"Success is where preparation and opportunity meet." — Bobby
The house smelled like home.
Mark pushed through the front door, and the scent hit him immediately—his mom's cooking, that specific blend of spices she used that somehow made even basic chicken taste incredible. Balloons hung from the ceiling, a handmade "CONGRATULATIONS GRADUATE" banner stretched across the living room, slightly crooked because Debbie had clearly hung it herself.
His chest tightened.
They did all this. For me.
"There he is!" Debbie emerged from the kitchen, oven mitts still on, face flushed from the heat. "Took you long enough. I was about to send a search party."
"Sorry, Mom. Got held up." Mark kissed her cheek as he passed. "Everything looks amazing."
"It better. I've been cooking all afternoon." She swatted him with the oven mitt. "Go wash up. Dinner's almost ready."
Nolan was already at the table, newspaper folded beside his plate, hands clasped like he'd been sitting there thinking for a while. When Mark walked in, their eyes met.
Something passed between them. Understanding. Anticipation.
Dinner was loud in that comfortable, familiar way. Debbie kept loading Mark's plate with more food, asking about the ceremony, who he'd said goodbye to, whether he'd gotten enough pictures. Nolan contributed here and there, but Mark could feel his attention—sharp, focused, waiting.
They ate. They laughed. Debbie told an embarrassing story about Mark's first day of kindergarten that made him want to sink through the floor.
"Mom, please—"
"You wore your underwear on the outside of your pants because you wanted to be like a superhero!" She was crying from laughing. "The teacher had to call me to bring you new clothes!"
"I was five!"
Nolan chuckled, low and warm. "That's my boy. Always committed."
Eventually, plates were cleared. Leftovers were packed. The kitchen settled into that after-dinner quiet where everything felt full and warm and safe.
Debbie leaned against the counter, drying a dish, and glanced at Mark with that look—the one that said she could see through walls and excuses and half-truths.
"So..." She set the dish down carefully. "What did you want to talk to your dad about? On the phone earlier?"
Mark felt Nolan's attention sharpen.
He took a breath. Met his dad's eyes. Nodded once.
"I, uh..." He swallowed. "I got my powers."
The silence that followed was heavy.
Debbie's hands froze mid-motion. The dish towel slipped from her fingers.
Nolan didn't move. Didn't blink. Just... stared.
For a long moment, nobody said anything.
Then Nolan leaned forward, elbows on the table. His expression went intense—not upset, not happy. Just... focused. Like he was seeing something far away. Calculating. Processing.
"When?" His voice was quiet but firm.
"About a week ago." A lie.
Debbie made a small noise—somewhere between surprise and frustration. "A week? Mark, why didn't you say something sooner?"
"I..." Mark shifted in his seat. "I wanted to be sure. I didn't want to get everyone excited if it was just... I don't know, a fluke or something."
"A fluke?" Nolan's eyebrow raised. "Son, Viltrumite powers don't just show up for a day and disappear."
"I know that now," Mark said. "But I needed time to process it. To understand what was happening."
Debbie crossed her arms, but her expression softened. "You should have told us. We could have helped you."
"I know. I'm sorry." Mark looked between them. "But I'm telling you now."
Nolan leaned back in his chair, exhaling slowly. His expression went distant—not upset, not happy. Just... lost. Like he was somewhere else entirely. Seeing something they couldn't.
The silence stretched.
Then Nolan nodded, slow and deliberate.
"We start tomorrow."
Mark straightened. "Okay. But Dad?"
Nolan looked up.
"Don't hold back." Mark's voice was firm. Steady. "Train me like a Viltrumite. Not like a hero. Like a Viltrumite."
Something flickered in Nolan's eyes. Surprise. Maybe even... respect?
He studied Mark for a long moment, searching his face for something. Then he gave a single, slow nod.
"Alright."
Debbie was watching them both, a small smile on her face—proud, if a little confused. She didn't catch the weight of what Mark had just said. Didn't know what Viltrumite training actually meant.
But Mark knew.
And Nolan knew.
On Viltrum, they didn't train soldiers. They forged weapons. They broke you down until nothing soft remained. Until you were hard. Fast. Efficient. Brutal.
