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"Have you ever wanted to be a superhero?Well, now you can become one! I can give you any superpower you want. 250 bucks each. 100 extra for anything ending in kinesis!"
That's what the ad said.
I found it in a library book.
Sandwiched inside a dog-eared copy of Percy Jackson, there it was.
**Have you ever wanted to be a superhero?**
**Well, now you can become one! I can give you any superpower you want. 250 bucks each. 100 extra for anything ending in kinesis. I'm open 9am-midnight every day. Find me between the old pizza hut and the library. Don't look for me. I'll find you.**
**Please note: These abilities are non-refundable, and MAY cause side effects.**
I had so many questions.
Keeping hold of the scrap of paper, I pulled it out during class to show my friend. “It's a dud,” Tai said with an eye roll. I mentioned it to him once, and the guy had not stopped talking about it all day.
This thing was clearly on his mind. The guy couldn't sit still for most of class, his gaze flicking to the scrap poking from my notebook. At lunch, Tai ripped the paper out of my hand when we were trashing our leftovers. I was still considering it. I did have 250 bucks in my savings *and* superpowers sounded fun. Tai, however, didn't share my excitement.
“I can guarantee someone out there is not giving people *super powers* for two hundred bucks.” he screwed the paper up in his fist and threw it in the trash. Tai was a sceptical person anyway, though his reaction was unlike him. His eyes were dark, a hollowness to them like I was staring into nothing.
It took me a moment to snap him out of it.
“Hey.” I nudged him and he blinked, his expression souring.
Tai rarely scowled, so this was for a first. I don't think I had ever seen that look on his face, clearly panicked, but trying to hide it. He feigned a smile, though I could see the whites in his fingers where he was squeezing his tray a little too hard. “Come on,” his mouth was still filled with mashed potatoes from lunch. “I thought you were smart. Do you seriously believe in superpowers?” Tai laughed, “In *this* world?”
“No.” I couldn't take my eyes off of the paper, now covered in someone's potato salad. I found myself reaching toward it, before Tai gently slapped my hand away.
“Well, don't believe in an obvious scam,” he dumped his tray, his tone hardening. There was a girl behind me trying to get past, but I was paralysed, staring at the advert. Tai’s fingers wrapped around my arm. I felt the weight of each one cinching into my skin, pressing pressure. “Fee, I am being completely serious when I say you will get your organs harvested.”
*Fee, I am being completely serious when I say you will get your organs harvested.”* Tai’s voice bounced around my skull. I nodded, though my actions weren't mine, a dreamy smile splitting across my lips I couldn't control.
“Yeah,” I said, my words tangled. The sound of the cafeteria faded into white noise, and for a moment I felt like I was floating. I kept nodding, all of my senses starting to seep into one. Tai’s touch was gentle and firm around my elbow. I could still hear the sound of chatter, but I could taste it too, smell gossip and small-talk. It tasted like ice-cream cake and lemon frosting on my tongue, chocolate lava and tomato ketchup tickling the back of my throat.
The guy in front of me had hair the color of fire, a deep orange glow igniting each strand alight. I shook my head of entangled smells and taste.
“Don't bother,” Tai’s voice was louder in my head. I had the sudden overwhelming urge to slam my hands over my ears, except my hands wouldn't move. I was frozen, my fingers still clutching my tray. “It’s a scam, Fee.”
Explosions of colour expanded in my vision trailing the sound of a girl’s scream.
*Pink.*
Someone dropped their tray.
*Purple.*
Laughter looked like yellow paint being spread across the floor, and tasted like cherries.
“You're… probably right.” I heard myself say in a daze. “It's a scam.”
“Good,” he hummed. “Let's go.”
Tai’s grip slipped from my arm, and reality slammed back into me. The loud laughter and chatter from students bustling around me. I was still holding my tray. I shook my head of mind fog, my thoughts seeping back to fruition.
My earlier words already felt foreign and wrong.
This wasn't a new thing. I had been suffering from brain blanks for a while.
Before I could stop myself, I pulled the scrap of paper from the trash, scraped away pieces of pasta, and followed Tai out of the cafeteria. Tai and I had been friends since junior year. I didn't think I'd befriend a guy twice the size of me, but here we were, a year later, practically glued to the hip. Tai was marginally attractive, dark brown hair and built like a brick wall. If I didn't swing the other way, I would definitely be swayed by Asian American features and dimpled smiles.
Catching up to him, I waved the paper in his face. “For someone who *doesn't really care* about this so-called dud, you seem to care a lot.”
Tai’s lip curled. I noticed his grip tighten around his phone. “You seriously dug it out of the trash?”
“Why wouldn't I?” I shot him a grin. “Don't *you* want superpowers?”
His lip twitched. “I'm good.”
His response confused me. “Seriously? You don't want *any* superpower?”
“No.” Tai’s voice was startlingly cold. The light fixture above us flickered erratically, the bulbs exploding, popping one by one. For a moment, I was entranced by shattered glass raining from the ceiling. I held out my hand, catching shards on my palm. Tai kept walking, unfazed. His gaze didn't leave his phone. “Don't go looking for fantasy,” he grumbled. “You won't find it.”
I stuffed the ad into my pocket, following his figure down the hallway.
“And how can you be sure?” I was teasing him at this point, but Tai wasn't getting the memo. As usual, he was taking things a little too seriously.
Tai shrugged, bowing his head. “It's basic common sense. Don't be stupid.”
“Okay,” I said, half joking. “I'll drop it.”
Tai was unusually quiet for the rest of the day. I told him I was going to the convenience store after class, which wasn't exactly a lie. I needed to grab food. But I wasn't going to tell him about my pit stop. Per what the ad said, I ventured down the alleyway between the library and the old Pizza Hut. There was a dead end, and a rat with its innards spilling out into a piece of cardboard.
I'm not an avid believer of bad luck, but it looked like the stars were aligning to personally tell me I was going to die.
According to the ad, I was supposed to wait for them to find me. Twenty minutes passed. Then half an hour. The sky was starting to darken, streaks of red and orange illuminating the horizon indicating twilight. An hour passed, and I was sitting on the wall, my legs dangling, my butt already half asleep. I checked my phone. 8% and zero service. I had five missed calls from an hour ago. Tai.
He was onto me.
I hated convenience store food.
UberEats was my go-to. I really thought I could fool the guy with some half assed text:
*Hey, I'll be back late tonight! I'm grabbing sushi from the C store.**
I would rather die than eat convenience store sushi, and my friend knew that.
Another twenty minutes passed, and street lights were flickering to life illuminating the dark in an orange glow.
I could see the streak of red which had been the rat in perfect detail. The head was gone while the torso had been ripped open, lumps of pulpy red spilling onto the ground. Something sour filled the back of my mouth. I jumped off of the wall, my stomach twisting into knots. I could have sworn that *thing* had been splattered across a piece of cardboard.
It was pitch black. With the help of my phone flashlight, I found the cardboard exactly where I saw it before.
So…
*How did the rat move?*
Taking a step back, my hand moved in jerking movements, my flashlight illuminating the hollow oblivion of the alleyway which felt like it was closing in on me, a slowly collapsing pinprick in my vision. *Fuck.* I could already feel my body catapulting into fight or flight. I couldn't resist looking at the ground and following the beam of my flashlight, searching for mutant rats.
I took another slow step back, phantom bugs filling my mouth and skittering across the bare flesh of my arms.
*Run*.
My body was telling me to run.
The air around me, thick and sour smelling, was telling me to run.
But I couldn't. I was paralysed, my gaze glued to the streaks of scarlet that *had* been the rat. The blood was still there, thick and congealing into the concrete. But the pulpy mass of flesh which were its grim remains were gone.
Following the splatters of blood with my flashlight, I was right.
It was… moving.
I expected an attack, furry masses diving onto me, razor sharp teeth tearing into my flesh.
What I got instead, was a clammy hand slamming over my mouth.
My body reacted, a scream erupting from my throat, muffling into the stranger's palm. I could sense their breath tickling the back of my neck.
“Caaaaaash, please.”
The voice was younger than I expected, a kid maybe a few years younger than me.
His voice was a low murmur, almost a sing-song. Blinking stars out of my eyes, it took me a disorienting second to understand what he meant, and I remembered why I was there in the first place. “I don't have it,” I muffled into the pressure over my mouth and nose.
