse. She was silent as I kept moving. I hopped up onto the wall and started my ascent to the window at a full sprint.
…
Samuel didn’t know what he was doing. His best friend had dragged him into this. They were going to start a revolution. ‘A glorious baptism of society. A trial by fire that would purify a major city and turn it into a utopia. But in order to make a new future one must burn the past all away.’ Or all you have is reminders of the way things were.
So there Samuel was. Assembling C4, getting ready to blow up an old warehouse and die a martyr while his best friend planned an escape. Samuel didn’t want to die a martyr. He didn’t really want a glorious revolution, but he’d much rather die in an explosion than be a hostage and die tied up on his knees.
First thing that they heard was a noise. Just a simple thud like a book hitting the ground. Samuel turned around and grabbed the handgun at his waist. As he turned back he saw what might have been a ghost.
“Didn’t I kill you?” Samuel asked the figure. It was the superhero he had shot last Friday at the hotel explosion. Carter, the leader of this glorious revolution, was pissed that his four horsemen had shot the kid. He wanted to have a freak on the side of the revolution. He hadn’t seen what the guy had done. He had tackled a van going sixty miles per hour like it was nothing. If Carter had been there he would’ve unloaded the whole clip.
“Oh great! Just who I was looking for!” Carter said with a big smile. He had been standing in the corner up until now. The figure stood still as Carter approached him. Carter reached out and clasped the figure’s hand in a firm handshake. “Welcome to our little operation. I’m so glad to meet you, Mr…” Carter paused. The figure looked down at him with electronic glowing eyes. The figure remained silent, Carter continued on as always. “Well, I’m sure you’d like to know what exactly we’re planning to do here.”
“You see we’re alike, you and I. We both want to change this city.” Carter explained. The figure didn’t say a word. He just watched, unmoving, as Carter pulled him along. “And while I admire everything you’ve done so far, I have to say that what you really need is help.” Carter continued. The figure tilted its head. “Oh, are you still upset about my boy’s last encounter with you? They’re a little skittish these days, what with all of these fascists trying to kill them. But I assure you that no one here has any intention of harming you.”
At this point one of the hostages, a young woman, started screaming into her gag. Carter looked back at her with a look of disgust.
“Hank, will you please take care of that!” Carter shouted. Samuel pointed his handgun in the direction of the figure. The figure stood still, like it was frozen in thought. Hank pulled his rifle on the woman and fired a bullet into her forehead.
The remaining hostages all started wriggling and screaming into their gags. A little black girl fell onto her side in an attempt to wriggle out of the ropes. Samuel recognized the little girl as the woman’s daughter. The gunshot seemed to awaken the figure. He jumped onto the ceiling, and Samuel immediately fired his gun. The bullet ended up striking the wall behind where the figure stood. Everyone in the room looked frightened. Carter seemed as calm as ever.
“Why don’t you just come down here and talk with me.” Carter sighed. Samuel pulled his handgun out and aimed it at the figure. The figure leaped across the room faster than Samuel could press his finger on the trigger. Hank was lifted off his feet and thrown into the wall hard enough to knock him unconscious. The figure wasted no time in going after Charlie who was also guarding the hostages. Charlie’s eyes lit open, and instead of fighting his first instinct was to drop the gun and run outside.
Next the figure ran after Calvin. Calvin was sitting at the desk on the phone with the people outside. Samuel pulled out his handgun and fired directly at the figures back. Carter went for a different approach. He grabbed the little girl off the ground and held his handgun to her head. The figure’s body rolled forward as his momentum from running carried him on.
Samuel walked over to where the figure laid. He pointed the gun at the back of the figure’s head. His hand was shaky. Samuel felt a noose slip around his throat. In an instant he went from breathing normally to choking on the last little bit of air he had left. The gun dropped from his hand. He felt his legs leave the ground as he was thrown across the room and slammed hard enough against the wall to make him see stars and hear a buzzing in the back of his head.
Carter stood unphased by the situation. The little girl he held was crying into her gag. He gripped the gun against her temple.
“You’ve taken out a good portion of my crew. Good job, hero. Let the police take care of them, and let me walk away. Everyone gets to go home happy and safe.” Carter said with a clear and understandable voice. Even when facing down the figure he remained steady and calm. “Or, these old walls get a red paint job.” He smiled.
“Drop the gun.” The figure growled in a deep growl.
“Ha.” Carter laughed dryly. The figure took a step forward and a loud noise emanated through the room, followed by Carter’s blood spraying on the ground. The police had gotten desperate and taken their shot.
Carter’s body fell limp on top of the little girl. The figure ran over and shoved Carter off of her. Carter gagged on his own blood as his eyes struggled to remain still. His hands became too weak to hold on to the gun. Samuel lost consciousness.
…
“Everyone on the ground!” The police barged in. The guy that was sitting at the chair finally noticed that he wasn’t alone in the room and got up and laid on the ground. I just stood there and stared at them.
“That means you too!” The short woman from earlier screamed in my direction. I tilted my head at her. When she started to move towards me I started towards the door. The woman ran in front of me at an impressive speed and put a hand on my chest.
“You decided to barge in here and become a part of this, now you’re a part of it. We’ll need you in court, we’ll need to know your identity. Don’t worry about being arrested, we’ll give you immunity.” She said. As she spoke she pressed her palm hard against my chest. I grabbed her wrist with my hand. “Or we can take you by force.” She stared hard at me.
“Force it is, then.” She said, and I used my grip on her wrist to gently remove her hand. Once I got her hand off she grabbed my arms and used her knee to force me to the ground. Once she got the handcuffs on I just barely stifled a laugh. She shoved her knee into the back of my neck hard.
“What’s so funny?” She sneered and pressed her knee in a little harder.
“I would like everyone in the room to pay close attention. Look at my back.” I exclaimed in a deep voice. The lady gave my back a once over and pulled the tiny bit of metal out where it was lodged. Clumps of ‘fur’ fell off.
“That is a bullet.” I said as I put my hands in position. I felt the knee shifting as she moved off my back. I moved my wrists as close together as possible. For a moment I felt uncertain if I could even do what I was trying to do.
“And these are handcuffs.” I said in my deep voice.
I pulled the handcuffs in opposite directions in a single motion as fast as possible. The chain snapped in two but just barely. Bits and pieces of metal fell on the floor. My hands instinctively went to my face as police officers gripped their guns.
But they remained completely still. I took the moment of confusion to throw the woman off my back and run full force through the open door and out into the crowd waiting outside.
