CHAPTER 17

Travis woke with a start. He was in his room, everything as it was. Like nothing had happened.

He groaned, face palming. Had it all been a dream? Had he just imagined the greatest thing that could have possibly ever happened to him? That wasn't fair!

"Damn it," he muttered, unable to stop the tear trickling down his face. He wanted to scream out, bang his hands against the wall. But he'd still be a powerless nobody except with a hoarse throat and sore hands. Might as well get back to it then and get ready for a new day of mediocrity.

"Hey, loser!" his brother suddenly said through the door. "Mom's making pancakes and if you want your stomach to stay like that, you better come get some." He walked off with a laugh.

Travis sighed, wondering if it was possible to put yourself up for adoption. "Well, no point prolonging," he said. Besides, he did want pancakes. He stood up and took a single step.

Energy surged through him and he slammed into his door. He backed up real quick and looked at his arms, seeing flashes of electricity sparking all over his skin. He stared at where he'd just been and to where he was now. He had moved here in an instant, moving faster than he ever had.

Than anyone ever had.

His eyes landed on his comic collection, specifically the Flash ones. His favorite DC hero.

"YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Franklin blinked the drowsiness away. The second he did, the previous night's events came rushing back to him and he was suddenly out of bed looking down at the railing, hoping that it had all been some sort of crazy dream. But nope, it wasn't. The railing was still broken. He gaped at it. How? How was this possible? Sure, he was strong but not that strong. That was insane.

"Must have been cracked, falling off already," he told himself the same thing he'd said last night. It was the only logical explanation. Still, his mom was definitely not going to like it. Maybe if he glued it or something, he could fake it. Yeah, that could work for now.

A sort-of plan in mind, Franklin moved to put the railing back in place when his door flew open.

"Yo, Franklin, do you have-" Angie started before she saw him and the railing. "What the-?"

"YAH!" Franklin cried out, instantly leaping back. Unfortunately, he went too far and hit the door to his closet which cracked and gave way, causing them both to fall. Franklin winced for an impact that never really came, just a slight thud on his back and the sharp sound of something cracking apart. He slowly turned and his eyes shot open wide as he saw the state of his door, now in four separate pieces. "Oh shizznit," he muttered. "Mom's definitely going to kill me."

He then remembered the reason he broke the door in the first place and turned to see Angie still in the doorway, gaping at him. "Would you believe me if I said it's not what it looks like?" he asked.

The first thing Madison did when she woke up was check over her entire body for anything strange and unusual. So far, she was good except for a red mark that hadn't been there the previous night. Probably (hopefully) a mosquito bite or something.

Did that mean that it had all been some sort of crazy dream or weird hallucination? She didn't really want to know. All that mattered was that things seemed to have gone back to normal now. She breathed out in relief, her heart still pounding a little.

She pulled on some clothes and went to the bathroom, deciding to wash her face and help clear her head a little. She turned on the tap and felt the cold water pool inside her hand before splashing herself, gasping a little from the sudden shock. She stayed like that for a few seconds before grabbing a towel and wiping her face, standing up straight to see her reflection in the mirror.

Except, there was no reflection.

She stared, only seeing a towel, floating as if by magic, and her clothes. It was as if the mirror had completely removed her. Madison stared, not fully understanding what she was seeing right now.

She looked down at her hands, to make sure they were there, but they weren't. She could still feel them, but she could no longer see them, as if they had ceased to exist.

That was when she screamed.

Gabriela grimaced as her alarm went off, the annoying beeps cut through the fog of sleep. She yawned before reaching for her phone. The second she touched it, she felt a weird feeling pass through her hand before hearing the sound of glass cracking.

"What?" she muttered, lifting her head to see her phone, cracked and on fire in her hand.

"Agh!" she threw it aside instinctively where it hit the ground, the small fires inside dying out quickly. Gabriela scrambled out of her bed, looking at the wreckage of her phone, before staring down at her hand which was glowing a faint orange color. Wait, no. It was more like there was something under her skin causing it to glow. Some kind of energy.

"I guess it wasn't a dream then," she muttered. That whole ball of light thing had actually happened. But she couldn't go around blowing stuff up with her hands. She needed to figure this out. "Ok, Gabriela. Let's get to work."

"Well, this sucks," Emily said.

Last night, after seeing the incredibly weird sight of her arms stretched so much they were touching the ceiling far above her, Emily had managed to make it three steps before collapsing on her bed, unable to do anything else. Her arms had lain stretched out at her sides, almost touching her toes.

