Super Natropolis was massive. It was in the shape of a snowflake. A central citadel was surrounded by six divisions, each stranger looking than the next. One had tall buildings with a large base. Another’s buildings were circular.338Please respect copyright.PENANA6t6T9nPW4n
“We better give you the grand tour,” Rim suggested, fishing something out of the many pockets of her belt. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAvIqIsf7bcD
She picked out something the size of a microchip and tossed it in the air. It folded out and expanded until it became a small motor scooter. I stared at it for a long time, completely stunned. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAuVpQPGbtKl
“Awesome….” She simply boarded the vehicle like it was the most normal thing. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAgES1wandJJ
“Sit behind me,” she ordered, starting up the engine. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAlfUgrJ93Xc
I did as I was told, swinging my legs to sit behind her, wrapping my arms around her waist. It felt awkward, as I didn’t know her well, but I had a feeling this thing might leave me in the dust if I so much as let go. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAwGiYMSnNqt
“What about you, Lena?” I asked the wizard girl. 338Please respect copyright.PENANA33UPncbxGl
She chewed on her stick. “I need to go.” 338Please respect copyright.PENANArPFBgjCJU0
Her face was clouded. I thought it would be best if I didn’t ask where she was going. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAIfYnlAji74
“Okay then, we’ll see you later?” She gave a slight nod. Maybe a nervous half-smile. Rim passed me a helmet. 338Please respect copyright.PENANA2Yv4nHX0A5
“You might need this.” I barely had time to put on my new headgear before we were off. Rim looked around as she drove, making me wonder how safe the bike was. 338Please respect copyright.PENANA1YiFccqXXm
“Welcome to Super Natroplis, home of the Super Naturals. You see, every once in awhile, babies, or people in general, are born with advanced abilities in certain areas of the body. There’s a legend that says it started a long time ago when some mad scientist tried to enhance his DNA to make himself ultra-powerful. Apparently, it didn’t go as planned, but it was passed on through his genealogy, and thus the term Super Naturals was born.”338Please respect copyright.PENANAIuLWidwoGt
“Supernatural abilities,” I summed up. My eyes probed wildly to get a look at everything. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAN84uWCZom4
Rim nodded and continued. “Sometimes it’s really common, like when some people are better in class than in the gym or vice versa. Here, we divide it up into six sections.” 338Please respect copyright.PENANApJdS4WKb0M
She pointed to the first sector. “Head is the largest, as it has the most abilities linked to it. The brain-naturals are sometimes linked to things such as intelligence, telepathic commutation, physic visioning, healing, telekinesis, magic, and so on. Then you have the other head things, such as the nose. I’m not kidding. My friend is a nose-natural, and his sonic sneezes are explosive. You also have ears-naturals, who can hear from far distances and eye-naturals with X-ray and laser vision.” 338Please respect copyright.PENANAFWeu67QhOQ
She looked back at me. “You getting all this?”338Please respect copyright.PENANAJUUwWaokMc
“Oh sure,” I responded. “Please, go on Professor Rim.” 338Please respect copyright.PENANAWMujd2dszy
She scoffed before continuing, pointing to Sector 2. “Chest-naturals have two powers: strength and heart.” 338Please respect copyright.PENANAaAwClNTnmn
She thought for a moment. “Your friend, Allen. He’s a chest-natural for strength.” 338Please respect copyright.PENANANsFD60JRBG
I would never look at Allen the same way again. No wonder that guy could play. I reeled my mind back in. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAKw6kH9OShg
“What about hearts?”338Please respect copyright.PENANA7JohnjPBOk
“Don’t mess with them. They’re obsessed with beauty and romance and they’re good at it too. They love gossip.” Rim snickered like she remembered a related comic moment. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAOo4qiomPQr
She pointed to the next sector with tall buildings with a wide base. “Next is leg-naturals, like yours truly. We specialize in speed and flexibility.”338Please respect copyright.PENANAnmqEBQK77p
“Elastic Rim,” I said, remembering the name the computed had given her. That had to be her super name. 338Please respect copyright.PENANALxkdJjaFFI
A thought occurred to me. “No way, are you really….” 338Please respect copyright.PENANAKc4YDxUwfd
She grinned and without breaking a sweat, kicked out her leg, which wrapped around a lamppost. It stretched like rubber as it circled around the lamppost before retracting. I stared as her leg went back to normal.338Please respect copyright.PENANAtHt7Lx0ONQ
“That’s how you switched with Lena in the car. You’re ultra-flexible?” She nodded. I asked her how long she’s known about it.338Please respect copyright.PENANAjD7j92wwkW
“Since before I can remember.” She said evenly.338Please respect copyright.PENANAicBLzTdwPv
“You live here?”338Please respect copyright.PENANAPPvvPeIBE1
“Yep. Here, you have two names. My name is Rim, but Elastic-Rim is my hero name. ” She waved to someone on the street.338Please respect copyright.PENANAHsNcF9uiSz
“That’s Travis,” she explained. “He’s a stomach-natural.” I busted a laugh. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAX4xocButcZ