That's what Mark was asking for.
And Nolan had agreed although Nolan just assumed mark was telling him to train him like a Viltrumite based of the story he told him.
Mark headed upstairs, feeling lighter and heavier at the same time.
His room looked the same as it always did—messy bed, posters on the walls, textbooks stacked in the corner. But everything felt different now. Like a door had opened that couldn't be closed.
He grabbed his phone off the charger and checked the calendar. May 20th. Move-in for Upstate wasn't until August. Almost three full months.
Three months to train. To prepare. To get ready for everything that's coming.
Most of his classes were online anyway. He'd made sure of that. Flexibility. Freedom. Time to do what needed to be done.
He changed into jeans and a hoodie, grabbed his keys, and headed back downstairs.
Debbie was in the living room, flipping through a magazine.
"Heading out again?" She looked up. "You just got home."
"I know. Just need to grab a couple things from the store. Won't be long." He kissed her forehead. "Love you, Mom."
"Love you too, baby." She squeezed his hand. "Drive safe."
"Always."
The store was bright and fluorescent and mostly empty. Mark moved through the aisles with purpose, grabbing what he needed without drawing attention.
Ibuprofen. Specific brand. Specific formulation.
He needed the polyethylene glycol it contained—a compound used medically as a laxative, a solvent, and a base for drug delivery systems. Normally, he'd synthesize it himself, but tonight? Tonight he was in a hurry.
He paid cash. Didn't make eye contact with the cashier. Walked out.
The parking lot was dark and empty when he got back to his car. He slid into the driver's seat, glanced around to make sure nobody was watching, then reached into his pocket and pulled out a plain black mask—something he'd picked up from a costume shop months ago. Nothing fancy. Just enough to hide his face.
He put it on.
Took a breath.
And then he flew.
The sensation never got old.
One second, he was standing next to his car. The next, the ground was gone, and he was up—wind screaming past him, the world shrinking below, streetlights turning into pinpricks of light scattered across a dark canvas.
His body remembered how to do this now. How to angle his shoulders. How to lean into the wind. How to cut through the air like a knife instead of fighting it.
He climbed higher. Higher. Until the cold bit into his skin and his breath came out in visible puffs.
Then he moved.
He shot forward like a bullet, faster than any car, faster than most planes. The city blurred beneath him—roads, buildings, parks all bleeding together into streaks of light and shadow.
His heart pounded. His lungs burned with cold air.
And he smiled.
Because this—this—was what it felt like to be alive.
Midnight City wasn't much of a city anymore.
It used to be a factory town—back when manufacturing was booming, back when people had jobs and hope. Now it was just... empty. Abandoned warehouses. Rusted chain-link fences. Cracked pavement overtaken by weeds.
Perfect for someone who needed privacy.
Mark landed in front of the warehouse he'd claimed months ago. The door was rusted shut, but he pulled it open with one hand—metal shrieking in protest—and slipped inside.
The interior was lit by a handful of battery-powered work lights he'd set up. Shadows stretched long and deep across the concrete floor.
Against one wall: weights. Barbells loaded with plates he'd scavenged from gyms and junkyards. Not that they challenged him anymore. He could bench-press a car without breaking a sweat.
Against another wall: a submarine propeller he'd hauled up from the ocean floor. Rusted. Massive. Heavy enough that it had taken him three trips to get it here.
And in the center of the room, bathed in flickering light: his real project.
Laptops. Monitors. Cables snaking across the floor like veins. Screens displaying code, molecular structures, simulation data.
And on the main screen, bold and green: ANALYSIS: 90%
Mark grinned.
Almost there.
He'd been working on this for six months.
A pain-dampening serum.
Not a painkiller. Not an anesthetic. Something that would reduce his ability to feel pain without eliminating it entirely. Because shutting off pain receptors completely was a death sentence.
Pain was information. It told you when something was broken. When you'd pushed too far. When you needed to stop before you killed yourself.
People born with congenital insensitivity to pain—CIPA—often died young. They burned themselves on stoves without realizing. Broke bones and kept walking. Chewed their tongues bloody in their sleep.
Pain kept you alive.
But pain also slowed you down. Made you hesitate. Made you human.
