Force of Will #1: Making an Entrance

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The morning was a fairly calm one. No rain like the day before, and the sky had cleared up nicely as well. Dante couldn't help but smile a bit as he gazed out through his window, observing the city under the rising sun. With cars beginning to pull out of their driveways, people stepping out to retrieve their mail or walk their dogs.

“It's like the city itself is waking up.” Dante thought to himself, closing the blinds of his small window. “Everyone is collectively preparing for their day, one way or another. They're probably not even aware that everyone else is doing the same thing as them. Just focused on themselves, and immediate loved ones...” Stifling a yawn, the young university student moved through his apartment and gathered what he needed for the day. It was a Thursday, one of his easier and slower days, so he felt relaxed as he went through his morning routine.

Shower, brush his teeth, eat breakfast: which was usually waffles or a simple bowl of cereal. His parents only had so much money to help support his living in Fairborough City. Thankfully it was in northern New York, not too far from the border and his home in Ontario. If he desperately needed anything he could always catch a bus home.

That was when his cellphone started to ring. It sat at the opposite end of his kitchen table to where he was sitting, eating his cereal. Dante scooted his chair back so he had room to stand up, but he paused and stared at the phone.

He was home alone, after all.

With a small, child-like smile, Dante stretched a hand out and focused his telekinetic field. The process was one Dante imagined being unable to describe. He wasn't exactly hyper attached or aware of physical sensations: but if he had to liken the manipulation of his telekinetic field to anything it would be the stretching and multiplication of his hands.

As his field stretched it was as if he had more than just two hands. He could grasp and feel everything within the field's area. With a similar thought process to gripping the table with his hands, he could grip the table with his mind. And his mind's hands were much larger and far, far more powerful than his hands were.

Once his field reached the phone he gently gripped the device and pulled it towards himself, catching it with his physical right hand before turning the field off. The phone continued to ring: it read “Simon”.

“Seriously? Already?” Dante sighed before reluctantly answering the phone. “Hey, Simon. I-”

“Oh thank god you're awake!” As per usual Simon's voice was almost unbearably loud for the time of day. “Usually you're still asleep by this point so I was worried that...er, anyway, anyway. Listen, do you still have your psyche book?”

“Yes, but that's probably not the question you really need to ask.” Dante said with a small, amused smirk, as he continued to eat his cereal.

“Right, right. What I really want to know is if you still NEED it.”

“What happened to yours?”

“Do you really want to know the answer to that?” Simon's energetic tone dropped just a bit. Something felt off to Dante.

“Kind of, if you don't mind.” He asked, a bit concerned for his friend. Simon was a fellow psychology student at Dante's university, aptly named “Fairborough U”. The two became friends in their first year...three years ago. They were on their fourth and final year now, but if they really wanted to make it in their fields they would have need to accept a three year program in an advanced program at a more “prestigious” university.

Simon was a bright fellow, but he didn't always use that intelligence in the wisest way.

“So...okay, you remember Vivian?”

“How could I forget?” Dante admitted. Vivian was a dark-skinned, dark haired girl that was in their program. Absolutely gorgeous young woman, consistently scoring top marks to boot.

“She and I er...well, I kind of took her on a date. To a bar. Went well by the way.” Ohh, he was getting cocky now. Dante was going to make him pay for that one.

“I'd be jealous, but you don't call just to brag. You save that for face to face moments, probably because when you were young-”

“Just let me finish man! Please don't analyze me! You know I can never turn it back around.” This was true. When it came to analyzing people, really understanding them beyond what the books could teach him, Dante was definitely Simon's superior. He just always had that knack for understanding people, even with only a few cues.

“Fine, fine, but stick to the relevant points of your story then. No gloating.”

“Agreed already, sheesh...anyway, so, I left my school bag at the bar aaaaand...it's gone. The only things in it were my books, and the only book I REALLY need is the Psyche book. Just for a week man, just to copy down the stuff we'll need for our exam!”

“You know I'm taking the same exam as you, right? At the same time? I'm going to need the book as well.”

“Please man! I don't know what else to do!” Dante sighed and set his spoon down in his now empty bowl. He leaned back a bit in
his chair while contemplating a solution.

“...You said your date with Vivian went well?”

“Huh? Yeah, yeah it was great. We had an awesome time.”

“Then I might not be the criminology major you need to be talking to.” Dante could practically hear the cogs in Simon's head turn. He held his phone away from his ear whilst Simon burst out laughing.

