The coffee maker wheezed its final breath, leaving the acrid aroma suspended in the stale office atmosphere. I gazed at the broken cup, wondering if room-temperature goo counted as breakfast.
"First-day jitters, Nate?" Brenda, director of the Youth Center, leaned against the doorway, her tired smile warm. "Don't worry about it. Kids can smell fear, but they can smell honesty too. Just show up."
I nodded, pushing the mug aside. Be present. Easy for her. She had no DC multiverse of temptation and seduction whispering in her ear as she attempted to instruct agricultural science to teens. But simplicity had a strange appeal. A test without cosmic repercussions.
The bell clanged, impatient and harsh. Children congested the hallway—a whirl of backpacks and agitation. I ironed out my shirt, allowing a gleam of that natural charm to ooze through. Eyes widened by passing lockers. Whispers trailed behind. Not of Superman or fifth-dimensional malarkey. Just. Him. The new boy who seemed to have leapt from the cover of a magazine. Amazing how reality warped just on the fringes when I required notice.
My class was diverse: sleep-deprived teens hunching over the tables, one hyperactive kid jumping in his seat, and one girl furiously sketching, unaware of anyone else. I leaned against the whiteboard, dumping disdain on the lesson plan Brenda produced. "Agricultural science," I declared, "is actually magic. Do you ever wonder how Batman decides where to plant crops without destroying Gotham's skyline?" Pencils ceased scratching on paper. Heads raised. The artist looked up. I smiled. "Let's break it down." Soil chemistry became stories. Crop rotations became Gotham rooftops. By the final period, even the sketcher pulled out her notebook—Batman prevailing over a cornfield.
Lunch duty was chaos in motion. A juice box spilled became a pushing match by the trash cans. I didn't yell. Just walked between them, exuding calm like turning down a dial. The rage disappeared in an instant. "Deep breaths," I whispered. "It's just grape." The children blinked stupidly at their own regained calm. Later, helping to repair a fallen Lego castle, I had a child tugging on my sleeve. A small boy leaned in and whispered, "You make things... quiet inside." The naked honesty stung harder than any alien danger.
By mid-afternoon, Brenda cornered me by the supply closet. "Whatever you're doing," she said to me, glancing over at the abnormally attentive homework group sitting behind me, "keep doing it. They listen. They feel safer." Her words felt warm in my chest. This wasn't duty now. It was... real. Tangible. Seeing a reserved girl finally raise her hand, confidence ignited at my nod, tasted sweeter than warping reality. The dismissal bell sounded. Students waved, yelling "See you tomorrow, Mr. Nate!" Real smiles. Mine mirrored theirs.
I returned home flying low, treetop-hugging, enjoying the fresh fall air tingling on my cheeks. The Youth Center neon diminished, its din replaced by crunching leaves and city noises in the background. For once, the multiverse's incessant chatter was far away, irrelevant. This earthy high – assisting, relating, being – was a new form of power. I glided in softly onto my apartment balcony, resting elbows on the railing, allowing the serene contentment to stay, stringing it out.
The balcony door swung open before I could touch it. Kara was in the doorway, sun on the golden trim of her jacket. No playful smirk this time. Her eyes were warm and hungry, as if she'd been waiting all day. "You're glowing," she said, moving out, her fingers running over my arm – possessive, warm. "Metropolis treating you well?"
I shifted, the quiet of the Youth Center still within me. "It's... surprisingly good. Real." Her closeness had changed now – not only exhilarating, but charged. "Kar, you can't keep arriving like this. Clark has super-hearing, remember?" I attempted to sound cavalier, but the scolding was sincere. She merely laughed, a carefree, uncontrolled laugh. "Relax. I checked for bugs, heat readings, stray thoughts three blocks off." Her fingers mapped the S-shield under my shirt, across my chest. "Other than that," her breath on my ear, "who'd ever suspect the Girl of Steel breaks and enters some rookie hero's apartment?"
