FicWad

Changed Consequences

Part Three

Burger Fool

A Short Time Later

Richie Foley picked uncomfortably at the meal in front of him. While it was a favourite of his a double cheeseburger with chilli cheese fries he found that it didn't grab his attention. Instead he was being distracted by all the noise in the restaurant - yet strangely he didn't see that many people around. This particular burger fool outlet was not the busiest in Dakota City - at least not at this time of the evening. There were barely half a dozen people here aside from himself and his parents.

Yet to Richie it felt like he was sitting in one of the seats at the super bowl, a constant hubbub of noise seemed to be coming from inside his head, like dozens or hundreds of voices all talking at once. The noise was too muffled and general for Richie to really make it out but it was distracting as hell. Forcing himself Richie picked up the burger and ate a bit more of it though he didn't really taste it, though he was aware that a part of him suddenly seemed to know the name and properties of every single ingredient in the burger. It felt like he had known it all along just hadn't really thought about it until now.

Watching there son quietly Maggie and Sean Foley exchanged a concerned look. They could both tell that Richie was both distracted and that something was bothering him. I wonder what's wrong, Maggie thought.

"Nothing's wrong mom," Richie said at that moment having clearly heard his mothers voice. Looking at her he saw both his parents staring at him. "What?"

"Richie I didn't say anything," Maggie replied. Richie frowned.

"But I heard you," he said confused before his suddenly faster, supercomputer like thoughts suddenly provided a possible answer. Telepathy, he thought, did I just read my mom's mind. I must have, great move Rich now there bound to realise that you're a metahuman.

Maggie exchanged another look with Sean who abruptly did not look happy as he realised what she suddenly suspected. She suspected that Richie had indeed been affected by the gas release at the school that was a metahuman with telepathic powers. Indeed Sean wasn't happy; if his son was now one of those freaks then he didn't know what he would do. Sean knew he wasn't a perfect father, his temper got the better of him far too often and he knew Richie despised his racist views. Sean was trying to rectify the fact that he was racist, having gotten to know Robert Hawkins reasonably well he had learned that there were no differences between whites and blacks. But he knew he would probably never fully put it behind him, it had been part of his life for too long.

"Can you hear anything else Richie," Sean asked gripped suddenly by conflicting emotions. He loved his son, he really did metahuman or not, but at the same time he didn't want him to be a metahuman. Richie looked at his father almost as through he was looking through him, without realising it Richie heard his fathers thoughts, could sense his conflicting emotions and thoughts almost as if they were his own. I've got to stop, I've got to stop, Richie thought trying to pull out of his fathers mind. "Richie?" Sean prompted.

"Voices," Richie answered. "I'm sorry Dad I didn't ask for this, I know your not happy that I'm a... a metahuman."

"Are you reading my mind," Sean asked suddenly realising that was what Richie was doing. Probably without realising that he was doing it.

"I guess," Richie replied starting to shake. "I'm sorry I don't mean to." He closed his eyes and concentrated, remembering what he had done earlier when his telekinetic and flying abilities had show up and tried to apply that to his newly awakened telepathic power. But try as he might I didn't work.

"Damn it this isn't working," he said telepathically without realising he was doing it. "I was able to do this earlier with the other abilities why can't I do it now." /Sean and Maggie heard Richie's voice clearly in there heads. /Other abilities, they thought in unison before both realising that Richie had already been aware that he had powers but he hadn't told them. Probably scared how we would react, Maggie thought giving her husband a pointed look and praying silently that Sean didn't do anything stupid.

"It's alright Richie," Sean said mentally crossing his fingers. "We're here. Try and put the voices out of your head."

"I can't," Richie mentally screamed making both Sean and Maggie wince from the sheer volume of his voice in there heads.

Then Richie stood up and raced outside as the voices in his head were getting louder, displacing everything else. All he could feel, all he could hear was the voices. They tore at his sanity in a worse way than the pain earlier had. It felt like he was drowning in a cerebral sea of sound. He ran blindly into an alleyway across the street trying to get away from the noise, but it continued getting louder so it felt like he was hearing the thoughts of everyone in the city.

Helplessly Richie screamed both with his voice and with his mind, and slumped against the wall of the alley. Wall, a part of his mind screamed at him, that's the key. Build a wall. Suddenly understanding Richie pictured a wall in his mind between him and the minds of others whose thoughts he could he hear as voices in his head. He built it one cerebral brick at a time but slowly the voice diminished as the wall got higher. Eventually the voices became just a very faint background hum of sound that he could easily ignore. Almost total silence filled his mind and Richie sighed in relief.

He opened the eyes he didn't even realised he had closed and immediately realised two very different things. One that he was shaking from exhaustion and completely covered in sweat that made him look like he had just run a marathon, two that his parents were standing over him with worried looks on there faces.

"Richie," Maggie asked worriedly. "Are you..."

"I'm okay mom I stopped it," Richie answered and was surprised to hear how weak and tired his voice sounded.

"Can you stand," Sean asked.

