The cabin was set against a backdrop of dense forest. The trees stretched out for what seemed like forever. There were hundreds of other similar cabins scattered across the lake's edge. The property had been in Jack's family for nearly a hundred years. Every year the various members of their extended family drew dates to head up to Lake Huron and stay. They would have the property all to themselves for four days before Alex's aunt and her children arrived to join them.
Jack stepped out of the car and stretched his arms high into the air. His back clicked and he grinned happily, "Smell that air son?"
Alex hopped out of the car as well. He rolled his eyes at his dad's ever-overbearing enthusiasm. He replied, "It's not bad."
Jack placed his hands on his hips and said in an outraged voice, "Not bad? Son this is it! We're up to our bloody necks in nature, this is the dream! When I was a kid-"
Amanda cut him off with an eye-roll. She thrust a cooler box of food into her husband's arms, "We've all heard the story honey and we love it. When you were a kid you'd catch fish in the lake and grill them over an open fire. But do we really have to hear it again? You told us four times already on the drive up."
Jack accepted the cooler box. He shook his head and looked sadly into the distance, "It is a curse and a blessing to be a man of nature."
Amanda snorted with laughter and turned the keys in the door, "Our man of nature is pretty damn scared of spiders!"
The cabin had half a dozen bedrooms. Alex chose one at the opposite end of the house from his parents. From the window he could see the shore of the lake rippling in the breeze. The edge of the lake was an inviting blue colour. The colour darkened as you approached closer to the centre. The shore on the other side was so far away that only very vague shapes could be made out.
The dark blue hues gave Alex an idea.
"Mom, Dad, I'm going for a swim!" He called out into the hallway. The walls were decorated with a homely mixture of old family photos.
Amanda poked her head out of the kitchen, "Enjoy honey! We'll call you when dinner's ready!"
The radio was playing an old song. Alex smiled, he could hear his dad's singing from one of the other rooms.
He changed into a pair of swimming trunks. The mirror in his room showed him his reflection.
'Not bad.' He thought to himself, amused by his own observation.
The man in the mirror was tall and handsome. He'd quietly crept past six foot. He planned to grow a few more inches before stopping. The extra height made the increasing trend in his weight appear more reasonable.
The water was cold at his ankles. He didn't flinch or react to the temperature. The discomfort was miniscule compared to the pain his modifications inflicted on him when they failed.
He strode deeper into the lake. The water crept up to his waist. He paused to peer into the clear water. The gently stirring water made it appear as if the edges of his feet were rippling.
The view of the lake floor became murkier. It didn't take long before his feet no longer touched the algae covered stones. He treaded water comfortably. The current pushed him slowly away from the shore. He didn't resist.
The families staying in the other cabins nearby spotted the human figure drifting across the lake. A number of them recognised Alex from previous holidays and waved hello. He smiled and waved back each time.
The lake was so wide that it would've taken an entire week for Alex to drift from one side to another. There were hundreds of islands, ranging in shape and size, dotted across. He'd grown up staring at the nearest small island from his bedroom window. He could draw its shape in his sleep and it served as an easy to spot landmark. From further away, the cabins all vaguely resembled one another.
Alex began to swim. He hadn't gone swimming since before he started at university, but the muscle memory remained. It didn't take him long to refamiliarise himself with the motions.
He took a deep breath. Then, with a powerful kick he dissapeared beneath the lake's surface. The water was clear enough that he could see down nearly twenty feet. He continued to kick deeper. The deepest point of Lake Huron was seven hundred and fifty feet. Even after he'd swam deeper than the clear section and into the colder, darker deep, he still couldn't see the bottom of the lake.
He looked back up at the lake's surface. His pupils were dilated far beyond the normal limits of a person's eye. He could still see relatively clearly despite the darker water. He started an internal countdown, if he remained underwater for more than a minute or two, people might think that something had gone wrong.
At a depth of more than twenty feet, the satellites in the skies high above couldn't penetrate deep enough to capture motion. The invisible weight of pretending that he was normal lifted from his shoulders. The feeling of freedom was intoxicating.
Time leaped forwards. The crystalline energy deposits in his body began to burn. Huge quantities of oxygen flowed to his muscles. Alex grinned and kicked his legs hard. He immediately shot forwards like a rocket.
The world record for underwater swimming sat at an impressive six point three miles per hour. Alex's speed shattered this record in seconds. He cut through the water at more than thirty-five.
The accelerated-motion project he'd spent more than sixth months working on was only a few days away from its conclusion. He could sustain five times acclerated-motion for twenty minutes without needing to actively repair damaged muscles or tendons. He could last for more than an hour at four times.
