Powers Enhanced

CHAPTER ONEFight The panicked words of “Leave me alone!!” slice through the air like thrown knives. I cut to the curb and screech to a stop. I jump off my bike, leaving it on its side in front of Coffee Cozy. Well, what’s left of the coffee shop. The owner decided to take the insurance money and set up elsewhere, instead of rebuilding after the tornado. The shops on both sides are back in business, but the destroyed coffee shop brings down the whole street, like a pretty girl sporting a black eye. Only the back wall is still standing, while the roof and the rest of the building is rubble piled in the center. A few people are on the sidewalks, going in and out of the shops. Everyone is rushing to get back into air conditioning. Heat rises in shimmering waves from the asphalt, while cicadas drone from the trees. It’s the hottest day in August so far. I'm wearing shorts and a t-shirt to keep up appearances, but in truth, I could wear thermal underwear and a parka. Heat and cold just don't bother me. Good thing, otherwise I would never ride my bike on a day like this. No one else seems to have heard the voice. That doesn’t really surprise me. My extra senses are on, which means I can hear, smell, and see better than any living human. I’m actually on par with some animals. I can read street signs two hundred feet away. The donut shop a block down from me just brought out a fresh batch of chocolate donuts. There’s an ice cream sandwich melting in a trashcan twenty feet away. But what I really need is my hearing. I close my eyes and open my ears. It’s like I jumped into a vat of cicadas. Their whirring noise surrounds me, drilling into my head. It takes effort, but I tune them out. Conversations from down the street are suddenly right here. I filter them, trying to direct my listening away from the people I see. I hear a thump, like a body being struck, and then a clatter as if someone had knocked a trash can over. And I know right where it’s coming from. I grab my bike and wheel it into the walkway between Coffee Cozy and Gardens of Life. I leave it leaning against the gardening store and then head back to where I hear laughter. The small alley is made smaller by the police tape cordoning off the still-standing wall of the coffee shop. The wall is sturdy enough to not fall down on its own, but the police don’t want kids playing around it, either. I make my way past the tape, into the large alley that runs behind all the shops. Trash cans and dumpsters line the walls, adding their own distinctive odor to the mix. I have to dial back my senses as far as they can go. The scene in front of me is about what I expected, but it still makes my blood boil. I immediately pick out the antagonists. It’s not hard. Two of them are carrying a third person by the armpits and ankles. A fourth person is standing on a box by a large dumpster, swinging the lid open. The kid being carried isn’t going quietly, either. He’s flailing around, trying to kick the hands away, but I can tell that he’s not that muscular. He doesn’t seem to have a chance against the two people carrying him. They’re big, like steroids big. They could easily be linebackers on a football team. One has a large Roman nose with black hair, giving him a very distinctive Greek look. The other one has brown spiky hair that’s shaved on the side. The other bully, the one by the dumpster, isn’t as wide, but he’s tall, blond, and athletic. He has a high-school quarterback vibe to him; like he knows he’s the alpha dog, and everyone else will naturally follow him. The leader sticks his head into the dumpster and sniffs. “Whoa,” he says, jerking his head back out. “Chris, are you in for a surprise! Looks like the menu tonight has spoiled milk, old Chinese food, and diapers! Nasty ones, too.” The two lackeys reaffirm their grip on Chris and then start swinging him back and forth. I can tell that they’re just going to chuck him into the dumpster. The kid’s face is mottled red, probably with fear and anger. He has a pale complexion, with a mass of freckles, and almost bright orange hair. “Let him go!” I shout, startling everyone. Greek Guy loses his grip on Chris’s feet. Chris’s legs drop to the ground, where he uses the sudden leverage to push back against the other guy. Spiked Hair stumbles backwards, tripping over a trash can, and suddenly Chris is free. He backs away, ending up next to me. His lanky form is taller than my five foot ten inch height by a couple of inches. “Thanks,” Chris fervently says, but I know it’s not over. These guys don’t look like they like getting the short end of the straw. The leader jumps down from his box and strides towards me, his friends joining him. “Why’d you have to ruin our fun?” he whines. “Chris would have liked dumpster diving.” He and his buddies laugh. Chris’s hands clench into fists, but he doesn’t do anything else. I don’t blame him. It looks like he’s bullied on a regular schedule by these three and has found out long ago that fighting back is useless. “Chris, just walk away. I’ll handle them,” I quietly tell him, while the three guys are still walking up to us. He looks at me askance. “There are three of them, and one of you.” I shrug. The truth is, right now I’m stronger than two grown men, and my reaction time is three times faster. I think I can handle three bullies. This is all thanks to the first powers I received, extra strength and speed. These abilities seem to originate within the adrenal gland, and they share some of the same characteristics as adrenaline. Luckily, without any negative side effects. The only downside to them is that I can't rely on them. They come and go at random. I don’t tell Chris that, of course. I like to keep these gifts a secret. “Yeah, it’s okay. I got this. Just go.” Chris gives me one last bewildered look, but then it melts into gratitude. “Ok, sure. Thank you!” Chris backs away and then takes off