You can buy this story here: PowerCore Chapter 5
PowerCore Chapter 5 – Preview
By MagnusMagneto
1.)
After taking off, the process finally stopped.
As Kristi flew away from her home into the crisp, blue sky, her powerful mind tried to comprehend just what had happened. All she knew was that a massive stream of thoughts, memories, and emotions originating from her brother’s mind flowed into hers. At first it was like trying to parse a massive block of data – the disjointed thoughts and fragments of past events was overwhelming. She suffered through intense bursts of every emotion, and felt them as if they were her own. Still soaring through the air, Kristi clutched her head, and focused on trying to empower her mind enough to get a better grasp on things.
Of course, the PowerCore obliged, and her control over the situation increased with each passing moment.
Mental gains were the most difficult for Kristi to recognize. In general, her mind became a bit sharper, a bit clearer, and she could think a bit faster. These things all compounded in profound ways, but in truth, Kristi’s consciousness had difficulty accessing the full extent of her growing capabilities. In retrospect, she would liken it to having access to an ultra-powerful computer, but not knowing how to fully utilize it.
Soon enough, Kristi began to get a clear grasp on what had happened. There was no denying it: Kristi had absorbed a great deal of Josh’s memories; and her mind could effortlessly cycle through them with vivid clarity. In truth, she could relive and examine these past events with far greater clarity and precision than Josh could ever hope to.
Kristi had, in a sense, become Josh; or, alternatively, now held a great deal of Josh within her mind. The vast majority of this thoughts, memories, and dreams now lie within her. If she wanted to, with a bit of effort, she could bring up virtually any recollection and relive it.
This also meant that she had a clear picture of his full personality. Who he was inside – not the person he projected to the outside world. She saw a lot of dark, nasty things – though at the same time, had a profound sense of sympathy, as she now understood the context from which he felt these things.
Despite this frame of sympathy, Kristi still struggled with the sheer depravity involving some of these thoughts. Especially the ones concerning her.
As Kristi flew, her mind continued to process and sift through the collection of Josh’s memories. She found herself paying little attention to her surroundings. Absentmindedly, Kristi steadily increased her speed, traveling with no planned destination.
A flurry of emotions coursed through her as she continued to parse her brother’s former thoughts.
On one hand, Kristi didn’t realize how insecure Josh was. He felt bad about almost everything: his looks, hobbies, choice of school, living at home. In fact, Kristi had difficulty finding anything Josh was proud of – other than his tabletop war-gaming prowess, and she had just dealt a very real blow to that pride.
Kristi couldn’t help but feel guilty, and through his eyes, understood that her actions – which she thought were playful and sisterly—actually caused Josh real pain.
Still, despite this, many of the things she was coming across were difficult to come to terms with. Perhaps the most disturbing of all: Josh was absolutely enamored with super powered women. In particular, Edana; Kristi had to try her best to avoid what seemed to be a countless number of ‘self-love’ sessions fixated on Firebird…
Kristi didn’t hold her brother’s tastes against him per say, but it was still a very difficult situation to deal with given the circumstances.
Of course, this also meant that by association, Josh was struggling to deal with his emotions towards Kristi. It was undeniable that Josh was attracted to her, and and as such, she firsthand his utter shame, disgust, and self-loathing for occasionally slipping in thoughts of Kristi herself during those ‘Firebird sessions’.
And at the same time, Josh was terrified of her. Josh wished that Kristi never received her powers. In fact, Josh felt, in his own thoughts, literally anybody else on the planet would be better than Kristi! Even mom! I think… I dunno… anybody other than Kristi and mom! Oh jeeze, what about grandma? Well, at least she doesn’t friggan’ live with me! Kristi could feel that this even included girls from the past who had turned Josh away or ‘friend-zoned’ him.
This deeply hurt Kristi. Her own brother would rather see, in his thoughts, ’that bitch Marcie’ become the most powerful being in the world instead of her?
As Kristi’s temper flared, she began to fly faster. She steadily passed the sound barrier, and continued to fly faster… and faster…
She had become entirely numb to her surroundings and the wind blasting against her face. Instead she was entirely transfixed on thinking about her brother’s memories.
Mach 1 turned to Mach 2, which eventually changed into 3… and then 4…
Before long the sky had changed colors, instead of crisp and blue, it was now dark. She was no longer on the same hemisphere she had started on. Realizing this, Kristi abruptly stopped and started scanning her surroundings.
Despite floating thousands of feet into the air, while in pitch darkness other than the moon’s glow, Kristi could see with vivid clarity. She focused on enhancing her eyes even further. Just as she hoped, more power began to flow into her.
“If Josh thinks I’m too powerful now… well he’s in for a big surprise! I’ll show him! I’ll become so strong that even Balthezar looks like a weak little twig next to me!” She exclaimed to herself, more and more strength entering her form.
2.)
Kristi’s eyesight continued to improve. She could now precisely see the ground beneath her, despite floating a mile above it. Her focus sharpened further, and soon she could project her sight as if she were standing on the very ground beneath her. She zoomed out, and continued to scan the horizons. Soon her sight came across a mountain range.
