Super & Real
Chapter Ten
“Aww, Jer! You cheated!”
A ten-year-old Luther Torvalds shouted his accusation at his older brother. He pushed his older brother and swiped at him. This really upset him, the fact that he couldn’t beat Jericho at any of their games. “Naw,” Jericho said, shaking his head. “I’m just better at it.”
“That’s enough roughhousing,” Suzanne said, pulling them apart. “And you!” She turned her attention to the older brother. “Your little brother is trying! You don’t need to be so hard on him!”
“Yeah! I can’t lose forever!” Luther cried.
“Don’t worry about it,” Suzanne said, hoping to relieve some of his tension. “You’ll win at some point.”
“Are we visiting my cousins this year?” Jericho asked.
“I’m not sure yet, honey,” Suzanne said. “You’ve got distant siblings, but they don’t come by, so we won’t be going unless they pay for our side of the transportation.”
“No point in flying us all out to New York just to visit the rich,” Andrew said, entering the room.
They lived in a four room, two-story house in the suburbs outside Chicago. Both parents worked as university professors, and, although far removed from the wealth and privilege that Suzanne’s father had cut her off from, they made it. Jericho had snuck into his mother’s room and read her private musings on the subject. It struck him as odd that she, having been disinherited by the billionaire patriarch of the Torrell family, wasn’t worried about the connections missed and lost. If he had his way, Jericho would make sure to get what was his. That, he decided, was his plan. He would enter the world of his estranged grandfather and show him that he’d made a mistake.
“Dinner’s almost ready,” Suzanne said, leading them back inside the house. “Better wash up and get ready.”
Luther did exactly as planned, washing up and getting ready for dinner. He sat, and soon enough, turkey breast, and all his favorite fixings, were placed in front of him. “Looks great, mom!” he said.
“Thanks for the dinner, mom,” Jericho said.
They ate, the family quiet for the first half of the meal. Andrew and Suzanne sat, proud that their two boys could be quiet long enough to eat, and thankful that they weren’t too picky. She worried about how their upbringing would affect them. She tried to raise them as best she could, her father’s influence notwithstanding. She’d partied quite a lot. In her youth, she’d done quite a few things she wasn’t proud of. The newspapers had made an ordeal out of how she had gotten drunk in public more than once. She’d been the public face of the shame of the Torrell family more than once. Finally, her father had cut her off. That’d gotten her on the right path, and she made her own path in life. She desperately hoped some of her sense of recovery had filtered down to her sons. What she wanted, more than anything, was for them to succeed and avoid the pitfalls she’d made.
Jericho had given her the greatest sense of relief. The boy took to hard work without complaint. He seemed hell-bent on getting as far up the ladder of success as fast as possible. He did chores well in advance, just so he didn’t have to worry about his little brother doing them wrong, and he having to be blamed. He read a grade level higher than he needed and got the grades his parents lauded. Their only complaint seemed to be his lack of empathy towards others, but they believed he would grow out of it. The boy himself had a million questions. “When am I going to meet grandpa?” he asked.
The silence became a thick fog. The parents stared at each other a moment. “When I decide he’s worth seeing you,” Suzanne said.
“I thought you said you didn’t hate him,” Luther cut in, repeating what he’d overheard.
Suzanne shot him a look. “Your mother doesn’t hate him,” Andrew answered, reading the expression on her face. “But he’s not the kind of person we want around. He doesn’t care about anything except money.”
The mother made a visible decision. “I once thought he was a monster because he ruined my chance at living it up in riches,” she said. She closed her eyes and shook her head. “I was a dumb twenty-something. Now I look back and it’s the best thing that happened to me. I learned that life is more than just having it all.”
Luther felt his spirits raise. It was a sentiment he could get behind. Sure, there were games and other goodies he wanted, but even as a child he wanted to help people. The last thing he wanted was someone around who only cared about being able to buy things. What bothered him about Jericho was that his older brother’s selfishness. Sure, he looked up to his older brother, who always seemed to be able to get things done he couldn’t, but he never did anything to help anyone. It really upset him sometimes and he hated holding things inside.
