The Acedemy

I woke up and stared up at my bed. I had grown tired of sleeping on it; it made me comfortable enough to dream. After all the wars; I didn't want to dream. I threw off the blanket and stared at my eighteen year-old face in the mirror of my hotel room. Hmph, after ninety years, you think it would've made a difference on my appearance after all the times I've been shot, beaten, stabbed, and hell, how many times I've killed myself, but no. I walked out of the hotel with only the clothes on my back. It's time for a new day at school.

At this school, I'm starting out as a junior under some forged papers that I made. I could occasionally pass as a junior, as long as I made my voice a little higher, hunkered down a bit from my 6'5" normal height, and didn't accidentally tear any desks apart.

I walked into the school labeled, "Martin Luther King Jr. High," It was running through my mind of how many other, 'Martin Luther King Jr. High's' I'd graduated from. Six.

I walked into the office and said in my high voice, "Hi, I'm Zachary; I'm here for my first day of school. Can I have my schedule please?" I said to the obviously annoyed desk attendant.

"Sure, kid. Zachary? Do you have a last name?" She asked, smacking her gum as she stared at me.

"Yeah, Elliot," I said to her. I was going to use my real name at this school to avoid as much confusion as possible. I'd run into some situations that were hard to get out of when I used a fake name.

"Alright then, here it is. Enjoy your day, Mr. Elliot," she said to me as I turned and left the office.

'Great, here goes another boring four years of High School,' I thought. I spent nearly the entire day listening to heartbeats, quiet conversations in the room I was in and rooms throughout the school, and deciding on what I was going to make myself this year. History geek? Football jock? The pussy magnet? Gothic kid? I've been all of them, I think of it sort of as an experiment. I'll just survey the people here and check it out. Everyone in the classroom was extremely diverse.

There was an extremely attractive clique of girls on the opposite side of the classroom; they may be the reason to be a pussy magnet. There was a group of girls wearing dark clothing, all attractive as well. This was going to be a tough decision. I closed my eyes and found it easy to see myself fucking all of the clique girls at once, but the Goth girls were a different story. My sexual thoughts were interrupted by the sound of someone coming over to my desk.

"Hey, what's your name, kid?" The jock said.

"Well, it's not, 'kid;' so don't call me that," I replied smartly. I could hear the jock's heart-rate rise as my comment angered him. I figure it angered him even more that I wasn't removing my sunglasses or even opening my eyes to acknowledge him.

"Listen, I saw you eyeing my girlfriend over there, don't do it again or I'll kick your ass, got it?" He said.

"Don't threaten me, you won't be able to play football if it goes too far," I said threateningly, still not opening my eyes.

"Are you trying to start something, stupid?" He said.

"No, I'm trying to get you to go back and take your seat." I said innocently.

"Well it's not going to work," He said. I heard the wind shift as he pulled his fist back and accelerated it forward at an alarming speed. I reached up my hand and caught his fist with extreme ease. I tightened my grip around his fist with the tiniest of fractions of my strength and snapped several bones in his hand.

"Agh! What the fuck?" He yelled in pain. It happened too quickly for his eyes to see. I pulled his arm behind his back, and pushed his knee in so his legs buckled and he fell onto the floor. Just so I could see him on the ground, I opened my eyes.

"Son, do you understand why you're here?" The principle asked.

"Because I defended myself and put the jock in a submissive position when he assaulted me?" I said, smartly.

"You're here because you violated school rules of violence on the first day back from summer. Because this is mostly Mr. Johnson's fault, we're going to excuse you," He said. "I'm going to ask that you take off those glasses in the school," He added.

"Yes, sir," I said as I removed them.

"Now, will you just answer one question for me?" He asked.

"Sure, what do you want to know?" I replied.

"How did you break his hand? By the X-Ray, the doctor says you broke most of the bones in his hand, and by the way you described what happened, you wouldn't have much time to do that," He said.

I got up and left the room. I can't tell anybody the reason because I don't even know how I can do it. I can hear things that other people can't, I've got the strength of fifty men and then some, and, most importantly, I don't age.

"Dude, are you the kid that kicked Eli's ass?" Some guy asked me.

"That depends, was that the asshole who attempted to hit me?" I said smartly.

