CHAPTER 2: Roswell
The sound of a black Mercedes could be heard zipping through the streets of an urban area, going through the highway at blistering speeds only police could dream of catching. Of course, there was no driver, just the passenger. Luckily around these times the highways are relatively empty.
"Where are you taking me this time?"
A familiar voice would ring out from the back of the car. One tapping the window in a pattern similar to the ABCs.
"I'm taking you to the lab again kid. Why don't you ever remember where we're going?"
A voice could be heard from the speakers of the car, it wasn't robotic, but rather the same as an elderly man, the same one from that orphanage earlier.
"Oh? Really, well for a sec I thought you were going to be. . ."
Now a sound of concern could be heard over the car's phone.
"What did you do this time?"
The girl twirled with her fingers, looking away from the video call from the car, trying to avoid eye contact yet relentlessly coming back to dart her eyes at the screen.
"Ah. . . Well, I may. . . have slightly. . . just a little bit, maybe. Um. . . Used my powers today. "
On the video chat, the curly haired man from before looked shocked, his left eye twitching slightly before an angry sigh was let out as he knitted his eyebrows. An exasperated sigh came out again, before the man finally found his words.
"I swear to god. What did you do with your powers? I'm not mad, I swear."
He said this despite looking visibly upset while the girl in the car had been twirling her hair, playing around with it as she tried to formulate the best possible story to try and get out of trouble. . . Was she to start from the beginning or just the good part? Maybe she was supposed to hype him up! Yeah! Mmhm!
"Well, you see. Your esteemed daughter stopped a criminal today~ Just look at the news! Look for the Walmart shooter article today~!"
Luckily she had already read the article about herself. . . which sort of boosted her ego as well.
"Let's see here. . ."
As she awaited her father to finish reading, the older Louise had rolled the window down. She tried to look for an escape route just in case her father would still be upset after her heroic actions! Actually, this might be the final straw, after all, she had gotten into multiple instances where she had used her power without the supervision of the scientists taking care of her.
This is just like the time with the tree. . .
That experience had been simple, a cat had gotten stuck to a tree and she tried. . . blowing the trunk out, because maybe it would just fall over. Luckily no one was harmed, and the cat escaped just as she planned. She got grounded for multiple weeks after that one. . .
Or maybe with the purse snatcher. . .
A similar experience, where a thief dressed in all black had taken a woman's purse, Louise had followed the man and blew up the ground beneath him, injuring the man and launching him to the air before the man inevitably landed on a couple. Luckily, her sentence was only a few days with that one. . .
I need to think of a name for myself. . . so that dad and the other scientists don't get mad at me, plus if I get a nickname, maybe I can get some rewards for being a vigilante. Hm. . . what would suit me though? I can't just call myself TNT, or dynamite or whatever I'd sound like a total loser with a name like that.
Cmon think!
There's gotta be something out here that I can use that sounds cool. .
Oh, I know! Maybe the scientists said something about an explosive. . . Or maybe I can just look it up on my phone.
Thus instead of thinking for herself, she decided to go on a name generator for a superhero. Of course, she did not like any of them. Though, her searching was cut off early once the car had suddenly stopped, looking to her left she realized why. She finally arrived at the lab!
"Oh, dad I'll be back, see ya later~"
She said, before cutting the older man off and jumping out of the car.
I guess I'll put that off till after dad leaves me alone.
Looking up at the laboratory. . . It truly was an achievement of humanity, a ten story building all seeming filled to the top with state of the art technologies and the smartest scientists. . .
The first three floors were called "Human improvements." Which was not as post-apocalyptic as some made it out to be, the human improvements floor was made for consumer products. The newest in things such as TVs, computers, vacuum cleaners, washers, dryers, cleaning products, food products, anything that looked nice and could be brought into the home was basically tested in this floor.
The fourth to sixth floors were called "Plant Improvements." Which was a simple floor, ever since the beginning of the city they were staying in, it has created multiple genetically engineered plants which have all sorts of applications, the latest being plants that could grow on Mars and on the moon.
Finally, the final floors were closed off to most workers. The city has technology which detects the entrance level of an employee, visitor or citizen, tracked by multiple supercomputers with people for maintenance 24/7. That final floor was where Superhumans were held. The meteor that had crashed into this city had given some who were exposed directly to it unnatural powers. . . however, according to the data, 99.9% of those who have abilities die within the first few years after birth.
After Louise had gotten adopted, and was moved to the city, her father, Mr. Summers had caught a glimpse of her extraordinary and bizarre abilities and had taken her to the lab. Upon being tested, the girl was perfectly healthy and didn't seem to be cursed with an illness. After more testing, her abilities manifested into a controllable state and thus testing had began. With this revelation, she was told not to reveal her real name to anyone, along with the location of the lab, in exchange for a special exception to live in the city.
The city's name? Roswell, New Mexico.
"Alright, we'll just do the usual today, Louise and then you're home free, alright?"
Many men and women in lab coats had observed and had taken notes on floating holograms that functioned the same as computers. They tested for simple things at first, height, weight, heartbeat, reflexes, a simple physical. Next, the real testing had begun, with her showing the progress of her abilities. Luckily, with state-of-the-art soundproofing and foundation, the sound of her explosive abilities were kept to a minimum, only making small disturbances here and there.
Because of the secrecy, only the highest level scientists are allowed into these last few floors, and the windows have projections to prevent observant onlookers from distinguishing what was happening inside of the top floors.
Testing would soon finish, the excruciating and boring 2 hours had finally passed, and the girl was finally free!
. . .