His hand smelled of disinfectant mixed with something metallic, a pungent taste that stuck to the back of my throat and lips. I was lying. I did have 250 bucks in my pocket. However, I wasn't expecting my seller to be a fucking kid. I said the first thing that came to my mind. “I… I can pay you in instalments!” I tried to pull his hand away, but he tightened his grip.
“Instalments?” the kid surprised me with a giggle. “For fucking superpowers, dude?”
I did my best to nod, tears stinging my eyes.
He let me go with a sigh, and I stumbled back, swiping my mouth.
“Fine.”
I scrambled for my flashlight, and the shadow in front of me grew a face. I found myself staring into bright eyes, twisted and wrong, a smile with too many teeth. I was right. It was a kid, maybe two years younger than me.
Rich, judging from his private school blazer. Thick sandy hair poking from a knitted beanie. The kid shot me a grin.
“I'll let you pay in instalments, but if you miss one, I'm adding interest.” he twisted around with a chuckle, jumping over a puddle. “I'm only doing this because I like the look of you. You're a college student, are clearly a superhero fan, and have risked coming down this scarrryyy alleyway, to become just like your fave. Which is brave, I gotta say!”
His head jerked almost inhumanly, a predator tracking its prey.
He was standing on the remnants of the rat, and when I looked closer, I realised he was barefoot. This kid went to a prestegious school and was wearing no fucking shoes, the slithering remains of the rat squashed between his toes.
I swore I caught the shadows enveloping his face, like he belonged in the dark, his lips curling into that of a monster, narrowed eyes drinking me in hungrily.
This kid was scarier than mutant rats.
He reminded me of an unhinged Percy Jackson.
Which was irònic.
“Well?” he cocked his head, mocking a frown. “Are you coming?”
I was already mentally mapping a getaway if this kid tried anything.
“You're the one selling...?”
I drifted off, and he nodded with a grin. “Yep! Why? Did you expect someone else?”
Before I could speak, he sighed. “Follow me. I have several left. I have some new ones, though I haven't advertised them yet. Pyrokinesis is a popular one, but I won't have another Pyro until at least January. My supplier is running short, which is soooo annoying.” He turned back to me when I didn't move.
The kid ushered me towards him, and something compelled me forward. Maybe I really did want to believe in this fantasy. Continuing to talk, he didn't seem fazed by my hesitance.
I took my place behind him.
“I expect instalments to pay me back if you can't pay now. You can give me your payment details after."
“Payment details?” I whispered.
The kid snorted, his expression darkening. “I'm not giving you superpowers for free,” he raised a brow. His eyes were darker, more hollow in the flashlight beam, ageing this kid way beyond a teenager. “I know some people who do, but you don't want to fuck around with them. I can give you high quality abilities without the, you know, super soldier programming.”
I swallowed. “The what?”
The kid didn't reply, only waving his hand with a sigh. “You wouldn't understand. But trust me, they're bad news.”
*The patronising little shit.*
Stumbling over my feet, I struggled through the dark. “Are you being serious?” I managed to choke out.
He surprised me with a laugh. “You thought I was lying? What were you expecting?”
I ignored his question. “I'm sorry, how old are you?”
“Uh, sixteen!” he shouted back. “And a half.”
I nodded dizzily, jumping over a puddle. The alleyway felt like it was going on forever. “You're a sixteen year old that sells superpowers to people?”
His shadow was getting further away, and I struggled to keep up.
“Yep!” the kid’s voice bounced off of the walls, while his figure weaved in and out of existence, creeping further and further away from my flashlight. “Hey, it's better than getting a job, *and* I’m earning my tuition. So, it's a win-win.”
“Uh-huh.” I cleared my throat. I was fully expecting drugs. This kid was talking like a drug dealer, so maybe high schooler’s had code names for drugs. Superpower names were less likely to cause alarm bells. Pyrokinesis was ice, and Telekinesis was cocaine. Maybe the *anything ending in kinesis* line meant Class A drugs. The ones in high demand. It made sense. This kid thought he was selling me cocaine, and I had taken his code names literally.
*Oh god, I was being led into a sixteen year old’s drug den.*
Tai was never going to let me live this down.
When we reached the end of the alleyway, the kid turned to me, pulling a piece of cloth from his pocket.
Immediately, I stumbled back, and he rolled his eyes. “Relax.” the boy held up the cloth. “It's just a blindfold. To protect my business, I don't want my customers to know where we’re going.”
I didn't move, my mind going into panic mode.
The kid sighed. “Dude, it's fine,” he said, tying the cloth around my eyes. My fingers moved to tear it away, but he stopped me. “I'll even tell you my name.” I could sense his face inches from mine. “I'm Wen! Nice to meet you! Now, I'm going to lead you inside, all right?” I felt his hands press down on my shoulders. “Do you mind?”
I nodded, swallowing hard. “Ophelia,” I whispered, letting him guide me forwards.
“Hm?”
“My name,” I said. “It's Ophelia.”
Wen chuckled. “Ophelia. I don't think I've ever known anyone with that name.” I tripped over something, and he pulled me further into the void. I had no idea where I was going, dragging my hands across brick to stabilise myself. When I was sure he was leading me to my doom, Wen pulled off the blindfold.
Blinking rapidly, I drank in eerie yellow light sparking from a dying bulb. I was in a small apartment kitchen. There was a faucet, a dining table, and a refrigerator. I opened it up, jumping back when a critter crept across the handle. For a rich private school kid, Wen’s living conditions were interesting.
I was frowning at peeled paint on the walls and used coffee mugs, bug infested flooring under my feet, when the kid filled up a glass of water and handed it to me. I noticed smears of dirt on the rim and politely declined.
Wen must have seen my expression.
He sighed, placing the glass down. “This is all I could get at short notice,” he gestured around and I took notice of the windows being blacked out. “I'm planning on upgrading next year, especially if I'm going to have competition.” He stood on his tiptoes to grab a pack of cookies from a cupboard.
“Want one?” Wen’s smile caught the light, and something rancid filled my mouth.
He was waiting for me to try and run.
When I made my way toward the door, he casually stepped in front of me, arms folded. Wen knew he was in control, and I think that exhilarated him. My flashlight and phone had died, and I was alone inside his drug den. He was practically bouncing up and down. “Are you *sure* you don't want a cookie?”
I managed a nod. “I'm okay.”
Wen shrugged, demolishing the cookies himself. “Suit yourself!”
I thought he was going to continue playing mind games, but he just sent me a smile. “You should eat. All of my customers eat before a sale.”
“I said I'm okay,” I gritted out.
With a shrug, Wen led me down a set of concrete steps, jumping down each one like he was playing a game.
Every time I turned back, something forced me further down the steps, like I wasn't in control of my legs. Wen talked casually, knowing just opening his mouth was terrifying me. His movements, the way he spoke, everything was manufactured to unnerve me. “It's Telekinesis you're looking for, right?” We reached the bottom, and he led us through a door of plastic sheets, straight into darkness.
I could smell it already. Disinfectant mixed with mould.
“Telekinesis is a great ability,” Wen laughed. “It took me a while to catch him, but I managed it in the end!”
Wen’s words played with my mind, phantom bugs creeping down my spine.
*Him*?
Light slammed into me, almost knocking me off of my feet.
Shading my eyes, I blinked rapidly. I expected a drug lab.
I expected mountains of powdered white and old science equipment. What I saw instead was… plastic. A room full of plastic hanging from the ceiling. I couldn't see anything else. I started to back away, but Wen was already grabbing me and pulling me with him.
In the flickering light from the figure above us, I glimpsed old and new red streaks staining the floor, and each plastic door we stumbled through. Blood.
It shined brighter the further I was pulled inside a labyrinth of plastic, a whole different world hidden inside. There were metal beds lined up, a body sized lump on each one. We passed a girl with halo hair lying face down on bloodstained blankets. I couldn't see her torso, the lower part of her body covered with soaked blankets stained revealing red.
There were plastic tubes forced into pale, limp arms hanging off of the edge.
“Ignore the Siren,” Wen sighed, tightening his grip. There was something pooling on the floor, thick and red seeping across pristine marble. “She's a drama Queen. Ariosa plays dead all the time. She's not for sale, by the way. Ariosa is just for display.”
