Sample of my Superhero Fiction

“Hi, My name is Jake.” I said as I gripped the Styrofoam coffee cup, almost crushing it and spilling the black mud they call coffee in this place all over my pants. “Hi Jake.” The people sitting around the room said. “I’ve never spoke at one of these before and I’m not sure what I should say.” I said as I felt the butterflies in my stomach rising, making me want to gag and run out of the room. I was never good at speaking in public and always hated when I had to for some reason. Ever since Mary McCormick shot a spitball at me during the fourth grade while I was reciting a poem in front of the class. The spitball hit me right between the eyes. I was so surprised by it, I tripped and knocked over the little podium that was set up. Everyone laughed at me so I ran out of the room with a big glob of spitball dripping down my face. Since that day whenever I had to get up in front of people and speak I felt worried and embarrassed. I keep thinking someone is going to do something to me and make me relive that day all over again. I knew I’m being paranoid but I couldn’t help it. Tim, the leader of the group, leaned forward in his chair. “You say whatever you want to Jake. You can say as much as you want or as little as you want. We won’t judge you, we’re here to support you.” A bunch of the people nodded as Tim spoke. “Why don’t you start at the beginning if you’re comfortable telling us about it.” “I guess I can do that. “I said as I fidgeted in my chair and took a big gulp of the mud in my cup before taking a deep breath. “I was at Adventure Park with my nephew during the day the Meteorite flew by. We were on one of the new rides called Zero-g. It’s one of those rides that take you up twenty stories and drop you so you felt like you were in zero-g. We were at the top of the ride getting ready to be dropped when we all saw the Meteorite fly overhead. A lot of people were talking and pointing at it. I remember looking at it when the clamps let us go, beginning our drop to the ground. The sky lit up green from the tail of the Meteorite.” One of the people in the group, Abby, looked at me with sadness in her eyes as I was telling my tale. She gave me an encouraging nod as I looked at her. “That’s when I felt it. My insides felt like they were on fire. I couldn’t breath. Afterwords my nephew told me I was yelling, but I don’t remember any of it. I just remember not being able to breath and plummeting at high speeds to the ground. A second later the metal harnesses that held everyone in their seats exploded away from us. Everyone started screaming as I grabbed onto my nephew and held on tight. Four out of the six of us on that ride, died that day.” I felt a tear run down my cheek as I took a deep breath. I noticed Abby crying along with me and a few of the others were nodding like they knew what I went through. How could they? It was my fault the people died on that ride. “What happened Jake?” Tim asked. “I was holding onto my nephew for dear life. The other four people were ejected away from us at high speeds, crashing into the ground. My nephew and I were just floating in the air. The meteorite unlocked the power of gravity control in me. I was the one that repelled the people away from us. I was the one that made the harness repel away from us.” I shook my head and sighed. “I didn’t ask to become a Super, but here I am.” I finished the mud in my cup and hung my head down. The people in the room started clapping for me and I couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed. I never told the story of what happened on the day of the Meteorite. Somehow when the Meteorite went through the sky it unlocked super powers in certain people. Not everyone was affected by it. Later on scientists were able to decide that certain people had a rare gene that triggered the super powers when the Meteorite flew through Earths orbit. The Day as people are calling it, started the world on a new path. One with Superheroes and Super Villains. One where people with powers were called Supers. After that day the government made it mandatory that Supers registered with them if they were going to use their powers. Unregistered Supers that used their powers in public would be arrested. Criminals didn’t care and the law enforcement agencies started getting overwhelmed with new types of crimes. Criminal Supers went on a crime spree causing mass destruction and mayhem all over the world. The Superhero Alliance Coalition, SAC for short, was formed. Any Super that wished to help fight crime were trained in modern law enforcement techniques and were brought in when a crime involving a Super was committed. They also helped out during a crisis when needed. SAC bases started popping up in every major city. Costume Shops started popping up as well as news agencies that only followed the Supers. People started fan clubs for their favorite Supers and the media went wild about it. Not all Supers registered though and became vigilantes. Those were the ones that were the biggest problem. Vigilantes didn’t care about collateral damage and other things that protected Supers in SAC. They just did their own thing, sometimes people died and law enforcement agencies spent just as much time hunting down the vigilantes than they did criminals. After a while SAC was tasked to hunt down these vigilantes and bring them in. A special division was created whose sole purpose was to hunt down Vigilantes and unregistered Supers using their powers. The official name was Supers Containment Unit. The Supers that did it for a living just called themselves Hunters. I was a Hunter. Tim stood up and informed us that the meeting was over for the night. He thanked everyone for coming and after a while people started heading out. Abby waved me over to her before I had a chance to leave. Abby was the one that dragged me to these meetings thinking it would make me feel better about myself. I was still on the fence about that but I did feel like a weight was lifted off my chest today after speaking. Abby was short in stature with shoulder length black hair. She was in good shape from spending years teaching dance. Her Asian heritage was obvious by the slant of her eyes. When she first told me about her power I couldn’t help myself but laugh. She has the power to control paper and calls herself Origami. I met Abby about a year ago when Alpha, my boss, chose her to become my partner. For