She kissed me hard, hungry, pinning me back against the frigid railing. I kissed back on autopilot – the spark of her lips, the ozone sweet scent of her flight – but recoiled abruptly. "Kara, wait." Her blue and bright confusion searched mine. "What's wrong?" She leaned forward again, but I clamped her shoulders hard in my hands. "Nothing's wrong. But this... Us. it's like listening to the same song." I waved vaguely towards the cityscape. "I spent today constructing Lego castles and not panic over soil samples. It was... solid. Real. Shouldn't we do something? Something new?"
She blinked, the proprietary warmth seeping into considerate questioning. A slow smile crept across her face. "You want an adventure." Not a question. Her fingers drummed my chest, playful once more. "Fine, Boy Scout. Forget Metropolis rooftops. Forget Earth." Her voice dropped to conspiratorial whisper. "How about we crash the party? Not just any party. The Legion of Super-Heroes' Founders Day Ball. Thirty-first century. Crystal spires, alien ambassadors, Brainiac 5 struggling not to glitch." Her smile grew ugly. "And they never expect uninvited guests."
My heart pounded. The Legion. Cosmic Boy. Saturn Girl. Lightning Lad. Names I used to mutter as a child reading old comic books. The sheer scope of it – a millennium ahead, legends I'd held as real people walking around. The peace of the Youth Center's idyll warred with the shock exhilaration of the impossible. "Crashing it?" I panted, already savoring the ozone of a time storm. "Won't they... you know, arrest us?"
Kara laughed, staccato and sharp. "Please. They'll screen us through as distinguished guests." Her eyes shone. "My cousin's name opens doors, even centuries ahead. Mostly." She exhaled softly against my jaw. "But just think of Brainiac 5's face when a Fifth-Dimensional being crashes in uninvited. Pure. Gold." Her fingers closed tightly around my wrist. "Ready?" I nodded.
The shift wasn't flight. It was a snap – the balcony shattering into ribbons of light, the city skyline stretching out, blurring, and then sharpening as crystalline spires that pierced a smurf-colored sky. My feet touched down on a platform of glittering energy, the air filled with ozone and something else, sweeter, like starlight turned to syrup. Kara landed beside me, already smoothing the cape with effortless cool. "Told you," she breathed, eyes gleaming with wickedness. "Honored guests."
But the platform sensors flashed red the instant my soles hit. Silent alarms flashed in the air – no noise, but a vibration that shivered through my teeth. Three Legionnaires materialized on the other side of the plaza, being shafts of light. Cosmic Boy hovered first, his magnetic field rippling like visible tension. Saturn Girl trailed, her telepathic touch lightly brushing my mind – a feather's weight touch that immediately flinched back like burned fingers. Lightning Lad sputtered alongside them, power snapping from his tightly clenched fists. "Identify yourselves!" he growled, his voice tight with distrust. "Unauthorized temporal incursion detected!"
Kara simply wrapped her arms across her chest, her lips playing with a smile. "Relax, Garth," she shouted, her voice the echo of a sound in the empty cavern. "It's just me. Bringing a friend." She nudged me forward with her shoulder. My fingers were relaxed at my hips, the S-shield jarring contrast to the plain buttoned shirt. Saturn Girl's eyes narrowed, her brow furrowed as she tried and failed to break through the surface of my mind. "He is... overwhelming," she breathed, her tone strained. "Like peering into a singularity."
Cosmic Boy leaned forward, his magnetic field still glittering on defense. "Identity confirmed: Supergirl, 21st Century. But him." He fingered me, his expression wary. "No records. No temporal signature. Just... void." Lightning Lad crackled testily. "Spit it out, then. Who are you meant to be?"
I met their stares, the tension thick as it was. "Nathaniel," I told them, simple and straightforward. "Fifth-Dimensional Entity." The words hung heavy. Saturn Girl flinched as if struck. "Not Mxyzptlk," I added quickly, seeing the momentary glint of fear in Cosmic Boy's eyes. "Not anarchy for sport. Consider... guardian. Of imagination." I laid a hand on the S-shield. "And I do mean it."
