High school is a pain, no matter how smart you are or how popular you are, being a high school student can be a real pain in the ass. You'll go insane if you don't have some way of destressing, even geniuses need it. And this is where the greatest day of the week comes in; Saturday, what would the world do without it? It's perfect for going on shopping sprees, or having paintball wars, or just watching a movie with your friends, six geniuses did exactly that(not all three,— that would be insanity —just the last one).
"This, is awesome." One of the friends said after pausing the movie. He was a red haired kid with similarly red framed glasses perched on his pointed nose. He wore a perpetual expression of excitement this time directed at the movie he had to pause because his best friend went to the kitchen to get snacks.
"Hurry up Javièr, You're missing the awesomeness of General Hardlight." Another boy called, he was much better built and had dark brown hair and a face of comfort and eagerness to continue the movie, though not as defined as the redhead.
"Would you keep your panties on Lucas, if these drinks spill, that's another five bucks you owe me." Javièr responded from the kitchen, raising his voice slightly to be heard.
The five other friends in Javièr's living room laughed a bit at Javièr's retort. A blonde in the room, seated across from Lucas said, "You might want to start paying up your debts Lucas, you can't solidify light into money like the General."
A brunette girl with Lucas' arm wrapped around her speaks up, her brown eyes sparkle with amusement. "Lay off him Julia. He may not be able to fly, or lift immense loads, or use light energy so awesomely-"
"Can you please get to the point babe." Lucas says, A bit uncomfortable.
"What she's trying to say is, even though you're no Hardlight, you're certainly no Sack, and that alone makes you alright." Javièr says as he walks into the room, a tray holding six glasses of orange juice balanced on his left palm and with the other, he held a large bag of potato chips.
Javièr held out the tray for everyone to pluck a drink from, when he got to Sack, he received a lighthearted glare and a, "some best friend you are."
When he turned to the raven haired girl sitting on a bean bag next to Julia, there were only two glasses left, he took one for himself and got down on one knee, extending the tray to her.
She only smiled and said, "yes of course Javi, of course I'll drink it."
The friends laughed again.
"Leave it to Vanessa an Javièr to be over the top" Lucas said.
"Oh hush, you. Why can't you do the same for Charlotte?" Vanessa shot.
"Maybe because if he doesn't want to give her a heart attack every time he gets on one knee. We all know he could never afford a ring if he keeps Javi around." Julia answered.
"Can someone press play already? Watching you is entertaining and all, but I'd rather watch someone move things and beat guys up with light." Sack interjected.
Charlotte untangled herself from Lucas and pressed a the play button on the virtual panel on the coffee table. "Happy?"
"Very." Sack answered. As the movie continued he noticed Charlotte back in Lucas' arms, Vanessa snuggled under Javièr's, he felt a pang of jealousy at that, but immediately buried it. He glanced at Julia next to him, raised his arm, but before he put it around her, she said without looking at him, "Try it Sack, and I'll rearrange your anatomy."
Javièr, understanding, sent a comforting smile to his best friend.
On screen, as General Hardlight is being himself, blasting people with photon beams, Charlotte said, "you should try doing that sometime Lucas."
"I would if I knew how." Lucas replied.
"It's just physics." Javièr explained.
On screen, Hardlight blasts twin photon beams at oncoming missiles. "You're going to compare that with nerd stuff."
"Everything he's doing can be explained and done, with physics. Vanessa, back me up here." Javièr said
Vanessa just shrugged. "I guess. Ask Sack, he and you are the physics nerds."
Javièr looked at Sack, asking with his eyes for support in the land of Nerddom.
"Yeah, it can be done. Maybe you can do it Javi, be the next General Hardlight." Sack said.
Lucas and Charlotte stood up then, since the movie was just about over, credits started rolling seconds after. "Good luck with that, Sack is more likely to have a girlfriend before that happens."
"Hey!" Sack exclaimed.
"All I'll need is to establish interference between electrons and-" Javièr was cut off by Lucas.
"Nerd stuff is rated Ar you know," Lucas started
"For we Argon." Charlotte finished, before they smiled and left through the front door after saying their signature sentence. And then they were four.
