Today is not my day. You might want to know why. To begin with, it was a bleak morning, to say the least: there was thunder and lightning outside, and I felt like God had decided to put on a laser show and just forgot to add colour. Was it necessary for me to go to the dean's office in such weather to pick up papers for my classmates? When I was made head teacher, I expected a lot of advantages, but, as it turned out, if you don't have a pair of "beautiful eyes", you're fucked, not advantages! So there I was, walking through a downpour and high winds with only one umbrella and annoyance, although AC/DC's Thunderstruck was lifting my spirits a bit. As I approached the bus stop and sang along to my favourite line - "You've been - thunderstruck!" - I noticed a flash. The last thing on my mind was, "Is Zeus going overboard with the special effects?"
And so we've come to the middle of this day. Although I'm not sure it's still the same day. I don't remember anything after the flash, the darkness covered everything. Then I felt the warmth of the sun and a cool breeze. When I opened my eyes, I found myself on a bus in the middle of unfamiliar streets, not knowing how I got here or how much time had passed, as the weather had changed from wet autumn to sunny summer. I tried to approach the driver and find out where we were, but after taking a couple of steps I felt an intense pain: my head felt like it wanted to explode, it felt like it was being inflated and inflated, and the limit had been reached long ago! As the pain began to subside, I was faced with a pile of fragments of memories. ONLY THEY WEREN'T MINE. After a mountain of images and videos popped into my head, I blacked out. I woke up in the hospital room and tried to figure out what the hell was going on.
So, remember what you remembered - shitty morning, rain, walking to the bus stop, flash and I'm on the bus... How did I get on the bus if there are only trolleybuses? Stop! We went the wrong way, what were those images after the pain? And that's when it hit me. I remembered everything: childhood, primary schools, high school, family, home, and a lot of other information that is foreign to me, but at the same time somehow so dear. After sorting out some of these memories, I realised what it was: I was reborn and I should probably shout with joy, but if I think about it, I have a family there: mother, father, future - and that it is very unpleasant to leave it all behind, and it makes me bitter at heart.
Okay, I calmed down and let's get to the bottom of it: this is Ryan Pearce's body and he, that is now me, is 16 years old and it is 3 April 2009. I was quite surprised that I was thrown back 12 years!!! Thinking about it, I remembered that his family is not poor and his father makes good money - something to do with politics, but it's not certain, as his father never told him anything about it. I can't say that there was a warm atmosphere in the family, but he didn't remember his mother: she either left the family or died in childbirth. His father was rather cold and did not refuse his son money and gifts, but after he turned 12, Rain could only get something if he met his father's expectations, namely being the best in school and fulfilling his requirements. He required Rain to study psychology, foreign languages like French, German, Chinese, Russian and hired him a martial arts coach.
The day I came here, he decided to get rid of his father's surveillance and meet up with his friends who, according to his father, were "not his level". Yeah, tough luck for the kid. If only...
Attention! Attention!
Loading the draft system... 1%... 5%... 10%... 20%... 40%... 40%... 70%... 90%... 99%... 99.9%... 100%.
Congratulations! You are now the owner of a test version of the system and, although it is not yet complete and you don't have access to all the features, you can be proud of yourself.
Oh, it's just like those stories where the protagonist gets the system and a bunch of pianos, right?
Zing!
You have one private message.
"Is there mail?!"
«Um... Open the mail.
"There's a voice mail."
"Dear podop... ahem, popadan, I am the Creator of this system, and I want to dash your silly hopes, and make things clear to you. The system was created fairly recently - only a couple of thousand years ago - and has not yet been tested, so all you can get from it are tasks that will help you develop and keep you from going too fast... ahem, off track. Also, your skills will develop faster than other people's. In your inventory you will find three gifts for your future endeavours. The world I've sent you to is a dangerous place, so I advise you to go beyond the limits of human strength and capabilities. And lastly, if you can perform well on the system run-in, I might let you return to your world and finish your business there."
«Why me?
«Is my life some kind of joke to you?
+1 to intuition
After I finished shouting at the ceiling, I decided to check the "gifts" in my inventory. There were three lottery tickets in it. Each had a strange name: "initial spit," "attractiveness increase," and "character trait."
When I touched the ticket icon, I saw the description: "You gain a random feature or ability from one of the many characters in the multiverse." I decided to use the spit first. Tearing the ticket open, I saw an orange glow and-and-and-and-and-and-and-and-and-and-and.
You got "time acceleration", which grants the ability to speed up the flow of time by 2x for your body.
