Spark, Amber

I carefully hovered the orange segment over my hand as I worked through some more homework. Holding back on making new powers had been for the best apparently since I hadn't seen any growth in the last few days.

That didn't mean that the time hadn't been productive. In an effort to make my powers as strong as they were, I had sacrificed a lot of usabilities. Unlike most cape powers, I didn't have any instincts that let me use my powers fluidly, I got a basic level of feedback from my abilities, in the amount of power in my reserves I had left, and the amount I was drawing, as well as what types of energy were being created, and a general sense of the volumes I designated around myself.

But I didn't know how much any particular proportion of my energy did with my current reserves. It had taken quite a bit of experimentation, but starting slow to make sure mom and Jenny didn't hear me, I was slowly able to get a feel for how much power I needed.

It had taken time, and I had been extremely tempted to make a power to deal with it right off the bat, but I figured that getting a feel for how the powers meshed would help me out in the future, and as the days went on without the seventh spark growing at all, I decided it was safer not to spend any of what I had left.

I had figured out a few things though.

It was surprising just how much more interesting my physics homework was when I could just do the experiments and see what happened.

It was also pretty useful for math since I could use my new focus and visualisation abilities to do on paper working in my head.

I had discovered issues with my multitasking, however. While I could give my full focus on everything I applied one of those ten lanes of thought to, it was still my best focus. My lanes of thought could still get bored quite easily, especially with work like this. I would have given up a few lanes to prevent boredom.

Especially working on this.

Still, it was quite helpful. With ten lanes I could work on multiple problems at once and work through the questions in my textbook easily.

My thoughts were interrupted as I felt a charge bloom into being.

Why now?

I slipped the orange segment into my mouth as I pondered the change. The power had all but stalled in growth for days, but it had grown suddenly, coming to fruition in seconds.

I took a moment to pull up my mental notebook and record the changes.

I thought that maybe making powers was what triggered it. But I hadn't even been considering it like I had many times over the last few days.

I don't really know what triggered it.

My phone buzzed and a new text message appeared on the screen. As I used my powers to grab the simple crutches Mom had gotten from a friend.

Standing up, I packed my backpack and lifted it over to me, hobbling over to the door, checking the message from Dave as I did.

Before I could reach it, it swung open, and I saw Jenny standing at the door.

"Bro, your leg is broken. You can chill."

I rolled my eyes, "Jen, it's been a week, and I have my crutches."

"Yeah, you have crutches, but you're still crippled doofus. Mom already told me to help you get to school."

"And you get a ride to school."

"And I get a ride to school. Now come on, Dave's waiting."

We eventually made our way down the stairs and I was lifted into the car.

"Just physics left, right?"

"Yeah, I have a good feeling about it too!"

"Really? I never really got the whole leverage stuff."

"Try drawing it. It's a lot easier than using the equations, at least for me."

As we descended into mindless chatter, I watched over the latest charge in frustration. The growth rate had stalled for no apparent reason.

Even as I was led up the stairs of the school and towards the exam hall, it seemed to barely change.

Putting the thought out of my head, I buckled down and focused on my exam, working through the multiple-choice quickly as my lanes considered every question on the page at once.

Before long I was onto the short answer questions. Those took a little longer, even with my lanes, but I managed to work through them.

I was actually pretty thankful that my powers weren't that user friendly yet. I'd been tempted to use my powers, but given the direct control, I needed to engage them I managed to hold off. I imagine someone with a more intuitive command over their powers may not have been able to help themselves.

Still, I was able to call up and edit the visualisations I used when studying, or equations right out of my textbooks, so I still moved quickly.

Eventually, I was left paging through my exam, waiting for everyone to catch up. I didn't want to just hand it in, since too many bangers went to Winslow and I didn't want to hint at having a power.

My new charge came in as I checked over my answers for the tenth time.

Why now? Admittedly, it had continued to slowly grow since this morning, but what made the charges grow?

I paused for a moment, ostensibly staring at one of the harder questions as I considered the eight charges. Together they would be enough to make a level four charge, enough to make a decent power, Miss Militia or Kreig.

As I watched a ninth spark come into existence, I considered my options.

This was important. I couldn't throw my charges around. I still had no idea how I got them. A level four power would be strong, but a strong power would be specialised. It wouldn't do to be able to create any weapon but come up against a bulletproof cape.

Still, I couldn't imagine a situation that a level four power couldn't get me out of. Having those charges lying around unused meant that I could make a power to get me out of trouble regardless of where I ended up.

On the other hand, a stronger power might mean that I wouldn't get into those situations in the first place.

Still, it wasn't like I was likely to get into trouble any time soon. I wasn't ready to get into a fight with a broken leg, and even if I didn't have one, what was I going to do? The protectorate was useless and I didn't want to join any of the gangs. I don't think New Wave was hiring either.

I'd need to wait and ramp up anyways, probably get fit too. All the capes were pretty fit and with all the running around I see in cape fights, I'm pretty sure that it was basically mandatory to be fit.

I absently handed the paper back to the teacher and waited until most of the other students left so that I could get myself back up on my crutches and out of the room.

Jenny was waiting for me at the door, "How did it go?" She asked as she helped me down the stairs.

"Pretty well I think, I finished fast enough to check my answers so I spotted a few mistakes."

We chatted a bit about winter break as one of my lanes contemplated the future. My first impression as a cape would have to be something big. I still remembered Clockblocker's debut, and I'd been surprised time and again when I'd learned of how powerful Vista was.