Jericho wanted to protest. But instead, he went back to his food. Soon enough, he would get out of this situation and make himself so rich he could prove to them you could have money and not be the kind of person who cares only about money. He didn’t quite know how he would do that, but he knew he wanted it, and that meant everything to him.
“You boys will understand it someday,” Andrew said.
An event took place not three weeks later, which set wheels in motion that Suzanne and Andrew wouldn’t have anticipated. Johann Torrell decided to show up. As the daughter of the billionaire tycoon stood agape in her doorway as the middle-aged man in the fifty-thousand-dollar suit had appeared right before her. She’d tried to keep her sons away from him because he would try and fill their heads with his corporate Wall Street nonsense. Even though she’d spent her youth living in luxury, she took pride in the fact that she had evolved as a person since then. His graying hair sat perfectly coiffed on his head, and he had his Rolex on his wrist. “Suzie,” he said, his slight German accent present. “It’s good to see you. I see you’ve landed on your feet.”
A long breath escaped her nose. Skeptical eyes ran over him. “Father,” she said. A long moment passed, the silence hanging on the air. “What brings you here?”
“We’ve only talked on the telephone,” her father said. “I understand the reluctance to see me, but I would appreciate the opportunity to see my grandchildren.”
“I thought we discussed this,” Suzanne said. “I didn’t want you to just barge in. I know you’re used to seeing everything go your way, but I would’ve liked for us to discuss this first.”
He gestured outward, looking more than a bit hurt. “How long do we have to talk about it before I can see my grandchildren?” he asked.
“I’m not mad at you for cutting me loose, dad,” she admitted, preemptively. “In fact, I’m glad you did, looking back. I couldn’t see it back then, but I’m glad I didn’t stay in your world. Understand that I don’t want you dragging my children into yours.”
He tilted his head just a fraction. “I wasn’t here to do that,” he chided, “and furthermore, that’s their decision, not yours.”
“Grandpa?”
Everyone turned at the sound of Luther’s voice. He’d never met the man in person, but he remembered faces well, and the pictures his mom had of this man told him this was his grandpa. He didn’t know what to expect—after all, mom wasn’t happy with him—but he did his best to hide that from his face.
“You must be Luther!” Johann Torrell said, kneeling beside the ten-year-old. He ruffled the boy’s black hair. He hugged the boy.
Suzanne watched her father hug her youngest son. The fact that he’d bothered to remember the boy’s name meant one of two things. Either he was trying to curry favor, or he was genuinely concerned. It hadn’t sold her on his arrival just yet, but it bought her points. This was a man who got people’s names wrong on purpose just to prove a point.
“Hi, sir,” Luther said, still suspicious. The man looked like a comic book villain to him. His outfit had a whole bunch of layers. He could see the suit’s jacket on top, vest underneath, and a shirt underneath that. Didn’t that get hot and uncomfortable? Who wore that kind of outfit in normal sunny daytime? Furthermore, the man’s hair looked like the kind of people his dad made fun of after coming home from work.
“Grandfather?” Jericho announced, running up at the sound of his little brother’s cry.
The older man stood up straight after finishing hugging his youngest grandson and extended his arms outward. “Wow, you must be Jericho!” he announced.
“I wanted to meet you,” he said.
The billionaire hugged him. “I wanted to meet you too,” he exclaimed.
“You and mom don’t get along?” he asked.
The man pulled back slightly from the hug. “I…it’s not something so straightforward,” he said. “Your mother and I have a complex set of issues.” He stood up straight again, looking at the mother. “So, what are the kids and you up to?”
“We’re about to head out for dinner,” Andrew said, coming out from behind and standing in the doorway. “The kids placed first in the regional math and science quiz championships.”
“We wanted to celebrate,” Suzanne added. She wanted to slap the man. This was his gimmick. As a corporate head, he often forced his way through deals and he treated people in a similar way, she knew. “It would be rude of me to not invite you, but it’s not only up to me.” She looked at her husband.
