“Hold still”

A serene, stillness fills the air as we rejoin a younger version of Calvary in the most perilous of situations. Trapped inside of a holding cell alongside his partner from The Divinity, Vik Tori. Previously, the two were captured trying to evade their higher ups at The Divinity after they discovered some sort of plot against Kal Vari. With no proof presented, Kal fought back only to be halted by some sort of inhibitor collar. Kal’s hands fidget with the collar around the neck of Vik as he tries to free him.

“Ouch, damnit Kal!”

“I said hold still!”

A few more moments of struggle before a mechanical whirring is heard before an arc of electricity shoots from the collar.

“Ow! Damnit!”

Kal shakes his hands, looking at them in a bit of shock. He hadn’t felt pain like that… well ever. The collar was obviously working as his pain tolerance was no longer at the level it used to be. He rubs his hands together tensely before standing up and looking around the room. He puts his hands on the walls and begins knocking and sliding them along the smooth surface. This room has no door as the walls seem to shift and move by command. Vik sighs and lays back on the floor. His face is a wreck with a swollen eye and a bloody lip.

“Well, it was worth a try.”

“A painful try. My fingers are still tingling.” Kal presses on one wall that seems to give a little bit, but nothing happens sadly. “But I’m not giving up on getting us out of here.”

Vik rolls his one eye as his other does as well, presumably.

“Just give it up. They won’t let us out of here until you give them what they want.”

“And I told you. I don’t have what they want.”

Vik closes his eye and lets out another annoyed sigh.

“Well, they won’t care. They won’t open that door until either you tell them something or they feel you’ve expended your usage. Either way, you won’t be leaving here to go anywhere but a morgue or a prison.”

Kal doesn’t respond as he folds his arms. He sighs.

“Can you believe we worked for these people?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, they had our people enslaved.” Kal says as he throws his hands up and turns to Vik. “Then when called out on it, they hide the evidence. What do you think happened to those we discovered? Were they hidden even better? Were they punished? Or worse yet…”

Vik sits back up and meets his teammate’s gaze. As best as he can.

“I think it’s too soon to know whether The Divinity was responsible for that location being removed or destroyed. We did leave a mess of the guards out front. Enough that anyone would know the location was compromised.”

Kal looks at the floor. Perhaps he was being rash and jumping to conclusions, he thought. But the whole situation seems screwy. From them locking him up without any sort of discussion to the location of the mines where his people were being used as cattle.

“We can’t just stand back idly while this atrocity happens.” With that, Kal punches the nearest wall as he quickly regrets it.

ZZZZZAAAAAAPPPPPP!

A bolt of lightning arcs out from the wall and zaps him as he falls to the ground in a steaming heap.

“Kal!”

“I’m-I’m fine. That fucking hurt!”

“Did you really think punching the wall was going to be our answer out of here? Especially while wearing these collars?”

Kal looks down at his right hand which is positively wrecked. It’s now swelling and red from the impact. Even with the inhibitor collar, he’d not realized he’d thrown the punch as hard as he had into a flat wall. He groans as he rises back to his feet.

“I didn’t… I was just frustrated. We’re in here and people just like us, blessed with abilities, are subjected to slavery. You saw how weak and frightened they were.”

“And punching that wall has done nothing to help the situation.”

Kal was furious. He could feel his anger rising with every moment spent in these confines. Every moment wasted here was another that they were being subjected to a torturous existence. Kal takes a moment and breathes out slowly. His anger was always something he was going to have to taper. He takes another moment before speaking.

“So what do you suggest next, Vik?”

Vik lays back down and clutches his head.

“Right now, we rest. I can’t think of anything with my head throbbing the way it is.”

Kal lowers himself onto his knees and rests back on his feet in an almost meditative stance. He looks ahead at the blank wall, awaiting any sort of movement.


Now…


“I was a fool.”

“Growing up with the abilities I had, it’s hard not to believe in yourself. It’s hard not to see those around you and know that you were superior. My neighbor could sustain no damage from fires up to 600 degrees. My sister could achieve the feat of flight. My mother was able to lift up to one thousand times her weight.”

“I was able to do all of those things and more.”

“How do you not develop a big head when you can achieve these things? How do you not view them as lesser when you can stop a war single-handedly?”

“I grew up with these powers developing slowly one after another until I reached maturity. A full-fledged super hero on this world and an extremely blessed person on my own. God had created the perfect warrior to defend and protect. Or nature had created the perfect apex predator. No matter what you believed, there was no denying the single fact that I was created with better parts.”

“And so, I grew up vain. I knew my worth, and I knew that no one could hold a candlestick to my strength and versatility. There was not a single doubt in my mind who I was.”

“I was the Messiah. I was the Second Coming. I was Ragnarok.”

“I was the new god to be worshiped on high.”

“Until I received a check in the form of an inhibitor collar. One device slapped around my neck and I was reduced to a normal man. Strength sapped, speed slowed, flight halted… the things that made me a god were taken away in an instant. It was then that I realized that I needed to be more than simply what my powers allowed. It was then that I realized that my overconfidence, my vanity, had led me down a path of being easily manipulated.”

“The Calvary had to be more.”

“I knew I couldn’t continue to live a life of assuming I was better than everyone simply because of my powers. I had to take each challenge as they came and prepare accordingly. I couldn’t rely solely on my self confidence to handle any situation.”

“But Cadryn Tiberius doesn’t subscribe to this ideology.”

