Richmond Hill, Ontario, Canada
July 10, 2017
Early Afternoon

Connor takes in a deep breath. His focus is on the surging course of his powers swirling in his palms. His tense hands are aimed ahead of him, glowing a misty yellow. His narrowed eyes are fixed on a lonely terracotta-coloured ceramic vase.

The vase is staring back at him innocently.

I want flowers to come out from this vase!

Rapidly, Connor builds the energy between his palms as he brings them up to his face. He then shoots them out ahead of them, emitting the flow of energy straight at the vase.

The vase gets taken out by the stream, flying off from its pedestal and across the air.

Suddenly, a quaking explosion erupts from behind Connor as it casts a hazardous light on him. Rubble and debris spew everywhere while thick smoke and flames billowing from behind.

Connor stays still, his eyes wide with fear and shock.

Beyond him, the vase clatters harmlessly on the laminate floor by a pair of feet. A hand scoops up the vase and brings it to the owner’s view, revealing the holder to be Carter.

Carter has scrutinizing eyes on the vase while sitting behind the countertop. “Nope, no flowers.” He perks up as he hears Connor growling.

In front of him, Connor has his back on him as he is spraying torrents of water at the small flames licking the charred kitchen.

Sitting next to Carter is Auston. He holds his hand out at the vase. “Let me see.”

Carter hands the vase to him. “Don’t get your hopes up high; there’s no flowers.”

Auston takes it and begins rotating it in front of his eyes, taking in every detail. “Well, it didn’t shatter.”

Connor slowly turns around to face the two, breathing heavily with a crinkled nose and a glare at the scorched kitchen. “That. Was not. Supposed. to HAPPEN!” He faces them with fists by his sides.

Carter holds his hand out at the vase. “At least it didn’t shatter!”

Auston agrees by tapping against the hard, rough side of the vase, creating a hollow knocking sound.

“But I wasn’t thinking of that!” Connor roars, his rigid hands out from his sides. “I can’t have my powers doing one thing when I command them to do another thing! Bad things can happen—” He holds his hands out to his smouldering kitchen. “—like blowing up my kitchen!”

Auston sets the vase back on the countertop’s surface and interlaces his fingers. “It’d take time, Connor. Have patience and practice, then it’d come.”

Connor flashes up to the countertop, his hands clutching onto its edge as he leans over it. “I CAN’T wait! If I wait any longer, I’m giving the GHP a better chance to succeed! I don’t want that!”

“Well, if you do the same thing you just did, you can blow up their headquarters!” Carter holds his hands out at the seared scene in front of him.

Connor smacks his hands against the countertop and spits out, “They’re unpredictable. I tried to do the same thing yesterday, but I ended up creating a mess in my room.”

“Ohhh…” The goalie scratches his jaw. “...so that’s what happened.”

“And that’s why” —Connor pushes himself away from the countertop— “I need to master my powers!”

Auston nods his head. “I have faith you will master them.”

“Can you stop time?” Carter narrows his eyes at him with curiosity. “You can practice your powers without the fear of the GHP ganging up on you.”

Carter groans with a roll of his eyes. “I would if I could.” He throws his hands out at the vase. “I can’t create flowers from a vase, let alone stop time!” He drops his hands with a frantic expression on the two.

Auston has narrowed eyes on the vase as he taps it. “What if we just attack the GHP, weaken them to get them out of our way for a bit…” He reverts his gaze up at Connor and halts his tapping. “...then that will buy you time to master your powers even more.”

Connor nods his head slowly with pursed lips. “I think we can do that. And we can attempt to get Duke and Clague again.” He stops his nodding and darts his eyes at his two members. “Let’s get fighting.”

Instantly, he swipes his arms across the air, releasing a sharp ribbon of yellow energy. The energy bursts into a white light, engulfing the whole scenery into whiteness.

---

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

The white gradually recedes, revealing new location of the the two men and one teenager. They glance around their surroundings, noticing they are in a dim tunnel with metallic walls. Nearby to their left is the opening of the tunnel, which appears to lead out to a massive, open room with much more light.

