4 Towards The Beginning
In school I was always good at one aspect of participating in class: engaging with the teacher. This particular skill of mine has not atrophied with disuse, even though before my chain the last time I was in a school was as a substitute teacher some years before I died. Truthfully I wasn't bad at participating in group work with my fellow students and I wasn't unpopular either.
As a student I had a certain skill at tutoring people in subjects I was good at, and I was a good listener so both teachers and students liked me enough for me to get by. I learned from visiting different schools for sometimes only a year at a time that someone needed flexibility and courage to excel in school. I have not lost those talents.
"Hey, uh, you sure?" I ask a classmate as I look at his paper, gesturing at a specific answer he's put down with a pencil I'm using to answer the questions on my own copy of the worksheet we're working on. Our math teacher, benefactors bless him, is letting us do group work. It's a bit odd for a math class but I appreciate the chance to interact with my peers.
I am trying to encourage my classmate to look at his paper and revise one of his answers which I can absolutely tell he got wrong. He looks at it for a few seconds, swayed by the concern in my voice, before realizing that he did one of the final steps of the equation wrong and revising his answer.
"Thanks!" He tells me, smiling brightly. We're part of a trio that includes Andrew, who makes this look easy. I never imagined that Andrew would be super into math, and he's not, but he's also not bad at the subject. He's certainly better than I am, but he's also considerably less talkative since we're working with a third person.
I know that today is not the start of the events of the film. Andrew did not bring the camera to school, which he does on the day the movie gets set in motion. This is good, it means more time for me to hone my abilities before Andrew, Steve, and Matt get theirs.
I've only been at school for about eighty or so minutes and a part of me is dreadfully bored by it. I mean this isn't stopping me from being fully present, perks I own allow me to be both bored and also 100% here mentally, but I've personally always struggled when it comes to being enthralled by math. Thankfully my diligence and actions here are having consequences.
I have a multifaceted mind that is capable of parsing through sensory information at rates that are pretty damn impressive. One excellent way this manifests is that it allows me to keep track of multiple conversations, and with "Polyglot" I can gain fluency in languages just by doing this. I can hear multiple quiet conversations. In some of them, my classmates express interest in learning from me, watching as I have occasionally guided Jonathan, the student who I just encouraged to double-check his work. Over the last few minutes I've had to stop and help him understand the steps in the mathematical formulas we are using for today's lesson.
Andrew, Jonathan, and I are working diligently and occasionally looking over each other's work. I have the sense that I am doing my work perfectly due to the subtle and not-so-subtle enhancements that have been laid on my brain.
As I casually return my attention to the math sheet a part of me begins to casually theory-craft about where to go from here. I don't mean this in a direct, immediate sense, but on a bigger, more challenging scale.
I need to seriously think about where to go from here, jump-wise. It's already been a few days, and my time in this setting is extremely limited. I'm leaving somewhere between Thanksgiving and November 30th, and it's currently August 6th. I have, at most, 117 days left here. Previously such a time left like a lifetime but now… now it feels like a single heartbeat.
I glance at Andrew and my thoughts turn to him. A part of me wonders what would happen if he doesn't get a video camera, but I've already seen the way he lights up at the thought of having a video diary of his own. Of having a… record of his life. His video diary meant a lot to the version of him I watched some years ago, it became a lifeline and something he valued and in this reality the seeds have already been sown for him to get it.
If the only change that occurs at the beginning of the movie is that Andrew doesn't have a video camera, as an in-universe consequence Andrew shouldn't get powers because he'd not be asked to come down to the cave… Although if I were a screenwriter and I still wanted the movie to happen but without the found footage angle I'd just have Matt, Andrew's cousin, go and ask him to join the two as they explore the cave. So even if I stop Andrew from getting the camera, he could still get powers.
I am also cognizant that it'd be good for me to go ahead and ice his dad. I could do it on the day of the party, since there's nothing requiring that I be in the cave with the trio…
As a part of me is lost in thought I continue to work on the school work I am assigned. I am grateful for my perks which remain active even when I'm not committing the fullness of my attention to the work on the paper in front of me. "I Get Knocked Down" allows me to correct the tiny mistakes I make on occasion, and when we grade the assignment I find that I have completed it perfectly. This marks the beginning of a trend that I will continue to observe throughout the rest of the day.
