Greg Veder vs The World

Hey, guys. Just like I promised, two weeks later.

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I'm working hard on all my stories and the next few chapters of Greg Vs.

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With spring semester mostly over, I've been kicking it into gear and I have a lot of great stuff coming.

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I want to thank my Patrons especially: MagusZanin, Jack, Segev, AnteausTheGiant, Cedron Spaulding, James Carl Henderson, Tian Seve, Ashley Stanhope, Nikhil Majumdar, Sartek, Zach Collins, Furyful Fawful, zero1995, greenfall87, ALEX, Skinnybonz, TheBlackenedWoods, SaintPriest, Andrea, Johnathan, Mark-Anthony Edwards, Shaan Vyas, Haydos, TJMTG, One Damed Soul.

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Thank you, guys. Regular updates here and on the Patreon are coming this week and regularly onwards.

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Cutscene: Embers

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

He feels it.

The weakness.

The cold.

The darkness creeping in with each passing moment.

His thoughts flit, flicker and fade as he sees lips below glowing eyes move, forming words he can't hear anymore.

He opens his mouth.

H-

His heart stops.

And the rest of him pulses despite it.

Like a single heartbeat within every cell of his body.

A heartbeat that refuses to drum a second beat, but instead continues like a single note, growing stronger every second.

Every inch of him screams.

Not with pain, but with raw sensation.

He feels it.

He feels it more than anything he's ever felt in his life.

His eyes are closed but he sees.

Light.

Powerful, bright.

Blue.

Gold.

Both battling each other, force against force, yet one blazes like a bonfire as its light meets his flesh and the other…

The other seems to struggle to latch on.

In the center of his heart, he sees with those same unopened eyes, a figure staring down at him, eyes like miniature suns brighter than anything ever had the right to be.

He feels the heartbeat within him thrum, thump and thunder like a drumbeat.

The figure opens his mouth and a voice resounds through every inch of him.

"WHO THE FUCK…"

It rang with power, each syllable pulsing in time with his strange, new heartbeat.

The words echo across the border of existence and non-existence, resounding in his bones and rattling his soul.

His breath hitched, each inhalation a battle, each exhalation a victory. His heart stuttered, faltered, and then began to beat again. Slowly, unevenly, but undeniably. The light subsided, but it did not disappear. It pulsed within him, a second heartbeat, a silent promise of continued existence.

His eyes wrenched shut as sensation rushed back into his previously fading form, but golden light burst from behind his eyelids even still.

"TOLD YOU…"

His mouth opened in a silent scream as his insides pulsed harder, golden light spilling forth like a beacon from inside his throat as he felt his back arch, body moving despite itself. An unseen force pulling him back from the brink, tethering him to this world, asserting an undeniable claim over his being.

The golden light within him responds, thrumming in time with each syllable, each pulse acting in sync with his heart, each drumbeat a refusal to surrender.

"THAT YOU COULD…"

His back arched, skin prickling as every single pore of his body became an aperture for golden light that refused to be contained any more. His body, a beacon in the black void, a defiance against the inevitable, a monument of resilience against the unforgiving march of time.

"DIE?!"

The words reverberate in his mind, in his soul, challenging the very fabric of his being. Light as bright as the sun but far, far denser pulsed again but this time in reverse as it vanished, hidden beneath flesh and bone.

[DESTINATION]

[TRAJECTORY]

[AGREEMENT]

[QUERY: POTENTIAL?]

[AGREEMENT]

He breathes in and for the first time…

He exists.

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

An expanse of nothingness, a vast canvas of sand, spread out to infinity. In its midst, a solitary figure walked on. A trekker in the desert of the surreal, where sand met sky at the horizon's edge, an edge that never draws closer, yet seems to recede with every step.

A dance with the sun above, a dance of shadows and light.

Larger than life, the sun. A giant, golden disk in the limitless sky. No friendly beacon, but an inferno.

Unforgiving. Merciless.

Its fiery tongues lapping at his mind, searing him from the inside out. The world around him shimmered and wavered in the brutal heat, a hazy mirage of existence.

