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The heroes fight villains, and villains are people who hurt other people.
So far so good. You got that down.
Next up; how to correctly identify the villains, because fighting involves hurting, and hurting a person who is not a villain would, by logical necessity, make you the villain. You’re not quite there yet with that one. It goes around in a loop and makes you dizzy.
In practice, though, you've found it’s easier. Someone who corners an old man and holds them at gunpoint to show off to their friends? Well. That one doesn’t loop at all—it goes straight to your gut and explodes into anger. Villain; check.
You take the anger and you follow—it makes things clearer, doesn’t get you stuck but pushes you to move instead. There’s three of them, but only one gun, and the thoughts of the man holding it are dull and loud—he’s drunk. So is the girl he’s trying to impress—the third person is the only one even considering keeping an eye out for intruders. You circle around in the shadows, quietly, and as you come around the watchful one’s back, you pause, for just a moment, fingers wrapped tight around the switchblade in your pocket.
They’re kids. They’re kids—the one you’re planning to stab in the thigh is worried about what’s going to happen if his dad finds out about this. And now he’s fretting about why his friends want to do this, anyway, isn’t this a terrible idea, this is terrible overall, this old man is terrified but Nate is the one who bought a gun and he does not want to get on Nate’s bad side because he does not want to be on the other side of that gun.
Maybe you should stab the girl instead?
Then Nate presses the barrel of the gun to the old man’s forehead.
“Hey!” you call out, and you pull on Nate’s fuzzy mind, trying to force his attention to the sound; to the intruder; to you. Three heads and one gun snap around.
“Who the fuck?” Nate calls, trying to sound as intimidating as possible even though he suddenly feels nauseous. “Don’t come any closer or I’ll shoot!”
A problem. He will. His friend is slowly moving away from you—not getting stabbed, seems like—and the girl is so drunk she has a hard time understanding what’s going on—she thinks this is funny. She’s never seen anyone get shot before. She wonders if it’s like in the movies.
So do you, suddenly—you don’t know how it looks in the movies, not really. The images in her mind are of people being thrown backwards like they’re being pulled by ropes, and that seems wrong—
“Hey, I’m telling you I’ll shoot!”
The decision coalesces in the air around him slowly but surely—he’s going to aim for your leg, he thinks he’ll hit, he thinks that’s what you deserve, you should have kept to your own business and you see how he sees you, where you are, and when his finger squeezes the trigger—
Move.
All four of the humans jump at the sound of the gun going off—much louder than they thought it would be (not like the movies?) and you reach Nate before he’s had a chance to catch himself from the recoil, and you punch him in the face.
The girl screams and his friend takes that as his cue to run—the girl does the same, and the old man does his best. Nate curses on the ground, scared now. Very scared. And there’s no one left except him and you and your knife, pointed at his face.
He’s too terrified to think.
Terrified of you.
He’s just a kid.
You take a step back, further into the shadows. He has his eyes fixed on your knife, but still, it makes you uncomfortable that he’s staring.
“Get out,” you grunt. “Go!”
Once you wave your hand a little, he gets it, and scrambles away with a small whimper.
You're left alone, in the dark.
They didn't hurt anyone. You punched him in the face. You flex your hand — your knuckles are stinging. His face must be stinging worse. A conundrum, that. If you stop a villain from hurting other people, are they still a villain? The simple answer to the question — wait for them to do the hurting and then stop them, feels unsatisfying in a prickly, angry way.
You grip your switchblade hard for a moment, before shoving it deep into your pocket and walking away. You feel something lurking deep in your belly, a twisting wormy feeling. It whispers at you, softly, seductively — it was easier before. You didn't have to decide, you didn't have to understand, you didn't have to spin your brain around and around and around like some dirty rag in a washing machine.
The rest of you watch this new pathetic thought with quiet bafflement. You stomp at it. Like squashing a cockroach.
More difficult than you’d think.
