Andrew lay silently on his bed, in the embrace of the night, re-living the events that happened to him earlier in the day.

His heart pumped forcefully, each thump resonating throughout his head, the sound even obscuring the gentle wheeze of the air conditioner.

Echoes of the event earlier that day rang through his head. The gunshot of the bullet that dug into his elbow was particularly resonating.

In the dark, he lifted his arm again, staring at the spot where he was shot. He flicked on the desk light, putting his other hand before his eyes to shield himself from the glare.

When his eyes accustomed to the brightness, he looked again closely.

Like earlier, he saw not a single tear, not a single scar. That chemical had done some wonders. It had been nearly half a day, and he had not felt any side effects yet. No fever, no nausea, no disorientation.

He got out of bed. He was not going to sleep yet, not if he could help it. He had better things to do. Reaching for the door, he yanked it open. Carelessly, his foot was caught by the door, and he yelped.

There was the pain one would normally expect, but Andrew felt more than that. His toes lost their normal feeling, replaced by a sensation similar to a dunk in the pool.

He looked down at his foot. Where the door had caught his toes, there was a small puddle of blood, and he could see the pale white of his bones that were sticking out due to the flesh that had turned into blood. It kind of seemed like someone had torn out his toes.

He shuddered at that sight. He took a step back, and stared at the blood skimming the floor, trailing after his foot, regenerating his toes in a second.

He noticed something enter his field of vision. Alarmed, he looked up, and his mother was standing right before him. He stared at her blankly for a few seconds, waiting for her to ask about what just happened.

But she didn’t. All she did was give him a warm hug.

Andrew heaved a sigh of relief internally, for his secret was safe.

“Can’t sleep? Wouldn’t blame you,” she replied, gently patting his back.

Indeed, other than the exhilarating events that daytoday, he had his blood-shifting body to worry about, and it was all too much. No one had ever had something like this happen to them, not that he knew of.

He walked into the living room cautiously, keeping a watch on his feet, to make sure he didn’t accidentally hit anything and turn bloody. He did not know his body’s limits to the force it would take before bursting into red.

Taking a glance around, he saw his father out cold on the sofa. He had gone through a lot of panic today, worrying about Andrew’s safety when he heard the emergency call from SOUL. And apparently, the police detectives had found out that the Cottonmouths were responsible, so there was a lot of work afterwards.

Andrew returned to his room after a sip of water, locking the door, and began to run some tests. He released a pen from eye-level onto his foot, which bounced off, clattering on the floor. He felt pain, although it wasn’t as much as he thought.

Maybe it was not enough force to induce his body to respond and turn into blood. He looked at his desk for more things to drop. He picked up a calculator, and let gravity pull it into contact with his foot.

It still did not turn his foot into blood. The force was too little, he suspected. He looked at the door, and he decided to open the door while leaving his foot in the way.

Twisting the doorknob quietly, he poked his head out of the room, and did not see his mother. Withdrawing his head, he yanked the door back, leaving his foot there.

He gritted his teeth and winced as the door collided with his toes. He looked down, expecting to see the blood that he saw earlier. There was none. His toes were reddish, but it was the same as any other time he caught his foot by accident. He was confused. Was the blood thing only activated when actual harm, not self-inflicted, came upon him? He had replicated the conditions of the earlier situation of accidentally clipping his toes. Yet this time, it did not have the same effect.

He kicked the wall, hoping it would at least show some change, but he again did not feel the liquefying feel of his toes turning into blood.

He grunted, punching the wall in frustration. There was the thunk of his bones hitting the hard wall, accompanied by a softer splashing sound. His hand was now bloody, his clean white wallpaper now tainted by a splat pattern of maroon.

He pulled back his fist, and the splat of blood leaped off the wall to reform his hand. He grinned, but he knew he had better stop punching things and making random noises.

...

It was about a week after the SOUL incident, and Andrew had been asked to meet with his friends to talk about it. They thought it would be better to give him time to take everything in.

Of course, he had no intention of mentioning his newfound abilities, which so far had no detrimental side effects.

Rounding a few more corners speedily, he saw the destination. A shopping complex, which had a cafe that his friends planned to gather at.

Strangely Andrew heard an almost-indistinct call of his name. He turned around, spotting a ginger-haired girl waving maniacally and running towards him.

“Penny,” he said, waving. “I see you happen to be late too.”

The girl grinned as she stopped to catch her breath. They had known each other for a few years, back in elementary school, when they were in the same class for two years. She was much more withdrawn in the past, and thus the two of them were nothing more than mere acquaintances. Over the next three years, when they went their separate ways, she changed somewhat, and seemed a lot more outgoing when they ‘reunited’ at the start of this year. Both of them had entered Maple Leaf Senior High, which was their last three years of education before university.

