《Hero or Villain?》


 Chapter 1

    ¡°Welcome Champion choose your power¡± A deep mellifluous voice boomed out of the impenetrable darkness surrounding me. Then a blue screen appeared before me with a list.


    <table>


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Speed


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Strength


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Perception


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Defense


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Magic


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Mental


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Technology


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Energy


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Elemental


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    To say I was confused would be a bit of an understatement. Waking up in pitch black conditions to a deep voice talking about powers would be one thing, but then to have some magic screen pop up stepped up my confusion to a whole new level. Last time I checked Earth didn¡¯t have VR, or at least not any good VR. Maybe this was some sort of augmented reality thing. That made more sense, someone probably put contact lenses in my eyes that allowed me to see the screen. How or why they did that I have no idea, so I spoke up, ¡°Ugh dude, what¡¯s going on and where am I?¡±


    The voice boomed again, ¡°Seriously, just pick a power, I don¡¯t want to have to explain a plane between life and death to someone that can barely grasp the concept..¡±


    My left eyebrow shot up at that statement and I cocked my head to the right. I still couldn¡¯t find the source of the voice, but my last memory was starting to come back to me. I was at work in a call center, that¡¯s right I was a telemarketer, not my first choice either but I had to pay for college somehow. I¡¯d been reading my lines preparing for another rejection when I heard the first gun shot. Then the shooter yelled out, ¡°You assholes have interrupted me for the last time.¡± He might have continued talking, but the screaming and panic sort of drowned him out. I know it wasn¡¯t exactly brave of me, but I hid under my desk.


    It¡¯s not my fault that there was only one door and I didn¡¯t fancy a run past the shooter, after all the first person to try it died before I even finished hiding. Of course killing just two telemarketers wasn¡¯t enough for the madman, he then proceeded to blindly fire through the cubicles missing way more often than he hit. If he had a pistol that would have been fine for most of us, unfortunately he was one of those well prepared psychos who brought some kind of high capacity rapid firing weapon to the party. For every seven bullets that completely missed everyone 3 were hitting something.


    I watched as coworker after coworker was hit by bullets or shrapnel. Then miraculously the shooting stopped. I say miraculously but then I heard the magazine hit the ground as he slotted a new one into the gun. So much for miracles, the asshole apparently needed to reload. At that point I knew I wasn¡¯t going to make it out of this mess by hiding and some hero wasn¡¯t going to swoop in to save the day so I crawled forward toward the door and toward the area he had shot up the most. I kept out of sight as I made my way forward, taking note of the frightened expressions of my coworkers as they hid under their desks. I guess they too were just hoping he would run out of bullets and go away without killing them.


    While staring at the terror stricken faces of my coworkers I took the time to notice how I couldn¡¯t hear anything like screaming or crying, the only thing that really came through was the pounding of my heart and the surge of adrenaline that came with it. I made it to the cubicle closest to the door before the shooter opened up again. Ah yeah, there was a sound that broke through the overwhelming pounding of my heartbeat, the unpleasant and unwelcome staccato of more gunfire. I hunkered down behind the bullet ridden cubicle as my former position was targeted by the shooter. I closed my eyes and waited for the bullet storm to end unwilling to watch the deadly result of the shooter¡¯s fury.


    When the gun seemed to run out of bullets again after what seemed like an eternity I took a quick breath, opened my eyes and made a run for the door. I¡¯m not sure if I was just trying to make it out of the room or if I was trying to take out the shooter. At that point my heart was pumping so hard that I¡¯m sure half my blood was replaced with pure adrenaline. There wasn¡¯t a lot of rational thoughts running through my mind. It didn¡¯t really matter either way. As I got my first real look at the shooter I realized I wasn¡¯t going to make it.


    The shooter stood at maybe 5¡¯10¡± with long blond hair and piercing blue eyes, he had a surfer¡¯s tan and a nose that had clearly been broken at some point. Of course while all those features were fairly unremarkable they framed something that I will never forget, his smile. The man was smiling so big I could almost see his molars, his teeth were slightly yellow and two of them were missing, almost as if someone had removed the canines from his mouth leaving hauntingly symmetrical gaps in the insane smile.


    Of course while I was admiring his features, oh and charging like a bull, the insane shooter was pulling a handgun. I got close to the shooter, maybe only seven feet away before I felt something tear through my body. The caliber of the bullet must not have been very large, because I didn¡¯t get pushed back, I didn¡¯t even lose much momentum so I continued toward the shooter while each half second a new bullet entered my body tearing into something vital.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    I ran directly into the shooter blood pouring from my wounds knocking him to the ground. I¡¯d like to say that I intentionally followed him to the floor in order to disarm him, but frankly I could already feel the life fading from my body. So I fell on top of him. His gun had been knocked away by our collision though it hadn¡¯t gone far. I reached out for it with the limited strength I had left, the motion was jerky and awkward as muscles in my back that would normally help with the motion had been destroyed by the exit wounds.


    My hand came in contact with the gun, meanwhile the shooter was busy trying to get my rather limp body off of him. Fortunately I was a large man and he wouldn¡¯t have an easy time shifting my bulk. With the gun in my hand I moved my hand a little bit to face it toward myself and the shooter trapped beneath me and pulled the trigger. I pulled it once, twice three four five times. Nothing happened, the shooter kept struggling to get me off of him and I stared blankly at the gun. Apparently the shooter had emptied the whole thing into me.


    I didn¡¯t last long after that, my vision already going dark at that point cut out. The struggles of the shooter finally yielded dividends and I felt him get out from under me. Then a booming voice awakened me from my slumber or death I guess and showed me the whole blue screen of choices thing.


    I spoke up, my last moments now fresh in my mind, ¡°Did I just die?¡±


    The voice boomed, ¡°Kind of, but not quite, anyway pick your power I don¡¯t have all day for this.¡±


    Me not dying after having an entire clip emptied into me didn¡¯t make a lot of sense, but then again this whole thing didn¡¯t make a lot of sense. ¡°Okay, so before I pick my power or whatever, can you explain to me what¡¯s going on?¡±


    The diety boomed, ¡°ugh, fine I¡¯ll give you the broad strokes, but you literally aren¡¯t worth much of my time, so this is going to be quick. I¡¯m a god from a different reality, I just moved into this one and my brothers and I are having a competition the see who gets control of the resources from this one. We do this with every new reality and this time the competition is taking place on earth. You will be one of my champions, I will reward you for gaining power, whether it is financial, social or political power, it doesn¡¯t matter to me, the stronger your position becomes, the stronger I will make you. I¡¯ll even allow you to pick the direction of your growth, so do your best to amass power otherwise you¡¯ll probably end up dead¡­¡±


    I paused for a second to left that soak in before responding, ¡°Okay so just to be clear, you saved me from death, your letting me start a new life on a different earth than the one I¡¯m from and you want me to amass wealth, fame, and reputation in order to help you win a competition between you and some other gods. I guess me real question is if you win what will you do? I mean if I am going to fight for you, which champion implies, what will you do with what I win you?¡±


    The god paused, ¡°Frankly, not much, I¡¯ll use the belief generated to expand my influence, I don¡¯t really care about good or evil, or anything else really, I like to let you mortals do whatever you want, honestly your whole debate over morality is a joke to us higher beings. Anyway, I¡¯m better than my brothers, because they actually kind of care about what you do and I don¡¯t. Can you imagine not being able to take a piss in public because it is too evil or taking a shit in a toilet because it is too good?¡±


    ¡°First off, why are those the two examples and second off why do the other deities care about that stuff?¡±


    ¡°Frankly we don¡¯t, but what we do care about is when you mortals offer up your defiance, now my brothers all have a strict moral code they expect you to live by, a set of laws that range from pointlessly detailed needlessly vague. I have one too, but it¡¯s pretty simple, don¡¯t kill all of my followers and direct your faith toward me. The shitting and pissing examples came from two of my brothers holy books.¡±


    ¡°Wait, so if I were to piss in a public place?¡±


    ¡°You would literally be crushed by a meteorite.¡±


    ¡°...¡±


    ¡°...¡±


    ¡°So, how do these powers work?¡±


    The god responded, ¡°I will enhance your body or your mind to allow you to perform superhuman feats, if you pick speed I can enhance your body to move 4 times faster than it used to, or I could give you the ability to slow time so it would appear to the world that you were moving at twice your previous maximum speed. Same thing with strength, I could quadruple your physical strength or provide limited telekinesis that would double your apparent strength.¡±


    ¡°So with each category I can either get a physical or mental improvement, the physical one being the stronger of the two?¡±


    The god chuckled, ¡°Yes and no, but I¡¯m tired of answering your questions so make your choice so that I can send you out into the world and you can start gaining power.¡±


    I guess it was time to consider my options. I eliminated strength right away, who wants to be super strong, most big things would tear the minute you tried to pick them up and who wants to deal with accidentally breaking everything because you don¡¯t have you strength completely under control.


    Perception might be cool, although I had a feeling it would be something like a spider sense or potentially being able to see into the future. It would be useful if combined with something else, but without pairing it up its¡¯ value dropped significantly. Same thing with defense, without some kind of offensive ability defense would get owned be a constant stream of attacks. Frankly they all seemed to have some kind of weakness, tech would cost too much money, elemental could suck, imagine stopping a bad guy only to set half the city on fire. Energy was a little vague which left mental, speed and magic.


    Magic could be anything and frankly it would be awesome to be able to do magic, although I would be really annoyed if it was just something like sleight of hand and illusions. Mental would also be good, as it would either give me some kind of psychic power like telekinesis or telepathy, or potentially it could increase my intelligence. Then there was Speed, the Flash was one of my favorite superheros I loved his powers and always kind of thought he could have used them better, there were just so many possibilities that being a speedster opened up, plus if you want to power up in a hurry speed is always a good option.


    I nodded and made my choice. ¡°I¡¯ll take speed, the time slowing version, not the physical enhancement please.¡±


    ¡°Also, how do I upgrade my powers and will I be given a choice every¡± I wasn¡¯t able to finish the sentence as I suddenly felt a shooting pain erupt from my temples. I kid you not it was worse than being shot, and I can say that now, because I was literally shot less than an hour ago. The throbbing pain became my world for far too long, I¡¯m not sure how long it lasted I do know I blacked out for a little while as the world changed from an endless dark void into a city once again.

 Chapter 2

    The pain was already starting to subside, going from a world shattering all consuming pain to merely a throbbing ache, uncomfortable sure, but when you¡¯ve been shot it puts things in perspective. Sure I didn¡¯t really want to move or do anything other than go to sleep and forget that the last few hours ever occurred but I was in a new world now and I needed to figure some things out before I could take a much needed rest.


    I examined my surroundings and immediately determined I was in a major city. I was surrounded by skyscrapers, Star Banking, Freeman¡¯s Financial, Harvest Investments, Quigly¡¯s Subs, regardless of whatever city I found myself in it became quickly apparent that I was in its¡¯ financial district. The streets were basically empty except for the one homeless guy lying next to me on some cardboard with a thin blanket covering him. He had a mostly empty bottle of beer tipped over next to his head, all of which was par for the course as far as financial districts are concerned. I was sitting down in front of the entrance to the Freeman¡¯s Financial building and tried to get my head on straight. I needed to figure a lot of things out.


    First off resources, I now moved twice as fast as any other regular human being, at least I probably did, that part was still untested so I¡¯d hold off on banking on said ability until I had a chance to try it out. Besides my new super power I also had my dress shirt and pants which currenlty had bullet holes and blood all over the place. Not really sure if I could count those as resources at this point, I suppose it was better than being naked, but not much better as it was sure to raise some questions. I also had my wallet which was filled with credit cards that didn¡¯t link to any active accounts and about 30 dollars that were probably not valid anywhere on this new world.


    So I had a healthy body that could probably move super fast and hey I was now debt free so that¡¯s always positive. How many other 22 year old men could say they didn¡¯t owe anything to anyone. Not many, that¡¯s for sure. So I was in the financial district of a city with nothing to my name except for some blood soaked clothes and a probably super power. I¡¯m guessing my new patron was recommending I do something about my current financial woes. I¡¯m not proud of the thoughts that started running through my head, but when faced with being homeless and flat broke I at least began to consider a life of crime.


