"And I'm Jacque. My power is the ability to turn invisible...though I haven't mastered it yet, I can only turn a portion of my body invisible at a time."

Zane started skeptically at the stocky boy as he made his hand from the wrist up vanish into thin air. It might've been a cool party trick but Zane found it hard to imagine it saving him in a life-or-death battle.

"Fascinating," Zane murmured sarcastically as the three boys looked at him expectantly. They'd all introduced themselves by their name and superpower, which Zane found incredibly stupid. 

They were sitting at a round table outside of one of the restaurants on the island. One of the boys who had introduced himself as Rocco leaned forward. Apparently, he had the ability to emit banshee cries which created sound waves powerful enough to attack enemies. He sure seemed to be talkative enough for such a power. "Well?" he asked intently.

"My name's Zane," Zane stated, purposely omitting his superpower. It wasn't supposed to be a part of an introduction as far as he was concerned.

"I hear you're a telekinetic," one of the boys said excitedly, unable to hold it in any longer. He'd introduced himself as Jai. He had obvious Indian heritage, but what stood out was his spiky hair which he had dyed orange with red tips. Zane had expected him to have fire powers but instead, the boy had explained he was able to emit energy out of the sole of his feet to propel him forward, similar to how a jet pack functioned. It was a unique power which the boy had very creatively dubbed propulsion.

Zane shot an accusatory glare at Rick who filled the last chair at the table. He seemed to have developed a new superpower; gossiping. "I know how shy you are," Rick said quickly, "just thought it'd be easier if I helped the introduction process."

"I'm not shy," Zane responded gruffly. "I just don't want every person in the world to know my business."

"Don't worry, you're secret is safe with us," Rocco said with a smile before it morphed into a thoughtful look. "Although...if you were planning to keep it a secret you probably shouldn't have gone ham on Richmond and his crew. Plenty of people saw it and they'll match your powers to your face soon enough."

Zane bit back a sigh. The banshee had a point - he'd embraced his powers when he'd publicly beat down the three and thus had taken a step in the direction of popularity - or rather notoriety. He looked at Rick curiously. It didn't seem like the boy's friends knew why they had ended up in that situation in the first place.

Rick noticed his look and quickly jumped in. "It's nothing my roomie can't handle. Even Ms.Stone seems to have taken an interest in him."

Before Zane could explain that Ms.Stone had said the exact opposite and she was just treating him like any new arrival, the boys launched into a loud conversation about what her interest could mean. He tuned out the boys gossiping and focused on his macaroni and cheese meal. 

He still hadn't received his SP card; a task that he aimed to complete today, so Rick had offered to buy him something and so he'd gone with the cheapest option, though he still intended to pay him back immediately.

The boys' gossip lasted until Zane was done with his plate, which tasted like heaven though that could be attributed to Zane's low orphanage standards.

"I'm going to Ms.Corbyn's office to get my SP card," Zane informed Rick, interrupting the boys' trivial chatter. One of the cowboy robots had come to his room to inform him his own card was ready to be picked up. Zane didn't get why the robot couldn't have brought it, but he wasn't complaining.

"I'll go with," Rick said, scrambling to keep up with Zane as he stood and started walking away. He waved a hasty goodbye to the others and then coughed pointedly. "Uh, Zane, you're going in the wrong direction."

Zane muttered a few choice words under his breath before following Rick after a quick U-turn. Since it was around midday, there were a lot more people loitering around than Zane had seen so far. He also noticed that there were some robots, attired in their cowboy gear walking around.

"What are the robots doing?" Zane asked.

Rick scoffed. "I can't believe it took you this long to mention them. When I first came I was sure they were a part of some evil coup to kill the newcomers that weren't good enough. To answer your question, though, they are patrolling."

Zane immediately wondered how strong they were individually. To be given the role of peacemaker against hot-headed young Metas sounded like it would require some might. "It's very convenient they weren't around when you were being used as a punching bag."

"Yeah, well, they patrol the areas with important buildings more, to ensure they aren't destroyed, I guess."

Zane wasn't surprised at the prioritizing, his neighborhood had been on the wrong end of such protection many times. As it turns out, the Super Heroes prefer to focus on areas with higher populations and media exposure, so they'd be praised more. Although that wasn't exactly the case here, it brought back memories for Zane.

"Speaking of you being a punching bag, why do your friends not know those guys give you trouble?"

Rick smiled but it didn't reach his eyes. "They are good guys, but it isn't their problem."

Zane wished he could say the same for himself. He suspected it was deeper than making it their problem, that it was more an issue of him not believing they were strong enough to help and not wanting them to share in his defeat.