“You can come,” Andrew replied, “just don’t make any commentary about the food.”
“I had manners as a part of my formal education,” Johann replied. He ignored the sarcastic look that Andrew shot him as they went inside the house.
“Kids, finish getting ready,” Suzanne said. “Don’t take too long.”
Jericho and Luther went into the upstairs restroom to wash their hands, and finish putting on their outfits. As Luther dried his hands in the towel, he couldn’t help but notice the look of amazement lingering on his older brother’s face. “Grandpa seems…” he struggled for the word that adequately described him.
“Amazing?” Jericho offered.
“No,” Luther said, shaking his head. “He seems fake.”
Jericho finished and turned off the water, grabbing the second towel. “He’s rich,” he explained for his younger brother. “They all have to act like that.” He gave a chuckle. “I’m gonna be rich someday.”
“I wouldn’t wanna be like that,” Luther said.
“Aw,” Jericho protested, “You’re just jealous.”
“He’s gotta act like a certain way,” Luther argued. “I don’t think I could stand it.”
“I’m gonna be rich like him one day,” Jericho continued to argue.
“Yeah,” Luther said, rolling his eyes. “And it’ll be because they’ll look at you and know you’re his grandson.”
“Uh-uh!” Jericho countered. “It’s gonna be because I did it!”
“Okay,” Luther said, sarcasm dripping.
They got their clothes on and headed downstairs to the car. The whole time, of the two, Jericho marveled at the middle-aged man. Something about the man his mother didn’t exactly enjoy, just sat perfectly well with him. This man had real power in the world. This man had ways of getting exactly what he wanted. He commanded respect without having to say a word. It was a place the young boy wanted to be. It was a world he wanted to live in. Luther, on the other hand, wasn’t impressed. To him, this was a man who had to worry night and day about aspects of money that, even at his young age, the boy knew he didn’t want to deal with.
“Let me drive the boys,” Johann said, motioning to the Maserati at the end of the driveway.
Suzanne found her lip curling in frustration, and she had to force it to stop. The prick had to show off, she thought. She faked a smile. “Why not? Saves me the trouble,” she said.
“We were going to the Denny’s across from the Walgreens…” Andrew said, leaning into the driver’s side window.
“It’s your family celebration,” Johann replied, as the boys climbed in the backseat. “Are you boys ready?”
“Absolutely!” Jericho cheered.
“Yes, sir,” Luther stated.
As they drove out of the neighborhood, the expensive luxury car got more than its fair share of glances. The older man knew, despite the boys waiting patiently at first, that they would want to ask questions. So, he waited for the inevitable.
“Grandfather?” Jericho asked, sheepishly.
“Yes?” The businessman replied.
“How did you get so rich?” Jericho’s question drew a smile from the man’s face. The boy’s natural hunger and curiosity gave off a look that he could see a mile away. Here was someone destined to be somebody. You’d never see this kid growing up to be a worthless layabout, a nobody destined to leech off the hard work of others like a parasite, he recognized. This was a kid who had that go-getter attitude so lacking in modern America.
“My father and a friend of his started a business repairing and selling machines,” he explained to the boy, “and when I inherited it, I expanded into multiple countries, fought off competitors, and drove efficiency up and up.” He looked in the mirror and saw that the boy hung on every word. “It wasn’t easy, and it took a whole lot of hard work. We had to expand our business into several distinct fields.”
“That’s amazing!” Jericho exclaimed.
Johann Torrell noticed that his youngest grandson hadn’t said anything. “Luther?” he asked. “Is there anything you’d like to know about me?”
The younger boy pondered this for a brief few moments. “What do you do for fun?”
His question prompted a minor chuckle from the man. “When you’re as busy as I am,” he offered, “you don’t have a lot of time for fun.” He put his thoughts together. “I mostly like to watch live theater, I’m a big fan of symphony orchestra, and sometimes, I even like to drive fast cars around the racetrack.”
