Evolution

by Hayden Thorne

  They were now downstairs, in the empty apartment one floor below me. I could hear them picking their way through the debris, their voices a constant, low hum. If I moved to go to the main door and escape to a different empty apartment, Calais would know.

  You can levitate.

  All right, then. Never mind.

  Concentration was all it took. I raised myself off the floor and focused on reaching the door. It was old and decrepit, just like everything else in the room, and was likely to make all kinds of loud, obnoxious sounds when moved.

  Use your powers on it. Seal it in a vacuum the way you sealed Calais and the girl.

  I did. It took a little more effort controlling the flow of energy as it rippled out of me, being so used to working with it in larger, more dramatic amounts. A couple of attempts were needed, and I made a mental note to practice some more.

  I watched the door shiver and contort as a mass of energy encased it.

  “Upstairs. I think I heard something,” the male voice said. Then I heard movement—stealthy shuffling through dirt and debris, followed by the cautious rattling of rusty steel as the two superheroes clambered up the fire escape to the floor I was on.

  Damn it. I turned the knob and slipped out the door, quietly, effortlessly. It was great. I’d cut off the energy surge just as the sounds of voices and footsteps filled the vacant room at the other side of the door.

  Get out.

  I did. Still levitating, I floated—no, I could fly now!—toward a window that was way at the end of the dark, rotting corridor. I shot out and flew off to another direction, stopping and hiding behind warehouses and tenements to make sure I wasn’t being followed. Every so often, I’d leap down to some dingy alley and crouch beside a dumpster to limit my presence above. God, the stench! My stomach turned, but I stuck to my task, feeling more and more confident with every danger-filled moment of playing hide-and-seek with some pretty powerful superheroes. I was only now coming into my power, and yet I’d been able to avoid them. This was fantastic.

  The voice suggested going to a place where I was least likely to be followed. I smiled to myself. Yes, I never even thought about that. Mentors were good to have around. Once sure of my safety, I continued my trek across the city, above and below, with plenty of pauses along the way for security’s sake. The delay in getting to my intended destination was a bit of a pain, but as long as I got there in one piece, that was all that mattered.

  Good job. A little slow, but you’ll improve in time.

  * * * *

  I blinked and held my breath. I felt like myself again and yet not. I was back in my own body, so to speak, but everything seemed off. For one thing, I found I was flying and descending to a rooftop. My brain was totally clear, but I was too stunned to freak out over my tweaked self. Yeah, I was tweaked—really tweaked. It was like having two personalities merging into one. The last several moments, it felt as though another part of me needed to take over first, fighting the heroes and then saving my skin, before helping my real self ease into place. Into my new body. And yet that other self stayed in the background, in a way, because I felt as though it’d never left. Like it was watching me from the sidelines, coaching me here and there the whole time. And that other self felt older somehow. An older me, hanging around and sharing mental space with me-me.

  And I realized that older me was the other voice in my head. As for me-me, I felt myself getting fed weird moods by my other half. Not only was I too stunned to freak out, I was actually going along for the ride, like, being led around on a leash willingly. And I couldn’t stop myself because—I guess I wanted it.

  This is where you can hide for now.

  I rolled my eyes and then surveyed my new location. “God, isn’t this typical?” I blurted out, shaking my head. “How much more classist can people be, expecting bad guys to come from the projects? Jeez!”

  The place where I was directed was the swanky part of Vintage City. I stood—seriously filthy, torn up, and disheveled—in the middle of endless rows of sparkling clean terraced houses, with shiny, expensive cars parked in front. It was a familiar sight, yeah, with all the sanitized prettiness that made the neighborhoods what they were. The extreme contrast to where I’d first hidden myself hurt my brain.

  Even more so the thought that Vintage City’s superheroes, those expected to uphold justice and peace, would expect to find me lurking around in the poorer areas like that grungy old building and not think about froufrou places like this.

  I guess Eugenics could do a lot to a person’s genes, but it sure as hell couldn’t do much for anything else, least of all a tendency toward snobbery.