It was nobly stupid to have friends and not give them the honor to help you - or at least, that's what Zane imagined would be the responsibility of a friend. However, he didn't consider it his place to judge or comment further

Zane found himself outside a moderately tall building where Rick assured him most of the offices were located.

Rick opted to stay outside, stating that the building gave him the creeps. Zane didn't find it any less creepy than every acre of the complex personally.

Inside was a board on the wall detailing which offices were on what floor. As it turned out, Ms.Corbyn's office was on the top floor. Which meant a long elevator ride that Zane wished was over before it began.

However, now that Zane had at least some idea of how to control his powers, the elevator ride didn't feel as scary as it did before he had any superpowers to speak of. He arrived in a hallway leading up to a door with one single cowboy robot standing guard. Its eyes glowed red as they focused on him before it opened the door and made way for him to pass.

Again he found himself wondering exactly how strong the robots were. Each seemed to stand around six feet and seemed nimble, rather than heavy-footed. As Zane passed the robot, he reached out with his telekinetic force and attempted to push it away lightly. To his dismay, his feet actually started to slide across the ground as he was pushed back by his own telekinetic force.

Just how heavy was this damn machine?

The dotted pupils which had been staring forward drifted to side-eye Zane in a red-tinged death stare that sent Zane hurrying into the room. 

Ms.Corbyn chuckled as he collected his bearings. "I wouldn't recommend testing them like that, there could be consequences."

"Them?"

"They are a hive mind, however, that's not the reason you're here, now is it?"

Zane got the feeling that she was purposely avoiding an in-depth explanation on how the robots operated but he didn't press the issue. "Yes, I've come for my SP card - the one which I suspect one of your robots could have delivered when he came to my room."

Ms.Corbyn chuckled. "Perhaps I wanted to check up on you. After all, I've heard you already made your presence known."

"Heard or seen?" Zane asked, adopting a challenging tone. "I refuse to believe you guys don't have something in place to monitor the fights in real time so they don't get out of control and damage your precious infrastructure." Ms. Corbyn said nothing, but she notably didn't deny his accusation. "What if - in my inexperience handling my powers, I'd have killed those boys?"

"You'd be punished," came the simple reply.

"And the boys' lives aren't important? Are they not powerful enough for you to care?" It felt weird defending the three stooges, but Zane didn't like how this system was starting to appear.

"Every life has value," she replied with a portrait smile, leaning forward on her desk with probing eyes. "But not every death has meaning. If you'd killed those boys who attacked you without reason, it would've served the purpose of teaching you the importance of learning control, both over your powers and self. For the boys, it would've been a consequence of pointless aggression."

Zane scoffed but he remembered Director Han's words; everyone had free will, but some choices had consequences. It seemed the institution was ready to border on immorality to endorse the presence of free will. "Doesn't make it alright to just spectate."

Ms.Corbyn offered him a card with writing emblazed on it which he took. "This conversation has turned down an insipid avenue, dear. Make sure you don't lose your card and I'd recommend you use your allowance wisely, as well." With that she refocused her attention on her laptop and Zane took it as his signal to leave.

After exiting the building and reuniting with an excited Rick, Zane had one very important goal in mind, which he considered his most important task since coming here.

Buy dog food for Max with his own money.

That'd be a first.

≫ ──────── ≪•◦ ❈ ◦•≫ ──────── ≪

The next day started out uneventful, until the class Zane was beginning to find as the only bright spot on the island rolled around.

Battle Training.

Zane had fully expected to be once again sent to the backroom where he'd continue to practice lifting and stopping objects as he'd be instructed to do at home as well, but Ms.Stone let him stay with the main group as the scheduled Spar Day occurred. 

Spar Day was exactly what it sounded like. Students were able to spar against each other in a random matchmaking process inside the arena to showcase the strategies they had learnt and the control and creativity they had developed with their powers.  There was a one-on-one spar day and a team spar day, today was scheduled to be the former. 

Admittedly, it was a little compelling to watch Metas fight against each other, whether it be overpowering the other with a better power or finding inventive methods to come away with the win. It was especially interesting when Jai and Rick ended up matching up.

As it turned out, Jai wasn't underselling his abilities at all; his powers really just consisted of emitting some type of force from his feet that propelled him forward. However, the boy had developed some crafty ways of using his ability, angling his body at various angles to dash forward to strike or dodge backward or sideways. Rick, on the other hand, displayed some extremely raw boxing techniques that clearly weren't taught by an expert - but was enough to get by when dealing with another novice.

Their fight came down to a battle of wills. Although Jai was much more agile because of his 'propulsion', Rick was naturally stronger because of his working out and his sturdy healing factor quickly erased any damage Jai was able to inflict. Just as Zane was beginning to wonder if Ms.Stone would let the two go on all day, Jai gave up, knowing it was pointless to continue.