Except for the last one, none of those interested the boy. “I get it,” he said, not wanting to sound too negative.
“What books do you read?” Jericho asked.
Luther shot him a look. Honestly? He didn’t want to read any books that this guy thought were interesting. They were likely to be the kind of reading that he hated, work that largely focused on real life. He read books to escape from real life, thank you very much.
“I’ve got a whole list I could give you,” he said. “I learned a lot about how things should be from the works of Ayn Rand.”
Jericho then asked the question that would shape the rest of his future, up until very recently.
“If I read that,” he said, “I can be more like you?”
This time, Johann laughed out loud. “Not so easy, I’m afraid!” he explained. “Honestly, it’s just a starting point.”
“I’d like to read Ayn Rand, if it’s a starting point!”
As the Maserati pulled into the parking lot of the Denny’s restaurant, Suzanne saw the bag in the backseat, next to her oldest son. She suddenly felt like punching her father in the face. “Father?” she asked, as the older man stepped out of the car. “Can I talk to you?”
He let out a nasal sigh. “Before you say anything,” he defended, “Jericho asked himself. I didn’t just buy it for him.”
“He’s just a child!” she retorted. “You’re putting propaganda into his head before he’s old enough to understand what’s happening!”
“Suzanne,” he said, trying to calm her down, “please. He asked me a question, and I gave him an answer. If he decides he doesn’t like it, that’s his decision. Please don’t take it from him.”
She fumed. “Alright,” she said. “I’ll let him read whatever he wants. But you’re going to cut this shit out!”
“Alright!” he said, putting up his hands in a mock defensive posture. “I won’t tell him any more!”
“I’ve seen you show off like this before,” she warned. “This isn’t one of your business partners to get on your side!”
“Mom,” Luther asked, “is something wrong?”
She looked at him, and the genuine concern on his face. “No, honey,” she said. “Nothing’s wrong.”
They ate uneventfully, but secretly, Johann sat pleased with himself. Sure, his daughter had surprised him with her ability to rebound from his disinheriting her, but that hadn’t been it. She’d become a tenured professor and her husband in a similar position provided a decent life for her children and her, but her children were a different story. Luther, he loved the boy as the grandson he was, but when he saw Jericho, he saw what he’d been looking for. There was a boy who would enter the world he lived in. The seed had already been planted. The boy saw what could be achieved and wouldn’t stop until he’d done so himself. Unlike several of his family, this boy wouldn’t have a crutch to lean on. This would be a prime example of one pulling oneself up by their bootstraps. He had longed to see such a success story to legitimize his viewpoints and his expectations. He wanted someone who would become a driving force at the company, or at least, someone who could demonstrate their intellectual superiority in the market.
Suzanne occasionally stared at her father. She knew what he intended. This man was talent scouting. He wanted a future executive at his company, or at the very least, someone he could talk investments with. Everyone he gave his time and attention to was for a reason. This man lived and breathed the Virtue of Selfishness. He had come here looking to expand his empire, and it pissed her off. Still, she didn’t want to seem too much of an asshole, so she toned it down. The thing that bothered her was that she knew Jericho was the kind of kid who would eat this stuff up, if for no other reason than he now had a strong male figure feeding it to him to look up to.
As time progressed, it turned out that Suzanne had a lot to worry about. Both her sons were smart as hell, but of the two, Jericho seemed to take after his grandfather in ways she’d hoped he wouldn’t. He started absorbing all the information about investments he possibly could. Luther was close to his brother, and it annoyed him how he stopped being fun. When they were kids, the younger boy found it always exciting to be around him, because he got into all sorts of adventures in the woods and in the playgrounds. Now, Luther had pursued his interests closely. He’d learned how to play the guitar and had joined a rock band. Girlfriends had come into his life. Dating, sex, it all gave him pleasure in life. Sure, he never would make it big, but at least he got to live on his own terms.
