Chapter 77

MAXIMUM OUTPUT

After catching up and handing over their gear with instructions and advice, Alexander found a stretch of beach far enough from the house that he wouldn’t disturb anyone.

Rocky outcroppings jutted from the sand here, worn smooth by centuries of waves but still solid enough for what he needed. The beautiful Mediterranean stretched endlessly before him, painted gold by the late afternoon sun.

Exhaustion tugged at his muscles. Three days of workshop marathons with only four to six hours of sleep in between was demanding payment, but excitement overrode it. New equipment to test. Powers to push. Thirty-six hours until they each had to make a decision about the quest, and he needed to know exactly what he could do.

He started with Metallokinesis.

Focusing on his equipment, he lifted himself straight up. His entire body went rigid as he rose three feet off the sand, arms and legs locked in place by his mental grip on all the metal he wore. It felt like being picked up by an invisible giant who didn’t understand human joints.

He lowered himself and tried again, this time focusing only on the boots. Up he went, smoother this time. One foot. Two. His legs stayed perfectly straight, locked from the knees down, but the rest of him could move.

Then physics caught up. His upper body weight pulled him forward, and with his legs unable to adjust, he tilted like a falling tree. The Metallokinesis slipped from his control. He crashed face-first into the sand, legs still straight as boards until the last second.

“Elegant,” he muttered, spitting out sand.

Next attempt: belt only. The heavy utility belt allowed him to lift himself easily enough, though it pulled awkwardly. When he tried to move his arms or legs, his mind reflexively adjusted the belt’s position with Metallokinesis, as if the metal should shift with his movements. The conflicting impulses turned simple gestures into chaotic lurches that sent him spinning and almost ragdolling through the air.

He managed to set himself down before completely losing orientation.

The drain is noticeable too, more than just lifting metal alone. Strange. There’s a difference between holding metal in place and lifting myself continuously.

During their aerial insertion at the Santiago facility, he’d barely felt the strain, but then they’d been falling and he’d only been slowing their descent, not trying to treat gravity like it was optional. Maybe that was the difference. Or maybe lifting living weight required more effort than just metal. He wasn’t sure.

Gauntlets only showed promise, with one major problem. He could maintain position with his arms extended, but the moment he needed his hands for anything else, he had to let go and drop himself.

The chest plate, though. That had potential.

Alexander focused on the armor covering his torso, lifting carefully. He rose smoothly, maintaining balance better than with any other anchor point. Three feet. Five. Ten. He hung there, actually stable for once. The center of mass was right; the distribution of force worked.

For about three seconds.

Then he felt himself slipping inside the armor, his body weight pulling him down while the chest plate stayed locked in position. The metal edge pressed painfully against his throat, then his chin.

He released the grip, dropping back to the sand with a grunt. Flying was possible, he could see the path forward now. But the Control needed to maintain position while adjusting for body movement? Or to treat each bit of metal as a separate piece? Not even close to his current level.

Still, evasion might work.

Alexander planted his feet and yanked himself sideways with a burst of Metallokinesis, using all his metal gear as anchor points. His body jerked left so fast his mind barely kept up, arms windmilling wildly as he slid to a stop in the sand.

Fast, but telegraphed. A cultivator would see the preparation, the planted stance. Need to work on disguising the setup.

He reset his position and tried backward. The yank sent him stumbling, but he managed to stay upright by throwing his weight forward at the last second. The movement covered fifteen feet in less than a second.

Better. Backward means I can keep eyes on target. But the stumble is a window of vulnerability. Will need to practice it.

Forward came next. The pull was easier to control, his body naturally leaning into the motion. Though stopping required an awkward hopping dance as momentum carried him further than intended.

Most controllable direction, but predictable. Anyone who’s fought enough would expect forward aggression.

He tried combinations. Left into backward. Forward into right. Each transition jarred his body in new ways, muscles not designed for this kind of instantaneous direction change. But it worked. Jerky, ungraceful, a touch painful, but it worked.

