Superhuman Nature

by Brandon Overall

Neil started to feel frustrated. Of course he wasn’t crazy, why wouldn’t they agree with him? His temper started to rise at the thought of his best friends not believing what he was saying. If they wouldn’t believe him, who would? All of that talk, and perhaps all of the alcohol, was starting to give him a headache. He thought back to that dream again, the one that felt so real…

  “I said I’m NOT CRAZY!” Neil slammed his beer bottle down on the coffee table, and as he did, he was startled by a deafening sound in front of him. He looked up, and saw the source of the noise. The screen on the TV in front of him was completely shattered, and smoke rose from the back of the set.

  CHAPTER 3

  “What the FUCK man, what did you throw at the TV?!?” Bryan immediately stood up, yelling. Neil could tell by the creases in his forehead that he was livid. “You seriously are crazy man. You just broke a $400 TV! You bet your ass you’re going to buy me a new one.”

  Neil wasn’t listening. He was speechless. He was still staring at the TV, while it smoked in front of him. There were angry voices surrounding him, but he didn’t care. This time he knew for sure. The TV didn’t break on its own. Neil didn’t throw anything at it. No one threw anything at it. Neil made it break.

  It was obviously not intentional, but as he was slamming the bottle down, he felt some kind of pressure building up inside of him. In his mind, he felt like the only way to release this pressure was to break something, but he knew that he didn’t want to break the bottle because that would cause his hand to bleed. In his rage, he decided to break the other thing he was holding. It wasn’t until afterwards that he realized he wasn’t holding anything else in his hands. The thing he broke was being held by something else. He broke the TV with his mind.

  He tried to remember the sensation of it. It wasn’t that he unleashed some kind of energy on the TV. The screen wasn’t simply the target of an outward force. He was the TV. He broke the TV just as easily as one would break a dry spaghetti noodle held between their hands. There was no resistance at all. He commanded it to happen, and it happened.

  Neil realized that he had gotten himself into a predicament. Now that he knew the TV was no accident, could he tell his friends? Could he trust them with this knowledge that he didn’t even fully understand? Neil decided that the best thing to do right then was to play it cool, pretend it was an accident, and pretend that all the weird stuff that happened that day was all in his head. To be fair, that wasn’t far from the truth.

  “Shit man, I’m sorry. I really blew it, didn’t I? I didn’t mean to throw the bottle opener at the TV. I swear I’ll buy you a new one. Maybe you guys are right, maybe I’m just cracking under the stress from finals and graduation and commissioning. I think I’m just going to go to bed for now.”

  Without waiting for a response, Neil sprinted up the steps to his room and locked the door. He wasn’t tired, but there was too much on his mind to do anything but think, so he laid down in bed and did just that.

  Neil replayed the day over and over in his head; the dream, the headaches, and the weird things that happened. He started to remember more about the other incidents too. When the shampoo bottle fell, he was thinking about the pencil in his dream and how he could just command it like it was part of his own body. He might have tried to do the same thing to the shampoo bottle without realizing it. Maybe he tried to move the shampoo bottle closer to his hand and caused it to fall.

  With the water fountain, he remembered thinking how badly he wanted that water so his headache would go away. He remembered thinking, as he approached the fountain, how all he had to do was press the button and cool, clean water would come rushing out for him to drink and end the awful aching. Was it possible that right when his thoughts were centered on his desire for water, he somehow made the button press?

  Neil knew that he sounded like a mad man. No sane person should be thinking they were able to turn on a water fountain with their mind. Yet he also knew that what he saw that day had actually happened and that there was no other explanation for it.

  Somehow, Neil was able to control objects in his environment just like he had been able to in his dream. He was able to make objects around him part of his body that he could control with his mind, just like any other part of his body attached to his nervous system.

  After convincing himself of this fact, Neil felt some amount of excitement. What if this wasn’t just a one-time thing? What if this was actually something he would be able to do for the rest of his life? Would it be possible that he could learn how to control it?