As he watched his brother, he felt sorry for the guy. On one hand, his older brother excelled at everything business-related he stuck his hands into. Entering college at a young age, he blew past scores of people much older and more skilled than him. Harvard business school took him in on a full scholarship and he shot up to the top of the roster. One day, Jericho had come home on a break from school, and Luther had his bandmates over. Jericho took him outside and told him how he felt.
“Luther,” Jericho had said, “are you supporting these people?”
“I don’t have to explain to you how I spend my money,” Luther defended himself. “Mister Ayn-Rand-worship should know that.”
A scoff escaped the older brother. “Are you serious?” he exclaimed. “We both know you’re the only one of these fools who has any talent and here you are, footing the bill for them to live in your house.”
“It’s my house,” Luther said, “and I paid for it with my money. If I want to support these people, these brothers of mine, who’ve been with me through thick and thin, that’s my prerogative, not yours.”
“They’re using you!” Jericho shouted. “How did you make that money, anyway?”
“You should know.” Luther folded his arms. “Whenever we visit mom on certain weekends, you’re always bragging about how your stocks are doing. I just follow whatever you’re doing.” He laughed and shook his head. “Oh, and I also have an actual job of my own. It’s the manager of a bookstore, but still, two incomes means I’m doing just fine.”
“You have actual talent,” Jericho countered. “If you had a proper group of musicians, you could actually make it big. Instead, these clowns are not only holding you back, but you’re actually spending money to house them.”
“They were there for me when I got depressed,” Luther retorted. “Our grandpa, the guy who you look at as if he were a god, hasn’t come to visit since we were children. He wasn’t there when you broke your leg.”
Jericho rolled his eyes. “He wasn’t supposed to be there,” he reminded. “It wasn’t necessary.”
“You mean it wasn’t in his rational self-interest,” Luther said.
“No! It probably wasn’t!”
Jericho’s angry shout had drawn a shocked expression out of both as soon as he’d said it. “Unbelievable,” Luther said. “You want to take after a person like that?”
“I want to take after a person who took full advantage of his capabilities!”
“No,” Luther countered, “you want to take after a person who took full advantage of people.”
Jericho started as if shocked by a taser. “You take that back,” he said. “You’re just jealous I’m doing something with my life!”
“I’m doing the things that make life worth living,” the little brother said. “If I don’t make it big, there’s no skin off my ass.”
“It’s a damn shame you’re okay with this,” the older brother said.
“I just hope you don’t wake up and realize you’re thirty-five with a whole lot of money,” the little brother retorted, “and no actual friends who care about you.”
Jericho let a hurt huff escape his nostrils. A half-formed sneer drew itself on his face. “Well,” he said, “I’m at least going to make the first part of that come true.”
Luther shook his head. “If you had any other business,” he said, “let’s talk about it now. Otherwise, you can leave.”
“I’m not going to bail you out if this plan of yours goes south,” Jericho reminded.
“I know,” Luther said. “I wasn’t planning on it.”
After that, they separated for years and barely spoke to one another. The older brother managed to make good on his promises.
“We’re here with Jericho Torvalds,” the pundit had said, “the latest addition to the Forbes’ billionaires list.” The older man motioned to Jericho, his three-piece Giorgio Armani suit and tie perfectly adorning him, as the lights moved over to his position. “He’s worth one point eight billion dollars, and he isn’t even thirty yet!” The audience gave a cheer. “Mister Torvalds, nice to get to interview you.”
“Nice to be here,” Jericho replied.
The older man folded his hands on his lap as he turned his chair to face his interviewee. “So,” he began, “twenty-five years old, worth over a billion dollars, the head of an investment firm new but rising like a rocket, how is this possible, and how did you do it?” Mild laughter came from the studio audience.