The heat wrapped around him, a tangible entity. Seeping through his skin, into his bones. Sweat trickled down his body, a river of desperation. Each droplet that hissed away under the unforgiving light drained at him, the clear fluid somehow his lifeblood.

His footsteps echoed in the silence, a rhythm of persistence. A testament of his journey.

But the sun... the sun drew nearer with each passing moment. A celestial body, defying the laws of space and time. A paradox.

The sun, it insists.

Tugs. Grasps.

Yet, at the edge of perception, a trembling mirage.

Blue.

Cool.

An oasis.

Shimmers, spectral, amidst the ballet of sands—swirling, twirling, twisting. Tranquility rendered illusory, wrapped in the soothing hues of the intangible—sapphire, azure, and dreams.

Verdant specters sway, calling to him. Their dance—shadows, whispers on the face of the water—promises. Promises of relief, sun-drenched lies forever out of reach. He reaches, lunges, plunges.

Toward it? Through it?

Stubborn, persistent in its elusive dance on the horizon.

A step. A falter. A slide. Further.

The dance—an eternal dance between hope and despair, sun and illusion. Drawing near, drawing away.

Reality blurred at the edges, a painting smeared by an unseen hand. His body slick with scarlet sweat, flesh glistening under the relentless sun. His strength waned and the desert floor embraced him, hot and unyielding.

His sweat-soaked body imprinted upon the grains of sand, a testament to his journey.

A voice rang in the silence. It echoed from the heavens, a deep, resonant sound, words that made no sense, a tongue forged in the heart of a star.

Again.

A voice. A din as infinite as the desert that echoed through the silence.

Words strung together, their meanings lost in the roar of a million furnaces. His mind grasped at them, a futile attempt to comprehend.

The sun was closer now. A face within the golden inferno. A face that was no face. A riddle wrapped in a mystery.

Axel squinted, his eyes stinging from the brilliance. The sun, larger than ever, filled the sky and his vision.

A burning paradox, threatening to consume him.

Yet, he did not burn.

Words.

Words that were not words. A communication of sorts, a conversation with a celestial entity. The sun spoke, its voice a symphony of heat and light.

A language born from the heart of a star.

The sun spoke again. A single phrase that echoed in the vast emptiness. A command, a plea, an inevitability.

DON'T DIE. DON'T DIE. DON'T DIE.

PLE-

I'LL DO ANYTHING.

COME BACK TO ME.

DON'T DIE.

I'M SORRY. I'M SO SORRY.

DON'T DIE. PLEASE.

With those words, the world shifted.

The desert, the sun, the voice, all fading into the background. The echo of the sun's words lingered, a faint whisper in the recesses of his mind.

He looked up again and the sun was upon him, close, so close. A face, a vague impression of a face, on the sun. It filled his vision, a blinding panorama of golden light.

The sun, it spoke, its voice a symphony of celestial melodies.

The words, unintelligible.

The roar, a million furnaces.

They washed over him, through him, the intensity of the star's language scorching his very soul.

The sun, now a lover's distance away, leaned in. A celestial kiss, an intimate moment between star and man.

From slow burn, now a raging fire.

It consumed him, devoured him. His silent screams echoed in the vast desert, his body writhing in the sand, a silent plea to the indifferent expanse.

And then, the sun's voice again, a whisper amidst the chaos.

A command, a plea, an existential truth.

WAKE UP.

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

With a suddenness that he knew was not normal, Axel Ramon felt himself wake.

His brain didn't trudge forward slowly, the fog of unconscious dreams gradually fading away to the normal morning rising one would expect. Instead, the alertness was jarring, abrupt, immediate, all-encompassing.

The teenager took in a sudden harsh breath as awareness flooded his mind. The air left his lungs in a quick gasp as he found himself acutely aware of himself, his location, the dimensions of the space around him and far, far too much from the very instant he was thrust into consciousness. This isn't… m-my room?

The excess of details that surged into his sightless mind all at once told him it wasn't. Where… He breathed in again, unsure of himself even as he refused to open his eyes to be sure. Where am I?

There was no answer, because why would there be?