    So now that I had a basic grasp of my resources it was time to consider short term goals and long term goals, short term, I needed to get some local currency, get some new clothes and then find a place to sleep. Long term I¡­


    My train of thought was broken when I saw three men come out of the Star bank building. This normally isn¡¯t a cause for alarm except they had on ski masks, were carrying guns and had sacks filled with what I can only assume was money or other valuables you might find stored in a bank. So my new patron was providing me with an opportunity, which was super convenient. I guess every now and then it pays to have a literal god on your side.


    So time to make a choice, I could apprehend these guys and hopefully be rewarded for my good deed. I would then be in a position to leverage the good will of the authorities to establish an identity and start a life as a superhero. Money would probably be tight initially but I¡¯d be doing good work and wouldn¡¯t have any trouble sleeping at night.


    Or I could stop the three crooks, take the money and use it as way to start my new life. Establishing my identity might be a little harder, but I¡¯ve found that having money tends to make everything easier¡­


    Either way I needed to stop those guys in order to have a chance to make said decision so it¡¯s time to see if this super power actually works. I focused on the pain as I¡¯m sure it had something to do with my new powers and I felt something weird. It was like being aware of the muscles in my calves, sure I¡¯m always aware of the fact that they exist, but without conscious thought, they just kind of sit there and do as their told by my subconscious mind. It¡¯s only when I actively thought about it that I could actually sense my new ability to manipulate my personal time. So I flexed my ¡°time muscle¡± and suddenly everyone was moving a lot slower. I would have been awed by the fact that I could now manipulate time, but the dull throbbing ache I¡¯d been experiencing suddenly ratched up to a sharp stabbing pain.


    I needed to move fast and take these guys out before the pain became debilitating. I deactivated my super speed and began improvising a plan. I got off the ground, grabbed the mostly empty beer bottle off the ground and started stumbling toward the now slowed thieves. I moved slow enough so as to not draw attention to myself, whilst maintaining a drunken stumble so that when they did look over I would appear as some drunk looking for change.


    As I made my way toward the thieves I did my best to plan out the next few seconds, first off I needed to confirm my first impression of them. I couldn¡¯t see much of their faces due to the masks, but I could tell they were white and male. They also weren¡¯t very big, the tallest amongst them was maybe 5¡¯ 9¡± the other two were around 5¡¯ 7¡±. So I was going to have an advantage once I got into range for things to get physical. They had their weapons lowered as they made their way out of the bank, they were slowly scanning the street, I was fairly sure they''d notice me shortly, hopefully they¡¯d buy my hastily improvised disguise. If not I¡¯d need to move fast.


    I continued to stumble toward the three, I¡¯d made it to maybe fifteen feet away from them before they noticed me, the darkness of the night was really kind to me, they¡¯d have probably noticed me immediately if it had been daylight, or if the street lights weren¡¯t so sparse. The guy who noticed me was one of the smaller guys, he nudged the big one and pointed at me. I was 10 feet away when the big one, whom I¡¯m assuming was the leader of the trio said, ¡°What the fuck do you think you¡¯re doing boy. Fuck off before we make you.¡±


    I lifted my hands and slurred my words in response, ¡°Whoa man, I wash jus gone ta take a pish, didn¡¯t mean nothin by it.¡±


    The ¡°big man¡± replied, ¡°Well take a piss somewhere else ya fuckin wino.¡±


    I took a step back and the three men dismissed me from their thoughts and began making their way away from the bank. As soon as they turned away from me I made my move. I reactivated my super speed to another increase in the pain I¡¯d been experiencing and started sprinting toward them. It took them a second to register the noise and another to begin to react. By that time I¡¯d already come into range of the crooks. I swung the bottle at the smaller crook on the right, the bottle shattered against the back of his skull and he was launched forward toward the ground. While he was being knocked forward I¡¯d already recovered from the attack. I aimed the sharp stub of a bottle at the goon on the left¡¯s right arm, you know the one holding a gun that was slowly making its way toward me.


    The bottle easily penetrated the other thief¡¯s forearm, causing him to clench his his hand in pain which happened to cause the gun to go off. The bullet left the barrel of the gun and promptly entered the side of the leader who was still in the process of turning around to deal with the unexpected threat behind him. I had enough time to see the spray of blood leave the leader¡¯s side before he got his hand on the wound and attempted to staunch the bleeding.


    While the leader was distracted with his new gunshot wound I decided to finish off the thief I¡¯d stabbed. I punched him across his jaw with my now freed right hand. His head rapidly turned as my fist connected, his body followed his head and he ended up doing a completed 360 spin before collapsing to the ground. The leader still grasping his wound tried to turn his gun on me, and probably would have succeeded too if I didn¡¯t have super speed. I slid along behind his back, making sure to keep his body between the barrel of the gun and myself. He couldn¡¯t turn fast enough to deal with me and rabbit punch to the back of his head was enough to knock him out.


    With all three crooks out for the count it was time to collect the loot and get the hell out of there. Yeah lets be real, I don¡¯t care that this was some kind of alternate reality, a black man takes out three white men, all of whom have serious injuries¡­ There¡¯s no way I leave the ordeal with the love and appreciation of the authorities, at best I am questioned and released, more likely I¡¯m in jail while the three men are put into the hospital. So yeah, I gathered up the three bags, the two unfired guns and the jacket of the one I¡¯d knock out with the beer bottle. I stashed the guns in one of the bags as I didn¡¯t want to get caught walking down a major city street toting a couple of guns. When I put the jacket on I felt the familiar weight of keys and a wallet inside.


    I patted the other two down, pulled their wallets, keys then I removed the leader¡¯s jacket and shirt, made a makeshift bandage tightened it around his wound and got away from the scene of the crime. As I left I checked my new keys to see if one of them had a car.


    Apparently between the three of them there was Ford and something with a Z. I¡¯d never heard of that brand but I¡¯d keep my eyes open. I spotted a Ford truck before I got a block away from the bank, looks like the crooks parked close enough to be convenient without being too suspicious. I tried the door and it didn¡¯t open. Well shit, guess it was just a random Ford. I got another block away before I found a bank of payphones. I walked up to one, dialed 911 and waited. The operator picked up quickly, ¡°911 what¡¯s your emergency?¡±The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.


    I slurred a response, ¡°yo¡­ I¡¯m pretty sure I jest saw some dead bodies outside the Star bank, not sure, lots a blood and I¡¯m a lil drunk, so you migh wanna send an ambulance or somthin.¡±


    I hung up the phone before the operator could ask any other questions, then started jogging away from the phones. I¡¯d done everything I reasonably could for the would be bank robbers without endangering my future, my conscience felt a little better, and now it was time to get my blood soaked ass out of there. I checked the street signs to figure out where I was, NE 7th and 112th. I checked the wallets to see if any of the three crooks lived nearby. Lets see here, no ID, no Id, Frank Miller, 4612 NE 7th st apt. A12 Charlotte, North Carolina 28105.


    I almost laughed, this asshole decided to rob the bank right down the street. I checked for building numbers and after looking for a few seconds I spotted one, 4317. Looks like I had to go another three blocks and I¡¯d have a place to wash up.


    I started jogging, which seemed like a good idea as I heard the sound of sirens from a few blocks away. I paused to listen and found that they didn¡¯t seem to be getting closer to me, looks like the guys I robbed might make it after all. I started jogging again, 4512, 4534, I crossed the street, 4612.


    I found myself in front of an old apartment building, you know the old red brick kind. I walked up to the front entrance and tried a couple of the keys until one of them unlocked the front door. I double checked the license again, A12, and began searching for the apartment. Fortunately it wasn¡¯t exactly hard to find as the apartment building had a fairly standard layout. I simply walked down the main hallway until I ran into the not so elusive A12. I tried a few more keys and opened the old door.


    I was greeted by a small studio apartment, there was a couch an old tube TV, a dresser, a queen bed and the smell of old dishes and dirty laundry. Apparently Frank wasn¡¯t exactly a fastidious guy but that didn¡¯t matter for what I needed. I made my way to the shower and turned it on. I stripped out of my my basically ruined clothes, the shirt was a total write off, it had numerous bullet holes and was covered in blood stains along with fresh specks from my recent violent encounter. I threw it into the shower to get some of the blood off. It might be a write off but I didn¡¯t want it to reek of blood while I hung on to it until I could get rid of it.


    My pants had blood on them, but might be salvageable as there wasn¡¯t any overt damage to them. Into the shower they went too. My boxers besides being covered in sweat were fine, socks and shoes were also fine though I¡¯d need to clean the shoes a bit to get rid of the few drops of blood that managed to splatter on them.


    I hopped in the shower as the stream started to rise and I began to shake. The last few hours were absolutely insane, and I¡¯d never dealt with anything like it before. The extreme violence, the difficult decisions, the fucking getting shot so many times. I¡¯d never been in so much pain before in my entire life. I think I started crying in the shower, but hey that might have just been the shower water coursing down my cheeks.


    I spent a few minutes just soaking in the hot water, recollect the shattered bits of my mind then I grabbed the soap I found in the shower and started vigorously cleaning. I didn¡¯t have time to freak out I needed to clean up and then get out of here before the cops showed up or hell before anyone saw me here and potentially linked me to the crime.


    Fuck! I¡¯d just commited a felony, a couple of them, assault with a deadly weapon, robbery, maybe even murder. I didn¡¯t have time to be sloppy or foolish, my only advantage was that I wasn¡¯t in any system on this planet, I doubted they¡¯d be able to get any prints off the bottle the blood would likely was it off. I didn¡¯t see any cameras and the victims didn¡¯t exactly get a good look at me. They¡¯d be able to say at best that a black homeless person made off with the money. So no good description or prints so unless they found me with the money they¡¯d have circumstantial evidence at best.


    So time to make a plan then get the hell out of here. I needed to find some clothes first, hopefully Frank had a shir that would fit and some shorts. I¡¯d have to look when I got out of the shower. Once clothes were sorted out I needed to leave the apartment The bags in which the loot was stored were pretty nondescript, heavy too, so I should have enough money for a while. I needed to get out of town or at least toward the edge of it, then I needed to find a motel to fort up in for a bit. Once I had a place to stay I¡¯d need to stash the cash, get some clothes that fit then plan out my next steps.


    I spent a few more minutes in the shower gathering up my composure and cleaning my blood stained clothes. After that I hopped out of the shower grabbed a towel, dried off and made my way back into the living room/bedroom. I checked the dresser making sure to use the towel to touch anything. I found some red gym shorts, thankfully they were both long and had some stretch to them. Not exactly a great fit, but they¡¯d do for now. I also grabbed white shirt, it was stupidly tight, but fortunately just long enough to cover up my stomach. I looked for a sweatshirt and found a grey number, once again a little too tight, but it was good enough for now. I gathered up the money and my wet clothes, throwing them into one of the bags of money along with the wallets and keys I¡¯d gathered.


    Then I scrubbed the place of my presence, I took the soap I¡¯d used and splashed some bleach in the shower. I put the soap in the towel i¡¯d used, threw both in the bag with my clothes then made my way out of the apartment. I checked the clock on the wall on my way out the door, it was an old analog clock so it took me a second to convert the hand positions into an actual time, 3:45 am probably why I hadn¡¯t really seen anyone on my way here. Looks like I had at least an hour or two before morning commuters would arrive on the streets and I risked being spotted. I made my way out the door, down the hall and back out onto the street. Then I started jogging.


    I wasn¡¯t sure where I¡¯d be able to find a place to stay I just knew it needed to be at least a few miles away. So I jogged, and it was uncomfortable. I was carrying three bags filled with a lot of money, and while they weren¡¯t exactly overflowing with cash they were still heavy, add in the clothes and the fact that I was jogging in dress shoes and I wasn¡¯t exactly having a great time. When I couldn¡¯t jog anymore I walked. I kept up the pattern of walking and jogging for at least 45 minutes, I probably got 3 to 4 miles away from the scene of the robbery. I¡¯d long since left the financial district, I¡¯d actually found myself in a more rundown part of town, which was perfect for my needs. I kept my eyes open now that I¡¯d gotten a decent distance from the bank and began looking for a motel, the cheaper the better. I wasn¡¯t concerned over money I just wanted a place where they wouldn¡¯t care that I didn¡¯t have any ID, where they were used to customers coming in at all hours.


