Chapter 1: Eureka!
"I finally did it!" exclaimed Sam to no one as he had been alone working on what he thought would change mankind. He jumped out of his chair and ran over to his, what would only be described as a 3D printer that had just "BEEPED" its conclusive tone. Inside the containment field of the printer was an almost gun like object with a long needle in it, an injector if you will. If one was to take a gander at what just appeared as well as the reaction just shouted, one would think Sam just created the Galaxy's best vaccine. However, the liquid inside of the injector was the color of a shiny metal liquid, upon looking closely with a microscope one could see the trillions of tiny robots that were moving around in all sorts of directions just waiting to be implemented.
What most don't know about Sam is that he has been working on one thing and one thing only since he heard his father's secret confession one night when his parents thought he was busy in his room like always. Sam had unfortunately felt thirsty the same time that his father had arrived home from a long office trip. His father John worked in a specific field for the Galactic Federation, the current one government system of the known galaxy, one that only a few people even knew existed nonetheless knew who John was and what he did.
John had come home to his wife Mary and decided to let out his frustration as well as his concern for the current GF policies. No one would listen to him about the threat he just encountered on the black portal planet designated P415. See John was considered the best at what he does but when he would report dangers they would get filed away and left for another day. John is the Commander of the SPRU, or Special Portal Reconnaissance Unit, which regularly goes out to unknown portals that are discovered. John coming home and being frightened was not something that Mary had ever seen before nor had Sam ever heard his dad sound so scared.
What Sam was trying to do was make sure that what scared his father so long ago never made it their homeworld, Hathin. Hathin's population was roughly 4 billion citizens of the Galactic Federation. Given the clearance levels that John had and Sam being gifted with computers made it easy for Sam to snoop around and figure out all that was going on that had his father so spooked.
Sam was only three galactic cycles old, (a galactic cycle is 1,000 days, a month was 100 days, a week was 10 days and a day was 20 hours) when John was as pale as a ghost, Sam spent the last six galactic cycles tirelessly working on it making no friends, well except for Andrei. Andrei was the one person who understood Sam, or at least gave Sam a chance to explain himself. Sam thought Andrei was a Saint as he would defend Sam from bullies at school, the park, even in their own neighborhood where the two of them were neighbors, Andrei always had his back. They also shared a unique problem, neither one of them had manifested a power.
Most humanoids in the galaxy would have a power that manifested by their 9th galactic cycle, these powers varied greatly from one person to the next. There were common powers among the different races and unique ones that only manifested themselves to a few. Powers ranged from people being able to make the perfect food according to the individual's taste buds up to and including transforming into creatures or controlling the elements or biotic abilities.
With Sam and Andrei not having manifested anything yet there was starting to be concern from both of their parents that their kid might be in for a long rough road given the society that they were in and Powers literally dictated what they were going to be in life. Sam had grabbed the injector and went looking specifically for Andrei.
What Sam did not know was that his work had been traced and watched over secretly by an unknown entity. Three men were standing outside of Sam's apartment just out of view but still could see when Sam might leave. If Sam wasn't so happy about what he just accomplished he might have recognized sooner that he was being followed.
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When it comes to physical specimens, in terms of ideal genetics for a man, one would say that Andrei has been blessed. Being 6 foot 6 inches tall and maybe still growing gave him an intimidating presence. His autumn colored deep red hair with dark green eyes, a strong button nose and what could only be called a natural frown. One thing Andrei never liked though was his freckles. Not only was it a source of scorn from classmates but he felt like the many colors of them were ugly.
What set Andrei apart from others besides his build was the fact that he never seemed to get along with anyone. He would never be invited to anything which stemmed from his first birthday party he ever attended which was Sam's 4th.
Two of the boys were seen picking on a small girl who only wanted to play with her doll and be left alone. Andrei saw the two boys laughing and making fun of the girl while playing keep away with the doll. A wave of rage filled Andrei for the first time. He had no idea how much it was affecting him but when he went over to the two boys to force them to give the doll back he ended up shouting.
His shouting was so loud everyone stopped what they were doing to look to see what all the commotion was about. That is when the boys continued to laugh and taunted Andrei which enraged him further. The next thing anyone knew, both boys had broken noses, one had a dislocated shoulder and the other's knee was sprained severely. Andrei didn't have a scratch on him, only huffing and puffing as he tried to calm down. Parents had rushed over but the fighting had stopped before any parent could save the two boys.
