Chapter 25: Power and Control
The beam exploded.
One moment I was testing my strength against an old support column in the abandoned Miller barn—a controlled experiment, maybe twenty percent output. The next, splinters of wood were flying in all directions, and the entire structure was groaning like a dying animal.
"Oh no."
I dove for the exit as the roof collapsed behind me. Beams crashed down where I'd been standing seconds earlier. Dust billowed outward in a choking cloud. The sound was like thunder—constant, rolling, final.
When the noise stopped, I stood in the December cold, staring at a pile of rubble that had been a building moments ago.
[STRUCTURAL DAMAGE: CATASTROPHIC. STRENGTH OUTPUT ANALYSIS: EXCEEDED INTENDED PARAMETERS BY 340%. RECOMMEND: RECALIBRATION.]
Three hundred and forty percent. I'd meant to hit with twenty, and I'd delivered nearly seventy.
This is getting out of control.
The System had been warning me for weeks. My strength was growing faster than my ability to regulate it—every time I thought I had a handle on the safe output range, the ceiling moved. What had been maximum effort a month ago was now casual exertion.
"Cole?"
I turned. Kara stood at the edge of the property, her expression shifting from concern to understanding as she took in the destruction.
"Training accident," I said.
"I see that." She picked her way through the debris, stopping beside me. "Third one this week."
"Fourth." The correction came out bitter. "I put my fist through the wall of my apartment yesterday. Landlord thinks I'm using sledgehammers for decoration."
Kara didn't laugh. She took my hands—still dusty from the collapse—and turned them over, examining them like she might find answers in my callused palms.
"On Krypton," she said quietly, "children with powers learned to pour water without breaking the glass before they lifted mountains."
"What does that mean?"
"It means you're approaching this wrong." She released my hands and began walking toward a clearer section of the property. "You train for maximum output. Push your limits, test your ceilings. But you never train for minimum. For control."
I followed her, uncertain. "Control feels like weakness. Like holding back."
"Control IS holding back. That's the point." She stopped near an old fence post, still standing despite the barn's collapse. "Your power is a river. Right now, you're trying to dam it completely or release it fully. What you need to learn is the middle—the steady flow that accomplishes tasks without causing floods."
She plucked a loose egg from the remains of a chicken coop that had somehow survived the destruction. The bird must have fled when the barn fell; its nest was overturned but intact.
"Show me," Kara said, placing the egg in my palm. "Thirty percent output. Squeeze."
I closed my fingers around the shell. Felt the fragile curve of it, the impossible thinness between my enhanced grip and oblivion.
The egg disintegrated instantly.
"Twenty percent," Kara said, handing me another.
Same result. Yellow yolk dripping between my fingers.
"Ten percent."
Crushed.
"Five."
Dust.
By the time we'd gone through a dozen eggs, my hands were coated in albumin and shell fragments, and my frustration had crystallized into something cold and hard.
"This is pointless."
"This is necessary." Kara took my hands again—sticky, disgusting, trembling with suppressed anger. "Close your eyes."
"Kara—"
"Close them."
I obeyed. The darkness behind my eyelids felt claustrophobic, suffocating. Every instinct screamed to watch, to observe, to track potential threats. But I trusted her.
"Feel the energy in your muscles," she said. "Not the amount—the quality. The way it flows."
I tried. At first, there was nothing but the usual background hum of enhanced physiology. Then, slowly, I became aware of something else—a current beneath the surface, moving through my arms, my hands, my fingers.
"You're thinking about what you can destroy," Kara continued. "Think instead about what you want to preserve."
She guided my hands together, pressing something small and cool between them. Another egg.
"Don't think about strength. Think about sensation. Feel the shell. Its texture. Its temperature. Its fragility."
I focused on the egg. Not on holding back—on holding carefully. On experiencing the object rather than overpowering it.
"Now squeeze. The smallest amount you can manage."
My fingers tightened—barely. The shell remained intact.
"More."
A fraction more pressure. Still intact.
"More."
A hairline crack appeared. But I felt it coming—felt the moment before failure, the warning in the structure.
I opened my eyes. The egg sat in my palm, cracked but not crushed. Wounded but whole.
[CONTROL CALIBRATION: IMPROVED. MINIMUM OUTPUT THRESHOLD: ESTABLISHING.]
"There," Kara said softly. Her smile was radiant. "That's the beginning."
We practiced for hours.
By sunset, I could crack eggs without destroying them. Could hold a full glass of water at thirty percent output without shattering it. Could pick up Kara's phone—left deliberately as a test—without crushing its delicate circuitry.
Small victories. But victories nonetheless.
"You're not like them," Kara said as we walked back toward town. "The meteor-affected who lose themselves to their powers. You're like us. Learning."
"Us meaning Kryptonians?"
"Us meaning people who weren't born knowing what they could do." She took my hand—I let her, confident now that I wouldn't accidentally break her fingers. "Clark struggled for years before he gained control. I'm still learning myself."
"Your powers are coming back?"
"Slowly. The yellow sun is rebuilding what Krypton's destruction damaged." She looked at the horizon, where the setting sun painted everything gold. "Every day, a little stronger. A little more like I was meant to be."
We walked in comfortable silence. The frostbite scars on my hands—souvenirs from the Sean Kelvin fight—ached in the December cold. My broken arm, finally free of its cast but still weak, protested the day's exertions.
But for the first time in weeks, I felt like I was moving forward instead of spiraling.
"Thank you," I said. "For teaching me."
"Thank you for learning." Kara stopped, turning to face me on the empty road. "Cole, I've been wanting to say something."
"What?"
She stepped closer. Close enough that I could smell her shampoo—something floral, probably borrowed from Martha. Close enough that I could see the alien stars reflected in her eyes.
"This," she said.
She kissed me.
Not the quick, questioning kisses we'd shared before. This was deliberate. Intentional. A statement rather than a question.
I kissed her back—carefully, controlled, the lessons of the day translating into gentleness I hadn't known I possessed.
[RELATIONSHIP STATUS: SIGNIFICANT DEVELOPMENT. EMOTIONAL BOND: STRENGTHENING.]
When we finally pulled apart, Kara was smiling. Not her polite smile or her brave smile. Her real smile—the one she rarely showed anyone.
"I've been wanting to do that properly for weeks," she admitted.
"What stopped you?"
"You had a broken arm. It seemed rude to distract you."
I laughed—a genuine laugh, surprising myself. "The arm's healed now."
"I noticed." Her hand found mine again. "Walk me home?"
"Always."
We made egg salad with the eggs I hadn't destroyed.
Neither of us could cook—my pre-transmigration life hadn't included culinary education, and Kryptonian food preparation was apparently very different from Earth methods. The result was a yellow-gray paste that looked like something you'd find in a hospital cafeteria.
"This is terrible," I said, taking another bite anyway.
"Completely inedible," Kara agreed, eating more. "We should never cook again."
"Martha would be appalled."
"Martha would be horrified. She might disown us both."
We sat on the floor of my apartment—the couch was too far away, and the floor had seemed perfectly reasonable when we'd started—sharing the terrible egg salad and laughing at our own incompetence.
It was, I realized, the happiest I'd been since arriving in this world.
[STABILITY INDEX: 88%. SOCIAL BOND STRENGTH: SIGNIFICANT. SYSTEM NOTE: HOST ADAPTATION PROCEEDING FAVORABLY.]
For once, the System's clinical assessment felt like celebration rather than observation.
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