For multiple reasons I find school to be a bit of a breeze. I am not flexing my intelligence to any benefactors or anyone else who might be able to watch my chain, as the primary reason why school is so easy for me is perks. More so than any particular specialized intelligence on my part, my perks pick up a lot of slack and allow me to find studying to be easier than it was back in my native reality, between "I Just Do My Best At Everything" and "When I Get Knocked Down" I am able to breeze through lessons, especially when my senses are heightened by my body mod and I can easily absorb every little thing my teachers attempt to convey even if I only overhear their comments as opposed to actively listening to what they've got to say.
This allows me to easily focus on what will be my primary priority: interacting with Andrew. Thanks to this when lunch rolls around I find myself sitting with Andrew, Matt, and Casey again, and listening as Casey talks to us about something neat.
"So do you guys wanna be in my video series?" She asks. I bite into a school-cooked french fry as the others look at her in surprise. Andrew eventually laughs lightly and decides to ask something.
"How are you gonna film this video series of yours?" He wonders, giving her a curious look. She is ready for the question and immediately replies, while smiling at him.
"Birthday money. Plus I actually have a job at the mall." She says, both brightly and quickly. This answer satisfies Andrew, while Matt asks a followup question.
"What do you plan to film?" He asks, grinning at her as he drinks some milk out of one of those weird cartons that schools provide their students with.
"Everything. I'll be making a 'Vlog' and posting regular videos." She shoots back with a satisfied grin. She emphasizes the "V" in "Vlog" quite heavily while laughing at her own quippiness. When she replies to her sometimes boyfriend I simply smile as I reply.
"Sure. Do you know when you'll be getting your camera?" I wonder, causing her to shrug.
"I get paid this Wednesday so I might get it as early as Thursday." She tells us, and I make a mental note of that. I have a feeling, because she said that, that the events of the movie may kick off on Friday. She has her camera at the party that the trio of protagonists attend and is filming for her vlog shortly before Andrew leaves the party and gets found by Steve.
The rest of the day passes by quickly. More classes and more interactions with students. I do enough interactions with students other than my main trio of friends that I trade numbers with some of my other classmates, and even text some, before the school day comes to an end.
Back home I do my homework, the first real assignments of the year, before I begin to well and truly train my telekinesis. At this point the ability is strong enough for me to do things like open kitchen cabinets with it and for me to create multiple telekinetic arms that are all strong enough to easily lift basic cooking ingredients and kitchen utensils. The ability is becoming strong enough for it to be something viable and handy in real life without being in a niche situation.
I passively listen to a YouTube video in Russian as I work on dinner. I use telekinesis for indelicate tasks and I even make dinner somewhat easier than usual with assistance from my odd superpower.
After dinner I clean for a bit while continuing to hone my telekinesis. As I reflect on the current uses of my ability I realize that right now I can probably use it for combat. Telekinesis in combat is not solely about lifting opponents up and slamming them down, which is something that is definitely beyond my level of raw power, but it's about interacting with foes and the environment in ways that alter the flow of a fight.
A telekinetic who only lifts opponents up or tosses them over cliffs in a fight may not be a bad telekinetic but they are a boring and uncreative one. A clever telekinetic uses telekinesis to make opponents miss their strikes, to disarm opponents, and to make a fight not only more dangerous for them but actively harder. I plan to use telekinesis to deprive my foes of opportunities to even know who I am.
As I lay in bed while the day comes to an end I focus on the ceiling above me. I lightly touch it with my telekinetic abilities and push slightly against it, like I'm using telekinesis to do an upside-down push-up. I faintly sense the solidity of the wall, and I smile. This is new. This exercise is one I've done before but I've never gained information about what I'm touching with the telekinesis. If I can find a way to consistently gain knowledge of what my powers touch that would be wildly powerful.
When I fall asleep I dream of the sorts of worlds I could visit and the sorts of characters I could meet. I wake up early Tuesday morning and I begin to get ready for the day. For the next three days I fall into a bit of a routine.
