by 52xMax » Sun Nov 24, 2013 3:59 pm
After the incident with the falling TV, Alejandro barely escaped from the public eye and unwanted attention by merging into the crowd. People don't usually pay much attention to guys like him, unless it's for the wrong reasons. He would've liked to check in on the people he had just saved from being crushed, but he knew that at worst the woman would have some light bruises, and the child with her was perfectly fine, he had made sure of that before when they landed on the concrete, just in time to avoid being hit. Alejandro thought some of the paramedics or police likely to arrive at the scene might recognize him, and playing the hero again was the opposite of what he needed right now at the station. He was also curious as for the cause of the incident, but he figured it was likely just a domestic disturbance. "Nothing that the blues can't handle", he thought.
Alejandro knew he had to be more careful from now on if he wanted to keep his secret, but other than that, he was running out of ideas. All he knew about these "gifts" he had learned from comic books, and as far as he knew, those stories were all fictional. Besides, he didn't find the idea of wearing spandex and fighting crime at all appealing. He wanted to save people, but he lacked that alpha male bravado all the crew at the station shared, and he wasn't too keen on violence or physical confrontations either.
However, rescuing that woman and her child had been fantastic. It was the same rush he had felt that day when he saved the day at the exploding building. Just knowing that he could make a difference had made Alejandro feel a natural high like nothing he had experienced before. "I could get used to this", he thought to himself as he was riding the subway home. "But I can't keep on doing this much longer. Sooner or later people will start suspecting, and things are complicated enough already. As it is now, I'm not sure I understand what I can do, much less how it works, or even why all of a sudden I find myself in this situation. Are there any others like me out there? is this the first time something like this happened, or has this been going forever? if so, why have we never heard about it before? why are these powers manifesting now? can they just day fade away at the worst possible moment?..."
Alejandro was lost on his own thoughts, so much that he didn't notice when he missed his stop. He got down on the following station, when he noticed someone was following, or at least he thought that might be the case or he was being paranoid on account of his dark thoughts. In any case, a man in an overcoat carrying a newspaper that was on the same train as Alejandro, was now walking a few steps behind him; always keeping the same distance, even when he switched his pace, and even turning down the same streets again and again. Paranoid or not, Alejandro wasn't taking any chances, but rather than sprinting at a corner and going all parkour again, he opted to keep a low profile, and subreptitiously walked into the first establishment he found open. It was a cozy little bookstore.
As the mysterious man in the overcoat walked away, the threat apparently gone for now, Alejandro sighed in relief. Then he turned around to see the puzzled face of the girl behind the counter.
"Can... I help you with something?"
"Uh, do you have... books? I mean, obviously you do... have books, this is a bookstore. It is a bookstore, right? of course it is. Silly me, I can see them from here. The books, that is. What I meant was, what I still mean is, do you have specialty books? like, funny books? no, not funny, comics. But not like comedy books, with jokes, or books on comedy by comedians... not that there's anything wrong with that. You know? the other kind, comic books! that's what they're called. Do you happen to have a section of comic books? not for kids, though, because I'm clearly an adult and I'm super mature. Adult comic books... wait NO! not like that! it's not what you think... or you might not think... again, not that there's anything wrong with that either". And after an awkward pause that couldn't have lasted 5 seconds but seemed like an eternity, Alejandro spoke again.
"Graphic novels (that's it! yeah, not that you sound less creepy, but let's stick with that). You must have some nice graphic novels in here right? some Neil Moore, Frank Gaiman, Alan Morrison perhaps?"
The girl, still looking at him oddly, pointed him to the proper aisle, and sank her head behind a book.
"That was smooth, dude!" he thought. "I think it's obvious by now that this gift of mine is strictly physical and not intellectual in any way. But maybe I can find something about it in one of these books"
"When in doubt... well, don't ask me!"