Mark sat in his seat, staring ahead with an expressionless face. He was barely listening to what the teacher was saying. His entire body was tense. He was sitting under the highest gravity he could currently handle.
685,000 g's.
This was what he had been doing in class. Whenever he needed to move, he lowered the gravity back down. He had been pushing himself as far as possible without injuring himself so badly that it stopped him from training. No one in class even noticed. Mark wore a loose hoodie that covered most of his body, hiding his defined physique.
Then the physics teacher, Mr. Hiles, asked a question about the topic he was currently teaching. After a few seconds, he called on Mark.
"Mark, let's say you're holding a positively charged electroscope. I bring a negatively charged rod close to the top plate, without touching it. The leaves fall together. Then, while the rod is still nearby, I touch the top plate with my finger. What happens to the leaves when I remove my finger first, and then remove the rod?"
Mark answered despite the strain he was under. His face remained straight.
"The leaves diverge again with a negative charge."
Mr. Hiles smiled at the answer and continued. "Why didn't the leaves diverge earlier when I brought the rod close the second time, right after you'd touched the top plate with your finger, but before you removed the rod?"
"It's because when I touched it, the electroscope became neutral. The rod still held the excess electrons at the top. No net charge reached the leaves until after the rod was removed."
Mr. Hiles smiled. The answer was correct. "Good. That's correct." He resumed his teaching.
When the school bell finally rang, the students quickly filed out. Mark stayed behind, finishing the homework Mr. Hiles had assigned. He didn't want to deal with it later at home.
He finished quickly, lowered his gravity, and walked out. As he looked up, he saw a girl with long, bright auburn hair flying upward in a pink, skin-tight suit.
'Eve.'
Seeing her, he simply headed home. He didn't think much of it. He yawned. He was tired, to say the least, after training even during class. When he arrived home, it was empty, just as he expected.
He went to his room and pulled out the gravitometers he had brought to school, just in case.
As he was removing his clothes, the gravitometers began to beep. They were picking up matter waves. A portal was being opened on Earth.
Mark quickly changed into his superhero suit, which he had hidden in the ceiling. At the same time, he grabbed a small backpack and stuffed the gravity watches and the thinking cap inside. He snatched up his gravitometers and left the house, closing his window behind him. He flew straight toward the general coordinates.
'Please don't be a bust like last time.'
When he arrived, Omni-Man was already on the scene, fighting alone against an army of green-skinned people with four antennae and no noses. Flaxans. A pink portal stood open, and more Flaxans were pouring out of it. Mark waited, watching, until the Flaxans began to retreat.
Omni-Man was holding his own. They weren't a real threat to him, but that didn't mean he was holding back much. He crushed their skulls with his bare hands. He punched straight through their bodies without reserve. Mark observed all of it, gauging the casual strength his father was displaying.
'I'm still not strong enough to beat him into submission.'
Then he heard Omni-Man shout as he hurled a spider-shaped Flaxan tank. "Get off my planet!"
Omni-Man was breathing heavily, struggling to contain his aggression. He noticed the Flaxans were retreating. He moved to follow them into the portal but stopped. His wife and son crossed his mind.
Mark saw his opportunity. He took a deep breath and thought to himself, 'Bye, Earth. I'll be back soon.'
He flew straight into the portal. Omni-Man's eyes went wide with shock, but the portal closed before he could even think to follow.
Mark breached through the portal and arrived in the Flaxan dimension. He floated above the ground on their home planet, staring down at an army of Flaxans holding weapons in the middle of a wasteland. Scattered army barracks surrounded them. Far in the distance, he saw a massive city with skyscrapers and a lightning-shaped barrier. Most surprising of all, there were many more cities spread across the landscape.
'I forgot. This is before my father destroyed this place.' Mark took a deep breath and muttered to himself, "This is going to be my new home for thousands of years."
The Flaxans on the ground aimed their weapons at him, shouting. Mark noticed them, but he didn't see them as a threat. Before they could fire, he flew a short distance away and hid his bag, tucking it somewhere safe for the time being. Then he returned to the army barracks.
"This is going to be annoying," Mark muttered. He planned not to kill them. He had decided to conquer this planet instead. He needed to live here for thousands of years, after all.
The Flaxans opened fire. Laser bolts shot toward him, but Mark dodged them, watching where they aimed. Even then, some shots clipped him, burning through his suit.
Mark gritted his teeth. It stung. Burn marks seared into his skin, but the injuries weren't severe. He could still move normally. He muttered to himself, "You're lucky I can't move at light speed on a planet."
If he did, the planet would be destroyed by the sheer velocity. Just like what Nolan had done in the TV series. And even then, that had barely been light speed.
He reached the first Flaxan and punched him in the stomach. The soldier lifted off the ground, his armor shattering, saliva flying from his mouth.
Before that Flaxan could hit the ground, Mark was already on the next one to his left. He launched a question mark kick to the soldier's head, knocking him unconscious.
Mark grabbed another by the head and slammed him into the ground. He looked up, staring at the remaining Flaxans, who stood frozen in shock.
"BRING ME YOUR KING!" Mark shouted. He pressed forward, tearing through the rest of the soldiers stationed at the barracks.