    Frankly I was hoping to find a place that catered to prostitutes, a place that rented by the hour would give me the shelter I needed while I figured out a better solution to my problems. So I kept up the pace while keeping an eye out. It took another 10 minutes before I found a likely candidate, the Cane Inn. Apparently their going rate was $15 an hour or $50 a night. I made my way into the front desk area to find a man who¡¯d obviously lived a hard life. He was mostly bald with long scraggly hair combed over poorly in an attempt to give the illusion that the man wasn¡¯t missing most of his hair. He was also skinny to the point of being gaunt and based on the sores covering his neck indicated that he he¡¯d been using meth for more than a little while. The man was currently dozing at his desk, and I took the opportunity to look around the office, there were plenty of keys on the wall so it looked like there were plenty of vacancies.


    I read the name tag attached to his uniform which turned out to be a polo and some khaki shorts. I knocked on the desk in front of Sid and said, ¡°Excuse me I¡¯d like to rent a room.¡±


    Sid jumped awake and looked around confusedly before he managed to focus on me. So I repeated myself, ¡°Hey man, I¡¯m looking to rent a room, have anything available?¡±


    Sid shook himself then replied, ¡°How long you want it?¡±


    I responded, ¡°depends, if it¡¯s clean a day or two, if it¡¯s dirty an hour to freshen up, change out of my travel clothes then I¡¯m out of here. I just got into town and I need a place to stay for a few days while I get myself situated. So Sid, am I going to be staying for a couple hours or just an hour?¡±


    Sid looked a little startled and asked, ¡°How''d you know my name?¡±


    I smiled affably, ¡°Because you¡¯re wearing a name tag and I can read. So back to my question, how long am I staying here Sid?¡±


    Sid smiled revealing a mouth sans most of its teeth and said, ¡°Well sir looks like you¡¯ll be staying with us for a couple of days, provided of course that you can pay, cash not checks.¡±


    I returned his grin, ¡°That¡¯s fine Sid, I have enough to cover a couple of days, though I hope you don¡¯t mind if I check my room before paying.¡±


    Sid sighed, almost offended and said, ¡°Fine, this is the key to room 203. Cleanest room in the house, I¡¯ll let you take a look, then I expect you to come back and pay for 2 days¡­¡±


    I nodded, ¡°That¡¯s fine, if it¡¯s up to snuff I¡¯ll be here for the next two days.¡±


    I brought my bags up to room 203 and was pleasantly surprised, while not exactly clean, nothing was too dirty, there were no obvious stains, an old tube tv sat on a dresser and the bathroom had a working shower/bathtub. I dropped the bags off in the room, grabbed $120 in $20s and made my way back to the office. I paid Sid, got my change and said, ¡°I¡¯ve been traveling for the last 12 hours I don¡¯t want to be disturbed by a cleaning lady or other patrons of this establishment. Should my wishes be honored a nice tip is in it for you before I go.¡±


    Sid replied, looking eager to please, ¡°Sure thing man, I¡¯ll keep the adjacent rooms empty and I¡¯ll tell Lupita not to bug you.¡±


    I nodded, ¡°Thanks, also where¡¯s the nearest place to get a decent breakfast?¡±


    Sid answered, ¡°About three blocks down 2nd there¡¯s a decent diner called Mabel¡¯s, can¡¯t miss it, the grits are great.¡±


    ¡°Perfect, alright Sid I¡¯m going to bed, have a good night Sid.¡±


    ¡°Goodnight.¡±


    I left the front desk area and retreated to my room. Upon entering the room again I took a second to sigh in relief. I¡¯d taken my first step in establishing myself in this new world. I had a place to stay, I had some money and most importantly I had some time to figure things out. I didn¡¯t have forever, but two days with a roof over my head would let me get a lot done.


    After taking a minute to revel in the relief I felt I decided to get to work. I opened the three bags and started counting my wealth. Apparently I was no longer even close to poor. It took me close to 30 minutes to count sort and stack all the cash, but I now had $243,571. Fuck me I was rich, maybe not buy a house rich, but I should be able to easily establish myself in the world now.


    With a sigh I put the money away, condensing it all down into just two now overly stuffed duffle bags, leaving me one for clothing, toiletries and all that jazz. Feeling a sense of relief I decided it was time to get some sleep. I¡¯d been awake for the last 20 hours if you didn¡¯t count the transition periods between worlds, which I didn¡¯t since they were in no way restful. I pulled back the sheets, noticed they were relatively clean, stripped and found my way under the covers. I was asleep in seconds.

 Chapter 3

    <table>


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Speed 2


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Strength


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Perception


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Defense


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Magic


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Mental


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Technology


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Energy


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Elemental


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    Damnit, I¡¯m supposed to be asleep, why is this thing popping up again?


    A mountain rumbled at me, ¡°Congratulations champion, you have made your first strides toward power. The wealth you have acquired will help you establish your base of power and influence. Your current abode leaves much to be desired but if you don¡¯t screw up too badly you should be able to get yourself a decent base of operations. Now since you have taken your first step toward power I have decided to reward you with two upgrades. Make your choices.¡±


    I sighed but decided power up was more important than sleep anyway. I asked, ¡°Hey super powerful being¡­ I don¡¯t like that¡­ What should I call you?¡±


    The deep voice responded with a laugh, ¡°You couldn¡¯t comprehend my name, and I mean that literally so how about you just call me Arbitrium. It means choice which is about as close to one of the core concepts of my name as you¡¯ll get.¡±


    I nodded, ¡°Alright Arbitrium, I need to get myself an ID and I can¡¯t really do that through any legal means without putting up a lot of red flags so if I chose to advance down the mental path, would I be able to take control of someone or at least influence them enough to get them to forge some papers for me?¡±


    Arbitrium responded, ¡°Hmmm, that depends, at the first level you¡¯d have enough juice to take over a weak mind, like Sid at the front desk, the amount of drugs he¡¯s taken have lowered his mental defenses. Someone like the leader of the crooks you robbed would likely be able to completely shut you out. His two lackeys would be weak enough that even if you weren''t able to outright take control you¡¯d be able to heavily influence them.¡±


    Okay, I could work with that, next question, ¡°If I chose speed 2 would I be able to pick between slowing time and speeding up my body again, and would the ratio be the same again?¡±


    The deep voice responded, ¡°Yes and yes, now it¡¯s time to get you back to your regularly scheduled dream, so make your choices.¡±


    I took a breath and decided, ¡°Alright give me speed 2 with a boost to my body instead of my ability to slow down time and give me Mental 1.¡±


    Pain lanced throughout my body, my muscles felt as if they were on fire, not metaphorically like after a hard workout I mean it felt like my muscles had been doused in gasoline and someone had set me on fire. It was almost a relief when the hammer blow to my head came and the pain knocked me unconscious again.


    When I regained consciousness again I found myself back in motel room, which didn¡¯t really surprise me, frankly my body might not have even left. I had a dull ache running throughout my body and a minor headache, but it looked like I had slept long enough to deal with the worst my I guess you¡¯d call them growing pains. I looked around the room and eventually spotted a clock on the wall, once again an analog model. 2:28, looks like I¡¯d slept for a solid seven hours or so. I felt refreshed despite the aches and pains.


    I hopped out of bed and took a shower, then got dressed in my pants that had finally dried and the tee shirt that didn¡¯t quite fit. Freshly clean and dressed it was time to address some issues I hadn¡¯t been able to get to yet, clothes and food. My stomach rumbled, but I ignored it, clothes first, I needed to get rid of everything I¡¯d taken from the hapless trio of thieves. I snagged the key to the room and filled one of the wallets with five hundred in $20s and $10s. Then I left, making sure to lock up after myself.


    I stopped by the office and found someone other than Sid at the post. This person looked a little more respectable, lacking Sid¡¯s particular blend of charming features. First off the clerk was a woman, somewhere in her late 30¡¯s she had brown hair and a heavy coating of makeup which she apparently applied to cover up the heavy bags under her eyes. She was thin, but not in a healthy way, more in a strung out way. She smiled up at me and it looked almost genuine except it never quite reached her eyes.


    I checked the name tag as Janet greeted me, ¡°Hello sir, how may I help you today?¡±


    I answered, ¡°Well I was looking for clothing store and a laundromat. Apparently I spilled something on my bags and it soaked through to my clothes, so all I have to wear is this little mismatched outfit.¡±


    Janet gave me a once over with her eyes and said, ¡°There¡¯s a woolworths about four blocks away, just head down 2nd for two blocks then take a right, you should be able to find it from there.¡±


    I nodded, ¡°Okay, thanks Janet.¡±


    Then I headed out of the office. After I left the office I stopped for a second and did my best to activate my new mental power. It took me a second to find it, but the practice I got activating my time slowing abilities made it a lot easier.


    Upon activation I was able to sense everyone around me, I was also able to sense a new rising headache so casted my power toward the office and felt Janet¡¯s presence, it was weak but there. As I closed in on it I began to hear her voice, ¡°Well that fella sure was big, I¡¯ll have to let Tyrone know to be careful when he breaks in later, don¡¯t want him to piss the big guy off. If Tyrone catches a beating I know that shit¡¯ll roll down hill and I¡¯ll end up with a black eye or two. Can¡¯t turn no tricks with a black eye, at least not the kind that won¡¯t want to add another one. Fuck I hope that don¡¯t happen.¡±


    I was surprised at first by her thoughts, but then I¡¯d already suspected some of this. I pushed in closer and the whispered, ¡°I better tell Tyrone about this now, never know when he¡¯ll be back.¡±


    I felt the suggestion slip smoothly into her train of thought, then I let her feel some of my anxiety, which I was hoping would increase her own, adding to her sense of urgency. I heard her pick up the phone and I made my way back to my room. Looks like shopping and food would have to wait on Tyrone.


    I closed and locked the door, put my bags in the closet then stepped into the bathroom and waited. It didn¡¯t take long, maybe 10 minutes or so before I heard a ket in the lock and the door swing ajar. From my position I couldn¡¯t see anything, but upon activating my powers again, I felt the approach of two people, looks like Tyrone brought Janet in with him. I focused in on Janet and sent her some of my fear, I could tell it worked when she spoke up, ¡°Tyrone, hurry up I don¡¯t know when he¡¯s gettin back, but he looked awful big and strong.¡±


    I shifted my focus to Tyrone as he responded, ¡°Shut up bitch, if he shows up before this is done I¡¯ll stab the mothafucka won¡¯t be the first time a nigga¡¯s died here, sure as hell won¡¯t be the last.¡±


    I heard someone opening drawers and moving around the small room and II sent Tyrone some of my anger, he continued to speak, ¡°Now you sure he has somthin good? If you been wastin my time I¡¯ll make ya regret it¡­¡±


    The threat hung uncomfortably in the air for a few seconds before janet meekly responded, ¡°I¡¯m sure, I¡¯m sure, Sid said he came in with three big bags full of stuff and had enough money to pay for a couple days, he should have somethin worthwhile.¡±


    I heard the closet door open and that¡¯s when I made my move. I slowed down time to the max which allowed me to arrive beside Tyrone who was opening the closet before Janet had a chance to yell a warning. Of course my arrival wasn¡¯t exactly silent so Tyrone was already starting to react to my presence by the time I got there. I took half a second to check Tyrone out, he was a tall light skinned black male probably around 6 feet, just a few inches shy of my own height, he was muscular without being totally in shape, the outline of a beer belly pressed against his shirt, which was pink of all colors. He had a bulge in his pocket which I¡¯m assuming was the knife he spoke of but no weapon in hand.