I kept walking, as if in a trance.
Even when behind me, the girl let out a deafening shriek that clawed its way into my skull.
Wen commanded me closer with his voice, and I moved like I was in a dream, my gaze glued to bloodstained steel and body parts without heads cruelly chained down to each gurney. I saw them at their most vulnerable, people, with the majority of them being in their twenties, college kids and older, put on a horrific display.
These kids were malnourished, anorexic, their haunted eyes piercing right through me. Some of them screamed at me, straining in cruel chains pinning them down. One guy was brutally tied down, his arms had been chopped off. His agonising wail followed me, begging Wen to kill him.
“Pyro.” Wen said. “He's my only one, and he's already been bought. I'm just waiting for the seller to come buy him.”
A ponytailed brunette looked to be in deep sleep, a plastic mask pressed over her mouth and nose. The girl looked drained, sickly pale skin and bruises covering her arms, no doubt from needles and tubes being forced into her veins. Looking closer, her face started to morph into a younger girl, and then a guy, their features changing sporadically, while their body, slightly delayed, followed. This person did not have one singular face. They had multiple.
“Jordan. Zero Nine, if we're talking about their ability. Anything starting with Zero is the shit people really want. Like, mind control, and anything with kinesis,” Wen muttered in my ear. “They're my first shifter. I’m selling them for 150. But nobody's interested.”
Somehow, I found my voice.
“I've changed my mind,” I managed to choke out.
Wen cocked his head, a smirk curling on his lips. The bastard was waiting for this. His eyes were alive, glittering with insanity. He was subtle in the way he positioned himself. “You can't *take back* agreement for a superpower,” he murmured. “I use your voice as a form of consent. You followed me in here expecting superpowers and wasted precious time I could have had with a paying customer, so you're buying.”
A cry clawed its way up my throat, and I pried his fingers from my arm, but he grabbed it again, this time squeezing hard enough to incite a screech. Wen pulled me close to him, his breath in my ear. His words were like poison, and I could sense his satisfied grin. “Like I said, we can talk about the legalities and payment details when you're all done, all right?” he shoved me forward.
At first, I didn't move.
“Walk, Ophelia!” His voice was playful at first.
Hearing Ariosa's whimpering behind me, I couldn't.
“Fucking *walk*,” Wen’s tone hardened, and I did, forcing my legs into motion.
Something smooth and metallic prodded into my spine. A gun.
I should have known a teenage drug lord who dealt in supernatural abilities would have a gun. Wen prodded me again. “I don't fuck with people who refuse to buy, lady. I feed ‘em to 102.”
I was still registering his words when he stopped in front of a particularly filthy sheet and swept it aside. “Here we are! Telekinesis. He was originally 250, but since you've been a *great* customer, I can give you him for half.”
I don't know what I expected. After already witnessing multiple people tied down and forcefully drugged, wires and tubes sticking from them, I thought it would be the same. But this was a whole other level of brutality, one that sent me staggering back. Wen easily caught me, stabbing the barrel of his gun into my back. I barely felt it. I sunk to my knees, my mind already trying and failing to drink in what I was seeing.
Wen wasn't just *selling* super powers.
I vomited all over myself, and the boy scoffed.
“Oh, come on, that's disgusting!”
Swiping barf from my lips, I struggled to breathe. *He was farming them.*
“Get up,” Wen dragged me to my feet, but my legs weren't working. My head felt thick, my thoughts dizzy and distant.
I wanted to lie to myself, tell myself I wasn't seeing this. But the blood on the floor was real, the splatters of scarlet staining skin and steel. In front of me was a man, my age, strapped to a chair, closed eyes flickering, lips parted in a silent scream. It looked like he used to be a college student, splinters of who he was still lingering. I could see where his hair used to be, tufts of dark blonde still attached to what was left of his scalp.
His skin was paper thin, malnourished, like it would splinter apart at any given moment. I think he used to be handsome, used to have laugh lines, and lips that smiled. Now, I was looking at a shell. The man’s body had been forced upright, trembling hands pinned to metal armrests. I looked for hair, for facial features that made sense and were human– but all of that had been stripped away. There was just agony.
It was agony I didn't know or understand, that twisted his body, contorting him back and forth like a puppet on strings. The back of his head was gone, the startling white bone of his skull and pinkish mush of brain exposed, needles and wires stuck into the meat. The man’s eyes flickered open, suddenly, wide and frantic.
Terrified.
Staring directly at me, the whites of his eyes were blood red.
He jolted on the chair, his arms moving, fingers twisting around the arm rest.
“Tah-dah!” Wen chuckled. He danced over to the man, playfully prodding the bare meat of the guy’s brain. The man screamed, contorting in his chair, the lights above flickering. The ground shook under my feet, stray instruments flying into the air. I watched, baffled, as swirling silver danced around my head, needles and scalpels in a manic dance, before faltering, like he was losing control.
The guy’s head dropped, and so did the whirlwind of metal, hitting the ground.
“Behave.” Wen rolled his eyes. “Stop showing off.”
Slowly, the man’s head snapped up. His lips moved, a thin line of red oozing from his nose. His gaze stuck to me, and with every jerk of his wrist, every blink of his eye, I knew he was trying to rip me apart from the inside. My skin prickled. I could feel his presence brushing over me, prodding at my skull. Wen flung out his arms like he was introducing a friend.
“This is Telekinesis! Well, I call him Zero two. Also Ryan. He's my most powerful. I can drug this guy into a fucking coma, and he still manages to rip a customer's head off,” Wen sighed. “The trick was finding the right mix. Horse tranquiliser works miracles with telekinetics. It knocks em’ straight out with no mess.”
The kid’s smile widened. “Which is why your brains aren't splattering the walls right now!” he said in a sing-song. “You're welcome, by the way!”
Zero Two let out an animalistic howl, struggling in the chair, and he laughed.
“You can shut up. Don't give me that look.”
Wen turned his attention to me. “All right, let's get you set up for the procedure.”
Zero Two’s gaze snapped to me, his lips moving.
Once.
Twice.
*Run*. He mouthed, and I glimpsed lingering humanity.
Wen jumped in front of me, dark eyes twisted with insanity.
“Well? Do you like him?” another step, and he was closing the distance between us. “It should take maybe an hour. Two, if your body rejects it. Which is a pain, but I've got the time!”
“You're sick,” I managed to get out.
Wen shrugged. “It's business. You have empathy, and I don't. Ouch. Do you want Telekinesis or not?”
“No.” Panic erupted inside of me, but I couldn't move. There was no way to run, and a psychotic kid held me at gunpoint.
I didn't have a choice. My freedom to choose had dissipated the second I made the decision to follow him inside his superpower farm. Wen was surprisingly strong, his arms wrapping around my neck in a chokehold. Something cold pricked the back of my neck, and my body went limp. I hit the ground, half aware of Wen’s shadow looming over me.
My vision was blurring, but I could just make out the curl of his cruel smile.
“After all,” Wen’s voice swam in and out of reality, while my body plunged.
My eyes flickered, finding intense splatters of red staining the ceiling. “I don't think I told you about *my* ability, did I?” He picked me up, and I was light as a feather, my head hanging.
Wen’s laugh sounded unreal, and there it was again. Just like in the cafeteria with Tai, my senses were twisting. The blood in my mouth was shaped like diamonds. I could see every bead, every cutting corner slipping from my lips.
Through tunnel vision, the boy's laughter had colour, pitch black darkness bleeding around him, like he was engulfed in ink. “Oh, dude, wait until I tell you about my father…”
His voice faded, and I stopped thinking for a while. I don't know how long. Time seemed to flow in a separate singularity. Consciousness hit me slowly. Wen’s voice grazed the back of my mind, pulling me back to a reality I didn't want to be in.
I could already sense my numb body, my wrists pinned to metal armrests.
There are certain things your mind chooses to block out in favour of panicking your body. I was already aware that the back of my head had been ripped open, and my mind was raw and naked to the rest of the world.
It hit me in tiny electroshocks, not prominent enough to be pain. I don't think pain existed in that disorienting moment between half consciousness and awake. It was something else entirely, an uncomfortable agony that wasn't quite agony, because I couldn't feel it.
