I woke up with a gasp, memories that weren't mine flashed through my eyes, blinks and snippets of a life that I didn't even remember living. Fog clouded the earliest ones, childhood memories like learning to ride a bike or playing catch with my dad or running, screaming while a dragon burnt down my home with my parents still inside.

Wait, what?

But the memories didn't stop, they kept coming in like tide into a bay (no The Bay, Brockton Bay and why did that sound so familiar?) without stopping. I screamed. I screamed and I screamed until my throat was raw and tears poured out my eyes because it just wouldn't stop, and it felt like my head was splitting open from the weight of the memories.

It felt like hours had passed when the torrent stopped as suddenly as it came leaving me in pure blissful peace. When I finally opened my eyes after hastily rubbing the wetness around them away with the back of my hand, I found myself laying spreadeagle and half fallen out of (my) a bed in (my) a room. I pushed myself up until I was sitting on the side of the bed, legs stretched out in front of me still trembling slightly. Hell, my whole body was trembling just from remembering the pain that had only just passed. It wasn't until I looked up from my hands twitching on my knees that I noticed what else was wrong with the room. The grey concrete and sparsely decorated walls were all familiar, even though I had never been here before, but I had and I've lived here for years and –

I winced, head throbbing again as more recent memories flooded in. Coming home from school, some place called Winslow and with it I saw flashes of run-down classrooms and desks, tired eyes from teachers and students alike and an overwhelming wall of apathy. This body, my body and whoever I was… before, held almost no feeling for the place. God this was confusing, but as the last aftershocks of the headache trickled away…

CALM

A feeling of tranquillity washed over me, rising from deep within myself. And with it rose knowledge. My memories linked with, well, my memories; I was a 21-year-old university student from England, I am a 15-year-old American High Schooler. I was Kieran, I am Myles Everett. But there was something new in me, that hadn't been there for either version of myself.

Power.

Holy shit, I'm a cape.

xOx

Half an hour later and I was still sorting through all the information, staring blankly at one of the few posters I had on my wall and thinking how lucky it was my aunt wasn't home, staying over with some new boy toy or something instead of hearing me screaming in the middle of the night. Eidolon, greenish bodysuit, hood, mask and all flew in the air above Houston, captured in a photo with his cape mid flutter and arms at his side in a strong, powerful pose. It seemed that no matter what universe(?) I was in, the idea of being a hero never grew old. I knew that I as Myles had always had an interest in the 'Cape World', who wouldn't with superpowered people flying around everywhere. Especially when many of them worse skin-tight outfits. Hey, sue me, I'm a teenager again.

But now that I had the option, the ability to actually do it, could I?

With the knowledge of my (I guess past) life, I knew that I recognised 'Brockton Bay' and 'Winslow' from somewhere, and that memory of a dragon killing my parents… yeah that definitely rung a few bells. This was the world of 'Worm', at least as far as I could tell. Which unfortunately wasn't very far considering that I'd never actually read the damn thing. I'd only just started before this, whatever this was, happened and apart from a few wiki dives I didn't know or remember anything about it. Sure I knew about Taylor or at least what would happen to her at the very beginning and her power and such and a vague idea of what would – no, what could happen to her by the end. It wasn't great, in fact what I could remember was downright horrible. All I could remember basically boiled down to a few things.

The world is shit.

Most of the people in it are too.

And the big gold man is not what he seems.

I tried to imagine myself going out there, short cropped and uneven dirty blonde hair courtesy of my aunt's scissors in some bright looking spandex. That was far too much and I couldn't stop from laughing at myself. Definitely don't have the ass for spandex.

I rubbed my knuckles into my forehead in soothing circular motions. Of all the places to end up. At least I had powers I guess, and I had a pretty good idea as to what they were too…

Even through the walls I could hear things I couldn't before I woke up. Not even just my room's walls too, no it felt like I could hear far, far further than that. In fact, I had spent the better part of the half hour trying to work out how to turn the damn thing off. You did not need to know how many people there were getting busy in Brockton Bay at night I tell you nor… nor how many of them weren't willing.

