Uncharted Limits: America
Chapter 1
Spring was always the best time to be out. With a humid summer followed by an absurd hurricane season and a rather lackluster winter, the best thing North Carolina's got is the humble warmness and pollen-infested air of the bee season.
It's because of this that I'm currently out at the local dog park. Dustin—our old family beagle—was feeling a bit angsty, so I decided to take him out for a breather. I guess the new floorboards my dad installed in the patio were still an irritation to the poor fella.
I sat in one of the benches, watching Dustin play with a labrador. With how obedient he was, I didn't need to worry about Dustin going out of my sight. Could probably be the influence of a passive quirk, though I've heard that was nearly impossible.
This moment of solitude gave me time to think over some stuff, and unfortunately some stuff I'd preferably not think about. In two days I have a research paper due, one that I haven't even started. And my teach gave us a month to do it, so there's no way I could justify any of it. The best I could do is probably half-ass the first four pages, then try to figure out how to make a more convincing half-assery for the other ten.
Yeah, life wasn't feeling all that great at the moment. Maybe I could ask Ben for help. His quirk has to do with nature, so I could probably do some sort of research on that. And besides, he still owes me for that one time at the range.
"Mr. Blacksmith," I heard an aged voiced, and to my side I saw Mrs. Ronny, our granny neighbor, "it's a pleasure to see you out here. How's your family?"
"They're fine, Mrs. Ronny, and it's good to see you two," I gave a half smile as she sat down next to me. She had the same antiquish flowery perfume she wore almost everywhere. It matched with the floral blue dress she was wearing.
"You seem to be in thought," Mrs. Ronny kindly pointed out, "care to talk about it?"
"Uh, it's nothing really. Just some school work I'm thinking about," I dismissed her concerns, not wanting to bring attention to my own foolishness.
Mrs. Ronny chuckled. "It seems that schooling just continues to grow ever more challenging. I remember when I was in secondary school, we'd have only an hour's worth of studies before helping Pa in the farm."
A bit of a cliche, but I never said that out loud. "Must've been second to heaven."
"Mhmhm, don't be too dramatic Mr. Blacksmith, and don't take this as reason to slack off. This new society is'n need of sharp young minds."
'A bit late to that warning…' I thought to myself and gave a smile. But she did bring up a good point. With quirks just continuing to take up the whole population, it's getting harder and easier to put yourself out there. You want to be a doctor? There's no longer a fair playing field; if you got the quirk for it, you're almost guaranteed to get it. Same thing goes for every other field of work. Makes you wonder if it's even worth it to try.
Personally, I would've much preferred living in the pre-quirk era. Seemed to be fairer and safer than what we've got going around now.
With those thoughts in mind, I spent the rest of my afternoon having idle chatter with Mrs. Ronny.
"... and Ethan just won a big lawsuit last Saturday. He gave an amazing case, I sent the recording in the family chat."
Dinner was as moderate but comfortable as it could get. Dad, Mom, me, and my sister Esther on the high chair; we all ate at the circular dinner table, with a four-armed chandelier hanging on top. Following the same vibe, much of the house was filled with old-fashioned furniture and decorations, partly due to both my mother's taste and family heirlooms. It wasn't something that I would complain about, but we did stand out from the majority of our more modernistic neighbors.
My mother was, as always, bringing up the good news of my older siblings who moved out a long time ago. Ethan, the oldest of us siblings, was a recently new lawyer. Grinded out his bachelors and masters within five years, something that I could never dream of even fathoming.
"I couldn't watch through those hours-long recordings, Amilia," my dad said in a gruff voice. His bushy black beard was the cornerstone to his bear-like features.
"Don't be like that, sweetie. You know they only publish the highlights," my mom huffed with exasperation, though there was no malice, "you should try to have more interest in your son's work."
"All I need to know is that he's successful, and I'm fine," my dad concluded, taking a large bite of the pork belly. Woefully, we crossed our eyes. "...how's school been for you, Kevin."
"Uh, it's been alright," I said half-baked, unprepared for the attention.
"And what does alright mean?"
"Well… subjects have been good," I rubbed the back of my neck in thought, "just a lot of assignments… and a paper due this Thursday."
"Oh, look at that dear, we have a third scholar in the making," my mom happily said, clasping her hands together. Dad didn't seem all that impressed and was eyeing me suspiciously.
"...as long as you know what you're doing, then no problems with me," he took another spoonful and shaved it down in seconds, "but remember… I don't mess with that hero nonsense, you hear?"
"Yes, dad, I get it," I nodded without hesitation. One thing that Dad constantly reminded everyone is his dislike towards anything heroes. He has that old pre-quirk mindset on how society should run, and he considers all heroes to have some twisted form of a God-complex. Of course, that was not true for all heroes, but he never really gave any room for reason.
In any case, it wasn't like I was ever thinking of being a hero in the first place. That was all for the big city business, and our small town Cedar Field barely had any crime activity that needed anything more than the local police. And also, I just personally think being a hero is overrated. We've got too many of those nowadays.
The rest of dinner went smoothly. After finishing my chores and nighttime grooming, I was in my bedroom, seated at my desk. I figured I might as well type out something for me to start off with tomorrow, but I was hitting a heavy writer's block. I normally hated that.
'...I don't even remember what the prompt is.' I sighed to myself, opening a new tab on my computer and pulling up the assignment. The submission was a group thing, so everyone could see who submitted. I was one of the two remaining unsubmitted.
Fortunately, rereading the prompt reminded me how broad and open the instructions were (which would explain why it was such a large paper, but whatever). So I had some leeway with this. The easier thing to do would be to focus on something I already know, since researching was out of question. And that, of course, would be quirks.
Ben's quirk? No, even though I considered it, I already trashed that idea out. There was no way I could reach out to him in time, and even during school it'd be too hectic with other classes for me to pull up some time with him. The best I got was either my own quirk or some random half-assed research on other people's quirks. I already threw research out the window as well, so the only option I got is a paper on my own quirk. And that…
…that was a bit concerning. I guess many other people would be absolutely happy to talk about their quirk, but not me. It wasn't because my quirk sucked, but because of its nature and a… substantial factor of omitting information. In simpler words, my quirk was special in the fact that it did not match to what was described in my medical documents. Like, at all.
I'll spare the details, but I couldn't write a paper on 'false information'. Hell, I'd rather not even bring up the fact that my quirk was different from what everyone knew. With what I've discovered so far, it was better that everyone still thought of my quirk as they did. If my real powers got leaked, I could only imagine whatever fuckery would happen to me.
'...Yeah, lemme just go to sleep,' I yawned, closing my computer and heading off to bed. My head was pretty cloudy, much less dull. I'd much rather work on a clearer mindset.
Author's Note
Many thanks for reading my story! This is a new series I've decided to work on the sideline form my main series. I want to practice my writing more and My Hero Academia is another fandom I love reading from.
This first chapter is kinda slow, I know, but I just wanted to layout the foundations. I'm still figuring out where to lead this story, but from the title you could've probably guess by now that I'm trying to make a character who naturally has a quirk similar to OFA. And no, I don't plan on making this dive into a deep and dark route lol.
I plan on only writing up to 10k words for this story. If it gets more interest (lets say, five follows?) then I'll try to flesh it out even more. With that said, thank you once again and have a good day/night!