DC: Don't Utter A Word

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I was on my way home after a hard day's work. I was quite tired and a little tense, but that was to be expected; fifteen hours of work a day will do that to you.

My job was nothing glamorous or fancy, but it was necessary; I worked with the Police IT department helping them with their systems.

I started two months ago after I came of age, and the pay was good.

But sometimes I wish I didn't have to work so much, but nothing is perfect, right?

"No traffic today; that's weird," I commented as I continued to drive home. Usually, the streets at the current time were full of people going to lunch. Yet, they were empty, outside of the occasional car and truck passing by, which was an impossibility in New York of all places.

With a smile, I dismissed those thoughts; why complain about the lack of traffic? This way, I would get home faster, which meant I would get to sleep faster, which would make me very, very happy.

As I smiled at that thought, a bright light blinded me, followed by a familiar sound I had heard before, the sound of tires screeching, though this time the sound wasn't in a movie, it was coming towards me. Seconds later, I felt a lot of pain, as my car was lifted into the air by the sudden violent hit, all while I lost consciousness.

I didn't know what had happened, but I knew something had hit me, that much was clear before I closed my eyes.

When I opened my eyes again, I could hear the sirens of the police and the fire department while my face rested in a puddle of my own blood inside my car.

I couldn't move; I could only faintly hear what was happening around me, but not very clearly. It was like hearing underwater, distorted, and far away.

Surprisingly I was calm, and not because I thought I was going to be rescued. No, something inside me was clear that I was going to die, that there was no way to save me, and even with the prospect of my imminent death, I was calm.

As I sank into my thoughts of acceptance of death, a light came into my tired eyes, blinding me.

"His pupils are unresponsive." I heard someone say in a worried tone.

"He has five penetrations, one in the throat, two in the abdomen, and two in the legs." added another person with the same tone.

"He's bleeding out; we have to help him," exclaimed the first person I heard before, who was blinding me with a flashlight, I guessed.

"No... I don't think we can." the second person added with a defeated tone.

While these two debated about my survival, I was laughing in my head, dying in a car crash; what a cliché. Still, I guess it's an ending like any other, how tired I am.... when I asked to rest... I didn't mean this, but maybe it's my fault for not specifying.

And with that last thought, my eyes stopped seeing, my ears stopped hearing, and my mind stopped thinking.

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[Star City. October 17, 19:30 PDT. 1995]

I opened my eyes again, and I was confused; I didn't feel like before, I didn't feel pain like I probably should've had, no, I felt different, it was hard to explain.

I immediately noted that I could not move, or rather, my body did not move as I wanted it to move.

I felt uncoordinated, out of control, like when you are drugged for an operation, but with all your mental faculties still intact, it was aggravating and very troubling.

Eventually, I managed to move my body to my right side to see something that didn't make much sense, a teddy bear, a giant teddy bear laying on the bed I was currently occupying; as far as I could see, it was as big as me.

Why would I have a giant teddy bear? Why would the hospital give me one… sighing I moved my eyes away from the teddy bear to see what else was around me, only to find some kind of bars surrounding my bed, wooden ones by what I could tell, my sight wasn't cooperating with me a lot today.

Bars and a giant teddy bear, none of this made any sense. Was I perhaps sleeping?

"Mom!" I heard someone say excitedly. "The baby is awake!"

The baby?

"Hello." a giant head peeked through the bars towards where I was looking. "I'm your big sister, and you must obey and listen to me." she declared, as I realized she was looking at me.

A giant blonde girl... something wasn't right...

She wasn't a giant, was she?

Suddenly it all made sense, to an extent of course. A giant teddy bear, a giant girl smiling at me.

It was all a matter of perception; these things weren't big, I was small, I was a baby.

Well, this I was not expecting.

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[Star City. October 23, 09:30 PDT. 1995]

Status update? Well, I was right with my first assessment, I was a baby.

I suppose there are worse things than being unable to shit properly like God intended or talk or move properly at all, I better not continue lest I want to become the first clinically depressed baby.

My new name was apparently David Lance.

My new sister aka the giant blonde girl that initially scared the crap out of me, her name was Dinah Lance, I wonder if she's a fan of Black Canary.

My new father was Larry Lance, a police officer from what I could see every now and then when he came to see me with his uniform.

And my new mother was Dinah Drake, no idea what she does, besides taking care of me.

Anyhow, I was a baby.

Quite the predicament, right?

Not much to say beyond that.

Life is monotonously boring as a baby, you eat, you process your food, you sleep, and rinse and repeat.

You have no control over it too, I get hungry many times a day, I sleep a lot, and well… soil my diaper a lot.

Though like I said before, not all is bad, yes it's depressing sure, but I'm alive, that has to be worth something, at the very least.

Yes, it would be torture for a bit, but not for that long, I mean, by my second birthday I should be able to go as adults say potty relatively alone, and walk, meaning I only really had two years of baby prison ahead of me, which is not that bad considering the situation.

Maybe even less, I was an adult in a baby's body, I should be able to learn things faster, right?

Though I wasn't sure how physically possible that was, I mean, for all I knew the body needed to mature to do certain things, and I couldn't rush those things, I guess I'm about to find out.

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[Star City. February 03, 15:30 PDT. 1997]

A lot of things have happened since my rebirth.

Things I never thought possible, things that often kept me awake at night.

For starters, during my first birthday, I discovered that the city where I lived was called Star City. Which although strange wasn't very concerning, how foolish I was, at the time I couldn't tell it was the first of many red flags I would get in my new life.

Days later, I saw my new mother dressed in a very strange way, like a stripper cosplaying Black Canary, but in the old comic style, not the updated style, at first, I thought that's what she did for a living, a cosplaying stripper, but days later I found out how wrong I was.