That's pretty cool! Now let's try poking at the second one... Hmmm... Weird: no description. Looks like nothing but the name will be explained to me. Tearing up the ticket, I see the same glow again. Luck seems to want to rebalance for today.
You have received the Captain America butt body modification, you are the owner of one of the best butts in the universe.
That's gonna increase my attractiveness to which fucking gender, huh?
Okay, I tear up the last ticket; the grey light reminds me what kind of day it is and I get a...
You have been given a one-time ticket for "Roronoa Zoro's topographical cretinism - 1 hour".
What am I doing with this?! It's more like a curse than a gift.
Not counting the ability, I got plastic surgery and a curse - the gifts are straight up top notch.
«Status:
Name: Ryan Pierce
Level: 1
Experience: 0/100
Parameters:
«Strength: 15
«Dexterity: 13
«Endurance: 18
«Intelligence: 23
«Intuition: 14
«Free Points: 10
Specialities: "major", "lab mouse", "hitman".
Skills: "martial arts - 9 level", "shooting - 4 level", "polyglot - 5 level", "psychology - 6 level", "strategist - 3 level", "stealth - 3 level", "player's mind - MAX".
Superpowers: "time acceleration".
I probably won't be scattering points yet - in case I need to raise one of the characteristics dramatically.
Zing!
Mission received.
"Where am I?"
You are in another world, and although you know the name of the city, it would be a good idea to find out the name of the world the city is in. You have five hours to do so. Good luck!
Reward for completion: 3 S.O. and an understanding of where you are.
Penalty for failure: -5 intelligence points and the trait, "dull-witted".
That's amazing! How am I supposed to figure that out, huh? For example, if it's the world of "Harry Potter" I should run to London for tickets, but if it's "Another World" or "Twilight" I should go get a bag of blood and a couple of bones? This assignment is ridiculous!
Okay, first we have to get out of the hospital. I pressed the nurse call button and waited. Two minutes later, a woman of Latin appearance walked in.
«Hello, I'm Carla, how are you feeling? - For some reason her eyes were filled with a mixture of anger and relief.
«Hello, Carla. Well, I don't feel any discomfort in my body and I'd like to know how long I was unconscious.
«You've been unconscious for 2 days and now it's best for you to keep lying down until the attending doctor comes," she said before hurriedly leaving my room.
A minute later the doctor came in.
«Well, let's see what you've got according to the indications, - he was looking at the papers carefully and his look was becoming more and more incomprehensible.
«Strange... It says here that while you were unconscious, your brain was going crazy, strange as it may sound. Different parts of your brain started working, even though there was no reason for them to be active. Especially your cerebellum and basal ganglia distinguished themselves, they were active to the maximum almost all the time of your coma and subsided only for an hour and a half or two hours before waking up. That's the first time in my 15 years of practice that I've seen that. Did you have any problems with understanding where you were, movements or awareness of your own self?
«No, I remember everything and realise who I am.
«Good. Then give me your date of birth and your first and last name.
«Ryan Pearce, born 15 March 1993.
«Relatives?
«Father is Alexander Pierce, and my mother is probably dead.
«What do you mean, "probably"?
«My father doesn't like to talk about her, and I didn't ask.
«All right. The blood tests came back negative, so I have no idea what caused it, do you?
«I have no idea what it was either, and I'd like to know when I'm going to be discharged.
«We'll run a few more tests, or if you go out and pass out again, our hospital will be finished.
«Excuse me?
«The head gave us a rather colourful performance that described the 'joyful' future of the hospital, and which also concerned me and the other doctors if we couldn't help you. He was very frightened, and his face changed its pallor in direct proportion to the sullenness of your father's look. Another day and I think he'd have gone to the next room.
«Can you get my father? I'd like to talk to him.
«That might be a problem. He got a phone call a few hours ago and he's away on business. But he left a number to notify us of any changes in your condition, so he already knows about the awakening and will probably call soon.- Okay, I'll wait for the rest of the exams, but in the meantime, could you get me some magazines to pass the time?
«Yeah, sure.
Left alone, I began feverishly pondering how I could get information about this world and figure out where I was. Rain had left his phone at home that day, as he knew his father used it to track his movements. The magazines might give some information, but then again, if this was a world with the supernatural, I'd get as much information from them as I would from the view out the window. Well, we'll wait and see.
«Here are the magazines you asked for. - Carla brought the magazines in, and I noticed that her gaze had softened a little.
I immediately grabbed the stack and started looking for any clues available in them about where I was. Come on, come on, at least something! I flipped through the pages, looking for clues, and suddenly my eyes latched onto the section, "America's Top Bachelors." In it, at number one, I saw a name that is hard to forget, a name that has resounded from cinema screens for 12 years. Number one, America's most eligible bachelor, Tony Stark.
