Install Description

“Set.”

The change washed over me like being dunked in warm water, and when I opened my eyes, my costumed self stared back at me in the cracked mirror. This wasn’t enough, though. My base Breaker state wasn’t really anything to celebrate — just strong enough and just fast enough for me to leg it to a safe spot to finish the transformation into one of my more powerful states. Maybe a low level brute and mover rating, but nothing on one of the famous Alexandria packages.

I looked deeper inside and rummaged through my knowledge of different Heroes, looking for one that could do what I needed it to do. Luckily, I’d had a situation like this before, one where I needed to repair a toaster or microwave I’d broken accidentally with my power — thankfully, Dad had never noticed the difference — so I selected her, grasped her with my metaphorical hands, and pulled her to the surface.

“Install.”

Power rushed through me. That was really the only way to describe it. It was power, pure, unadulterated, and massive beyond imagining. If my normal human state was a puddle and my base Breaker state was a pool, then what surged through me as I called upon that Hero was an ocean. In the beginning, just holding onto a fraction of that much power was like trying to wrangle a hurricane or a tsunami or an erupting volcano.

It was intoxicating. I’d experienced what they called “runner’s high” quite a few times in the past three months, and even that paled in comparison. I didn’t have any experience, so I had no idea how good sex felt, but “orgasmic” probably wasn’t that far off. It was like every nerve in my brain was being flooded with dopamine and serotonin.

If that was what being high felt like, I could understand why people had such a problem with addiction.