Needless to say Andrei did not get invited to any neighborhood or class parties after that as most 4 cycles old's weren't strong enough or big enough to break anyone's bones. Andrei didn't mind this as Sam was a good enough friend for the times he needed someone to talk to, everyone else was just blah to him.
John had a big impact also in Andrei's life as he was the one who consoled Andrei that first day of rage. John took Andrei to his personnel state of the art training room. The room had a built in VR Assistant that would personalize each individual's workout. Andrei learned how to make his body strong and to control his rage by venting in the weight room. This became a habit for Andrei to go to Sam's and then head to John's weight room. Typically Andrei would do this when Sam would be too intrigued in whatever he was currently working on.
What Andrei never knew was that the personnel assistant was slowly making his body into a powerhouse. Andrei made a lot of people nervous just by his presence alone, nonetheless he never smiled at anyone which gave an even more scary vibe to anyone who paid attention to Andrei.
What only Sam knew was that Andrei was a softy at heart. Andrei would spend his days reading sappy love novels written about fictitious creatures that would seduce mankind to their whim. Andrei would get a kick out of how they would be the knight in shining armor with a secret. He thought he could never keep something like that a secret.
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Sam had left his apartment building with a hop in his step. He was so excited to tell Andrei that what he had been working on all his life was finally going to be ready and that Andrei was going to be the driver of it.
He then felt like he was being followed as he felt movement behind him which he ignored until he did a twirl in his dance and noticed three men were following him and closing in. He did a quick look over his shoulder as he continued on and seeing that they were closer than before he jolted into a sprint.
The three men took off in pursuit with all of them in a full sprint when Sam turned the corner of the building he could see Andrei's large figure off in the distance. He told his body if it ever had to run its fastest it's now and his legs started churning at an increased pace.
Seeing Sam running to him put a small smile on Andrei's face, not often was Sam seen running in general so Andrei thought something big must be happening in the world of computers for him to be so excited. What Andrei did not realize was that Sam was running for his life.
"Andrei! Andrei!" Sam exclaimed "we don't have any time, give me your arm!"
"What?" Andrei had never seen Sam flustered like this and was starting to get nervous, what kind of request was that. Without thinking Sam jabbed the injector into Andrei's arm, it went deep and hurt like hell. "OUCH!" exclaimed Andrei "What in the h…"
Suddenly Andrei was in an all white location, having no idea what was going on he started touching his arm and noticed no pain, when he looked he could not see anything wrong with his arm. Also now his clothes were completely different, how did that happen so quickly he wondered.
Looking around the white space he took a step forward and instantly a screen came up out of seemingly nowhere. The screen had a simple looking interface so Andrei took another step forward and touched the screen.
As instantly as he was in the all white space he was now looking at a man dressed in military fatigues. "Sorry for the quick thaw Master Chief, things are a little hectic right now"..."The Demon is here"..."We did what we had to do for Earth"...
As if beating thousands of weird aliens with some really cool weapons wasn't enough, he felt like he did what he had to do only to then be transferred out of Master Chief to suddenly holding a large axe with a small boy standing beside him "Father what should we do?" Father? What is this boy talking about? Andrei thought to himself, staring at the yellow hand on the tree in front of him.
Fighting as Kratos was even more fun than Master Chief but to be called the God of War…what is happening to me? Andrei was enjoying this new found power he was getting as he went from one experience to the next.
"Commander Shepard, what are we going to do about the Reapers?"..."Zug Zug, Something needs doing?"...."The Protoss are eternal"..."The whole realm of Skyrim owes you"...
His vision went from black to normal and Andrei was looking back at Sam who was now standing there completely out of breath bent over with his hands on his knees trying to catch his breath. Andrei, still unsure of what just happened, looked around to make sure he was not in another whatever that was. Recognizing his surroundings as his neighborhood park and Sam, his best friend, is next to him his vision all of a sudden had something pop up as if it was in his head.
["New Quest: Tutorial"]
["Reward: Instant Level Up"]
"What in the name of…" Andrei was standing there baffled, what is this tutorial quest option seemingly in my view right now. "Stop right there, what did you just give him?" an unknown man had come to a halt 10 yards away with 2 other men shortly behind him who had followed Sam since he left his home. Andrei did not know what just happened and Sam couldn't respond and that is when all three men checked their ear piece with their right hand all at the same time as if it was choreographed.
