Chapter 4 Reality Check
I blinked.
I blinked again.
I kept on blinking.
Why am I blinking so much, you ask? Disbelief, that's why.
Just to double-check, I hesitated, then hopped once. A normal hop.
Okay then.
Did reality just glitch?
What did I do the first time? I just wanted to let loose a little—and ended up jumping close to my personal best. Are you telling me the more stressed I am, the higher I jump now?
I kept jumping like a lunatic.
Looks like that one caught some eyes, because heads turned my way.
"Why are you jumping so much?" Jessie asked, looking at me like I'd lost my mind.
Frustration burned in my chest. I had to recreate that phenomenon. What's the difference between now and last time? I was filled with tension and frustration.
Well, I had plenty of that. Maybe that means I'll do it again.
I flashed him a grin. "Watch this."
I gathered strength in my legs. I felt this odd, "flow" inside me—like tangible "strength" waiting to burst free.
Then I jumped.
In moments, the world dropped away beneath me. The forest stretched as far as my eye could tell, a green sea in every direction.
I had jumped nearly fifteen meters—maybe more.
For a split second, it felt like time had stopped, midair, at the peak of my height.
I began to fall. The wind whistled past my ears. I instinctively braced myself for an impact I couldn't handle.
My feet hit the ground with a heavy thud—and it felt like dropping from a single step.
I stared wide-eyed at my friends.
They stared wide-eyed at me.
Mouths open. No one said a thing.
They wanted to ask how, but words were failing all of us.
Instead of saying anything, I let my curiosity of this new power drive me.
That flow in my body—it was real. I could really feel it, coiled through every vein and muscle. More seamlessly than using a muscle, the "flow" responded and strengthened me. I turned to a tree far from the others and focused.
With an open hand, I unleashed that strength. Bark split and peeled away beneath my fingers, and the whole trunk groaned before collapsing with a thunderous crash.
Oh, I see.
Rather than panic, I decided to just… accept it. I gave myself a quiet nod.
This simply wasn't my reality anymore.
No point clinging to the rules of my old world. Any expectations I had needed to be thrown out the window. I didn't know how this place worked, or what it held in store for me. All I could do now was adapt.
Maybe I should've been asking—Why was I brought here?—but honestly, I think the world would just retort by asking me why not.
That's the kind of place this felt like.
Still, this power—this "flow"—was something I could grasp. I flared it again, stronger this time, feeling it surge through me like fire under my skin.
Then I jumped—thirty meters this time.
The air screamed around me. The ground looked like a painting below my feet.
When I landed, the earth quaked beneath my boots.
Why did I do that again? To confirm one thing; my strength was variable. Controllable. The strength rose and fell with output, like flexing and relaxing a muscle. Easy. Intuitive. Instant.
Ah, I had forgotten about my friends.
I turned back toward my companions—still frozen like statues.
Even now they couldn't come up with the right words.
To them, they woke up in the middle of a forest, their friend's eye changed like he had a superpower, and then he started jumping as high as their houses.
It's not like I didn't understand their situation; I really did sympathize with them. That doesn't change the fact that I have no explanation for all this or know any way to comfort them. Truth is, I was just as shocked. The only difference is I was handling my shock better.
Still, there was something I needed to discuss with them. I went straight to the point—glossing over everything that happened like it was completely natural.
"Alright," I said, breaking the silence. "I think you guys can do that too."
Nothing. Just stares.
I sighed. "Listen, I don't know what's happening to me—or to us—I'm just as lost as all of you. That being said, pretending this isn't real isn't going to help. We're not in our reality anymore. Accept that. Either we figure out our powers, or die clueless."
That snapped them back.
Havi was the first to speak. In a shrill voice, he asked, "Alright. How do we do it then?"
"Simple," I said. "Pretend you're ten years old again. Imagine you've got some awesome superpower inside you. It's exactly like that. Not complicated at all."
They looked skeptical, but they all started trying.
"If you feel a warmth inside you, it's not your imagination this time. Trust me, it's real. Feel it, trust it, then channel it—and jump."
One by one, they did. Jessie went first, springing up nearly eight meters. Then Sunny, a little higher. Havi and Andre hit twelve. They landed laughing, adrenaline flooding their faces.
I began to understand how they felt when they saw me do that. It was a lot more surreal seeing someone else perform a feat like that.
"How'd it feel?" I asked.
Andre's grin was manic. "That was amazing! How are we doing this?"
"Like I said," I shrugged, "we just are."
Havi turned toward the direction of that strange pull we'd all been feeling. "This proves Aria's right. This isn't our reality anymore. Whatever's calling to us—it has to have some answers."
A slight smile crept up on my face. I was happy to see Havi get his bearings back
I mostly agreed with everything he said, but didn't want to head straight there. I decided to play devil's advocate.
"Or it might be something trying to kill us."
Havi frowned. "I think it's safe to say that whatever is calling us here is related to us being here. It's just too coincidental for us to be put in the middle of nowhere and have something literally calling out to us. And if whatever dropped us here wanted to kill us, we would already be in danger, not being led to it."
"Maybe," I said, folding my arms. "Except your logic only proves it doesn't purely want us dead. That doesn't mean it won't put us in danger—perhaps as a way of testing us. Not to mention, there is no such thing as 'too convenient' anymore. You only say that because we have no other leads and desperately want to believe we have some guiding force. That could very well be something unrelated; something that's going to try and kill us."