  You’re a mess. Clean yourself up and then rest. You’ve had enough for one day. You’ll have more time to explore your powers in days to come.

  I’d never been big on crime. Then again, I’d never really committed one. A minor no-no here and there—a reluctant lie to my parents regarding my after-school activities the day Peter tore up my locker, snarky exchanges with my older sister, a joking request for Althea to break into the school’s computer and change my Chemistry and Geometry grades. Oh, and that martini party with the Trill’s gang inside their limo. Those were smaller than small potatoes in the criminal world.

  At this point in time, given my new powers, I was ready to up the ante. I flitted over to a ritzy hotel nearby, spied on different rooms in the back of the building, and used my powers to weaken the window lock and break into one room that was unoccupied. Seriously, this energy wave thing was pretty handy to have. I was in there, totally enjoying a nice, warm shower, complete with the typical citrus-scented shampoo, conditioner, and soap. My soiled clothes bugged me when I stepped out of the tub. I washed them as best I could—and without laundry detergent—scrubbing as much of the dirt off my shirt and jeans as was humanly possible under the circumstances. Ugh. This definitely made me develop a better appreciation of our washer and dryer at home.

  Speaking of, insta-dryer! I lined the dripping clothes along the tub’s edge, all neat and spread out, and blasted them all with my energy waves. Voila! Dry laundry! I told myself to put together a running list of what I could use my powers for, in addition to drying clothes, opening squeaky doors, and encasing pesky superheroes in energy bubbles.

  I stood before the mirror for some time, taking stock of myself physically. I expected a few changes in the way I looked now that I was, well, one of them—and wondered how obvious these changes would be to everyone who knew me. Especially my family.

  Still tall, still pale, but—hey!—better built. Now how the hell did that happen? I’d been doing my pushups for some time, with really pathetic results. All of a sudden, I had muscles? All because my brain waves enjoyed a form of mental steroids? Well, I’ll be damned.

  I continued my survey. Hair still neatly trimmed, but the blue streaks had vanished. My face looked a little more angular—mature, maybe? I couldn’t say for sure, but it definitely gave off a sense of age. Like my other half—the one that was kind of manipulating me right now—was showing himself physically. My eyes startled me. My irises had changed color from green to hazel, with a thin but distinct edging of red. I blinked several times, squinted, and leaned forward for a closer look till my face was practically pressed against the mirror.

  Yeah, my eyes were different. What the hell? My skin crawled at the sight, but at the same time, I couldn’t help but feel a major thrill. Gone was the old Eric Plath, I thought. Gone were the stupid grades, the stupid haikus, the stupid sensitivity toward perfection. The boy who stared back at me was better, way better. He was older, stronger, smarter, more independent, and he bowed to no one.

  He had control over his life. Cliché would have me go further and say he had control over his destiny. A seriously dumb cliché, but it worked in this case, and I was shocked but in a more positive way. Was he also manipulating me into embracing this “new me”? Then again, I’d always wanted this, hadn’t I?

  Do you like what you see?

&nb
sp; I slapped a hand against my mouth to keep myself from crying all of a sudden.

  I pulled away, took a deep, relaxing breath to get a hold of myself, and walked over to the bed. I tumbled in, exhausted. What if the hotel manager let out this room to a new guest? I yawned against the big, soft pillow as I curled on my side, burrowing under the nice, clean sheets. Let them take it from me. I could crush them if I wanted to.

  I didn’t even know which part of me thought that.

  Chapter 12

  The crappiest thing about being superhuman is just that—I was still human. I woke up after a couple of hours, my stomach gurgling and shrunken. I might be comfortable and totally hidden in my spur-of-the-moment hideaway—note to self: find a good place for my headquarters—but I was still broke and hungry. Crap. Crap, crap, crap.

  So how did superhumans get around this sort of thing? The bed felt way too good, so I burrowed deeper under the covers, inhaling the scent of fresh laundry and ignoring my rapidly shrinking oxygen supply, while I mulled things over.