Kara stood beside me, confident. "He speaks the truth, Rokk. Scans won't help. This is beyond your tech." Lightning Lad sneered, sparks dancing across his knuckles. "Imagination? Fancy terms for trouble." Brainiac 5, though, materialized silently at their sides, his green glowing eyes drinking in data streams only he could see. "Interesting," he breathed. "Probability matrices are... fluctuating wildly around him. As if reality hesitates."
I felt their tension—a physical push against my skin. So I touched them, not forcefully, but with a gentle touch of sympathy. Cosmic Boy recalled at once his initial clumsy flight through the Braal's iron-hills, the lightheaded terror of flight in the face of gravity. Saturn Girl re-lived the sheer shock of feeling the surface thoughts of a stranger in an overcrowded marketplace, the sudden, overwhelming burden. Lightning Lad stiffened as the recollection hit: a child's storm, fists tightened up toward the heavens, daring lightning to strike him—and the impossible shock when it did. Brainiac 5 alone did not blink, but his equations perceptibly staggered.
"See?" Kara's voice was soft. "No illusion. Just a reminder where it all starts." She indicated the glistening spires that surrounded us. "This? Your fate? Built on moments like those."
Cosmic Boy was fully down on the platform now, his defensive glow vanishing from his magnetic field. His severe face eased into one of thoughtfulness, approaching wistfulness. "That... that's where my dad worked," he said, rubbing his palm with his thumb as if feeling the rough metal of his first flight harness. "He told me I'd crash. I did. Twice." A gentle, genuine smile teased his lips. "You pulled that from my own mind?"
Lightning Lad's sparks fizzed out entirely. He stared at his hands, curling and uncurling them. "No one knew about the storm," he admitted, his voice raspy. "Not even my sister. I was scared it'd kill me." He stared at me again, suspicion making way to resentful wonder. "How'd you do that without incinerating my synapses?"
Brainiac 5's silence finally broke, his voice sharp but curious. "Fifth-Dimensional resonance bypasses conventional neural pathways. It interferes the fundamental plane of subjective experience – the moment potential becomes identity." His radiant eyes fixed on me. "A demonstration, not an intrusion. Efficient."
Saturn Girl stepped forward, her initial nervousness giving way to expansive interest. "You showed us our sparks," she whispered. "But what motivates yours?" Her presence pricked mine again, but this time gently – not challenging. I let her feel the resonance: a dingy flat, low-rent comic strips spread on a worn carpet, the dizzy thrill of seeing Superman lift a car for the first time. Not power, but unbridled, childlike wonder. I didn't give it all to her – not the horny hunger Kara had sparked, not the queasy doubt as to where I belonged – only that hard, human core. "Imagination needs believers too," I said simply.
Kara elbowed me, her warm shoulder against mine. "Told you they'd get it." Her gaze swept the Legionnaires, alighting on Brainiac 5. "So? Founders Day bash still raging? Or are we standing out here all century?" Lightning Lad grinned, the final shreds of his suspicion dissipating. "Oh, it's on. And you," he touched me, sparks dancing harmlessly around the tip of his fingers, "owe me a beverage for that short mind-surf. We've got Tharrian fire-ale that'll melt the soles off your boots."
Cosmic Boy gestured towards a sparkling archway that had not been there a second before. "Welcome to the 31st Century, Nathaniel. Officially." Passing through it, the sterile platform disintegrated in a vortex of sound and color. The ballroom pulsed around us – a thousand tongues speaking words I couldn't recognize, the smell of exotic spice hanging in the air, beings with skin like crystal or wings that shone like colors gliding past. A holographic band played something that was recognizably jazz blended with starlight. Kara vanished into the crowd at once, exchanging cheerful nods with a tall, plant-bearded being wrapped in gossamer vines. I lingered at the entrance, momentarily overcome by the density of life.