《The Shroud》 Chapter 1: Ben Florence meet Ben Florence ¡°Are you Ben Florence?¡± ¡°My head... where am I?¡± ¡°Depends. Are you Ben Florence? Because if not then there was one hell of a mix up.¡± ¡°Yeah that''s me. I''m Ben Florence.¡± ¡°Oh good. If you weren''t I would have had to kill you.¡± ¡°... Why can''t I see. What happened to me?¡± ¡°You''re asleep dumb ass. And you mean what happened to me. I don''t know who you are but I gave you a trick question before. I''m Ben Florence and I''ve never seen you before.¡± ¡°You can''t see me now.¡± ¡°Touch¨¦ douch¨¦. So listen, here''s what could be happening. Scenario one; you dragged me into your dream and now I have to kill you.¡± ¡°... Give me a second option? ¡°You''re dead and somehow got into my body like a truck driver at a pit stop. In which case I have to kill you. Painfully.¡± ¡°Oh.¡± ¡°You don''t seem so surprised.¡± ¡°You keep saying it but you haven''t killed me yet. So I''m guessing you can''t. And the name really is Ben Florence.¡± ¡°The sass on your bitchy little mouth amazes me. But you''re right. I can''t move any more than you can, so tell me Imposter Ben Florence -if that is your real name- what do you remember.¡± ¡°... I remember going to sleep.¡± ¡°Somebody give this guy a fucking medal. I figured that out and I''m asleep.¡± ¡°You''re... A real ass.¡± ¡°Poetry to my ears kid. But I''d recognize my husky and fabulous voice anywhere. So does that make you my conscience? If so you can go kill yourself for me.¡± ¡°You''d... tell your own consciousness to go kill itself? That doesn¡¯t seem like a healthy lifestyle choice.¡± ¡°I have seen some messed up shit in my life, enough that I don''t need a conscience any more.¡± ¡°If... you''re going to exposition on me... teach me how to kill myself now. What is this? Some sort of afterlife?¡± ¡°I saw my parents killed you ass.¡± ¡°My parents are dead?¡± ¡°No. Ben Florence''s parents are dead. And you''re not him. I know that because I''m him.¡± ¡°But... my parents aren''t dead. I saw them last week. Fine and healthy.¡± ¡°Imposter Ben Florence, that might have been the realest thing you''ve told me. You know what, I''m just going to assume everything is fine and dandy, my parents aren''t dead despite me seeing them and I''m just going to chalk you off as one more more voice in my head. How does that sound?¡± ¡°Terrible... Are you sure I''m not dead? This could be my punishment. But I always thought I''d go to heaven.¡± ¡°Trust me, what I''ve done in my life is definitely going to land us a one way ticket to hell.¡± ¡°So it''s us now... You seem to have accepted this easily.¡± ¡°Nope. Not at all. But I''ve learnt to not care about the little things and go with the flow. Also, I''m almost positive that you''re dead, or I¡¯m dead.¡± ¡°You... don''t know? This all seems weird. I still can''t see.¡± ¡°Why was I cursed with this numbnuts as my conscience. You don¡¯t seem to be the most tightly fitted nut in my brain, but I guess I may have a screw or two loose.¡± ¡°Do crazy people know they¡¯re crazy?¡± ¡°Slip slap straight onto my heartstrings meat bag. So tell me, do you know what a hero is?¡± ¡°Hero... like in comics?¡± ¡°Holy shit on a stick. Just answer the damn question.¡± ¡°... Are you a hero?¡± ¡°Yeah. No.¡± ¡°Oh... that''s disappointing.¡± ¡°Way to kick a man in the nuts when he''s down dirt-bag.¡± ¡°I''m not sure if I''m sorry for that.¡± ¡°Well you should be, I¡¯m a very sensitive soul .¡± ¡°¡­ Are you?¡± ¡°No, but that¡¯s not the point. I¡¯m the one asking the questions here bucko.¡± ¡°Where is here? I have no idea where I am.¡± ¡°Listen, don¡¯t talk to me like we¡¯re all familiar now. All this talking and feeling is making me uncomfortable. Normally I''d have killed you by now. But since we''re both here and not doing anything I figured I''d ask you a question.¡± ¡°I''d say you''re ten questions too late to ask me for permission now.¡± ¡°I¡¯m surprised you could hear them when your head is clearly so far up your ass.¡± ¡°¡­ Are you going to ask your question or not? I don¡¯t have all day. Or maybe I do¡­ Why did you ask me about heroes?¡± ¡°J-just shut up. Can you feel that? Can you see that?¡± ¡°Pictures¡­ memories? Flashing all around me, like a movie ¡°What are you doing to me queef cookie? Is this an attack?¡± ¡°Dad¡­ killed? Mum too? Why¡­ what¡¯s happening here? Who is this person. So much death¡­ you, you¡¯re killing people¡­ so many innocent people. What are you doing?¡± ¡°Happiness, I can feel myself turning into a sappy little shit. Mum, dad, why are you still alive? I have a brother? Impossible, Who are you? What are you? Why are you so normal.¡± ¡°This isn¡¯t my life.¡±This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. ¡°This isn¡¯t my life.¡± ¡°You... I''m you? What is this. What are you doing to me?¡± ¡°No wait. Shut up a second. I''m- I''m starting to remember now. What is this?¡± ¡°¡­ You tell me. I-I¡¯m so confused, so tired, no, these aren¡¯t my feelings. Why are you so tired? So much anger, so much hate. It¡¯s like you¡¯re in constant agony. Swirling in your heart, digging into it. My¡­ I can¡¯t take this. Make it stop.¡± ¡°Ben Florence. Two of us. Parents, friends, allies. This isn''t my life, what the hell is this. You''re not a dead body, you''re me. But- but I''m me. God damn am I going crazy again, please tell me I''m going crazy again. Hey you worthless sack of crap what the hell are you doing to me?¡± ¡°I''m... I''m you... What happened to you? My parents... they''re not dead. What are you doing to me? You... You''re a murderer. You''re a villain.¡± ¡°Hehe, well, told you I wasn''t a hero.¡± ¡°Well... what are these? They''re not my memories... but they are at the same time. Why are you so calm about this? Our parents are dead... But they''re not dead... I saw them just before... But they died years ago.¡± ¡°Get the fuck out of my memories Ben. Stop looking right now before I do something we both regret. I can''t move yet but I swear if you keep going I''ll pop a cap in our heads when we wake up.¡± ¡°I don''t want to see this. Okay... It... It''s stopping. You''re a millionaire? I was never a millionaire.¡± ¡°Gave it all away kid. I didn''t need it then and I don''t need it now.¡± ¡°It¡¯s¡­ all jumbled up. You¡¯re all screwed up¡­ what the hell did you do with yourself. Our parents die and you become a killer?¡± ¡°Wait it¡¯s coming to me, a memory, a-ah, you¡¯re sleeping? Dying? But you¡¯re not dead.¡± ¡°What do you mean I¡¯m dying?¡± ¡°Keep your head in the game shi- Ben. You''re dead now, but I''m alive.¡¯ ¡°How do I know you¡¯re not dead and I¡¯m alive¡­ why don¡¯t I remember anything? I swear I only went to sleep.¡± ¡°You didn''t die. Did something do this to us? I have a lot of enemies, I wouldn¡¯t be surprised if somebody did this to us. My parents¡­ were they were never meant to die? I-I should have had your life. I want your life. This- ah, fuck it. Thanks for the new memories Ben. This isn''t your fault. You''re just as useless now as you were when you were alive.¡± ¡°Awfully nice of you. So... What is this? I¡¯m not stupid. A dream? The memories¡­ this feeling of awareness¡­ am I like some sort of parallel universe you that got stuck in your body?¡± ¡°I wish. Well, maybe kind of. I need time to think. I¡¯m going to try and figure this out. There''s going to be a lot of killing. Things might get a bit complicated.¡± ¡°... What the hell. I''m not killing anybody. You¡­ seem to be making a lot of decisions all of a sudden.¡± ¡°Yeah well you don''t get much of a choice right now. You may have stopped remembering but I didn''t. I remember it all now. The images I saw. There are no heroes in your world? No villains. No aliens. No powers and no magic.¡± ¡°... You guys live in one weird as universe.¡± ¡°Your universe kid. Why does it seem like all this stuff didn''t exist until just now. I-I''m not sure why I know this. None of this is right. Somebodies screwing up my reality. None of this should exist. They shouldn''t have died. Now I''m pissed. We''re going to get to the bottom of this. Not me, not you. Us.¡± ¡°I¡¯m¡­ not quite sure I¡¯m following you. Are you crazy? Am I crazy now? God, is this me going insane.¡± ¡°Just¡­ we have to do something first. You and me, we need to work this out. We need to get this whole thing fixed.¡± ¡°... How can I help you?¡± ¡°We''re going to find the fucker that did this and put a bullet through his head.¡± ¡°... Huh?¡± ¡°You heard me. How far did you get into my memories Ben?¡± ¡°Snippets¡­ so much killing. I saw things that couldn¡¯t be real. You-you¡¯re covered in shadows, killing so many people. Our parents died¡­ killed by some sort of creature? What is that?¡± ¡°That¡¯s an alien. Killed our parents in cold blood and I murdered it in return. The first time I ever killed. The first time we ever killed.¡± ¡°¡­ I never killed anyone. There¡¯s so much I need to wrap my head around. Why did you ask me what a hero is? No¡­ I see it now, you actually have those here.¡± ¡°Told you that before slow poke. Keep up with me here, this isn¡¯t your average garden variety movie film shit.¡± ¡°Are you¡­ asleep? This is impossible, there¡¯s so much here that is unbelievable.¡± ¡°Listen Ben. I''ve been around this community for years, when somebody says that an alien invasion just got stopped or some new guy with powers is trying to take over the country I don''t bat an eyelid. I''ve lived like this all my life. I''ve done a lot of terrible things. So, as you can imagine, there''s not much I can''t do.¡± ¡°¡­ Stuck up about yourself much?¡± ¡°Don¡¯t interrupt me while I¡¯m brainstorming. I have so many enemies¡­ But this is different. What did they do? It¡¯s like somebody altered reality for me. Memories I¡¯ve never had, is that what you are? Just a new personality somebody stuck into my head. Did somebody think that giving me these sorts of memories would make me less of a threat?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t particularly enjoy being sidelined as your imagination¡­ I¡¯m real, you¡¯re the one that seems too fantastic to be fake.¡± ¡°That''s some heavy crap right there. I mean some people can do it, common knowledge you know. If there¡¯s a power for everything then surely someone could have planted memories in me. Maybe somebody could have even altered reality. That''s where you come in. You''re not dead Ben, you''re just me, but not me at the same time. I think something screwed up our lives somehow¡­ if you¡¯re real then what does that make me?¡± ¡°¡­ I still vote for parallel universe. Or a dream, I enjoy dreams.¡± ¡°God you¡¯re so- You''re not meant to be in my head right now, you never existed. We''re the same person. Except we''re not. What is this I¡¯m seeing? You lived a normal life with your parents in some world with no superheroes. I got the shitty end of the deal on that one. If you¡¯re real. And this is a real big IF. Then you¡¯re what? Another time line version of me? Gah, I¡¯m not used to this¡­ this familiarity. So we''re going to do this my way. We¡¯ll find the son of a bitch that''s been screwing with us and put a bullet through his head. That should solve the problem. That always solves the problem.¡± ¡°Uh... umm...¡± ¡°Umm?¡± ¡°It''s just... a lot to take in one go... where did you suddenly get the idea that somebody is warping reality from again¡­ or whatever they did?¡± ¡°Listen Ben, this may surprise you since you didn''t look through my memories but somebody warping reality isn''t the craziest thing that I''ve heard about in my life.¡± ¡°That''s great and all... but even if that''s true and somebodies messing with us... we have no way to stop them. We''re just a normal guy.¡± ¡±No. You''re a normal guy. My parents were aliens. ¡°Wait¡­ what?¡± ¡°And you should know that thanks to some other crap in my life I''m also an almost unstoppable killing machine. Not a pussy like you.¡± ¡°You seem to have skipped an important point there¡­ When you say unstoppable... You mean like unkillable? And how many people have you killed.¡± ¡°I stopped crunching the numbers a long time ago. And not unkillable. Just really hard to kill. I didn''t spend my entire life fighting for survival without picking up a few tricks.¡± ¡°So... do I call you Ben too then? This is pretty confusing. What do you mean your parents are aliens? I¡¯m not an alien.¡± ¡°Were. I said were. Don''t even try to call me Ben. The name''s Shroud. Didn''t make the name, it''s just what people call me. You''ll get used to the life once you live it a while.¡± ¡°Uh.... Shroud... So how does this work? We share a body?¡± ¡°Don''t get comfortable Ben. You''re an ordinary guy that''s never even seen a kid mulched by a wood-chipper before. I''ll do the controlling and the killing. You take a seat and close your eyes when I tell you to. And whatever you do, don''t look at my memories.¡± ¡°That seems... like a rather extreme example.¡± ¡°More common than you¡¯d think in my world.¡± ¡°What happens if I don''t want to stay some voice in your head?¡± ¡°Ben, I''m barely paying attention to you because you''re me and I feel like its wrong to kill myself no matter how much I want to. But if you do anything, and I mean anything, that impacts me negatively and I will call it quits and blow my brains out. Sure I wouldn''t gain anything and more than likely I would die with you, but I swear I will die with a smile on my face and laugh as I drag your screaming soul down into the lowest level of hell with me.¡± ¡°Dude... I don''t think I even want the possibility of looking at those memories of yours.¡± ¡°Yeah well. I''ve lost enough to not care about losing my life. Now are you ready to wake up or am I going to have to force it?¡± ¡°... I thought you were the one that''s sleeping.¡± ¡°Yeah well hopefully this isn''t a permanent thing. Spending every little second asleep with a pussy ass bitch version of me is not my picture of an ideal dream.¡± ¡°... That hurts man.¡± ¡°Suck it up sugar. It''s a bit of a risk for me to even kill you alive when we wake up but I''m going to give you the benefit of the doubt. Think of it like paid vacation with no pay. I''ve never had it before and now you get it for the rest of your life.¡± ¡°I don''t know...¡± ¡°I''m going to mentally strangle you if that''s what it takes to wake you up you frutty little shit. You might not have any problem with being here but I''ve got a dead me in my mind and I don''t like it. Your memories are probably already causing my harm I can''t see. Hurry up.¡± ¡°But... I don''t know how to wake up. It''s like my whole minds drowsy... I''m almost certain its a dream... Please let it be a dream.¡± ¡°Yep. It worked. It was all a dream. Whoop-dee-doo let''s all go home and celebrate. Oh wait, I''m still here and you''re still being a little turd.¡± ¡°Fine... I''ll wake up. Why would I even have control over that if it''s your body. God you make no sense dream me.¡± ¡°Good. Get to it then.¡± ¡°... How do I do it.¡± ¡°Oh for fucks sake. This is going to hurt.¡± ¡°Hurt? What is? We''re not even... oh my god... that really hurts!¡± Chapter 2: Shroud Uniform Ben Florence woke with a start, falling down and landing nose first onto the floor. The moment he touched the ground he grasped his head in his hands and cried out. He could feel the veins shivering underneath his skin and sweat was forming across his body as it trembled. It felt like his brain had decided to give birth, pulsations of pain flowing down his neck and around his heart. He forced himself to sit up and blinked as his eyes adjusted to the darkness around him. Slowly the shadows turned into shapes and he lifted his hand onto the bed he¡¯d fallen off, vaguely registering that it felt too hard and cold to be his mattress. This wasn''t his room. It wasn''t even a bedroom. He looked back onto the thing he was holding and felt a sharp pain shoot out from his head at the movement. He''d been sleeping on a smoothly cut rock that he was now groping with his fingers as he tried to keep himself steady. From the corner of his eye he saw a faint light reflecting off of a surface. A single cracked mirror rested on a wall where it caught the faint light coming from the roof in its reflection. Ben laid back against the smooth stone as the pain slowly subsided and he sighed, giving himself a pat down. He didn''t remember falling asleep in an unfinished construction site. He could hear a small buzzing noise and looked up to see a broken fan spinning around and showering him with particles of dust. Clearly not a construction site then. It didn¡¯t look like any place a human would stay in though, it was bare, cold and the entire place looked like it had been cut from a single slab of concrete and then hastily painted over with the cheap stuff that was now peeling all over the place. Even so, he couldn''t help but feel that this place was familiar to him. When he squinted and took into account the shape and contours of the surroundings, it looked like his room. Except it was empty and collapsing around him. Plus, at his place there wasn''t a huge stone slab in the side of the room where his bed should be. Ben shook his head to get the dust out of his eyes and groaned as pain racked through his body. His head felt like he¡¯d had enough alcohol to black out. Then again he was in a dusty old place that looked like crap so maybe he had blacked out. As he moved his hands to his head he became acutely aware that there was something beating lightly against his skin. He looked down at his shirt and realized that the pajamas he''d thought he¡¯d gone to bed with were gone, and in their place was a single black body suit. It looked like a gimp suit. He tugged at the material and was surprised as it almost melted in his hands like a fine silk. The melting material dripped at his feet and he caught his breath, the entire lighting in the room seemed to shift as the drops hit the stone ground. He stopped pinching the suit and slowly stood up, continuing to stare at the ground. Even though it was impossible, he could swear that the darkness of the room was pooling around his feet in a puddle. He stepped away from the puddle towards the mirror and looked up from it, ¡°Well...