“Once upon a time,” the kid’s voice was mocking, and I could *feel* his fingers.
I could feel the tips of his fingernails digging into me, skittering right across the bare flesh of my brain. There was no scream in my throat, no panic in my chest. I think my body was in a state of paralysis. I remember opening my eyes to brutal light blinding me, rivulets of thick red beading down my arms, tiny rivers seeping down my skin. I closed my eyes again, sharp, heavy pants escaping my lips. “There was a boy with a father who was very intelligent.”
I was pushing out words, my mouth filled with blood.
*Why are you doing this?*
My lips moved, but the words failed to hit the sound barrier.
“Shhhh,” Wen hummed. “Listen to the story.” he cleared his throat, and his fingers continued to dig down, deep into the meat of my brain, pulverising tissue.
I felt nothing, and yet my body still reacted, jerking side to side. My eyes rolled back, darkness momentarily swallowing me up, only to spit me back out. “Anyway,” Wen continued. Through flickering eyes, I could glimpse steel protruding into my wrist.
“So, the boy had a super smart father who was obsessed with the supernatural,” Wen hummed. “So, can you guess what the boy's father did?”
I didn't respond, my gaze lazily skating over ceiling tiles.
“He experimented.” Wen dug his fingernails in, and this time I screamed.
No pain, but my body was sure there was. Sweat trickled down the back of my neck and face, bile gathering in my mouth. “The boy's father was obsessed with unlocking a certain part of the mind. The boy didn't know this. One day, he was just exploring. His mother had been gone for a few days. But hey, his dad said it was cool. His Mom was just visiting family, and she'd be back.”
Another prod.
“Nope! The body found his mother– or more appropriately, what was left of his mother. Daddy carved her brain out! Mommy was right there on the bed, her blood was still warm. He hugged her, and still remembers the blood on his face. He tried to wake her up, but Mommy was long dead. Dad had already cut up her brain for testing.”
He giggled, another explosion of colour seeping into my vision. “When his mother failed, his father used him.”
Deeper and deeper his fingers were going.
“It hurt him, Fee. It fucking hurt enough for the boy to want to die over and over again. He spent a long time on a table made of stone, while his father cut him apart and stitched him back together. He stopped feeling pain. Fuck, he stopped feeeling completely! Because the boy's father had cut all of it away, all the bad emotions, and all the good, to make way for his greatest gift.”
*No wonder Wen was a psychopath, his childhood was a never ending experiment.*
“I think you know where I'm going with this story,” Wen chuckled. “My father wanted to turn me into a superhero. Just like the other kids he played around with. But he did the exact opposite.”
I held my breath when his fingers stopped moving, straying in cerebral tissue. “Dad didn't give me the powers I wanted,” his tone twisted and his fingers twisted. That time I *did* feel pain, my lips parting in a silent scream.
“He gave me this.” Wen twisted his fingers again, and my white hot pain filled me, bleeding into my blood and bones. I screamed that time, my raw screech reminding my body I was still real. “The power to extract abilities that I can't take for myself,” Wen continued in a spiteful hiss. “And give them to others.” It was like being filled with electricity, my brain being boiled alive.
My eyes clouded, the lights above flickering.
I screamed again, my head lolling to the side.
“Sorry,” Wen muttered. “I'm trying to reach your cerebral cortex-- I think that's what it's called--but it's hard…” his voice faded in and out. “I should be better at this by now, but there's so much I have to dig through, and that's on top of keeping the customer alive with Zero Five’s ability. Urgh. I’ve got brain juices all over me.”
I counted ceiling tiles to distract myself.
“Almost…”
I lost count around the 400 mark, my body unsure whether to shut down or stay awake.
“There…”
Colours and stars spotted my eyes. I remember curling my fingers, and feeling a *pull* from somewhere, like a magnet repelling. Darkness found me once more, but even asleep, I could still sense that *pull* entangling around me.
“Wakey, wakey!”
Drifting back to fruition, I was sitting, my legs dangling off of a bed. When my hand instantly went to the back of my head, my fingers only grazed my own thick brown hair. I delved two fingers into my scalp, and there it was, thick rugged stitches sewing me back together. My first thought was Zero Two.
I tried to move my body to get up, but my limbs weren't working.
Dropping onto my hands and knees, I barely felt the impact.
Zero Two was gone. The chair where he'd been restrained was empty.
“Here! Let me help you.”
Wen was standing over me. He ducked to my height. I thought he was going to hit me, but he just pulled a stray needle out of my arm. “All right. Try now.”
I did, jumping to unsteady feet. Already, I was looking for a way out– and that strange magnetic-like pull was still there.
It moved with me, attaching itself to everything in my vicinity. I was sure with a simple jerk of my hand or finger, I could cause damage. Already, my mouth was moving, my heightened senses overwhelming me. Ariosa, the siren in the bed a few metres away, was easy to latch onto. “Where is he?” I demanded, already scanning for Zero Two.
Wen folded his arms. “Zero Two? Oh, I incinerate the original host after extraction,” he said. “Think of your ability like a virus. In rare cases, the power itself tries to find the original host, which can result in…problems.” he tutted. “Luckily, it was just one person. But I've been told to be careful.”
He shook his head. “Anyway! Enough about the shell. I want payment by Monday. If you can't pay, you can come work for me! You're telekinetic, and I need some extra weight to play catch.”
“Boss!”
A girl’s voice made me jump.
“We’ve got another one!”
Wen’s eyes lit up. “Watch this,” he grabbed my arm and pulled me back through the room, passing beds filled with supernaturals. I was lighter on my feet, already clumsy with my ability. I was knocking things onto the floor and sending beds crashing into the wall.
Wen was ahead of me, so I had one chance to do it.
I found Zero Two on a pile of bodies, each marked for incineration. His hands were tied, so Wen was lying about him being braindead. The man wasn't moving, his head clumsily stitched back on. But I still pulled apart his restraints. If he was strong enough, he would rip Wen apart.
Superpowers or no fucking superpowers.
Wen was greeted by two figures at the door. When I got closer, the shadows were even younger than him. The girl, twelve or thirteen, with blonde pigtails, and a boy, a little older than her. They looked like twins, the two of them in the same private school uniform as Wen.
I was so busy staring at the little girl’s red slicked hands, I didn't see their catch.
The man curled up on the ground, bound and gagged, a bag over his head.
“Psychokinetic,” Pigtails shot Wen a grin. “The stupid-head came right to us.” She was hesitant to go near him. “Careful. I had to gag him with three layers of duct tape to stop him fucking with my mind. He connects through touch and speech. And he's strong.”
“Seriously?” Wen whistled. “Damn.” he knelt next to the fresh catch. “I have pre-orders for a psychokinetic, but I don't think I've ever met one since dad’s collection.” the boy straightened up, and kicked the lump, forcefully rolling the man onto his side. I caught a flash of familiar dark brown curls slipping from the bag over his head. Tai. I could see the beaded bracelet I got him for Christmas, and his engagement ring.
He had *just* got engaged, his girlfriend proposing to him two weeks earlier.
But Tai didn't have an ability.
He couldn't have. I would have known!
Wen’s smile made me feel sick, a triumphant grin. “I can harvest him tonight and greenlight those orders!”
I had an ability, and I had no idea how to use it.
It felt like a magnet, like I could pull things apart and rip into solid objects.
But I had no idea how.
For example, I tried to tear into Wen’s mind. But he was already nodding at his child soldiers to take me down. I hit the ground, and the last thing I saw was the little bastard scooping Tai into his arms.
I woke up inside my apartment, lying on my bedroom floor.
But I couldn't move.
I blinked, and I was standing in front of the subway, my feet teetering on the edge.
Jumping back, I had no memory of getting there.
I blinked again, and this time I was standing in the middle of traffic.
*Die*.
There was a voice in my head, a snarl creeping into the back of my skull.
It was persistent, trying to shove me into the path of a truck. I could sense the voice trying to use the ability now inside me. This time he *could* use it. I managed to wrangle back control before he sent the Subway derailing.
*Die!*
I've only known this world for a few days. I've lost my best friend, and I've been illegally fucked with by a teenage psychopath and his army of children.
I don't know about the origin of these powers, and I don't know *how* Tai is a psychokinetic. I don't know how to get him back, and even if he's alive.
