Hero Super

“How’ve you been, Calvin?” Lightspeed smirked, looking down at Calvin from a terrace.

“Peachy.” Calvin replied with a heavy tone, a shadow of fatigue casting on his face.

A bunch more figures appeared, arriving with vines, smoke, and from thin air. Usual theatrical superhero entrances.

“You know this kid?” Matterdom asked, looking back and forth towards the obviously malicious glare on Lightspeed’s masked face and the tired expression the kid wore.

“Know him, they’re practically best friends. Right, Calvin?” Frostbloom jumped down from her vine and sat on the ledge beside Lightspeed.

“The bestest.“ Calvin groaned. “Look, can you rescue us or whatever? You’re heroes, right?”

“Oh no you’re not—” Lightspeed was about to jump down before a bunch of blue vines started restraining him and pulling him back.

“Yeah, kid. Don’t worry, you’re safe now.” Matterdom nodded and pressed a button on her earpiece.

A few moments later, a handful of Vanguard personnel arrived on a hovercraft. They carried the three children onto the vehicle, reassuring them of their safety and giving them first aid while they quickly flew off towards the exit.

“Chill out, Lightspeed.” Frostbloom said, watching as the children were escorted away. She waved her hand and released the vines.

“I swear to god if you make one more pun—”

“That’s what you’re angry about?” Frostbloom smirked.

“Look, Light, I don’t know what sort of grudge you have against a kid, but there’s a time and a place, okay?” Matterdom spoke as she threw a ball towards him. “We have a potential hatchling coming out and you’re here fuming at a minor.”

“No— you’re right. I need to prioritize…”

A woman standing next to them, wearing a misty-white costume while biting a large cigar on her lips, puffed out a cloud of smoke. The cloud instantly formed words in the air, asking a question.

‘Why are you so angry?’ The cloud spelled before forming an arrow towards Lightspeed.

“I’m not angry.” He said angrily.

“He got knocked on his ass once about a month ago by that kid, Puffer.”

“Frostbloom!”

“Then he got tricked again by the same kid a week ago.”

“Really? Just that?” Matterdom narrowed her eyes at how childish the reason was.

“It’s not just that. He attacked us when we were in the middle of a mission, and then lied to us when we tried confirming his identity. And now, we find him in the middle of another mission involving children.” He looked at his partner. “Why don’t you find this suspicious?”

“Because he’s a kid, Martin.” Frostbloom returned his stare, giving him one without any shred of her usual levity. “He’s just a kid.”

‘Yeah!’ The smoke in the air changed as Puffer nodded in agreement.

“Destructo told us to find him—”

“And now he’s here. We found him, mission’s done. We’ll tell the Big D when he arrives.” She looked at her partner. “Different mission right now, okay? We’ll talk about it later.”

“Right now we hold the fort until Destructoman comes.” Matterdom nodded, before doing a double take towards Frostbloom. “Did you just call him ‘Big D’?”.

Super Quest

Road to Heroism II Save 20/5 people.

Embarking on the path of heroism is a challenging step that you have overcome, yet unlike every other path it does not relinquish any difficulty. The mark of a genuine hero lies in consistently proving that their valor extends beyond isolated acts of heroism.

Quest Rewards

+5 Super Point(s)

Calvin looked at the screens in front of him, wondering how the system concluded when he had saved lives and when he had not. As far as he knew, there were eighteen of them, and the system never actually counted saving his own self. Even if it did, the numbers were still off by one.

‘Seventeen students. And an extra three? Did it count Ina and Quinn twice when I prevented the hatching? Did it count the monster too even though he died right after?’ He tried summoning the system help to get some answers, but as per usual it was unresponsive. ‘System Help my ass. More like system— uh— whatever the reverse of help is. System Harm?’

He shook off the stray thoughts and sent them away along with the System Quest panel. With another thought, he opened up the System Information and added a point to super spirit to alleviate the bloat.

Super Information

Super Name None Super Attributes

Super Status Alive, Bruised, Slight-Fatigue(Physical), Fracture(Ribs), Spirit-severance Super Body 1

Super Quest Road to Heroism III, A True Hero's Name Super Mind 0

Super Points 3

Super Spirit 1.7 → 2.7 (-0.3)

Super Powers

Impervious Pebble Gourmand's Instinct

Color Control Jumper

Vigilant Aegis

‘Hooh… there. I’m not going to explode any time soon—’ “Wait. Three points?” He blurted out, doubling back at the panel. “Two points for one?”