¡± His attention was taken up by the figure staring back at him. Behind the cracked glass and badly cleaned surface a sallow, grey skinned face with a wide open mouth was looking into the mirror. It looked like a demon from hell, or one of those underground cave people you hear rumours about. Grey skin, pale and vein filled eyes, a shaved head and connected to all of it like a second skin layer was the black gimp suit. Ben¡¯s body began to shudder as his nerves took a blow. The suit was moving, little puffs of darkness swirling across its surface and the different shades of black that it was made from were flickering about as though the suit was a living thing. When you added his entirely vampire-like looks then it painted a terrifying picture. Ben looked away and a thought crossed his mind and threatened to bring tears of frustration and panic to his eyes. He¡¯d just had a sneaking suspicion that this wasn''t his world. Part of him didn''t want to believe it, but another part... Another part of him was telling him that maybe what he¡¯d just experience hadn''t just been a dream. He distinctly remembered there had been a second voice talking to him in his sleep. He shook his head. These thoughts wouldn¡¯t help him now. His eyes fell onto the dark swirls that were crossing over his body and the drops that had fallen onto the ground. His hands and feet were fully covered by this strange material, and there didn''t seem to be a way to take it off. It wasn¡¯t doing him any harm as far as he could tell. In fact, it didn''t feel like he was wearing anything, as though the darkness was a part of his body. A slow, rhythmic beat that constantly pressed against his skin gave him that uncomfortable feeling that it was alive. He touched his face and he realized that dots of darkness had somehow placed themselves in front of it, probably when he had fallen out of the stone slab. His nose was fine despite him hitting the ground second before. But if it had been bruised he wouldn''t have been able to notice anything wrong compared to how squashed it already was, it definitely wasn¡¯t the same nose that he remembered. It looked like he¡¯d run into several trucks during his life, all of which had swerved into him while desperately trying to do the most damage possible. He ran his hands through his short hair and realized that he couldn''t feel anything rushing against his palms. ¡®I¡¯m bald now.¡¯ He vaguely registered the lack of hair he¡¯d seen in the mirror. ¡°Well fuck.¡± A gruff voice resounded through his mind and the room. Ben turned around and saw someone sitting on the stone he''d been sleeping on. He hadn''t seen or heard anyone come in, or even heard them. This person was... transparent. It looked like he wasn¡¯t real, but Ben didn¡¯t care about that. He recognized the person. It was him. But it wasn''t this gray faced, pale and weird version of him that he could still see in the mirror. This was the Ben Florence he remembered, shoulder-length hair with olive-white skin and no black gimp suit attached to him. The only thing that was different from normal was the scowl that was contorting the normally pleasant face. Ben continued to stare at the transparent thing with a frown. ¡°Yeah it''s me fuck nuts. Take a picture it''ll last longer.¡± The man stuck up his middle finger as he spoke. Ben tilted his head to the side and tried to brush out whatever dust he had in his eyes. He felt like if he tried hard enough the person would disappear into the air. But the ghost-like Ben that was sitting in front of him continued to grimace and flip him the bird. ¡°You''re...¡± Ben tried to wrap his mind around what was happening. ¡°The version of you that you were just talking to. Good to meet you fuckwad, looks like there was a slight mix-up. That''s my body and you''re not meant to be in control of it.¡± ¡°You look just like me. The me that isn''t some sort of weird vampire living on a stone slab.¡± Ben blinked, he was slowly trying to connect the pieces of this weird puzzle in his mind, ¡°Why does your head look like a shriveled up gray apple.¡±Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more. ¡°Oddly specific and insulting way to say it. We might have more in common than I thought. And about my appearance,¡± The transparent Ben shrugged, ¡°Whatever, it''s not that important. Like I said my parents, our parents, were aliens in this reality. They left behind the Shroud Uniform you''re wearing and since I''ve been literally living in darkness the lack of sunlight made my skin wither up like a raisin... And short hair is just more convenient. Well that and the thing takes my blood as payment for working. It can¡¯t let any old creature use it after all¡± ¡°... What?¡± Ben tried to wrap his head around the person¡¯s confusing words, ¡®Shroud Uniform.¡¯ Ben looked down, ¡°Do you mean this black body suit?¡± ¡°Your brain thinks its a black body suit. But that mean mother fucker is an alien weapon designed solely for killing and espionage. Our parents intended to give it to us. They died. I got it off the person that killed our parents, the ultimate trophy. Its also my main weapon of choice for killing people. If you know how to use it properly it can do a lot more than just stick to your skin.¡± ¡°I... you sound awfully proud about something so horrible.¡± ¡°Yeah you''ll soon find out that my attitude isn''t such a big deal. We''re the same person remember so before I forget...¡± The transparent Ben stood up and rushed towards Ben and slapped him in the face. Ben recoiled from the smack, even though the other Ben was transparent his palm hit like a rock. It landed squarely on his cheek and Ben could feel his head begin to burn as pain once again began to shoot out from it. He lifted his hand to his cheek but the pain was coursing inside him, all over his body. He groaned and felt his knees his to solid stone ground as his body collapsed onto the floor. Blood spurted out of his nose and through the pores of the black suit, darkness swirling around the red little beads and smoothly ejecting them onto the floor. Streaks of blood gave the room the only other color it had. After a few minutes that pain subsided and Ben lifted himself off the ground and into a sitting position. The ghost-ben was standing in front of him. ¡°What the hell was that?¡± Ben traced a hand over his cheeks and then his body. There wasn''t a speck of blood clinging to his body but there was clearly a lot of it on the floor. It was enough to make him worry that blood loss would cause him a lot of problems. Worse, he could feel that something had been taken away from him. Nothing physical, it was like he was missing a part of him that he hadn''t realized he''d had before. ¡°You have the reflexes of a sloth.¡± The transparent Ben snorted and pointed at Ben''s head, ¡°I sealed off my memories from your mind, they''re still there but you can''t access them. I''ve seen your life and if you looked at mine by accident you would probably go crazy. Don''t worry about the blood. We have a healing factor in our body. Anything bleeds and it''ll be healed in a few seconds, anything gets cut off and it''ll grow back in a few minutes. The Shroud Uniform is also self cleaning, no dust, blood or dead skin cells to bother you.¡± Ben groaned again as he took in the information, ¡°What about the pain? Anything to make that go away?¡± ¡°Yeah, it¡¯s called living with it. A little pain is nothing compared to the ability to grow back limbs. Hell, you could survive almost anything as long as a single molecule survives. Maybe. I¡¯ve never tried it, and even if you did get into some sort of limb-cutting event the Shroud Uniform is hard to destroy and self-repairing. As long as you maintain some sort of contact with it, it''ll protect you. But that doesn''t mean we''re indestructible, this isn¡¯t your little boy league world with ordinary people and puny nukes. In this reality we''re in the small league. People that can kill us pop up by the dozen in this country alone. And trust me, with what your world was like, you do not want me to tell you what the big league guys can do. ¡± ¡°I''m not sure what to say to that... I think you just listed a bunch of impossible things.¡± ¡°Yeah, it''s not too bad. Just think of it as being in that world of comic books you have in your memories. Things don''t make sense unless you''re really smart and we''re not really smart. But I think that comic book stuff is a lot more accurate than you think. So if you could just go off and hunt down the fucker that merged our minds that¡¯d be grand. I can''t guarantee killing them would work, but it never hurts to try. So we should probably do it for good measure.¡± ¡°I see. I think I see... I didn''t get any of that.¡± ¡°Well shit. There''s probably a lot more I should explain before you go off to kill whoever did this. And there''s this thing about all that blood being on the floor, you should definitely get rid of that. There are way too many people that can use your own blood against you in this world. Rule one Ben is that you never forget to mop up after yourself or it''ll come back to kick you in the testicles and then shoot you in the face. Also this will come as a surprise since my face is a raisin twat but we don''t reveal our identity to anybody. Our identity stays a secret to everyone and everything. Got it? Now mop up that blood.¡± ¡°How?¡± Ben looked around, the room was bare except for the stone slab and the broken mirror, ¡°Uh..¡± ¡°Use your brain dipshit.¡± ¡°That doesn''t help me at all.¡± Ben stood up and moved towards the door, opening it and leaving. He found himself in a narrow hallway that was just as decrepit as his room. And there were no windows. He hadn''t realized that until just now but there were no windows in this place. Or in the room he''d just been in. And everything was made of stone. He was definitely being way too calm about this as well. On the outside at least, his insides were getting hit by waves of pain from his head and behind that was barely suppressed panic. But at least something seemed to be holding it back from becoming a full blown mental breakdown. ¡°Yeah this isn''t what I meant. This is going to be harder than I thought.¡± The air shimmered in front of Ben and the transparent Ben appeared. He looked disgruntled and annoyed. ¡°Alright Ben, you saw how the Shroud Uniform cleaned all the blood off of you. Well it can suck up the blood as well, in built feature the Shroud implemented so that nobody could take the DNA of their agents. It also works on telepathic commands. I know you know what that means. Go back into the room and think real hard about the blood disappearing and the Shroud Uniform will destroy it. Just don''t think about destroying yourself since your healing factor means that''s going to be one hell of a never ending pain-filled fight.¡± ¡°Right...¡± Ben walked back into the room and was suddenly struck by a sense of deja vu. It was such a simple place, stone walls and stone floor. But it felt like he''d seen it all, and even walked into it like this a thousand times. It was different from what he knew, but it was definitely his room. The one he remembered living in all his life in his parents house. But it was all different as well. For one thing, it was missing the giant window on its side. It also lacked almost the entirety of his furniture, book collection and wardrobe. And anything else that had been in it for that matter. He spotted the mirror as he walked back inside and sighed. He''d changed too, even though he was still Ben, he was covered in a pale black layer of skin, a ''Shroud Uniform'', and he could feel his face drooping an impossible amount due to its unhealthy complexion. Everything reminded him of himself and his life, but at the same time it was all so different. Was he even the same person any more? He closed the door behind him, the only thing that wasn''t made of stone in this place, and looked down onto the streaks of blood that were plastered onto the ground like a weird tribute to modern art. Despite the large amounts of blood he had lost, he felt perfectly fine. He tiptoed around it and was suddenly hit with the urge to heave and vomit. It wasn''t the site of the blood that did it, he was oddly calm about that, it was the smell of it. That weird metallic smell that wafted through the air. The thought that all this blood was his didn''t help him either. ¡°Stop being a pussy and tell the suit to clean it,¡± The transparent Ben''s annoyed voice floated towards him and Ben almost let out his bowels. Being surprised at this moment wasn''t good for his mental state. The transparent Ben seemed to relish in his predicament, ¡°You know, I don''t think you''re quite ready to do things with your mind yet, try saying it out loud. You can do that without chucking right?¡± Chapter 3: Shroud ¡°Where are you?¡± Ben looked around but the room was empty, the door closed. He frowned and tried to look away from the blood, but the smell was already in his nose and he could almost taste it in the air. He was trying to spot the transparent figure whose voice was speaking to him. He couldn¡¯t see anyone else in the room but he knew he¡¯d left them in here when he left. Come to think of it, he hadn¡¯t been able to see when they entered the room either. ¡°Still in the hallway, well,¡± transparent Ben paused, ¡°It''s not like that''s actually my body you know. It''s just how I show myself to you, I''m actually here all the time. Inside our head. So I can appear wherever you are but only you can see and hear me. I''m not actually talking out loud like you are, I''m just sending whatever I want to say directly to your brain.¡± Ben looked around uncomfortably as though expecting the transparent Ben to appear at any moment. ¡°It works both ways idiot. Think about talking to me in your head and whatever you say should probably be sent to me. Just don''t go crazy on the messages or else I''ll brain slap you again.¡± The voice paused for a few seconds, ¡°Think really hard Ben. I know it''s not something you''re used to but in this world you''re not going to be used to anything. For both our sakes it''s better that you learn this now or else you''ll find yourself in a situation where you''ll wish you had.¡± ''So... like this?'' Ben thought. He looked around as though looking for some sort of visual confirmation. He was trying his hardest to imaging talking to himself in his head but he felt like an idiot trying to do something he knew was impossible. It was easier for him to believe that he was going crazy than it was to believe that another person was now inside his mind. But then again a lot of things that should be impossible seemed to have happened in the last few minutes. ¡°Exactly like that. So easy even you could do it.¡± ''That insult was weak. Why aren''t mine in italics?'' ¡°Enough with the questions. It''s blood cleaning time.¡± Ben lifted his hands towards the blood and stood there stupidly for a few seconds. He gestured hopelessly to the air, ¡®I don¡¯t know what to do.¡¯ ¡°Oh for- It''s not like you have to say a magic word. Just tell it you want it to clean up the blood.¡± ¡°Right...¡± Ben stared down at the blood, ¡°Suit- no- Shroud Uniform, clean the blood.