Under the water, Alex could finally unleash everything that his body was capable of. The feeling was pure exhiliration. He twisted and turned, changing direction easily as if he'd been born in water. He smiled widely at the occasional fish as he zipped past them. Their small watery eyes reflected an emotion that he faintly recognised as surprise.
He yelled with joy. A stream of bubbles chased each other up to the surface. After a minute and a half he reluctantly rose to the surface and took a breath. The air somehow tasted better than it ever had.
He started to laugh. That kind of laughter people only produced when they were struck by the sheer awe-invoking absurdity of life.
In the kitchen looking out over the lake, Amanda released a tense breath that she hadn't realised she had been holding. She knew that her son was different to her and her husband. His abilities were incredible. She knew that his strength was increasing with every day that passed.
She'd watched him dissapear underwater for more than a minute. Every second after that felt like hours. Her head told her that he would surely be safe, he'd killed a demon for god's sake. But her heart throbbed with worry. When she saw his head emerge from the water the constricted feeling in her chest finally eased.
"Sometimes I can't believe it either."
Amanda turned sharply to the sound of her husband's voice. She hadn't noticed when he'd come in. He stepped closer to her and rested his arm across her shoulder. She brought it to her chest and held his hand tightly.
"Was-was he really meant for all this? These powers of his-I just-..." The sentence trailed off.
There were nights where she lay awake in bed for hours wondering if it would've been better if Alex had never got his powers. He'd always been special to them. Now, he was special in a way that the whole world could see. Or at least, maybe one day they would.
Jack took a deep breath. He watched his son dissapear beneath the lake's surface again. He smiled and shook his head softly, "I ask myself the same thing."
"Some nights I can't sleep thinking about it." There was something in his voice that held a deeper meaning.
Amanda smiled and laughed weakly, she leant her head on her husband's shoulder, "Me too."
The knowledge was unspoken but they both knew it. The sudden emergence of Alex's powers was a weight that always existed in the back of their minds. They'd watched Alex grow up from a boy to a man. He'd told them that he wanted his powers to remain a secret for as long as possible. He said that he didn't want to be a superhero.
In some ways, Amanda knew her son better than he knew himself. She knew that he'd risked exposing his powers when he saved the life of a young woman in the forest. He hadn't realised it in himself, but it was the third time he'd intervened to save someone.
Alex said that he wanted to live an ordinary life. She wanted him to be ordinary, ordinary meant safe. Not all superheroes were like Omni-Man, not every battle ended with victory and applause. The idea of seeing him on television fighting supervillains and saving the world terrified her, but she couldn't deny the growing feeling that he was meant for something much more than ordinary.
The family sat down for dinner on the porch later that evening. The orange-glow of the sunset on the lake was breathtakingly beautiful. Alex emerged from the water and grabbed a towel he'd left on the shore. He smiled and sat down at the dinner table, lake water dripped from his hair.
Alex grabbed his plate and eagerly started eating. There was one burger on his mother's plate, two on his father's and seven on his, "Thanks mom!"
Seeing how much her son could eat never failed to make Amanda feel shocked. She'd noticed how much taller Alex had gotten since he'd started at university. On the car ride to the cabin he'd already had a dozen sandwiches. The fact he somehow still had room for more was unbelivable.
"I swam past loads of fish, I'll catch a few for desert tomorrow." Alex said mid-chew.
Amanda tapped the salad tongs on her son's forehead. She placed a generous portion of lettuce and tomatoes on his plate, "Don't speak with your mouth full!"
After dinner, Alex looked out across the sun-setting on the lake. There was a dull itch in the back of his mind. The exhiliration he'd felt beneath the water tugged at his thoughts. The feeling of moving without inhibition was incredible.
He dried off the last of the cleaned dishes. He'd finished the washing up without even realising it, "I think I'm gonna go for a run."
The sky was darkening and the air was chilly. Amanda instinctively wanted to disagree. She stopped herself at the last minute.
"Sure honey, enjoy!" Alex didn't notice the forced cheeriness in his mother's smile.
Jack poked his head into the room. The smell of wood burning drifted out from the open living-room door behind him, "Stay safe!"
Alex didn't bother with a coat or jacket. He threw on a pair of running shorts and a shirt. The gravel on the drive crunched underneath his feet. The nighttime air tasted damp and cold.
The drive snaked out onto the main road. The tarmac was smooth, he didn't have to consider where his feet landed like when he ran along the uneven hiking trails in the forest near university.
The wind whistled past his ears. The itch to go faster tugged harder. He looked around. The trees on either side of the road blocked most of the moonlight. The darkness wasn't a problem for him.
'Screw it.'
The steady beating in his chest surged. The contractions were so violent and powerful that they could be faintly heard from outside his body. The blood rushed at incredible speed to his arms and legs. He shot away like an arrow released from the string. In an instant he had accelerated to top speed.