running. Spiked Hair starts chasing after him, but that’s short-lived when my foot hooks his ankle. He goes sprawling into a pile of trash. I turn back to face Greek Guy and Mr. Quarterback. They're no longer amused. “You got a death wish or something?” growls Greek Guy. “I can pummel you where you stand.” Spiked Hair joins his friends, spaghetti sauce coating his shirt. “Look, I don’t want to fight you, but I’m not going to let you beat up on other kids,” I respond, taking a few steps back so they can’t flank me. I do not want any of them to surprise me from behind. “You didn’t want a fight?” asks the leader. His perfect teeth clench into a grimace. “I think it’s a little late for that. Liam, take him out.” Apparently, Liam is the one with the spiked hair. He frowns and takes a few steps forward to meet me. As he comes forward, he pulls his right fist back. Trajectories and amount of force calculations are instantly computed, thanks to another power I have. This ability increases my thought processes, making me smarter. Liam starts to swing forward, his fist moving towards me. A normal kid would not be able to react in time. I am definitely not normal. I can tell from his trajectory he’s aiming for my jaw, so I take a step to the left and bob my head out of the way. Liam whiffs right past me, missing me by a few inches. I can tell he’s surprised, but he lines up again. Same result. I haven’t even put up my fists yet. I’m just timing the swings so he always just barely misses me. “Stay still!” he yells, and I have to grin. This infuriates him. “Alex, help me out,” Liam commands, and Greek Guy steps forward. Two people are obviously harder, so I raise my fists in self-defense. I have to be careful that I don’t lash out. With my extra strength, I could break bones. Alex comes at me on my left, and Liam is on my right. Their large physiques block out the rest of the alleyway. It also means that if I get hit, it’s going to hurt. A lot. This time Alex takes a swing at me, and it’s quickly followed by a jab from Liam. I dodge the first punch and block the second with my left arm. Alex tries to use my block to strike at my body, but I slip to the side so that his punch misses. I dance back, as Liam overbalances on his own second punch, and then slips on some of that same spaghetti sauce. He goes down and trips up Alex. Here’s my chance. With Chris out of the way, now is a good time to make my exit. I don’t need to prove anything by sticking around. I do a quick about-face to make my escape and come face to face with Mr. Quarterback. His face glistens with sweat, and he’s breathing hard. He must have run out onto the street as soon as his friend blocked my sight of him and came around to the same alley I had entered. And now I’m trapped. With three very large, very angry teenagers. My extra hearing picks up a footfall behind me. I instantly process the information and make a quick decision. I duck to the left. A split second later, Liam sails past, his missed punch throwing him off balance. I dodge right, and this time Alex comes up empty. Maybe I can do this. If I make them miss enough, maybe they’ll get frustrated and leave me alone. Yeah, I’ll just keep thinking that. “Dirk, a little help?” grunts Liam. Dirk snarls. “He’s making you look like idiots!” he says and steps forward to enter the fray. And that’s when the worst possible thing happens. Like a tap being turned off, I feel my adrenal powers drain away. The feeling of strength and power that has accompanied me for the past two hours is gone once again. Everything around me speeds up as my reaction time slows. The blond bully seems to move like a cobra, striking out and smashing his fist straight into my nose. Bright lights flash in front of my eyes, and I instantly tear up, the pain so sudden that I almost can’t deal with it. I think my nose is broken. I try to look past the tears in my eyes and see a feral grin blossom on the leader’s face. “That’s how you do it,” he crows, and then comes back in for more. I take a flurry of hits to my face, and then I’m falling. My head strikes something hard, and I black out. * * * * * When I come to, I hurt. All over. My face is sticky with dried blood, and my nose throbs like a tween’s heart in the presence of her favorite boy band. My ribs are tender, and since I don’t remember any punches to that general region, I must have been kicked a few times while I was out. My three aggressors are nowhere in sight. I slowly sit up, groaning as more injuries announce themselves. I have a raging headache, and my jaw feels loose. I touch the back of my head, and come in contact with a massive goose egg. I gingerly touch my ribs, and while none feel broken, I should stay away from laughing or deep sighing. I sit there, amongst the trash, and wonder when my healing power will turn on. That’s something else I can do. I have a power that heals me, as well as others. All I have to do is touch them, and the energy will flow from my hand into their body. But, like my strength and speed and extra senses, they’re unreliable. They turn on and off randomly. I’ve gotten injured, and sometimes I’m healed instantly, and sometimes it takes a day. There’s no way to predict it. Same with my senses and adrenal powers. My intelligence never turns off, luckily, but it’s unpredictable in another way. Whenever I’m not paying attention to anything and not doing anything active, I have the potential to go into a trance. My mind will get so involved in solving some little equation that I’ll zone out. And I mean out. Once, while I was helping with the tornado clean up, I started calculating how many leaves were on a tree. The only problem was that I was in the middle of a construction zone, with large trucks and bulldozers moving around me. Police Chief Mark Johnson had to pull me out of the way of a reversing backhoe. The backup beep was almost deafening, but I hadn’t heard it.