A random something or other...

"Power"

Power was not something Nic was accustomed to, but that didn’t matter, not at all.

All his life, Dominic Tyler sat at the back of the class, more to avoid attention than through any lack of interest. Nic actually liked to learn (even though he’d noticed school was a terrible place to do it), so he listened attentively, from the corner practically assigned to quiet kids and rejects. Somehow, there was only ever one, and he got the seat, with a few empty chairs between him and the rest of the class. It looked the same when he peeked in to see another class, only the kid sitting there was someone else. He thought sometimes, that the other kids couldn’t tell the difference and thought it was the same kid, that they were all a gender-unspecific student named “Pick On Me.” That was elementary school though. He was in college now, if just barely. Their name was “Scapegoat” now.

Of course, Nic never fought it.

He’d had a few jobs, all of them crap. McDonald’s, Hastings, Target, one of those booths in the mall. When a customer “became irate,” Nic fetched a manager, so said customer could complain about him and subsequently be ignored because it was the jackass’s fault in the first place, not Nic’s. Eventually he got fired for bothering the manager too much, or something.

Of course, Nic shouldn’t fight it.

Like everyone else, Nic lost something. He walked to the car with his mother; her long, curly hair was a mess in the wind. They got in the car and heard a sound Nic thought existed only in movies: a gun being cocked. Slowly, slowly, he turned his head and saw it, the thing that was cocked. Now it was pointed. He could see it there, pointed at his mother’s curl-covered head. The man had hidden in the back seat. His voice was gravely, menacing. Nic was too scared to hide or run or save his mother. He didn’t like to, but he easily remembered everything: the man demanding his mother’s wallet, and that she drive him somewhere (turn left here, straight past this one and the second right). Nic didn’t know his way around then; he didn’t know where they were. Of course the clearest part was when she stopped the car and the man’s hand began to shake. He started to say something, but that gravel just leaked into his lap and he gripped the gun in both hands instead. When the killer pulled the trigger, Nic couldn’t stop him. He just fainted and woke up later with his father and police all around him.

Of course, Nic couldn’t fight it.

He followed the killer’s tracks after that. The killer committed one more murder, escaped from prison, stayed on the run. Rumors of him popped up every now and then, none got him arrested. Nic told himself he wasn’t obsessed, but that was useless now. Nic found the killer easily enough (his new power helped, though Nic couldn’t say how). Even easier was making sure it was the right man: Nic recognized him, he recognized Nic. The easiest part of all though—and by far the most satisfying—was ripping out his weak human throat.

Oh, no, Nic wouldn’t fight this.