  Peter still had to bow to his parents. Maybe Trent did as well. Althea got grounded, too, and was always arguing with Mrs. Horace about curfews and stuff. What about me? My family still had no clue about my transformation—no, evolution—that sounded better. It was most likely they’d still make me take out the garbage and help with the chores.

  I didn’t know how to go about things. My powers never came with instructions.

  You do have a teacher.

  “Yeah, but I have to break him out of that insane asylum just to have lessons,” I grumbled.

  Quit bitching. You owe him this.

  I sighed and emerged from the cocoon of blankets, taking in deep gulps of air. “I need to go back home and eat,” I said, staring at the ceiling, which was now being swallowed up by growing shadows. “I also need a change of clothes.” Was I entitled to wear something fancy like Peter? Maybe the Trill would help me find something suitable. I honestly hadn’t considered the idea of wearing Spandex. I shuddered at the thought of my gawky-ass body in stretchy, airtight material. Talk about being a huge disappointment to average gay boys everywhere. Of course, that little detail only served to ground home the fact I was one of the bad guys.

  “I’m a supervillain?” I breathed, frowning. No. A protégé. Big difference. At any rate, was I supposed to be scared by that? Something deep and kind of distant stirred at the idea. Discomfort? Fear? Maybe. For the most part, though, I toyed with the idea and let it sink in, bit by bit, expecting violent resistance from my conscience but finding none. It was a bit of a surprise.

  “I’m a supervillain protégé,” I repeated and then whistled. “Wow.”

  Well, I figured being an up-and-coming supervillain was way better than being a dull no-name with nothing to boast about but a lifetime of average-ness. And a dull no-name who kept getting left behind by his superhero pals. The perpetual outsider looking in. Yeah, it was much, much better to be a supervillain protégé. At least I was finally on par with Peter and everyone else. Then discomfort stirred again, and I went back and focused on another, maybe the most important, reminder.

  I was now two people in one body. Or one mind, divided and yet obviously conscious of each other. Things suddenly became clear. The day of the attack at the theatre, I had alternating halves surging to full awareness, one after the other: my tweaked side and my natural side. It was no wonder my natural self reacted with extreme and unexplainable fear to events I couldn’t remember in full detail.

  My tweaked side was in control during the theatre incident as well as the downtown attacks. Yeah—the one that felt older to me.

  After waking from my nap, my natural side had emerged even more, kind of reasserting itself in my head. But my tweaked self was still there, not wanting to be suppressed like before, and I could see everything that happened now. From start to finish, I could remember every moment.

  Now, lying in bed and coming to terms with my destructive capabilities, my two halves were at play. On one hand, I knew I was doomed to be on the wrong side of the law, and it freaked me out. On the other, I knew I was given a gift despite its dangerous source.

  I was dangerous, too, but I was also special and much better than most people out there. I was terrified of what I’d become, and yet I reveled in my new powers and the possibilities they offered me, the doors they opened, the roads they revealed.

  Another thought crossed my mind. With two opposing forces fully awake and sharing space in my mind and body, did it mean I was meant to be one of those torn, tragic figures in superhero myths? That I was both good and bad? The kind people were afraid of but admired at the same time? I couldn’t tell. It was too early to say, and I didn’t have the ability to see that far. The questions being left unanswered drove me crazy, but there was time enough for further thinky-thoughts. In the meantime, practical matters needed to be addressed.

  Hopefully my parents wouldn’t notice too much of a difference. I had to live with them for a while, after all, before striking out on my own, possibly squatting at the Trill’s, considering our connection.

  You’re good at this!

  “Maybe it comes with the powers.”

  And what about me and Peter? How would my newfound badness affect our relationship, which was pretty delicate to begin with? I couldn’t think of an answer. In fact, I didn’t want to and shoved the thought aside with a gloomy little huff after a moment of fumbling for something. Technically, Calais—no, Peter—and I were still together, but once on the battlefield, we were aligned to opposing forces. I’d be changed, my loyalties moving away from what had always been expected of me and my good, law-abiding, average kid-ness. Just from our near one-to-one that day, I saw that I’d be ruthless against him despite our day-to-day connection, and I was sure Peter would be just as relentless if he didn’t have a choice. I hoped, in my own desperate, clueless way, this situation would make our bond stronger. God, did any of that make sense?