¡± As soon as he spoke the Shroud Uniform began to contort and pulsate, sections of it disintegrating into a black gas that wafted through the air. The Shroud Uniform was still sticking to his skin, that was for sure. But it was also wafting in the air as though it was in two states at once, a solid and a gas. It wasn''t that it came off of him and broke off into the air, it was more like it was creating more tendrils of darkness out of nothing and sending it flying towards the blood. Ben''s vision became black as the darkness permeated through the air and all across his vision but he could still see through it. It wasn''t like night vision, it was more like he could feel everything that the darkness felt, as though he was touching everything it touched. It was sending information into his brain about everything in the area and his brain was taking it all in stride. The blood didn''t feel like anything other than liquid, and the smell had already disappeared from the air. In less than a minute the Shroud Uniform surprised him by telling him that there was no more blood on the floor or in the air. It had wiped the room clean. It had also spoken into his mind. ¡°You''re pretty quiet,¡± The transparent Ben''s voice came out of the darkness, startling Ben who looked around before remembering that the other Ben was talking into his head, ¡°I was awed the first time as well.¡± Ben stared at the darkness as it began to swirl and dissipate, parts of it returning and merging into his Shroud Uniform, ¡°That''s the first humane thing you''ve said to me.¡± ¡°Don''t get used to it blue balls.¡± ¡°You''re me,¡± Ben said, pointing at the suit, at his heart, ¡°You''ve just had one hell of a messed up life. Well whether you like it or not I''m here now. I don''t know what happened to you to make you so jaded but it wasn''t just the death of our parents, I saw those too through your memories and I know it didn''t affect you this way. I''m going to try and help you.¡± Ben patiently waited and eventually a monotone voice floated into his mind, ¡°You''re talking out loud again Ben. It makes you look crazy. It''ll probably be a while until we''re separated but if you take one piece of advice from me in the entire time we know each other then take this one, stay out of my life and my memories. Don''t try to find out anything about me. We may have been born the same person but you had the chances in life I never had, a life of comfort I never had. And no matter how much of an ass I am, I refuse to let the only version of me that went alright in life get corrupted like I was.¡± ¡°So you do care about me.¡± Ben teased out loud, then fell silent. He walked towards the stone slab as the darkness gathered back into his black suit, disappearing from the air as though it had never existed. Even the stone slab felt comfortable underneath the Shroud Uniform. It was as though the darkness contorted around everything he touched to make sure he wasn¡¯t harmed or put into a bad position. This probably explained why the other Ben had been sleeping on a stone slab, it wasn¡¯t as though an actual bed would have been any different. ''I wonder... How long will it take? To get me back to my normal life.'' Transparent Ben fell quiet. The remaining bits of darkness had all been absorbed into the Shroud Uniform and since it had even cleaned the blood from the air and his nostrils he could breath normally again. Ben touched his nose again, it wasn''t actually that uncomfortable but he got the feeling it wasn''t because of his body so much as the uniform he was wearing. ¡°I''m Shroud by the way. Ben''s not my name, and I can hear you calling me transparent Ben in my mind. Shrouds my name now, I prefer it.¡± ''Okay.'' Ben laid back on the slab. It was a simple response, but he had no idea what else he could say. Shroud had appeared in the room again, looking into the mirror but not seeing a reflection. Shroud turned towards Ben with that permanent lopsided scowl, ¡°You talked more when I was threatening to kill you.¡± ''Well... what do you want to talk about?'' ¡°Ha.¡± the single sound reverberated through Ben''s mind, ¡°Don''t worry about me Ben. Also since you can''t use the Shroud Uniform in your mind yet it''s easier to just call it the SU. It''s the thought rather than the name that counts, the Shroud Uniform will work all the same.¡± Shroud walked towards him and Ben moved to the side, making room for Shroud on the stone slab, Shroud gave him a funny look but sat down anyway, his body not actually touching the slab but looking like it was, ¡°You''re overwhelmed right now. Me too. So I''m just going to explain things slowly to you, I''ve seen the differences between us, and the differences between our worlds, our two realities. Stop me If you need to ask anything.¡± ''Sounds good.'' ¡°You and I are connected,¡± Shroud spoke slowly, ¡°Not our bodies, but our minds. Biologically you''re me, I know that because the SU would have torn your body to shreds if you weren''t. Not everyone has alien blood coursing through their veins you know. But for some reason only you can control our body and the SU. It''s not that common in this reality, but I''ve heard of this sort of thing happening. Its like my entire mind is here, but not here. But that''s the key point. This is my reality.¡± Shroud paused a moment to let it sink in, ¡°I''ve seen your reality in your memories, no powers, no aliens and no magic. Everybody is normal. I suppose to some that seems like a bad thing, but to me it sounds like heaven. How do I know you¡¯re even real though? Maybe somebody just created you¡­ maybe someone created me? No, no. It¡¯s easier for me to believe someone has clearly dragged you from your world somehow and put you into my body. I don''t know why and I don''t know who but they did. There are some advantages that come with that, I''m certainly a lot saner now that our memories have merged. You had a damn good life. But that''s negated by the fact that I can''t control the body. That means any old average Joe could probably walk by us and kill us. We need to find out who merged our bodies and why, but I don''t have any enemies like that. And for some reason... I feel like something is wrong here, like this isn''t just my reality. Like it''s yours at the same time. Which could mean that we¡¯re cray, or which means that we didn''t merge as two different people, it means we merged because we are exactly the same person, in the same reality. But mine is completely different from yours. I can see that. So does that mean everybody outside is experiencing the same thing?¡± Shroud sighed, ¡°Is everyone running around like headless chickens as they try to get a grip on which reality was never the real one, yours or theirs? But then something happened to your reality, or mine, somebody warped and changed it until it became mine, and for some reason instead of changing alongside that reality you merged with its version of you, me.¡± he looked towards the door and frowned, ¡°Which means we need to find out if you''re the only one that remembers, or if right now every person in the world is remembering their real lives and noticing that reality isn''t as it''s meant to be.¡±Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work! Ben blinked, ''That''s a lot to take in.'' ¡°You¡¯re right, and you''re taking this awfully calmly.¡± Shroud tapped the side of Ben''s head to see if he was still listening. Ben could feel every single tap as though it was an anvil slapping his head, even though Shroud wasn''t technically there. ''Well... it just seems like such a big leap to take. I''m not sure how you got to this answer.'' ¡°It has to do with my memories,¡± Shroud stopped tapping Ben''s head and knocked at his own instead, ¡°I cut off the memories that were flowing into you, but even with the ones you saw you noticed that they were completely different from your own. We''re the same person but we''ve lived completely different lives. And I''ve seen stuff you''d consider impossible. I may inhabit your brain now but you''ve seen for yourself what kind of body I have, you haven''t even scratched the surface of the SU''s abilities and our own. But this world around us, this is the real world. No world changes this drastically without somebody or something manipulating it. So if you really are from the same world I am, it means someone is behind this. But did they change it to this from what you had? Or did something else happen. And looking through your memories I think your comment about this being like a comic book is pretty realistic. This is exactly like that world, nothing makes sense in this reality and for some reason we''ve all accepted it because that''s how its always been.¡± Shroud paused again and Ben wondered if he had to catch his breath when he wasn''t actually breathing, ¡°But it''s not as simple as it sounds. Think about it Ben, your world wasn''t as complicated as ours, it had its natural laws and everybody had no powers. In this world people are born with powers all the time, there are even some who would be born with the power to warp reality or obtain that power later in life somehow. But what if someone like that appeared in your reality, a person who looked at the world around them and decided that it was too boring. Nobody can control all the aspects and changes made to your reality to this extent, but they didn''t need to. They would have had the basic concepts down pat already, in your literature, in your movies and in your comic books. They just needed to wish it was all real and poof. Here we are, everybody non-the-wiser that their entire lives and history have been changed by one selfish mind that got bored.¡± Ben tried to say something but realised that he couldn''t find the words to say it. So he just stared at Shroud with a raised eyebrow as he tried to process everything that was being said. Shroud tilted his head to the side, ¡°Did that make sense to you?¡± Ben nodded his head, but inside he was wondering if Shroud really was as sane as he claimed to have become. He had no knowledge of how Shroud had been before a few minutes ago. ¡°Good. Luckily we have an advantage, an that''s the fact that we know that reality was changed thanks to you.¡± Ben shrugged, ''Let¡¯s say you¡¯re right, and the entire world was changed, and maybe we¡¯re the only ones that remember too. How does that help us against somebody that can change an entire world?'' ¡°That''s the thing Ben, it''s common sense to me that the only time a person lets their guard down is when they think they''ve won. Our history may have been completely changed and everybody''s lives also changed as a result, but you only merged with me just now. That means that whoever changed the worlds only did it just then and that was when your reality ceased to exist and mine was created. So whoever did it is probably celebrating. Of course they screwed up, we remember the original reality. But if nobody else remembers when we check then that means that our reality warping foe has no idea that a bug slipped through his net. It''s not a big advantage, hell, its tiny. but it''s the only one we''ve got.¡± Shroud smirked and Ben couldn''t help but admire how much his face changed when he wasn''t scowling. ¡°Though, most of this is just my assumption.¡± Shroud continued, ¡°But if I were a reality warper that''s selfish enough to change his entire reality in order to make it into what he wanted then I think it''s obvious where he is.¡± Shroud pointed up, ¡°The only place they''d feel comfortable is at the top, where they can look down on everybody and be praised as a godlike being. I''d say he probably joined a superhero team, probably created one just for himself so that he could be considered the best and look good. He could also be a super-villain but I find that less likely because right now the heroes need help. Hell, maybe he¡¯s just hidden himself until he wants to have the spotlight on him. I know the hero situation right now, they''re losing the fight against evil and they need someone to help them urgently. It sounds like the perfect debut for our foe to show himself and become adored by the world with his shiny new powers he''s been showing off. Understood?¡± ''... Yeah.'' Ben nodded again. ¡°So the thing is. Now that we know this we can''t exactly do anything about it. My entire life I''ve been fighting for my survival and now all of those skills are locked away in my memories, which means that we can''t find the reality warper even if we wanted to. And even if we did he would probably kick our asses and then blink us out of existence before we could lift a finger. But I don''t want to give you my memories, because with the stuff I''ve seen and done you''d probably go crazy. It''s better not to have that sort of baggage.¡± ''Alright,¡± Ben raised his knee on top of the slab and propped his chin on it, ¡°But how do you know I''ll go crazy if I see your memories? I mean, It''s not like you seem all that bad and you lived them. Though I am still doubting if you¡¯re sane.'' ¡°That''s nice of you to say Ben. I lived the memories, but my mental fortitude grew stronger because I was exposed to them since I was young and slowly built up worse and worse memories and so I also built a tolerance to them. But you''d get them all in one go and after seeing your life I can almost guarantee you haven''t built up the mental strength to handle it like I have. I think that even if you had I wouldn''t let you see all those memories at once. You''ve only seen the first few years and I can tell you that after our parents die it only gets worse.¡± ''Our parents... what if... no, never mind. This is all so surreal.'' ¡°I was just giving an example Ben. Trust me when I say its the best I can give.¡± ''Do you kill people for a living? You mentioned it before... I saw it too. You''re a villain?'' ¡°Not a massive one. I think according to your memories I would be what you call a vigilante. Though to heroes I suppose I am also considered a villain. Pricks. But I don''t kill people that don''t deserve to be killed, only criminals, like the person that killed our parents.¡± ''Right...'' Ben''s gaze drifted to the roof and he tugged at the SU that clung to his body, ''I do have a question... a pretty important one...'' ¡°What is it?¡± ''No... don''t worry about it.'' Ben went silent. He would never say it out loud to Shroud, and he didn''t even know if he should be thinking it. This all seemed like such a convenient answer, Ben was the real person and Shroud was just a different version of him that had never truly existed. Or some version that had been created just at this moment or something. Maybe he could even justify that everything that had every happened to him had never truly happened. But that''s the thing, it was too convenient. Ben couldn''t deny that this wasn''t his reality, but that didn''t mean it was his own reality that had been changed. Shroud had come to that conclusion too easily. He was a version of Ben that hadn''t had a good life, he had seen his parents murdered and it sounds like since then he had seen and done enough to make him go crazy. What if this was just his way of escaping reality? Another Ben appears and he''s willing to believe that somebody changed his life into the horror it was, instead of accepting that that''s how his life always had been. It didn''t sound like he was trying to solve anything, it sounded like he was trying to run and hide from the life he''d lived. He hadn''t even asked for control of the body or tried to take it back. He was content to take a back seat and let Ben take control of his life, it just seemed too strange. Ben couldn''t be sure if Shroud was stable, or if he was just insane and didn''t want to admit it to himself. But then again maybe he was the insane one. After all he was actually taking all this seriously. ¡°Going silent on me Ben?¡± Shroud shrugged, ¡°Stop pausing when somebodies talking to you. It makes me feel like an ass.¡± ''Urgh...'' Ben broke out of his contemplation, ''So you''re some sort of super powered version of me. Then why don''t you just become a hero? It seems like the easy way to do things to me. If the person you think warped reality is a hero-'' ¡°We think warped realities.¡± ''Right... we.'' Ben paused and collected his thoughts, ''Then it makes sense to get near him as somebody he trusts. He probably wont trust anyone completely, but he''d most likely trust a hero over a villain. Like you said, he probably created the heroes to adore him. He¡¯d want them as close to him as they could be so they could hear his praise.'' ¡°You know Ben, that''s the damn smartest thing I''ve ever heard you say. And I''m including everything you''ve ever said in your memories.