  The questions kept flowing through his head, until he started to think about all the negatives that could come from this ability he seemed to have. Who could he tell about this? Would anyone believe him, or would they lock him up in some mental ward? Would people be afraid of him? Would they use him for some science experiments?

  The more Neil thought about it, the more he realized that the things he had been doing could potentially be dangerous. He could get angry and hurt someone, just like the TV, and just like he almost did in his dream. If he was going to figure out more about what was happening to him, he had to do it somewhere safe and as far away from other people as possible.

  He was positive that telling anyone else about what was going on was a bad idea until he figured it out for himself. Best case scenario, they locked him up in the loony bin. Worst case scenario, he would spend the rest of his life getting poked and prodded by government scientists wearing hazmat suits.

  As his thoughts became more sporadic, he started drifting off to sleep. He didn’t bother fighting it.

  ---

  The next thing Neil heard was a banging on his bedroom door,

  “Neil, get out of bed you fat slob, you’re driving me to Best Buy to buy a new TV!”

  It was eight thirty in the morning. Why would Bryan possibly need a new TV at eight thirty in the morning?

  “Go away, Bryan. I’ll buy one later. If you come in here, I’m going to give you AIDS.”

  “It doesn’t work like that dumb ass. If you don’t buy me a new TV by the end of the day, I’m upping the screen size by one inch per day until I get one. I have no homework this weekend and I want to sit my ass down in front of the TV the whole time.”

  “Ok, fine, shut up and let me sleep. You’ll have a new TV by the end of the day, now go away.” Neil didn’t want to let Bryan into his room. He needed to figure everything out and avoid human interaction as much as possible until he was sure he wouldn’t hurt anyone. He heard Bryan walk away from his door and back down the stairs.

  Neil decided that he was going to skip his only class for the day and spend the afternoon experimenting with his new talents. He went down to the kitchen and threw a bunch of things into his back pack. He grabbed some fruits, a few empty cans and bottles, and a nearly full gallon of milk.

  Alex came in and saw him stuffing the stuff into his backpack.

  “Dude, where are you taking our milk? I was going to eat some cereal.”

  Alex’s brown hair was still messy, and his eyes were puffy and barely open. He had just woken up and probably wasn’t going to be doing any critical thinking any time soon.

  “I’m trading it for some crack, my stash is empty. Get yourself a pop-tart and go back to bed, princess.” Alex didn’t push him any further, so Neil threw his bag into his ’97 Pontiac Sunfire and drove off.

  Michigan State University used to be an agricultural college, so there were a lot of empty farm lands and wooded areas around the outskirts of the campus. Neil drove a few miles away from the city to a section of woods that was far enough off the road that no one was likely to disturb him. He took out his back pack and walked a half-mile or so into the wood line.

  He finally found a nice area with a few tree stumps scattered around for him to set his items on. He started out by placing a bright red apple and an empty coke can on two adjacent stumps. He took several steps back, and then turned around to face the stumps. It dawned on him that he missed a pretty
significant step in his planning process.

  “Now what?” Neil said aloud, despite the fact that there was no one around to hear.

  It wasn’t until just then that he realized that he had no idea how to control the things he had done the previous day. They just sort of happened. It was more of an impulsive reaction, like when someone blurted out something they didn’t really mean in an argument.

  He stared at the apple for a few minutes and tried to imagine it rolling off the side of the stump. Nothing happened. He tried imagining it just wiggling a little bit, but still no luck. He did the same thing with the can, but just as he expected, nothing happened. He had no idea what he was doing and probably looked like either an idiot or a lunatic out there in the middle of the woods playing with groceries.

  He thought back to yesterday, and tried to remember the feeling he had when the strange things happened. It had felt like the objects he manipulated had become a part of him for a moment. He was able to feel them just as he could feel his fingers, or any other part of his body he had control over.