“My family went out, so I had to walk the dog. What’s your reason?”

Andrew couldn’t say. He was late because of his little wall-punching exercise. But the good old oversleeping excuse came in handy.

Penelope smirked. But her expression quickly changed into one that was more caring. “You okay? The event must be...” Penelope trailed off, attempting to find a suitable word to describe the SOUL incident. “Traumatising.”

If Andrew was one of the other people who survived, he would say it sucked. It was still applicable to his situation, because he had a close shave with death, but somehow gained something of immeasurable value, which was his blood power.

This thing needs a name, he thought. Like, Blood Force. Nope.

Penelope was staring at him, snapping her fingers to get his attention back. “Hey!”

Andrew vigorously shook his head. “Yeah. It sucked. I could’ve died.”

“Luckily you didn’t get shot,” Penelope said as they stepped onto an escalator. “Or I’d be one friend short.”

“Heh, yeah, I-” Andrew stopped as a chill crept up his spine. He was shot. He remembered the gunshot, the exact crisp sound still fresh in his mind. He felt that tearing pain, every bit of it, but it all disappeared after he regained consciousness. The chemical had done something to his body in that short time span of about ten minutes which saved him.

“Sorry. Just had a flashback.” Andrew looked away hastily. He had to move the conversation elsewhere, in case he accidentally mentioned things better left unspoken. “Let’s hurry, don’t wanna be any later.”

Penelope placed a hand on his shoulder, giving him a warm smile. “Take it easy. If you need a listening ear, I’m available anytime.”

They reached the cafe, where Su-Jin and Melvin were already seated, waiting with drinks on the table. The two boys waved them over, and they each took a seat.

“Right. Now that we’re all here, it’s time for you to share the story,” Su-Jin rubbed his hands in anticipation. “Well, if you’re okay with it.”

Melvin seemed okay with talking about the happenings, but he looked at Andrew, trying to see his expression, to see if he was fine with it.

Andrew gave an okay gesture. He wanted to hear Melvin’s side of the story. After all, they probably experienced different things, and on the actual day of the incident, he was too busy answering questions for the police to catch up with Melvin.

“Well, from my side, it went down this way: we were down there, in the GMO lab. About halfway through the tour. That’s where the creatures were, and Andrew was having a damn good time,” Melvin described, which drew a small laugh from Andrew.

“Then, there were gunshots from above,” he continued, his hands gesturing rapidly, imitating guns and the sound of them being fired. “Six shooters, I think, came down through the lift, then they started shooting at us. Everyone was trying to escape, at the start. They went for the stairs to go up but I’m quite sure there were shooters upstairs too. After all, we first heard the gunshots from above.”

Andrew decided to add on. “Some people got shot trying to get to the stairs, but some survived. Also, we got separated amidst the chaos. I only saw him after the entire thing.”

Melvin gave a slight nod. “I’m super lucky to have survived. Both of us are.” He paused, taking a long sip from his fruit juice. “Although it still scares me. This is the first time I’ve seen people die in front of my eyes, and I probably won’t be able to enjoy movies the same way I did before.”

Su-Jin put his hand on Melvin’s shoulder, squeezing it firmly. “Sorry to hear that. Maybe a trip to the arcade might help?”

Penelope gulped up the rest of her drink and got up. “I’ll pay for the first ten tokens.”

Melvin agreed, but he gave Andrew a look that seemed to ask if he himself was okay. After all, Andrew barely said anything about his side of the story.

Andrew nodded, so they all headed towards the arcade. Time flew, and Andrew was able to distract himself from memories of the incident as well as his own blood power. He took a toilet break, and was about to leave, but a loud thud told him he had hit something.

He felt the impact but not much pain, and looked at his elbow where he hit the toilet door handle. The elbow coincidentally was the same one that was shot yesterday.

Where he struck the handle, there was blood. A gap in his elbow area revealed the bone underneath. He looked away at the sight, disgusted at the bloodiness. But curiosity got the better of him, so he scrutinised it closely, attempting to find any traces of the bullet’s impact on his bone. There was none. Then the blood jumped off the handle and reformed his flesh, as if nothing even happened. He looked around, and there was no one in the toilet that could have seen what just happened.

He also took note that he was starting to get tougher. Besides being able to take damage without leaving behind any marks, his collision with the door handle hurt less than his foot being clipped last night.

“Yo,” Su-Jin said as he headed into the toilet, surprising Andrew. “It’s like, a little past seven. The others were thinking of grabbing dinner now, that aight?”

Andrew exhaled in relief. Su-Jin had barely missed the sight of his elbow region turning into blood. “Sure, let’s go. I’m hungry.”

...

Andrew and Penelope strolled across various stores lining opposite sides of the mall, as they slowly inched towards the exit.