«I'm in MARVEL!
Zing!
Mission accomplished, you get three S.O.s.
I'm in Marvel, holy shit! Right, I need to think about what I'm going to do now. If this world follows the KVM plot, then in a month Tony will go to present his new rocket, and then he'll be captured by the Ten Rings. Then, if history repeats itself, I'll get confirmation of my hunch. Right now, we need to think about ourselves. Ryan's father is a big shot in the government, which means he may have a connection to S.H.I.E.L.D. Now we need to figure out if there is one, and which side of Shield he plays on, otherwise I'm in trouble if my dad is in favour of the Octopussy.
And it was at this point that a nurse came in and handed me a phone with a video link on.
«How are you feeling and what happened to you?
«'I'm fine now and you shouldn't have been so... worried.
"It's him, I know him! Moron, how could you forget him, you just said his first and last name an hour ago and didn't even think about who they belonged to! My father is fucking Alexander Pierce, alpha member of the World Security Council and one of the heads of Hydra. I can see the bright future he has in store for the son of one of Hydra's heads: I'll go around throwing zigs and shouting "Heil, Hydra!" reminding everyone that obedience will be rewarded. So many possibilities open up, hmm."
«Are you sure? Your face looks a little pale.
«I'm fine, it's just that this camera's so bad at colour. The doctors said the latest results show no abnormalities and I'm healthy, so a couple more tests and I'll be discharged. I also heard about the conversation you had with the head of the hospital.
«Healthy people don't go into comas for two days! And I'd sack them all because a doctor who can't help a patient shouldn't work in a hospital like this.
And you wouldn't mistake him for one of the leaders of the most dangerous organisation on earth, just a concerned father with a lot of connections.
«Do you have any idea what happened to you?
I was reborn in your son's body, Mr Pearce. If I told you that, yeah, I'd be all over you.
«No, I just felt sick. Maybe it's the fatigue.
«I'll see what I can do about your schedule and unload it for the next two or three months. Also, I've already made arrangements with the school to home-school you for the next two weeks.
«If the follow-up exams don't show anything, I'll be discharged - that's what the doctor said.
«Okay, I'm here, rest and recuperate.
Now I'm worried about my future: in 5 years Captain America and the Widow will destroy everything Hydra worked on after the invasion in New York, and put my "father" in some top-secret prison, and I'll be out on the street, because all the accounts will be frozen, and I'll be at the top of the list in terms of the importance of surveillance in the military, because I was not hidden from everyone, like Struker's son, and will not be able to drink cocktails on the yacht after this mega-failure. So I had to come up with a plan to get away from my family ties and stay alive, or become a good guy in the eyes of the Avengers so I wouldn't be in trouble after all the DC stuff. I grabbed a piece of paper and a pencil from the nightstand and started writing, but realising afterwards that it was dumb, I erased the first words and started working out the goals in my head:
1. Gather personal finances that have no connection to my father.
2. Gain connections with one / more Avengers.
3. Become strong enough before Cable Thanos arrives.
Well, following the points in the plan, I can already tell you how I'm going to get a starting capital of "clean money". Right now I have about $5 million in my account, and you'd say, "Yay, that's enough for a lifetime!" But yikes, I'm a little above average for Marvel. My plan is that if events go exactly according to the KWM plot, when Tony returns, he will shut down weapons production at the Stark International factories. After that announcement, his stock will drop to half its price, and although Obadiah will be able to stabilise it, it will still be losing value before the motorway battle, and the day before the market will be at its lowest. And what could be better than buying up 5 million worth of Stark Industries shares on the cheap and watch people's faces when their value increases by 30-40 per cent in just one day, thanks to just one phrase: "I am Iron Man"?
You have to think of other ways to make money, like: as soon as I get out of here, I'll find out if there are differences in music, books, films, games, TV shows and so on - all of which are a plagiarist's gold mine.
Then there are the connections. And those I'll deal with in... Just a year from now! When Tony's dying of palladium in his mini-reactor. I've also got an idea of another genius I can make my debt to.
And the last item is power. I can't really visualise it yet, as I don't know what kind of tasks the system will throw at me, or how I can get more of these gift tickets. I think I should visit Kamar-Taj, though - I could use the extra powers. On the plus side, if the letter is true, I should be learning faster than Strange.
As I fell asleep, I wondered: what if this was all just a dream and I closed my eyes and went back to my world? Would I be sad or, on the contrary, happy?