  He turned back to the apple and tried to shift the focus of his thoughts to mimic how he had felt the day before. He thought about the apple the same way he thought about his arm, or his toes. He wiggled his toes and moved his arm up and down and tried to capture the sort of sensation it gave him to know that these parts of his body were under his control. He looked at the apple and tried to imagine how it would feel for the apple to be part of his body. He commanded the apple, as part of his body, to roll off the stump to the left.

  Neil’s eyes tracked the movement immediately.

  The apple rolled off the stump. He watched it fall to the ground almost in slow motion.

  “YES!” He exclaimed, “FUCK YES, I DID IT!!”

  Neil felt the rush of excitement. His heart started beating faster and he got a sudden burst of energy…until he felt the breeze. The damn wind had blown it off. His mood sank almost as quickly as it rose. He picked up a stick, threw it at the can, missed, and sat down on the ground, defeated.

  Neil tried for another 20 or 30 minutes in an attempt to make something...anything…happen to the apple and the can, but nothing worked. He decided he was tired of wasting his time looking foolish and walked over to the stumps to retrieve his produce, feeling embarrassed.

  As Neil was walking towards the apple, he felt a tickling sensation on his cheek and heard a buzzing noise. It took a split second for him to realize that a bug had landed on his face, and a split second longer for him to raise his hand to try to swat it off.

  He was too late. He felt the sharp stinging sensation and realized that the bug was a bee, and his cheek was throbbing with pain. His temper immediately flared from the sudden sting. He knew he needed to swat off and kill the damned bee, so that’s what he did. Instead of raising his arm to do it, he reflexively used the other part of his body – the new part of his body that he hadn’t used before – the red spherical part of his body that he sensed had untapped potential that could be used in this very situation to kill a bee.

  Before he realized what he was doing, he felt a baseball sized object smack into the side of his face, explode into tiny juicy pieces, and knock him to the ground. He laid in the dirt and leaves, staring up at the sky. He tasted something on the corner of his mouth. It tasted sweet, and then it dawned on him what it was that hit him in the side of the head. He had just killed the bee with an apple.

  CHAPTER 4

  Neil was still lying in the grass, staring up at the sky for several minutes after his collision with the apple. He started laughing. At first it was just a chuckle, but then it escalated into full blown hysteria. How could he not find this situation humorous? There he was, trying for almost an hour to get an apple and a can to fall off of a stump, on the verge of defeat, when all it took was a bee sting, some anger, and a little reflexive action for him to get what he wanted.

  His face still hurt, and he was pretty sure he was going to have a black eye, but that didn’t matter. He just used an apple as a flying projectile killing machine. He was essentially the most dangerous man on the planet. The thought of that made him start laughing again. After a few more minutes of lying in the grass, fully appreciating what had just happened, he turned his head to the right and saw the apple next to him. At least half of it was blown completely off and was in chunks everywhere, but he picked up the biggest piece and took a big bite out of it.

  He realized that he just took a bite out of himself, and had to resist the urge to start laughing again. Still a little disoriented from what was probably a concussion, Neil said aloud “Mmm, I’m delicious” as he took another bite.

  After discarding the apple, Neil stood up again. The can was still sitting on the stump, right where it was before he flung the apple into his own face. He told himself that he wasn’t going to leave those woods until he was able to move the can.

  He remembered the thoughts that flashed in his mind from the moment the bee landed on his face to the moment he tried to raise his hand to swat it. He remembered feeling like the apple was just as much a part of his body as his arm was, and it was completely under his command. Just as one would throw their arm forward to toss a baseball, he threw the apple forward to kill the bee.

  The feeling was natural. It was as effortless as the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest when breathing, or the automatic action of blinking when his eyes began to dry. In fact, it was even easier than that. It expended no energy and took no physical effort. Neil felt like he could throw the apple around for hours and not grow tired.