He couldn't help but howl with joy. The sound echoed into the night. The wind knifed past. He moved so quickly that he would've appeared as nothing more than a dark blur to anyone he passed. One hundred and ten miles an hour was fast enough to be pulled over by law enforcement on the highway.
Every footstep sounded like a gunshot going off. The kinetic energy transmitted from the soles of his feet into the earth was so enormous that it shredded his shoes within seconds. The machine-gun like drumming noise pulled him out of the euphoric state.
He hastily dashed into the forest and away from the paved road. The explosion-like bursts could be blamed on a passing sportscar, but he knew he had to leave the area before anyone came to investigate.
It didn't seem likely that anyone would leave their warm houses and march out into the night to pursue a loud sportscar that was most likely already dozens of miles away. Nonetheless, he raced away from the road.
The darkness cloaked his figure. Anyone he might've passed would have seen nothing more than a dark blur. The dense canopy of trees above provided added protection from any overhead surveilance. He'd been prepared to dissapear into the deep forests in an instant if he'd spotted the headlights of any approaching vehicles.
The towering trees forced him to slow down. The slightly-damp earth absorbed the impact of his footsteps with muffled thuds. The sound was comparable to a horse dashing across an empty plain.
The modifications to his body had brought about countless secondary enhancements, many of which he'd never even considered. His internal compass was as accurate as any GPS system. He darted between trees without fear of losing his way.
The explosive movement rapidly burned away the crystalline energy deposits hidden in his bone marrow and other tissues. When his energy reserves dipped below fifty percent he started to slow down. He wouldn't feel safe without knowing he had enough to carry his parents and escape away at lightning-like speed in an emergency.
The whole of the forest swayed slightly with the breeze. From the higher branches a person could look out onto an endless expanse of rolling mountains. The bark was rough under Alex's feet. The height didn't bother him. The fall from so high up would undoubtedly leave him severely injured, but it would only take a couple of seconds to reconstruct his body.
He hadn't tested whether a fatal attack to the skull would trigger the self-protective mechanism of his powers. He hoped that he would never need to find out.
The wind tickled against his bare feet. His toes dangled off the edge of the branch. He leaned back on the tree's broad trunk. The tranquility of the forest cleared away the last of the restlessness feeling that had urged him to run. In every direction there was only the rolling green expanse. He'd gone deep enough into the forest that there were no visible sources of illumination from the cabins along the lake's edge.
He looked out across the trees and thought to himself, 'This speed is fast enough for now. It's time to start something new.'
He could move as quickly as a sportscar zooming down the highway. Any casual punch would pack the force of a speeding truck. His speed alone would easily allow him to stand out amongst B tier superheroes. Not every superhero was as strong as a Guardian Of The Globe.
He wasn't human anymore, not like he once had been. A scientist would be stunned by the almost unrecognisable anatomy beneath his skin. But the template for his modifications was still a relatively fragile human body. He was incredibly fast, but he wasn't bulletproof like Wonder Woman or The Immortal.
If he wasn't careful, the recoil of throwing a punch while moving at fifty meters per second would instantly shatter the bones in his arms. It would be fine if the punch landed on an object and penetrated through, but coming to a near-instantenous standstill against the chest of someone like Omni-Man would send all that force straight back into his hand and up his shoulder.
The structure of his bone marrow and bones themselves had undergone significant changes. They were more than thirty-percent heavier than the bones of an ordinary person. He could accelerate to two and a half times speed and attack freely without fear of breaking bones. Going above this point would lead to stress-fractures. He would then need to use his powers to speed up the natural healing of the bones in order to keep fighting.
He thought back to the oil-coloured shining material used in the construction of the arenas where he'd defeated Clark. The strange material had a fluid quality to it. He'd forgotten about it initially, but a month or so ago he'd suddenly recalled the peculiar feeling underfoot.
The oil-coloured material behaved somewhat similarly to a non-newtonian fluid, hardening when pressure was applied. The same principle was used in the manafacturing of "bullet-proof" vests and armour. The sheer-thickening fibres were impregnated into Kevlar. When a bullet struck the vest, the fibres hardened and acted to dissipate the force.
Whilst the majority of his time was spent making modifications to bear the strain of accelerated-motion, Alex still set aside a little time to experiment with non-newtonian fluids. It had taken nearly a week just to work out how to apply the hardening principle to biological tissue. Since then he'd been making slow but steady progress.
He chuckled and thought to himself, 'Bulletproof skin here I come.'
He didn't know how long the next project he had planned would take. But he was excited to get started. He only needed another day or two to tie up the loose ends of five times accelerated-motion. With incredible speed and the durability to match, his ability to protect himself would improve enormously.