Escape: Through the Fourth Wall

2: A Hero Is Made

There's a whole lot of stuff that happened after I (and not everyone else somehow) realised that I had superpowers. I would throw in a couple more flashbacks, but honestly I'm fed up with italics, so I'm just going to narrate a bunch of events. 

Stick with me.

The first important event was my parents' divorce after someone broke into our home. Nothing was stolen (probably because the thief saw how little we owned and felt pity for us), but my parents argued about how irresponsible each other were (some more), not that they actually cared for my safety, but more for something to yell about.

My mom left to live with her parents, and I was caught between my two 'homes', each grudgingly agreeing to look after me every other week.

I didn't mind. It was much more peaceful without eternal fighting, and it was easier for me to work on the one thing that really mattered to me- in secret, of course.

It took me years to discover and hone my powers- I experimented in abandoned alleys, on roofs when nobody was around, and occasionally in my room. I watched combat training videos, practising against cardboard cutouts and making my way up to walls at the end of more dark alleys. 

It seemed like a backstory straight from an underdog-redemption action movie. I would've gone as far as to say 'The Karate Kid', but even karate itself wouldn't have been able to keep up with me (Except it's not karate, it's kung fu, and whoever named the movie clearly did no research whatsoever).

Once, a couple of guys tried to mug me in said dark, abandoned alley, but their glee turned to desperate fear when they realised I wouldn't let them escape. 

They were the best practice I had until I was sixteen.

Because sixteen was when I decided to become a superhero.

In the eight and a half years I trained, I found I had a bunch of impressive and seemingly unrelated powers that could only be unlocked when I knew exactly what I was looking for, or that manifested in dire situations.

I discovered that each of my powers took a great deal of energy, exponentially so when I used more than one at a time. This meant I had to eat a lot. Not that I'm complaining.

I also discovered that I'm awesome.

I'm just kidding, I knew that already.

I already knew about my astounding strength, and the ability to increase the power behind my punches indefinitely simply by wanting to was a pleasant surprise, the mountains of food I'd need to consume after that not exactly a deterrent. 

The very next ability I thought I'd have was flight. Surprisingly, I couldn't manage to do it for a long, long time, until one day I floated in my sleep when I dreamt that gravity didn't affect me. It turns out that that was because I could actually turn myself impervious to gravity and regulate the extent, so I could soar if not really fly.

It took me a while to discover element manipulation. Well, not really like The Last Airbender. I may have accidentally set my mattress on fire... and yes, while I was sleeping on it. It was after I picked it up and chucked it into the conveniently (relatively) nearby ocean that I learnt that I could withstand and release heat- lots of it. Enough, in fact, that I could create winds and currents just by heating them enough. I even hurled a few fireballs, but quickly stopped when I saw how dangerous they were.

Let's just say a few pigeons have been scarred for life.

Since I could mess around with heat, I assumed that I could mess around with cold, and I have managed to conjure up ice from thin air- I'm probably rapidly changing the temperature of water vapour, but I'm still working on that. I'll learn to stop freezing stray elves eventually.