    Tyrone was turning to face me while I took the second to observe him. He started to open his mouth, probably to threaten me, maybe to swear at Janet, either way I didn¡¯t care about what he had to say so I kindly shut his mouth with my fist moving at close to twice the speed it used to be able to go. This was backed by a lot of my weight, but not all of it, I didn¡¯t want to kill Tyrone after all. The blow connected with his chin and as his head snapped back and his teeth clicked shut I saw his eyes roll back and watched him crumple to the ground.


    Janet then decided to do something stupid, she charged at me, she probably didn¡¯t expect Tyrone to go down so fast, which allowed her to cover most of the distance to me before she realized her mistake and skidded to a halt. I glared at her returned to normal speed and said, ¡°Janet, Janet, Janet, what am I going to do with you? I asked you where I could buy some clothes and you came to rob me¡­¡±


    Janet started backing away from me and my voice lashed out, ¡°Stop right where you are.¡±


    She stopped, apparently she¡¯d learned not to disobey an angry deep voice. I kind of felt like a piece of shit for scaring her, but she was trying to rob me so¡­


    I infused my voice with anger and activated my powers again, pressing fear and obedience upon the already terrified woman, ¡°Sit down now!¡±


    She sat on the floor and I continued in a slightly calmer voice, ¡°Now tell me about yourself Janet, give me a reason not to kill you.¡±


    Janet started shaking the fear she was feeling came off in waves, she tried to speak but her throat had seized up. I pressed obedience upon her while I rolled Tyrone over, he was still unconscious so I took his knife, wallet and keys. The stimulation began to wake Tyrone and I transitioned powers from mental back to speed. Janet finally squeaked out, ¡°Oh my god, please don¡¯t kill me, I have a kid, I¡¯m a mom, please I don¡¯t want to die.¡± She started sobbing by the end of her pleading. Tears streamed down her cheeks, and I began to feel even more guilty. I quashed the guilt and looked down at Tyrone who was just now stirring.Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    He opened his eyes and I loomed over him, ¡°Morning sunshine.¡± I smirked, then I took a step back and kicked him in the side. He managed to tense his stomach up as my foot connected, but it forced him to roll over to try and protect the injury. ¡°Now Tyrone it¡¯s really not a great idea to lay down while your new boss is standing.¡±


    He looked a little confused at that then his face scrunched up in a rictus of anger as he tried to respond. I took the opportunity to head off anything stupid he might have to say by kicking him in the stomach. I sped myself up a bit to get past his defenses. This had the added bonus of imparting a little extra momentum to the kick making it hit all the harder. The air rushed out of his lungs in a grunt and he was gasping for a while.


    Janet decided that it was a good time to get the hell out of the room, but I couldn¡¯t let her leave just yet so my voice cracked out like a whip, ¡°I didn¡¯t say you could leave yet Janet. Stay where you are!¡±


    Janet collapsed back onto her butt, tears continued to stream down her face, and I refocused my attention back onto Tyrone. He had started to get his breath back and I took the opportunity to lay out his options. ¡°So Tyrone, I find myself with quite the dilemma here, you see you tried to steal from me and I really don¡¯t like thieves, I also don¡¯t really like the cops so I¡¯m not sure what to do with you. You see I could kill you and Janet, dispose of your bodies and then leave. This however would be an inconvenience, plus Janet has a kid and I don¡¯t particularly want to make him an orphan. Now I could also just kill you and intimidate Janet into silence, which would work for a while but I¡¯d still be at risk for going down for a murder rap. I could call the cops of course, have you both arrested for burglary but that isn¡¯t really satisfying, or I could make you both my subordinates.¡±


    Tyrone had stopped gasping at this point and was trying to regather his strength, I switched over to my mental powers again and focused in on Tyrone. The anger was radiating off of him creating almost visible waves. Of course just underneath that anger was fear, he didn¡¯t really doubt that if I wanted him dead he would be dead. I crouched down projecting more fear into his mind and said, ¡°Think carefully about what I am about to say Tyrone, because the next words out of your mouth will likely determine the course of the rest of your life however long or short that may be. Of the options I laid out before you what is your choice? Keep in mind any sort of resistance or disrespect will result in option 1. I¡¯ll give you a minute to decide.¡±


    I got up from my crouch and continued to project fear onto Tyrone, I also increased the worry he felt for Janet however small that was originally. I felt a bond between them snap into place as other emotions seemed to glomp onto the worry I was fostering, lust, concern, sadness, shame, possessiveness, and a desire to protect all sprung up alongside the worry. I may have just made Tyrone fall in love with Janet which was kind of weird, but hey call me cupid and also don¡¯t get in my way.


    I felt resignation from Tyrone as he looked up at what I hoped was an implacable expression on my face. He asked, ¡°What would it mean to be your subordinate?¡±


    I smiled down at my unfortunate new subordinate. I responded, ¡°Not much at the start, I¡¯d have you and janet running errands for me at first. You will also have to pay me a tithe of your income from any illicit activities you take part in. You will also lay out your current assets and the local gang situation for me. You see Tyrone I plan on taking over this city and depending on how you perform you will either rise or fall with me.¡±


    I felt greed, anger and a trace of fear flash through Tyrone, he responded, ¡°What¡¯s a tithe? And what makes you think you can take over the city?¡±


    I chuckled a bit before responding, ¡°Well Tyrone a tithe is what churchgoers donate to the church, it¡¯s 10% of their income, which is fitting as you just came to church, and guess what I¡¯m God. As for taking over the city you just let me worry about that I don¡¯t need muscle just a little information from you. Now speak, what do you own that¡¯s of any consequences, and don¡¯t try to lie or we go back to option number 1¡±


    I felt a flash of fear at that and reinforced the feeling. I looked back at Janet to make sure she hadn¡¯t moved and I saw tears still streaming down her face, though a lot of the fear had left her mind and relief was flooding through her as it seemed like she would survive this encounter. Tyrone answered and I focused back on him, ¡°I¡¯ve got a caddy, seven hoes, a gun and an apartment. I also sling some weed and some coke, but most of my money comes from my hoes.¡±


    Apparently Tyrone was afraid enough to be honest as I never even felt a flicker of doubt as he listed off his assets. I nodded, ¡°Alright Tyrone starting from today on 10% of what you earn goes to me. Now what about your expenses, who do you pay protection money to?¡±


    Tyrone answered quickly, ¡°I don¡¯t pay protection money, to anyone, but I do have to pay rent, the owner of the motel gets about 5 bucks a trick and I gotta pay the diablos $100 buck to use the corner of 2nd and 108th.¡± As for protection I take care of that myself.¡±


    I nodded okay, so I found my first two targets, the diablos would be my muscle and this motel would be my new base of operations. I commanded, ¡°Alright Tyrone, tell me about the owner of this place.¡±


    Tyrone nodded again, ¡°His name¡¯s Clint, he¡¯s a mean bastard, but he pays the diablos on the regular so they keep most of the addicts away from the place. He¡¯s got five employees, Janet and Sid you¡¯ve met, there¡¯s also Lupita, the maid, there¡¯s Hank, he does maintenance and also mans the front desk from time to time, and then there¡¯s me, I get called in when someone doesn¡¯t pay their bill or won¡¯t leave their room.¡±


    I took a second to put together a picture of Clint, he likely paid his taxes and while I doubted he¡¯d get a great response time out of them the police were always an option for Clint to call upon. He¡¯d also have the diablos to call upon, once again I doubted he was high enough up in the hierarchy to get much of a response out of them, but if he claimed someone was trying to muscle in on their territory I¡¯m sure they¡¯d send some people as a show of force. Hmmm, this would bear thinking about, for now though I had more immediate concerns to deal with.


    I addressed Tyrone, ¡°Okay for now I have some things to take care of, you are going to give me a ride and act as tour guide. It will give us a chance to get to know each other and for you to tell me about the diablos.¡± I shifted my focus to Janet, ¡°Janet you get to go back to work at the front desk, don¡¯t try to rob me again, and also your days as a hooker are over, from now on you are going to be my assistant. You¡¯ll be doing things like shopping for me, getting me food, that sort of thing. If you happen to be using drugs, I¡¯d recommend stopping immediately as you will need to be sharp enough to not fuck things up. Now go.¡± Shifting my focus back to Tyrone, ¡°Now get up, show me to your car and lets hit the road, I need some new clothes.¡±


    Tyrone got up from the floor doing his best to stay as far away from me as possible while he was in a vulnerable position. I felt the fear radiating off of him along, I also felt him do his best to control the fear, I felt courage, apprehension and anger all contending with the fear. It was weird to feel someone else¡¯s emotions but I was slowly getting used to it. As for the headache brought on by alternating between my two powers, well it was unpleasant, but manageable. I saw Janet leave the room as I headed toward the door. I exposed my back to Tyrone and I felt a surge of anger followed by an even stronger surge of fear. Good, he obviously thought about taking a run at me, but the recent beating he received was still fresh enough in his mind to make him stop himself. I¡¯d need to do a few more really scary things in front of Tyrone before I truly cemented either his allegiance or his fear. For my purposes either would work.


    We left my room and I locked up behind us, then we headed toward I shit you not a straight up pimpmobile. He was driving around in a baby blue Cadillac Eldorado from the 1960¡¯s. The only trippy thing about it was that it looked brand new. Now I normally wouldn¡¯t care too much about a person¡¯s ride, but I kind of had a thing for muscle cars which gave me some familiarity with cars from the same era. The car in front of me looked only a few years old, which shouldn¡¯t be possible. Tyrone didn¡¯t have the money to refurbish a car like that not if he only had 7 girls working for him. Also who would restore a car like that only to drive it around as their day to day car, it didn¡¯t make a ton of sense.


    I added it to the list of weird things I¡¯d noticed and promised myself I¡¯d take a couple of days to explore and figure out what was different between my earth and this one. We got in the car and started driving. I didn¡¯t pay too much attention to where we were going, instead I focused on Tyrone and further exploring this new power of mine. The more I focused on him, the more I could sense, the more nuance I felt from his emotion. I did my best to press in closer and get to his actual thoughts after all I managed to breach Janet¡¯s thoughts without too much difficulty.


    Unfortunately Tyrone seemed to have a stronger sense of self or something as I was rebuffed before I could sense any of his actual thoughts. I¡¯d have to practice more later, the attempt I¡¯d just made sent a sharp spike of pain through my temples and I didn¡¯t really want to experience more of that right now. So as we drove I focused on Tyrone¡¯s emotions and commanded, ¡°Tell me about the diablos. How many members do they have, what¡¯s their main sources of income, how high profile are they?¡±


    Tyrone responded, ¡°Well shit, let me think for a sec¡­ okay okay, so they¡¯re this mexican gang, moved into the area maybe ten fifteen years ago, something like that. They supply most of the hard drugs in this part of town, I think they¡¯re hooked up with the latin kings, you know that crazy ass gang out of Chicago. Not too sure bout that though. Anyway there¡¯s like 20 of them mothafuckas that are ready to throw down with anyone, they also have like 50 dealers they supply throughout Charlotte. They also got a couple of pimps working their territory, maybe 40 of 50 hoes workin for em. They collect rent from any of us freelancers and I know they charge a few of the smaller local businesses a ¡°community service fee¡± every week. They run most of the area around here, they ran out most of the smaller local gangs. They¡¯re mostly at peace with the other gangs, a few scuffles every now and then but no one really wants to mess with them¡­¡±


    I nodded, ¡°So I¡¯m guessing while there maybe some competition between the gangs they have mostly sorted things out so that they don¡¯t interfere with each other''s businesses.¡± Tyrone nodded so I continued, ¡°Since there isn¡¯t a lot of violence I¡¯m guessing the police don¡¯t do very much to break up the gangs, besides the normal drug busts and stings.¡± Another nod and I started planning how I would upset the current balance of power.


    While I was busy plotting my rise to power, we arrived in front of the Woolworths Janet told me about. Two hundred and forty seven dollars and one bored Tyrone later I had a decent selection of clothing and it was time to fill the empty pit that was my stomach after over twenty hours of being empty. We stopped at Mabel¡¯s and I think I ate somewhere around 3500 calories. The burgers and pancakes were delicious though so no complaints. Tyrone claimed to not be hungry, I could tell he was but then eating with the guy that just put you on your ass might prove to be a bit difficult.