¡± Chapter 4: Meeting the garden-variety Moser ''I''m trying my best to cope with all this. I don''t think I can fully believe it though, not until I see it for myself.'' Ben tried recalling the small amount of memories he¡¯d received during his dream. It all looked blurry but he could vaguely make out things that he would have considered impossible. In fact, he still did consider it impossible deep inside his heart. He hadn¡¯t fully accepted the reality of the situation before him because it seemed like something so devoid of reality. ¡°Ah well, I expected that. So do you want to go outside and see it for yourself?¡± Ben looked around the decrepit and bare room, ''No chance you have a TV somewhere in here?'' ¡°We don''t need a TV.¡± Shroud pointed to Ben''s arms and Ben lifted them up, ¡°You may have lived in a technologically backward world, but in this world the things you know can be thrown out the window. The SU has an inbuilt screen that shows you whatever you want to see as long as its on the internet. Yup, it''s still called that here. It''s totally untraceable and was meant to be used to keep an eye on enemies but since I killed the owner I''ve used it for whatever I want.¡± Shroud stared at Ben, ¡°Let me straighten out something. You don''t look up my life. You wont find anything anyway. The SU isn''t some common t-shirt you find in a clothes store, this is alien technology and it jams everything that takes a look at it. Most people don''t even know I exist and those that do were the ones left alive because they weren''t criminals. If you want to become a hero then I guess that''s going to have to change, but you wont be running into anybody that knows me in the meantime, probably never will.¡± Ben gulped as Shroud spoke and he took a look at his arm. He tried to imagine a television or screen appearing but nothing happened. Ben sighed, ¡°SU turn on TV.¡± Ben stot up from the slab as his right arm began to itch, ''It''s just the concepts that matter right?'' The darkness around his arm was swirling and the itching underneath his skin began to intensify. Soon the tendrils were expanding into a vaguely square shape, a few inches tall but wide enough that it looked like a small television from the memories of his own world. Inside there were images flickering as though he were actually looking at a television or computer screen. The tiny images were changing constantly, nothing consistent or defined but it looked beautiful in a weird sort of way, like watching events through a bowl of water that was constantly rippling. ¡°You''re asking for too much, too vaguely. Just ask it for something specific and don''t think of anything gruesome.¡± ''Woah... okay,'' before he could do as advised and the images quickly stopped rippling and changing, ''What is this? I didn''t say anything yet.'' ¡°Alien technology is far beyond what you can comprehend, you thought about something specific and it read your mind and took it as a command. Look.¡± ''That''s it? It almost seems too easy,'' Ben gazed at the screen and shuddered as he realized he was looking directly into the eyes of something. The screen was so life-like in quality that he could have sworn whatever was on the other side was right in front of him. The eyes started at him blankly and then moved away from the screen as though it hadn¡¯t noticed him. ¡°A Moser.¡± Ben scrutinized Shroud from the corner of his eyes. The transparent figure had regained his scowl and was looking at the pair of moving eyes in the screen. Ben wondered what the thing the eyes were attached to looked like and as though responding to their thoughts the picture zoomed out and Ben gasped as he got a full view of the creature. It looked like a rock with arms and legs. Or several large rocks slapped together hastily in the shape of a person. The eyes they had been staring into moments before were almost indistinguishable from the rest of its brown body and it hulked at least six or seven feet high. It was walking through an empty street with a backpack over its back and glancing from side to side nervously. At least as nervously as a rock could glance. Ben watched the creature with amazement. He had never seen anything like it except in video games. It was something that his brain was telling him shouldn¡¯t even exist let alone be able to walk around and move. He could even see from its eyes that it was aware of the things around it, it was intelligent. ''What do you mean, Moser?'' ¡°Complicated. For now just know that he''s a guy that packs and delivers drugs. One of many. Not a murderer, but definitely the muscle for a major crime boss. The SU must have judged him to be within your skill level.¡± ''What do you mean judged him?'' Ben felt something fall onto his face and frowned. The roof was showering him with small bits of stone as something seemed to knock on it gently from the other side. It was like a truck or train was passing by over the roof and causing the structure to dislodge slightly. ¡°You''re being stupid again. The SU read your thoughts and showed you what you wanted to see. Since you were thinking about being a hero it picked something that you had the ability to stop. You''re the one controlling it not me.¡± ''But... isn''t this a bit too sudden? The guy looks like he''s made out of rocks for gods sake. How do I even stop someone like that.'' ¡°Well you better make up your mind soon.¡± ''Why?'' ¡°Because I know that street. It''s right on top of us and those knocks you hear are the big lug walking right above us.¡± Ben hesitated at Shroud''s words. He stood there for what he knew would have only been a few seconds but seemed like an eternity. His gaze shifted from Shroud and onto the floor. This was happening all too fast for him. He didn¡¯t even know what the thing was, or even if he agreed with this plan to be a hero. He had been shoved here only a few minutes ago into a world he didn¡¯t know or recognize. He didn¡¯t even know if his parents were alive. Why was he so calm about this. ¡°But,¡± he spoke out loud, ¡°I don''t even know how I''d stop him.¡± ¡°I know. You''re a yellow bellied coward that''s never seen the world from outside his mother''s protection. I saw it.¡± ¡°Then why do you want me to go out now? Do you know if I even want to be a hero? Did you ask me if I want to go and stop everything?¡± The air around Shroud seemed to turn cold. ¡°Are you saying you don''t?¡± ¡°I''m saying I haven''t even been here a few minutes and you''re already telling me to go fight someone I''ve never even seen before, in a world I don''t even recognize and right after I''ve found out that I''ve lost everything I¡¯ve ever known with no idea how to get it back.¡± ¡°Listen Ben. If you don''t want to do anything that''s fine, I''ll just have to take the risk that killing you wont kill me too. Because that''s the only thing holding me back from doing it and getting my body back. Don''t think it''s your right to be in control right now, it''s a damn privilege that I would literally kill to have back. I''m giving you the benefit of the doubt that you''re not some enemy because I don''t want to kill myself but I''ve done worse things in my life than kill some pathetic little worm that can''t even recognize that he''s not the one in control of his own life any more. You''re in my body and I''ll tell you to do whatever the hell I want you to to get you out. I could be sending you out against far worse than what the SU is showing you in the screen. I could force so much pain into your body that you''d turn into a slave that only lives to do my bidding for fear of punishment. But...¡± Shroud looked away and Ben could feel himself trembling. ¡°If I wanted to do that then I wouldn''t have agreed to help you in the first place. I would have just done that from the beginning without explaining anything. Right now you''re my equal, you''re me, but that''s the only thing I respect about you and you better hope to god you don''t lose that respect.¡± Ben could feel a vague headache coming from the back of his mind, it wasn''t him, it seemed to be Shroud. ''But...'' Shroud sighed, ¡°Fuck waiting for you to figure it out on your own. From now until we take down the Moser you listen to everything I say. No objections or I pop your head like a balloon.¡±If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. Ben looked up, ''What...?'' ¡°From the moment I saw your memories I knew you wouldn''t be cut out for this world, things aren''t as happy go lucky as your world is. It''s eat or be eaten here, a world where people can and do die on a daily basis without even being part of whatever event killed them.¡± Shroud seemed to cover himself in darkness and the SU began to shift around uncomfortably over Ben''s skin, ¡°That''s how it works here. Whoever did this thought it''d be all life saving heroes and adoration, and maybe that''s how it is from the top. But we''re not toys in this reality Ben, we''re real people with lives. Even when heroes fight to save people they end up killing bystanders in the crossfire. Even if villains didn''t exist there are people discovering they have powers and using them to take revenge on others every day. Situations like this happen every day and life sucks. People die all the time and even more commit suicide thinking that they can''t live being as helpless as they are. That''s the sort of world I live in Ben, and in this world there isn''t time for one guy to wait until it''s too late to make a decision.¡± Ben blinked, ''Then... fine, let''s go.'' ¡°That''s what I thought. Remember that the world cant wait for you to make the decision, I can''t wait for you to make the decision either. You need to act fast and you need to act decisively if you want to be here. Hell, you need to if you want to survive in this world.¡± Shroud gave Ben a shrug, ¡°It seems tough from your perspective. Probably is. But we''ve got to go to the surface now because Moser is definitely up there and he wont be in another few seconds. So let''s not drag this thing out. Get up there right now and I''ll explain what you have to do when you get up there. After a while you''ll figure it out.¡± Ben''s gaze returned to the door and his eyes shut as he processed what was happening. ¡°By the way... we can teleport.¡± ¡°That actually sounds pretty awesome.¡± ¡°Alright calm down now hot shot. Just imagine the street you just saw yourself in, notice how the SU screen is showing the whole street? Well that''s where we''re going to want to go, behind Moser.¡± Shroud paused, ¡°This one is more of an intuitive trait of our parents race. So all I can say is think really hard. It probably just hasn''t worked yet because you have a shit imagination. You don''t have to worry about hitting anything. The way the teleport works is that it puts you a small distance from anything else solid. At least you wont find yourself halfway in a wall.¡± Ben squinted as he tried to concentrate. He looked at the screen in front of him as he did and tried to take in the features around the walking Moser. It looked like an ordinary street and all he felt was a bit of tension behind his eyes. ¡°God damn- Think about it like nothing can stop you, there is no roof and there is no room. There is only you and the street, that''s where you are. Mental over physical.¡± Ben covered his eyes with his hands, trying in vain to think of being in the street and not in the room, ''I''m in the street... I''m in the street.'' ¡°You look like a dipshit that''s trying to take a dump while constipated.¡± ¡°You¡¯re distracting me.¡± The mental image was there now, integrating itself into his mind. Once it had implanted itself it was hard to get rid of, he was imagining himself in the street he had seen through the Shroud Uniform screen and was hoping as much as he could that he was actually in the street. ¡°Don''t just imagine the street. The breeze, the fresh air, the Moser in front of you. The SU streaming across your skin. Think of it as though it''s something you really want. Something that''s a part of you and don''t try to fight it when it comes for you.¡± Ben tried to say something but something was creeping across his body, he could feel his flesh prickling underneath the Shroud Uniform. His breath was growing ragged and he choked as suddenly he realized he couldn''t breath. It was as though some sort of veil had been placed over his body and he was being pulled somewhere, but at the same time he was the one that was leading the way. Then the veil suddenly lifted and he felt a cool breeze hit his face. ¡°You did it you smug bastard!¡± Shroud almost sounded excited as he shouted in Ben''s mind, ¡°This time you''ll have my help. So don''t waste this chance... hey, hey, open your damn eyes first!¡± Ben opened his eyes and felt them grow wide as he took in the scenery around him. It was just an ordinary street that he had never seen before but to him it felt like he was gazing at a whole new world. He could almost taste the fresh air and he knew that he had gotten out of that stale stone room. But if this street was on the ground floor, then where was the room? He looked around and gasped. In front of him was the biggest man he had ever seen, if it could be called a man. Even though it was covered by a large backpack he could see its two legs made out of brown rock. Both of them looked like cannon barrels and his full height must have been at least two and a half meters. The Moser looked far more frightening up front than it did through a screen. ¡°Who''re you?¡± A tough, rocky voice came out of the man in a grumble and Ben stiffened. He hadn''t even tried to hide his previous gasp and the sound had been heard crystal clear by the rock man. The creature turned around and gave off a low growl as his eyes met Ben''s. He scanned the black uniform up and down. The small rocks that made up his mouth lifted themselves up in what Ben would only call a smug grin. ¡°Some little pissant wants to play hero?¡± The Moser started to walk calmly towards Ben, ¡°Normally I''d let you off easy and just send you to the hospital, but tonight''s a special night. So you got to disappear, capisce?¡± Shroud laughed at the big guys words and Ben grimaced. ''What can I do against this guy?'' ¡°Well this is how it works. You don''t want to kill this guy if you¡¯re playing hero so you need to find some way to stop him from moving.¡± ''What do you mean, ''some way''?'' ¡°Bad time to zone out kid.¡± Ben gasped as he felt himself being lifted off the ground. The Moser had lifted him up until his legs were dangling over the ground. The pair of rocky hands wrapped around Ben''s stick-like body and he was staring directly into the eyes of the Moser. The criminal tilted his head at him, taking his pale skin and veiny eyes into account. ¡°You a junkie kid?¡± ¡°That just hurts.¡± Shroud whispered into Ben''s mind, ¡°Don''t piss yourself or anything. The guy can''t actually hurt you, he''s not strong enough to break through the suit. Not quickly anyway.¡± ''But how am I meant to stop him? You''re not going to make me kill him are you?'' Ben could feel his thoughts coming across as hurried. After all he was dangling four feet off the ground. The Moser was shaking his body around like a rag doll. ¡°I said no killing. But we don''t want this to get messy either. Arresting him is the authorities job, we just need a way to keep him here until they arrive.¡± ''How do you know they''ll come?'' Ben''s head smacked across a wall and he groaned. ¡°He''s a giant rock man who was almost definitely seen walking across a secluded street. Not to mention the racket this guy is making trying to kill you. I don''t know who hired him as muscle for this job but they did a terrible job planning it. The police should be here in a few minutes. We just need to... of course.¡± Ben''s vision went black as a piece of jagged stone hanging out of a wall tore one of his eyes, but before he could even shout his sight was back again and the pain was gone. ''Of course what?'' ¡°Point your hands at him and tell the suit to restrain him.¡± ¡°What the hell is wrong with you kid?¡± The Moser grunted at the lack of progress and dropped Ben onto the ground, lifting a leg into the air to stomp him into the ground. ''Will that actually work? God this hurts.'' ¡°Hurry up.¡± ¡°SU Restrain.¡± A long dark cloud rushed through the air from Ben''s body, leaving from his Shroud Uniform and sticking onto the inner section of Moser''s raised leg, pushing against it and stopping the oversized lunk from crushing him. Ben wasn''t sure what to do next, but the cloud didn''t stop there, it gathered around Moser''s skin and between his clothes and backpack. A giant crash resounded through the area as Moser was knocked down onto the ground looking like a cocoon made of black silk. Only his head was visible. The stream of black gunk hadn''t ceased though, and instead increased in its pace of release, constantly strengthening the restraints around Moser and suspending him to the ground with layered rope-like tendrils. His loud shouts were mixed with the sound of sirens in the distance. Even the backpack that''d covered half his back ¡°Cover your face kid. Before somebody shines a light on it.