A cultivator expecting normal human movement patterns might hesitate for a fraction of a second. Might be enough to avoid getting my skull cracked like...

Alexander paused, looking at the boulders he was about to test his gauntlets on. Something about that comparison felt oddly specific. He shook it off, refocusing on the tactical puzzle.

The real advantage is three-dimensional. They can move fast on the ground, but can they chase if I yank myself ten feet straight up? Or drop suddenly?

He tested it, pulling himself vertical. The ascent was smooth if jerky, but landing required rolling to dissipate the impact. His legs would only take so many of those before giving out.

Unless I descend slowly… but that puts me at risk. Save vertical moves for critical moments. Horizontal for general evasion. And hope whoever I’m fighting doesn’t have ranged techniques that make distance irrelevant.

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Done with the evasion testing, Alexander decided it was time to move on to his gauntlets.

He flexed his fingers, feeling the capacitor banks humming with potential. The control system had been deliberately designed with no external interface. Only his Technopathy could adjust the settings, making them useless to anyone else. They had no internal power generation, relying entirely on his Electrokinesis to charge and operate.

Starting safe, he dialed the output to minimum. A touch against a rock produced a sharp crack and a small scorch mark. Taser level, enough to drop someone without lasting damage.

He stepped back, increased the power slightly, and aimed with an open palm at the sand near his feet. Purple-blue light traced a thin line through the air for a split second before electricity followed the path. The bolt fizzled out after three feet, but where it struck, it left a small patch of glass in the sand.

Alexander let the capacitors charge, timing it. Thirty seconds from empty to full at rest, maybe twenty if he pushed hard with Electrokinesis. He increased the output to quarter strength. This time the purple trace was brighter, the lightning bolt reaching roughly fifteen feet before dissipating.

Halfway now. The capacitors whined softly as they discharged. The bolt struck a smaller rock, cracking it down the middle with a sound like a gunshot.

Excitement overtook caution. Alexander dialed the output to maximum, skipping the prudent intermediate testing. The capacitors took their full thirty seconds to charge, humming with barely contained energy as he poured Electrokinesis into them. He aimed at a boulder the size of a refrigerator.

The purple-blue ionization path blazed bright enough to leave afterimages. Then lightning followed. Not a bolt but a pillar of white-hot electricity connected his palm to the stone for a full second.

The boulder exploded.

He’d expected it to crack or split. Instead, it detonated like it had swallowed a grenade. Chunks of rock shot in every direction, pelting the sand and splashing into the waves. Alexander stumbled backward, ears ringing, acrid ozone burning his nostrils.

“Holy shit.” He looked at the gauntlets, then at the where the boulder had been. “I really should have calculated the maximum output. And perhaps testing on rocks with high water content wasn’t the smartest idea.”

He checked the gauntlets anxiously, running his combined senses through them to check for flaws. They were still in perfect condition. The materials had held; none of the systems had overloaded. They’d performed exactly as designed.

Which meant he’d built weapons capable of literally exploding stone and had somehow not realized it during three days of exhausted construction.

His Hyperawareness picked up movement. Someone behind a cluster of olive trees further up the beach, trying very hard to stay hidden. Alexander turned, raising his hands peacefully.

“Testing! Just testing. All done now, I promise.”

The rock alien emerged from behind the trees, which hadn’t really concealed its bulk anyway. It rumbled something that sounded concerned.

Alexander looked at the alien. Then at the shattered remains of the rocks and boulders. Then back at the alien, who was made of rock.

“I’m... sorry?” he offered, not entirely sure why he was apologizing but feeling it was necessary.

The alien rumbled again, softer this time, and began making its way back toward the house. Alexander followed, exhaustion finally winning as the adrenaline faded. His legs felt like lead, his eyes burned, and the thought of finding a bed was becoming irresistible.

One sofa was crowded when Alexander entered, with the team gathered around the holo. Annie looked up as he walked in, taking in his sand-covered appearance and the faint smell of burnt ozone that clung to him.

“You missed it starting, but—” She paused, sniffing. “Dude, did you blow something up?”