Am I dreaming? The question popped into his head even as he dismissed it; the sudden hyper-reality too detailed for a dream. Awareness seeped into him like ink spreading on blotting paper. He could sense everything, his mind and body inexplicably alert, his perceptions keen and razor-sharp. No, this can't be a dream.

His forehead crinkled in confusion, eyes firmly shut against the torrent of sensory information. Even still, his mind spun like a top, trying to grapple with foreign sensations that stood just an arm's reach past the realm of understanding.

From the soft morning breeze that whispered past the open window — the fresh scent of dew-covered grass carried by the wind right to his nose — to the feeling of cloth and fabric against his skin — a symphony of cotton blends, all of it, right down to the socks — and even the faint hum of electrical current coursing through the wires in the walls. Suddenly, a wave of disorientation washed over him, a sensory overload swarming his senses that made his head spin.

He could feel everything.

For a moment, he thought he would be sick. The world spun around him, a kaleidoscope of colors and sounds and smells. His heart hammered in his chest, matching the frantic pace of his thoughts.

Then, just as quickly as it had come, the disorientation passed. Sparky took a deep breath, steadying himself as he lay still. He was still here, still…

Sparky's heart continued to pound in his chest, each beat resonating with a strange energy that pulsed through his veins. What is happening to me?

Swamped by the deluge of perceptions and thoughts, Axel shifted haphazardly in bed, teetering on the brink of sensory overload, his expression one more of exasperation and discomfort than any real pain.

For a too-long moment, he found himself wondering a single question: Is this what death feels like? The thought hung above his head like a sword on a frayed string as he tried to come to terms with the possibility.

I have to be dead, right, he attempted to convince himself again, as if trying to push past the denial of his own mortality. I… I got shot. Twice? The thought shifted into a question, before he answered that same question himself not even a full moment later. Twice. And this is probably some last-minute hallucination my mind's trying to give me right before my brain stops working.

But…

He froze, body stilling atop the bed as he wondered how this could be a hallucination if he's able to think and feel and t-

His mind grappled with the intrusive sensations as he finally forced his eyes open. Oh God…

All of a sudden, the world came rushing back, an assault of amplified details blasting his senses with all the subtlety of a lion's roar. He let out a low groan, wincing as his eyes were assaulted by the details of the ceiling above, the speckled texture paint of the popcorn paint easily noticeable, the faint, complex patterns of whorls and knots on the wooden closet doors, the muted glow of morning sunlight casting a kaleidoscope of shadows.

The air held more than just the scent of dew-kissed grass. It was a cocktail of aromas — fragments of last night's dinner lingering in the air, the familiar musk of his room, the faint smell of old books from the shelf, the subtlest hint of fresh paint from a freshly retouched surface.

It was overpowering, intoxicating, overwhelming.

Too much.

His skin prickled with awareness, the mere touch of his bedsheets sending ripples of sensory feedback. The fabric's weave was suddenly complex, individual threads distinguishable under his fingertips. Even the air felt denser against his skin, like an invisible, silken blanket pressing against him.

This is too much. He tried to sit up, to ground himself, but the effort sent tremors of strength through his limbs. As if every single muscle fiber was individually aware, singing in harmony with the flow of his blood, each cell alive and responsive. Even his confused flailing felt different, individual movements somehow flowing and practiced, a fluid dance of muscle and bone.

The background hum of electricity in the walls was no longer just a hum. It was a symphony of currents, a fluctuating melody of energy. He could hear the gentle tick of a timepiece from somewhere, the sporadic chirping of birds outside, the distant rumble of a car engine, the muted conversation of a radio host outside even as it became more and more distant. He could even hear his own heartbeat, the rhythmic thump echoing in his ears.

His stomach churned, a sense of nausea swirling within him. His body — suddenly a stranger's: foreign and unfamiliar… yet intimately his own. Every breath he took was a discovery, a flood of amplified experiences that left him gasping but never breathless.

What the hell is going on? He thought again, fear creeping into his thoughts. The panic that had subsided began to rise again, a tide threatening to drown him as he teetered on the edge of the tightrope that was his sanity.