¡± People had already begun to appear from the side walk with their phones, about to take photos and videos. Some of them were laughing and others were stumbling around. Behind them red and blue lights were flashing as the police arrived. Ben whispered a command under his breath and the Shroud Uniform expanded to cover his face in swathes of darkness. Ben wondered what would happen if one of the people came up to him and started asking him questions or asking for an autograph, like those heroes in the comic books after they defeated the villain. But then he realized that with his lack of experience he would probably give away something he didn''t want to. He didn''t even know how heroes were accepted in this world. Did they just pop up or did he have to sign up for it like a job. Could this be put on his resume? There were too many things he didn''t know and he didn''t want to accidentally let everyone know about his lack of knowledge by sauntering up and casually starting a conversation with some random person. For all they knew he was as much of a danger to them than this rock man. Hell, how would they even know the difference between the rock man and him. For all he knew they might think that the rock man is the hero and he was a villain that beat him. ¡°You think too much.¡± Shroud''s voice kicked into his mind and Ben realized he''d been thinking all of that out loud, in a mental sort of way, ¡°Imagine yourself teleporting up there. Quickly.¡± Ben looked to where Shroud was mentally pointing and saw the square roof of one of those multi-flat complexes. There was a person standing there and staring at him, he looked like your average bystander except for the fact that he was on top of a roof he clearly had no reason to be on top of. Ben squinted in concentration and with a sudden jolt he was on top of the roof and behind the man. ''That was... surprisingly easy, compared to the last one at least. Who''s this guy?'' ¡°First time''s the hardest. And this guy is your ticket to becoming a hero. And that''s because he''s one himself. Little king of the molehill that is this region. Small time, small fry.¡± Ben ignored Shrouds petty insults and eyed the man in front of him. His tweed jacket and brown baggy pants didn''t exactly scream hero. It definitely wasn''t the type of person he''d imagined, but then again, what does a hero look like? Since this guy was a hero the next step seemed obvious enough, but Ben hesitated. ¡°What''s wrong?¡± ''If I talk to this guy and tell him I''m a hero... doesn''t it seem a little bit suspicious? Wont he be suspicious?'' Shroud gave a heavy grunt and then sighed, ¡°If you''re thinking that he''ll cuff you and try to prove you''re not a hero then you''re wrong. This is your first crime stopping, and I''m virtually unknown to the outside world. The hero one at least. I''m not giving you more than you can handle.¡± ''But...'' ¡°Hey there. Since you haven''t killed me I suppose you want to talk. How can I help you?¡± Chapter 5: The first act Ben lifted his head and saw that the man had turned around and was looking at him, patiently waiting for a response. Shroud was pressing at him to talk, ¡°Relax. Nothing this guy could do could possibly kill you. Besides, he''s a hero, why would he even want to hurt you? I''ll admit I''m not exactly on the same side of the coin as heroes but I respect the fact that they risk everything to help people. So say something to him... you''re not getting star struck are you? This guy is a no-leaguer. I bet you could mop the floor with him in a second.¡± ''Just shut a second would you.'' Ben sighed internally. He had been dragged around and smashed into a wall by a Moser, just minutes after finding out he was a super powered being in another reality. He needed a breather. He really needed way more than a breather. The man seemed to take Ben''s silence as a signal to talk more, ¡°I saw you taking care of the Moser by yourself.¡± ¡°Yeah.¡± ¡°I''m sorry.¡± The man sheepishly grinned and Ben noted that he had a giant handlebar mustache above his lips. It wasn''t anything significant, but it somehow made the situation and person in front of him seem a lot more realistic all of a sudden. Even heroes grow facial hair. ¡°... What?¡± Ben raised an eyebrow and then realized that the man couldn''t see it underneath the Shroud Uniform. ¡°I was meant to deal with the Moser but I couldn''t get there in time to help you. If you''d been an ordinary person that could have been fatal.¡± ¡°This isn''t your comic books, heroes don''t always get there on time Ben.¡± ¡°Right... don''t worry about it. I knew I could deal with him myself.¡± The mustached man fiddled with his tweed jacket, ¡°That''s a bold thing to say. I don''t know how many people I''ve seen fight a Moser and come out with no injuries. I would have taken things a little slower than you, but I guess your way is a lot more effective.¡± ''A Moser? Why did he say ''A'' Moser?'' ¡°Because Moser wasn''t the guys name. Moser was just the thing he was, they''re not even human technically. It''s a bit hard to explain but just trust me when I say there''s more than one. It''s something you would have found out in a few seconds either way.¡± Ben''s body stiffened, ''What? Why?'' ¡°Well I didn''t plan to tell you this until after this guy left but Moser''s aren''t individual workers, they get created and hired by the dozen. The police don''t just come at a moments notice, they''re expecting more of these guys to pop up around town. Usually its followed by either a lot of property damage or a lot of killing. It''s not exactly easy to bring a dozen rock men into the station, so I was sort of going to tell you about this after so you could go after the remaining Mosers.¡± ''What?!'' Ben looked back at the mustached man and frowned, the police down below had already brought out a police truck and Ben could feel the Shroud Uniform''s tendril loosening in order to let them drag the tied up Moser off the ground and into the truck. ¡°Yeah so we''d better get moving if you want to get to them all.¡± ¡°So,¡± the moustached man looked at Ben calmly, ¡°Are you going around the city looking for the Mosers? They''re not exactly easy pickings. I can help if you can get me around.¡± ¡°He wants to know if you can teleport him. The fact that you can even teleport surprises him.¡± ''Is that a big thing? And, ah, can I even take him along? I just learnt how to teleport myself.'' ¡°Same thing. Just imagine him coming with you, even if you don''t know exactly what he looks like it''ll work. Use the SU to find the next Moser.¡± ¡°Let''s¡­ let¡¯s go.¡± Ben hesitated and looked at mustached man and then down at his Shroud Uniform. It had already formed a clear picture of the next location and another backpack carrying rock man. ¡°Grab onto my arm.¡± Ben didn¡¯t need him to actually hold onto him when teleporting but it certainly helped calm his nerves and imagine the process happening. He teleported as soon as he felt the mans fingers push against him and they ended up in another street similar to the one the first Moser had been walking across. Except this time they ended up directly in front of the Moser. Ben heart a thump and looked to his side. The mustache man had fallen onto the ground after the teleport and was scrambling to stand up so Ben had the head start. ¡°SU restrain!¡± He shouted out so that both the mustache man and the Moser could hear him and black streams had already begun to shed off of his body at the mere thought of restraining and and were flying towards the Moser. The streams of darkness bounded through the air like a wave and Ben''s vision of the top of the Moser was quickly covered by them. Just like inside the room he could feel the Moser squiggling and struggling underneath the tendrils like he was holding the thing down with his palms. A pair of hands appeared beside him and the mustached man¡¯s sleeves let off a stream of water that hit the Moser square in the legs. It looked like he had some sort of water gun device hidden inside his clothing. As soon as the water hit the ground and the Moser''s legs it turned into ice that plastered it onto the ground.This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. Ben grinned as the Moser tried in vain to bash against the oncoming streams of darkness and water. ¡°Who the hell are you? Heroes? You stop this now and you don''t get hurt, don''t think we don''t know that we''d be tracked down!¡± Ben and the mustached man didn''t respond to the enraged Moser, but Ben glanced nervously at his surroundings as the Moser shouted. Shroud''s voice suddenly came to life, ¡°He''s reacting weirdly. There are Mosers hiding in the buildings around us.¡± Ben backed up and commanded the SU to stop shooting out the restraints, ''what do you mean there are more Mosers around us?'' He took a look a the surrounding area but couldn''t see anything out of the ordinary. By now the Moser had already been covered in enough black and ice threads that he wasn''t going to escape any time soon. The mustached man saw Ben''s strange actions and immediately a wary look crossed his face and he began to scan the nearby buildings. ¡°Mosers are stupid but whoever hired them isn''t. If the Moser knew someone was coming then that means they prepared a trap. And we just walked right into it.¡± ¡°Look out!¡± The mustached man shouted and Ben twitched and jumped back, landing almost two meters away just as the spot he was in was crushed underneath a two meter rock man. ¡°They know we''re here,¡± The mustached man ran next to Ben and sprayed jets of water onto the oncoming Moser. Ben immediately felt a series of explosions as four more Mosers crashed into the ground around them, and the mustached man signaled at him hurriedly, ¡°I can''t handle them all!¡± Ben raised his hands and chunks of concrete, rock and bitumen flew into the air and were immediately wrapped by tendrils of darkness and ice. Ben could feel the vibrations in the air around him as the Mosers simultaneously smashed their massive rock fists against the oncoming attacks. ¡°Don''t stop.¡± Shroud''s voice popped into Ben''s head just as a Moser broke through the wall of darkness and ice and saw Ben, it''s fist lifting up and throwing an assortment of stones and concrete chunks at him. Horror appeared on the mustached man''s face as he was struck by an oncoming rock and he crumpled onto the floor. Ben leaned down to check on him but Shroud''s voice insisted otherwise, ¡°The missiles can''t hurt you and they aren''t strong enough to break the SU''s material quickly. Worry about the hero¡¯s wounds later. If any one of those Mosers gets through then he''ll get crushed like a fly by their fists.¡± Ben was conflicted, he could see his own contribution to the fight because the five Mosers were already beginning to lose their ability to move. The one that had broken through the initial wave of threads was already covered by the next round and was looking at Ben with a helpless gaze. But he could see the hero on the floor twitching from the corner of his eye and felt like he had to get him to the hospital. But if he hadn''t spread enough of the tendrils then the Mosers could break through and kill the man before he could tell the Shroud Uniform to show him a hospital to teleport to. The struggles of the Mosers grew weaker as more and more tendrils tangled them and strangled their bodies. After a few seconds all five of them were pinned against the ground alongside the first Moser and looking at him with hate in their eyes. Ben looked down at his body in awe, strands of darkness still leaking off of it and heading towards the incapacitated Mosers. He was frightened by how much power he held in his hands, it was something he had never even dreamed of being able to do in his world. He cut off the stream of tendrils and they stayed on the Mosers, clinging like rope and tying them in triple layers as tightly as they could. He didn''t know if the Mosers needed to breathe with their rock-like bodies but none of them looked like they were suffocating. ¡°I''d like to remind you about that hero on the floor while you''re busy wanking yourself off for something so insignificant.¡± Ben was startled out of his stupor and he saw the mustached man twitching on the floor. He was still alive, but blood was seeping onto the floor from a cut on his forehead. His eyes fell onto Ben''s face and when they locked onto him he smiled. Ben tried to help the man wiggle off the various pieces of rubble that had been thrown onto him by the Mosers. When Ben looked again the cut on his head had healed almost perfectly and even the bruises had disappeared. The man who''d looked like a beaten mule only seconds before was now completely fine, no little cuts or major gashes to be seen. Ben moved backwards to give the mustached man room to stand up, ¡°Sorry.¡± He looked apologetically at the man, ¡°I should have tried to stop all the rubble from reaching you. It''s a good thing you''re healthy... I mean, it''s safe now. There shouldn''t be any more of those Mosers, at least in this place. ''There aren''t any Mosers here right?'' ¡°All gone. I''m not even sure this was the main group of them though, I''m not sure what they''re carrying but it seems pretty damn important to whoever they''re working for. People don¡¯t go throwing around Mosers like pennies.¡± The man finished brushing the dirt and broken street off of his tweed jacket and let out a hearty laugh. ¡°Don''t worry about it, don''t worry about! It comes in the job description. Now, the police will arrive any minute.¡± He took a look at the black cocoons that kept the Mosers trapped, ¡°Good work. No, solid work. I wonder what they were trying to do, it''s not often that Mosers will be used to spring a trap like that. They''re way too costly to maintain and not have them spread out doing different jobs. Oh, the press has already arrived.¡± Ben''s ears twitched as they heard the sound of people chattering and sirens in the distance. Onlookers were already gathering around them and some of them were carrying machines that looked a lot bigger and better than the phones the people from before had been carrying. ¡°Alright Ben that''s enough heroics for one night, teleport back into the room.¡± ''What... don''t we want them to know I helped so that I can be a hero?'' ¡°The hero over here will tell them you exist, and that''s all they need to know for now. If you become involved with them intimately then it raises a lot more questions than you want to answer right now. And besides, I always like to keep the element of surprise that leaves enemies guessing about me. Like how the Moser from before only let you near him because he thought you were a bystander trying to play hero.¡± Ben could see Shroud from the corner of his eyes pointing downward and sighed. He felt a veil covering his breath as he teleported again and when he opened his eyes he was inside the stone room once again. But before he could do anything he fell to the ground. His pale face had taken on an unhealthier pallor and the Shroud Uniform was constricting around him. He felt as though he had been hit by a truck after going to the gym. He barely had time to make it to the stone slab and lie across it before his vision turned black and he lost consciousness. Chapter 6: The Shroud ''¡­ You forget to mention I''d be blacking out at random times... what the hell happened back there? Wait a second... am I asleep again?'' ¡°You think creating matter out of nothing comes without a cost? Each time you use the SU it converts your own flesh and blood into more material. It doesn''t matter that much since you can heal infinitely and the SU kills your nerves so you don''t even notice it happening. But after a while your mind and body can''t take the harassment so it shuts down as a self-preservation mechanism.¡± ''Oh... okay? So how do I know if I''m about to collapse? I could have gotten stomped by five of those guys... Mosers... if I''d dropped there.'' ¡°Well I haven''t actually collapsed in years. This only happened because you didn''t give your body any time to rest. You restrained a Moser, teleported, restrained more Mosers and then teleported again with barely any time to rest in-between. If you were smart you''d have realized you could have just tripped their legs or something instead of turning them into Christmas presents.