Elias didn't walk through the front gates so much as he glided, his rubber slides clicking rhythmically against the concrete. The whispers started instantly—a low, buzzing static that his enhanced hearing picked up like a radio signal.
"Is that Elias?"
"No way. Elias was a scrawny ghost. That guy is huge."
He ignored them, his focus buried in the digital layer of the school. Through his Technopathy, he could feel the pulse of every smartphone in the courtyard. He saw their private group chats, their selfies, their frantic texts about the "new guy" at the gate. He reached out with a mental flick, causing every security camera he passed to swivel in his direction, tracking him like a VIP.
As he entered the main hallway, the air seemed to grow colder. The girls lining the lockers went silent, their conversations dying mid-sentence.
"Oh my god," one whispered, her phone slipping slightly in her grip. "Look at his eyes. Are those contacts? He looks... dangerous. Like, actually hot."
"He's so tall now," another murmured, leaning back against a locker to get a better view. "Since when was Elias Tall"? And that hair..."
Elias didn't look at them. He didn't have to. He could feel their elevated heart rates through the gym's biometric sensors nearby. He pushed open the door to his first-period history class.
The room was loud until the door hit the stopper. Mr. Henderson stopped writing on the whiteboard. In the back row, Jax and his two friends—the same kids who had spent the last three years shoving Elias into urinals—were laughing about a video on Jax's phone.
Elias walked straight to his old desk in the middle of the room. He didn't fit. His new, longer legs bumped against the underside of the metal frame.
"Elias?" Mr. Henderson stammered, his glasses sliding down his nose. "You're... late. And you've... changed your appearance?"
"I grew," Elias said. His voice was different—deeper, vibrating with a resonance that made the windows in the classroom rattle almost imperceptibly.
He turned his head slowly toward the back row. Jax was staring, his mouth slightly open. The bully tried to recover, putting on his usual smug mask.
"Hey, look at that," Jax barked, though his voice cracked. "The freak got a makeover. What's with the eyes, Elias? You joined a cult or something?"
Elias stood up. He didn't do it quickly, but the sheer scale of him now—6'2" of lean, predatory muscle—cast a shadow that reached all the way to Jax's desk. He walked toward the back of the room. The air in the classroom began to thin, the Time Manipulation causing the ticking wall clock to slow until each second sounded like a hammer hitting an anvil.
Jax tried to stand up to meet him, but Elias was already there. He leaned over Jax's desk, placing his hands on the wood. The black voids in the center of his eyes seemed to expand, swirling like a dark nebula.
'I remember every time you hit me. I remember every word.'
"You have a loud heart, Jax," Elias whispered, his voice only for the bully. "It's beating so fast. Are you scared? You should be."
Elias reached out, his hand moving with a speed the human eye couldn't track. He didn't strike. He simply gripped the edge of Jax's heavy metal desk and squeezed. The steel groaned and buckled like it was made of wet paper, the sound of screeching metal filling the silent room.
Jax scrambled backward, his chair flipping over as he hit the floor. He looked up at Elias, his face pale, his bravado completely shattered. The "Hero" mindset in Elias was dead; there was only the cold, manic joy of seeing a predator turn into prey.
Elias leaned down, a wide, jagged grin spreading across his face.
"Don't worry," Elias said, loud enough for the whole class to hear. "I'm just getting started."
He turned back to his desk, leaving Jax trembling on the floor. Behind him, he heard the frantic tapping of phone screens as the girls in the front row started texting.
Elias is terrifying. And I think I'm obsessed.