"Well, yeah, I guess so," the kid said.

"Then yes. I kicked his ass, why?" I asked.

"Because dude, he was a dick to pretty much everybody in school. We're all thankful that he's out for a while. Some girls said that they'll thank the dude who did it," The kid said.

"Okay... And this concerns you, how?" I said.

"Well... Nobody really knew who it was, I was wondering if I could tell people it was me," The kid said shyly.

"Umm... Sure, kid. Why not," I said.

"Oh my god, dude, thanks! I'm going to get so much pussy for this," The kid said as he walked quickly away to a group of girls talking about the exact same subject. I listened intently to the subject with my oversensitive hearing.

"I heard the guy broke his hand in like four different places, I wonder how good he is at other things with his hands..."

"Hey ladies," The kid said.

"Umm, who the fuck are you?" The girl said.

"I'm the guy who kicked Eli's ass," He said.

"Oh, sorry; I didn't know. Umm... Listen, I've been feeling kind of vulnerable lately and I was wondering if you could come over later and teach me some of those moves that you pulled on Eli," She said, catching herself. I could hear her heartbeat skip a step and then begin beating abruptly.

"Sure, anything you want, just to let you know, I can get pretty out of control if I get too in to it," He said, hinting a sexual undertone. Her heartbeat skipped another beat and started beating even faster. Did this story really have that much of an effect on girls at this school?

"Oh, well, um. I'll be sure to tell you if you get too rowdy," She said. She was also playing a game, she winked at him and his heartbeat picked up the pace.

I lost interest in the conversation because I knew where it was heading. The bell rang for school to end and I left as quickly as possible, nowhere to go. I began wandering around downtown. Of all the chatters and yelling I heard through the building walls, I heard some communication line interference. Like two people on the same line were standing too close. I turned into a dark alley and ducked behind a trash can. I tried to isolate the sound itself to see what the people were talking about.

"*Static* Sir, the target just went into an alley, he probably heard us approaching or the command aler-*Static*," A man said.

Shit. Who is looking for me now? I moved my head around the alley corner just enough to see two very inconspicuous men walking towards the alley. Both looked different somehow, their heart rates were normal as well. Did whoever that was commanding not fill them in on who they were up against. I moved even further into the alley, if this was going to get messy I wanted them in a place where it would be difficult for someone to find the bodies.

The two men came around the corner and I stayed behind the trash can. One of the men either stopped walking or he suddenly became the quietest person on the planet. A small cloud of smoke in the shape of a man suddenly formed in front of me. The smoky hand moved up toward my face and then materialized into an actual hand. The grip firmly grasped my neck, harder than anything I had ever felt.

'What the hell? How did he get here?' I thought to myself. The hand picked me up off of the ground and held me in the air.

"Are you Zachary Elliot?" The man asked. I took the brief second to judge the opponent, about my height, blonde hair, and by the grip around my neck, strong. Very strong.

"No, who the hell is that?" I lied.

"Funny, I've got several pictures. Some are from World War II. They all look strangely like you." The brunette man behind me said.

Before either of them could take another breath, I summoned all my strength and took a blow at the man holding me by the throat. This punch was enough to catch him off guard and break his neck, killing him.

The brunette man behind me caught my back and tried to strangle me, he wouldn't be the first to try. I threw him over my shoulder and into another dumpster in front of me. That should've broken his back; it didn't. He god back up and threw a punch at my face only for it to be caught by my fist just inches away. I had to use nearly all my strength to push his fist back and return another punch to his face. He fell onto the ground and attempted to get up. I punched him again, knocking him back down to the ground and then stomped on his face as hard as I could. Finally, the strange pair of super men was dead.

I left the alley as fast as I could, 'Who the hell were those guys?' I thought to myself. How were they as strong as me? Did they have the same abilities? If so, why didn't they get back up? All these questions flew around my head as I broke into a flat out run down the street in order to get away from the scene.

"...he's alive; he's on the run down Garrison Avenue, Southbound..." Another transmission said. This time it was a female's voice. I could hear a heartbeat close by, but I couldn't find the owner, followed by a rush of air, sounds like someone raising a handgun to aim; again I could not find the owner.