    We returned to the motel and I told Tyrone to report back tomorrow at 10:00 am as we had some things to discuss. He just nodded and left. I think he could tell I wanted to be left alone. After he left the apartment I double checked the room to make sure that no one had been in while I was away. The bags were still filled with money and still in the positions I¡¯d left them so I sat on the bed and turned on the TV. I flipped through the channels and marveled at the low production values of all the shows. Of course that was to be expected of a world that was going through it¡¯s 1960¡¯s.


    Yeah I know right I was in the 60¡¯s weird right but apparently this world started later than ours or something, maybe Jesus showed up later I¡¯m not a scientist and there¡¯s no way I was going to be able to figure out the how or why without asking a certain deity about the strange situation I found myself in and our meetings weren¡¯t exactly something I could arrange whenever I wanted. So for now a Mystery is how I¡¯d think of the situation. Pushing past that I needed to review my actions over the last day or so. They didn¡¯t make sense, at least not really.


    I was a student at a community college, working in a call center selling diazapran, a medication designed to help people lose weight. I went from basically dying due to gunshot wounds to taking out bank robbers, making off with the loot and then beating up a pimp all in order to build a criminal empire. When The Hell did I decide to build a criminal empire? Seriously I don¡¯t remember consciously making that decision. I mean sure it was one way to gain power which would help me level up, but seriously what the hell made me think I could do it?


    I kept running those questions through my head, when did I decide to become a criminal? When did I start planning to take over gangs? Clearly something happened to me after I came to this world, because I didn¡¯t used to act like this, even in video games I was always the good guy. Sure desperation can drive a man to do a lot he wouldn¡¯t normally do, but I don¡¯t think that¡¯s what this was. I could have dealt with Tyrone in a lot of ways, but instead of doing the sane thing I decided to recruit the guy into what? My gang? I¡¯m honestly starting to think that the deity messed with my head, because I sure as hell wasn¡¯t acting like myself.


    Then again I know Arbitrium messed with my head, after all I¡¯d been having headaches almost constantly since I¡¯d come to this world. Even now while I¡¯m questioning why I¡¯ve done so many violent things over the last day I¡¯m still thinking about how to destabilize the gangs around here to weaken them enough so that a strong figure has a shot at taking over. This desire to control things, to rule, it was not mine, it was implanted. I¡¯m not exactly a fan of someone implanting foreign impulses in my head, at the same time I am a fan of superpowers and it was beginning to look like one came with the other.


    Okay, so after my sanity check I¡¯ve learned two things, number one I have some impulses that were likely implanted by Arbirium in order to encourage me to gain power, likely he wanted me ready for the fight with other champions. Two I was not okay with what these impulses wanted me to do. Sure rich crime lord sounds kind of nice due to the whole rich thing, but that¡¯s not the life I want, so I need to figure out how to channel those impulses into something I can live with.


    I laid back in bed trying to come up with a route to power that didn¡¯t involve an evil empire. I¡¯m pretty sure I fell asleep at some point in my musings because the next thing I knew I saw something that I¡¯d been both dreading and looking forward to.


    <table>


    <tbody>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Speed 3


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Strength


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Perception


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Defense


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Magic


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Mental 2


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Technology


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Energy


    </td>


    </tr>


    <tr>


    <td>


    Elemental


    </td>


    </tr>


    </tbody>


    </table>


    I heard a deep rumbling laughter in the background then that rumble turned into words, ¡°So you figured it out did you? You are correct I added a little something to your subconscious, I¡¯m not controlling or anything nearly as sinister as that instead I just highlighted a few parts of your personality that atrophied in your old world. You are still the same person I just felt like your old world beat down some impulses that would serve you well in this new world so I reinvigorated those impulses. You can control them of course and if you really want you can kill them, it will just take a little time and some self control. Consider it a chance to truly decide who you want to be. Now I¡¯m pleased with your acquisition of some henchmen and your understanding of your own mind. So you may choose two more upgrades, of course you really shouldn¡¯t expect many more freebies like this. Your going to actually have to do something impressive next if you want another upgrade, like I don¡¯t know, taking over those diablos, or taking control of the inn. Or maybe something even better, surprise me and I¡¯ll make it worth your while. Now make a choice.¡±


    I glared at the deity that decided not to show himself then I sighed. ¡°Okay give me one more level in Speed the time slowing variety and another level in Mental, I¡¯d like you to focus it on helping me overcome the minds of others.¡±


    The deep rumbling responded, ¡°looks like you haven¡¯t quite decided on what you want to do, on who you wish to become. That¡¯s okay though, I look forward to see who you become.¡±


    Fucking deities and their cryptic bullshit. Then Pain double tapped my brain and I fell unconscious again.

 Chapter 4

    I woke up a few hours later to an all too familiar headache. I checked the clock hanging above the TV that was still on, it was 10:08 pm if the lack of light was anything to judge by. Perfect, I had some tests to run and light wasn¡¯t exactly conducive to keeping them quiet. I put on my new athletic clothing, a red jersey, red shorts and some red Adidas. Yeah all red I know, but like I said my favorite hero was the flash and well frankly I¡¯m a speedster, at least I hope I qualify for that title. Regardless of my fashion choices it was time to test that speed. I put on the cheap little watch I¡¯d bought at woolworths, took down the clock from the wall and put it and the stopwatch I¡¯d purchased into a red backpack I¡¯d gotten while shopping.


    With all my supplies gathered I left the room, locked up and started jogging, first down the stairs then out on the streets. My goal was to find a high school. Why a high school, because they always have tracks that are a quarter of a mile long and I needed a set distance to try and figure out what sorts of speeds I could move at. So I jogged, warming up the my muscles because honestly I can¡¯t imagine what it¡¯s like to pull a muscle when travelling over 100 miles per hour. That¡¯s right I¡¯m pretty sure I could move at least that fast. I know I can sprint at 10 mph maybe a little fast if I really pushed myself thanks to the treadmills at my college. I was now physically 4x faster than I used to be, that would put me sprinting at 40 mph. Then if you add in my ability to slow time down 4x I should be able to sprint at 160 mph, maybe a little faster depending on what my actual max speed was.


    Now I didn¡¯t plan on going all out on a curved track, I¡¯d probably need an airport runway to really test myself out, but if I could manage 100 mph on a high school track I¡¯d be happy. So I jogged through the outskirts of Charlotte, looking for a high school. Kind of weird sure but I¡¯m not really sure where else you are supposed to find a track in the middle of a city.


    It took a while, and by a while I mean an hour and a half of running before I found something that would work. It wasn¡¯t a high school, it was in fact James Woods middle school, but by that point I didn¡¯t really care I¡¯d jogged close to twelve miles in order to find the place and I was a little tired of running around aimlessly. The weird thing though was that I wasn¡¯t tired. I mean sure I wasn¡¯t going at my max speed, but still twelve miles would have put me on my ass before coming to this world and now I was able to jog it like it was a warm up.


    I¡¯m going to make some assumptions here because I don¡¯t really have any hard facts yet, but my guess is that when my body was upgraded to run faster my stamina increased as a corollary. It does make some sense I mean what kind of speedster gets tired after running only three miles. So yeah warm up over time to test some stuff out. First up my ability to slow down time. I needed to test out if I really did make things go four time slower when I activated the power. So I pulled out all my time keeping gear, synched up my watch with the clock, started the stopwatch, dropped it and maxed out my ability to slow down time relative to myself. It was weird watching the stopwatch fall while moving 4x faster relative to everything else. The stopwatch still fell, it¡¯s not everything around me stopped or anything like that, but instead of almost instantly hitting the ground it began to fall like a helium balloon that was no longer able to hold itself up. I checked the watch attached to my wrist noting that at least it was still moving at a normal pace when I heard a weird deep noise. I took my eyes off the watch and realized the sound was the stopwatch hitting the track. The deep noise was likely the clattering noise of the falling object distorted by the speed at which time was moving for me.


    Okay so that was pretty cool, I waited a solid minute, double checking the watch to make sure it was exact, before I stopped the stopwatch and checked the time¡­ 15 seconds, okay so goods as advertised. I resynced the watch with the clock then got up and got ready to run. It was time to test if I could really move four times faster than I used to be able to. I hadn¡¯t really tested this out yet, but I figured it would be pretty easy to activate so I started the timer and broke out into a sprint. When I reached my maximum speed I felt an energy start coursing through my veins it felt like it was encouraging me to go faster and I gave into the energy and it¡¯s like I shifted gears. Everything began to blur a little bit as air moving at close to 40 mph began to hit my eyes. They began to water, but I pushed through and did my best to stay on the track. The turns ended up being a little too sharp for me so I ended up slowing down a little bit in order to not fly off the track, but I got four laps done in record time. I mean that quite literally it took me 1 minute and 44 seconds to do four laps. I did some rough math¡­ damn near 35 miles per hour.


    Time to test the synergy of my two skills, though first I needed to wipe the tears off my face, looks like goggles or some kind of wind break would be necessary. But first, I pressed the the button to start the stopwatch, slowed down time, dropped the stopwatch and took off. 26 objective seconds later and I stopped the stop watch. I yelled, ¡°140 fucking miles per hour! I am officially a beast!¡±


    I spent the next couple of hours fine tuning my various methods of speeding up. Surprisingly enough getting time to move at the pace I wanted it to was a lot easier than running at 20 mph vs 25 mph vs 30 mph. Once that energy started coursing through my veins it was a lot harder to control. I was starting to get control of it though, but several hours of running and experiment with my powers left me pretty tired so I began to make my way back to the motel. I began to jog at a steady 8 miles per hour when i had a thought¡­


    It wasn¡¯t exactly my brightest idea, but I was going to be doing it eventually so even though I lacked the mask and goggles I¡¯d eventually end up wearing I started sprinting back. It was close to 1 AM according to the clock I¡¯d taken from my room, 6 am according to the watch on my wrist. At a certain point I¡¯d stopped syncing it up with real time. But yeah it took me about 4 minutes to get back. I ended up saving on distance since I actually knew where I was going this time. Super speed is cool.


    When I got back I double checked that the room was still untouched, then went into the bathroom took a shower and went back to sleep. Thankfully this time no blue screen ruined my rest and when I woke up at 7:40 am I felt refreshed and hungry.


    I changed into some jeans and a tee shirt that actually fit then made my way down to the front desk. Sid was sitting at the desk and he looked at me with fear in his eyes. I smiled and activated my mental powers. I hadn¡¯t tested them since the upgrade but now that I focused on them I could instantly tell that they were much stronger. The sensitivity to other people¡¯s thoughts as Sid¡¯s instantly jumped out at me. ¡°Holy shit it¡¯s the guy who kicked the shit out of Tyrone. So glad I¡¯m not mixed up with those two or I¡¯d likely have to deal with this crazy fucker too. Shit I can¡¯t stare better say somthin¡± Sid spoke, ¡°Hey there sir! How ya doin today, things been quiet for ya?¡±The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    I grinned, and responded, ¡°Oh sure, quiet enough, in fact I¡¯ve enjoyed my stay here so much I¡¯d like another couple days.¡± I dropped five $20s on the desk and Sid¡¯s jaw dropped a bit. He slowly gathered his wits and asked, ¡°You sure bout that sir? There¡¯s plenty of other establishments around that are nicer than our¡­¡±


    I smiled again, flashing my large white teeth at him, ¡°Oh I¡¯m sure after all the staff here is top notch, I¡¯ve built up such great rapport with everyone here I¡¯d hate to lose that after all I am new in town and I can¡¯t afford to pass up new friends.¡±


    Sid gulped and took the money, then asked, ¡°Well if you¡¯re sure¡­ I¡¯m guessing you want to stay in the same room¡­ Uhm by the way I never did catch your name¡­¡±


    I flashed my teeth again and said, ¡°Oh? Well that¡¯s okay, I guess we just aren¡¯t close enough yet.¡±


    I turned around and walked out the door leaving behind a stunned Sid. I chuckled a bit at his confusion. As soon as I saw there was going to be magic in this world I knew I¡¯d never reveal my name to anyone. I¡¯d read enough fantasy to know that true names had power and sometimes never have said yours in the world you were on would protect you from some of it. So yeah people would only know me by assumed names. I should probably think about what I¡¯d have people call me, maybe Richard Johnson, that way I¡¯d get a laugh out of everytime someone called me by name¡­ Dick Dick¡­ too funny.