“Who are you talking to?” Quinn’s voice made him jump.

“No one.” He answered, closing the panel. ‘Fuck, I forgot I’m not the only one here.’

Laying in a hospital bed, inside an incredibly opulent private room, and hearing beeps and boops from various machines beside him made him complacent. Just around a month ago he was in one, albeit in the previous world. A room of his own. This was the first time he’d shared a hospital room in either world. His previous life’s condition made it so he can only be isolated from other people, this time he only had a few bruises and fractures.

They stuck him in with Quinn upon her insistence. She said she didn’t want to be alone in the boring hospital room, but she was probably doing him a favor. Namely not being interrogated by the heroes alone in a room where he can’t escape and not having to share a room with others that literally abandoned them.

“How rich are you?” He asked Quinn as he looked at the various tech all around him. ‘Is that gold on the walls? Why is there gold on the walls?’

“Rich enough.” She smirked, looking up from her wrist. “They still haven’t given you your holowatch?”

“Yep. It has… ‘stuff’ on it.” He prayed the Dox wouldn’t be— well, ‘doxxed’.

“Secret stuff?”

“More or less. Maybe less.”

“Bad stuff?”

“More like unlicensed.” He suddenly looked around the room. “There’s no invisible recording devices in this room, is there? I hope I didn’t just incriminate myself.”

“The authorities are already on their way, criminal.” She smiled evilly.

“I’ll take you hostage then, rich girl.”

“I’ll melt your insides.”

“I’ll permanently blind you.” The two of them sent a smirk at one another. “By the way, what’s up with that? The turning into soup thing? I thought you can’t do that?”

Quinn put down her holowatch and turned to him. “Normally, no. There’s the Manning Effect—”

“Yeah, the tendency for powers to suck when used directly on a person. I know that.”

“Not exactly worded like that, and it’s specifically dangerous powers, but close enough.” She shrugged before continuing. “Yeah, most powers won’t, unless they have the absolution prefix.”

She turned silent and Calvin rolled his eyes at that, “…you’re waiting for me to ask.”

“Yes.”

“Fine. What’s the absolution prefix?”

“I’ll tell you if you answer a question from me.”

“Depends on the question.”

“You can not answer if you want.”

“Deal.” Calvin gestured towards her. “Go on, then.”

“You know permanence prefix, right? Your color changing thing probably has it. And Lonnie, the cutlery guy, also has it.”

“Makes powers stay permanently, I know it.” Calvin nodded. They had established that during one of their gym workout sessions. His [Color Control] took too long to go away on its own, so the three of them considered it de facto permanent.

“Yep, absolution is what it says on the tin. It’s absolute.”

“…that explains literally nothing.”

“It means nothing will stop the effects and the activation of the power. Not another power. Not a defense tinker tech. Not even the M.E. will stop it. It’s absolute.”

“That seems—”

“Strong?”

“Scary.”

Quinn smiled. “It is. But it’s not infallible. My Vibrations are absolute, but it won’t evolve any more. It won’t grow stronger, or mutate, or anything. It’ll stay as it is.”

“Still seems overpowered.” Calvin shrugged.

His thoughts immediately went into theory-crafting about the applications of her power. It was scary enough on its own, but there should be other uses than just killing people.

‘Maybe vibrate the air and make an instant flashbang? Or counteract an earthquake by vibrating the ground? Or friction welding, that’s good too.’

“Now for your question.” Quinn smiled widely.

Calvin felt uneasy from the way she was staring at him, making him instinctively gulp from anticipation.

After a moment of deliberate suspense, Quinn finally asked, “do you like Ina?”

“No.” He immediately answered.

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re not just denying it?”

“No.”

“So you are?”

“No— I mean no, I’m not just denying it for the sake of— you know what, just shut up, Quinn.”

“So is that a yes?”

“It’s a ‘shut up, Quinn’.”

A knock interrupted the two of them. The door opened, and in came peeking was the head of one of the nurses that took care of them earlier.

“You have a guest, miss.” She looked at Quinn.

“Who?”

“Mister Croftweld.”

Quinn frowned, turning towards Calvin. He gave her a shrug and a gesture that said ‘up to you’. The both of them felt betrayed by how all the others had left them when Ina was going through a hatching. The both of them understood, but that didn’t diminish the feeling of betrayal. Especially for Quinn.