I wake up early, get ready for school, and then do as most teens in this country, in this age, do and go to my classes. I don't find them challenging, which is good, and during class I interact with Andrew a good deal. He slowly starts to seem happier and more outgoing, even learning to talk to some of our classmates, and I can intuitively piece together that this should be the result of my good boy perk.
I also get something very important: Andrew's address as he invites me to his house over the weekend. This is surprising given his relationship with his dad, but he loves his mom very much so that might help offset whatever reluctance he'd feel towards inviting a friend over. Helping her is actually a part of my long-term plan and so meeting her matters a good deal.
Every day after school I go home and train. I continue to gain experience with the ability. I also continue to diversify the training I do with the signature power, and incorporate exercises that require precise amounts of force, such as writing sentences and drawing things. This is the first area where I experience meaningful difficulty, and I go through an embarrassing number of pencils, crayons, and paper before I begin to gain any real finesse with my handy telekinesis power.
When Friday rolls around and I arrive at school I spot Andrew before he spots me and what I see makes me smile. At what feels like long last, Andrew has the camera that marks the beginning of this world as I know and understand it. The sight of the surprisingly goofy teen with the thing brings a smile to my face, especially in this alternate universe where stuff is already beginning to improve for him.
I walk over to him and smile curiously at the camera as he spots me. There is something different, in a good way, about this version of Andrew, and for a moment a part of me wonders if it'd be better for me to trust in my perks and not bloody my hands with the blood of Andrew's father.
"Hey man, I wasn't expecting you to… volunteer for a documentary's crew. What's with the camera?" I ask, a light grin on my face as I study the thing. It is a decently large, somewhat old (relative to my world anyway) camera. Andrew smiles at me from behind the thing.
"I got a camera! I told my mom about Casey's idea for a video diary and she really liked it. She snuck me some money to get this last night. She wants me to film her as we like go to the doctor and stuff." He tells me. I overhear quiet snickers and not-so-quiet remarks that almost certainly go unheard by Andrew due to the chaos of the early morning traffic.
Andrew and I begin to walk to class, and he asks me if he can interview me for his series. There's something mildly amusing about the thought of being in the videos that constitute the film even in-universe so I agree to be interviewed. This causes him to excitedly ask me to hang out over the weekend, and I tell him we already planned to do just that, which is true.
We reach class together and sit down in the back of the math class. Andrew still has his camera but now it's in his backpack, taking up an awkward amount of space. As class begins my thoughts turn to what I'm considering doing later today…
The thought of making Andrew's dad pay a bloody price for his crimes stirs a part of me. That said, I could also help the man by befriending him, which is something I could do without much difficulty in a range of ways thanks to my perks. If nothing else Andrew seems happier, and if I overly intervene instead of continuing to be a meaningful but mostly subtle presence, I could wreck things.
The day begins with a quiz and I am delighted to find that it is very easy for me to do. Math was easily my weakest subject in high school so to have this level of ease with it now makes me feel positively brilliant. This marks the start of a good day, one that culminates with me walking to the bus and watching Andrew and Matt get in Matt's car. I know precisely what they are going to talk about. For now I need to decide on which course of action I'm going to take…
I've been invited to the party Matt, Steve, and Andrew are all destined to attend by a friend of Steve's. If I want to go, I can do so. Annoyingly going to the party guarantees I lose my best shot at doing away with the single biggest factor contributing to Andrew's moral collapse, but would also preserve the integrity of the plot and give me the circumstances which most easily allow me to befriend Steve.
A part of me is thrilled at the prospect of having the chance to make this choice, but another part of me sees this and wishes I had a cloning perk, since with one I could easily head to the party and ice Andrew's dad at the same time. That'd mean that I'd have it all. Cloning perks are essential and I really should try to get one as soon as I can.
When my bus reaches my home I step off of it and realize that I need to make my decision soon. I only have a few hours, and I need to call a taxi to get wherever I ultimately decide to go. One of the drawbacks of not driving is that I have to depend on others to get places, something both unreliable and time-consuming even under the best of circumstances.