    I headed over to Mabel¡¯s as it was literally the only food place I knew in town. I took a second today to actually take a look at the diner today as yesterday I was too hungry to notice anything except the food. The diner was a part of a small stripmall, there was also a pet shop, a bakery, a nail salon and a place serving authentic mexican food, which I found a bit dubious. But then again I was in the territory of a latino gang so maybe the place did actually serve real mexican food. I went into Mabel¡¯s and sat down in the booth I took yesterday. The place wasn¡¯t overly full but then I¡¯d probably arrived after the real breakfast crowd. A young waitress approached me in that classic 60¡¯s diner server¡¯s outfit and asked, ¡°Hey there how ya doin today?¡±


    She handed me a menu and I responded, ¡°Doing great though I¡¯m a little hungry today¡­¡±


    She smiled one of those polite service smiles and responded, ¡°Well that¡¯s good, I imagine a big fella like you can really put it away. Can I get you some coffee?¡±


    I shook my head and replied, ¡°No thanks, I¡¯d love some water and some OJ if you have it?¡±


    She smiled once again and brightly responded, ¡°Sure thing hun, be right back with that.¡±


    She walked away and I perused the menu. For the first time I noticed prices and was stunned, a number 1 which consisted of 4 pancakes, hash browns, bacon, toast and two eggs all for just $2.00. Okay maybe I was being a little harsh with those thieves they were apparently walking away with the equivalent of at least a million dollars, and they might have gotten away with it too if I hadn¡¯t been such a meddling kid.


    The waitress started making her way back and I had a chance to make a note of her name, she dropped the two glasses off in front of me and asked, ¡°So you had a chance to decide on whatchu want?¡±


    I nodded and replied, ¡°I sure have Trixie, I¡¯d like the number one with a side of grits, please and thank you.¡±


    Trixie wrote down my order, flashed me a smile grabbed my menu and said, ¡°Well okay then, those¡¯ll be right up.¡±


    She left the table and I sat in silence for a few seconds before I reached for my phone¡­ Damn I forgot I didn¡¯t have my phone, I also couldn¡¯t get a new one as they didn¡¯t freaking exist back in the 60¡¯s¡­ Maybe I should have gotten a paper.


    With nothing else to do I looked around the little diner, there were 14 booths like the one I was sitting in, half of which were empty, there was a long bar in front of the kitchen that lonely patrons could sit at, though there were only three people taking up the¡­ 12 seat bar. There were also a few tables, 6 to be exact though all of those were empty at the moment. Frankly I was a little surprised at how empty the place was, either I really missed the crowd at.. 12:06 damn forgot to reset the watch, I checked around the diner for a clock that hadn¡¯t recently experienced temporal fluctuations¡­ 7:45 am right, anyway unless the crowds already came and went or were yet to come, Mabel¡¯s was probably in some financial troubles.


    I mean seriously you can¡¯t have a positive cash flow for a diner that seats¡­ 92 people yet only has¡­ 16 people in it during what should be peak hours. This might be something to look into, a diner would be a good way to launder money and as a future gang lord I would need places to do that. Of course setting up a false identity would be key to doing anything of that nature. After all a ghost might be damn near untraceable but a ghost has a hard time booking a flight, or dealing with the police.


    I was interrupted from my musings by the arrival of food. My stomach gurgled as Trixie dropped everything off she managed to not notice the noise, or was polite enough to ignore it before saying, ¡°Enjoy hun!¡±


    I decided after that bit of embarrassment faded that I needed to hit up a grocery store. Time was a little more fluid for me and going 16 hours without food after having run for over fifty miles wasn¡¯t exactly a good idea. I cleared my plate relatively quickly, only barely managing to not speed up my body so I could shove it in my mouth faster. After I finished breakfast which was great Trixie dropped off the bill. My total was a whopping $2.67 after tax. I left a five on the table wished Trixie a nice rest of her day and left the shop in search of a grocery store. I vaguely remembered seeing one about a mile away from my current location and so I went for a quick jog. Not supernaturally fast mind you but I still moved at a decent clip. Ten minutes later I was standing in the produce aisle of a Piggly Wiggly. I loaded up my cart with bananas, apples and oranges. Then I made my way over to the cereal aisle, picked up some Special K and made my way to the checkout stand. I grabbed a newspaper while the cashier a pleasantly plump middle aged white woman checked me out for get this¡­ $3.56. I had over ten pounds of fruit along with cereal and I spent less than 5 bucks. The 60¡¯s were a cool time when you had more than $200,000 in stolen cash.


    After my little grocery visit I made my way back to the motel and deposited the food on my dresser. I then put away all the clothes I purchased the day before and began to read the paper. I¡¯d gotten through most of the paper when I heard a knock at my door. I looked through the peephole and outside were Tyrone and Janet. I activated my mental powers¡­ man I need to think of a better name than that, anyway I began snooping through the two¡¯s emotions and got a sense of nervous anticipation.


    Now that could be caused by meeting with me as I was a definite source of fear in both their lives, but I¡¯d rather not take chances so I cast my thoughts forward and began to search for the source of their nervousness. Janet was an open book as always, ¡°Fuck I hope he¡¯s not there, please tell me he skipped town, I don¡¯t want to do this, I don¡¯t want to do this, I don¡¯t want to do this¡­¡± You get the picture, Tyrone took a bit more work, but where yesterday I was rebuffed at the door so to speak today i gained access. ¡°Those fuckers better show up I¡¯m nobody''s¡¯ bitch specially not some jumped up nigger who got the drop on me. Once those diablos show up this fucker¡¯s dead and I¡¯m in the clear.¡±


    I smiled at Tyrone¡¯s plan, opened the door and said, ¡°Welcome in my oh so faithful employees.¡±

 Chapter 5

    I not only saw Tyrone twitch at that I felt his emotions spike, fear coming through stronger than anything else. I smiled at him and patted him on the shoulder before taking a step back and ushering them into the little motel room. I said oh so politely, ¡°Why don¡¯t you two take a seat on the bed, we¡¯ll get started in just a minute.¡±


    The two sat down on the edge of the bed and I moved toward the dresser, leaning back against it. Then I just stood there staring at the two of them. The first minute was uncomfortable, by the time the time the second minute came and passed the two were feeling an excruciating amount of anxiety. Why were they feeling this, probably due to their guilty consciousnesses, it probably had nothing to do with me ramping up their anxiety. Janet started squirming within the first 30 seconds and if not for a firm hand on her arm dimpling her flesh she might have cracked right there.


    After the two minutes passed Tyrone couldn¡¯t take it anymore and spoke up, ¡°So why¡¯d you want us to come here?¡±


    I didn¡¯t respond, I just continued to stare at the duo. I felt Tyrone becoming more and more frustrated, his anxiety also started to go through the roof. He started to get up saying, ¡°Well if you don¡¯t need us I¡¯m heading out.¡±


    I lashed out at him with a whip of fear and I saw his hands start to tremble. I finally spoke, my voice hard, ¡°Sit back down Tyrone, I did not give you permission to leave. Besides, not everyone is here yet, we can¡¯t start a meeting without everyone being here.¡±


    Janet started to panic and Tyrone¡¯s anxiety jumped through the roof, he asked, ¡°Who else is coming?¡±


    I smiled, and said in a playful voice, ¡°Oh I¡¯m not sure exactly but I expect they¡¯ll be simply wicked.¡±


    The duo seemed to understand what I was implying and they both attempted to bolt. I kicked out with a little extra speed and tripped Tyrone. We went down with flailing arms and ended up bringing Janet down with him. They fell into a pile of tangled limbs and I walked a little closer to the pair. I said, ¡°Tyrone, Janet, I don¡¯t believe I gave you permission to get up off the bed, but since you want to be on the floor so much you can stay down there until our other guests arrive.¡±


    The two finally managed to untangle themselves and Tyrone attempted to push himself up, I however didn¡¯t approve so I stepped on his back, hard. He crashed into the ground and I heard his teeth click. I grinned then shuddered a bit, those damned impulses that deity awakened were kind of making me into a sadist, something I¡¯d rather not become.


    I used my command voice to say, ¡°Stay down and keep your eyes open, you need to understand exactly why crossing me is a bad idea. This is the one mistake I¡¯ll allow you as you new boss. Mess up again and you will disappear. No one will know what happened to you, you will just disappear off the face of the earth.¡±


    I extended my senses outward ignoring the pulsing fear radiating off of Tyrone and Janet, and we waited. We spent maybe ten minutes in silence before the door burst open and two hispanic men burst in. I was of course ready for them as I felt them as they were making their way up the stairs. I was on the move as they were opening the door. They burst through the door at 1 quarter speed which allowed me plenty of time to take note of their appearances, one was in his early 20¡¯s lighter skin tone while still obviously hispanic, he was dressed in a white shirt with jeans, had a gold chain and a shaved head. He was also sporting a small caliber handgun which I promptly took out of his hand. I might have broken his finger while disarming him, but who knows he could have started screaming for no reason whatsoever.


    His buddy had spike black hair held back by a red bandana, a short sleeve collared shirt that for some reason he¡¯d only buttoned the top button of and of course he was also sporting a gun. I snatched the gun out of his hand and for some reason he started swearing like a trucker. Now there was a lady present and I couldn¡¯t let him befoul her ears with such filth so I closed the source of filth with my fist. I then decided to help the screamer with his pain by relieving him of the consciousness that was hurting him so much. I knocked out with a tap to the temple. The whole scuffle lasted for maybe 5 seconds.


    Having completed my introduction to the diablos I turned to face Tyrone who was stunned on the floor. He apparently didn¡¯t remember how fast I was, probably because when he saw it he was knocked out almost immediately after witnessing it. It probably skewed his memories, made him think he just wasn¡¯t prepared for my attack which is why I was able to take him down. Now I think he understood that we weren¡¯t in the same league. I hunkered down next to the stunned Tyrone and terrified Janet. I then said, ¡°Now that you have a little bit of a better appreciation of who your dealing with I don¡¯t think you¡¯ll do something so foolish as to try and ambush me with a couple of thugs will you?¡±


    Tyrone shook his head, ¡°please¡­ please don¡¯t kill me¡­¡±


    I smiled, ¡°Oh Tyrone, I¡¯m not going to kill you because you¡¯re going to be my little helper aren¡¯t you and Janet is going to be my loyal assistant right?¡±


    They both started nodding frantically, tears streamed down Janet¡¯s face again. I adjusted my position a bit so I was facing Janet directly and said, ¡°Now Janet this is the second time you haven¡¯t warned me about an ambush. Learn this lesson now, if you come to me with information like this I will protect and reward you. You should understand at this point if you have my protection no one will lay their hands on you because I will lay my hands on them so much harder. Now I know you and Tyrone have a relationship, I¡¯d like you to make sure he doesn¡¯t do anything this stupid again. Can you do that?¡±


    Janet nodded and squeaked out, ¡°yyyeah I cccan do thatttt.¡±


    I smiled down at her, ¡°Good I¡¯m glad we understand each other. Now we have some guests and I¡¯m sure they''d like some coffee as they seem to have fallen asleep. Why don¡¯t you be a dear and go make us some coffee.¡±


    Janet got up off the floor and began to limp out of the door, I¡¯m guessing her leg fell asleep while she was stuck on the ground these last few minutes. When she closed the door behind her I returned my attention to Tyrone, I addressed his cowering form and said, ¡°Now look here Tyrone, our guests are going to think we are inhospitable hosts if we just leave them in the entry way like this. You should make them more comfortable while I relieve them of all the things weighing them down. I then collected their wallets and a knife from the bald one. Meanwhile Tyrone dragged the two out of the entryway and leaned them up against one of the inner walls., he propped them up almost like they were sitting although their heads lolling against their chest quickly dispelled the illusion that they were even remotely conscious.The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    I sat on the bed, double checking the contents of their wallets. Let¡¯s see here we had one Hector Mendoza and Javier Hernandez. They had a combined 23 dollars on them which implied to me that they were low level enforcers, maybe recruits, definitely not high up in the hierarchy. I decided to clarify things before I made too many assumptions, ¡°So Tyrone, when you decided to go to the diablos, who did you talk to and who did they say they¡¯d send?¡±


    Tyrone responded, ¡°I talked to Jorge Mendoza, he¡¯s one of the sargento¡¯s of the diablos. He¡¯s in charge of this area, makes sure everyone pays their rent on time. He usually sends these two to do the collecting, but if someone fails to pay Jorge¡¯s the one that shows up and makes them regret his visit.¡±


    I nodded, and guessed Hector was probably a nephew, cousin, or son of Jorge, and Javier was probably his friend. As I expected fairly low on the totem pole, but Hector might know something if he¡¯s the type to pay attention.