“Williams, you are a freaking genius! Thanks buddy! I'll let you know how that goes at lunch today!” And with that Simon hung up.

Dante smiled a bit and set his phone down. He was happy and hopeful for his friend, but he really needed to focus on getting to class.

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After his morning routine was completed Dante stepped out of his apartment and made his way to the street below. His campus was about a 45 minute walk, but he honestly didn't mind that too much. The walk was fairly straight forward and the alternative was either paying for a taxi and sitting in traffic, or paying for bus and sitting in traffic...surrounded by thirty other people.

Neither option was all that appealing to Dante.

So the young man stepped onto the street, carefully pulling his the hood of his black hoodie up and adjusting his red scarf. The scarf as a favourite of his, and he planned to wear right until the warmest spring weather rolled around.

His phone went off again. He had set the ringer to “vibrate”, so all he felt was a strong vibration in his pocket. He let out a small sigh before pulling his phone out. He was always willing to look at a message or text as soon as he received her, but mornings didn't allow him for the private reflection time he generally desired on a daily basis. Getting phone calls or texts in these mornings didn't necessarily help with that.

Of course, predictably, it was a text from Simon. It read: “Thnx again man! Gret idea we decided to study togetherr!”

The grammatical errors were likely because Simon was in a rush. Excited from Vivian's response to his dilemma and panicked about being late to class.

Still, Dante couldn't help but smile to himself a bit before replying: “Lol np man”.

Putting his phone away Dante took in the sights of the street, which was far less sleepy than it had been when he first observed it that morning. The road was loaded with cars eager to get to work, school, or whatever establishment their drivers needed to be at. Sidewalk was also busy, but there was plenty of walking space for Dante. He gently slipped his ear buds into his ear and began to play music, making his way down the sidewalk.

Though the song that came on was a favourite, his mind lingered not on the lyrics or the music. Instead he was contemplating his future. What was he going to do when he graduated? Move right along to get his masters in psychology and criminology? His powers, his gifts, were always something he tried to factor into his future. They hadn't done much for him in the past, with how limited he was in his freedom to use them.

All they did was leave him feeling a little isolated, internally. Nobody he had met growing up was the same as him. More and more “special” people were getting exposure through television. Some of them acted like heroes from those cartoons he watched as a kid. They even dressed up in costumes and capes. Some of them used their powers for to their own ends, spreading fear everywhere they went.

Some people just wanted to live their lives and use their powers freely, hurting people no more than average human would. You could argue they were wasting their gifts, but why were they obligated to use them for good?

Dante had always wanted to find a safe way to use his powers to help people, but his parents never wanted the world to know that he had them. They didn't want him being targeted by anyone nefarious, or even pressured by one of the more “heroic” organizations in the world. Dante understood all of this, but what he didn't understand was why it couldn't be just a bit simpler. Why couldn't he just help?

That's part of what led him to study psychology and criminology in the first place. Understanding people, understanding the human mind, was fascinating to him. Not necessarily the human brain, the neurological science behind that was not nearly as interesting, but how humans perceived things. If he could understand all of that, maybe he could use that knowledge to help.

“Oof!” Dante was snapped out of his thoughts when he bumped shoulders with an older woman. The woman stumbled but did not fall, as Dante reached out to grab hold of her gently, helping her catch her balance. “I'm sorry about that. Should watch where I'm going more.”

“Hmph. Yes, you should.” The older woman said little more as she kept on down the sidewalk. Dante frowned ever so slightly. He had apologized, and besides it wasn't as if she had moved out of his way either. Still...best not to dwell on it.

After all, something far more jarring was about to take place that day. Right as Dante neared a bank about halfway between his school and his apartment.

[Deleted]

“Nobody ever wakes up anticipating the actual worst. Sometimes they imagine a worst case scenario for themselves. Sometimes that comes true. But it's never anywhere near the worst thing that could actually happen to them. Maybe they woke up dreading the thought of failing an exam, but they sure didn't wake up thinking that they might wind up taken as a hostage, or that they might lose their life.”

-

“Everyone get down on the ground!” The speaker roared out, raising his hand to the ceiling and firing a few rounds from his machine gun. “Now!”