"I'll be leaving too guys, I actually have a social life." Julia said, also getting up to leave.
"Yeah, us." Javièr said.
Julia rolled her eyes before leaving as well. And then they were three.
"Zachary, Vanessa, can we talk for a minute?" Javièr asked. The people he spoke to gave him their undivided attention, because it was a rare moment, Javièr being serious. He hadn't used Sack's real name in almost four years, so to hear it know showed the gravity of his next words.
"What Zachary said got me thinking. We could actually pull off recreating General Hardlight's powers. Zach and I can handle the physics, Vanessa, you can take care of the biology, making sure it's compatible with our bodies and stuff like that."
"You're actually thinking of pulling this off, maybe you had a bit too much orange juice." Zachary said with concern.
"I'm not just thinking about controlling light. With our combined IQ, we can control just about every aspect of physics, just imagine, the power of physics, properly bent to the will of man— it's the ultimate science experiment." Javièr said enthusiastically.
"If you're a hundred percent sure about this, I'm with you, let's take this crazy idea of yours out of your head and into reality. We got this." Vanessa said, holding Javièr's hand and giving him a warm smile in support.
"I'm in if you can come up with a cool name for this." Sack said, pushing up his glasses and raising an eyebrow in expectation.
"It should be something Spanish, since the language is so much cooler than English, no offense." He said the last part to Sack.
"None taken." Was Sack's reply.
"How about we call it Project MADEF— Mando Del A Fisica— Control of the physics." Javièr suggested.
The friends agreed, and so it became their mission to make Project MADEF realized. It took eleven years, but they did it. A lot happened between that time, Lucas and Charlotte got married, had kids, so did Javièr and Vanessa, who also had a kid. Lucas was right though, Sack did get a girlfriend before MADEF worked, several in fact, but they never worked out.
All that happened, and even though it took years, with the resources available since being employed by SOSRAC, a Scientific company powerful enough to be called a country, the three friends did it, Sack and Vanessa helped a bit, but Javièr did most of the work, so he got the recognition for it and got ready to present it to the Heads of SOSRAC, A team of four, slightly aging, imposing men and women. They were difficult to impress, luckily, Javièr Hernàndez, with his glowing resumè, is difficult to not be impressed by.
He sat in his lab, going over his notes again to make sure he covered all the existing data he had on his device, he didn't want to experience any mishap, during the first use of MADEF in front of an audience.
"Alright, the neural link is firmly established, I don't think another quick test could hurt." Javièr was saying to himself.
"Do my eyes deceive me?" A male voice asked in amused disbelief. The owner of said voice walked in right after his words. Into Javièr's view came a man of average build and height, sporting a lab coat buttoned all the way to the top and blue jeans under. Javièr wore the same, but his jeans were slightly darker, just like his skin in comparison to Sack's, it was more bronze than white, he was Mexican after all.
"Javièr Hernàndez, stressing over a presentation, an I thought I'd seen it all." Sack said, smirking at his best friend.
"It's good to see you Sack, or should I call you boss?" Javièr replied, smirking as well.
"We've been over this Javi, I'm only the head of the physics department because you don't want to be, if you did, you'd be the boss, not that I'd call you that." Sack answered.
"I was considering another test for MADEF." Javièr said, changing the subject.
"You've worked out the kinks already, we don't need another test, besides, Vanessa isn't here." Sack said.
"It was going to be a quick one." Javièr tried weakly to convince Sack.
Sack remained firm. " It's not necessary. Who postulated the metallic reduction theorem? Who utilized Javièr's Law of Photomagnetism to create a functional tracking system? Who decided to take control of physics instead of merely study it?" Sack asked.
"Some dude called Javièr I guess."
After a brief period of silence during which Javièr smiled at his supportive best friend, he said, "thanks for coming Sack, I was about to have a nervous break down. Por qué siempre has sido mi mejor amigo."
"De Nada Mucho." Sack replied. (It's nothing much). "By the way, the Heads are ready for you."
Javièr blinked, then picked up a chrome sphere on the table, slightly larger than a tennis ball with a small black screen on one side. "I'm going to give you two seconds to come up with a good reason for why you didn't tell me this first."