“Kinda funny how Su-Jin told me that we were all gonna grab dinner, and then he ends up having to go home to eat with his family,” Andrew said. “I mean, Melvin too, but yeah.”

“But that gave us a chance to talk properly,” Penelope responded. “I hope it helped you feel better, or at least, take your mind off things.”

Andrew nodded and smiled in appreciation. He thought about the things they talked about over dinner. He avoided mentioning anything about SOUL, but shared about his self-perceived insignificance and difficulty in opening up to other people.

“Hey, Penny, back in elementary school, you were still rather quiet, and we barely spoke to each other.”

She nodded. “Yeah, I remember that. Not good times.”

“Now you’re way more sociable, and we’re good friends. I’m kinda curious about what happened to you during the next few years when we lost contact.”

Penelope stopped to gather her thoughts. “In my first year of junior high, I was still the same. And then I became friends with a girl who was, in a way, similar to me. She didn’t really open up to other people, but she told me that she really wanted to make friends with everyone, even though she found it difficult to start conversations, or to give ‘good reactions’ to things other people tell her.”

She paused to think, appearing more melancholic. “The thing is, our classmates weren’t exactly very nice people. Sure, they didn’t pick fights, but they didn’t care. They stayed within their own cliques all the time. Sometimes they were a little mean, too. A little crude, critical, and the like. So she felt lonely, insignificant, and all the negativity built up so much that she tried to... she tried to kill herself.”

Now it was Andrew’s turn to be unsure of what to say. He felt sorry for Penelope’s friend, and to a certain extent, he could relate with what she went through. “I’m... sorry to hear that. What happened to her?”

“She got professional help after that, so yeah, and then I managed to talk to her and hear her reasons behind all that. And that’s the thing. I wasn’t able to realise she felt unwanted, because even though we were friends, I didn’t do a very good job. I didn’t look for hints that she was feeling neglected? Left out? Although I guess some people keep it all inside and it isn’t always obvious. But either way, I decided to change myself, to make sure nobody felt alone, to make sure they had a friend to turn to. I got better at looking out for signs of negative emotions, I suppose.”

Andrew did not expect that the reason for her change was so dark. “How’s she now?” he asked. “I’m sorry for causing you to talk about this.”

“It’s fine. She’s okay, we still keep in touch. But yeah, now you know why I’m different. So you better remember that you’re not alone.” Penelope placed her hand on Andrew’s shoulder, giving him an affirming squeeze.

“Thanks, Penny. It means a lot.”

...

On his way home, Andrew’s thoughts dwelled on his new powers. He knew he had healing abilities, and seemingly an increasing resistance to pain. There had to be more to it, and he would find it out and unlock all its secrets. By chance, he had been dealt a unique hand, and he would learn to make use of every opportunity.

He spent the past few years getting into comic books and their adapted movies, and one thing that was present in nearly all heroes and villains was that they had super strength. Of course, there was a large pool of abilities across the various characters, and not all of them were physically enhanced. But maybe he was.

The thought of making use of an old alley wall to test his strength came across his mind. Nobody would care about an already-crumbling brick wall. He could smash it, testing both his strength and his resistance to pain and damage. Or he could wait for another day, to hit the gym and start lifting those giant weights he never thought of trying.

A woman brushed by him, her neck adorned with a shiny pearl necklace and a flashy watch wrapped around her wrist. It cut through his train of thought, leaving him to wonder. He thought it was not a good idea to be wearing such jewellery and be out alone like that. Even though Karabone City was not considered a crime-plagued city, an arsenal of precious items was enough to draw unnecessary attention from the wrong crowd.

He still did not expect to hear a muffled cry so soon. He had barely taken a few extra steps on his way home. He turned around instantly, running in the direction opposite from home.

He passed by the same alley he walked by just a mere ten seconds ago, and in the dim glow of a street lamp, he saw a man in a ski mask restrain the woman in a chokehold. She flailed wildly, unable to escape.

Seeing this sent his heart rate into a new high, every thump resonating like a drum being struck.

If he was his father, there would certainly be no hesitation. He would have gone up to save the woman.

But he was not his father. They had a similar enough moral code, both knowing that it was the job of the capable to protect the vulnerable. But he was not the kind to rush in to render aid without a second thought, without caring about his own safety.

Would he be able to help her? He had his newfound powers of absorbing damage and healing, so he did not have to worry about getting injured. But he was by no means a skilled fighter, even if he picked up a few self-defence moves from his father, and he barely knew anything about his new abilities.

As he heard the cries of the woman, something stirred him from within. He peeked at the scene, at the scuffle. He watched the woman struggle, no matter how futile her efforts were. The dim lighting prevented him from seeing her fearful expression, but he didn’t have to see it to know it.

Before he knew what he was doing, he called out, albeit softly.