An ominous smile grows on Connor’s face as he gazes at the opening. “We’re here.”

“These are the GHP headquarters?” Carter asks from behind him tentatively.

Connor spins around to face him. “Yes. If there’s one thing I mastered, it’s remote teleportation.” He turns around to stand before the tunnel’s mouth. “Okay, Auston, you can start.”

Auston rubs his hands eagerly. “Don’t mind if I do.” He then throws his hands out in front of him.

Instantly, thick vines thrust out from the ground before them, swimming under and over the surface as they make their way toward the main room.

In the main room, Reid, Kale, Emily, Brett, Jake, and Dru are sitting around the main table, playing “Go Fish.”

Emily holds up a trading card of Auston Matthews in the air. “Who has Auston—OOF!!!”

The ground sharply lurches as the vines distort it in their trek toward them. The six power players peer down, quickly noticing the rushing vines.

Reid instantly stands onto his chair, materializing his sword into view. “I got this!” He gives it a good spin before raising it up above his head, throwing himself inches from the chair.

“YAAAHHH!!” He brings his sword down, creating a trail of golden energy behind the blade as it makes contact with the closest vine.

Golden energy shoots through the vine, causing it to jolt violently and throw itself backward. The vine crashes feet from the tunnel’s entrance, smoking and becoming lifeless.

Instantly, another vine shoots out, snatching Kale from his seat by wrapping itself around his torso.

“AAAHHH!!!”

The vine flies above the table and slams him up high against the wall.

“Ah-ha!” Kale wriggles in its tight grasp. “Guys!”

Reid’s eyes widen at the sight. “Claguer!” He holds his sword out, ready to power it again when suddenly—

“AHHH!!!”

Another vine smacks against the wall next to Kale. This vine has Brett occupied in it.

“No-oh!” Brett cranes his head as he squirms in its grasp. “I can’t fight like this!”

Jake gasps at the horrific sight of his bestie. “BRETT!”

Emily has a displeased expression on the restraints. “I’m gonna find out who’s doing this!” She zooms off before a vine crosses her path, disappearing in a snap.

“I’ll take out another!” Dru wipes out two elongated blades as two majestic, sharp bladed wings expand from each side of her back. She flies straight at another vine.

Brett whips his head toward the direction of the other vines for Jake. “Go, Jake Dog! Help out Pfalzy and Burnsy!”

Jake nods his head hastily. “Okay, okay!” He whirls around and rushes off beside her.

Reid observes his restrained group members as he spins his glowing sword. “Okay, how to do this without frying you—”

He is instantly thrown against the wall on his torso by another vine, being flattened by it. “Or that can happen too,” he croaks.

Kale lets out a heavy sigh with a shake of his head. Brett has lowered eyebrows and pursed lips.

Meanwhile, Dru glides over the length of a vine’s slithering self, chopping at it with rapid movements with her two blades. The vine dismantles, lessening its aggression, as its sharp pieces drop onto the floor.

Dru darts into the tunnel, continuing her cutting until she crashes into a person. She falls forward due to the unexpected impact and collapses onto the ground against her metallic wings.

“Ughhh,” she grumbles at the stinging pain. She then gazes upward, catching sight of Connor and Carter peering down at her.

“Well, it seems like we have ‘bumped’ into each other, eh?” Connor points out with a smirk.

Before she could respond, a thick object shoves her forward from behind her. She flies ahead of herself, whizzing in between Connor and Carter, before crashing onto the floor on her stomach.

From behind her, Auston rises to her feet, retracting a rectangular flattened plant construct. He shrugs the pain away. “I’ll get her—!”

Suddenly, he freezes as a blue ergokinetic ribbon wraps around him, locking his arms against his torso.

Emily instantly appears in front of him with a big grin, holding onto the restraints. “Nuh-uh-huh, no you won’t!”

Connor whirls to Carter with his pointer finger at Dru. “Grab her!”

