CHAPTER 01
The Meeting
People say that before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. That you reflect on all the things you have done in your life. I would just like to say that is a load of crap, but I shall get back to that later. My name is Maxs and this is my story. My life was simple; I was an average guy working as a detective for the Paragon City Police Department, or PPD for short. The Gang Wars between the Skulls, the Lost, and the Hellions had been Getting worse ever since the Vahzilok moved in and started kidnapping homeless men and women for experiments involving god knows what. The Bureau decided to enlist heroes to help with the case, because let's face it, humans with no super abilities wouldn't stand a chance in hell of taking down something that wasn't dead or alive. Anyway, I had been partnered with a hero from Atlas Park. He was a few inches shorter than me, about 5' 8" and had electric blue streaks in his black hair and shockingly blue eyes with a yellow tint to them. He also had an aura about him that crackled, as if electricity was coursing through his body. I was wondering what his abilities were, when he called out my name. I snapped out of my trance and smiled, slightly embarrassed. He smiled back and held out his hand, introducing himself. "Hi, my name is Samaeil, Sam for short." He said. "You must be Maxs, it's nice to meet you." I shook his hand, the hair on my arm sticking up as I did so. "May I inquire as to what your powers are exactly?" I asked. I released his hand and rubbed my arm, trying to get the hair to stay down. Sam looked at me and said, "I have the power of electricity and lightning. I can also manipulate magnetic fields to paralyze targets for a few minutes." He sat in the chair next to mine and put his hands together, interlocking his fingers.
I sat down behind my desk and turned on the monitor, moving it around so Sam could also see. I pulled up a map of Kings Row, the part of the city I worked in and pointed at the spot where the concentration of Vahzilok was the greatest. "Here is where we think the Vahzilok base is, a sewer system in the south eastern section. The problem is there is no way to get close without being spotted by them." I explained. Sam leaned in and scratched his chin, thinking about a strategy. "This will definitely be our main focus, but we need to take out some of the smaller groups first so that we can try and isolate where they are getting their supplies from and cut them off." I nodded my head in agreement and smiled. "You are quite the strategist, aren't you?" I asked. Sam looked at me and smiled as well. "Thanks, I have had quite a bit of practice strategizing, seeing as how I am a master at chess." I raised my Eyebrow and looked at him. "Really? I never pegged you as a chess person." He chuckled, placing an arm on the desk and leaning on it. "It helps to pass the time in between lab experiments, or at least it used to." He sighed and continued. "I am going to tell you the story of how I got my powers, if you don't mind listening to it." Maxs stood up, walking to the other side of the desk. Leaning in close, he replied. "Why don't we do this somewhere else, say my place? Tonight?" Sam looked at me and smiled. "Sure, sounds like a plan. Where do you live?" Maxs was surprised that he actually agreed to it, and I was also relieved that I had the nerve to ask. I sighed and stood up. "I live in Atlas Park, 1871 Grey Street. It's the northeastern section of that part of the city." Sam stood and smiled back. "See you then." As he walked out the front door, I sat back on the desk, my head working faster than I could comprehend. A few minutes passed and I got up and walked to my car. I got in and drove home.
I turned the key in the lock on my apartment door and waked in, kicking the door closed behind me. I set the grocery bags on the counter and emptied my pockets, putting my wallet and phone next to the front door. I took my gun off my hip and set it on the coffee table in the living room. "Hopefully my nerves will be under control tonight. Relax Maxs, just relax." I sighed and hopped into the shower, making sure I scrubbed good. I didn't want to smell like Kings Row, I wanted to smell like me. After the shower, I put the groceries away and started making dinner. I decided to make ravioli and tomato sauce. As everything finished cooking, the doorbell rang. I looked to the door and sighed, turning off the stove. I walked to the door and opened it, on the other side of the door stood Sam wearing a pair of jeans and a light blue button up shirt. "Wow." I whispered. "Please come in. I just finished making dinner." I backed away from the door as Sam walked in. "Welcome to my place, make yourself at home." I closed the door and walked to the counter, pouring wine into two glasses. After setting the cider back into ice, I walked to the couch and handed one to Sam. "It's Sparkling cider. I don't drink anymore, I am three years sober." I smiled and sat down, taking a sip and placing the glass on the coffee table. Sam looked at me, smiling. "This is a nice place, very homey." He took a drink and looked into the glass. "So what did you make for dinner? It smells really good." I got up and walked over to the stove. "It's ravioli, made it myself." I made up two plates, and walked back to the living room, handing Sam a plate. "Here you are." Sam smiled and took the plate. "Thanks."