some reason he thought we would be a good fit together. Hunters always worked in pairs and they were put together where powers would complement each other. At first we both thought he was crazy putting us together. A paper master and a gravity master. Origami could create paper out of nothing and make it into anything she could imagine. If she wanted to make a paper sword, no problem. A flying Dragon, piece of cake. Whatever she decided to make she made. I on the other hand had total control over my own personal gravity and any object I wished within a certain range. At first people confused me with someone with super strength because I could lift a car as easily as if it were a pencil. I can manipulate the weight of anything to make it very light and easy to move or very heavy and impossible to move. I can make an object so heavy it can break through almost anything or so light that it can just float away. I could do the same for myself. I can make myself fly or make myself anchored to the ground becoming immovable. In a fight I can create a gravitational force-field around myself to repel all manner of attacks. I can cause myself and objects to fall toward any direction instead of the earth. I can enhance my hands and feet with gravitational force to be able to crush things with ease or become super fast and light to get the jump on things. Doctor Frank James, our chief medical doctor and Super tester, thinks we haven’t reached the limits to my abilities yet and wishes for me to keep training and experimenting inside SAC base. My training sessions with Abby have become quite interesting lately and we are learning more and more about ourselves and our powers. “I’m proud of you Jake. After a year of being your partner you never told me about your transformation.” Abby said with a smile. I shrugged as I tossed the Styrofoam cup in the garbage can. “You never asked.” I’ve been through a lot with Abby and I trusted her with my life. I just never brought up my transformation to anyone. It was still hard for me to grasp the situation considering I caused the death of four people. Of course it was ruled an accident and no charges were brought down on me but I have to live with the guilt of what happened. I see those four people when I close my eyes at night. I hear the wrenching sound of the metal harness exploding away from me and my nephew as the other four people were pushed away from me at terrifying speeds. One body was found over a mile away from the accident. We walked outside the high school where the support group held its meetings. People were still in the parking lot talking and saying their goodbyes to each other. Abby and I walked down the block. We didn’t drive to the meetings since we could both fly but we didn’t want people to see us leave. When we go to these meetings the SAC gave us a special charm created by one of our magic Supers that disguises our true identity so no one would recognize us. It comes in handy when we want to keep our secret identities intact. You never know who is watching these meetings and would want to get revenge on certain Supers. Especially being a Hunter. Taking down Vigilantes is never a popular thing with the public. People had their favorites and when you take down their Idols anything could happen. We’ve had death threats come in to the base for bringing in certain Supers. As we walked I turned on my earpiece and called control. “Control, Gravitar and Origami are online and ready to go. Any news?” I said as Abby turned on her earpiece as well. “Negative Gravitar, welcome back. How was your meeting?” When I was first brought in and tested, Doctor James suggested for me to go to some kind of counseling to try and cope with what happened but I always brushed it off. When I finally told them I was going to go with Abby to a support group they practically pushed me there, giving me a mandatory block of time off every week to go. Doc James thought it would do wonders for me and I’m glad Abby finally convinced me to go. “Our boy finally spoke up about his transformation.” Abby said. “He’s finally growing up.” I smacked Abby on the shoulder as we heard our controller chuckle into our earpieces. “I’m glad it’s working for you Gravitar. Back to business. We’ve had reports of gang activity in the lower east side.” “War Dogs territory?” I asked. “Affirmative. There have been sightings of Mindfreak in the area. It seems she is making the War Dogs night a living hell. We need you to bring her in and any other unregistered Supers you come across.” “Time to fly.” I told Abby as I deactivated the disguise charm. My clothes shimmered for a second turning into my costume of deep purple and black tights covering me from head to toe. My black and purple cape billowing in the wind as I changed the gravity around me and took off. The golden G stood out on my chest in contrast to the darker colors of my uniform. Origami did the same and her clothes transformed into the white spandex she preferred to wear. She had a simple white mask covering her eyes. A giant set of paper crafted wings appeared on her back and she took off after me. “What do we know about Mindfreak?” “She is a class 2 telekinetic. She can enhance her speed and strength and is able to move things with her mind. It seems she has enough power to make normals fear her. She has some beef with the War Dogs and has been trying to clean up the east side for over a year. She’s been off our radar since she hasn’t really done anything note worthy except the last time she was on patrol. A fight got out of hand and a few normals were put in the hospital after a car exploded and damaged a building. The police have a general warrant for her. Bring her in.” “Copy that Control. Light the way.” A green arrow appeared on my holo display directing us towards the east side. All SAC members had a camera and holo display built into their masks so Control could see and hear what we were doing and bring up a tactical display to help us in a fight. “Heads up Abby, the War Dogs are probably not going to be happy we are there as well as Mindfreak.” “Don’t worry about me partner.” Abby said as she gave me a thumbs up. “I always worry Abby, you should know that.” I said as I fought down the butterflies in my stomach. Going into battle always made me nervous. I didn’t want to hurt anyone and going into a battlefield against a vigilante and a violent gang was not my idea of a good time.