But there is something I am 100% sure of.
Zero-Two is inside my fucking head.
#entertainment
source
That's what the ad said.
I found it in a library book.
Sandwiched inside a dog-eared copy of Percy Jackson, there it was.
**Have you ever wanted to be a superhero?**
**Well, now you can become one! I can give you any superpower you want. 250 bucks each. 100 extra for anything ending in kinesis. I'm open 9am-midnight every day. Find me between the old pizza hut and the library. Don't look for me. I'll find you.**
**Please note: These abilities are non-refundable, and MAY cause side effects.**
I had so many questions.
Keeping hold of the scrap of paper, I pulled it out during class to show my friend. “It's a dud,” Tai said with an eye roll. I mentioned it to him once, and the guy had not stopped talking about it all day.
This thing was clearly on his mind. The guy couldn't sit still for most of class, his gaze flicking to the scrap poking from my notebook. At lunch, Tai ripped the paper out of my hand when we were trashing our leftovers. I was still considering it. I did have 250 bucks in my savings *and* superpowers sounded fun. Tai, however, didn't share my excitement.
“I can guarantee someone out there is not giving people *super powers* for two hundred bucks.” he screwed the paper up in his fist and threw it in the trash. Tai was a sceptical person anyway, though his reaction was unlike him. His eyes were dark, a hollowness to them like I was staring into nothing.
It took me a moment to snap him out of it.
“Hey.” I nudged him and he blinked, his expression souring.
Tai rarely scowled, so this was for a first. I don't think I had ever seen that look on his face, clearly panicked, but trying to hide it. He feigned a smile, though I could see the whites in his fingers where he was squeezing his tray a little too hard. “Come on,” his mouth was still filled with mashed potatoes from lunch. “I thought you were smart. Do you seriously believe in superpowers?” Tai laughed, “In *this* world?”
“No.” I couldn't take my eyes off of the paper, now covered in someone's potato salad. I found myself reaching toward it, before Tai gently slapped my hand away.
“Well, don't believe in an obvious scam,” he dumped his tray, his tone hardening. There was a girl behind me trying to get past, but I was paralysed, staring at the advert. Tai’s fingers wrapped around my arm. I felt the weight of each one cinching into my skin, pressing pressure. “Fee, I am being completely serious when I say you will get your organs harvested.”
*Fee, I am being completely serious when I say you will get your organs harvested.”* Tai’s voice bounced around my skull. I nodded, though my actions weren't mine, a dreamy smile splitting across my lips I couldn't control.
“Yeah,” I said, my words tangled. The sound of the cafeteria faded into white noise, and for a moment I felt like I was floating. I kept nodding, all of my senses starting to seep into one. Tai’s touch was gentle and firm around my elbow. I could still hear the sound of chatter, but I could taste it too, smell gossip and small-talk. It tasted like ice-cream cake and lemon frosting on my tongue, chocolate lava and tomato ketchup tickling the back of my throat.
The guy in front of me had hair the color of fire, a deep orange glow igniting each strand alight. I shook my head of entangled smells and taste.
“Don't bother,” Tai’s voice was louder in my head. I had the sudden overwhelming urge to slam my hands over my ears, except my hands wouldn't move. I was frozen, my fingers still clutching my tray. “It’s a scam, Fee.”
Explosions of colour expanded in my vision trailing the sound of a girl’s scream.
*Pink.*
Someone dropped their tray.
*Purple.*
Laughter looked like yellow paint being spread across the floor, and tasted like cherries.
“You're… probably right.” I heard myself say in a daze. “It's a scam.”
“Good,” he hummed. “Let's go.”
Tai’s grip slipped from my arm, and reality slammed back into me. The loud laughter and chatter from students bustling around me. I was still holding my tray. I shook my head of mind fog, my thoughts seeping back to fruition.
My earlier words already felt foreign and wrong.
This wasn't a new thing. I had been suffering from brain blanks for a while.
Before I could stop myself, I pulled the scrap of paper from the trash, scraped away pieces of pasta, and followed Tai out of the cafeteria. Tai and I had been friends since junior year. I didn't think I'd befriend a guy twice the size of me, but here we were, a year later, practically glued to the hip. Tai was marginally attractive, dark brown hair and built like a brick wall. If I didn't swing the other way, I would definitely be swayed by Asian American features and dimpled smiles.
Catching up to him, I waved the paper in his face. “For someone who *doesn't really care* about this so-called dud, you seem to care a lot.”
Tai’s lip curled. I noticed his grip tighten around his phone. “You seriously dug it out of the trash?”
“Why wouldn't I?” I shot him a grin. “Don't *you* want superpowers?”
His lip twitched. “I'm good.”
His response confused me. “Seriously? You don't want *any* superpower?”
“No.” Tai’s voice was startlingly cold. The light fixture above us flickered erratically, the bulbs exploding, popping one by one. For a moment, I was entranced by shattered glass raining from the ceiling. I held out my hand, catching shards on my palm. Tai kept walking, unfazed. His gaze didn't leave his phone. “Don't go looking for fantasy,” he grumbled. “You won't find it.”
I stuffed the ad into my pocket, following his figure down the hallway.
“And how can you be sure?” I was teasing him at this point, but Tai wasn't getting the memo. As usual, he was taking things a little too seriously.
Tai shrugged, bowing his head. “It's basic common sense. Don't be stupid.”
“Okay,” I said, half joking. “I'll drop it.”
Tai was unusually quiet for the rest of the day. I told him I was going to the convenience store after class, which wasn't exactly a lie. I needed to grab food. But I wasn't going to tell him about my pit stop. Per what the ad said, I ventured down the alleyway between the library and the old Pizza Hut. There was a dead end, and a rat with its innards spilling out into a piece of cardboard.
I'm not an avid believer of bad luck, but it looked like the stars were aligning to personally tell me I was going to die.
According to the ad, I was supposed to wait for them to find me. Twenty minutes passed. Then half an hour. The sky was starting to darken, streaks of red and orange illuminating the horizon indicating twilight. An hour passed, and I was sitting on the wall, my legs dangling, my butt already half asleep. I checked my phone. 8% and zero service. I had five missed calls from an hour ago. Tai.
He was onto me.
I hated convenience store food.
UberEats was my go-to. I really thought I could fool the guy with some half assed text:
*Hey, I'll be back late tonight! I'm grabbing sushi from the C store.**
I would rather die than eat convenience store sushi, and my friend knew that.
Another twenty minutes passed, and street lights were flickering to life illuminating the dark in an orange glow.
I could see the streak of red which had been the rat in perfect detail. The head was gone while the torso had been ripped open, lumps of pulpy red spilling onto the ground. Something sour filled the back of my mouth. I jumped off of the wall, my stomach twisting into knots. I could have sworn that *thing* had been splattered across a piece of cardboard.
It was pitch black. With the help of my phone flashlight, I found the cardboard exactly where I saw it before.
So…
*How did the rat move?*
Taking a step back, my hand moved in jerking movements, my flashlight illuminating the hollow oblivion of the alleyway which felt like it was closing in on me, a slowly collapsing pinprick in my vision. *Fuck.* I could already feel my body catapulting into fight or flight. I couldn't resist looking at the ground and following the beam of my flashlight, searching for mutant rats.
I took another slow step back, phantom bugs filling my mouth and skittering across the bare flesh of my arms.
*Run*.
My body was telling me to run.
The air around me, thick and sour smelling, was telling me to run.
But I couldn't. I was paralysed, my gaze glued to the streaks of scarlet that *had* been the rat. The blood was still there, thick and congealing into the concrete. But the pulpy mass of flesh which were its grim remains were gone.
Following the splatters of blood with my flashlight, I was right.
It was… moving.
I expected an attack, furry masses diving onto me, razor sharp teeth tearing into my flesh.
What I got instead, was a clammy hand slamming over my mouth.
My body reacted, a scream erupting from my throat, muffling into the stranger's palm. I could sense their breath tickling the back of my neck.
“Caaaaaash, please.”
The voice was younger than I expected, a kid maybe a few years younger than me.
His voice was a low murmur, almost a sing-song. Blinking stars out of my eyes, it took me a disorienting second to understand what he meant, and I remembered why I was there in the first place. “I don't have it,” I muffled into the pressure over my mouth and nose.