  He looked back at the can and tried his hardest to mimic the state of mind he was in earlier. Repeatedly, he thought the word “natural, natural, natural” to himself. Then, just as simply as he could squeeze his fingers to make a fist, he reached out to the can, and commanded it to tip on its side. It wasn’t a can anymore, it was part of him. It was inside his mind where he could do whatever he wanted with it.

  It happened.

  The can didn’t fall completely on its side, but it did move. It spun around a little bit and lifted off its side for the briefest period of time, but it definitely happened. Neil waited for several seconds for the inevitable breeze that had surely deceived him, but it never came. This time, it was definitely him that moved the can. It wasn’t much, but it was something. ‘Something’ was amazing enough for Neil to realize that this was real, and that he might be able to learn how to use whatever this thing was at will.

  Neil looked around him to see everything within his view. He saw trees, grass, weeds, ferns, stumps, fallen logs, dead leaves all over the ground, insects flying around, stones and more. Which of these things could he make a part of himself, like the apple and the can? Was there any limit to which things he could command to do what he wanted? The possibilities excited him, but also made him nervous, like diving into an unknown pool of water without being able to see beneath the surface.

  There was so much more to take in. Everything around him could possibly become part of him. The realization overwhelmed him.

  His head began to ache in the same way it had before. He started feeling dizzy, then nauseous. The pain and the nausea escalated in intensity. He fell to his knees, and clasped his hands around his skull which felt like it was about to split open. The edges of his vision blackened, and he vomited all over the ground before falling forward and passing out in the remnants of his own breakfast.

  ---

  When he woke up, his headache was gone, but it wasn’t all good news. The sun was going down and he had been lying in a pool of vomit for what must have been at least eight hours. The smell was completely putrid, and he probably would have thrown up again if he had anything left in his stomach. After a few dry heaves, he grabbed a pile of leaves and tried to wipe as much of it off as he could, but there was still a horrible taste in his mouth. He rinsed his mouth out with water and tried to clean the rest of his face off.

  As he was examining himself, assessing which parts of his body wer
e dirty, he realized he was forgetting to examine something. He forgot about the part of his body that was further away, sitting over there on the stump. This thought confused him, until he raised his head and understood what he was feeling. The can was still on the stump. Even after his little eight hour nap, he hadn’t severed the connection that he had built with the can earlier.

  Neil stared at the can, over 15 feet away. He tried to do what should have felt natural for any other part of his body. He tried to fling the can.

  This time, it obeyed. There was no partial success. The can did exactly as he intended and flung into the air several feet towards him, landing in a pile of leaves. It was easier now than it was before his nap. He could feel a stronger connection to the can. Before, it felt like he was trying to move his arm after it had fallen asleep from the circulation getting cut off, but now the blood had returned and the can was directly under his control.

  He flung the can again, and again, and again in several different directions at several different speeds. Sometimes his estimations were a little bit off and it went further than he wanted, or at a different angle than he wanted, but it still moved every time he commanded it to.

  Neil was mesmerized by the dancing can in front of his eyes. It was a thing of beauty. This can, which was now part of Neil, was capable of doing incredible things. Impossible things.

  He scanned the tree line, which was now getting difficult to see due to the quickly darkening sky. He saw a pine cone hanging from a nearby tree. Neil used his new can like an arm and extended it out to knock down the pinecone. The can obeyed, as Neil knew it would. It had no choice. The pinecone came crashing to the ground several feet away from him, and the can returned to where he told it to go, at the base of his feet.

  If Neil could use the can as a projectile, what else could he do with it? Did it have to be flung around, or could he handle it with more finesse? Neil crouched down and examined the can lying on the ground in front of him. He thought back to his dream where he made the pencil hover in front of him and wondered if he might be able to do the same thing with the can. He held his hand out to gather the sensation of what it was like to hold it out in front of his face, just like the pencil. Neil tried to make the can do the same thing. At first it just wiggled around on the ground a little bit, but then it lifted off and hovered in front of his face.