My searching was interrupted by the sting of something in my neck. I looked down, a dart. 'Did someone seriously think a friggin dart would take me down? That's pathetic!" I thought. Dizziness overcame me, 'What the hell? This has never happened before. This is a bad day.' I fell hard to onto my knees. A woman suddenly appeared in front of me. She was beautiful, was I dying finally dying and this is my angel, I hope so.

"You're going to be okay, Zachary," I heard her sweet voice through the haze and the growing silence around me. My eyes were starting to have a tunnel vision effect. I was losing the sight of her beautiful face, those green eyes. No! I lunged up in an effort to hold her, our lips met and she shoved me back to the ground. I was finally unconscious.

*TWO*

"Zachary? Can you hear me? Nurse, I think he's coming around, go get the professor, quick!" I heard a beautiful voice say. My eyes fluttered open and I was on a table, why was I strapped down? Fuck, I didn't die. I looked over and saw the same beautiful woman.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"The person who saved your ass," She replied

"Wait, didn't you shoot me?" I said bluntly.

"Yes," She said plainly.

"Pardon my lack of deductive reasoning skills, how in hell did that save me?" I said.

"Well, it was either shoot you with elephant tranquilizer or risk fighting you and expose us to the people who wanted to kill you," She said.

"Yeah, like you could last five seconds in a fight with me, honey." I said.

She suddenly disappeared into thin air. I heard the sound of her getting up. She reappeared, he face just inches away from mine. I wanted to kiss her so badly.

"You can't fight what you can't see," She said warningly.

"I guess that's why god, or whatever the hell did this to me, blessed me with super hearing," I said snarkily. "I've got three questions for you. One: Why am I here, two: why am I strapped down, three: What's your name?" I said the third one as flirtily as possible.

"You're here because the professor has some interest in you. You're strapped down because I'm afraid you're going to try and kiss me again, and I'm Amanda," She said, her voice flat. Her eyes never left the door.

"Well, who's the professor?" I asked.

"You said you only had three questions," She sighed.

The metallic doors opened quickly and a balding man stepped through.

"Zachary! It's so good to see you again," The strange old man said.

"Do I know you?" I asked.

"You don't remember me, I'm insulted. Amanda, remove those shackles, you shouldn't try to chain every man up who kisses you, you should be flattered that such a wonderful man tried to do so," The professor said.

"Listen, old man, I don't know who you are," I said.

"My name is Caleb Fleming; you served with my father in the Second World War. You saved his life too," He said.

"Wait, you're James' kid?" I said.

"Precisely," he said.

"I was there when your mother gave birth to you, she died doing so. Your father was devastated," I said apologetically.

"Yes, he was. He took his own life several months later. He only left me a note saying to find you and rescue you from whatever boring life you have when I could," the professor said.

"Well, Sergeant Fleming was a far greater man than I will be," I said.

"As that may be, in the letter, my father told me to be as much of a mentor to you as possible, teach you all that I've learned. And now, I have actual teachers to do that. I personally enrolled you in my academy for, 'gifted,' children," He said.

"Gifted, you mean like super powers?" I asked.

"Precisely, the new semester starts up tomorrow and you'll be assigned a roommate. There's no need to pretend here, you just have to be you," He said knowingly.

"Great, I need to buy some clothes though; I only have what's on my back," I said.

"I know, I already bought you a month's worth of clothes. They're sitting against that wall, I think there are three duffle bags," He said to me.

The next morning, the professor took me to my room and I set my clothes in the dresser. My roommate had already unpacked, organized, and left the room to explore; the professor informed me.

"Well, here's your class schedule and a map of the school," He said, "Find me if you have any trouble with anything."

"Alright, thanks for ev-," he was already gone.

I sat on my bed and closed my eyes, trying to focus on what's going on in the rooms next to me. I could hear two old friends hugging in the room to my right. Two roommates talking about some girls they had back home, by their heart rates, one of them was lying.

To my luck, I managed to phone in on Amanda, by my guess; she was two hallways forward and three rooms to the left of mine.

"... You're lucky, professor made me save this jerk today, this guy could not stop staring at me, like he could read my thoughts or something," Amanda said.

"If the professor wants him, he probably can, that weirdo Drew will have some competition then," The other girl said.

"I don't know, there's something about this guy, though, it's like he's older than he is, wiser, like he already knows what I'm going to do. And he's actually pretty cute," She said.