Now, she stared at them in the early morning light and any hope that it had been some crazy dream had vanished. Because there they were, still stretched out like fleshy ropes. She could still move them easily, lifting them into the air like normal. They were just stretched out.

"I have got to be dreaming." She moved to rub her eyes, trying to wake herself up, when her hands came shooting towards her from across the room.

"Oh shi-"

Her hands slapped her face, knocking her back into the bed. Emily moaned. It hadn't hurt too much, her skin somehow absorbing the impact, but it had still stunned her.

"Alright, that's it," she grunted, sitting upright again. She was Emily Simmons, damn it. She had spent her life mastering her body to stay in shape to perform all the complicated athletic techniques she needed to while, as her mother said, still remaining pretty. This was just another, new freaky part of her that had apparently taken hold. It didn't matter. To her, it was just something new for her to master.

And by god, she would.

Luke threw the football as hard as he could, watching it soar through the air in perfect form before coming in for a landing. "60 yards," he nodded approvingly as it bounced across the ground. "Not bad. Though as dad would say, could be better."

He shook his head. After yesterday's talk, he understood his dad a bit more and his drive for Luke to succeed. But still, it was because of him that Luke was out here throwing a ball for the tenth time in a row. It wasn't like Luke didn't want to improve, he just didn't want the constant drive to keep doing it. He liked where he was right now perfectly fine.

But there's always someone better, his dad's words flashed through his mind and he sighed. Today was the big day. The tryouts where the new coach would determine who would make the team this year. And Luke had to be great at everything. From running to kicking to, as he was practicing now, throwing. It didn't matter what position he got. As long as he was on the team, then he would be able to prove his skills.

"Last ball," Luke said, picking it up. Then he'd have to go and collect them all and do it again. He let off a pent-up breath at the thought of doing all this again before he channeled it into his next toss, sending the ball flying. He blinked, marking it for maybe 65-70 yards. "Huh, that's pretty good," he remarked. But now he had to go get them. He sighed, his hand still outstretched from the throw. He wished the ball would just fly right back to his hand.

There was a sudden gust of wind and something slapped into his palm. It was the football. Gaping, he turned and saw that the ball had disappeared from where he'd thrown it. Dropping the ball, he reached out his hand for another one and suddenly felt a pull. A ball levitated there before it too flew over right into his hand.

"Oh my god," Luke said, gasping in disbelief. He turned once more, looking at the remaining balls and felt the pull again, causing all of them to rise up. He laughed at the sight in disbelief, but the laugh quickly died as all the balls shot towards him.

"Oh boy," he gulped before the balls struck like missiles.

Sumin had been sitting at the foot of their bed for a while now, staring down at their hands. The first thing they had noticed when waking up had been the strange lights surrounding their bed. On closer inspection, they realized each of the lights was a small star burning with indigo light. And by star, they meant that each one was in the shape of a star with five points.

Instantly, Sumin had deduced that last night's strange activities had actually occurred. Therefore, these lights must have something to do with that ball of light that had entered them.

However, soon the lights vanished. It was then that Sumin noticed their hands glowing with the same colored light. That led them to the position they were in right now, sitting cross-legged at the foot of their bed with calming forest music playing and staring at their hands, watching the light shine across their hands.

The whole situation seemed like it belonged in one of the stories their grandmother used to tell them as a child. For a second there, Sumin had thought maybe one of those stories was actually true, that the power of their ancestors was now flowing through them. However, after a quick scroll through their memories, they found none of the stories they'd been told correlated with their current predicament. In fact, the closest thing they could find was the one-sided discussion Travis had once had on the greatness of 'Green Lantern' comics. The constructs of light, as he called them, seemed eerily similar to what was now happening.

As if following Sumin's thoughts, an indigo form of an old-fashioned lantern with a handle with even flames inside appeared floating in front of them.

"Very strange."

It had come so suddenly that he could barely comprehend what it meant. A bright light, a sudden surge of energy, and then nothing, like it had never happened.

But he could still feel it. The energy was still there. Surging throughout his entire body, just waiting to be unleashed. He just didn't know what to do. He had been here, cowering in the corner for a while now, waiting for some sort of sign or explanation. But he was just as lost as before.

It had all happened so fast. He had been working, peacefully for once. No interruptions and no…incidents. And then the light had come, filling him to the brim with energy so strange and different. And so…alive.

He could feel it, in the back of his mind. Whatever this power was, he could feel just the wisp of a consciousness there and he could just get a semblance of its will.

Then, slowly, he began to smile.