He went quiet. He knew I had a point.
Jessie cocked a brow. "So what, we just sit here?"
"No," I said. "We move. But first, we practice. We've got superpowers now, so let's make sure we can actually use them before rushing into whatever's waiting for us."
"Why didn't you just start with that?" Jessie asked.
"Because," I grinned, "I like proving you guys wrong. Besides, someone has to make sure you learn to think before you act. I might not always be around you, ya know."
I heard a grunt come from Andre. He had a slight smile on his face, "Still a smartass, even now."
I gave a warm smile at the remark.
"Let's go. We'll practice on the way."
I soared above the treetops.
Wind crashed against my body and whipped through my hair as the forest rushed by underneath me in a blur of green. I nearly shouted—not in fear, but in exhilaration.
Eventually, I landed, but not before hitting a tree on the way down.
My friends and I had partially split up.
Rather than discuss how this power worked, we decided it was better to experience it firsthand.
We've been making our way through the forest in various zig-zags and loops, testing our powers in various ways.
I passed Sunny a few minutes ago. He'd barely said a word, but I could see he was improving.
I, on the other hand, was really getting good at using my new abilities.
The "flow" was alive in me—spread throughout my body at all times. It had a baseline, a resting state, ensuring a certain level of enhancement at all times. I could "flare" it up like flexing a muscle, making my power jump in proportion.
If I focused on a specific spot of my body, I could limit the flare-up to only that area. I was able to focus more "flow" when I used it this way; it was also less taxing.
I could also use the "flare" up against the "flow" itself, like constricting a muscle with another muscle. This served as a way of suppressing the flow, and in turn weakening me below my "baseline".
The more power I poured into my body, the faster I burned through stamina. Pacing myself was key.
I almost glossed over it until I thought about it for a second. How was I able to know where I was going at such high speeds?
The answer? This power could also enhance your senses, and the dilation would depend on how much "flow" you focus on those areas.
The more your physical abilities increase, the more you would need to increase your senses to keep up with your body.
In some ways, it was similar to the boosts given by the analese, but you didn't get a boost in cognition from this new power. They could also be combined to an even greater effect.
Next was that there was a new, in a way, sixth sense that we had developed. It's hard to explain, but just as eyes can see shifts in gravity of a person, you could "feel" shifts in this "flow" in other beings.
I learned this through the few interactions I had with my friends on the way. This new sense was still weak, untrained, and something I wasn't used to. Still, it meant that suppression ability had a use.
I ran my way through the trees as fast as a car. Whatever was in my way, I tried to get as close to it as I could before dodging out the way.
I lunged forward with a powerful step, taking to the air like a bullet. I headed straight for a tree and before I crashed I maneuvered the muscles in my body to do a 180 so I landed with my feet on the trunk. It was a tight maneuver, but that's why I attempted it.
Before gravity forced me to the ground, I used the trunk as a springboard and launched myself. I grabbed the trunk of another tree midflight and used it to spin me round before stopping.
The last thing I learned was about me.
This felt good.
Not in the sense of I've become super powerful yay—though there was that too—but in how free I felt.
The existential dread at discovering my warped analese and then these powers shortly after had my stomach in a knot. But then as I continued to use these abilities and took in the new experience, the anxiety slowly died down.
Perhaps the dread was still there.
I wasn't comfortable with the idea of being trapped in an unfamiliar place, but a part of me wanted to get away from where I was before. To just stare at an open canopy during the night, with no worries or burdens on my shoulders.
Right now, this was exactly that for me. My mind felt clearer than it ever had. My heart—light as a feather.
Eventually, I slowed, sensing the others, and…no, just my mind playing tricks on me. The pull was stronger here. Whatever was waiting for us—it was close.
I took a moment to take it all in before refocusing myself. I felt pretty confident in my ability to use this new power. I was far from perfect, but it flowed well with my instincts, like I was born to use this.
When I reached them, Jessie turned toward me first. "Took you long enough."
"We were starting to discuss whether you were still alive or not," Havi added.
Andre decided he too wanted to say something about me. "I was saying we should go in without you. You probably won't be of much help anyways."
Yeah. Okay, buddy.
"Glad to see you're back to your old self." I scoffed.
He gave me a cocky smile back.
Sunny just looked like he missed his mommy. He's hardly said a thing.
"Alright," I said. "Is everyone ready? Actually, don't care—let's move."
We walked forward, every step laced with confidence. We were ready for anything—
What?
I froze. My brain failed to compute what my eyes were seeing.
I know I said to throw expectation out the window, yet somehow I was still caught off guard.
A cockroach—the size of a bear—stood before us. Thick, stubby legs, allowing it to stand upright. Outstretched cockroach arms—or technically legs?—like it was waiting for a hug. And what was up with that mask? It had the creepiest emoji face I've ever seen.
The creature was horrific, not in a scary movie sort of way, but in a predator sort of way. I didn't feel like it was here to make me its prey, but its victim. My eyes already felt violated. If I step any closer to it, I fear it won't just be my eyes.
Still, there was one thing I needed to do before whatever happened next.
Dead serious, I turned toward Andre.
"What's your mother doing here?"