And then, as sudden as it came, a moment of stillness. It was as if his senses, his thoughts, his fears, everything paused for a breath. The world around him was still a riot of sensory information, but it was no longer a chaotic, crushing wave. It was a river, a rush of experiences that he was part of.

He could feel everything. He could hear everything. He could see everything.

He could t-

A harsh cough ruptured the silence, thick phlegm wrenched from his throat with a guttural rasp. The teenager outright wretched in disgust as an overwhelming rush of taste exploded in his mind like a dormant landmine.

Taste.

His tongue felt like sandpaper, a gritty desert, coated in dust and dried blood from hours past. The teenager jolted upright in bed, hands flying to his mouth, fingers scraping urgently at his tongue.

Barely a moment passed before Sparky found himself frozen once again, those same eyes widening as they locked onto a mirror directly across from him.

He stared back as he was met with the reflection of irises ablaze with a gold as molten as a supernova. Stunning eyes set in a seemingly untouched face, every single one of his features pristine, flawless and…

Perfect. His hands fell away from his now-forgotten tongue as a mouth filled with impeccably placed and immaculately white teeth silently formed both syllables of the word before it slowly returned to a single flat line that he recognized as his face's natural expression.

Am I... me? The thought, insane as it was, felt like it needed to be answered.

Sparky swung his legs over the side of his bed, nearly pausing as he took in how fluid the action seemed. There was a distinctly uncanny grace to his actions, each motion a seamless transition from the last as his body responded to his commands with a fluidity he had never known, each muscle and tendon working in perfect harmony. His bare feet brushed against the carpet, and he felt every thread, every fiber. The sensation was so intense, so vivid, that for a moment, he thought he could count each individual strand beneath his soles.

The unsteadiness Sparky would have expected after that sudden bout of nausea was seemingly nonexistent as he moved towards the mirror, feet gliding across the floor with a dancer's effortless grace. His reflection stared back, a figure so similar and yet so foreign. His posture was straighter, his body more defined, his gaze sharper. He looked... stronger, not in the obvious way of bulging muscles, but in a more subtle, understated way, lithe and powerful compared to his former lean scrawniness.

But his face…

Is this me?

Perfect was the closest thing he could think of to describe it — him, his face —the same sort of look you'd see on a magazine, or a movie star on the screen. His skin looked as though it had been filtered and airbrushed to the point of actual beauty, skin glowing and radiant. His long hair, usually something he'd have to comb and manage from a tangled mess, hovered just above his shoulders with a level of life and bounce that didn't seem real outside of a shampoo commercial.

He glanced down at his hands, unsurprised at what met his gaze. His palms, once rough with callouses, were now as soft and smooth as an infant's, and his previously gnawed-on fingernails were now neat and polished to a degree that looked almost reflective.

I feel good. No, not good. He blinked at his expression again. Great!

No… He bent and curled his fingers into solid fists, every muscle in his arms coiling with an almost predatory grace. He stared down at his hands again, relaxing his fists just to flex his fingers and watch silently as the sinewy muscles beneath his skin responded instantly. They were the same hands, but also, they were not. I feel… right.

A slight smile pulled at the corners of his mouth despite his confusion, immaculate teeth in perfect rows gleaming back at him. His skin hummed with an undercurrent of energy, a sensation almost like the shock of caffeine, yet somehow purer.

Adrenaline, his mind supplied, his newfound hyperawareness unfamiliar but not unwelcome, especially so soon after waking.

Fast.

Immediate, even.

Far quicker than he was used to, at least.

His mind raced, neurons firing and thoughts whirling as he tried to comprehend his situation. His body felt different, stronger, more agile. He could sense his surroundings with an acuity that was almost frightening.

The thought lingered, taking up the entirety of his mind as he tried to process what was going on with him until something else seized his attention.

"You're not dead, by the way."

A voice, laced with an uncanny mixture of relief and trepidation, pierced the silence.

Sparky spun around, tension rising and bleeding from his body in a single instant. to see a familiar face sitting by the door, a blond figure perfectly still and unnoticeable as he remained in place in his computer chair.