¡± ''Crap... you could have told me about that.'' ¡°Now you know. So I guess every time you have to sleep or fall unconscious we''ll be meeting up here instead of dreaming. So it''s time to start telling you how to use the god damn SU while we have time.¡± ''¡­ I''m listening.'' Before he''d even woken up Ben had realized that his dream sessions were going to be a chore. It made sense, he couldn''t very well be a hero by running around town like a headless chicken without any idea of what he was doing. But that didn''t make it suck any less. He spent the entire night listening to Shroud tell him how much he sucked at using the Shroud Uniform, why he sucked and why he would still suck at using it even after the session was over. But he did learn a lot. For one thing he could see perfectly in the dark. He hadn''t even realized that not only did the stone room not have a light, but that it had also been night time when he had fought against the Mosers alongside mustached man. Shroud also constantly drilled into him that he was an idiot for ''spraying and praying'' against the Mosers when he should have been telling the Shroud Uniform to shoot at the enemies arms and legs to stop them from moving. Apparently what it shot out was actually the same material is was made of, it was just multi-purpose for reasons that were apparently too complicated for a feeble mind like Ben''s to know. But the bare basics of it was that the Shroud Uniform was made from, and shooting out, the closest thing anyone in the world could get to physical darkness. It was hard to break and it could alternate between being something physical and something incorporeal. Ben breathed a sigh of relief when he finally felt himself waking up from his long slumber. If sleep came again then he hoped it wouldn''t be too soon. ¡°Rise and shine tiny balls. It''s a never ending party for a hero and you still have to eat.¡± Ben groaned as he felt Shroud mentally tapping him on the head, ''Just... you''re not even trying with the insults any more. Honestly I feel like hugging this stone slab and never letting go. Besides you have a constantly regenerating body, why would you even need to eat.'' ¡°If you don''t eat you die. That''s just common sense. Don''t ask me why. I''m not god.¡± Ben could feel his hands digging into the stone slab underneath him. It wasn''t that uncomfortable but apparently that was only because the Shroud Uniform was contorting around his body and acting as a mattress. He didn''t need to sleep but he could feel the mental exhaustion seeping into his mind. He didn''t feel like waking up into a world that wasn''t his own. ¡°I said rise and shine.¡± Ben grunted as his brain jolted in pain. He sat up wincing and glared at Shroud, who had appeared next to him and was tapping at his head, ¡°No need to be such an ass about it.¡± ¡°Well why don''t you stop being such a little bitch. I bit of pain is a good thing. If you''ve experienced pain then it wont come as such a big shock when your arm is inevitably ripped off in a fight. That pain wont just go away on its own. Trust me.¡± Ben slowly lifted himself off of the stone slab and remembered the mustached man getting brain blasted by a rock, ''As horrible as that sounds after last night I think you might be right.'' ¡°Damn right I am. Two things you can''t hold back in this world are pain and exhaustion Ben. You either take it slowly and grow used to it or stall long enough for it to hit you like a bus when it finally arrives. Feeling this pain now will only make you stronger.¡± ''I think I just got a very dark glimpse into your life that I''m going to completely ignore. You have your dream lecture and pain taps to thank for that.'' ¡°One day you''re going to be grateful for all this crap I''m giving you Ben. We aren''t going to be sharing a body forever and when that time comes you''re going to have to thank me for it. I hope I don''t have to keep reminding you that I could probably make you go insane with a touch.¡± Ben sighed and opened the door into the hallway, ''I got that part. Clearly.'' ¡°You''re more of an ass than usual in the morning.¡± Ben blinked as he walked through the hallway and grunted as he contemplated, ''Fine, fine. Sorry. I guess you''re just as stuck as I am on the whole thing. You don''t even have a body any more. I guess I am being a bit selfish.'' There was a small pause, then, ¡°Yeah. It''s fine. Kitchens to your left by the way.¡± Ben strode through another door and stopped, ''This is surprisingly normal.'' The kitchen had everything your standard kitchen needed, including a clean sink and stove. Ben washed a pan and opened the fridge. He took out and cooked some eggs that he hoped hadn''t been in the fridge as long as some of the other food looked like it had. Eating at a stone table was probably the most normal it was going to get around here, and it was nice in a weird and simple sort of way. Nobody telling him he was in another world. Nobody proving that by trying to kill him. A little space where none of that complicated stuff entered because it just seemed like such a normal event. Such a familiar action. ¡°You look like an eighty year old retiree that''s about to kill himself.¡±This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. Ben rolled his eyes and ignored Shroud. If he thought about it from a very generous angle his other self wasn''t actually angry at him, he was just angry at life in general. And he was right about what he''d said before. Shroud had been kicked out of his own body by someone who had the life he never did, and the parents he''d never had. That must suck. But Ben also didn''t doubt that Shroud had killed people before. And he couldn''t trust Shroud enough to take it for granted that all those people had deserved it. Who was he to be judge, jury and executioner? Ben looked up at the roof and frowned. Even the kitchen didn''t have any lights. It wasn''t like he needed it. But he could spot a problem that he though about straight away. Shroud certainly hadn''t thought about it, but the reason he looked like a shriveled up grape was probably because he''d been living in this house without light for years. It was bad enough that he was permanently attached to clothing that was a physical manifestation of darkness. The entire house gave off a feeling of being unapproachable. Stone walls, stone furniture and dust everywhere. Not to mention Shroud had clearly stated it was underground with probably no entrances or exits except for his teleportation power. ''Come to think of it...'' ¡°What?¡± ''Do you have any friends?'' Shroud looked puzzled for a second, his transparent figure appeared hanging around the edge of the table and he began cracking his transparent knuckles, ¡°Don''t need them. Not in my line of work.¡± ''Then... allies? Arch enemy? Anybody at all that you can talk to or anything?'' ¡°Why the sudden questions Ben? My life is my life. I told you not to pry into it.¡± ''Because this house feels so lonely that I''d probably kill myself in it if I had to live in it. If I hadn''t gotten here yesterday and had somewhere else to go I would have tried to burn this place to the ground and never looked back.'' Shroud didn''t react to the remark and it was impossible for Ben to tell what he was thinking. He didn''t feel any of the painful vibes coming from his head that seemed to accompany Shroud when he was annoyed. A sad lesson he¡¯d learned in a single nights rest. In a strange sort of way it was nice to have his company, and he was sure that Shroud felt the same way. Even if he didn''t want to admit it. Sure, Shroud was a bit of an ass, but he hadn''t killed Ben despite all the threats he''d made. And he''d at least fully cooperated with whatever Ben said when he had more than good reason to just stay silent. But that didn''t make this place any less of a lonely dump that''s be better suited as a murder investigation site or part of an underground mole kingdom. Ben wanted to ask how he''d even come to live in this place but he refrained from asking about it. The place looked exactly like his own house, without all the furniture and memorabilia. So it was more than likely that he would just trigger Shroud''s anger by bringing up bad memories. ¡°This house has some good memories for me.¡± Ben waited patiently but the silence drew out longer and he gave up finishing the conversation. The plate had transformed from full to empty and Ben felt more content than he''d ever been since arriving at this place, this world. Mental unrest and the brutal way several Mosers had tried to kill him aside the situation still seemed pretty serious. It was starting to lean on Ben''s mind. Even if Shroud''s theory about a reality warper was correct that didn''t explain why he remembered his previous life. And if he was just a parallel counterpart that had probably died and gotten stuck to Shroud, then why did it happen to him. He wasn''t anyone special, nobody in his world had been anyone special. Not in the super powered sense of the word at least. ''There''s something I want to know,'' Ben went to the sink and started to clean the dishes while thinking carefully about how he was going to bring up the next topic. ¡°Yeah?¡± ''You said our parents were aliens in this world. What kind of aliens were they?'' Shroud cocked a transparent eyebrow, ¡°Well its about fucking time.¡± ''Yeah well...'' Ben cocked his head to the side in confusion, Shroud''s attitude change startled him, ''In my memories our parents were just ordinary people, definitely no teleporting, definitely no invincible healing powers. My dad cut his finger on a paper edge once and cried like a little b-baby,'' Ben coughed as the word caught on his throat. Remembering his parents brought on feelings that he wasn''t sure he wanted to deal with, he could feel tears welling up at the corner of his eyes but Shroud''s penetrating gaze reminded him why he''d brought it up, ''But there''s a lot of weird stuff happening in this world, compared to mine at least, and I need to be prepared for it. So, uh, I''m not really digging for information about your past but, there are a bunch of reasons why I should know about our parents and what that means for me.'' ¡°Aliens. Right.¡± Shroud looked troubled for a second then continued, ¡°All you need to know is that there were several wars involving aliens, so they''re not the most trusted beings on the planet. Yeah, it''s a racist remark since there are actually different types of aliens around but honestly all of them have caused trouble at one time or another. The Human-Moser conflict, the Alaskan-Sipa war, the Shroud-Moser and the Shroud-Zarath war are the major ones.¡± Ben tugged at the Shroud Uniform, ''Which ones were our parents? Shroud?'' ¡°They sure as hell weren''t Mosers.¡± Ben shuddered, he definitely wouldn''t want to be a Moser. ''Wait so, just to clear things up. We have night vision, can heal from any injury and we use darkness to fight against our enemies. Aren''t we just vampires? Space vampires? Hell, you live underground in stone. This is a deluxe house sized coffin.'' Shook his head, ¡°God no. Vampires are completely different from us. The Shroud can live in sunlight for one thing, and we don''t suck the blood out of living things and make them our servants. Besides, unfortunately, our circumstances aren''t as good. We''re not on the protected species list for one.¡± Shroud sat down on the table as he spoke, ¡°Not every member of the Shroud has a Shroud Uniform, in fact, those are pretty rare. Definitely not something your average Shroud immigrant family living on earth would have. During one of the conflicts, a civil war, on the Shroud homeworld the leader of the Shroud went bat-shit crazy and decided to send assassins to kill all off-world Shroud, fearing that they''d come home and help the revolutionaries. Needless to say he was killed off before I ever found out about him. But that didn''t stop the assassin he''d sent from killing our parents, or me killing him. It¡­ exposed a lot more about our parents history than I¡¯d have liked to have known. But in the end I received the uniform.¡± ''Oh... Sorry.'' ¡°Casualties of war Ben, even if you''re not involved it''ll sweep you up and make you involved. There''ll never be any love between me and the Shroud but at least they left me alone after that. I don''t even think they know I''m alive any more. But if you happen to see one just ignore them, not everyone off-world agrees with the new leadership, and others might even support the old one. Those guys we just call idiots and walk away from them nice and slowly.¡± ''Then... if the Shroud and the Mosers had a war with each other, wont they side against us now that I used a Shroud Weapon against them? I''ve never known but about war but being in the opposing army doesn''t seem like the best way to make them forget about us. Even if we were trying to protect people from the Mosers, maybe they''ll take it as a personal vendetta instead of considering us heroic.'' Shroud shrugged, ¡°They had a war a couple of hundred years ago Ben, most Mosers live a decade at most and they''re all clones. None of them left alive even care about the Shroud, let alone hate them. Besides we''re part of a big, wide universe. Chances are those Mosers are cloned mercenaries created somewhere on Earth. They cost a ton to make but they''re not exactly rare, nor are they exclusively an alien race any more. Just hired muscle when you need brawn over brains. Also you didn''t kill them, a true enemy stopping them for personal reasons would have killed them.¡± Ben strode into the hallway and back into the stone room. There wasn''t much of a reason to change locations in such a bland house but it seemed appropriate to exit the kitchen after eating. ''So... there are probably more of those Mosers out there? Are we going to try and stop them? Without collapsing this time. Or would that make things worse.'' Shroud appeared in the room and nodded, ¡°You''re trying to be a hero now Ben. Of course we''re going to stop those Mosers, and whoever hired them. But first we''re going to need to go on a little hunt.¡± ''What are we hunting?'' Shroud grinned, ¡°Heroes.¡± Chapter 7: Moser Hunting ''What... I don''t... why?'' ¡°Like I said. We need people to start getting to know us and that we''re heroes. But nobody cares about how many people know you until you''re really trying for the big leagues. Here at the street level all the heroes care about are saving lives and protecting the peace. You know, genuine good guys that want to make a difference.¡± ''That... that just makes hunting those heroes down sound even more horrific.'' ¡°You don''t see the big picture Ben. We''re treading into a battlefield where anything can happen at any time, eventually heroes will encounter each other and its up to them to make a good impressions on each other. Frankly, you look like a villain and your powers don''t exactly scream hero. So we need to find heroes that are about to get stomped in the head and help them. Find a few people using the SU and tally up a few favours to cash in at a later date. At the least it''ll make people more trusting and build up a reputation, if we eventually want to grow big and get our enemy to trust us a reputation is what we need.¡± ''So we''re going to look for heroes that are in danger and save them? You sure as hell said that in a roundabout way.'' ¡°How I feel whenever you talk.¡± ''So how does this work? I tell the SU to find a hero in danger and hope I''m good enough to save them?'' ¡°You are good enough. For the street level at least. You think its easy to take down six Mosers in a few minutes? There are a lot of people needing protection out there, heroes keeping their heads low so that they don''t cause too much of a disturbance and cause a panic. They may be heroes but they don''t have death wishes, somebody finds out who they are and most times their families end up dead. We don''t have to find someone that''s going to die, we just have to find someone that''s getting beaten badly enough that they''re in risk of losing a limb or something.¡± ''That unsettles me greatly. It doesn''t feel heroic when you do things with the intention of growing a reputation.'' ¡°Deal with it. We''re saving the streets instead of finding some big name heroes and events. You''re not good enough to deal with those sorts of things yet. We also can''t grow too fast, it''s a common thing in this world for heroes to appear, but if someone really did warp realities then its possible that they''d be watching any quickly rising heroes and be suspicious of them. Or just plain old jealous of them. Call me crazy but its what I would be doing, watching for any potential threats to my reputation no matter how unlikely they are.