The next thing Andrei knew he was looking at three guns being pulled on him and Sam and without warning all three guns were fired. That is when a female voice said to him "Adrenaline Rush" and an icon popped up in the lower part of his view. He had no time to read it but noticed that after the voice stated that the bullets coming out of the guns suddenly seemed to slow down.
"Am I seeing this correctly?" Andrei started thinking to himself, "how can i see the bullets and man I better move out of the way". The bullets were moving at a normal speed just Andrei was now able to perceive them at a rate that seemed like they were going slowly. After stepping out of the way and out of danger of the bullets they suddenly accelerated past Andrei.
"He has a power, looks like speed, maybe we should get out of here that dude is big" said one of the three men with the now seemingly worthless guns. They had no idea that Andrei just did something he didn't know was possible, so they did not know they weren't in that much danger. That was until Andrei saw where the bullets ended up going.
"I'm sorry my friend but you are our only hope!" was the last thing Sam spoke to his best friend who always looked after him. Andrei didn't know how to react, the rage that he felt that day at Sam's 4th birthday paled in comparison to the rage he felt now. "WHAT THE HELL! FUCK YOU COME BACK HERE NOW!" Andrei blurted out.
In his vision the "Adrenaline Rush" box appeared with a line circling through the box going clockwise with a red tint being dissolved as the line moved. He just thought about the skill of "Adrenaline Rush" and the three men running away seemed to have slowed down again. In fact now that he was looking around at non threatening scenery he realized everything had slowed down.
The three guys did not have a chance as Andrei caught up to them quickly, however not realizing it the skill ran out as he caught up to the three men. This was going to be tricky because if any of them were to shoot their guns at him he would not be able to dodge it. Seeing the box fill red and line moving again he was trying to figure out the timing, 5 seconds gone by, it's a quarter of the way so quickly he estimated he had 20 seconds to wait what was probably 1-2 seconds of the skill active.
Not knowing the extent of his powers the three men had given up on their guns working having seen Andrei dodge the bullets. Guns were good for those without fighting powers but were usually worthless against those with fighting powers, especially speed powers. The first man that Andrei had caught up to threw out a punch that even without the skill it was seen from a mile away, Andrei having been in many fights but never learned how to defend himself didn't know how to block the slow attack properly and when he raised his arm to stop the blow he missed and the blow hit him square across the chin.
The two other men seeing Andrei get hit thought they might have a chance, so they stopped running and joined in on the fight. Andrei got hit now from all sides, the three men were throwing kicks and punches at Andrei. Thinking they had him beat and he was going to give up any moment, Andrei's skill cooldown had finally finished and he was able to activate "Adrenaline Rush" once again.
This time the three men were in close proximity to Andrei and Andrei took full advantage of this. Now with them slowed down Andrei was able to get out of the curled up ball position he had been in and gotten up before any of the three could finish their current punch or kick.
This is pretty spicy! Andrei thought. Seeing these three guys still in the process of trying to throw attacks Andei was not sure how long he would have as he was still getting used to this ability but he knew one thing that would knock any man down quickly.
All three men collapsed mid attack and quickly grabbed their mid section. One of them said with an octave higher voice "Stop, you don't have to do this!" but Andrei was not listening to anything they were saying. He hadn't realized that his power was over as he grabbed the two closest men's heads and smashed the two of them together.
The one who could talk was the only one alive at this point, "We were ordered to make sure that kid didn't pass anything along, when you got the injection our boss said to eliminate both of you, but we didn't know you had powers, we were told both of you didn't"
"Told? By who?" Andrei stated while dropping the now two dead heads that were in his hands. He took two steps closer to the third man who now all of a sudden went quiet. "TOLD BY WHO!!!" Andrei's face was almost purple, the rage hadn't stopped, it was only rising. Andrei suddenly sniffed the air, that is when he realized the man in front of him was pissing himself. Disgusted by the man in front of him for killing his best and only friend, Andrei's rage had completely taken over him as he slammed his fist straight through the man's cheek bone. The collapse of the bone was so strong that the coroner could file the report as all three killed with super strength.
Lost and out of breath, completely confused about what just happened. He thought he spent months going from one experience to the next only to find out that it was mere seconds. Then he gets this strange power that allows him to see bullets flying. Just what is this quest that I got, thought Andrei.