His hand smelled of disinfectant mixed with something metallic, a pungent taste that stuck to the back of my throat and lips. I was lying. I did have 250 bucks in my pocket. However, I wasn't expecting my seller to be a fucking kid. I said the first thing that came to my mind. “I… I can pay you in instalments!” I tried to pull his hand away, but he tightened his grip.
“Instalments?” the kid surprised me with a giggle. “For fucking superpowers, dude?”
I did my best to nod, tears stinging my eyes.
He let me go with a sigh, and I stumbled back, swiping my mouth.
“Fine.”
I scrambled for my flashlight, and the shadow in front of me grew a face. I found myself staring into bright eyes, twisted and wrong, a smile with too many teeth. I was right. It was a kid, maybe two years younger than me.
Rich, judging from his private school blazer. Thick sandy hair poking from a knitted beanie. The kid shot me a grin.
“I'll let you pay in instalments, but if you miss one, I'm adding interest.” he twisted around with a chuckle, jumping over a puddle. “I'm only doing this because I like the look of you. You're a college student, are clearly a superhero fan, and have risked coming down this scarrryyy alleyway, to become just like your fave. Which is brave, I gotta say!”
His head jerked almost inhumanly, a predator tracking its prey.
He was standing on the remnants of the rat, and when I looked closer, I realised he was barefoot. This kid went to a prestegious school and was wearing no fucking shoes, the slithering remains of the rat squashed between his toes.
I swore I caught the shadows enveloping his face, like he belonged in the dark, his lips curling into that of a monster, narrowed eyes drinking me in hungrily.
This kid was scarier than mutant rats.
He reminded me of an unhinged Percy Jackson.
Which was irònic.
“Well?” he cocked his head, mocking a frown. “Are you coming?”
I was already mentally mapping a getaway if this kid tried anything.
“You're the one selling...?”
I drifted off, and he nodded with a grin. “Yep! Why? Did you expect someone else?”
Before I could speak, he sighed. “Follow me. I have several left. I have some new ones, though I haven't advertised them yet. Pyrokinesis is a popular one, but I won't have another Pyro until at least January. My supplier is running short, which is soooo annoying.” He turned back to me when I didn't move.
The kid ushered me towards him, and something compelled me forward. Maybe I really did want to believe in this fantasy. Continuing to talk, he didn't seem fazed by my hesitance.
I took my place behind him.
“I expect instalments to pay me back if you can't pay now. You can give me your payment details after."
“Payment details?” I whispered.
The kid snorted, his expression darkening. “I'm not giving you superpowers for free,” he raised a brow. His eyes were darker, more hollow in the flashlight beam, ageing this kid way beyond a teenager. “I know some people who do, but you don't want to fuck around with them. I can give you high quality abilities without the, you know, super soldier programming.”
I swallowed. “The what?”
The kid didn't reply, only waving his hand with a sigh. “You wouldn't understand. But trust me, they're bad news.”
*The patronising little shit.*
Stumbling over my feet, I struggled through the dark. “Are you being serious?” I managed to choke out.
He surprised me with a laugh. “You thought I was lying? What were you expecting?”
I ignored his question. “I'm sorry, how old are you?”
“Uh, sixteen!” he shouted back. “And a half.”
I nodded dizzily, jumping over a puddle. The alleyway felt like it was going on forever. “You're a sixteen year old that sells superpowers to people?”
His shadow was getting further away, and I struggled to keep up.
“Yep!” the kid’s voice bounced off of the walls, while his figure weaved in and out of existence, creeping further and further away from my flashlight. “Hey, it's better than getting a job, *and* I’m earning my tuition. So, it's a win-win.”
“Uh-huh.” I cleared my throat. I was fully expecting drugs. This kid was talking like a drug dealer, so maybe high schooler’s had code names for drugs. Superpower names were less likely to cause alarm bells. Pyrokinesis was ice, and Telekinesis was cocaine. Maybe the *anything ending in kinesis* line meant Class A drugs. The ones in high demand. It made sense. This kid thought he was selling me cocaine, and I had taken his code names literally.
*Oh god, I was being led into a sixteen year old’s drug den.*
Tai was never going to let me live this down.
When we reached the end of the alleyway, the kid turned to me, pulling a piece of cloth from his pocket.
Immediately, I stumbled back, and he rolled his eyes. “Relax.” the boy held up the cloth. “It's just a blindfold. To protect my business, I don't want my customers to know where we’re going.”
I didn't move, my mind going into panic mode.
The kid sighed. “Dude, it's fine,” he said, tying the cloth around my eyes. My fingers moved to tear it away, but he stopped me. “I'll even tell you my name.” I could sense his face inches from mine. “I'm Wen! Nice to meet you! Now, I'm going to lead you inside, all right?” I felt his hands press down on my shoulders. “Do you mind?”
I nodded, swallowing hard. “Ophelia,” I whispered, letting him guide me forwards.
“Hm?”
“My name,” I said. “It's Ophelia.”
Wen chuckled. “Ophelia. I don't think I've ever known anyone with that name.” I tripped over something, and he pulled me further into the void. I had no idea where I was going, dragging my hands across brick to stabilise myself. When I was sure he was leading me to my doom, Wen pulled off the blindfold.
Blinking rapidly, I drank in eerie yellow light sparking from a dying bulb. I was in a small apartment kitchen. There was a faucet, a dining table, and a refrigerator. I opened it up, jumping back when a critter crept across the handle. For a rich private school kid, Wen’s living conditions were interesting.
I was frowning at peeled paint on the walls and used coffee mugs, bug infested flooring under my feet, when the kid filled up a glass of water and handed it to me. I noticed smears of dirt on the rim and politely declined.
Wen must have seen my expression.
He sighed, placing the glass down. “This is all I could get at short notice,” he gestured around and I took notice of the windows being blacked out. “I'm planning on upgrading next year, especially if I'm going to have competition.” He stood on his tiptoes to grab a pack of cookies from a cupboard.
“Want one?” Wen’s smile caught the light, and something rancid filled my mouth.
He was waiting for me to try and run.
When I made my way toward the door, he casually stepped in front of me, arms folded. Wen knew he was in control, and I think that exhilarated him. My flashlight and phone had died, and I was alone inside his drug den. He was practically bouncing up and down. “Are you *sure* you don't want a cookie?”
I managed a nod. “I'm okay.”
Wen shrugged, demolishing the cookies himself. “Suit yourself!”
I thought he was going to continue playing mind games, but he just sent me a smile. “You should eat. All of my customers eat before a sale.”
“I said I'm okay,” I gritted out.
With a shrug, Wen led me down a set of concrete steps, jumping down each one like he was playing a game.
Every time I turned back, something forced me further down the steps, like I wasn't in control of my legs. Wen talked casually, knowing just opening his mouth was terrifying me. His movements, the way he spoke, everything was manufactured to unnerve me. “It's Telekinesis you're looking for, right?” We reached the bottom, and he led us through a door of plastic sheets, straight into darkness.
I could smell it already. Disinfectant mixed with mould.
“Telekinesis is a great ability,” Wen laughed. “It took me a while to catch him, but I managed it in the end!”
Wen’s words played with my mind, phantom bugs creeping down my spine.
*Him*?
Light slammed into me, almost knocking me off of my feet.
Shading my eyes, I blinked rapidly. I expected a drug lab.
I expected mountains of powdered white and old science equipment. What I saw instead was… plastic. A room full of plastic hanging from the ceiling. I couldn't see anything else. I started to back away, but Wen was already grabbing me and pulling me with him.
In the flickering light from the figure above us, I glimpsed old and new red streaks staining the floor, and each plastic door we stumbled through. Blood.
It shined brighter the further I was pulled inside a labyrinth of plastic, a whole different world hidden inside. There were metal beds lined up, a body sized lump on each one. We passed a girl with halo hair lying face down on bloodstained blankets. I couldn't see her torso, the lower part of her body covered with soaked blankets stained revealing red.
There were plastic tubes forced into pale, limp arms hanging off of the edge.
“Ignore the Siren,” Wen sighed, tightening his grip. There was something pooling on the floor, thick and red seeping across pristine marble. “She's a drama Queen. Ariosa plays dead all the time. She's not for sale, by the way. Ariosa is just for display.”
I kept walking, as if in a trance.