The people in the bank, the unsuspecting victims of this heist, screamed and scrambled onto the ground. Children clinging to their parents and parents clinging to each other, shaking and trembling with fear and shock. The masked speaker was not alone, several of his colleagues appearing from various corners of the bank, guns at the ready.

Of course the bank employees did not have the luxury of simply lowering themselves to the ground. One brave clerk was quick to hit the panic button, swiftly alerting the FBPD* about the situation. However the speaker and apparent leader of this group caught on quickly, noting the clerk's arm bent beneath her counter, and without a word he put a bullet in her head, prompting further screams of horror from the citizens.

“Hey shut up!” One of the speaker's henchman cried out, firing more rounds into the ceiling as if to add some extra punch to his point.

The speaker surveyed the remaining bank clerks. They had a good few minutes to accomplish their goal and escape before police intervention, and they had taken care of bank security before revealing themselves. All they needed to do now was act swiftly.

“All right...you!” He pointed his weapon at a young male clerk. The man was nervous, terrified even, and his eyes widened as he felt the cold metal of the gun's muzzle on his nose. “Stand up, and take us to the vaults. Now!”

-

Dante's favourite song finished. His hand hovered on his phone in order to skip back and listen to it again, but as he stood at yet another red light, he decided against it. The young man would hate to have his current favourite song become one he was sick of. He used to do that all the time when he was younger. Binge listen the tunes that he really loved, until he became tired of them.

The redhead scouted around as the lights turned green. At first glance everything seemed fairly normal. He walked past this street almost every morning for the past year or so. However it didn't take long for the boy to notice something amiss.

A crowd had formed outside of “RBA”, the local “Royal Bank of America” branch. Odd...the bank was rather large, and it never really had line-ups. Dante's eyes widened, however, when the bank's glass was shattered by a storm of bullets from within. Some of the crowd were struck by some stray gunfire while the rest scattered, screaming like mad as they ran away.

Dante's heart raced. This was it, wasn't it? This was the time. He had these gifts and it'd be a crime not to use them. But...

“Hurry up! Let's go!” A man with a black ski-mask pulled over his face leapt out of the window, nearly landing on a woman who was hit by one of his bullets. Dante felt as though he swallowed his tongue when he saw the weapon the man was carrying. It wasn't just some sort of handgun. It was large, looked like something a soldier would be carrying. Dangerous, incredibly dangerous.

Behind the first masked man came four more, dressed identically to him. So if Dante stepped in it would be 1 vs 5. And their weapons...did he really stand a chance? Dante's powers were strong, but limited. How much gunfire could his barrier block? How did he clear that range or distance?!

And his identity. Good lord his identity! He could just start hurling things with telekinesis at them, unmasked. Yet the young man had no time to waste.

Dante tugged his hood over his head and pulled his scarf up to cover the lower part of his face. It was the only idea he really had, what with no sort of costume or mask or anything proper to hide his identity.

“Sorry, mom and dad.” Dante thought to himself before carefully making his way to the masked men. They had made their way from the shattered bank window to a white armoured vehicle parked fairly close by, slowed down by the canvas bags they had to heft behind them. The bags were carelessly stuffed with stack upon stack of dollar bills. They must have moved pretty fast, as Dante couldn't even hear any police sirens.

If he didn't stop them, odds were these thieves were getting away.

“Let's go already! Move it!” The first man out, apparently some sort of leader, barked out from underneath his mask.

Dante continued to move carefully closer to the masked men, the chaos of men and women running away from the scene doing wonders to hide his approach. Ten meters. His first goal was to disarm the men, take away their guns. But to do that he had to be within ten meters of them. If he couldn't get that close he'd have to resort to throwing things at them that were within that range.

His heart was racing now. Almost too fast. If Dante didn't know better he'd thought he was having a heart attack. But that wasn't it at all. This was adrenaline, fueled by fear. His legs wanted to turn him around and run. But his mind...

“About 12...okay...okay...now!” Dante reached a hand out, expanding his field carefully. Sure enough three of the five men were within range, and with a swift pull of his hand he ripped the machine guns right out of their grips. Dante could feel the cold metal of the weapons, each groove and nick of them being grazed over by his psychic field. His mind was analyzing them, breaking all this information down rapidly, and before the men could even react he had learned how to disable the weapons.

“What the hell?!” The leader cried out as he watched three machine guns, floating in mid air around a young, hooded man, seemingly disassemble themselves. “Damn...is he one of those freaks?” Without waiting for a response the leader gripped his weapon and opened fire on Dante.

