***
Andros awoke in what looked like a classroom. As he sat up on the desk he realised he was in the counselling room, and had been lying on top of three desks pushed together, a jumper had been rolled up and pushed under his head. Andros turned around as the door opened and Mr Kenly, the school counsellor, entered, with two steaming mugs in his hands. He was tall, dark haired man and appeared to be in his late twenties, but in reality he was in his late thirties. “Oh, I see you’re awake,” he said with a smile, yet there was an undertone of surprise in his voice, “I brought you this” and he handed Andros a mug, “I hope you like your coffee black.” Andros nodded and took a deep drink, he felt much better afterwards “Umm…why am I here” he said hesitantly. A strange look flashed across Mr Kenly’s face, “Well I saw you being beat up on the playground, and I noticed how that rock hit ‘Ace’ in the face and then I saw you black out,” he said in a worried voice, “I don’t believe I ever told you I knew your father did I Andros?” Andros sat you straight at the mention of the father he had never known, his mother had always told him that he died in an car crash, Andros figured this was the reason she was so overprotective of him, “No, sir” he said through the lump that had appeared in his throat. Mr Kenly sighed, “Well I did, we went to school together, you remind me of him, he never quite fitted in, and the sportier boys picked on him but it never bothered him, because he had a secret myself and few other knew, and I believe you share the same secret,” he said in a low voice. “Your father,” said Mr Kenly in almost a whisper, but with a tone of excitement in his voice, “had powers. Yes I know it sounds insane,” he continued noticing the look of disbelief on Andros’ face, “but its true. It was strange, he was able to fly, breath fire and acid, and, which I believe you exhibited today, he could use telekinesis.” Andros stood up, “Sir I don’t think you’re the best person for the counsellor, I mean I don’t think whackos are the best people for finding out of other people are whackos, no offence.” Mr Kenly sighed and followed Andros to the door, “If you want to leave that’s ok, but if you want to find out what you can do, and more importantly, who you are, please stay.” Andros opened the door, but then hesitantly closed it again, “Fine, tell about my father.” Mr Kenly pulled out a chair from under a desk and sat down, motioning for Andros to do the same.
Andros slumped into the chair and Mr Kenly said, “When your father was 15 he got badly beat up one day and started choking and sputtering and he just threw up acid everywhere, over time he was able to refine this ability, and then the other abilities, powers if you will, began to grow. Telekinesis and flight used to make him particularly weak, and I believe that is what happened to you today, you exhausted yourself so much that you blacked out.” Andros decided to try and be open minded about this thing, so now he knew, his dad, who he had never met, as far as he knew, was some kind of mutant, “Mr Kenly,” he said, “Do these powers have anything to do with my dad…dieing?” Once again Mr Kenly sighed, “I thought you might ask that, and the answer is yes, he became something of a vigilante, at the age of 17, which was very brave, but very stupid. He rid this city of a lot of its scum, but one night he met his match, at the age of just 23, a few years after he had meet your mother, and the night after they had been married. He tried to bust a major drugs deal, but there were too many guards.” Andros looked at his feet, he knew what he had to do, train his powers, and try to follow in his father’s footsteps. “Mr Kenly,” he said in a timid voice, “will you train me?” He looked up waiting for the answer, and it came in the form of a nod. They agreed to meet the next day after school in the gymnasium.
***
At 4:00pm Andros entered the gymnasium via the back door, it appeared that Mr Kenly hadn’t yet arrived, so he decided he’d sit down and think about what he was going to do. “OK,” he said to himself, “You’re a mutant, a bigger freak than people thought you were, but at least you have cool powers, right? Speaking of which let’s try them out.” Flying seemed like the coolest power his father had, so that was the obvious choice to begin with he stood with his arms stretched in the middle of the hall and tried to imagine himself flying. Suddenly he began to feel very tried, and then he heard a door slam behind him, he opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was Mr Kenly running across the floor of the gym, the second thing he saw was the floor 5 feet below, panicking he lost his concentration and fell to the ground. “Andros, are you ok?” said Mr Kenly, in a voice that seemed a million miles away to Andros. “Yea, I’m fine,” he groaned, “flying sure takes it out of you, and falling five feet doesn’t help much either.” Mr Kenly smiled, “Here eat one of these, I figured you might need them,” and he handed Andros an energy bar, which he thankfully wolfed down. “Ok, lets start with something more basic, we know you can do telekinesis so lets work on that,” said Mr Kenly in an encouraging and enthusiastic manner. The next few hours were spent between learning how to spit acid and fire, fly, and use telekinesis, and by the time Andros was heading home he felt tremendously tired.
The sun had already set and a few blocks to his house he heard someone screaming. His house wasn’t in a particularly bad neighbourhood, but bad things could happen there, like anywhere. He started to run, and heard the screaming increase in intensity as he neared an alleyway, normally reserved for junkies. Andros threw himself down the alleyway and the first thing he saw was a blue jacket and the person wearing it half bent over an blonde girl who Andros vaguely recognised as someone who went to his school. Andros knew instantly what was going on, the guy was Ace and he was raping the girl. Without minimal concentration Andros began to pelt Ace with various bottles and cans littered around the alley via telekinesis. Ace spun around with a look of rage on his face, his broken nose making him look almost demonic. Andros began to slightly regret his decision to head down this alleyway, after all his powers were not yet fully developed, and defiantly not well trained, but he figured he could at least try and sedate Ace. Andros spat a small burst of flame at Ace, not enough to scar him, or even injure him, but enough to scare him and put him off balance. Ace jumped back, “What the hell was that you freak?” he roared at Andros. Ace leapt at Andros, but Andros, being lighter, easily jumped out of the way. Fearing another attack Andros focused all his being on lifting into the air, and surely he began to float slowly towards the top of the alleyway. The blonde girl tried to scamper as far away from Ace as possible, but ended up at the back of the alley. Ace moved towards her, but never got to far, Andros quickly broke off a piece of metal from the fire escape he was floating beside with a burst of acid and quickly dropped behind Ace, and smacked him as hard as he could across the back of the head. Ace dropped to the ground, and a few seconds later, after a triumphant smile flashed across his face, so did Andros.
***
The blonde girl looked down at Andros as he awoke in the accident and emergency ward in one of New York’s smaller hospitals. Andros bolted straight up, not knowing where he was, “You fainted, the doctors said it was from exhaustion,” explained the girl. Andros went to open his mouth but she said, “Its fine, don’t worry, I didn’t tell them that you had those powers or whatever it was.” Andros nodded, “Thank you,” he said gratefully. The girl’s face showed an expression of amazement and surprise, she said, “I should be the one thanking you, you saved my life. By the way my name is Sarah, and I know you’re Andros. I’ll see you around school,” she added as she hugged Andros around the neck. As the girl walked out of the room Mr Kenly entered looking both worried and proud, “I heard what had happened,” he said, “The doctor’s told me you fought Ace to save Sarah, and then Sarah explained to me the whole story. That was a very stupid thing you did…but I’m sure you father would have been proud of you” he smiled widely at Andros, “Ace has a concussion,” he continued, “but he’ll be fine, and the doctors said he would go to jail for a few years for rape.” Andros lay back down on the bed, his head spinning, “I guess this is the start of my superhero career,” said Andros with a grin, and he quickly went back to sleep.