After dinner, we sat on the couch and conversed for a while about life in Paragon City. There was laughing about funny stories and agreeing that this city was turning into the Rogue Isles very slowly, but at a steady pace. Sam looked at me and sighed. "I want to tell you a story. It is about how I got my powers." He sat back on the couch, clearing his throat. "I used to be a professor at the university in Steel Canyon. I specialized in electric currents and used tesla coils in all of my experiments." He paused as if he was reliving some dark memory. "One of my friends was a biochemist who was also working with electric currents and how they effect living tissue. He created a serum that had the potential to build up electricity and shoot it out at high concentrations, like a weapon." Sam took another drink and continued. "He was so excited, but he didn't have anything to test it on, so I volunteered. He injected it straight into my blood stream. For the first few minutes nothing happened, but then I started feeling strange, like every fiber of my being was on fire, I fell to the floor in pain." He started to shake, which got me worried about him, so I got up and sat next to him not sure if I should touch him or not. The static that was coming off him made all the hair on my arms stand up. "Are you ok?" I asked. "Yeah, I will be fine. Thank you." He looked up at me and smiled, his blue- yellow eyes shining. Before I knew what happened, he leaned in and kissed me. I was surprised at first, but then relaxed into it. When he pulled back he smiled. "Sorry about that, I've been wanting to do that since I got here." I raised an eyebrow and smiled back. "You should've done it earlier. Then again I should've done it earlier, but I was nervous." I nervously chuckled and scratched the back of my head. "So, how was the food?" I asked as I took the dishes into the kitchen. He smiled and stood, following me into the kitchen. "It was exceptional. Definitely one of the better meals I have had in a while." He walked up behind me, the hairs on the back of my neck were sticking up from the static. "I have a question to ask you, if you don't mind." I hesitated, washing the dishes off in the sink. "Ask away." He said. I turned to face him and found him right in front of me, barely an inch between us. "Is the static electricity always coming off your body or do you have a way of shutting it off? Not that I am complaining or anything, I was just wondering." He smiled that sweet smile of his and nodded. "I can turn it on and off at will, took me a while to learn that though, you should've seen me try to take a shower when I first got my powers." We both laughed and made our way back to the living room. Before we got to the couch, Sam gently backed me against a wall, one arm on the wall and one arm on my waist. "The first time I tried to take a shower with the static on, I nearly singed all the hair off of my body." I looked at him curiously, slightly smiling. "Have you tried to take one since you learned to dissipate the static around yourself?" He looked at me. "Actually, I haven't been brave enough to try, in case it doesn't work." I put a hand on his chest and walked him backward toward the couch, pushing him onto it. "We can worry about that later then. Right now I think I have a better idea." He smiled and pulled me onto the couch, right on top of him. "Guess we think alike, huh?" I asked. "I guess we do." He replied. What followed was an intense make out session that ended up leading to a bit of foreplay, definitely one of the highlights of that night. After about an hour or so of that, we both sat up on the couch. "You are a great kisser Maxs." Sam said. I looked at him and grinned. "Why thank you, I have learned quite a bit from movies. You aren't too bad yourself." He squeezed his arms around me and smiled. We sat there for a bit in each others arms, time passing slowly, as if we were trapped in the very sands of time. I dozed off sometime between 10 and 11 pm, comfortably in Sam's arms. He picked me up and moved me into the bedroom, laying me gently on the bed. He crawled in next to me and pulled me close, stroking my hair as I fell into a comfortable sleep.
Cut to the morning; I woke up feeling relaxed and looked next to me. Sam was still asleep. I kissed him on the lips and rubbed his chest, getting out of the bed. I changed into clean jeans and shirt, and then went to the bathroom to freshen up. I heard a knock on the front door before I got to the restroom. I walked towards the door. "Who is it?" I asked. I unlocked the door and opened it slightly. Then something happened that I didn't expect, there was a reanimated corpse on the front porch. I tried to close the door but the cadaver was way too strong. It forced its way in and came at me, I roundhouse kicked it in the head, but it barely did anything. After that failed attempt, a few reapers came through the door and swarmed me. Before I could say or do anything they injected me with something and I was knocked out. A few hours or so later, I groggily woke up and looked around. My vision was blurry as hell, and it smelled like rotten everything. The best I could tell is that the Vahzilok kidnapped me and dragged me down to a sewer for experimentation. This was just what I needed for a perfect ending to my life; to be turned into something neither dead nor alive. All I hoped for was that Sam would find me before I was beyond saving.