She sighed and gestured to let him in anyway.

The brunette boy walked in wearing a hospital gown and a glowing IV drip. “Calvin. Quinn. You’re okay.”

“That seems to be the case.” Quinn answered coldly. “What do you want?”

He was taken aback by her coldness, scratching his cheek awkwardly as he averted his eyes. “I wanted to check up on the two of you. The others are okay in the other rooms. They wanted to say thanks to Calvin for— well, what happened there.”

“Good for them. Now you’ve seen us, you can go.” She said as she kept staring at him with dead eyes.

“What’s with that?” He interrupted, seeing how awkward it was. And he was genuinely curious at the magical glowing liquid in the IV drip.

“It’s—” “Antidote. We got drugged, remember?” Quinn interrupted.

Calvin shot Alden a wry and awkward smile. The latter sighed and walked out of the room, dragging his IV drip beside him.

“You really don’t like them now, huh?” He turned to Quinn who had a flat expression.

“Was it that obvious?” She flashed a smirk at him. “I just— they just left. I know it makes sense, I know it’s logical. I’d probably have done it too if it wasn’t Ina, but it still…”

“…hurts.” Calvin nodded.

Silence blanketed the room, only the hospital beeps and boops provided ambience in the air. Calvin couldn’t help but compare this luxurious suite to his own back on Earth, especially on how it had an infinitely more reliable sound-proofing. Although he was partially thankful for that— he’d have grown insane if he didn’t at least hear a buzz of conversation whenever he was alone. And he was usually alone.

Pulling himself out of encroaching dark thoughts, he turned to Quinn, “what did you say, by the way? About the ‘fake hatching’.”

“What did you say?”

“Said it was probably the machines or something. I was busy trying to escape. Which wasn’t exactly a lie.”

She chuckled. “I told them the same thing. It’s the pods.”

“Ha, great minds—”, he grinned towards her.

“Great minds what?”

“They think alike? Ah—”, he remembered he was in a different world, “—I’m saying we have great minds.”

She raised a brow. “Maybe I do, I don’t know about you.”

“You’re much nicer when Ina’s around.” He rolled his eyes at her. “How is she, by the way? I didn’t get to see where she was sent.”

“She’s with the best healers in Bastion. She’ll be okay.” Saying that, she opened her holowatch and started typing, “—there, I threatened them again to make sure she’s okay.”

Calvin narrowed his eyes, trying to gauge how serious she was. In the end, he’d rather not know, “good to know.”

He laid back down the bed, tired as hell but too worried about his friend to sleep. ‘What a day… kidnapped, tried to escape, got caught trying to escape, smacked a big green monster, got caught smacking the big green monster, saw the science pods I woke up to in this world, saw a dead body—’ “Fuck.”

“What?”

“I forgot about Allen’s body.”

Quinn reassured Calvin that the body wouldn’t rot in his pocket even if he gave it to them later, but Calvin felt too guilty to leave it inside. He felt wrong. So, despite that, he asked her to call a nurse to take the body away.

The nurse arrived, carrying a metal contraption underneath his arm.

“Do you have the dead body in your pocket?” He asked.

“That’s a sentence I never thought I’d hear,” Calvin muttered before nodding.

“Okay, wait.”

He put down the metal contraption and started unfolding it like a reverse origami. The thing was a stretcher, and once fully unfolded the nurse gestured for him to put the body on top of it. Calvin nodded and pointed his hand, feeling the natural pull of spirit from the pocket activating and grabbing the body from an unknown space.

Allen’s naked body appeared from thin air directly on top of the stretcher. The nurse nodded and proceeded to push a button to activate a barrier of shadow on top of the body before pushing it out of the room.

“Oh, incoming, excuse—”, a man squeezed through as the stretcher went out of the door.

“Who are you? This is a private room.” Quinn narrowed her eyes at the suspicious man wearing a trench coat.

“No such thing.” He said as he fished out a notebook from his coat. “Okay, so are the two of you Miss Quinn and Mister Calvin?”

“No.” “Nope.” The two of them answered immediately after before looking at each other in confusion.

“Good, okay, next question— were you aware that you were going to be kidnapped?”

“Yes.” “Naturally.” Again, the same thing happened, like it was an impulse.

Calvin knew something was wrong, rolling out of bed and getting into a stance with Quinn right beside him doing the same. Whoever the man in front of them was had an odd power that made them answer.