“I’m serious! They’re resistant to natural hunger and thirst! Don’t judge! You’d dream of having that if you were on a deserted island. Think about it.” 338Please respect copyright.PENANAEehlQQkRuS
I did. “Throwing up is probably not a problem either, right?”338Please respect copyright.PENANA0FCw0uqOUq
“EW! I’m going to toss you off this thing,” she threatened, turning a street corner. 338Please respect copyright.PENANARsYDqHr2L4
We began to drive through an old rickety town. The paint job was messy and some of the weird-shaped buildings looked almost rusty as if no one wanted to fix it. I wrinkled my nose.338Please respect copyright.PENANAnuNflwJNj6
“Who lives here?” Rim turned, surprised as if she drove through here a lot and forgot to look at the mess. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAHIE2GDVuLs
“This is the Ultra-natural part of town.” She said the name as some type of virus. “Ultra-naturals are extremely powerful. They often have one or more extreme powers. Exceedingly dangerous.”338Please respect copyright.PENANAr6H3Jkjd8H
“So….why don’t they use their quote “extreme powers” to clean up the place? It looks almost…deserted.” I pointed to the nearest street, which looked like the residence of a hurricane victim. 338Please respect copyright.PENANA0BJXVbChvx
Rim was silent for a moment. “Ultra-naturals are really rare. They only pop up when the world really needs them.” 338Please respect copyright.PENANAlFLf36n7z7
I got a crazy image of a really muscular guy in a jumpsuit popping out of the ground, shaking my head. I tried to think of something educated to say. 338Please respect copyright.PENANADGLlTQ5Zd5
“What kind of powers are they born with?”338Please respect copyright.PENANAwoF30sAAiL
“Powers? You never know with ultra-naturals. Time, Natural Forces, Invisibility…..” She caught herself, rushing on. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAXCKvlIAIki
“Basically anything. There hasn’t been an ultra-natural in…a long time. Let’s be happy.”338Please respect copyright.PENANANLgId5PXGD
“What do you mean? It sounds cool. Anyone would want to be one,” I mused.338Please respect copyright.PENANAiPPhBTI6QV
With that, she slammed the brakes. I raised an eyebrow. She turns to me and grabs me by the shoulders. “You don’t mean that.”338Please respect copyright.PENANA8fEaAHjlAp
“Huh?” She stared me down. The electric blue eyes made it intense. “You don’t want to be one.”338Please respect copyright.PENANAxWNcGbBSeV
“I never said to me!” I defended, half lying because I thought it was cool. 338Please respect copyright.PENANATWJR0NjJ53
“You said ‘anyone’ as in ‘you.’” She sighed painfully. “Look, it’s dangerous. You get hunted, you get caught, and the thing about ultras….they don’t last long. Put in horrible danger by our enemies.” Her expression was sad. 338Please respect copyright.PENANABRdzU6aiG8
I was confused. “Enemies? Like the ones that tried to get me in the gym?”338Please respect copyright.PENANAAT44p4MZIE
“It’s not safe to talk about them here. Come on. This place scares me.” She bit her lip and turned her key, the engine of her scooter humming to life. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAGDABrzb9Mo
She wouldn’t talk to me for the rest of the trip. Was it something I said? I still didn’t understand how I belonged here. It was all so bizarre, like something out of a fairytale. I looked at my own hands. They didn’t look like something….not human. In fact, they looked weak and less powerful than I expected. I wasn’t a superhero. I was just a regular kid. A kid named Blake, who had a mother and a father. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAlWMjojwbjo
Well, he never knew his father, but that was another story. He went to school and played volleyball and skateboarded with his buddy Allen. I could never be one of these. I realized fully for the first time that Allen was a super natural. I mean, it made sense and all. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAv8BWDxuMj9
He was strong and undefeated in volleyball. That kid I met in the gym with the sports goggles…..he was something else. This? This wasn’t something I was expecting. I pinched myself in the arm, hard. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAMqIOeMFtn9
I was dreaming. 338Please respect copyright.PENANASWKTOQMvpk
I had to be. 338Please respect copyright.PENANA5xADYqm7hq
This wasn’t real. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAqOYetTpD5f
I looked at some kids hanging out by a café. Two boys were trying to grab their sodas out of the air, while a girl laughed, a weird glow settling around her, her fingers touching the sides of her head as if she was levitating them. The weird just gets weirder. 338Please respect copyright.PENANA3kDNWMLmYK
Along with the residential buildings, Super Natropolis also had some awesome places to have fun, like rock climbing walls the size of skyscrapers, and big fields and parks. I glanced at Rim in the rearview mirror. She looked angry and hurt, but she wouldn’t let me ask what was bothering her. She shut me out and kept driving. Something pops up on her dashboard, but I can’t see what it is. 338Please respect copyright.PENANA6hU2wwThsv
“You ready for a surprise?” She asked rhetorically. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAIWv1GYJqBR
I asked her what it is. She told me it was time for me to take a pop quiz. Judging by the powers in the town, I wasn’t particularly excited. 338Please respect copyright.PENANAFD4vhUWg0H
I knew this “quiz” could possibly be code for “your doom”.
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