Unbeknownst to Jericho, Luther sat in the studio audience. He’d been on another news program at the same station, so he just asked, and they let him be in the audience for his brother’s interview. He watched his brother take part in this spectacle of money worship at the altar of shameless capitalism. Despite everything, he did love his brother and it pained him to see the boy he played with as a child grow up to be one of these bloodsucking leeches. The band he led had made it big, but he wasn’t making pennies compared to the egregious wealth his brother was starting to both horde for himself and earn for greedy Wall Street vampires. Still, he wanted to hear what his brother said.
Jericho gave a cordial smile and minor chuckle. “It’s actually fascinating the story of how I got here,” he explained. “As you know, I didn’t have my grandfather’s money to fall back on, so I had to make it in the world of investments from the bottom up. My mother and father are both professors, so I grew up in an environment of learning. I was taught to learn from every source I could find, so that’s what I did.”
The pundit nodded. “You credit Ayn Rand and the philosophy of laissez-faire capitalism for your success,” he pointed out.
“When I met my grandfather,” Jericho went on, “he gave me a chance to buy any book I wanted. I wanted to read what he said made him successful, so that’s what I read.” The audience cheered and gave a mild burst of laughter. “Hey, it worked. I learned about the morality of capitalism. My investing skills? That I had to pick up as I went along.”
“And what investing skills they are!” The pundit cheered. “In just under two years, you’ve turned a few tens of thousands of dollars of money into over a billion dollars. Don’t keep us in the dark.”
Jericho leaned back in his chair. “Where do I begin?” he asked rhetorically. “I looked at the market and picked up on trends I noticed and started investing. When the trends I saw started to pick up, I got others to invest along with me. Soon I was running an investment firm. When I started pouring other people’s money into stocks, that’s when the dough really started rolling in.”
“You made billions for others,” his interviewer asked, “and over a billion for yourself. Are you worried the gravy train is coming to an end?”
“Ha ha,” Jericho said, chuckling. “Not really. I’ve decided to recession-proof my organization by converting a lot of stock into cash before reinvesting. That way, we cover our cash flow issues before they exist.”
“But isn’t that a way to attract higher and higher taxes?”
“Well,” Jericho retorted, “we do end up paying higher taxes, but it keeps us safe in the long run.”
“A bit counterintuitive.” The pundit smiled. “I like it!”
The interview went on, but Luther had seen all he could take. The worst-case scenario their mother had envisioned was happening. Jericho had been suckered into the selfish world of Johann Torrell. This pathetic display of wealth worship was more than he could stand.
“Luther!” Almost out of the building, the younger brother turned at his older brother’s voice.
“Jericho,” he stated, a flat acknowledgement.
Jericho threw up his arms. “I didn’t know you were coming to see me!” he said, cheerfully. “I thought you didn’t care!”
“You’re my brother, I love you,” Luther said. “But I wasn’t just here for you. My band was being interviewed for the quadruple platinum of our debut album.”
Jericho let out an impressed whistle. “I read about that,” he admitted. “That’s a hell of an accomplishment.” In spite of everything, he actually loved his brother. What bothered him, though, had to be the fact that Luther could have gotten much farther on his own.
“Thank you,” Luther said. He sniffed, stifling emotion. “That means a lot to me.” It seriously burnt him up that his brother had gotten poisoned by the mental nonsense their grandfather, and a hack of a writer who’d been dead for almost two decades, had convinced him of. He looked down just a moment. “But, honestly, I don’t think I can stay here and just watch you worship wealth and the type of people who value money over human life.”
“Oh,” Jericho cried, “not this shit again.” He wiped his face once. “Why can’t you just see things my way?” This always came between them, and by now, he’d gotten tired of Objectivism and the value of selfishness coming between them.
“I can’t support this world you live in,” Luther explained.
“You’re rich now,” Jericho pointed out. “Hell, you’re likely to get richer.”
“I’ve given more money to charity than you,” Luther retorted, “and you’re worth more than nine hundred times what I’m worth.”
Jericho’s arms shot out to his side. “That’s because I’m not subscribed to a mentality that makes people helpless!” His head shook in disbelief. “My god, Luther! When are people responsible for themselves, when we’re always expected to prop them up?”