“BS! I told you not to—”, another person entered wearing casual clothing, “—were you interrogating the victims? You goddamn—”

“Hey hey, calm down Sky. I was just asking them questions. Like you asked.” He raised his hands in surrender, pocketing the pen and notebook as he did so.

“That’s what an interrogation is.” Another person entered, this one a beautiful mature woman wearing a red regal medieval dress.

Quinn noticeably stiffened up upon the entrance of the woman in question.

“How are you, darling? I see you’ve made another friend.” She smiled softly towards Quinn.

“What are you doing here, mom?” Quinn asked, her voice sending a chill up Calvin’s spine.

“What do you think I’m doing here? Sampling their cuisine?” Quinn’s mom rolled her eyes, not losing the smile on her face. “Your father and I have been worried about you, sweetie. You haven’t visited home for at least a month, and now—”

Sky sighed. “Can you do this later, Damsel? We have to get their testimonies first.”

“Testimonies?” Calvin narrowed his eyes.

“You can lay back on your beds,” Sky started to explain, “we’re not here to interrogate you, just to interview.”

“Didn’t we already give them our testimonies? I’m sure we did.” Calvin spoke, looking to Quinn who nodded in agreement.

“That was for a police investigation, this is Vanguard’s.”

“Can’t you just take their transcript?”

“Standard protocol is to make a separate investigation.”

“And that needs two of the seven in the same room?” Quinn looked at them. “Private hospital room.”

“I paid for it, honey.” Damsel spoke, still smiling sweetly. Calvin felt unnerved at how the smile didn’t make any sort of crease on her beautiful face, like she was a porcelain doll. “And no, you may not ‘interview’ my child, Sky. She’s in shock, she needs to rest.”

“We need to figure this out as soon as possible, Damsel. I’ve got an entire council breathing down my back for an ex—”

“Then figure it out without harassing my daughter.”

The two expressionlessly stared at each other, figurative sparks flying in the air between them as the tension gradually rose.

Calvin, watching from the side, took out a bag of chips from his pocket and opened it. Quinn whispered to him from the other bed, shooting him a begging look. He waved his hand and summoned another pack of chips in front of her.

The two adults twitched at the sound of crunching chips, ending their staredown with a glance towards the two kids eating while they watched.

“Well. Sky, detective—”, Damsel glanced towards Calvin, making a cold shiver run up his spine, “—Calvin, I need to speak to my daughter. Alone.”

Sky looked at her with narrowed eyes before nodding. “Very well. Let’s go, BS.”

Calvin watched the two of them go out before looking towards Quinn. She nodded towards his inquisitive look, reassuring him that she’ll be fine.

“I can just sleep here, you know? Plug my ears.”

Quinn chuckled. “Go.”

Calvin sighed and got up, clutching his bag of chips as he went out of the room. He turned to the woman and nodded before exiting, “It was nice to meet you, ma’am.”

Hospital hallways. Empty on good days, full on ‘end-of-the-world’ days. Thankfully, the world didn’t seem to be suffering from an apocalypse, as far as he could tell anyway, and the hallways were rather quiet barring a few nurses running up and down.

‘Cafeteria. Where’s the cafeteria?’ He scanned the walls for a map, finding one near an intersection. He walked closer to find the food place, tracing the hallways just in case he gets kidnapped again. ‘Ground floor. Really? Down there?’

“Mister Calvin.” The two men who just got out called to him before he was about to leave.

He looked at them, ate a chip from the bag in his hand, and started walking the opposite direction.‘I’m too fucking tired for this.’

“I’m sorry, we just need you to answer some questions.” Sky said, grabbing his arm.

“Yeah, well, I need to go to the bathroom.” He pulled his arm away, finding it difficult with the man’s iron grip.

“Do you really?” The man in the coat, the detective as Damsel called, asked.

Calvin looked down and held his mouth. A dizzy feeling encroached his head as the question ended, much like when the mind-controller was using his power. ‘Is he trying to control my mind? Fucking again?!’

“Goddamn it, BS. Sorry about that, forgot to— well, sorry.” Sky spoke, making the dizziness disappear. “Stop asking questions, BS.”

“I can’t help it, you know—”

“Just shut up for once.” He sighed, turning back to Calvin. “Just a few questions.”

Calvin looked to them, then to the cafeteria. He let out a tired groan knowing they’ll come later anyway even if he didn’t give them something now. And they might not be as understanding later.

He nodded to them. “Fine, but you pay.”