"I'll try," Richie replied and cautiously he stood up, his legs wobbled alarmingly feeling like they were made out of jelly not bone, muscle and skin. He stumbled and would have fallen if Sean didn't abruptly catch him and gently lift him up into his arms in away that he hadn't done since Richie was small.

"Let's go home," Sean said and started carrying Richie back to the car, with a concerned Maggie bringing up the rear. Sean carried Richie all the way to the car and laid him down on the backseat.

As his parents climbed in the car as well Richie felt exhaustion pulling strongly at him. He didn't really want to go asleep but he knew that he needed to. Despite his best efforts to stay awake his eyes drifted closed and in seconds he had descended into a deep, restful sleep.

***

Virgil's Room

Dakota General Hospital

A Few Minutes Later

Virgil Hawkins awoke with a sharp gasp, sitting upright quickly in bed he breathed quickly as if the breath had been stolen from his lungs. He'd been dreaming when all of sudden Richie had appeared in his dream and he was in pain. Virgil didn't know if it was a dream or not - he had had many nightmares about Richie and others close to him getting hurt since he'd first become Static - either way it had him concerned. For a moment he considered seeing if one of the hospital staff could bring him the phone but knew that it wasn't likely that they would do it this late in the evening. Now that visiting hours were over he would have to wait until the morning. Hopefully they'll let me out tomorrow, Virgil thought, and then I can see Richie for myself.

Laying back down reluctantly Virgil sighed. He was about to close his eyes to try and go back to sleep when he abruptly felt something happen inside of him. He stiffened as he felt the strange addition to his existing powers that he had felt earlier flare. It started as a sudden sharp spike in the constant internal warmth he felt from all the energy his body contained, it spread rapidly till it was everywhere in his body. Great now what, Virgil thought a moment before he heard a soft rumbling sound from outside, like a rumble of thunder.

A millisecond later Virgil saw a blue flash of lightning through the windows of his room, followed by another and another and another. Accompanying each flash of lightning was an ominous rumbling of thunder but that sounded different to any thunder that he had ever heard before. The windows of the hospital room began to rattle worryingly as if suddenly being assaulted by a powerful wind and the hospitals lights began flickering with power fluctuations. What, what's going on, Virgil thought. Am I doing this somehow? I've never been able to control the weather or anything like that before.

Before he could begin to formulate an answer for himself there was a horrendous bang. Instantly all the lights throughout the building went out and the hospital was plunged into silence. The only noise now came from outside and from the rattling of the windows. After a moment the sound of thunder stopped as did the lightning though the wind rattling the windows remained. But then that to stopped and for a moment out of time there was nothing but complete and total silence.

Then the window to Virgil's room blew inwards in a shower of shattered fragments. What Virgil could only describe as a tornado of pure energy came in through the window. The swirling mass of energy moved and expanded until it completely surrounded Virgil's bed and all he could see was a wall of pure multicoloured light. That was when he felt the strange additional energy pulse; it rippled through his body making him glow with a strange purple aura for a moment.

Instantly arcs of energy began leaping from the vortex to Virgil's body. Virgil jerked and gasped in pain as he felt his body absorbing the energy, energy that was very different to the electrical energy that he could painlessly absorb and use to boost his own powers. He felt the vortex's energy surging through his body. It was painful, very painful, almost as bad as the pain he'd experienced when he had been initially mutated by the first big bang. He felt the power doing something to him inside, could feel his insides changing, stretching, expanding, and altering.

The pain began to recede replaced by a new feeling, a feeling of strength. It grew stronger and stronger, filling his body. He felt himself growing larger and stronger as energy arcs continued to danced from the rapidly weakening vortex to his body. The new feeling was almost euphoric, Virgil enjoyed it, the way it was making him feel. He relaxed completely allowing it to flow through him.

Then all of a sudden it was over, the energy vortex vanished as if its purpose had been fulfilled. Power hummed back to life in the hospital and Virgil blinked to clear the hazy afterimage from the massive light show from his eyes even as he was aware that the feeling of strength still pervaded his whole body, mixing in with the feel of his regular powers.

Sitting up again Virgil felt something slide off his torso; he looked down and gasped at what he saw. His body had changed, grown. Having been Static for almost a year Virgil had started to put on muscle mass but not like this. His muscles had grown bigger, a lot bigger so much so that he looked like an Olympic gymnast with some slight overtones of a bodybuilder. Virgil clearly felt the strength, awesome amazing feeling strength, coming from his enlarged, altered muscles. And that wasn't all he got the distinct impression that he had somehow gotten taller in the last couple of minutes as well as bigger. Wow, he thought, what was that, it must have been what the second gas exposure also did to me. It made have made that energy storm whatever it was which turned me into this. /Wow, what are Sharon and Pops going to say when they see me like this?/ What's Richie going to say?

The sound of running feet caught his attention and Virgil looked up, just in time to see the door to his room fly open. In came two of the nurses and a doctor, all three stopped dead in their tracks and stared at him in absolute astonishment.

"Uh hi," Virgil said to them nervously. "You wouldn't happen to have some spare clothes around here would you?"