“I hope you never have to suffer like some people,” Luther retorted, turning to leave. “Some people never have the luxury of getting to prop themselves up.”
“Like the people you call your bandmates?”
Luther’s head shot around as he heard his brother’s words. A long moment passed as he stared in a mixture of anger and utter disbelief. “You…you motherfucker!” He stomped back towards his brother.
“Yeah, I know you got that one!” Jericho shouted. “You bailed them out of jail, you’ve paid for their kids’ medical bills, you’re practically their sugar daddy. And for what?” He pointed at him. “So they could one day maybe pay you back? Don’t make me laugh!” He chuckled. “You could’ve been so much more so much faster if you’d thought about yourself.”
“You fucking…!” Luther’s statement didn’t have time to finish as he decked his brother in the face. His hand would feel it later, but right now, he wasn’t about to let that one slide.
“I touch a nerve?” Jericho managed to say, even as a jolt of pain rocketed through his cheek and up to the top of his head. “I think I got one that time.”
“FUCK YOU!” Luther propelled himself forward, crashing into his brother and tackling him to the ground. The two then began trading body blows as people nearby rushed to pull the younger brother off of Jericho.
The older brother struggled to his feet, his cheek bleeding and his suit scratched and torn in places, and let out a sigh as people nearby held him up. “Proves my point,” he told his younger brother. “You don’t have an answer for me.”
Luther moved away, a wall of spectators forming between him and his brother. “You’re a sad piece of shit!” he swore. “A sad little fucker with his pile of money! Well, fuck you, Jericho!”
After that, they hadn’t spoken for years. It always bothered Jericho that his little brother couldn’t realize how his potential kept being wasted by his insane desire to put others before himself. Luther, on the other hand, felt that his older brother had sacrificed all his sense of compassion and empathy in favor of a giant bank account and the attention of some fake friends who wouldn’t be there if he hadn’t had a dime to his name. Both were convinced of their correctness and the utter wrongness of the other.
When the series of lights had lit up the sky, one fateful day, Luther had simply known that his brother would have gotten powers. He’d gotten some as well. He’d gotten a power that had proven very useful.
The evening sun was beginning to set and he’d just gotten through doing an afternoon show for a television special, and was leaving the studio. A woman sat on a bench, staring at a television screen in an electronics store window.
On the screen, a man had set fire to a police station where an officer accused of a racially motivated killing had worked. The woman pointed at the screen. “Crazy world we’re living in,” she said. “Guy walked up and fired something out of his hands. Would you believe that?”
“I would,” Luther said. “It’s strange. They say powers are popping up.”
She laughed. “Do you believe that?” she asked.
Just then, he felt a twinge in his mind. Somewhere, in the back, almost completely unobtrusive, but still making itself known, was some kind of…presence. He found it difficult to understand. Words didn’t seem adequate to describe it. Breath stopped in his throat before he could speak out loud what it was. A thought came to him a moment later, maybe it was the thing calling to him, there were two states. Currently, it made him realize it was in the off position. He flipped it on, curiosity getting the better of him.
A fire hose of emotions, images, and situations flew through his mind with lightning speed. The man on the television had somehow, someway, made his motivation crystal clear to him. The power had told him everything he needed to know about why the man did what he did and his feelings about everything related to his action. The disorientation came the moment the instant-long vision ended, and he struggled for balance.
“Holy crap, are you…?” The woman, curious as to the sudden stumbling of the man she’d just been talking to, found her question die when he stumbled and, to balance himself, placed a palm on her shoulder. The instant contact occurred, what had been shown to him came to her. “What in the fuck!”
He pulled away a moment later. It took a long few moments before the impact of what had happened occurred to him. Somehow, he’d gotten the motivation of the person he’d seen on the television and had shown the woman by making contact with her.
