Worry : Improved

Finally, it was Friday, and Liam couldn't have been happier. Friday meant the weekend, after all. This meant he could do whatever he wanted. Usually, he would jog, try to train his body, or read through more books.

It was early 2005, still three years away from when everything would change. In three years, Tony Stark would become Iron Man, and the world would see actual superheroes again after Captain America was frozen in the Arctic.

'That still gives me some time,' Liam thought to himself. But truthfully, he had no idea what to do when the plot kicked in.

He would turn sixteen later this year. By then, normal people had some sort of plan for their lives—college, work, or something else entirely.

'But me?' Liam thought. 'No plan, nothing. I guess I'll read up on old books until I find out Oscorp produces the spiders and shows them off to the world as a future way to cure diseases.'

'Sure, I could go somewhere no one would find me or my grandpa and spend the rest of my days hiding from any danger, praying Thanos' snap doesn't kill me or my grandfather and that the plot truly goes how it's supposed to,' Liam thought. 'But that isn't me. I don't want to be powerless. I don't want to hide.'

Remembering a quote from his past life: It's better to die trying than never to have lived at all. In his previous life, he had done enough hiding. He wanted to survive, but he wanted to gain strength while doing so.

He was worried about Thanos, but he knew it wasn't just about him. He didn't even know if he could make it that far when everything went down. From 2010 to 2018, a supernatural fight seemed to happen every week.

The nights were the worst for Liam. His worries always came up, keeping him awake while thinking about countless possibilities. But since the start of the year, it wasn't just the worries that kept him awake. He had started having dreams—or rather nightmares—each one more intense than the last.

In the dreams, there were these whispers. He couldn't make out the words—they were always muffled, distant. Sometimes they turned into strange sounds, like the rustling of paper or the scraping of metal. And then there was the darkness. It felt alive, closing in on him until he woke up, drenched in cold sweat, his heart racing as if he'd just escaped something terrifying.

Liam tried to brush it off at first. 'Just stress and sleep deprivation,' he told himself. He thought it was just his mind playing tricks on him because he was overthinking everything. But the more the dreams came, the harder it was to ignore them.

Harold noticed. "You've been looking tired lately," he mentioned one morning, his brow furrowed with concern while he poured Liam a cup of coffee. "Everything okay?"

"Yeah, just a lot on my mind," Liam lied, forcing a smile. He didn't want to make Harold worried. How could he explain that he was losing sleep over nightmares that didn't make any sense?

Liam felt like these nightmares were different from normal ones. Nightmares itself weren't unfamiliar to him—not in this life or his previous one. But these new nightmares, he didn't remember much when he woke up, except an intense feeling of dread.

He also couldn't explain them. Sure, he was worried about the future. But that worried? No, he wasn't. It felt like he had no control over whatever happened during his sleep.

As another night passed, Liam woke up in cold sweat again. This time, the whispers stayed in the back of his mind. Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, he sat there for a minute or two, getting his breathing under control again.

'I need to get moving to clear my head,' Liam thought, putting on a hoodie and his old sneakers.

Jogging through the streets to the park, he enjoyed the fresh air. At this hour in the morning, the city felt completely different. It was much quieter and a lot more peaceful.

Jogging into the park, he barely saw any other people—only a few earlyrisers, whom were letting their dogs out or were jogging themselves. The whispers he had in the back of his mind, slowly faded away the longer he ran.

After a while of jogging, he sat down on a bench in the park, drinking a sip of water from his bottle as he watched the sun rise in front of him. Feeling the warmth of the sunshine, he managed to relax again.

A few minutes passed, and he stood up again, continuing to jog back to his grandfather's apartment. He was determined to live his life to the fullest. Gaining strength was something he knew would happen.

No matter how long it took, he was determined to get strong. Even with how unpredictable the Marvel Universe was, he was confident he could do it eventually.