Carter twirls himself around as he launches to Dru with great strength and speed. He lands before her feet on his hands and feet.

Dru slowly cranes her head around to catch the menacing expression on his face. A hint of fear mixed with agony is shown on her face.

Before Carter makes another move, he senses a protective presence looming over him. He slowly lifts his eyes up, quickly spotting the disturbance of his mission.

Jake is crouched by her head, staring hard at him with bared teeth and sharp eyes. A rumbling growl is coming from his throat. “Get away from her. Now.”

Carter lets out a thundering roar before hurling himself over Dru and tackling Jake, slamming him onto the floor. Being on top of him, he begins swiping his clawed hands as he feels Jake forcefully slamming his fists against his chest, shoulders, and arms.

Carter throws his torso upward to pull away from Jake’s attacks and get a better view of his target. He lets out another shaking roar before slashing his hand across Jake.

Jake holds his arm up in defense, instantly feeling the acute pain of the claws ripping across his skin. He lets out a whimper of pain, dropping his injured arm onto the floor.

Carter hurls his other arm at him in blind fury. Jake pulls himself away, watching as the claws scrape the ground with sparks.

He then fights back with a tremendous punch to Carter’s cheek.

Carter instantly throws his head sharply to his right with an open mouth, his eyes flying in pain.
In the moment of shock, Jake took the opportunity to shove Carter off of him, throwing him onto the floor against his back.

Carter stays still on the floor, his eyes big with agony written all over his face. He lets out a taut groan.

Jake gets up on his feet, his narrowed eyes glued on his defeated opponent. “Stay down.” He then leans over and gingerly scoops Dru up into his arms.

Dru peers up at him with half-closed eyes as she tucks her feeble wings behind her. “Jake Dog…”

A whimper escapes from his throat as a sharp pain shoot up his injured arm. “I got you.” He then rushes out from the tunnel.

Meanwhile, Emily is appearing in different areas of the tunnel, playing a game of “tag” with Auston and Connor.

“I’m right here!” she exclaims, holding onto the ends of her restraint around Auston.

Connor releases a blast of energy at her location. The energy smashes into the wall just as she disappears. Auston twirls around as the restraints add on to him and pull him toward the main room.

“URGH!” Connor bellows, holding up his tense hands.

“No need to get mad, I’m just right here!” he hears Emily saying from behind him.

Connor whirls around, spotting Emily waving him next to the wall. He builds up two hands with energy and releases two beams at her.

She instantly disappears before they could reach her.

Connor slams his foot on the ground as Auston spins around to the ribbons. “That. Is IT!!!” He then yells as a fury of yellow ergokinetic flames engulf him, burning with his emotions.

BLAM!

The echoing sound of a gunshot brings everything to a halt and silence: Connor retracts his flames, returning back to his normal physique; Emily appears next to Auston, halting his spinning; Carter continues to lie on the ground in agony.

Facing them in the mouth of the tunnel is Katie, who has her rifle aimed at the ceiling. Next to her is Ryan, who now has two two electric, golden energy zapping from his each side of his head down to his hands and spiralling around them; the same energy drifts from the outer edges of his eyes.

“The clash is at an end,” Katie states sternly with a hand on her hip. Emily zips next to her side, her hands on the restraints.

Connor begins building popping, yellow energy in his hands. “You can’t define that.”

“Well, we shall ascertain that subsequent to this attack.” She turns to Ryan, who is gazing coolly at the opponents. “Hacker, compel them to retreat.”

“You got it,” Matt is heard saying from Ryan.

Ryan pulls his extended palms by his shoulders, increasing the strength of his swirling energy.

Connor’s eyes widen as he senses the ability Ryan is conjuring utilizing. “Another power player with companion allegiance?”

“Yup.” Ryan has a smirk on his face. “And it’s not gonna be pretty.”

Instantly, he throws his hands out at him, directing the twisting electrical energy straight at Connor, Auston, and Carter.

Notes