Or so she thought.
Because right outside of the building was a man, tapping his foot angrily. A curly haired man with his familiar blue suit.
Ah crap. I forgot. I'm about to get yelled at-
1 hour later. . .
One could see the bump on Louise's head, as she exasperatedly sighed. She took out a pink double pocket mirror, checking on the little bump on the top of her head.
Well. . . At the least he isn't too upset, I didn't even get grounded this time.
She let out a small and silent giggle before seeing an alarming sight and sound. Multiple armored vehicles had passed by her, along with a myriad of police cars. There seemed to be 10 armored vehicles and 20 police cars that had zoomed their way past her. Not only that, but an alarm could be heard, one which meant to evacuate.
What. . . Is going on?
Despite already being yelled at and hit, she decided to run forward into the danger ahead. Of course, being your average 15 year old, she couldn't just catch up to those cars using her legs, it was time to use her ability.
She had awaited the perfect time to use it, waiting for the position which one of her legs would be bent before hitting the ground and her other to be just recovering from the last running cycle before. . .
BOOM.
With that sound, Louise had immediately lunged forward, giving her enough horizontal speed to catch up with the armored trucks in the middle of the air.
Oh wait, Dad might actually ground me or take my phone away if I show my face.
Luckily, the older Louise had been wearing a hoodie, and she always kept a bandana inside of her pocket for situations like this, even in the article about the Walmart shooter, she was described as wearing a hoodie and a bandana. Not only that, but because of her status as a supernatural human fake information was disclosed to authorities and the news. The fake name and identity was Jaime Fall.
So with all that, she finally had her bandana on, with her hoodie covering as much of her face as it could. She needed to wear gloves as well, luckily with her normal outfit of joggers and a hoodie, she wore black fingerless gloves.
As they approached the site, the smoke within the air had gotten thicker. She noticed the large fire that ravaged the site. She could also hear gunshots.
What's going on? Is this a terrorist-
Her thought process had ben cut off as the armored car she was hiding on had been shot, multiple gunshots had fired onto the vehicle.
Whoa!
She jumped upwards and a small explosion occurred on her feet, launching her upwards, and then sideways, making her land on a tree, right behind a large building which was on fire. She needed more information.
Should I call dad for this? No, he'd just ground me! There's no way this was an accident, they wouldn't need to send in the Roswell Guard. . .
So she looked around, noticing people that were inside of the burning building, multiple men with suits covering their faces, looking like gas masks. They also had a diverse set of weapons, SMGs, ARs, LMGs and even a few shotguns. Not only that. . . there were hostages, a larger group than the number of terrorists.
One, two, three. . . five. . . six. . .nine. . .twelve. . .fifteen.
She tried to scout the area as well, blasting herself upwards to the roof of the building. Luckily with the technological advancements of Roswell the burning building was still stable, she landed steadily and safely, with the roof lacking a single soul on it, though that would change soon. She could see the helicopters coming towards her, and it seemed that the siege had started, as more armored cars had come.
Ah great, time for me to save the day again, huh?
Extending her hand forward, Louise had sent out an explosion, breaking the door, and going inside. She needed to find a set of stairs, an elevator would mean death in this burning building. Soon enough, she found those stairs, luckily they were in a spiral formation and she could just. . . jump down through the middle, and finally using a few explosions to cushon her landing.
" Get out of my way, crimin- "
She made a mistake. She went all the way down to the underground parking lot, and no one was here! Ahhh! What a terrible mistake! She needed to run upwards! Ready. . . Set. . .
Step. Step. Step.
Louise turned around upon hearing the sound. Someone else was inside of the lot! She gave a stern stare, observing whomever had just come out and upon looking at the man. . . he was tall, about 9 inches taller than her. He wore similar clothes to the terrorists at the first floor.
Great. I'm gonna need to knock him out.
She launched herself forward, immediately trying to move her legs to get in the proper position for a spinning kick propelled by an explosion. As she launched her attack, she felt a chill down her spine causing her to flinch and twitch, missing her target as he ducked under her.
Who? Is he not armed?
He wasn't pulling anything out, but rather. . . he lunged towards her with a punch! She immediately ducked under the punch, blasting herself to the left to give each other some space. . .
BANG
What? What was that? Was that a gun- Wait-
She noticed what the sound really came from, the concrete wall had been punched through, with a crater wider than a sumo wrestler and a hole with the size of the man's fist.
Whoa whoa whoa! This is bad! Is this guy a Superhuman!? I can't just use my power on him! He'll literally die if I just blow him up!
However, the person she had been fighting didn't seem to have the same concern, he seemingly flew forward, pulling back another punch. The girl flinched, and closed her eyes, she instinctively blew herself backwards but due to the speed of the punch, her bandana came off, and the extra wind with it blew her hoodie back. She tried to correct it, putting her hoodie back on but it was all too late. The man really saw who she was.
She needed to run away. She needed an escape, and it seemed that the two were at a showdown, they were staring at each other, and with the splash of a single drop of sweat. . . Louise had immediately blasted her side before blasting her back, launching herself around the man, and then blasting her front to slow her down. . .
However.
The man wasn't moving. All he did was stare at her.
He's distracted!
She pulled her own fist back, and as she pushed her arm forward, ready to blast the man's legs in order to trip him. . . however, she was stopped by a few words.
" Who. Who are you? "
She recognized that voice, it echoed within her mind. She couldn't pick it up however. Who was it? She couldn't remember. This caused her to stop as well.
" I should be asking you that! You stupid terror- "
She was cut off.
" Louise? "