He fled, switching his power to the off position. Whatever this power was, being able to discern people’s…what, motivations? Emotions? Desires? Whatever it meant, he would have to figure it out. It disturbed him that he would have this ability, but a few days ago, he wouldn’t have even believed that superpowers even existed. He almost had to laugh at the absurdity. If he’d been asked, he would have chosen a power more like Superman, where he could fly and have incredible physical power. Being able to not even fully read people’ minds? What was that about? Still, it seemed like the perfect bit of poetic justice, being that he got a power based on empathy when his brother always accused him of letting others take advantage of his empathy. If Jericho got powers, he figured, it would be something absurd like copying powers.
Luther had started small. He started walking down the street, and listening in on people’s conversations. Whenever someone mentioned someone by name, he could focus on that, and without even knowing the person, use his power to gleam aspects of their mentality. At first, just the motivation related to the topic of confusion mentioned by the other person would come up. Then, with much effort, he could gather the entire reason for who they were as a person at that moment. After that, he would give what he found to the person who had been confused or unsure. This filled him with a kind of glee; he could help the world be free of misunderstanding and confusion. He could show people exactly what their ‘other’ was thinking. Still, he wasn’t a naïve moron; he knew some old prejudices would never go away. Nonetheless, any bit of help was help.
His first few outings he took slow and safe. The major political groups around city hall desperately needed some exercises of empathy. Whether Democrat or Republican, there were all sorts of ideas and no one seemed to understand that their counterparts had reasons behind what they believed in. Sure, a few genuinely had bad intentions, but the people would discover that knowing what someone else intended and their reasons why made cooperation more possible. Occasionally, he stumbled across a genuine stumbling block, such as the racists of the world, but in between concerts, he would go around each city he toured in and see what he could do.
On his tours, answers to questions he hadn’t even considered. As a child he’d read a few comic books. He’d always imagined that the arrival of superpowers would cause catastrophe, with people going wild and releasing their inhibitions wherever they could. As he looked at the motivations and memories of various people with powers, he found a common theme. Most people possessed at least enough logic to understand that they weren’t the only one with powers. The vast majority he came across simply did not intend to actually get into a fight other people. A situation came up that he honestly hadn’t expected but didn’t surprise him.
Jericho got powers. Luther couldn’t help but give a disapproving sneer at the television. It was exactly the type of power that suited a greedy crapsack like the man his brother had turned into.
“Do you believe that?” He told his mother when his parents came to visit at his house for their vacation.
His mother gestured a “what have you” motion. “He went down the rabbit hole my grandfather wanted him to go down,” she said. “Now that this insanity is our world, he got what he wanted. I’m still going to love him, but I’m through discussing things with him. If he wants to live in a world where only what he desires matters, that’s what he wants and I’m going to leave him to his life.”
“Yeah,” Luther simply agreed. Jericho had called them several times over the intervening weeks, but they’d simply given basic small talk and ended the conversation.
One fateful day, he got a phone call from his brother. “Luther, hey,” the businessman had said. He tried to hang up, but sensing this, his brother interrupted him. “Look, hey! You were right all along!”
The younger brother’s finger held suspended in midair. Cautiously, he held the phone up to his ear. “Alright,” he began, slowly and eyes shifting, “you got my attention.”
“You know I’ve been trading money for powers,” Jericho explained. “A few days ago, I gained the ability to experience the memories of others and have others do the same.”
A pregnant pause passed. “I’ve got a similar power,” Luther said.
“Really?” Jericho said, startled. “I wasn’t expecting that.” He recovered. “Anyway, being able to experience what the world is like for real people has shown me that everything grandfather got me to believe is, at best, horribly flawed, and at worst, an out-and-out manipulation and delusion.”
A chuckle escaped Luther’s lips. “Are you serious?” he said just short of shouting. “You expect me to believe that suddenly, you’ve gained a conscience?”
“The wealth I’ve gained is evil,” he said. “I have a plan to deal with that, but honestly, first, I have to help you deal with a problem.”
“What problem is that?”
Luther heard his brother utter a harsh breath. “I have to get you and mom and dad to safety,” he said. “Someone is trying to bring about the Second Coming.”