"Well then go for it, he's probably different then all these other pussy chasing guys who think they're hot shit because they can set stuff on fire with their minds," Hannah said.

"Yeah, I prefer guys who wouldn't set my house on fire if they got angry too," A voice in front of me said. I jumped and swung at the intruder. He vanished for a second and then reappeared on the other bed in the room, now holding an apple.

"What the hell?" I said.

"The name is Drew, pleased to make your acquaintance," he said.

"What are you doing in here?" I asked.

"What kind of dumb ass question is that? I'm your roommate," He said.

"Well, why did you say that before," I asked.

"I can read your mind," He said plainly, more interested in the apple than our conversation.

"Ah, so you have telepathy, anything else I should be aware of?" I asked.

"Well, as you saw before, I can also teleport, plus I'm working on my telekinesis," He said, still more interested in the apple.

"Jesus, you're a mind freak," I said, "Any other powers?"

"Not really, I can juggle like a mo- fo, though," He said, completely serious.

"Uh-huh," I said. I started sizing the man up, long, emo- style hair, black makeup and black clothes. I got roomed with a Goth kid.

"Hey, I'm not Goth, I hated people before it was cool," He said.

"Will you stop reading my mind?" I said.

"Well, no. I can't, I can only focus it on one person."

"Well, focus it on someone else, damn it," I barked back.

"It's a lot harder to do than you think, I can hear it, I can't just tune it out. Can you tune out how you hear everything?" He said.

"Yes, only because I've been alive for a hundred years," I said back.

"Woah, I'm only eighteen," He said.

"I am too, kinda. I've not aged since 1930. I've been in every war since. You don't know how many people I've killed, how many officers, Enlisted men, civilians... I can hardly sleep through all of the nightmares," I explained to him.

"So, you can't die, age, or be hurt, super hearing? Anything else?" He asked.

I picked up one of his thirty-five pound dumbbells and bent it into the shape of a heart; then bent it back.

"Oh, well you're basically the perfect soldier. If any side had you, they'd win eventually," He concluded.

Drew leaned back against the wall while sitting on his bed; he held the apple core flat out in his hand and concentrated for a second. The core hesitantly floated a few inches above his hand and settled back down; Drew let out a breath as if he had just run a mile.

At that moment, Amanda stepped in the room. "Zach, um, hey. I just wanted to let you know, our first classes start tomorrow. We've got first and second class together," She said, smiling. Her heart rate picked up a little. She started twiddling her thumbs.

"Oh, thanks, Amanda," I said, trying to be inconspicuous to the fact that I heard that she was probably going to flirt with me and try a lot more. But the other, more dominant and horny part of me decided to keep going, "Umm, will you show me around the school?" Drew smirked; the bastard. Stop listening to me, listen to her. Tell me what she said later. I'll see you tonight. "Bye, Drew!" I said, in a fake, corny, overly friendly way.

"This is the courtyard, where people try and perfect certain aspects of their abilities," She said, grabbing a hold of my left arm and pointing to my right to the group of people sparring. A kid's hands lit on fire and he threw a punch at one of the smallest girls I've ever seen. She countered by grabbing his elbow and shoulder and slamming him onto the ground; super strength definitely. She followed that by blowing freezing air onto his hands, thus putting them out and keeping him frozen to the ground. Didn't expect that...

"Watch out!" She did her best to throw me to the ground; I heard something large rapidly approaching from our backs. I read her movements and her words and grabbed the both of us and put her under me and shielded her from whatever was coming so quickly.

An explosion thudded on the ceiling directly above where they were laying. Fire, debris and ash covered my back and singed my clothes and skin. I poked my head up and looked around to see if where it had come from. I remembered Amanda and moved to the side. She fainted.

"Dude! I am so sorry, I didn't know how big that was going to get," A long haired young boy said. He was maybe around fifteen. "Woah... Your back, man it's burned bad. We've got to get you to the hospital wing," He touched the gnarly burn wound on my back. Even as he moved toward me, it started to heal before his eyes.

"It's fine, be more careful. Practice that out in the open field near the entrance. You're less likely to kill someone there," I said jokingly. He smiled feebly, gave more apologies and left.