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.597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkHe3UeYuWr
“We better give you the grand tour,” Rim suggested, fishing something out of the many pockets of her belt. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqzlSAKpQMc
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXbe0N2uicB
“Awesome….” She simply boarded the vehicle like it was the most normal thing. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKW9e1M2OXc
“Sit behind me,” she ordered, starting up the engine. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTGOt6vrWOy
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiQnUZAsupT
“What about you, Lena?” I asked the wizard girl. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtyz0JrP11z
She chewed on her stick. “I need to go.” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUHFopUxb1Q
Her face was clouded. I thought it would be best if I didn’t ask where she was going. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6FbsHvS72q
“Okay then, we’ll see you later?” She gave a slight nod. Maybe a nervous half-smile. Rim passed me a helmet. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmaa96mtQcS
“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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxD9lvRSALQ
“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.”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSGqt0FJsHd
“Supernatural abilities,” I summed up. My eyes probed wildly to get a look at everything. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhcw1jDQ9vv
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.” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡToepV85qtl
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.” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZEx8kiwh6p
She looked back at me. “You getting all this?”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmdTAyjy992
“Oh sure,” I responded. “Please, go on Professor Rim.” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3dUQo5Ed5j
She scoffed before continuing, pointing to Sector 2. “Chest-naturals have two powers: strength and heart.” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvHhnkLfCrh
She thought for a moment. “Your friend, Allen. He’s a chest-natural for strength.” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4COKLQrPNn
I would never look at Allen the same way again. No wonder that guy could play. I reeled my mind back in. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzh3TXTIUMU
“What about hearts?”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvOGtENsPk2
“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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ67KxZ9BX5j
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.”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3knP38AYnK
“Elastic Rim,” I said, remembering the name the computed had given her. That had to be her super name. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIRRUD4Cfof
A thought occurred to me. “No way, are you really….” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡH47VB4j1Es
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.597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEErRrtz6W3
“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.597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8nLa4hszIj
“Since before I can remember.” She said evenly.597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOUthZgBTJU
“You live here?”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSs4A8y0U31
“Yep. Here, you have two names. My name is Rim, but Elastic-Rim is my hero name. ” She waved to someone on the street.597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡX5RvL7SCYi
“That’s Travis,” she explained. “He’s a stomach-natural.” I busted a laugh. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpMdzlgqtQQ
“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.” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf5FEVemPMl
I did. “Throwing up is probably not a problem either, right?”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjaFSS85v4n
“EW! I’m going to toss you off this thing,” she threatened, turning a street corner. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqL3iHp2ug8
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.597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡj3nZJFNoa5
“Who lives here?” Rim turned, surprised as if she drove through here a lot and forgot to look at the mess. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8aAT50JsJT
“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.”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpWujIyNEkU
“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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡB6cYoBfk6x
Rim was silent for a moment. “Ultra-naturals are really rare. They only pop up when the world really needs them.” 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU8Q7PqZdvM
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNFMsWssOv4
“What kind of powers are they born with?”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCm7PN3LSnh
“Powers? You never know with ultra-naturals. Time, Natural Forces, Invisibility…..” She caught herself, rushing on. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQ5yZPioAvi
“Basically anything. There hasn’t been an ultra-natural in…a long time. Let’s be happy.”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvTzDMdA6xv
“What do you mean? It sounds cool. Anyone would want to be one,” I mused.597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnV2aMTFybJ
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.”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWkcNw7qBwI
“Huh?” She stared me down. The electric blue eyes made it intense. “You don’t want to be one.”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTXmVEWJ4zo
“I never said to me!” I defended, half lying because I thought it was cool. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpcEBj0hKVd
“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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCuKsVnIjzO
I was confused. “Enemies? Like the ones that tried to get me in the gym?”597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2r7Rg403jm
“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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3bRxahmsk0
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqOaunpHFuP
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxzLPzC3s0f
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUR0OVcUFOn
I was dreaming. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlUsmmh0xoO
I had to be. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTGyRc12oe3
This wasn’t real. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqOBbWR7NwM
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9zH5jbqhmR
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjuBI8LPt1K
“You ready for a surprise?” She asked rhetorically. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHHUDAJk47X
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. 597Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQAqzmtiPMa
I knew this “quiz” could possibly be code for “your doom”.
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