  “As long as we don’t have to fight each other, I guess.”

  That’s a stupid thought. You know you’ll have to fight him.

  “I don’t want to,” I ground out. “Never. I didn’t have control over myself back then, when I blasted him with an energy bubble, but I’m aware of everything now. I’d rather die than hurt Peter, and if I’m forced to face him, I’ll let him beat me to a pulp.”

  A very stupid thought.

  “I won’t fight him. I’ll never fight him. I still have control over this, and I can choose what I’ll do in a battle. If you wanted me to be full-on evil, you should’ve taken over my head completely.”

  That was the key, wasn’t it? If the Trill really wanted me to be his protégé, his mindfuck methods should’ve completely erased my old self, or at least squashed it into silence for the time being, and I’d be out there still, wreaking havoc up and down Vintage. As it was, I did have a choice in this still, even with my other half pulling the strings now and then. I could control this. I had to.

  I continued to mull things over. By that time, a shaky confidence had taken hold of me, softening my fear with glimpses of hope. Maybe I could make my either-or situation work for me—that is, channel my powers and develop them for their purpose—which was destruction—but twist them as needed and use them for good. Technically I was a supervillain protégé, but I wasn’t genetically-altered or hardwired into being a bad guy. Unlike Magnifiman and the Trill and everyone else, I enjoyed independence with my powers, and though they were meant for evil, I still had the freedom to turn the tables.

  You idiot.

  Hope surged in me. Yes, that made sense. I could live with the idea of being someone who straddled good and evil, even braving misconceptions about my true purpose. Being gay, I’d long grown used to slurs and misconceptions. I had the best of both worlds within my reach, and all I needed to do was to keep my mind fixed on my goals.

  “I can make this work,” I muttered. “Yeah, I can. I have to. I’ll turn the tables on the Trill now I’ve got
the chance.” The voice in my head said nothing.

  I forced myself out of bed and washed up again, taking care to make sure I looked as neat as possible, and hoping that Mom wouldn’t notice the telltale stains and tears on my clothes.

  I was never good at hand-washing clothes.

  I exited the same way I entered, through the window. I flew past a row of ritzy rooftops before descending and walking to the nearest bus stop. I had enough loose change on me for bus fare; unfortunately, only one bus drove through upscale neighborhoods for its route, and it didn’t go anywhere near my house at any given point. I had to get off in some middle-of-the-road area outside downtown Vintage and walk the rest of the way home.

  Traffic was a nightmare, thanks to what had happened earlier. The main drag that cut through the shopping center was closed off. People in the bus chattered about the “big showdown” between Calais, the Fire Girl, and the Shadow Puppet’s puppets. Half the passengers pressed their faces against the windows to catch glimpses of the closed-off street whenever the bus drove through one that paralleled it. I thought I saw a thin gray mist—smoke, most likely—hovering in space in the general area, and I guessed Fire Girl must have been busy even after I’d escaped the scene. Magnifiman never showed up when I was there. Maybe he was too busy fighting the Puppet elsewhere.

  When I reached our front door, I stared at it, feeling nervous. Hopefully I’d be able to pull this off without a hitch. I fished around my pockets for my glasses, which I’d completely forgotten till that moment, and put them back on.

  “Oh, damn,” I hissed. It was awful. I pinched my eyes shut against the massive distortion and wondered how the hell I was going to make it through the rest of the day, practically blinded by the very thing that was designed to improve my eyesight.

  I should come up with a good enough excuse to sashay around without my glasses. In the meantime, I needed to somehow find my way to my bedroom without causing myself any major damage. Sighing, I fumbled for the door and opened it after a moment of poking my house key all over the door just to find the stupid lock since I couldn’t see it.