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Dante didn't hesitate to retract his barrier from max range close to minimum, his range of influence and information shrinking rapidly. Visually it was horrifying: at max range his barrier had stopped a few bullets, but even though he was consciously retracting his barrier the sight of those bullets slowly approaching was almost enough to make Dante's knees tremble.

As soon as he felt the impact from the first bullet fired at him he knew that, at max range, his barrier wouldn't be able to hold off a full salvo for long. It was too stretched out and too thin. So he pulled his barrier closer and began to run for cover. Anything would do, really, so he made for the nearest car, bullets bouncing off his psionic barrier as he made his sprint.

“Holy...okay, I'm actually doing this. I'm actually doing this. So I need to think, and think fast.” Adrenaline was in full gear now as Dante's heart and mind raced. He disarmed three of the five robbers. He needed to restrain them and secure the money they stole...right? How could he do with that without causing too much harm to anyone? Too much damage to any property?

Dante cursed under his breath as the sound of bullets pelting the car he was crouched behind reminded him that it was a bit late to worry about the whole property damage thing, and frankly he didn't quite have the luxury of worrying about somebody's car that very moment.

Instead...yeah, he could do this. Dante placed his hands on the car's rear end, focusing his barrier strictly on his forearms and hands, before giving a mighty shove towards the robbers. Heavily boosted by his telekinesis the car shot forward, forcing the thieves to scatter before it slammed into the side of their armoured truck.

There, he had a window and he needed to use it. Dante sprinted towards the nearest thief, one that he had already disarmed. The man had leaped onto the sidewalk to dodge the car, and before he could get up Dante drove a barrier enhanced fist straight into the side of his head. The force wasn't nearly the same as what the had used to push that car, but it was certainly enough to knock the man out cold.

“One down...four to go.” Dante turned around and quickly expanded his barrier outwards, just to three meters. It should take a few bullets at that range but gave him some options as well, but unfortunately there wasn't anything he could really use as a weapon within three meters.

The other thieves began to gather towards the armoured truck once again, so Dante rushed forward, expanding his barrier further before once again pulling away their weapons: the remaining two machine guns. He didn't bother disassembling these ones, though, and hastily tossed them aside before bringing his barrier back to minimum range.

The robbers looked dumbfounded, their heads turning towards their leader, who cursed loudly before opened the door of his armoured truck. “Just hold him off and load this thing up, all right?!”

“Yeah right!” Dante ran forwards, his body covered by his barrier, but was met with a front kick from one of the robbers. He was wearing steel-toed boots, and any other human Dante's size would have been completely winded from the blow and brought to their knees. Instead Dante felt no pain from the kick at all, his barrier absorbing the blow, but unfortunately he wasn't immune to the kick's force. His barrier was too close to his body and he still staggered back from the blow.

The other two robbers charged forward, tackling Dante to the ground. Again, no pain, but he was still caught off guard by it all. The two masked man began to wail on Dante, throwing elbows and fists alike down on him while keeping him pinned. His barrier was in it's strongest state, and regular human strikes weren't quite enough to weaken it like this, but Dante still struggled beneath them. If he expanded his barrier to push them off he'd risk getting actually hit, and he didn't know how well he could maintain the barrier when faced with real pain.

However he could hear the engine of the armoured truck start. The leader was going to get away if he didn't act fast!

[Deleted]

“I've never been the kind of guy to really dwell on the meanings of memories. There's value in the past, I know, but I'm usually a bit more forward thinking. To me the future is always more valuable, because it's the future that my actions can change. I need to see it for myself before it comes, so I that I can be as prepared as possible.

That said...every now and then, it's okay to let a memory guide you. No matter how silly, or how simple. The past exists for a reason: to learn from”

-

Desperation and anger began to swell within Dante as the thieves continued to batter his telekinetic field with their blows. The armoured truck was beginning to drive away now, and if it escaped then his actions would have been for naught. Dante mustered up his focus, putting all of his energy into hardening the field before rapidly expanding it to maximum range, launching both men several feet into the air at different angles.

The men cam back down to the earth after a few seconds, one landing on top of a nearby car with a loud thud, the other slamming into the wall of the bank he'd just helped rob. Both of them unconscious.