When a man wearing a golden helmet floated into our house telling our mom she was needed. A man I knew as Dr. Fate.

Imagine my surprise for a moment.

It was there when I became aware that this was not my world, that I had not only been reincarnated in some kind of past but that I had been transported to a new universe, one to which I was somewhat familiar.

I'll be honest, I didn't know what to make of this situation.

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[Star City. November 21, 19:30 PDT. 2001]

Six years passed in the blink of an eye, and well, there was a lot to tell.

My sister, Dinah who since my discovery of what universe I inhabited I knew was going to be the next Black Canary was an awesome sister. She loved me a lot, she showed it with everything she did for me, and I'm not going to lie, I loved her a lot too.

I never had siblings, and I never thought that having siblings would be so good, so necessary.

Maybe it wasn't like that for everyone, but Dinah was a pretty good big sister.

I didn't miss my past life at all, in fact, heck I barely remembered it. I only remembered my job, and what I knew about this universe, but things like my name before I died, or my age, I didn't really remember, they faded with time, leaving only what I knew now, that I was a man, that I died, and that I knew a lot about this universe.

Although based on what I remembered, I could make some conclusions about my past life, like for example, knowing that I died in a car crash, I knew that I must have been at least sixteen years old.

But I really didn't care for it.

Anyway, about my current life.

Well, Dinah was already training to be a hero, even though she was just sixteen years old, our mother and others were helping her get a hold of her powers.

Which brought me the following question, would I inherit such powers, I mean, in a world like this any kind of power is a good power.

I suppose sooner or later I would know, Dinah got hers when she was six, almost leaving her entire first-grade class deaf, which was when she started training with other heroes to control her power, so considering I'm six, I should know soon.

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[Star City. December 21, 19:30 PDT. 2001]

I killed someone.

It wasn't my intention, but… I did, and it feels awful, I think it's the first time since I got here that actually cried.

I got my powers and they were worse than I imagined.

I was playing hide and seek with Dinah in an abandoned building when all of the sudden a random drunk appeared as I tried to hide behind some boxes, the man startled me, but I didn't scream. I just mutter a word, like one does when surprised but not enough to be scared. I wasn't scared, I knew Dinah would kick his ass if he tried anything, but as soon as I muttered that word, the man exploded leaving nothing behind but a small handful of blood.

Dinah found me a few seconds later.

I was in a state of shock, she hugged me, I didn't feel it.

I had killed a man.

I could barely think, but something was clear, a part of me knew that if I ever opened my mouth again, the result would be the same, but worse.

I could feel it now.

And I was scared, not only for me but for everyone around me.

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[Star City. January 13, 15:30 PDT. 2002]

After that fateful day when my powers awoke.

I was moved to a secured location to train me into controlling my powers, courtesy of Green Arrow, the new upcoming hero of Star City, who was apparently friends with the family.

No one blames me for what I did, not entirely.

But that didn't make me feel any better.

My powers, I knew them, I had somehow obtained the powers of the inhuman known as Black Bolt.

Each passing day, I felt my power growing stronger, which alone was more than enough to aggravate me.

I had no control over it, if I uttered a word, people would die.

Especially taking into consideration the fact I used to talk, it's hard to simply stop talking, to simply not say or utter a sound. It's unbearably hard, it's torture.

At least things like sneezing, or coughing didn't activate my powers, but every other sound did.

I regretted thinking that any power would be a good power in this world, this power was not a gift, it was a burden, if I wasn't careful, I would end up killing those who I loved.

"Everything will get better," Dinah said, as she approached me with a smile.

Taking my notepad, the one I had been given to communicate, I wrote. --I don't think so, but it's good to dream, isn't it?--

Dinah sighed, hugging me tightly. "I will love you, no matter what."

Tears fell from my eyes, but I made no sound.

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[Star City. October 13, 15:30 PDT. 2007]

By 2003, our mother died, and soon after our dad followed.

Not much to say about that, beyond that they were somewhat old, but not old enough to die of old age.

As for me, well, I was twelve, and as I had said, my powers had only gotten stronger.

Not only voice-wise, but physically, I was leagues about what a twelve-year-old should be capable of. I was strong, not sure how much in the scale of things, especially considering Superman was a thing here, but I was strong.

As for my speech, well, I was now legally a mute you could say.

After destroying five arrow caves in less than a year by accidentally muttering a word, well, they all came to the conclusion my powers were always active, and that it was best if I learned how to control them, in a different manner, by containing them.

By this point, both Dinah and Oliver, who now trusted me enough to share his name, were both part of the newly formed Justice League.

And with their help, well, I got better training, in facilities made for such things.

Batman specifically was interested in my training, I knew why, I mean, it was more than obvious he wanted to neutralize a possible vocal nuke.

My training consisted of two things, meditation and pain control.

Meditation was mostly done with Martian Manhunter, who helped me with it.

Pain control was done with Batman, he would put me in a soundproof room, and have a robot punch me or slap me, or electrocute me.

Dinah was not happy with that, but I begged her to let me handle it.

I didn't want to destroy a city by hitting a toe.

I needed to be able to control my voice, even if I lost an arm, or if someone broke my legs, I needed to be able to talk only when I wanted to.

It had come to the point, I was seriously considering damaging my pain receptors, but Dinah forbade me from doing such, even Batman seemed appalled by my idea.

~Stop thinking about mutilating yourself!~ Dinah signed, she didn't have to, I could understand her if she talked, but she… she said she didn't want me to feel left out, so she learned sign language with me.

~I know it sounds like a suicidal thing.~ I signed with a smile. ~But you have to admit, it would solve a big part of my problem.~

~I don't care~ Dinah signed angrily.

~I love you~ I signed with a smile.

~I love you too.~ Dinah signed, hugging as she did so.

I didn't know what life had in store for me, but I would be ready.