The robber threw two punches at the woman, causing her to lie on the floor, dazed. The robber briefly turned to face Andrew. "What'd you say?"

He heard me, Andrew thought. His ears and cheeks flushed, as he began to feel heat building up in his cells. “I said HEY!”

The robber pulled off the necklace and watch from the woman, and stood facing Andrew. He began to sing in a weirdly high-pitched voice, “I said hey, what’s going on?”

What the actual heck is wrong with this guy? Andrew thought to himself.

The robber cleared his throat and shook his head, reverting back to his normal gruff voice. “Get out of here,” he spat, “or you’ll get to taste blood in your mouth.” As if to play the part, he cracked his knuckles and huffed like an angry boar.

Andrew stared back at the robber. It was mostly because he was not sure how to act. But at this point, adrenaline coursed through his bloodstream, and now he felt the urge to beat up the robber just because he probably could.

After a few silent moments, the robber began to step away from the downed woman, stuffing the loot in his pockets. Perhaps the robber realised that he did not actually need to threaten the kid that faced him. He could just outrun him. The kid appeared to be rather skinny, and probably was nowhere near as fit as he was.

But the robber did not consider the possibility that he was facing someone with powers. Someone who was much more than what he appeared to be.

Andrew managed to shake himself out of his thoughts. I can do this, he thought. Not to make myself a hero, but because she needs me to help. He clenched his fists, ready to act.

He began to close the distance between himself and the robber, each step he took accelerating his pulse. For good measure, he yelled like a martial artist would during a training session.

The robber was caught by surprise, and he himself began to run. But he soon stopped, after realising that it would make his escape easier if he simply knocked out the kid, so that he wouldn’t be followed.

The robber growled, and charged at Andrew, eager to take him down.

Andrew instinctively turned around to run, but remembered he was supposed to deal with the guy. He faced the man again and taunted him.

The man slid on the floor, his hands reaching out for Andrew’s leg, attempting to drag him down.

“Since you’ve decided to stick around, I’ll gladly add your phone and wallet to my collection,” the man laughed while clamping his hands around Andrew’s leg. The momentum of the man should have caused Andrew to topple.

He was more than horrified when his hands slipped off Andrew’s slimy leg, wet with some kind of red fluid, and when he noticed Andrew’s jeans, it was a ghastly sight, soaked with a violent shade of red under the illumination of street lights a few metres away.

“Hey, if you licked your hands now, you’ll get to taste blood in your mouth,” Andrew commented, as his bloody jeans returned to normal. In the spur of the moment, he just felt like saying something to fill in the silence.

Attempting to imitate what he had seen in movies, Andrew’s leg swept the man’s head, sending him tumbling across the ground. The robber wheezed heavily through his ski mask, as he tried to recover from the kick.

Andrew flipped him around, and slapped the man’s face.

The man tasted something odd in his mouth. There was the metallic taste of blood, but there was also something else. It was bitter. He rubbed his throbbing face, and detected the same sliminess as when he had grabbed Andrew’s leg. He looked up briefly to see Andrew, whose lower arm had a similar hue to red wine.

“What the hell are you?” his voice quivered as he crawled away from Andrew, desperately clawing at the pavement to drag himself further.

Andrew caught up to the man, reached out with his left arm, and firmly gripped the man’s shirt collar. He yanked it, bringing the now-helpless, quivering man before him.

“Your last mistake,” he callously smiled, his eyes burning directly into the robber’s. Then he gleefully threw a right cross that connected with the man’s cheek, feeling the hardness of the bone underneath.

There was a sick sound as the man went down, crumpled onto the ground, splattering the grey pavement with dark drops of blood.

“Did I hit him too hard?” Andrew said to himself. He bent down to retrieve the stolen goods, pulling out a necklace and a silvery watch from the man’s pockets. Your last mistake. Sounds cool. Can't believe I just came up with that. But I kinda just called myself a mistake. What the heck.

He removed the unconscious man’s ski mask. His appearance fit that of a convict, having a tattoo on the back of his neck, a couple of scars here and there, and a general rough-looking face.

Tightly clutching the necklace and watch, Andrew slowly walked to the woman, who had just begun to recover from her wrecked state, completely missing the entire fight.

“Call the police now. He should be down for long enough,” he instructed, dropping the items into her open palms.

“Thank you so much, young man,” she said, giving his hands a tight squeeze.

He smiled, giving a small nod, and brisk-walked away.

Stopping a few blocks away, he leaned onto a brick wall to rest, taking a deep breath. His heart pulsated rapidly, as he closed his eyes and sat down. He looked at his hands, once again, which transitioned between bloodlike and flesh.

He had gone and done it. Helped someone. Made a difference. He felt good, excited, the clear sound of blood coursing through his entire body, as he breathed in and out. It was the beginning of a new life for himself. One where he mattered.