¡± ''I guess.'' Shroud gazed as the squeamish Ben, ¡°There are people that need our help out there. Regardless of whether you feel good about it or not those people would still be in danger, putting themselves there on purpose in order to make other peoples lives better. Maybe I can''t respect that. I don''t know how to respect what they do since they gain almost nothing and I think their ambitions are stupid. But if you choose to hide now it won''t help those people in danger. If you think they''ll be in any less danger because you choose to ignore them then you''re stupider than I thought you are.¡± ''Makes sense.'' ¡°Questions? Queries? Anything else you want to cry and complain about?¡± Ben bit his lip, Shroud was a lot more annoying than he thought. Even worse, he was probably right. Ben could feel his head trying to protest and not finding any ground to. ''There is one thing... no... I have nothing else to say. Is it really that easy to find heroes going about their jobs? It doesn''t seem like something that would be easy to do considering their enemies could just ambush them like the Mosers tried to do to us.'' ¡°Whoa, hold up. We have an alien battle uniform and the ability to teleport. There are probably less than ten people in the world with the same combination. We may not be the strongest player out there but when it comes to finding people we''re definitely at the forefront. You think all villains are like us? The most they have on the streets is a bunch of thugs and guns, even the Mosers were pretty high class for a simple drug peddling. Five of them in an ambush is something most heroes wouldn''t see in a lifetime. They wouldn''t have access to the kind of technology the SU uses to find people.¡± ''Okay... So I just have to tell the SU to look for any heroes in the area then.'' ¡°Good guess Ben. But, we''re going to search for the complete opposite of what you said. That is how wrong you are. So no, it wasn¡¯t a good guess.¡± Shroud crossed his arms, ¡°There are heroes everywhere in the world, if you ask the SU to find something so vague then it''ll never be able to help up, it''ll just constantly switch images on us. Heroes are combatants for the most part, so the most likely place to find a hero in danger would be a battlefield. All we have to do is look for a place where a hero is likely to turn up and wait until they do.¡± He lifted a finger to his head so that Ben could see, ¡°Now I wonder what possible place we could think of that has a crime and criminals written all over it and has already attracted police attention.¡± A look of annoyance flashed across Ben''s face, ''So we go looking for Mosers then.'' The Shroud Uniform''s arm screen flickered, switching between at least three different locations where Mosers were gathering. According to Shroud the screen could only search areas within a few kilometres of the Shroud Uniform. Two of the Moser groups had several Mosers milling about and carrying boxes, the other one was a lone backpack carrier that was already being retained by heroes. Ben wasn''t sure which one they would go for but before he had to decide one of the Mosers dropped a box, breaking it and sending its contents flying across the floor. ¡°Well well,¡± Shroud looked with interest as someone moved into the screen and berated the Moser, ¡°That''s the site we hit last Ben.¡± The figure berating the Moser on the screen was covered in a trenchcoat and hat, like those old American gangsters in films, but it was obvious just from his height and bulk that he wasn''t a Moser. He lifted a gun and blasted at the Mosers arm, causing it to melt and resemble a mushy soup. ¡°What an incredible ass,¡± Shroud said, ¡°He''s probably wasting a huge amount of money by shooting the hired help. It''s not easy to clone those things, whoever he''s buying them from wont be happy either.¡± Ben wanted to question why they were hitting this place last if they could clearly see the person who hired the Mosers was there, but he figured he would just get berated. It made sense after a few seconds of thinking, either he wasn''t skilled enough to handle the big boss or it was more likely that the heroes weren''t stupid, they knew that the boss would be the last person they wanted to make a move on and when they did, they would do it properly. Ben shifted onto the image of the other group and it was obvious after a few minutes that there was nobody watching over them. They were talking with each other and didn''t seem to care whether or not the boxes were handled with care. The Shroud Uniform searched the nearby area and he teleported behind a huge pile of the boxes, well hidden behind them. He watched them from the Shroud Uniform screen but he was close enough to hear what they were saying. ¡°Ben,¡± Shroud''s voice cut into his mind, ¡°don''t forget.¡± ''Oh right.'' ¡°SU cover.¡± Ben whispered so that the Mosers didn''t hear him. The area surrounding Ben immediately turned dark as the Shroud Uniform created the material necessary to cover the area in tendrils of darkness, with the uniform covering his head and body to anyone looking at him it would just look like any other dark patch. It was more than just a handy survival tool, it would allow him to go unnoticed unless someone was specifically looking for him.If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. The Mosers didn''t notice anything different and milled about conversing, ¡°Hey Devina.¡± One of the Mosers looked up at her companion and seemed to sneer at him, ¡°What do you want Drev?¡± She lifted a box and walked off, ¡°Try talking to me when you''re at least two months old. Maybe by then your rocks would have developed and you''d actually look like a man.¡± Ben looked at the two through the screen, speechless. ''I thought Mosers were clones.'' ¡°The species wasn''t born a clone race moron. It was just a more convenient way to keep the species alive. They can still enjoy the simple pleasures in life. They can probably have babies too, never bothered to look it up.¡± ''How do they tell each other apart?'' ¡°Don''t be a racist Ben. Nobody likes racists.¡± Drev the Moser looked morose and he walked towards the pile of boxes with a hunched back. ¡°You''ll get her next time Drev.¡± He spoke to himself, frightening Ben by coming uncomfortably close to him, ¡°She''ll see what a great guy you are. Boxes now, big boss Drev after. Big boss Drev, yeah, I like the sound of that.¡± Drev walked off after grabbing another box. ''What was that about?'' Ben asked. Shroud appeared next to him, floating off of the air, ¡°I know right. He''s a two and a half meter tall rock mobster and he can''t even talk to a girl. How pathetic. This guy should have come with some guts. Does he even know he can lift a car over his head and crush normal people with a flick of his finger. That knowledge usual gives you more than the little rocks he''s clearly packing.¡± ''That''s not what I meant... He''s... I mean... I sort of thought that since he was a clone...'' ¡°You find out he''s a clone and suddenly you have him all worked out? Think that because he''s just one of the many he''s going to think exactly like them and be exactly like them. It doesn''t work like that Ben. Each one of them might be clones but they aren''t necessarily from the same batch, you''d never get a race of the same person without that race killing itself off pretty quickly. Each Moser is slightly different from the others and they even have their own individual minds. Sure, they grow to maturity really quickly, but that doesn''t mean they all grow up the same and thinking the same. They''re as much individuals as you are. In fact, we''re the same person so you should understand this better than most people. You turned out nothing like me even though you are me, and I learned to regret that fact. Look at all this progress.¡± Ben shifted from side to side uncomfortably, ''I mean... Yeah that makes sense.'' Shroud shook his head as though disappointed, ¡°Are you getting cold feet now because you saw one sorry Moser getting his feelings smashed into the ground by some high maintenance chick? They''re still criminals Ben. Don''t forget that.¡± ''Right...'' Ben occupied himself by looking through the screen at the surrounding area. They were in some sort of warehouse, he could tell that just by looking up and seeing the size of the place. The boxes were being packed into three separate trucks and were about a meter and a half tall each. The Mosers couldn''t see past the boxes when they carried them, but they seemed to have a steady grip on them. Tripping over was probably a difficult feat for a giant rock. ¡°Do you want to save him?¡± Shroud glanced at Ben and nodded in the direction Drev had gone, he was sitting on top of the box he had taken away and was eating what looked like a chunk of concrete by himself in a corner. ''I thought you said they were criminals, you told me not to forget it.'' ¡°The rest of these guys are criminals, there''s no denying that. But it''s not like the Mosers are all criminals, just this group.¡± Ben followed his gaze and saw the other Mosers weren''t paying any attention at all to Drev, purposefully ignoring him, ''I''ll admit he doesn''t look like much of a criminal. But how can we know that for sure?'' ¡°Ben I''m about to show you why I''m such a superior sounding jackass to you all the time,¡± Shroud cleared his throat and Ben rolled his eyes, ¡°Think about it. A group of Mosers on an alien world ignoring a single Moser? That means he''s not part of their original clone batch, probably a new guy come in to replace another Moser that either got jailed or died. The loser was also rejected by the female Moser and she mentioned that he wasn''t even two months old yet. But for the first month of life Mosers have to stay within a cloning chamber to stabilize and grow. This is probably his first job ever and judging from the attitudes of his co-workers he probably hasn''t been given any amazing criminal opportunities to shine, I wouldn''t be surprised if they kept him cleaning whatever Mosers use for toilets this entire time. Those back pack Mosers we fought, those are the criminals that know what they''re doing and like it. Drev over there is the new born that is doing something he probably hates by now because he was forced by whoever created him and whoever hired him. Ergo, the poor bastard is just a lonely alien kid that most likely hasn''t even committed a crime yet.¡± ''I could have told you that if I knew as many things about this world that you did.'' ¡°Could have, should have, would have. But you didn''t.¡± Ben didn''t answer. ¡°Well, what do you want to do?¡± Ben nodded his head and took another look at Drev the Moser, ''Let''s save him. Now.'' ¡°Woah. Don''t go crazy on me here Ben. Remember what we talked about before, remember the plan. We need to help a hero and right now there are no heroes here. It''s not a good time to make a move. Wait until the heroes come here and we can start kicking some ass.¡± ''I hear your advice and choose to ignore it. I''m not stupid enough to think that the heroes will let some lone Moser go away and be free. Even in my world the authorities didn''t do that. They''ll just think he''s another Moser leading a criminal life. You said it yourself, you don''t want to tell me what to do all the time. We always have that other group of Mosers to save heroes from, So now I''m making this decision for us.'' ¡°Ha... hahaha.¡± Shroud let out peals of laughter inside Ben''s mind, ¡°Smart. I like it Ben. You want to make a decision? Let''s do it. Let''s go save this poor loner bastard.¡± Ben felt a wash of relief fall over him. He had been worried that Shroud would try to argue with him. He looked down as a small smile crossed his face. For a moment he wondered why Shroud had gone with his decision so easily, but then he realized. Drev was a loner, Shroud could relate to him. Probably felt sorry for him, a sort of connection. Shroud was right, he and Ben were different people no matter how similar they were meant to be. But Ben understood that some parts of him would never change. He wanted to help this person and no matter how stupid it may seem to Shroud, he wanted it just as much as Ben did. Shroud looked at a nearby Moser that was walking towards them, ¡°This is the one you¡¯ll start with.¡± Ben looked up, scrutinizing the Moser. He looked exactly like the other ones, a two and half meter tall walking rock with arms and legs. It would pick up a box any second now just like the others had done. He could see the rock bending its knees to lift up the next box. If there was a time to strike it would be when it fully lifted the box and turned its back to him. ¡°Tell you what Ben. I''m going to go and check on a few things while you kick all their asses,¡± Shroud grinned smugly and promptly disappeared from sight, ¡°I''ll come back when you''ve finished, probably with another genius idea to make it easier to become a hero.¡± Ben felt panic rise in his heart, ''What do you mean check out things? You''re in my head seeing everything I am.'' ¡°You know, think about stuff, remember things. It''s not like I have photographic memory. I have to think about who could be pulling the strings on this operation and how to take them down. Call me if there are any extreme problems.¡± ''Call you... right...'' ¡°You say something?¡± ''Don''t leave me alone. I''ve been in one fight and I barely did anything.'' Shroud paused and Ben imagined him considering his request, ¡°I''m constantly in your head remember. If anything bad happens I''ll know about it. Besides I saw how you dealt with the other Mosers, with the guidance I gave you when we slept I''m sure you can mop the floor with these guys. Just don''t try to punch one, they don''t just look like giant rocks. They are giant rocks.¡± Ben nodded uncertainly. ¡°If you never do anything alone then your life wont be any good. I might not always be here to help you, it''s not like I want to talk to you and see what you see twenty four-seven.¡± ''Okay...'' The Mosers had already come and gone several times since the time they arrived and Ben took a second to backtrack and begin watching them for an opening. There were more of them than at the ambush, seven in total. But if he didn''t count Drev who was sitting too far away to make a move quickly and the Moser he hopefully took care of in the initial attack then he would only have to fight five. ''Aim for the legs Ben.'' He thought to himself. He sat around and hyped himself up for a few moments, watching through the screen and looking at the oncoming Moser so that he could quickly take him out of the fight. He wondered what was inside the boxes, they were clearly large and extremely heavy but he''d seen one drop on the screen before and it had been filled with things too small to get a good look at. Since they were criminals it was clearly something out of the ordinary, probably guns or bullets or something. Then again, that gun that had melted the Mosers arm had clearly used something other than regular bullets. Ben was startled out of his thoughts by a series of vibrations, the Moser was shfting part of the pile of boxes and taking another one. Ben watched it bend down and closed his eyes, feeling the sudden cutting off of breath that came with his teleportation. ¡°SU restrain legs,¡± Chapter 8: Unexpected Developments Ben appeared behind the box carrying Moser. A long but thin string of darkness shot towards the standing Moser and wrapped around its legs. ¡°What the hell!¡± The Moser cried out. The Moser struggled furiously trying to break the rope-like tendrils that were tightening around its legs. The more it struggled the stronger the strands seem to become as they bore into the rocky skin and crevices, causing the Moser to fall helplessly onto the ground. ¡°No no no! Not the box!¡± The Moser let out a furious howl as the box fell out of its arms and smashed onto the ground. ¡°Dav! What the hell have you done?