"I don't need it, I can run away." Sack replied, and did just that. He high tailed it out of Javièr's lab before he could do anything.
Javièr considered bringing the research papers along with him, but decided against it; they were unnecessary anyway.
He left his lab with nothing but the sphere and arrived at P-Room 6— Presentation Room, not to be confused with the lavatory, the pee room— there, he was confronted with the stares of four aging heads, who made up the heads of SOSRAC.
Javièr cleared his throat silently before he began, "Esteemed ladies and gentlemen, what you will witness today will revolutionize science as we know it. I present to you, Project MADEF. It will enable the user to control energy in nearly all its manifestations with a thought. Observe."
He placed his thumb on the black screen, and projected his thoughts clearly to the device, saying to the Heads, "Gravitational Energy."
Javier was levitated off the ground, but the Heads stayed rooted in place.
"Electrical Energy." Javièr said. Following his words, A miniscule Thunder cloud accumulated above his head, electric discharge took place within it and a flash of lightning shot out, aiming for his head, before it connected, it was halted by a magnetic field.
"Magnetic Energy." Javièr said, referring to the shield that saved him from certain death. "Just wait until you see the next ones. Heat Energy."
He cancelled the gravitational field holding him in the airs and as he fell, A column of fire rose up from the ground and engulfed him, the flame pillar obstructed him from the view of the Heads. When he landed on the ground, unharmed, the fire forward to the heads before drastically dropping in temperature and becoming cool breeze.
"Sound Energy. Want to hear the National Anthem?" Javièr asked.
Immediately, the melody of SOSRAC's signature song started playing by his left. "How about in reverse?"
The same song played in reverse played on his right. With a clap of his hands the two sounds ceased, the clap itself was not heard.
"Try to speak." Javièr requested.
One of the heads, A sexagenarian, moved his lips but no sound originated, he stopped when he realized this.
"I thought so." Javièr said. "And for the grand finale, light energy!"
Four human sized Shields of Amethyst light appeared in front of Javièr, he blasted concentrated beams at them, and they didn't even move, the shields converged to form a ball of amethyst light, it came to rest above Javièr's head, and as the entire room was drenched in pitch black darkness, the ball formed a spotlight over Javièr.
"Fancy a peek at my insides?" The light became a functioning X-ray, allowing his internal organs and skeletal system to be seen by the heads.
After a few seconds of this, he released MADEF, A purple disc of light floated it upwards to the ball. When MADEF reached the ball, it disappeared and light was restored to the room. The disc also vanished, so MADEF fell back into Javièr's waiting hands. "Thank you for your time."
The heads glanced at each other, then wrote on their digital notepads, probably communicating to each other. After a few seconds of this, one of them stood up, the man who tried to speak earlier. "Mr. Hernàndez, I think I speak for all of us when I say that Project MADEF is not only approved, but is probably the greatest invention the world of science has ever seen."
"You flatter me sir." Javièr said coolly. On the outside, he kept his composure. On the inside, he was already in a grass skirt and doing the hula on the sandy shore of Hawaii.
Javièr glanced up, in a room a bit above him, the heads of each science department stood, watching his presentation, separated from him only by glass. He could see Sack from where he stood, Vanessa wasn't there, since she had to take care of the baby. Sack gave him a smile and a congratulating thumbs up. His expression of glee changed to one of confusion when a metal sheet slid over the glass between him and Javièr.
Javièr was confused too, he turned around to ask the heads about it, what he saw confused him even more. All four heads had gas masks on and looked creepy as hell.
"What's going on here? Is there a problem?
"No problem Javièr, we just need full access to MADEF, knowing you won't let us have it, for SOSRAC to have rights to it, you'll have to be out of the picture, you did use our resources after all." A different head said, this voice belonged to a lady, but the voice sounded lifeless, mechanical behind the mask.
Javièr didn't like the sound of what he heard, but before he could try to use MADEF to escape, the colour less, knockout gas they used pulled him under. It was fast acting and undetectable, he had advancement in biochemistry to thank for that, as much as he loves his wife, times like this make him wish she wasn't so smart.