"I figured you'd be worried about that," he continued on. "Considering… y'know, two gunshots and all."

There, by the doorway, sat a blond figure, a familiar face that he didn't realize how badly he needed to see. A blond figure, statue-still in a computer chair, melding seamlessly with the background, unnoticed till now as if he had always been there.

Sparky's awareness flared again, the realization that had escaped him for the last fifteen seconds of consciousness ringing in his mind like a morning alarm as he suddenly took in all the familiar gaming and superhero merch that surrounded him with new eyes. I'm in Greg's room.

"Hey, Axel," Greg ventured, his voice soft yet somehow reverberating in the silent room.

"Don't call me that." The words escaped Sparky's mouth reflexively, his tone sharp, eyes instinctively narrowing into a glare before he caught himself, blinking away the sudden and unexpected animosity.

He doesn't speak at first.

At least, not immediately after.

Instead, Sparky simply stared at his friend and Greg was kind enough to return the favor by not disrupting the quiet and staring right back. The silence had a purpose, at least for Sparky. He needed a moment or three to simply see, to take everything in and study his friend with these new eyes of his.

So much new detail he was sure he would have missed before, how little he used to see.

Sparky's memory of Greg was a somewhat blurry adolescent image. A boy with a cluttered face, speckled with the ordinary smatterings of acne, the persisting baby fat giving him a round, youthful charm not quite appropriate of a boy nearing his sixteenth year of life. His hair tried to be neat but never quite reached the level of control his mother would have liked, not without copious amounts of gel that neither of them bothered to consider as an option.

After he had returned to school, Greg was almost a different person entirely. The "almost" was rather kind, but it was still true.

Sure, Greg had returned taller, leaner, an airbrushed version of his old self with a mane of hair that was rather wild and untamed and yet somehow looked like it was meant to be that way. Blue eyes that were once both nervous and jovial had changed to something slightly darker — not quite malicious — and at the same time playful, like he was listening to a joke that only he could hear. A similar smile tugged at his lips constantly, mocking and aware of it.

All of it — all of that — was true, but there was still undeniably a core of Greg at the center of it all, despite how much Sparky had railed against those former changes, and even now, that was clearer than ever.

To Sparky's newly altered eyes, Greg seemed almost otherworldly. His smooth, unblemished skin was so perfect it looked almost unreal, making him more of an ethereal fae-creature than a handsome boy. Yet, he was both, in an unsettling, undeniable manner. His eyes sparkled with an intense brightness, meeting Sparky's stare with an unwavering blue flame that seemed to burn bright even in the light of day.

His irises were not quite circular either, the things looking almost ragged, not quite the usual round of a normal human but seemed to be on the verge of narrowing at points, teetering on the edge of shifting into something alien. Wow.

Something else was different now too, not just physically or appearance-wise. It was something more…

Silently, Sparky studied Greg again, noting the tension in his friend's shoulders, the forced grin that hung on his face, even as his voice was laced with a playful jest. Behind the fake good humor, there was a noticeable uncertainty, a distinct nervousness.

His friend was unsure.

Worried, even.

After several long moments of thought, Sparky finally built up the courage to ask the question burning at his thoughts. Staring right into those jewel-bright, royal blue eyes, the teenager sighs before he finally speaks, his own voice melodic and unfamiliar to him for a moment. "Wh-what h-happened?"

Greg's response came with a radiant smile, "You have no idea how happy I am right now."

It doesn't go unnoticed that his question went unanswered. "Why?"

"You almost died, Ax. In fact, I'm pretty sure you did. I…" Greg's voice trailed off, a flicker of some haunting emotion passing over his face so quickly that Sparky wasn't sure if it had been there at all an instant later. "I didn't even think it would work. It was a fuckin' Hail Mary, dude."

Hail Mary. Sparky took a tentative step forward, hesitant as he reacquainted himself with his voice. "Wait, what… what happened?"

"You don't remember." A statement, not a question. Greg's face lost its smile for another instant, looking all too grim and scaring Sparky into another step back even after it vanished.

"...No?" Something… something tickled Sparky's thoughts: a faint non-memory — like a distant dream at the edge of his consciousness demanding to be acknowledged, but elusive, already miles out of reach the moment you woke up.