I clenched my firsts, bones whitening against the skin. It really was a hell hole. Finally, after torturous minutes I had managed to pull it in, maintaining a much more reasonable sized bubble of hearing extending to just outside the small two-bedroom apartment I lived at with my aunt. It wasn't just my hearing that had shot up a ridiculous degree, my vision was beyond perfect, I could see motes of dust hanging in the air even in the dark with the lights off. When I looked out the window, I could count bricks on a building across the city. I felt strong, stronger than I could've ever imagined not that I'd tested it thoroughly inside my tiny room but I could pick up my bed with one hand without feeling any strain at all.

Hell I even felt smarter, my mind moving at speeds unfamiliar to me in either life. I don't think I could've handled the influx and merging of information nearly as well as I had without the boost. Even though I spent who knows how long screaming my head off, my newly acquired mental prowess told me without it my skull would have done an excellent impression of a watermelon meeting a sledgehammer travelling at near terminal velocity.

There was something else there too, buried in my conscious. Something to do with manipulation, of what I wasn't sure but before I could try to dive deeper into figuring it out, I heard heavy footsteps approaching outside in the corridor. Whoever it was out there wasn't even trying to be quiet even at, I glanced at the small clock on the cabinet by my bed, an ungodly hour of the morning. Heavy duty boots too, my mind provided me, all the same standard issue so an organised group. Police?

Gangs?

A knock sounded on a door, my door, like a bell toll I could almost hear it echoing. Alright, don't panic. Breath Myles. Breath. It could be anybody, there's no reason to suspect that someone is hear to kill you or anything.

CALM

Again, my emotions quieted as the feeling of something rolled over me, sweeping them away. The knocking came again, more insistent but this time I didn't feel any anxiety. How strange. Quickly but calmly I stood, not even feeling the chill of the floor even though I was certain it was freezing; we certainly couldn't afford to pay heating and I had many memories of waking up in the middle of the night shivering.

I shrugged on the thick long sleeve shirt that Myles I had worn yesterday, still musty after not having been washed for multiple days straight. It should have hung closer to my knees than my waist, and the sleeves should have obscured most of my hands but now it was much tighter around the chest and almost felt like it actually fitted properly. Was I taller too? I shook myself out of it, time enough for worrying about fashion later, answer scary group of people at the door first.

By the time that I'd slipped into shorts and opened the door the knocking on the door was closer to slamming and I could tell they were getting irritated. Crap, I took too long.

Hurriedly I opened the door, interrupting them mid-knock as I came face to face with a man in the distinctive blue overalls of the Brockton Bay Police Department. Over the top of it he wore a black bulletproof vest plastered with great white letters spelling out BBPD on the front. All his companions wore it too, I noticed. This kind of uniform was only common in these areas, at the Boardwalk or Downtown they wouldn't, much safer there I supposed.

The man himself had short-cut black hair, shaved at the sides and slightly spiked up at the front. With a start I realised that I was looking down on him, so used to being on even ground with other or below them. His arm is still up in the air, fist closed in mid swing to bang on the door.

"Can I help you?" I ask, voice level and unfamiliar. Even that changed? Where before I had a typical local accent, if lower class and before before I had a British one, now I had neither? Somewhere in between? It even sounded odd to me. Going to have to work on that.

He stared at me for a moment, almost uncomprehending. He blinked once, and then twice before slowly lowering his arm down to his hip, resting it on his belt only an inch or two from a holstered pistol.

"We got a noise complaint, sir," the policeman coughed into his hand awkwardly, "quite a lot of them actually. Is everything okay in there sir?"

As he spoke he his eyes flitted over my shoulder and he leant slightly back and to the side, putting some more distance between us while also trying to look behind me. I gave him a startled look, noise complaints?