Even when behind me, the girl let out a deafening shriek that clawed its way into my skull.
Wen commanded me closer with his voice, and I moved like I was in a dream, my gaze glued to bloodstained steel and body parts without heads cruelly chained down to each gurney. I saw them at their most vulnerable, people, with the majority of them being in their twenties, college kids and older, put on a horrific display.
These kids were malnourished, anorexic, their haunted eyes piercing right through me. Some of them screamed at me, straining in cruel chains pinning them down. One guy was brutally tied down, his arms had been chopped off. His agonising wail followed me, begging Wen to kill him.
“Pyro.” Wen said. “He's my only one, and he's already been bought. I'm just waiting for the seller to come buy him.”
A ponytailed brunette looked to be in deep sleep, a plastic mask pressed over her mouth and nose. The girl looked drained, sickly pale skin and bruises covering her arms, no doubt from needles and tubes being forced into her veins. Looking closer, her face started to morph into a younger girl, and then a guy, their features changing sporadically, while their body, slightly delayed, followed. This person did not have one singular face. They had multiple.
“Jordan. Zero Nine, if we're talking about their ability. Anything starting with Zero is the shit people really want. Like, mind control, and anything with kinesis,” Wen muttered in my ear. “They're my first shifter. I’m selling them for 150. But nobody's interested.”
Somehow, I found my voice.
“I've changed my mind,” I managed to choke out.
Wen cocked his head, a smirk curling on his lips. The bastard was waiting for this. His eyes were alive, glittering with insanity. He was subtle in the way he positioned himself. “You can't *take back* agreement for a superpower,” he murmured. “I use your voice as a form of consent. You followed me in here expecting superpowers and wasted precious time I could have had with a paying customer, so you're buying.”
A cry clawed its way up my throat, and I pried his fingers from my arm, but he grabbed it again, this time squeezing hard enough to incite a screech. Wen pulled me close to him, his breath in my ear. His words were like poison, and I could sense his satisfied grin. “Like I said, we can talk about the legalities and payment details when you're all done, all right?” he shoved me forward.
At first, I didn't move.
“Walk, Ophelia!” His voice was playful at first.
Hearing Ariosa's whimpering behind me, I couldn't.
“Fucking *walk*,” Wen’s tone hardened, and I did, forcing my legs into motion.
Something smooth and metallic prodded into my spine. A gun.
I should have known a teenage drug lord who dealt in supernatural abilities would have a gun. Wen prodded me again. “I don't fuck with people who refuse to buy, lady. I feed ‘em to 102.”
I was still registering his words when he stopped in front of a particularly filthy sheet and swept it aside. “Here we are! Telekinesis. He was originally 250, but since you've been a *great* customer, I can give you him for half.”
I don't know what I expected. After already witnessing multiple people tied down and forcefully drugged, wires and tubes sticking from them, I thought it would be the same. But this was a whole other level of brutality, one that sent me staggering back. Wen easily caught me, stabbing the barrel of his gun into my back. I barely felt it. I sunk to my knees, my mind already trying and failing to drink in what I was seeing.
Wen wasn't just *selling* super powers.
I vomited all over myself, and the boy scoffed.
“Oh, come on, that's disgusting!”
Swiping barf from my lips, I struggled to breathe. *He was farming them.*
“Get up,” Wen dragged me to my feet, but my legs weren't working. My head felt thick, my thoughts dizzy and distant.
I wanted to lie to myself, tell myself I wasn't seeing this. But the blood on the floor was real, the splatters of scarlet staining skin and steel. In front of me was a man, my age, strapped to a chair, closed eyes flickering, lips parted in a silent scream. It looked like he used to be a college student, splinters of who he was still lingering. I could see where his hair used to be, tufts of dark blonde still attached to what was left of his scalp.
His skin was paper thin, malnourished, like it would splinter apart at any given moment. I think he used to be handsome, used to have laugh lines, and lips that smiled. Now, I was looking at a shell. The man’s body had been forced upright, trembling hands pinned to metal armrests. I looked for hair, for facial features that made sense and were human– but all of that had been stripped away. There was just agony.
It was agony I didn't know or understand, that twisted his body, contorting him back and forth like a puppet on strings. The back of his head was gone, the startling white bone of his skull and pinkish mush of brain exposed, needles and wires stuck into the meat. The man’s eyes flickered open, suddenly, wide and frantic.
Terrified.
Staring directly at me, the whites of his eyes were blood red.
He jolted on the chair, his arms moving, fingers twisting around the arm rest.
“Tah-dah!” Wen chuckled. He danced over to the man, playfully prodding the bare meat of the guy’s brain. The man screamed, contorting in his chair, the lights above flickering. The ground shook under my feet, stray instruments flying into the air. I watched, baffled, as swirling silver danced around my head, needles and scalpels in a manic dance, before faltering, like he was losing control.
The guy’s head dropped, and so did the whirlwind of metal, hitting the ground.
“Behave.” Wen rolled his eyes. “Stop showing off.”
Slowly, the man’s head snapped up. His lips moved, a thin line of red oozing from his nose. His gaze stuck to me, and with every jerk of his wrist, every blink of his eye, I knew he was trying to rip me apart from the inside. My skin prickled. I could feel his presence brushing over me, prodding at my skull. Wen flung out his arms like he was introducing a friend.
“This is Telekinesis! Well, I call him Zero two. Also Ryan. He's my most powerful. I can drug this guy into a fucking coma, and he still manages to rip a customer's head off,” Wen sighed. “The trick was finding the right mix. Horse tranquiliser works miracles with telekinetics. It knocks em’ straight out with no mess.”
The kid’s smile widened. “Which is why your brains aren't splattering the walls right now!” he said in a sing-song. “You're welcome, by the way!”
Zero Two let out an animalistic howl, struggling in the chair, and he laughed.
“You can shut up. Don't give me that look.”
Wen turned his attention to me. “All right, let's get you set up for the procedure.”
Zero Two’s gaze snapped to me, his lips moving.
Once.
Twice.
*Run*. He mouthed, and I glimpsed lingering humanity.
Wen jumped in front of me, dark eyes twisted with insanity.
“Well? Do you like him?” another step, and he was closing the distance between us. “It should take maybe an hour. Two, if your body rejects it. Which is a pain, but I've got the time!”
“You're sick,” I managed to get out.
Wen shrugged. “It's business. You have empathy, and I don't. Ouch. Do you want Telekinesis or not?”
“No.” Panic erupted inside of me, but I couldn't move. There was no way to run, and a psychotic kid held me at gunpoint.
I didn't have a choice. My freedom to choose had dissipated the second I made the decision to follow him inside his superpower farm. Wen was surprisingly strong, his arms wrapping around my neck in a chokehold. Something cold pricked the back of my neck, and my body went limp. I hit the ground, half aware of Wen’s shadow looming over me.
My vision was blurring, but I could just make out the curl of his cruel smile.
“After all,” Wen’s voice swam in and out of reality, while my body plunged.
My eyes flickered, finding intense splatters of red staining the ceiling. “I don't think I told you about *my* ability, did I?” He picked me up, and I was light as a feather, my head hanging.
Wen’s laugh sounded unreal, and there it was again. Just like in the cafeteria with Tai, my senses were twisting. The blood in my mouth was shaped like diamonds. I could see every bead, every cutting corner slipping from my lips.
Through tunnel vision, the boy's laughter had colour, pitch black darkness bleeding around him, like he was engulfed in ink. “Oh, dude, wait until I tell you about my father…”
His voice faded, and I stopped thinking for a while. I don't know how long. Time seemed to flow in a separate singularity. Consciousness hit me slowly. Wen’s voice grazed the back of my mind, pulling me back to a reality I didn't want to be in.
I could already sense my numb body, my wrists pinned to metal armrests.
There are certain things your mind chooses to block out in favour of panicking your body. I was already aware that the back of my head had been ripped open, and my mind was raw and naked to the rest of the world.
It hit me in tiny electroshocks, not prominent enough to be pain. I don't think pain existed in that disorienting moment between half consciousness and awake. It was something else entirely, an uncomfortable agony that wasn't quite agony, because I couldn't feel it.
“Once upon a time,” the kid’s voice was mocking, and I could *feel* his fingers.