And Mark needed to be more than human.
So he'd designed something in between. A serum that would dull pain significantly—enough to keep fighting through injuries that would cripple most people—but leave just enough sensation to warn him when something was really wrong.
The science had been brutal. Trial and error. Mostly error. He'd gone through a dozen iterations, each one failing in some new and horrifying way.
But this time—this time—he thought he'd cracked it.
Mark pulled the ibuprofen capsules from his bag, cracked them open, and carefully extracted the polyethylene glycol. He added it to the mixture waiting in the analyzer, watching the readout climb.
91%
93%
97%
99%
100%
"Yes," Mark whispered.
The simulation was green across the board. Molecular stability: optimal. Toxicity: minimal. Efficacy: projected at 87%.
Good enough.
He loaded a syringe with the serum, hands steady despite the adrenaline singing through his veins.
Then he zipped across the warehouse at super speed, grabbed a mouse that had been living in the corner, and brought it back to the table before it even registered movement.
He injected it. Placed it in a small cage.
And waited.
One minute.
Two.
Five.
The mouse was fine. Moving normally. Eating a piece of cracker Mark had left in the cage.
Mark reached into the cage with a small metal probe, applying pressure to different areas. The mouse reacted normally to gentle touches, but when he applied what should have been painful pressure to its tail, there was minimal response. When he pressed harder on its leg, it squeaked and pulled away.
The threshold is working. It's dampening pain but not eliminating it entirely.
Mark's face split into a grin.
It works.
He quickly and humanely euthanized the mouse—he'd learned the proper method months ago—and set it aside respectfully. The little guy had given its life for this. The least Mark could do was be quick about it.
Then he picked up the vial of serum.
Stared at it.
This was insane. He knew that. Testing something like this on himself without proper trials, without oversight, without a medical team standing by in case something went catastrophically wrong...
But he didn't have time for proper trials.
He didn't have the luxury of caution.
"Fuck it."
He downed the vial in one swallow.
For a moment, nothing happened.
Then—
Warmth spread through his chest. Not painful. Just... there. Like drinking hot tea on a cold day.
It spread down his arms. Into his legs. Up into his head.
He felt... lighter. Disconnected. Like his body was wrapped in cotton.
Mark stepped into the center of the warehouse, into the open space he'd cleared for testing.
He needed to know if this actually worked.
He clenched his right fist, drew back his left, and with every ounce of Viltrumite strength he could muster—
He punched himself in the face.
CRACK.
The sound was like a gunshot. A shockwave burst from the point of impact, rippling outward in a visible distortion of air. Dust exploded off the floor. The nearby laptops rattled on their tables.
Mark's head snapped to the side from the force.
And he felt...
Nothing.
Well, not nothing. There was pressure. The sensation of impact. Like someone had firmly pressed their palm against his cheek.
But pain? The skull-splitting, brain-rattling agony that should have come from hitting himself with enough force to shatter concrete?
Gone.
Mark touched his jaw, working it side to side. Totally fine. Not even sore.
He laughed—breathless, disbelieving.
"Holy shit."
It actually worked.
Then the exhaustion hit him like a freight train.
His vision blurred. His legs gave out.
"Oh... fuck..."
Side effect. He'd known there'd be side effects. The simulation had predicted drowsiness, possible temporary unconsciousness as the body adjusted...
He stumbled toward his laptop, vision swimming. Plugged in a flash drive. Initiated upload.
COPYING FILES... 23%
He couldn't wait. Couldn't risk passing out here.
47%
His hands were shaking.
68%
Almost there.
89%
100%
UPLOAD COMPLETE
Mark yanked the drive out, shoved it in his pocket, and concentrated.
The warehouse around him groaned. Metal buckled. Support beams bent inward.
He flew up and out through a gap in the roof, and behind him, the building collapsed—folding in on itself in a cloud of dust and twisted metal.
No evidence. No trail.
He flew toward his car, vision darkening at the edges, body screaming for sleep.
He landed hard in the parking lot, yanked off his mask, stumbled to his car.
Drove home on autopilot, barely keeping his eyes open.
He made it to his room.
Barely.
He face-planted onto his bed, still fully dressed, shoes still on.
And the world went black.