Oh, the screaming. In the rush of realising that I was a cape now and trying to sort through the jumbled mess of memories I had forgotten my reaction at the time.

"Oh, ah," I chuckled lightly while scratching the back of my head, "yes that. Right. I had a nightmare."

He stared at me disbelievingly. So did his squad mates.

"A nightmare."

His tone was as dry as a desert and the disbelief in his eyes was fading to irritation and suspicion.

"That's right." I mentally clapped myself on the back for how calm I sounded. Way to go.

This time it was the man next to him that spoke up, "A nightmare that lasted for over an hour?"

I winced. Shit. What use is a super powered brain if I'm still a colossal dumbass?

"Yeah I was reliving some… unpleasant memories." I dropped the hand from the back of my head and looked away. It's not like it wasn't true. The house burning, people screaming my parents burning. Still I had to stomp on the sliver of guilt I felt at 'lying' to a policeman. Great start to being a hero.

I could tell the officer still didn't believe me, could see it how tense he was an how his fingers kept twitching towards the grip of his gun. Brockton Bay rwas the kind of city where I almost couldn't blame the police for shooting first and asking questions later.

"Could we come inside?"

It really wasn't a question.

xOx

Luckily it didn't take long to clear up the confusion. One conversation (read interrogation) later, a whole squad of police officers knew my sob story of my parents' death by Lung. By the time that day comes around and it's almost time for me to go to Winslow (not a school, never a school) my aunt still isn't back. It's not that unusual and I found myself glad that I could enjoy the relative peace and quiet of trying to work out my new powers without worrying whether my aunt would come back suddenly even if I could sense anyone outside the door; or worrying whether she would notice anything different about me. Kieran is me, Myles is me and neither are. What a mess.

Outside of investigating my powers, I had spent the rest of my time trying to work out when in the timeline I was using my limited, opening heavy knowledge of it. From what I could remember Taylor took down Lung very early, and there was bank robbery with Panacea in the bank? Neither of those had happened yet as far as I could tell. There was no news about it and nothing on PHO. I hadn't even decided if I should do anything about it. Big bad things are coming after all and I don't want to make things worse.

Neither have I decided on what to do cape-scene wise. Kieran had never physically hurt anyone on purpose, while Myles had gotten into a few fights. As few as could have been expected really, growing up in a place like Brockton Bay. Even worse, I could feel the strength thrumming over my skin. I'd heard about how much damage a normal unpowered punch to do, but a super powered one of unknown power? That was practically begging for an accident.

I frowned as I grabbed my tattered bag stuffed full of equally damaged textbooks and notepads and started on my way to Winslow. It felt like I was just arguing with myself in circles over and over again, I needed more information before I could decide anything. It wouldn't do to go running into things without know what I was hurtling towards.

First, find out when in the timeline I was. My phone told me it was April 5th, which I think meant that Taylor had triggered already (I was almost sick just thinking about The Locker, and yes it deserved capitalization, I couldn't imagine what it was like for her). Whether she had or hadn't wasn't really relevant to what I wanted though. A large part of me was tearing at the bit to try and just help her, even just be a friend but I had a feeling that would just be suspicious.

Secondly, I needed information on my powers. They felt absurdly strong but that could be how everyone it feels for everyone when they first touch on their powers.

I stopped in place, a thought occurring to me. I was so hung up on appearing a new universe, supplanting someone's consciousness (reincarnating?), getting powers and trying to decide what to do that I had ignored the far larger, more dire problem.

I was going to have to go through High School. Again.

Motherfu-

AN

So yeah this is a thing. First time I'm posting in a while and I don't really know what I'm doing. I haven't written in a long time and was struggling with inspiration so I decided to try out a CYOA. I'm not entirely convinced this won't turn into a power fantasy fic as I have been known to enjoy those but I'll try my best to keep it interesting. Any feedback is appreciated, even if nothing interesting has happened so far. Might come back and edit it later.