¡± The other Mosers hadn''t noticed Ben yet, but it would only be a matter of seconds before they took their eyes off the box and onto him. Just as he''d planned the Moser had been taken out almost instantly, it wouldn¡¯t be able to move properly or break through the Shroud Uniform material for a few minutes. Now came the hard part. The Mosers had already seen the darkness wrapped around their companions legs and their eyes were coming up to where he was. Ben sprinted to the side and shot out two more streams of darkness, one from his left side of the Shroud Uniform and the other one from the right. The one from the left sprayed against the floor and over the Moser¡¯s feet, they didn''t hesitate to smash against the ground and fling themselves towards him. But the darkness held fast and they couldn¡¯t force their feet off the ground to make the jump. It would only last a few seconds. But a few seconds was all he needed. He''d planned ahead for this mission. The first wave of darkness would keep the Mosers tied down, the second wave would turn incorporeal and quickly fill up his location with darkness. It was one of the things Shroud had taught him while he slept, Since he had collapsed because he was using too much of the Shroud Uniform''s materials he would need to cut back. That would obviously leave him at a disadvantage when he was confronting people head on, but that''s not what the uniform was meant to be used for. It was a battle suit designed for assassinations and espionage and the incorporeal darkness used up a lot less energy than the physical strings. It would also cover a large area quickly which was exactly what he needed. In a matter of seconds the entire warehouse was covered in darkness. It couldn''t be touched or moved, and light couldn''t penetrate it. It was his own personal arena. The Mosers broke through the darkness holding them down and slowly huddled back to back as they looked out cautiously in all directions. Only Drev was left outside the fighting formation as he stared dumbstruck around him at the sudden turn of events. Ben couldn''t see around him, apparently his night vision didn''t penetrate through the suits darkness. But just like when he had cleaned up the blood off the stone room''s floor he could feel the darkness clinging to everything in the warehouse, providing him with the location of everyone and everything he needed to see. ¡°SU restrain legs.¡± Ben smiled as the streams shot towards the Mosers legs and they cried out in panic. Four of them were taken out with a single stream, crashing to the ground and struggling against the increasing amount of bonds that linked them. The last Moser was the one furthest away from Ben. It had avoided the darkness because they were blocked by its companions. ¡°SU restrain legs.¡± The Moser''s head perked up as Ben spoke and it immediately smashed its fists against the ground, breaking the concrete and causing a wave of debris to fly into the air and block the strands. The darkness wrapped around the first things they touched instead of the Mosers legs and Ben took a step back to survey the situation. ¡°You''re dead you little shit.¡± The Moser grunted and jumped into the air. It landed next to Ben and he realized that since it couldn¡¯t see it must have just jumped into the general direction that the streams had come from. The broken ground turned into shrapnel as it flew towards the air and hit him, pieces pattering onto the ground. The Moser grinned ¡°I hear you.¡± It lifted it hand towards the sound of falling concrete and Ben gasped as his arm was gripped hard enough to feel it being crushed. ''Uh oh.'' Ben thought. ¡°SU restrain.¡± Even though the Mosers hand had grabbed onto his arm the strands of darkness came from all over his body. Ben didn''t bother to ask it to restrain a specific place as he let the strands fire across the Moser entire body. The Moser shouted and let go of him, trying to use its hands to block to oncoming darkness, but it was no use. In a matter of seconds it crashed to the ground with its entire body covered in a thin layer of darkness. ¡°SU restrain legs.¡± Ben turned away from the incapacitated Moser and instead turned to the first one he had taken out. If it was given enough time then it would be able to break through the thin layer he had shot at it. Ben went through all of the Mosers again until he felt that they wouldn''t be able to break out and breathed a sigh of relief. He didn''t feel tired at all and he''d made sure that both their arms and legs were restrained after he''d gone around them twice. There was no reason to cover their whole bodies, it would just waste energy and cause him to collapse. ¡°You attacked them.¡± Ben turned around, ''Shit.'' He''d forgotten about Drev. ¡°You''re a hero?¡± Drev the Moser was looking at him through the darkness, he had long ago pinpointed his general location from the sounds of the battle. But he hadn''t moved away from the box he''d been sitting on. He had an expression of awe on his face, well, at least Ben thought it was awe. It was hard to tell when his face was made out of rock. ¡°Yes. I didn''t kill any of them.¡± ¡°Good.¡± Ben tilted his head at Drev. The guy didn''t seem particularly bright, even compared to the Mosers he''d seen. ¡°If I hadn''t captured them they might have hurt people.¡± Ben felt stupid for explaining himself. He didn''t even know if heroes were meant to tell people why they did things. It made sense to him to explain though. Drev the Moser nodded his head. ¡°You didn''t attack me.¡± He stated. ¡°You didn''t look like you liked what they''re doing. Besides...¡± Ben thought of what Shroud had taught him. ¡°I heard before that you''re less than two months old. So that means this is probably your first job. You haven''t committed any crimes yet, so you''re not a criminal.¡± ¡°Yes.¡± ¡°Holy shit,¡± Ben almost jumped out of his skin as Shroud''s spoke, ¡°You need to get to that Moser straight away. Restrain his whole body if you need to.¡± ''What?'' ¡°This is wrong, this is all wrong Ben! These Mosers wouldn''t just let whoever hired them shoot or kill one of their own. I should have realized it before.¡± ''What''s wrong? What''s going on Shroud?'' But Ben had already started running towards Drev and the Moser was startled as his body was suddenly covered in black strands and he suddenly found himself glued to the box he''d been sitting on.This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. ¡°What are you doing!¡± Drev bellowed. ¡°These Mosers are all working because if they don''t they die.¡± ¡°Every single one has a bomb implanted in them set to explode at any moment!¡± Ben reached the incapacitated Drev within seconds, ''Okay, what do I do? Shroud?'' ¡°Tell the SU to find the bomb and take it out without killing the Moser. It can do the work. You just have to think about it hard enough.¡± ¡°Drev listen to me, I know you have a bomb inside you. I''m going to take it out, trust me. But it''s going to hurt like hell.¡± The Moser whimpered in acknowledgment. ¡°SU find and take out the bomb without killing Drev.¡± ¡°Tell it to cover the bomb as well. It''ll absorb the explosion if it goes off.¡± Ben instantly did as he was told. The Shroud Uniform writhed and tendrils of darkness shot out and pierced through Drev''s skin, causing the huge Moser to scream out in pain. Ben looked away from the twitching figure and grimaced, he could feel every tendril digging through the rock-like body of Moser and hurting him while it looked for the bomb. ''How do you know there''s a bomb Shroud?'' ¡°I was thinking about what we''d seen. All the Mosers looked perfectly healthy, so clearly someone had paid good money for them. But these aren''t just industrial Mosers you hire for small business, like those drug peddlers you saw before. These guys are all at least two meters tall and clearly built for battle. They may be clones but that doesn''t mean they''ll just obey anyone. Usually Mosers get paid by their creators, its part of the reason they''re so expensive to make, part of it is also a life salary they''re given to spend as they want. Think about it, free job and living space. Nobody complains with those kinds of things just given to them. But that doesn''t mean they''ll just let somebody kill them on the spot and not retaliate at all. They''re still alive, they still want to survive. There has to be an even greater and more definite threat keeping them in line. But its not easy to kill a Moser whenever you want. Especially when they wont even be around you most of the time since you need them to do other things.¡± ''So they planted bombs in them?'' ¡°Yeah. Remote controlled to detonate at the push of a button. If one of the Moser''s tried to escape or retaliate against whoever hired them they''d blow up. Instant death.¡± ''What kind of a sick bastard would do that. Forcing people to work with their lives at stake... I don''t mind trying to take that kind of guy out.'' ¡°I''ll let you know if I figure out who''s pulling the strings around here. A new villain crops up every week to replace any that are arrested nowadays. I don''t even kill around here, first rule of killing villains is that you don''t hunt in your own area.¡± ''I do not need the exact details right now Shroud. How long until Drev''s bomb is out?'' ¡°With the amount of burrowing these tendrils are doing it should only be a few seconds. You''re going to need to release him almost straight away though. Mosers don''t heal like we do, they need to consume similar materials to construct new body parts.¡± Drev''s face was a mask of pain. Ben winced as he suddenly felt one of the tendrils cave in, it had found a small hole inside the Moser''s body. ''Found it.'' The tendril immediately wrapped around the bomb, dragging it through the hole it had carved through Drev''s body and retracting outside. Ben could feel the bomb and grimaced. The tendril tightened and immediately destroyed it, Ben didn''t even know if it had exploded or had simply been crushed like a bug. ¡°Splendid.¡± Ben paused for a moment and retracted the tendrils from Drevs body and dissipated the darkness restraining him. Drev immediately stood up with a roar of pain and Ben jumped back warily. Instead of attacking Ben the Moser immediately smashed against the concrete floor and started to consume the broken chunks with a voracity that rivaled a hungry lion''s dinnertime. ¡°Don''t forget about the other ones.¡± Ben turned around to face the remaining Mosers still restrained on the ground. ¡°Wait, they look strange. Don''t go near them.¡± Ben looked down at them and realized that even through his darkness they were glowing, ''What-'' Ben had barely thought out the word before the six Mosers in front of him exploded from the inside out. They screamed out in pain for a single second before their bodies melted and the outer layer of their rock skin flew out into the air, showering his horrified face with pieces of disintegrated rock and ash. The tendrils of darkness holding them down disappeared as they died and Ben fell to his knees from the force and the shock. He was hit with the sudden realization that he couldn''t save them. ¡°Well... forget that then, clearly we couldn''t get to them in time.¡± ''What the hell are you saying.'' ¡°It''s called being tough Ben. We couldn''t save them. It happened. And it''ll probably happen again.¡± ''You don''t have to be so mean about it... so blunt. People just died in front of our eyes. Lives, even if they weren''t humans.'' ¡°Look long and hard Ben. Life''s a bitch, that''s why the world needs heroes. But you can''t save everyone, nobody can. I learnt that the hard way a long time ago.¡± ¡°Uh god- no, just- just give me a second.¡± It was a few minutes before Ben finally got up, slipping out of the warehouse and chucking all over the floor. He could hear the oncoming sirens hitting his ears like a Sunday morning church bell. Shroud had told him to teleport straight out of there after cleaning up the vomit he¡¯d emptied onto the ground but he ignored him and turned back to face the warehouse. The darkness was already disappearing, the Shroud Uniform could remotely control any of its material and it would be long gone before the police arrived. They would probably arrive at an empty warehouse, the boxes were still there, and the trucks. But there was nothing living in there. Ben leant against one of its walls and thought about how sudden theirs deaths had been. He was new to all this but even he could recognize death when he saw it. He wondered if it would have been worse if they had been humans instead. Probably. A noise caught his attention and he spotted a lumbering figure walking out of the storage warehouse. He gathered his thoughts and stepped out to greet the figure. Just as he did the figure turned towards him as well. ¡°You saved me.¡± Ben cringed. Drev the Moser was looking at him with something akin to respect in his eyes that Ben didn''t feel he deserved. He''d caused the Moser so much pain, and then hadn''t even managed to save the other people of his race. Sure, they clearly hadn''t shared much love for each other but Drev had worked with them, and they were under as much duress as him. That Ben had found out the hard way. ¡°Don''t look so sad.¡± Ben looked up and Drev spoke to him, ¡°Rejoice. You saved one. The others... you tried. I saw.¡± ¡°No.¡± Ben pulled away from Drev and started to walk away, ¡°I just... need some time. You''re free now. No threats of bombs. I don''t know if you want to stay for the police but it would probably be a good idea. I''m sure they''d understand.¡± Shroud had told him they would. ¡°You''ll be back.¡± Drev stated it simply, but surely. Ben could tell that even though the big man had just walked out of a warehouse filled with the dead body parts of his people the Moser was almost unaffected by the whole ordeal. Maybe that was just the type of world this was. Or maybe Moser''s thoughts were different in their thinking of life and death, with them being clones and having ten year life spans. Ben didn''t know. And he didn''t really care. ¡°Let''s go back to the house.¡± Ben couldn''t muster a response as he felt the veil of breathlessness fall over him. He was back in the stone room. He sighed and sat down on the stone slab, arching his back and staring at the roof. ¡°Do you know what it means to be a hero Ben.¡± Shroud appeared in front of Ben, a worried look replacing the scowl that usually occupied his face. ''Tell me then. That''s what you were going to do anyway wasn''t it.'' ¡°Heroes are big men. Bigger than most people, bigger than me, bigger than you. They''re so big that they''re intimidating, not all day, not everyday, but when they need to be they are the scariest mother fuckers on the planet. Not because they''re strong, and not because they have heaven-defying powers. It''s because they don''t give a damn about what other people have to say. When it comes to their jobs, their duties, they will move mountains, depose dictators and hone their skills all their lives. And every single one of them knows that it wont mean jack shit most of the time. But every one of them that I''ve met has lived this kind of life for one reason and one reason only. A moment. That single moment where they need to act, where they need to be the symbols of peace the people look up to. It''s not really something that can be described in words, because every single person has their own moment and their own reasons. Needless to say, its a moment where even the nicest man in the world becomes unstoppable, every pore of their body defying all odds to fight against impossible enemies, the moment even the most cowardly person pushes on regardless of the risk to their life. Because at that moment they know that if they don''t act, people will die.¡± Shroud put a transparent hand on Ben''s shoulder. ¡°Nobody is born a hero Ben. They''re made into heroes through blood, sweat and tears. A hero works so hard to prevent death because they''re the people that have been most affected by it. A relative, a friend... and innocent bystander, nobody is safe in this world. But where others see a wall, heroes see a way around it. They try every second of every day to cross over an insurmountable obstacle, to bring about a peace that the world has never seen before. They know they can''t stop death, they know they can''t save everyone. But they fight against it all the same. And it works. Out there in the world there are millions of people who look up at night and thanks heroes in their hearts. That one man that was saved from a car crash, that one daughter that was abused by her father. They can''t fight against criminals and villains, they''re not strong enough, but that''s why heroes exist. So that when all the hope is gone, and when people find themselves experiencing the cold reality of life... they jump in. A beacon of hope, a person that shows that even in this cold merciless world there''s somebody out there keeping them safe, fighting against impossible odds with everything they have. You can''t win every battle Ben, hell, you can''t even win most of them. But a hero doesn''t do it for the losses, they do it because they know that for every hundred times they lose somebody, there will be somebody they saved. They do it to let others know that somebody out there is trying their hardest to keep them safe in a world of death. Well... you get the idea.¡± Shroud disappeared, ¡°I didn''t mean to talk so much... Just don''t let this get you down too hard.¡± Ben continued to stare at the wall, a small light shining in his eyes. ''Yeah... thanks Shroud.''