    I decided to wake up Javier first, he was the bald screamer and likely easier to break than Hector. Now personally I am not a fan of alarm clocks so I figured a loud noise might not be the nicest way to wake Hector up, so instead I gave him a nice firm slap to the face. The smack resonated around the room, but didn¡¯t seem to do much for sleeping beauty so I delivered a back hand. That one seemed to have an affect. Javier¡¯s head lolled to the side and his eyelids began to flutter. I also saw some blood leak out of his mouth.


    I lifted Javier¡¯s head by the chin and looked him in the eyes. I could see he was a little out of it, probably a result of having his brain rattled around from my punch. Not exactly a great state to get information out of him, at the same time he¡¯d likely be too messed up to try and lie, so there were some advantages to giving him a concussion. I saw his eyes, well one of his eyes focus on me and then I saw anger begin to cloud it over. Rather than let him build up a head of steam I smacked him in the face again and said, ¡°If you know what¡¯s good for you boy you will continue to sit there and..¡±


    Javier lunged at me. Of course he was in a bad position to do so as his legs were splayed out in front of him. I could have just ignored the awkward attempt at attacking me, but I didn¡¯t want to encourage such behavior so i gave him another responding slap. I imparted enough force into the slap so that it overbalanced the little gangster, he ended up in a awkward sprawl on the ground. I then grabbed him by the throat and returned him to his original position against the wall. He grabbed onto my forearm while I was returning him to an upright and locked position, his nails were digging into my skin. I think he was choking because he started gasping when I eventually released his throat.


    I hunkered down a bit so we were eye to eye again and said, ¡°Now let¡¯s try this again, or would you prefer I beat you unconscious and then when you wake up I question you?¡±


    Javier was beginning to feel some fear, which I happily encouraged, and he blustered, ¡°You just signed your death warrant Puta. No one lays a hand on the diablos without catching a bullet.¡±


    I laughed, not chuckled, I straight up laughed in his face, who the fuck says that kind of shit. Who tries to scare the guy that just beat the shit out of you with comments like that? He might as well have just said that his dad could beat up my dad. When I calmed down enough I said, ¡°So you think that your gang is going to shoot me, and who exactly are they going to be shooting? What¡¯s my name? Who knows what I look like? Come on buddy if your gang¡¯s going to come after me, who am I?¡±


    It took a second for Javier to come to grips with the fact that I was basically anonymous and unless they wanted to shoot every black man over six feet in Charlotte his gang wasn¡¯t going to avenge him. He apparently couldn¡¯t think of an appropriate response but his fear did ratchet up a notch which I encouraged. He tried bluster again, ¡°Fuck you man, we know what you look like and our boss knows about Tyrone, even if we can¡¯t get you that fucker will just have to take your place.¡±


    I smiled, then put a little mock fear and a lot of sarcasm in my voice, ¡°So you want to torture and kill the guy that just betrayed me? Damn, anything but that¡­ As for you guys knowing what I look like, who in the world said you would be leaving this room alive?¡±


    I let him sit with the question for a couple of seconds before I spoke again, ¡°You idiots broke into my room with guns drawn I could kill you both right now and when the cops show up I would get off scot free because I was defending myself from armed intruders. Or I could just make you two disappear, no one see you or hears from you again. As for your last known whereabouts, you went into the room of a large black man and were never seen again. You need to understand one thing right now Javier, You. Are. Fucked. The only way in which you don¡¯t end up dead is if I decide not to kill you. The only way I¡¯m not going to kill you is if I am given a compelling reason not to. Tyrone is still alive because he gave me a reason not to kill him. So why shouldn¡¯t I kill you right now?¡±


    Javier seemed to be stumped, his eyes started roving around the room looking for an escape. His fear started climbing to the point where I thought he might start having a panic attack, that¡¯s when I looked a little deeper. His thoughts were racing, very few of them were coherent, probably due to the mild concussion I¡¯d given him, but the main premise of his thoughts were, ¡°how do I get out of here, how do I escape?¡± So I inserted one simple clear thought, ¡°What if I offer to serve him?¡±


    I let him think for another 5 seconds before repeating my question, ¡°Javier you don¡¯t seem to be paying any attention to me, which is so rude. I asked you why I shouldn¡¯t kill you.¡±


    Javier then blurted out what I was hoping for, ¡°If you don¡¯t kill me I¡¯ll do whatever you want man. Seriously just don¡¯t fuckin kill me man.¡±


    While Javier was offering up his loyalty Hector was beginning to wake up. I didn¡¯t want him to affect the current situation so I lightly tapped him on the chin. His head ended up rocking back and hitting the wall. That would probably buy me a few minutes to properly bring Javier into the fold and drain him of information. Tyrone¡¯s eyes widened at my strike, but he showed no other signs of reacting. Javier however flinched at the strike, his eyes closed and hands raised up defensively. I amplified the pulse of fear he felt then sent a flash of relief. Javier opened his eyes and they once again desperately looked around the room, probably searching for something to help him escape. They locked on Tyrone and when he helplessly shook his head I could see the defeat in his eyes. Javier helplessly looked back at me and I smiled down at him.


    I commanded in the form of a question, ¡°Now Javier I believe you were about to tell me everything you know about your gang isn¡¯t that right?¡±


    Javier nodded his head up and down like a bobble head and started stuttering out, ¡°Thththere¡¯s 24 enforcers like ma ma me and Hector, wa wa we work for his tio Jorge whos a sargento, he¡¯s got 5 other guys under him. There are 2 other Sargentos they¡¯ve got 4 guys and 6 guys respectively. Then there¡¯s the Capitan, he¡¯s got a crew of 7 guys that directly report to him. Ththey have the best gear and the easiest jobs. The sargentos are all responsible for different things, Hector¡¯s tio is in charge of collecting rent from all the independent businesses, and all the pimps that aren¡¯t part of the gang. He and the rest of our crew also do most of the fighting, whenever some knucklehead tries to rise up, we¡¯re normally the ones that put them in their place. The other two sargento¡¯s are responsible for the drugs and the girls.¡±


    I nodded and clapped Javier on the shoulder, the sound and the contact made him flinch. I said, ¡°Good, it¡¯s nice that we can have an open and honest conversation. Now Javier, how do you think Jorge will react if you and Hector don¡¯t return home today?¡±


    Javier shrugged, ¡°I don¡¯t know man. He might just think we went out to get drunk, we do that a lot, he probably doesn¡¯t expect to see us til tomorrow.¡±


    I asked, ¡°And when you don¡¯t show up tomorrow?¡±


    Javier thought for a second, ¡°Well, he¡¯ll probably come after that puta Tyrone once he realizes we¡¯re missing.¡±


    I smiled, ¡°Well that¡¯s just perfect. Now Javier I think you are ready to be smart about this, so I¡¯m going to extend an offer your way, you can take it or you can leave it, though I¡¯d really suggest you take it. You see, I plan on taking over your little gang, then I¡¯m going to take over every other gang in the city. By the end of the month I expect to have complete control over every bit of organized crime in the city. Now you can be a part of that, and if you prove capable and loyal I¡¯ll promote you, I¡¯ll give you power and wealth, all you have to do is obey my commands. Do you think you can do that?¡±


    Javier nodded, then I could see confusion clouding over his features he asked, ¡°Wait, how are you going to take over all the other gangs? Even if you managed to take out el jefe and get the hombres to follow you, we can¡¯t take the other gangs¡­¡±


    I laughed, ¡°Muwahahaha, don¡¯t worry about that Javier. All you have to do is follow my orders and answer my questions honestly, if you do that I guarantee you¡¯ll be living the high life in no time at all.¡±


    Javier began to nervously laugh and responded, ¡°Okay boss, you say the word and I¡¯ll do whatever you want.¡±


    I could feel that Javier wasn¡¯t being entirely honest with me, but then it takes time for the fear to properly set in and loyalty to sprout from said fear. I¡¯d give him some time and let him see me beat the shit out of his former boss. After that I¡¯m sure he¡¯d start to see things my way.


    I said, ¡°Now Javier as the newest member of my gang, I¡¯m going to give you some errands while I have a talk with Hector here. Here¡¯s all you have to do¡­¡±

 Chapter 5

    I not only saw Tyrone twitch at that I felt his emotions spike, fear coming through stronger than anything else. I smiled at him and patted him on the shoulder before taking a step back and ushering them into the little motel room. I said oh so politely, ¡°Why don¡¯t you two take a seat on the bed, we¡¯ll get started in just a minute.¡±


    The two sat down on the edge of the bed and I moved toward the dresser, leaning back against it. Then I just stood there staring at the two of them. The first minute was uncomfortable, by the time the time the second minute came and passed the two were feeling an excruciating amount of anxiety. Why were they feeling this, probably due to their guilty consciousnesses, it probably had nothing to do with me ramping up their anxiety. Janet started squirming within the first 30 seconds and if not for a firm hand on her arm dimpling her flesh she might have cracked right there.


    After the two minutes passed Tyrone couldn¡¯t take it anymore and spoke up, ¡°So why¡¯d you want us to come here?¡±


    I didn¡¯t respond, I just continued to stare at the duo. I felt Tyrone becoming more and more frustrated, his anxiety also started to go through the roof. He started to get up saying, ¡°Well if you don¡¯t need us I¡¯m heading out.¡±


    I lashed out at him with a whip of fear and I saw his hands start to tremble. I finally spoke, my voice hard, ¡°Sit back down Tyrone, I did not give you permission to leave. Besides, not everyone is here yet, we can¡¯t start a meeting without everyone being here.¡±


    Janet started to panic and Tyrone¡¯s anxiety jumped through the roof, he asked, ¡°Who else is coming?¡±


    I smiled, and said in a playful voice, ¡°Oh I¡¯m not sure exactly but I expect they¡¯ll be simply wicked.¡±


    The duo seemed to understand what I was implying and they both attempted to bolt. I kicked out with a little extra speed and tripped Tyrone. We went down with flailing arms and ended up bringing Janet down with him. They fell into a pile of tangled limbs and I walked a little closer to the pair. I said, ¡°Tyrone, Janet, I don¡¯t believe I gave you permission to get up off the bed, but since you want to be on the floor so much you can stay down there until our other guests arrive.¡±


    The two finally managed to untangle themselves and Tyrone attempted to push himself up, I however didn¡¯t approve so I stepped on his back, hard. He crashed into the ground and I heard his teeth click. I grinned then shuddered a bit, those damned impulses that deity awakened were kind of making me into a sadist, something I¡¯d rather not become.


    I used my command voice to say, ¡°Stay down and keep your eyes open, you need to understand exactly why crossing me is a bad idea. This is the one mistake I¡¯ll allow you as you new boss. Mess up again and you will disappear. No one will know what happened to you, you will just disappear off the face of the earth.¡±


    I extended my senses outward ignoring the pulsing fear radiating off of Tyrone and Janet, and we waited. We spent maybe ten minutes in silence before the door burst open and two hispanic men burst in. I was of course ready for them as I felt them as they were making their way up the stairs. I was on the move as they were opening the door. They burst through the door at 1 quarter speed which allowed me plenty of time to take note of their appearances, one was in his early 20¡¯s lighter skin tone while still obviously hispanic, he was dressed in a white shirt with jeans, had a gold chain and a shaved head. He was also sporting a small caliber handgun which I promptly took out of his hand. I might have broken his finger while disarming him, but who knows he could have started screaming for no reason whatsoever.