Taking the time to ensure that I was powerful and that I could make sure people knew I was powerful would mean that people would be wary of going after me. Plus, I needed time to figure out some way of making sure mom and Jenny were protected.

I'd heard of Fleur and I didn't want to take any risks. It would take one slip up for my secret identity to no longer be a secret, and I might not even know if I was in danger.

As that ninth charge formed, I took stock of the situation. Winter break would be the perfect time to train myself up, especially if I made a power that would let me get in shape faster. I could even pass it off as wanting to get in better shape after what happened.

Every lane determinedly focused on something, keeping the memories out.

"What did you say?"

Jenny looked for a moment and I stared her in the eye before she continued asking me about the exam.

I went home and headed back up to my room and carefully lowered myself onto the bed.

Staring at the ceiling, I thought about my cape plans.

I thought about the self-help articles I read online and considered my goals and challenges.

I mean, the challenges were easy. I was worried about being press-ganged by the gangs, and I didn't want mom or Jenny to be… hurt.

I didn't really have any goals though. I mean, beyond more powers because powers were cool.

But those were pretty crap. The self-help stuff was all about being specific and those weren't all that great.

I mean…

I guess I wanted an Xbox. So the money I guess? I mean, more money would be great. I wasn't poor, but I was going to turn sixteen soon and being able to buy a car would be cool.

Making money with my powers would be better though.

I didn't want to work with the protectorate though. Useless bastards.

Maybe like New Wave? They were pretty rich.

So what? I wanted to keep mom and Jenny safe and make money with my powers.

Maybe that was good enough?

I called up the self-help article again.

I let myself settle in. Concrete goals. I needed concrete goals. Um… I guess I could say that I wanted to make enough money to buy a car when I get a licence, or maybe I'll start small and try and make enough money to buy an Xbox?

Okay, start small. I want to buy an Xbox. So I need to.

I need to…

How did New Wave make money?

Or like, any cape, how did they make money?

I grabbed my laptop and started loading up Spyglass. I was about to search before I stopped myself. Dragon made spyglass and she worked with the protectorate. Is that how they found capes? Searching for people who start searching for cape stuff. I mean, on PHO they talked about how tinkers had to be careful about where they get their materials or they would be tracked.

The thought worried me. Was the government spying on me?

Heh, I sounded like a crazy person.

Still could they?

So I started searching up how the internet worked.

And as I did I found something interesting.

Firstly, yes, it was totally possible that Dragon could be using Spyglass to spy on new capes, not sure if she did but it was possible.

But when my tenth charge was completed as I was reading some articles, I paused. The way I had my powers feeding together, they kind of reminded me of these diagrams. UML diagrams apparently. I could kind of map how they mixed and how I was using them.

Could this help?

I stared at the computer screen in frustration. I wanted to keep looking into the internet stuff, but I also wanted to learn more about this UML stuff, but I searching up multiple things was trouble…some…

Honestly, a power that let me connect to the internet wouldn't be a bad one. Or maybe like a hacking power or something? I'd have to pin that down. An internet uplink by itself took up a fairly small portion of a charge, so I figured that I could get a fairly reasonable power out of a single charge, and honestly, the power was decent enough that I wouldn't be against spending a couple of charges to do it. Something like that would be a fairly decent power all by itself.

Hmmm… if it included some stealth abilities, it would even let me search without worrying about being found out.

I could hack gangs maybe…is that a thing? Did gangs have like administrators and stuff I could hack?

Not sure if I should hack the PRT though.

"James?"

I lifted my head up from the bed, "Yes, Jenny?"

"Can I come in?"

I shrugged, "Sure, what do you want to talk about."

"Err… how are you doing?" she asked as she closed the door behind her.

I looked around the room, "Eh, pretty decent."

She relaxed a bit, "It's just…"

"I wasn't mad at you earlier. Just you know…"

"Oh sorry."

I waved her over and put a hand on her shoulder, "Jen, I'll be fine. And anyways, school just finished, why don't you hang out with your friends?"

"It's just…"

"Don't worry about me, I'm already feeling better, and I'm going in for an X-ray on Monday, I'll be fine."

She nodded, "But please, if you need anything, just ask me."

I shook my head and smiled, "Go, call Tracy and have some fun."

Jenny nodded and headed out of my room.

As I heard the front door close, nodded and closed my eyes, before returning to my thoughts.

I had goals, what stood in the way of me achieving them?

I was still too paranoid to look up how capes make money right now, so I'll focus on the safety front.

Brockton Bay wasn't all that safe, at the end of the day. As worried as I was about someone targeting them because of me, any work I did in that direction would be moot if they just died randomly. With how shit the PRT was with actually dealing with gangs, some merchant druggy could kill them over five bucks if they ended up in the wrong part of town.

So I guess the gangs, in general, were a problem.

Well, crime, in general, was a problem.

I knew the boardwalk was one of the safer places in town, mainly because of the merchants of all people. It was a tourist area, and they didn't want to scare away customers, so they paid people to keep it that way. Plus the PRT was so close they basically had to do their damn jobs.

So basically, the drug addicted Merchants did a better job of keeping people safe than the actual cops. I bet I could do better once I got a few decent powers.

I'd gained five more charges today. If I was lucky and got another round like this? I could probably make enough powers that I'd basically be a hero team, all by myself.

Huh…

A hero team.

I'd need more capes but.

Othala exists.

I took a moment to check how much a power granting ability would be, something like Othalla's.Seven charges. Damn.

Actually…

I checked how many charges it would take for me to give one of my powers to someone else.

And smiled. One charge. Two if I wanted to have more control over it.