“That’s why he’s still running around calling himself ‘The Essence of Excellence’ despite displaying none of the attributes that would contribute to that. Nothing about his essence screams excellence to me or any of the XWF faithfuls.”

“He boasts of being intelligent then constantly contradicts this aspect of his excellence by placing himself in the most ludicrous situations. Like showing the children who watch Sesame Street how to play Dink or Ball. I’m almost surprised that you’re even allowed within fifty feet of schools after that little performance.”

“But not only is his intelligence in question, but his ‘verbal creativity’ is also in question after witnessing him walk into a Popeyes and call the chicken ‘shit’ and calling the clerk racially derogatory terms. If your intelligence and verbal creativity is so profound, how could you not realize where you were and who you were conversing with? For someone so creative, you sure fell on the most verbally uncreative insult.”

“But it’s your vanity that allows you to continue on in this pattern. You don’t fear the repercussions of your actions and thus find yourself in situations that you can’t possibly overcome. Much like that clerk, you’ve found yourself in yet another unobtainable victory squared against me.”

“Because while you rely on your vanity to get yourself out of bed every morning, I utilize mine and keep it in check. I know my strengths, and I know my enemies better than they know themselves.”

“That’s why I’m increasing my winning record while you’re losing your Tag Team title belts to the likes of Bilbo Blumpkinz and Sebasstian Dyke less than a month after winning them. After all, what’s better to add to your record than losing your titles in your first defense to a paraplegic? That’s a feat that only two can claim.”

“Your vanity cost you your tag team titles and it’ll cost you another victory against me if you dare look past me. I know my worth Tiberius, and unfortunately, I know yours as well.”

“I’m coming to win, and I can see through you Cadryn.”

“But the only essence I’m seeing around you isn’t excellence.”

“It’s pathetic.”


Then…


The warm smell of something delicious being cooked. The sound of laughter echoing through the halls. The sight of a young dark-haired young man sitting on the edge of his bed as a larger gentleman stands in front of him waving his hands in the air as a blue image is cast in front of him. Similar fatigues to those worn by The Calvary although the wearer is a bit pudgier with thick framed glasses upon his nose.

He claps his hands and the image shatters into a million tiny fractiles of light before falling down slowly over the face of the young man who giggles.

“And that’s how the universe came to be, Vari. An explosion of energy with its essence spreading through the universe.”

The older man sits on the bed beside who we assume is a very young Kal Vari. His hands rustle Vari’s hair who frowns.

“Stop dadddd!”

Vai’s father suddenly has very noticeable traits to resemble Vari. Same jawline, same smile, same hair color although his father’s is a bit more peppered with age. He smiles.

“Son, your hair is all over the place. Just let me help you smooth it out.”

Vari playfully bats his hands away.

“No, I like it this way!”

Vari’s father laughs.

“Fine, fine. But one day you’ll grow up, and you’ll have to keep your hair under control, okay? Or else you’ll look like the wild men of Dreadnar!”

With that, Vari’s father crosses his eyes, hunches his back, and purses his lips before jumping on his son as if emulating what a wild man of Drednar looked like. Vari giggles wildly as his father attempts to tickle him to death. Vari and his father slowly begin to rise off of the bed. After a moment, Vari’s father begins to realize this and looks around in shock.

“Vari… are you making us fly?”

Vari snaps out of his laughing fit and looks down. Immediately, they slam back onto the bed which responds with a resounding cracking sound as if the frame itself snapped.

“No, dad, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…”

Vari’s father’s eyes well up as he grabs him and holds him tight in an embrace. Kal Vari looks confused as his father squeezes him. His dad releases him and holds him by the shoulders as he looks through his spectacles at him with tears in his eyes.

“Vari, don’t apologize. You’ve been blessed with such a gift as flight. I’m so proud of you.”

Vari hugs him tight and buries his face in his fatigues.

“Mmm smmmm dmmmm”

“I can’t hear you, son.”

Vari pulls his face to the side.

“I’m scared, Dad.”

His father pulls him back and squeezes his shoulder tight.

“That’s okay, Vari. These powers that you have are a blessing. You will learn in time how to properly use them. Tomorrow, we will start learning together how to properly refine them.”

Vari could feel his tensions fading away. His father always had a comforting presence that would ease his emotions.

Bzzzt Bzzzt.

His father’s body tensed as he looked over towards his transponder. He releases his son’s shoulder before walking over and pressing a button on it. A holographic image of another general appears before him.

“Kal Med. Your presence is required at Divinity Headquarters awaiting deployment.”

Kal Med, for the first time, seems a little shaken.

“Already? I was supposed to have another week here before this assignment. Dinner is already on the stove.”

“No time. New intel. In order to get ahead of it, we need you off planet this evening. Report in.”

The image disappears as Kal Med’s hand grips the device forcefully before sighing heavily. He turns to his son.

“Vari, I love you son. I’m going to be going away for a little bit. Can you take care of your sister and mother while I’m gone?”

Kal Med gives his son a warming smile. Vari could feel nothing but peace.

“Yes, dad.”

“Good. And be careful with this new power. When I get back, we’ll look at how you can better control it. I promise.”

Vari doesn’t respond verbally, but instead grabs his father around the waist in a tight embrace. They hold each other for what seemed like an eternity, but in reality was only a few moments. Kal Med breaks off the hug and walks to the corner and picks up a large duffle bag before slumping it over his shoulder.

“Be good, Kal Vari. I know you will be. I’ll be back in a week, I promise.”

And with that, he was gone.

And never did Kal Vari’s smiling father return.

Vanity claimed another.