"Probably for the best, really," Greg frowned at the last syllable, the expression actually visible on his face and remained there without flickering away, his voice laced with a seriousness that momentarily disrupted his usual playful demeanor. For a second or so, Sparky wondered how much of that was genuine and how much was for his benefit until Greg spoke again. "You sounded like you were in a lot of pain."

"A lot of… What did you do to me?" Sparky questioned, voice firm despite his growing unease at the fact Greg had yet to answer his actual question. He moved forward, steps surprisingly graceful and effortless. But as he advanced, his eyes dropped to his own body, distracted by the smoothness of his movements again, and he paused as another more pressing realization pushed all others aside. "Wha- did you undress me? Change my clothes?"

Another realization hit him. The grime, sweat, and blood that had stained his skin the previous night were gone. His skin felt clean, fresh. "Did you... bathe me?"

"Waitwaitwait. No…" Greg held up a finger, the action accompanied by a slightly nervous laugh. "Well, yes, yes and no."

"What?"

"Well, after I got you off that rooftop, I needed somewhere to take you but the hospital would ask too many questions because… well," Greg shrugged. "You were literally in perfect health, from what I could tell. Just really, really deep asleep. So, I brought you to my place. But you were dirty as hell so I hosed you down. "

Greg shrugged again, offering Sparky a sheepish smile. "Literally."

"What?"

The blond nodded. "Yeah, you were deep asleep but not in a coma. I checked."

Not in a c-

Coma. The word echoed in Sparky's mind, a chilling reminder of the severity of the situation. But he brushed it aside, doing his best to focus his attention firmly on the more pressing issue. "...That's not the important part," Sparky bit the words out, partly to Greg but also to his own errant thoughts.

Wait, isn't a coma kinda imp- "Not. The. Important. Part," he repeated the reminder through gritted teeth.

Holding back the urge to say something rude was a challenge but Sparky somehow managed it, instead letting out a long breath. "So… what exactly did you do to me?"

"Oh… that."

The explanation that left Greg's mouth was more confusing than it was enlightening, something Sparky couldn't help but frown at. Granted, he was grateful that Greg had saved his life but he would have liked some real answers on what exactly the fuck had been done to him. Apparently, from what the blond managed to lay out after a five-minute story, the whole thing had involved a lot of sound effects, hand gestures and words like "glowing", "pushing energy into you" and finally ending with "then something clicked and your body just started healing itself right up".

All in all, Axel Ramon was neither enlightened nor amused.

"Long story short," the blond finished up. "I'm pretty sure I… kinda Reinforced your body… permanently. Or soul, or ability to exist or whatever. For all I know, I realigned your chakras. I definitely reinforced something 'cus, well, I mean it's kinda obvious, right?" Greg pulled a face and offered Sparky a shrug, gesturing to all of him in a manner that distinctly felt both familiar and insulting. "I'm not really sure how but I think I made you Trigger or something, not gonna lie. This is the first time I ever tried to do this on purpose."

"Uh-huh." Axel mumbled, as if he understood.

Far from it, really.

It made him want to cry.

"I'm thinking of calling it something else actually. Triggering doesn't sound right to me, gotta be honest," Greg shook his head thoughtfully, cupping his chin as he paused the movement. "Maybe… Ascension. No, no, no… Awakening?"

Sparky frowned. "Greg. Me. My Body. Answers," he demanded softly.

"Oh, sorry, yeah," the other boy changed gears with a nod. "It was sick as fuck to see from the outside. I mean, I heal and glow all the time but I've never really glowed-it-up in the mirror or seen anyone else heal like me. I mean, there was Emma but…"

The long-haired boy froze, an incredulous expression on his face. "What?"

Greg blinked back. "What?"

Sparky took in a deep breath, chest shuddering before he asked again. "What do you mean, heal like you? You mean… you gave me your powers?" His question hung heavy in the air, his incredulity unmistakable.