Rick celebrated as if he'd just singlehandedly brought down the most powerful Metas in the world which elicited some laughter from the spectators.

"Well, you're next, Zane," Ms.Stone said from next to him.

Zane raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure? I've been practicing as you instructed but I'm still not sure how much control I'll have in a fight," Zane admitted. In his fight against the bullies, he'd taken them by surprise and they'd never recovered. If he faced someone with proper experience it'd be a different story.

"I know, putting you up against one of your peers could be dangerous to either one of you...which is why you'll be facing me."

Zane hesitated. It seemed that Ms.Stone's only power was creating clones of herself but she was given the role of teaching strategy and tactics to new Metas, which meant she was more than qualified in the experience category. He didn't underestimate her a bit.

Ms.Stone smiled at his hesitation. "If you'd rather not face me that's fine, I just thought some battle training on the side would do you well," she said in a slightly teasing voice. He could tell she was trying to antagonize him into accepting but there was no need.

"I'll do it."

A murmur went up in the crowd as Zane faced off against Ms.Stone. They didn't know who he was or what he was capable of, but it was very rare to see Ms.Stone take on someone and so they watched intently.

Predictably, Ms.Stone started off by cloning herself into multiple projections which Zane counted as five. He'd seen multiple versions of her lift objects simultaneously so he knew they weren't intangible projections, but there was no way they could be as strong as the main body.

Right?

A gong sounded and Zane swiped his hand in a wide arc and was rewarded with the obedience of his telekinesis, as the force pushed toward the duplicates and hopefully, the main body. Unable to see the invisible attack, the force smashed into all his targets, sending them flying back into the far wall of the arena.

A large dust smoke drifted into the arena and Zane wondered if it was already over. Suddenly, two figures darted out of the dust cloud from different angles, coming towards him in a wide berth. 

Knowing that behind him was the only spot he could be sure no clones were, Zane started drifting backward, focused on making sure he wasn't surrounded. However, he severely underestimated the speed of Ms.Stone and her clones, as before he could lay his eyes back on them again, the one on the right landed a punch.

It was the first time a punch had actually been connected by a Meta and it was easily the most pain his abdomen had ever felt. He winced, instinctively flinching to the left which ended up being a horrible idea, as his half shut eyes saw a flying boot before the Ms.Stone on the left landed a solid kick straight to his face which sent him soaring away.

His mouth leaked blood and his face felt like it'd been hit by a hammer repeatedly. What he found fascinating though, was he could almost feel his body healing as the thumping pain started to subside and his leaking blood slowed down, as if someone was turning down a faucet. It was a weird feeling, but it also felt empowering, he felt invincible.

He stood back up, noting the five Ms.Stones advancing on him. Luckily, she had decided not to surround him, which was probably a result of her taking it easy on him. 

Or so he thought.

He saw a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye and turned quickly to see that five Ms.Stones were approaching from the other side as well. Zane guessed that strategies weren't apart of her holding back, since the crowd was also students who could learn from her tactics.

Zane sighed, knowing he couldn't overpower ten Ms.Stones directly, which meant he'd have to resort to some sort of trick. A small smile tugged at his face as he remembered one of the moves that he'd been practicing in the apartment.

That might just work.

He crouched down and waited for the Ms.Stones to come a little closer. He could see the confusion on their faces as they observed his maneuver but they continued forward like he wanted. He started to spin, slowly standing up from his crouch as the world spun and he activated his telekinesis, thrusting his telekinetic force away from him and at the clones all around him.

Back in his room, he'd practiced emitting force from around him in a circle and the result had been only rustling a few books pages. He just couldn't get the power behind it at his level. Instead of giving up, though, he brainstormed until coming up with spinning his body to generate more power and was rewarded by half of his belongings being blown away.

Now - this was the first time trying it on a human and he could only hope he succeeded. Dust rustled as the force once again stretched outward and slammed into the Ms.Stones, this time sending them jolting backward at breakneck speed. 

Zane's mouth dropped open at how good it had worked...and then something happened that he never saw coming and Rick had to recount to him later. 

Due to the immense force behind his telekinetic force, the dust particles on the floor had responded as they were disturbed, telegraphing the oncoming wave. Ms.Stone seeing this, jumped up onto one of her clones ' shoulders and used it as a trampoline, leaping into the air in  a great athletic feat - even for a Meta. Then, as she started falling toward Zane, she transitioned into a flip, maximizing the force of her foot which she swung down onto Zane's head, crushing it into the floor and leaving him motionless.

For Zane, all he saw was black.