There was no time to hesitate. The young man got to his feet and started to run down the street after the van. If this was restricted to a simple foot chase he'd lose the van in less than a minute. It was out of range of his barrier, far out of his range. Thankfully there were no other cars driving along the road, most of them had stopped and turned away when the drivers saw what had happened to the bank.

So it was just him and the van. All he needed to do was find out how to stop it. If couldn't grip onto the car with his telekinesis he'd have to...

Dante's gaze fell upon an alley he had just sprinted past. A large, green dumpster was visible.

“Dad, it's okay. I'm not that great at scoring, so I just play defense. I don't mind.”

Could he do it?

“That's no way to think. I mean, it's great that you have a role you prefer, a role you know you're best at, but limiting yourself to that is just robbing you from other experiences. Why not develop new talents?”

Dante ran closer to the field. 15 meters...12...

“But others do it better? Shouldn't I just...I don't know, leave it to them?”

“You could, but learning something new doesn't take away from them. Doesn't take away from you, either. It just...it adds new possibilities, son.”

“So, pay close attention to what I do.”

10! He kept his field at maximum range and put all of his focus onto the dumpster. At max range his telekinesis was at it's weakest, and moving something so heavy...he'd never tried it before. “Come on...come on...” Dante grunted under his breath as the dumpster shook from the pressure he was applying to it. It was a sensation akin to lifting the heaviest set of weights your biceps could handle, just all of that pressure, heat, and pain wracked his whole body instead. Especially his mind.

“Just take a few steps back, keep your eyes focused not on the ball, but where in the net you want to kick the sucker into.”

With a roar Dante managed to rip the dumpster from it's spot, sending the large green object sliding across the ground towards him. He brought his field back to it's minimum range as quickly as he could, focusing all of it into his right leg.

“When you've got the shot all lined up...”

Dante took a few steps back, his gaze firmly fixed onto the back of the armoured van. It was now or never.

“Let it FLY!” He said aloud, running forward as the dumpster crossed in front of him. Dante drove his leg into the dumpster as hard as he could, the force behind his kick such that the dumpster wound up dented where he struck. So much force went into the kick that Dante fell backwards afterwards, using his elbows to prop himself up and see for himself whether he was successful.

The dumpster soared down the street, bouncing across the road when it came back down. It tore up the street wherever it touched, debris and chunks of asphalt shooting upwards from each bounce. Sure enough, though, before the van could turn down the next street, the dumpster slammed straight into the back of it with enough momentum to knock the van onto it's front bumper, coming down on it's back as it, and the dumpster, slid across the road.

“WOOHOOO!” Dante pumped a fist into the air and screamed out, the adrenaline that had filled his being truly getting the best of him now. He couldn't believe he actually did it!

...Sadly, he didn't have much time to celebrate. Past the pounding of his own heart, Dante could hear sirens approaching, getting louder and louder. He looked over his shoulder to see a crowd had formed at the other end of the street, closer to the bank.

He couldn't stick around.

Dante scrambled to his feet and ran into the alley way he'd found the dumpster in. Hastily he tore his hoodie off and tossed it aside. He nearly did the same for his scarf, but rather than throw it out he instead shoved it into his knapsack. It hadn't been as visible as the hoodie would have been, right? He could still keep it, just...he ought to wear it wisely for at least the next few days.

Dante glanced over his shoulder to see if the cops would follow him into the alleyway. Evidently not...

...

Oh crap! He was late for class!

[Deleted]

Dante huffed and puffed as he pumped his legs, steadily making his way through the trail that snaked through to his campus. His heart was racing with adrenaline once again, but for a much different reason than earlier. Far more normal and natural, really. He was exactly 20 minutes late to his first course that day: and he really didn't want to have to play catch up with any courses.

Bursting through the doors Dante slowed his sprint to a mild jog, not wanting to be scolded not to run through the halls by anyone. He sped up whenever the coast was clear, though, weaving down the halls and finding his way to his classroom.

Dante reached the door, grabbed the handle, and took a moment to catch his breath. Compose himself. He was already fairly worn out from the battle earlier. If he stressed himself further, well...he had no idea what could happen, frankly. He'd never exerted his powers that much...ever. Funny, that. Though extremely fatigued from the battle and the sprint that followed: Dante felt perfectly fine.

So with that Dante opened the classroom door, took a few steps into the room before he felt his legs wobble. “Oh cr-...” He didn't get to finish the thought, his mind blanking out. The last thing he saw was the floorboards rapidly approaching.