Roy Addams - Puzzle Social Perk (t3)

Roy Addams opened and closed his hands a few times as he was attempting to wrangle is mind free of the dreaded thoughts that contiued to plague his mind. He hated feeling this way, he hated these thoughts that clouded his mind, so he needed to do something to clear it. Solving a puzzle normally helped eased his mind before he learned of his mutation, right? Maybe he could try something like that.

wasn’t the type to be stumped by puzzles. He'd always had a knack for putting things together—cogs, wires, equations, even people. But standing in the middle of a damp, echoing cavern with a stone puzzle door looming before him, he realized this one was different. The door bore nine carved circles, each with a different symbol--storm clouds, rivers, suns, moons, and jagged bolts. The inscription above read: "Only the true current flows forward." Simple enough, Roy thought, until he noticed that touching one symbol caused three others to shift, rotate, or fade. A child’s puzzle, perhaps, but wrapped in riddles layered like thunderclouds. (1)

He brushed his hand across the nearest carving, and it sparked faintly beneath his touch. Electricity hummed in his veins, responding instinctively to the strange material. For most, this puzzle would mean trial and error, but Roy felt every shift like a static itch under his skin. Each incorrect move sent a jolt of resistance through his arm—not painful, but insistent. The puzzle wasn’t asking him to arrange shapes. It was testing flow, demanding he think not in answers but in currents. He paused, closing his eyes, and pictured how lightning always seeks the fastest path to ground, not the prettiest or most logical route. (2)

Hours might have passed, or only minutes—time bent when Roy let his powers think for him. He traced the puzzle with sparks, letting his fingertips carry arcs of blue-white light that danced across the symbols. Each connection made the others react unpredictably: rivers drying to reveal suns, clouds breaking apart into moons, bolts bending back on themselves. Complex answers sprouted like weeds, dozens of potential patterns at once, each promising a solution but crumbling under scrutiny. He resisted the urge to force it. Instead, he waited, breathing, letting the natural rhythm of electricity guide him. Lightning never second-guessed itself. Neither would he. (3)

At last, he pressed the storm cloud, then the river, then let his hand linger on the bolt. Power surged from him into the stone, and the carvings rearranged themselves into a single, glowing circuit. The door rumbled open with a satisfying crack, dust spilling down in waves. Roy chuckled under his breath. A simple puzzle, yeah, he thought, but sometimes the simplest puzzles ask the most complicated questions. He stepped through the doorway, sparks fading from his hands. Whatever lay ahead, he knew one truth: lightning never doubts its path—it just strikes. (4)