“I’ll go let off some steam.” She reasoned to herself before jettisoning over.
–
Kristi stood on the dirt of an empty clearing. She was far out of sight of anyone, which meant that if she accidentally summoned too much power, nobody would be hurt.
She took a few deep breaths. This mere act alone caused a significant amount of wind to move, creating a distinct breezy noise. Despite her increasing intelligence, Kristi had difficulty understanding the sheer scope of her power. It wasn’t too long ago that she was a scrawny beanpole struggling to gain just a couple pounds of lean mass on her frame. Now she could… Kristi leaned back, demanded some more physical strength, and received it – all of her muscles increasing in size by about half of an inch. Just like that, Kristi could gain more muscle in an instant than she could have with months of dedication in the past.
Was it even responsible of Kristi to seek out this much power? It didn’t matter. She was going to teach Josh a lesson for not supporting his sister.
Still, gaining a bunch of muscle mass and physical strength was one thing. Kristi wanted to explore new avenues of improvement. She thought about her current abilities, and made a realization: if she could summon fire, lightning, and ice – and she could control wind created by her lungs enough to clean up the house… Then what if she focused really hard and…
Suddenly a strong breeze appeared, blowing her long mane of hair.
Kristi narrowed her gaze, and the wind picked up, gaining more strength.
How was this possible? Unless she was mistaken, Kristi was literally influencing the weather around her. She felt the familiar swell of energy gathering within her, as the PowerCore rewarded her further, granting her even greater abilities.
The current picked up even more, howling and screeching; sticks, leaves, and other small debris began to ascend from the ground – the gentle breeze was quickly turning into a hurricane.
While Kristi wanted to test the extent of her abilities, she didn’t want to inadvertently harm others by summoning too powerful a storm. She shifted her thoughts and focus to generating rain – dark clouds began to accumulate in the sky; her powers continued to grow to new heights, and after a few minutes of concentration, condensation began to fall from above.
As the gentle rain fell upon Kristi’s skin, she couldn’t help but smirk at how it didn’t bother her. Sure, she could feel it, and the sensation of being wet in itself was the same – but the cold temperature of the liquid had no impact on her.
Inadvertently, Kristi’s mind returned to the thoughts and memories she had accidentally stolen from her brother. She felt Josh’s fear upon learning his sister was now a Core Conduit; she experienced his envy, jealousy, and even desire to see his sister lose all of that. In turn, Kristi’s own anger bubbled to the surface. She felt betrayed: how could her own brother genuinely wish she lose these amazing abilities?
Kristi’s anger fed into her power – the clouds darkened further, and the rain intensified. With a half-thought, Kristi called down a few lightning bolts.
The entire process was surprisingly simple. Kristi was merely manifesting her elemental abilities on a wider scale.
She returned her focus on the rain. It began to pour downward, and Kristi’s tight clothing became thoroughly drenched as a result. She looked down at the garment: it was Josh’s community college sweat shirt. Suddenly a flood of his memories associated with it came to mind. His disappointment at receiving it for a gift. The way it reminded him that he was stuck at that school, and not the one he hoped to go to. How he couldn’t fit into it – along with innumerous flashes of Josh looking down at it, or gazing in to the mirror, sighing as it lazily hung from his skinny body.
Then came the memories associated with her. Kristi saw herself putting it on. She also saw herself through Josh’s eyes – Kristi hadn’t realized just how huge she was. Suddenly she felt a bizarre mixture of awe, admiration, fear, jealousy, and… lust. These were obviously Josh’s emotions, mixed with a few of her own. Then came a replay of Kristi undergoing a growth spurt, making the sweat shirt appear even smaller in comparison to her outrageous form. All of the prior emotions were amplified manifold.
This was all too much for Kristi. It was too weird. She felt a little less hard on Josh – seeing herself through his eyes was something else. She was so powerful! Still, she felt personally betrayed that he viewed her as some kind of monster.
Kristi returned her attention to manipulating the weather. While the rain on her body didn’t bother her, she wondered if she could exert more control over it. First she focused on the rain already dripping down her immense form. A few moments later, the droplets began to float off of her body, and remained suspended in mid-air. Kristi extended this control to create an invisible barrier around her, which caused all of the rain drops to bounce off of, instead of colliding with her. Finally, Kristi extracted the remaining rain from her soaked clothing, and then produced just enough heat to instantly dry the garments without damaging them.
Next Kristi wondered if she could lower the temperature of the rain enough to…
It worked.
A few moments passed, and the condensation turned from rain to snow.
Kristi stared up at the sky, and lowered the barrier she formed, allowing the snow to fall onto her. She languished for a while, spending a childlike moment with her creation; collections of the stuff gathered in the crevices of her rippling muscles.
Before Kristi could stare for too long however, a familiar streak appeared in the sky. A Core Conduit was headed right for her, and Kristi instantly recognized who it was: Edana!
(This is just the beginning of the story – get the rest by supporting the release below!
You can buy this story here: PowerCore Chapter 5