I could feel the tips of his fingernails digging into me, skittering right across the bare flesh of my brain. There was no scream in my throat, no panic in my chest. I think my body was in a state of paralysis. I remember opening my eyes to brutal light blinding me, rivulets of thick red beading down my arms, tiny rivers seeping down my skin. I closed my eyes again, sharp, heavy pants escaping my lips. “There was a boy with a father who was very intelligent.”
I was pushing out words, my mouth filled with blood.
*Why are you doing this?*
My lips moved, but the words failed to hit the sound barrier.
“Shhhh,” Wen hummed. “Listen to the story.” he cleared his throat, and his fingers continued to dig down, deep into the meat of my brain, pulverising tissue.
I felt nothing, and yet my body still reacted, jerking side to side. My eyes rolled back, darkness momentarily swallowing me up, only to spit me back out. “Anyway,” Wen continued. Through flickering eyes, I could glimpse steel protruding into my wrist.
“So, the boy had a super smart father who was obsessed with the supernatural,” Wen hummed. “So, can you guess what the boy's father did?”
I didn't respond, my gaze lazily skating over ceiling tiles.
“He experimented.” Wen dug his fingernails in, and this time I screamed.
No pain, but my body was sure there was. Sweat trickled down the back of my neck and face, bile gathering in my mouth. “The boy's father was obsessed with unlocking a certain part of the mind. The boy didn't know this. One day, he was just exploring. His mother had been gone for a few days. But hey, his dad said it was cool. His Mom was just visiting family, and she'd be back.”
Another prod.
“Nope! The body found his mother– or more appropriately, what was left of his mother. Daddy carved her brain out! Mommy was right there on the bed, her blood was still warm. He hugged her, and still remembers the blood on his face. He tried to wake her up, but Mommy was long dead. Dad had already cut up her brain for testing.”
He giggled, another explosion of colour seeping into my vision. “When his mother failed, his father used him.”
Deeper and deeper his fingers were going.
“It hurt him, Fee. It fucking hurt enough for the boy to want to die over and over again. He spent a long time on a table made of stone, while his father cut him apart and stitched him back together. He stopped feeling pain. Fuck, he stopped feeeling completely! Because the boy's father had cut all of it away, all the bad emotions, and all the good, to make way for his greatest gift.”
*No wonder Wen was a psychopath, his childhood was a never ending experiment.*
“I think you know where I'm going with this story,” Wen chuckled. “My father wanted to turn me into a superhero. Just like the other kids he played around with. But he did the exact opposite.”
I held my breath when his fingers stopped moving, straying in cerebral tissue. “Dad didn't give me the powers I wanted,” his tone twisted and his fingers twisted. That time I *did* feel pain, my lips parting in a silent scream.
“He gave me this.” Wen twisted his fingers again, and my white hot pain filled me, bleeding into my blood and bones. I screamed that time, my raw screech reminding my body I was still real. “The power to extract abilities that I can't take for myself,” Wen continued in a spiteful hiss. “And give them to others.” It was like being filled with electricity, my brain being boiled alive.
My eyes clouded, the lights above flickering.
I screamed again, my head lolling to the side.
“Sorry,” Wen muttered. “I'm trying to reach your cerebral cortex-- I think that's what it's called--but it's hard…” his voice faded in and out. “I should be better at this by now, but there's so much I have to dig through, and that's on top of keeping the customer alive with Zero Five’s ability. Urgh. I’ve got brain juices all over me.”
I counted ceiling tiles to distract myself.
“Almost…”
I lost count around the 400 mark, my body unsure whether to shut down or stay awake.
“There…”
Colours and stars spotted my eyes. I remember curling my fingers, and feeling a *pull* from somewhere, like a magnet repelling. Darkness found me once more, but even asleep, I could still sense that *pull* entangling around me.
“Wakey, wakey!”
Drifting back to fruition, I was sitting, my legs dangling off of a bed. When my hand instantly went to the back of my head, my fingers only grazed my own thick brown hair. I delved two fingers into my scalp, and there it was, thick rugged stitches sewing me back together. My first thought was Zero Two.
I tried to move my body to get up, but my limbs weren't working.
Dropping onto my hands and knees, I barely felt the impact.
Zero Two was gone. The chair where he'd been restrained was empty.
“Here! Let me help you.”
Wen was standing over me. He ducked to my height. I thought he was going to hit me, but he just pulled a stray needle out of my arm. “All right. Try now.”
I did, jumping to unsteady feet. Already, I was looking for a way out– and that strange magnetic-like pull was still there.
It moved with me, attaching itself to everything in my vicinity. I was sure with a simple jerk of my hand or finger, I could cause damage. Already, my mouth was moving, my heightened senses overwhelming me. Ariosa, the siren in the bed a few metres away, was easy to latch onto. “Where is he?” I demanded, already scanning for Zero Two.
Wen folded his arms. “Zero Two? Oh, I incinerate the original host after extraction,” he said. “Think of your ability like a virus. In rare cases, the power itself tries to find the original host, which can result in…problems.” he tutted. “Luckily, it was just one person. But I've been told to be careful.”
He shook his head. “Anyway! Enough about the shell. I want payment by Monday. If you can't pay, you can come work for me! You're telekinetic, and I need some extra weight to play catch.”
“Boss!”
A girl’s voice made me jump.
“We’ve got another one!”
Wen’s eyes lit up. “Watch this,” he grabbed my arm and pulled me back through the room, passing beds filled with supernaturals. I was lighter on my feet, already clumsy with my ability. I was knocking things onto the floor and sending beds crashing into the wall.
Wen was ahead of me, so I had one chance to do it.
I found Zero Two on a pile of bodies, each marked for incineration. His hands were tied, so Wen was lying about him being braindead. The man wasn't moving, his head clumsily stitched back on. But I still pulled apart his restraints. If he was strong enough, he would rip Wen apart.
Superpowers or no fucking superpowers.
Wen was greeted by two figures at the door. When I got closer, the shadows were even younger than him. The girl, twelve or thirteen, with blonde pigtails, and a boy, a little older than her. They looked like twins, the two of them in the same private school uniform as Wen.
I was so busy staring at the little girl’s red slicked hands, I didn't see their catch.
The man curled up on the ground, bound and gagged, a bag over his head.
“Psychokinetic,” Pigtails shot Wen a grin. “The stupid-head came right to us.” She was hesitant to go near him. “Careful. I had to gag him with three layers of duct tape to stop him fucking with my mind. He connects through touch and speech. And he's strong.”
“Seriously?” Wen whistled. “Damn.” he knelt next to the fresh catch. “I have pre-orders for a psychokinetic, but I don't think I've ever met one since dad’s collection.” the boy straightened up, and kicked the lump, forcefully rolling the man onto his side. I caught a flash of familiar dark brown curls slipping from the bag over his head. Tai. I could see the beaded bracelet I got him for Christmas, and his engagement ring.
He had *just* got engaged, his girlfriend proposing to him two weeks earlier.
But Tai didn't have an ability.
He couldn't have. I would have known!
Wen’s smile made me feel sick, a triumphant grin. “I can harvest him tonight and greenlight those orders!”
I had an ability, and I had no idea how to use it.
It felt like a magnet, like I could pull things apart and rip into solid objects.
But I had no idea how.
For example, I tried to tear into Wen’s mind. But he was already nodding at his child soldiers to take me down. I hit the ground, and the last thing I saw was the little bastard scooping Tai into his arms.
I woke up inside my apartment, lying on my bedroom floor.
But I couldn't move.
I blinked, and I was standing in front of the subway, my feet teetering on the edge.
Jumping back, I had no memory of getting there.
I blinked again, and this time I was standing in the middle of traffic.
*Die*.
There was a voice in my head, a snarl creeping into the back of my skull.
It was persistent, trying to shove me into the path of a truck. I could sense the voice trying to use the ability now inside me. This time he *could* use it. I managed to wrangle back control before he sent the Subway derailing.
*Die!*
I've only known this world for a few days. I've lost my best friend, and I've been illegally fucked with by a teenage psychopath and his army of children.
I don't know about the origin of these powers, and I don't know *how* Tai is a psychokinetic. I don't know how to get him back, and even if he's alive.
But there is something I am 100% sure of.
Zero-Two is inside my fucking head.
#entertainment
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