“A boulder. What did I miss?”

“Star Titan,” Augustus said gravely, not looking away from the screen. “He made his move.”

Alexander moved closer, seeing news footage of what had clearly been a Santiago Systems facility. Past tense, because it was now mostly rubble and emergency vehicles.

“—confirmed reports that Star Titan was involved in an attack on a facility early this morning where he engaged in combat with superheroes, before escaping with an unknown individual,” the reporter was saying. “Sources indicate the unknown person may be related to Star Titan. Santiago Systems has refused to comment on why this individual was being held at the facility or the nature of the research being conducted there.”

The footage switched to shakier citizen-recorded video. Star Titan hovered in the sky, one arm wrapped protectively around an unconscious figure while Radiant blazed through the air in bursts of incredible speed. The hero would streak across the sky, come to a sudden stop, unleash a beam of concentrated light, then burst into motion again before Star Titan could counter. Each attack came from a different angle, forcing Star Titan to constantly adjust.

Star Titan rotated slowly in comparison, but there was desperation in his movements. Bursts of plasma erupted from his free hand, trying to intercept each attack. Sometimes the plasma absorbed the light, dissipating it harmlessly. Other times he was too slow, beams scorching past his defenses. He kept turning, using his own body to shield his brother, taking hits that should have gone to the unconscious figure in his arms.

“AEGIS has officially designated Star Titan as a Class S supervillain threat,” the reporter continued. “This marks the first new S-class supervillain designation in over two years. Santiago Systems stock has dropped twelve percent in early trading.”

“He actually did it,” Talia said quietly from where she stood by the kitchen counter. “Used the information we sent and got his brother.”

The coverage continued, showing the crater where Star Titan had apparently punched through rocky ground followed by sixty feet of reinforced concrete to reach the underground levels. Alexander wondered what else had been down there that Santiago hadn’t wanted found.

“They mentioned us too,” Annie said. “Earlier, before you got here. Something about ‘possible connections to the Grimnir organization.’ They’re trying to tie us to it.”

“Of course they are.” Alexander rubbed his eyes. The room was starting to blur around the edges. “Any other developments?”

“Actually,” Talia said, “there is one more development.”

She pulled the golden vial from her pocket, the liquid inside catching the light.

“You’re ready?” Augustus asked.

“As ready as I’ll ever be.” She held the vial carefully. “I’ve been meditating on the concept for days now, building my intent layer by layer. The Nakamura paper emphasized absolute clarity of intent before injection. You need to hold the concept so firmly that the serum has no choice but to awaken it.”

Augustus shifted forward. “Should we be concerned about the... soul-death risk? Perhaps you should do it in the medical room, just in case.”

Talia shook her head. “I’ve thought about it extensively. If our alternate selves are already dead, then there is no spare soul to bolster mine anyway. Plus,” she paused, choosing her words carefully, “I theorize our souls have already been reinforced by surviving the first awakening. This should be a smoother experience. I’m adding to what already exists, not breaking reality again.”

“That’s amazing!” Annie bounced on the sofa cushion. “What power are you going for?”

“Something to make my other powers tangible. To turn understanding and my Mind Palace into reality through touch.” Talia’s fingers tightened around the vial. “I’m going to inject it privately, test the results, and then I’ll share it with everyone tomorrow. New powers can be… unpredictable.”

Alexander yawned so wide his jaw cracked, then managed to pat her shoulder. “Complete faith in you, Talia. You’ve got this.”

“Thanks.” She gave him a small smile. “Get some rest.”

“Good night, everyone,” Alexander mumbled, already heading for the stairs.

“It’s like six in the evening!” Annie called after him.

“Third floor,” she added, louder as he got farther away. “Last door on the right. I saved you the room with the best view.”

Alexander raised a hand in acknowledgment without turning around, legs heavy as he climbed the stairs. Behind him, he could hear the team’s voices continuing, probably Augustus asking more questions about safety protocols, but the words blurred together.

Sleep was calling, and he was finally ready to answer.