As if unaware or ignoring the wariness on his friend's face, the blond rose to his feet, a smile on his lips and a snort leaving his mouth as he responded blithely, "I sure hope not. I kinda like being a special snowflake in this city. More likely your powers are just similar to mine, for some reason. Probably because you got them while I was doing… well, whatever we end up calling it, to save your life. I mean, can you imagine if I ended up giving you all my powers? You'd have to take over as Prodigy and Hardkour and run the gang to keep the city from imploding with turf-wars. That would kinda suck. Also, let's be real, everybody hates legacy capes too — never as good as the originals."

Thisisntamotherfuckingjoke! The scream remained internal, just the way Sparky liked it, and he simply stared at his friend and nodded, a similar smile on his face as his gratitude wrestled with a tag team duo of shock and worry. "Hehe… yeah."

Trying to ignore the fact that Greg had done something to him, changed him, only brought those changes to his attention — smell, sight, hearing, touch. Hell, even taste.

He could make out the dust in the air on his tongue, smell the accumulated leaves in the rain gutters outside, the soap from the laundry detergent on the bed sheets, the stale aroma of last night's Chinese food from downstairs. Even the individual, nigh-invisible strands of a spider-web at the very corner of Greg's ceiling was noticeable to his new superhuman eyes.

He closed his eyes, inhaling a slow, steady breath. Despite the flood of new sensory information, he maintained his breathing rhythm — in and out. He knew if he allowed himself to pause, he would let out a scream. He already felt a strong urge to lash out, to vent his frustration and confusion. Whatever Greg did to him — even if he doesn't know exactly what — he's not human anymore.

Finally, the teenager opens his mouth again, plastering a smile on his face that isn't entirely faked. "Makes sense, at least," Sparky began with a laugh. "I'm alive, right?"

"You know I honestly thought you'd be freaking the fuck out," Greg spoke up again, a slight but noticeable confusion coloring his words. "You're more freaked out about the part where I changed your clothes than… y'know, making you a cape."

Now it was Sparky's turn to hold up a finger, the long-haired boy pointing a single digit at his friend. "We're gonna get back to that later but… you're right. I really think I should be. It's insane but, for some reason… for some reason…" Sparky worked his digits, forming his fingers into tight fists before opening them once more, "this just feels right."

He could feel every inch of himself as he flexed his hands again, feeling the pulsing energy travel down his arms, coursing through his veins like liquid lightning.

An ever-present thrum of energy just beneath his skin.

"Uh-huh," Greg parroted back.

"Is this how you feel all the time?" The question was genuine, the last few syllables coming out like a whisper as he felt the coiled energy in his veins, heart pounding louder than he'd ever noticed before in his ears. A part of him recoiled at the idea, a quiet voice screaming in him that this wasn't right. But the larger part of him, the part that was experiencing it, was reveling in it, embracing the change. "Like the most natural thing ever."

"I… maybe?" Greg screwed up his face in a thoughtful expression, head tilting to the side in an authentic way that helped to reinforce Sparky's belief that his friend was still the same beneath everything else.

After a second, he raised his head and focused those suddenly-bright glowing eyes back onto Sparky's, mouth turned down in a thoughtful frown as the glow faded. "What do you feel?"

The teenager took a breath, the natural action sending a thrum of energy through him. The feeling pounded in tune with his heartbeat, power surging in his body in tune with his blood as his spine tingled with potential and the hair on his arms stood at attention. Sparky flexed his muscles and glanced down at his clenched forearms, half-expecting golden light to be visible just beneath his veins.

There was nothing to be seen, but he still felt it all the same.

"I feel good." Sparky grinned.

All hesitation vanished in an instant from Greg's face as the blond grinned back.

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

"Can you do me a favor?"

"What?"

"Say 'Menu'."

Sparky blinked, slowly realizing what the other teenager meant. With a slight hesitancy in his voice, he repeated the word. "M… Menu."

Nothing.

He said as much to Greg, his friend's face falling slightly.

"Okay… try 'Status'."

"Nope."

"Skills."

"Nuh-uh."

"Inventory?"

"Nada."

"...Well, guess you can't have everything. Anyway, welcome to the party… Player Two."

"Fuck you, no."