It keeps twitching its little chittering insect legs at you, as you move through the streets. Easier before. Aimless, now. You just float, drifting through people's thoughts and anxieties and desires. So many of them. So few of them make any sense.
You find yourself eventually at an overpass where you've slept a couple of times before. You like it better than the empty apartment you've been squatting in, or the parks. The other people here make you feel safer; less exposed. You can blend in here.
You find your spot, at the edge of the little encampment, where you can see the traffic drift by in the distance. The buzzing of the minds behind you is a comfort, letting you relax. Simple worries. Easy to understand. Where will I sleep; how will I eat; who can I trust? Will it be cold tonight? No, you think not.
You've barely had time to settle in when you pick up someone's intention behind you—intention towards you. Scraping against the ground. A cough.
"Hey there." You recognize the mind, suddenly. Been here a few times before, but before, they were always high. Today, they're mostly sober - with a strikingly single-minded purpose, even though you can't make out for what.
The person slumps down next to you—thin, tall, in their early twenties probably. Long hair in a scruffy ponytail, wrapped up in a thin cardigan they've pulled tight around them, despite the humid summer warmth clinging to the night air.
"Hey," you mumble back at them. They want something from you. "I don't have any money."
They laugh, a tight, nervous sound. "Yeah, sure," they say even though they don't believe you. "Me either." A big grin at the night sky. "My name's Carlos," they say, and hold out a hand at an awkward angle. You take it, with an equally awkward affirmative noise.
You sit in silence for a while, Carlos shuffling about, trying to find the right moment to speak up. About what he wants. What he wants to sell to you. He wants to sell to you because you seem like the type. Because you seem harmless. Because you (probably) won't beat him up and just take it.
"I don't have any money," you say again.
"Yeah?" he says again, with another nervous laugh. "A shame, that." His eyes flicker to you. He takes your silent neutrality as encouragement. "'Cause I got something that might change your life."
"My life is good," you say. He doesn't believe it — he can't believe it. This is nobody's idea of a good life, you've come to realize, and sometimes that worries you.
"Yeah, sure," he sniggers. "But what if you could be a hero?"
You snap your head towards him before you can stop it. How does he know? He's not a telepath. You push at his mind, but no, nothing just...
Oh.
"What if you could fly, or lift buildings? Set things on fire with your mind?" There's an almost feverish glare in his eyes now, as he thinks your reaction means he's got you hooked. "I've got enough for two," he whispers. "Can you imagine? Superpowers."
"It'll kill you," you mumble, trying to look away from his desperation.
"No it won't," he says, and he means it. He's already dying — you don't really know the disease he's thinking of, but in his mind, he can't die anymore. Nothing can kill him, now. He risked his life to get a hold of the drug he's got in his back pocket, and the fact that he pulled it off is proof. It can't kill him.
"I don't want any," you whisper.
"Sure?" Carlos whispers back, reaches into his back pocket for a little plastic bag. There are three white capsules inside. "I can't use all of them." He doesn’t want to; not alone.
You swallow. "Why me?” In his giddy, nervous, desperate swirl of thoughts you find nothing that answers that question. “You can’t think I have enough money for that."
"Because you're cute." He does think that. He's thought it before, through a haze of other drugs, you remember.
"I don't want any," you repeat, hoarse.
"Yeah," he says. Less disappointed than he thought he'd be. "Well, if you change your mind you can come find me, yeah."
When he stands, it's like he unfolds, a long dark silhouette against the warm glow of the city. His back straight now, the cardigan slipping off his bare shoulder.
"Good luck, stranger," he says.
You watch him leave, can't look away. You ball your fists, release the tension again. Maybe he'll live. Maybe you'll see him again. Maybe he'll get to fly away, maybe... He slips out of your view, and you release your breath.
You come back to the underpass several times, but you never see him again.
You wonder what kind of hero he would have liked to be. Maybe he’d know what to do.