Oh boy this is quite an old one. I think I wrote it quite soon after IV and III's names were revealed. Anyway, it was a silly headcanon I thought of and made me laugh hard enough to write. So here it is. I'm too lazy to change all the Michaels into Mihaels. Bite me. :'D
Heavy footsteps could have been heard from upstairs, along with some sort of shouting and what sounded like jumping. At first, the rest of the Arclight family was worried that Michael was in trouble, such as a person had broken into their home, or something had fallen. But, as this kept carrying on, only to find him claiming he was some kind of hero, this had become the norm in the household. Instead of rushing to his aid, they let him play upstairs, alone and happy.
No one was quite sure how Michael had developed a love for superheroes, let alone the more classical heroes. But he did enjoy running around, claiming he was Superman, or Thor, or in some cases when it came to Thomas being horrible to him, he claimed he was the Hulk, and could crush his brother's puny body. This always ended with them running to their father and their older brother, crying about how mean the other was, and he should have been grounded for being a bully, and why was he so horrible? For the most part, the boys were then separated and told to leave each other alone. That suited Michael just fine. He could have pretended to be a hero alone, anyway.
One day, Michael had the idea to make his own hero. But he wouldn't have been alone. His brothers would have been heroes, too. Then they could have worked together and saved the world from evil! And maybe a pretty girl would have kissed him on the cheek for saving her. Whoops, did he really think that just now?
"...and our names will be III, IV and V!" he explained happily.
"Don't you mean 'five', and not 'vee'?" Thomas asked.
"No I know what I mean! Just for that, you can have the power of butts." Michael crossed his arms in a huff.
"I don't want butt power! You have butt power!"
"No! You smell like a butt, and look like a butt, and you are a butt, so you have the powers of a butt!"
Needless to say, Michael was grounded for that.
He had soon forgotten about being his own hero, and went back to his old loves. Besides, it wasn't as fun as being able to swing a hammer around, or having a bunch of cool gadgets, or, like one Halloween, being able to shoot webs from his hands.
One Halloween, he had the privilege of wearing a Spider-Man outfit, with all of his gadgets, including his webs. He was already incredibly excited for it, running around the house and shooting webs on everything. Michael may or may not have showed it off to Thomas.
"Look at me, I'm Pider-Man," he said, jumping up and down.
"Spider-man," he corrected.
"I am Spiders now, and I know all."
Before Thomas understood what that could have even meant, his face was suddenly covered in sticky web, with Michael running away and claiming he was 'defeating evil'. Thomas was just jealous of his cool outfit. Just because Father never got him anything cool. Such a jealous brother! However, his own ghost costume - half assed at best - was ruined by the web.
Somehow, he was allowed to go trick or treating. But, when they got back, he was grounded. It wasn't his fault that Thomas couldn't handle sticky web! No, not sticky web. He couldn't handle justice. When he told Chris about this, his grounding was only prolonged. This wasn't fair at all! It wasn't like Chris was even trying to stop evil, anyway. He just didn't get it.
There was one time when he was in the bath alone just for a moment whilst Chris took a phone call, and Thomas was taking a nap. Michael had taken it upon himself to wash his own hair, because he felt Chris wasn't doing a very good job. He felt something trickle down his forehead. It got into his eye. Oh no. He was going to be blind and die! He couldn't have been a superhero without being able to see. No, that was a lie. There was one hero he could have been.
"I'm Daredevil!" he exclaimed in happiness, instantly halting his tears.
He scrambled out of the bathtub and out of the bathroom. His eyes had been screwed shut to ignore the pain as he ran around the house. His happy shouts of 'I'm Daredevil!' were completely ignored by his family. He didn't know where he was going. Somehow, he managed to run down stairs without falling over. However, what he hadn't expected was one thing; the front door was closed. Instead of running out to freedom, for his new life as a hero in the nude, he was faced with the biggest obstacle of them all, other than his brother. He didn't anticipate the door. He didn't anticipate the loud thump, and the sudden darkness that ensued.
watChris had left him for one minute. Only one. When he went back to the bathroom, it was empty. That boy was a nightmare. He called out his name as he walked through the large house until he went downstairs. A naked body was flumped in front of the front door, knocked out. He supposed he should have put him to bed. Not without a couple of pictures, of course. This could have been used for blackmail material when Michael was old enough to be a real pain in the ass.
His last costume was the one that made Byron tell him to stop. He was going to ignore every single 'rule' that stated that he couldn't have dressed like a woman. Michael had found one of his mother's old bras, among other very personal items in his father's room. It wasn't anything he understood, anyway.
Knowing no one was going to be in the kitchen, he grabbed his costume and the bra, and scampered off into the kitchen. He searched through various round fruit, until finally, he found oranges. They were Thomas' favourite fruit, weren't they? Michael got undressed, and put on the bra, placing an orange or two in each cup. Then, he put on the costume. Now he was ready for his new role as Catwoman.
"Brother!" he ran into the living room. "I'm Catwoman!"
"...why do you have fake boobies?" Thomas asked.
"They're called 'breasts'. And I was wondering that, too," Chris added.
"I went in Father's room, and I found this weird thing. I put it on and put oranges in. ...Father's room is really weird if you look in his stuff," Michael frowned.
Chris was too stunned to say anything. Thomas simply laughed at him for a while. When Byron had returned and was informed of his youngest son's adventure, that was when he had to put a stop on him dressing up. But he was still allowed to watch cartoons, and collect figures. Eventually, he had grown out of this obsession.
Years later, Michael had found an old photo album. It was labelled with his name, with a bunch of superhero stickers. He had a terrible feeling about this particular album. He went to put it away, until he felt someone behind him.
"I think I remember that album," Chris said, before taking it out of his hands. "Yes, it's from when you had your superhero phase."
"Brother, please, give it back." The pinkette tried to reach for the book, but was too short.
"Perhaps we should all look at the photos together," the older brother said with a smile.
"No, please!"
"I'll gather Tron and IV."
Michael had his face buried in his hands as the rest of his family had fun mocking him. This wasn't funny! They looked through photos of him in various outfits, such as his Spider-Man one, where he and Thomas were standing next to each other and Thomas seemed upset about his shoddy outfit being ruined. It was all bad enough, until it got to the photo of him in the nude by the front door labelled as 'Daredevil'.
"I don't remember this one," Thomas said.
"You were taking a nap. I took a call for a minute, and I found him by the door, unconscious," Chris explained.
"Brother, please stop." Michael couldn't have handled more humiliation. The page flicked over to him in a Catwoman outfit.
"He stuffed a bra with oranges!" the middle brother complained. "Wait, what did you even find in Dad's room?"
"I don't want to talk about it please just stop."
"Gay porn, then," Thomas decided.
"I said we're not talking about this!" At this point, Michael was ready to curl up and cry.
"Yes, I don't want to discuss what was in there, either," Chris said.
The moment that damn photo album was put down, Michael had taken it upon himself to hide the crappy thing. Never again would anyone have found it again. God, that was just humiliating.