    His buddy had spike black hair held back by a red bandana, a short sleeve collared shirt that for some reason he¡¯d only buttoned the top button of and of course he was also sporting a gun. I snatched the gun out of his hand and for some reason he started swearing like a trucker. Now there was a lady present and I couldn¡¯t let him befoul her ears with such filth so I closed the source of filth with my fist. I then decided to help the screamer with his pain by relieving him of the consciousness that was hurting him so much. I knocked out with a tap to the temple. The whole scuffle lasted for maybe 5 seconds.


    Having completed my introduction to the diablos I turned to face Tyrone who was stunned on the floor. He apparently didn¡¯t remember how fast I was, probably because when he saw it he was knocked out almost immediately after witnessing it. It probably skewed his memories, made him think he just wasn¡¯t prepared for my attack which is why I was able to take him down. Now I think he understood that we weren¡¯t in the same league. I hunkered down next to the stunned Tyrone and terrified Janet. I then said, ¡°Now that you have a little bit of a better appreciation of who your dealing with I don¡¯t think you¡¯ll do something so foolish as to try and ambush me with a couple of thugs will you?¡±


    Tyrone shook his head, ¡°please¡­ please don¡¯t kill me¡­¡±


    I smiled, ¡°Oh Tyrone, I¡¯m not going to kill you because you¡¯re going to be my little helper aren¡¯t you and Janet is going to be my loyal assistant right?¡±


    They both started nodding frantically, tears streamed down Janet¡¯s face again. I adjusted my position a bit so I was facing Janet directly and said, ¡°Now Janet this is the second time you haven¡¯t warned me about an ambush. Learn this lesson now, if you come to me with information like this I will protect and reward you. You should understand at this point if you have my protection no one will lay their hands on you because I will lay my hands on them so much harder. Now I know you and Tyrone have a relationship, I¡¯d like you to make sure he doesn¡¯t do anything this stupid again. Can you do that?¡±


    Janet nodded and squeaked out, ¡°yyyeah I cccan do thatttt.¡±


    I smiled down at her, ¡°Good I¡¯m glad we understand each other. Now we have some guests and I¡¯m sure they''d like some coffee as they seem to have fallen asleep. Why don¡¯t you be a dear and go make us some coffee.¡±


    Janet got up off the floor and began to limp out of the door, I¡¯m guessing her leg fell asleep while she was stuck on the ground these last few minutes. When she closed the door behind her I returned my attention to Tyrone, I addressed his cowering form and said, ¡°Now look here Tyrone, our guests are going to think we are inhospitable hosts if we just leave them in the entry way like this. You should make them more comfortable while I relieve them of all the things weighing them down. I then collected their wallets and a knife from the bald one. Meanwhile Tyrone dragged the two out of the entryway and leaned them up against one of the inner walls., he propped them up almost like they were sitting although their heads lolling against their chest quickly dispelled the illusion that they were even remotely conscious.This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    I sat on the bed, double checking the contents of their wallets. Let¡¯s see here we had one Hector Mendoza and Javier Hernandez. They had a combined 23 dollars on them which implied to me that they were low level enforcers, maybe recruits, definitely not high up in the hierarchy. I decided to clarify things before I made too many assumptions, ¡°So Tyrone, when you decided to go to the diablos, who did you talk to and who did they say they¡¯d send?¡±


    Tyrone responded, ¡°I talked to Jorge Mendoza, he¡¯s one of the sargento¡¯s of the diablos. He¡¯s in charge of this area, makes sure everyone pays their rent on time. He usually sends these two to do the collecting, but if someone fails to pay Jorge¡¯s the one that shows up and makes them regret his visit.¡±


    I nodded, and guessed Hector was probably a nephew, cousin, or son of Jorge, and Javier was probably his friend. As I expected fairly low on the totem pole, but Hector might know something if he¡¯s the type to pay attention.


    I decided to wake up Javier first, he was the bald screamer and likely easier to break than Hector. Now personally I am not a fan of alarm clocks so I figured a loud noise might not be the nicest way to wake Hector up, so instead I gave him a nice firm slap to the face. The smack resonated around the room, but didn¡¯t seem to do much for sleeping beauty so I delivered a back hand. That one seemed to have an affect. Javier¡¯s head lolled to the side and his eyelids began to flutter. I also saw some blood leak out of his mouth.


    I lifted Javier¡¯s head by the chin and looked him in the eyes. I could see he was a little out of it, probably a result of having his brain rattled around from my punch. Not exactly a great state to get information out of him, at the same time he¡¯d likely be too messed up to try and lie, so there were some advantages to giving him a concussion. I saw his eyes, well one of his eyes focus on me and then I saw anger begin to cloud it over. Rather than let him build up a head of steam I smacked him in the face again and said, ¡°If you know what¡¯s good for you boy you will continue to sit there and..¡±


    Javier lunged at me. Of course he was in a bad position to do so as his legs were splayed out in front of him. I could have just ignored the awkward attempt at attacking me, but I didn¡¯t want to encourage such behavior so i gave him another responding slap. I imparted enough force into the slap so that it overbalanced the little gangster, he ended up in a awkward sprawl on the ground. I then grabbed him by the throat and returned him to his original position against the wall. He grabbed onto my forearm while I was returning him to an upright and locked position, his nails were digging into my skin. I think he was choking because he started gasping when I eventually released his throat.


    I hunkered down a bit so we were eye to eye again and said, ¡°Now let¡¯s try this again, or would you prefer I beat you unconscious and then when you wake up I question you?¡±


    Javier was beginning to feel some fear, which I happily encouraged, and he blustered, ¡°You just signed your death warrant Puta. No one lays a hand on the diablos without catching a bullet.¡±


    I laughed, not chuckled, I straight up laughed in his face, who the fuck says that kind of shit. Who tries to scare the guy that just beat the shit out of you with comments like that? He might as well have just said that his dad could beat up my dad. When I calmed down enough I said, ¡°So you think that your gang is going to shoot me, and who exactly are they going to be shooting? What¡¯s my name? Who knows what I look like? Come on buddy if your gang¡¯s going to come after me, who am I?¡±


    It took a second for Javier to come to grips with the fact that I was basically anonymous and unless they wanted to shoot every black man over six feet in Charlotte his gang wasn¡¯t going to avenge him. He apparently couldn¡¯t think of an appropriate response but his fear did ratchet up a notch which I encouraged. He tried bluster again, ¡°Fuck you man, we know what you look like and our boss knows about Tyrone, even if we can¡¯t get you that fucker will just have to take your place.¡±


    I smiled, then put a little mock fear and a lot of sarcasm in my voice, ¡°So you want to torture and kill the guy that just betrayed me? Damn, anything but that¡­ As for you guys knowing what I look like, who in the world said you would be leaving this room alive?¡±


    I let him sit with the question for a couple of seconds before I spoke again, ¡°You idiots broke into my room with guns drawn I could kill you both right now and when the cops show up I would get off scot free because I was defending myself from armed intruders. Or I could just make you two disappear, no one see you or hears from you again. As for your last known whereabouts, you went into the room of a large black man and were never seen again. You need to understand one thing right now Javier, You. Are. Fucked. The only way in which you don¡¯t end up dead is if I decide not to kill you. The only way I¡¯m not going to kill you is if I am given a compelling reason not to. Tyrone is still alive because he gave me a reason not to kill him. So why shouldn¡¯t I kill you right now?¡±


    Javier seemed to be stumped, his eyes started roving around the room looking for an escape. His fear started climbing to the point where I thought he might start having a panic attack, that¡¯s when I looked a little deeper. His thoughts were racing, very few of them were coherent, probably due to the mild concussion I¡¯d given him, but the main premise of his thoughts were, ¡°how do I get out of here, how do I escape?¡± So I inserted one simple clear thought, ¡°What if I offer to serve him?¡±


    I let him think for another 5 seconds before repeating my question, ¡°Javier you don¡¯t seem to be paying any attention to me, which is so rude. I asked you why I shouldn¡¯t kill you.¡±


    Javier then blurted out what I was hoping for, ¡°If you don¡¯t kill me I¡¯ll do whatever you want man. Seriously just don¡¯t fuckin kill me man.¡±


    While Javier was offering up his loyalty Hector was beginning to wake up. I didn¡¯t want him to affect the current situation so I lightly tapped him on the chin. His head ended up rocking back and hitting the wall. That would probably buy me a few minutes to properly bring Javier into the fold and drain him of information. Tyrone¡¯s eyes widened at my strike, but he showed no other signs of reacting. Javier however flinched at the strike, his eyes closed and hands raised up defensively. I amplified the pulse of fear he felt then sent a flash of relief. Javier opened his eyes and they once again desperately looked around the room, probably searching for something to help him escape. They locked on Tyrone and when he helplessly shook his head I could see the defeat in his eyes. Javier helplessly looked back at me and I smiled down at him.


    I commanded in the form of a question, ¡°Now Javier I believe you were about to tell me everything you know about your gang isn¡¯t that right?¡±


    Javier nodded his head up and down like a bobble head and started stuttering out, ¡°Thththere¡¯s 24 enforcers like ma ma me and Hector, wa wa we work for his tio Jorge whos a sargento, he¡¯s got 5 other guys under him. There are 2 other Sargentos they¡¯ve got 4 guys and 6 guys respectively. Then there¡¯s the Capitan, he¡¯s got a crew of 7 guys that directly report to him. Ththey have the best gear and the easiest jobs. The sargentos are all responsible for different things, Hector¡¯s tio is in charge of collecting rent from all the independent businesses, and all the pimps that aren¡¯t part of the gang. He and the rest of our crew also do most of the fighting, whenever some knucklehead tries to rise up, we¡¯re normally the ones that put them in their place. The other two sargento¡¯s are responsible for the drugs and the girls.¡±


    I nodded and clapped Javier on the shoulder, the sound and the contact made him flinch. I said, ¡°Good, it¡¯s nice that we can have an open and honest conversation. Now Javier, how do you think Jorge will react if you and Hector don¡¯t return home today?¡±


    Javier shrugged, ¡°I don¡¯t know man. He might just think we went out to get drunk, we do that a lot, he probably doesn¡¯t expect to see us til tomorrow.¡±


    I asked, ¡°And when you don¡¯t show up tomorrow?¡±


    Javier thought for a second, ¡°Well, he¡¯ll probably come after that puta Tyrone once he realizes we¡¯re missing.¡±


    I smiled, ¡°Well that¡¯s just perfect. Now Javier I think you are ready to be smart about this, so I¡¯m going to extend an offer your way, you can take it or you can leave it, though I¡¯d really suggest you take it. You see, I plan on taking over your little gang, then I¡¯m going to take over every other gang in the city. By the end of the month I expect to have complete control over every bit of organized crime in the city. Now you can be a part of that, and if you prove capable and loyal I¡¯ll promote you, I¡¯ll give you power and wealth, all you have to do is obey my commands. Do you think you can do that?¡±


    Javier nodded, then I could see confusion clouding over his features he asked, ¡°Wait, how are you going to take over all the other gangs? Even if you managed to take out el jefe and get the hombres to follow you, we can¡¯t take the other gangs¡­¡±


    I laughed, ¡°Muwahahaha, don¡¯t worry about that Javier. All you have to do is follow my orders and answer my questions honestly, if you do that I guarantee you¡¯ll be living the high life in no time at all.¡±


    Javier began to nervously laugh and responded, ¡°Okay boss, you say the word and I¡¯ll do whatever you want.¡±


    I could feel that Javier wasn¡¯t being entirely honest with me, but then it takes time for the fear to properly set in and loyalty to sprout from said fear. I¡¯d give him some time and let him see me beat the shit out of his former boss. After that I¡¯m sure he¡¯d start to see things my way.


    I said, ¡°Now Javier as the newest member of my gang, I¡¯m going to give you some errands while I have a talk with Hector here. Here¡¯s all you have to do¡­¡±