What is surely to be the first in a long series of bad decisions. (Open!)

[sofresh]

Who| Superboy (sofresh) and anyone!
What| Testing his powers (or lack thereof).
Where| Observation deck.
When| Afternoon.
Warnings/Notes| N/A!

Looking for Superboy? Probably not. But if someone happened to glance up over on the observation deck, that'd be where they'd find him, floating in the air a few feet above ground (not terribly high—eight to ten feet at most), arms crossed, with a contemplative look on his face. In retrospect, he probably should have done things differently—namely, he probably should have questioned his situation more when he woke up here. He didn't.

Look, even Superman made mistakes sometimes.

But that was in the not-so-distant past, and now, Superboy was trying to figure things out for himself. That'd be the reason why Superboy, casually floating a few feet in the air, slipped off his flight ring, just to see what'd happen. Needless to say, it went about as well as expected.

In other words, he landed, with a thud and a wince, on the ground, in a pretty ungraceful (and totally uncool) position.

"I'm startin' to think I might be defective or somethin'."

There was all this talk of gaining superpowers, except Superboy already had them, so he'd just tuned the rest out. No one ever said anything about losing powers (or, at least, not that he'd heard of), and honestly, he was not happy about it.

Comments

[sofresh]

"Really?" That intrigued Superboy, even as he tried to move to sit in a position that didn't hurt too much. Ow. "I mean, I guess I'm kinda new to it. Like, I had powers before I got here, but I guess I was kinda new to those, too."

There were things that he knew he should have been able to do, but couldn't, and for the life of him (short as it was), he couldn't figure out why. Maybe they were in similar situations? Though, this seemed like it was probably a little more complicated than that. Still, he was definitely interested.

[captainbuzzkill]

"Mine are influenced by emotions," Dipper said flatly. He flopped down to sit on the edge of the observation platform next to Superboy, his legs dangling. "So I have this really cool telekinesis and when it works, sometimes I can blow stuff up with my brain."

He pointed to his temples with his pointer fingers.

"But instead of just having to worry about my concentration, it's super keyed into what I'm feeling, so if I'm angry it throws things around a room uncontrollably like there's a poltergeist, and when I'm really angry, it blows things up even when I don't want it to. And if I'm surprised or sad, sometimes it just...stops."

A pause.

"Not that I get sad. That often. Or anything," he said, slightly defensively.

What, him? Homesick a lot? And missing his sister? Neeeeveeeer.

"But that means I have to try to stay 100% totally and completely calm to use it, and that's on top of concentrating really hard to focus it and make it do what I need it to. It'll mess up even if I'm a tiny bit annoyed at something."

Staying totally internally placid and chill was not exactly an easy thing for a teenage boy. Especially in the middle of a fight. It was a natural thing for fights to make you angry or scared -- or even excited, if things were more cool than scary.

[sofresh]

"That sounds like a whole lotta work," Superboy said, thoughtfully. Having to control your emotions really didn't sound fun, especially for a teenager. Superboy wasn't too sure he could do it—he was all about following his heart, basically. He couldn't imagine living any other way. But at the same time... Well, there was something interesting about it. "But you know what? I think I got something like that, too."

It seemed like Dipper's powers were a whole lot more volatile than his were, but there was definitely something similar about them. He had been able to escape from the Cyborg's weird mechanical restraints just by kind of freaking out about it, after all—there was no way that was just a fluke.

"It's kinda weird, though. I think I could do it before I got here, but I also used to be able to fly, and I sure can't do that anymore. I wonder if they could be related...?"

That sounded a little too strange, though. How could they be related?

(He had no idea.)

[captainbuzzkill]

"Some people had different powers before they got here. So there are people like me that had nothing and got new powers and other people that had theirs change. It seems like a lot of them took a hit so now they're less powerful."

Dipper raised his eyebrows so high they almost disappeared under the brim of his baseball cap.

"Some of us think it means something intelligent and powerful brought us here. Why they'd want some people to have less powers or changed powers is a mystery, but it seems like something purposeful."

He had theories.

"There's something that even happens sometimes where we get pulled away from here and dropped into other random dimensions and there's voice in our heads that tells us to play along. Like it's testing us. The Legionnaires from this universe seem to think some cosmic being is doing it all but they don't know what. One time we had to fight giant monsters in giant robots, and the other time was air pirates, but I didn't get pulled into that one."

All of it suggested something powerful was jerking them around.

[sofresh]

"Whatever it is, there's no way it could be anything good."

When Dipper put it like that, it just sounded too... suspicious. Maybe it was because of who (or, rather, what) he was, but Superboy failed to see how more powers would be a bad thing. What good would Superman have been as a superhero if he'd had even half of his usual powers? Sure, maybe his invulnerability didn't save him in the end, but who was to say he'd even have been able to defeat Doomsday if he hadn't had any of the things that made him Superman? He just couldn't imagine a situation in which less powers would be the better choice. Something was definitely off about it.

Superboy was definitely happy to help as far as the Legion was concerned, but other than that... He frowned.

"I guess that means I'm outta luck, then, huh? I mean, there's no chance that my powers could like, re-change or anything, right?"

[captainbuzzkill]

Dipper shrugged.

"I don't think that's happened to anyone," he said. "But the upside is we're all in the same boat. Since everyone either got something new or lost something, everyone's been trying to help everyone else figure it out."

The group was pretty good at trying to sympathetic to each other over the weird powers thing.

"And Umbra, she's the Legionnaire that trains a lot of us with our powers? She's pretty good at it. She yells a lot and is mostly pretty terrifying, but she also knows what she's talking about."

Having the native Legionnaires helping them and everyone trying to look out for each other made it all easier.

"You said you were new to your powers back home, too. Did get superpowers right before you got here?"

[sofresh]

"Sorta. I'm a clone, so it's more like I was just born."

In theory, that was probably something he wasn't supposed to be telling people, but as usual, he didn't even hesitate. There was no such thing as secrets with Superboy.

"When they made me, they, like, implanted knowledge in my head? So I know all kinds of stuff, even though I never picked up a book in my life. So I always knew I had powers, but I was never told how to use 'em."

That wasn't quite right, but he didn't know any better. This was just the situation as he understood it—he had yet to have anyone tell him that his powers weren't quite what he thought they were, and that this would be why he couldn't use them.

[captainbuzzkill]

"You're a clone?" Dipper asked brightly. "I had a clone!"

His face fell slightly and he held a tiny fist to his chest, over his heart, looking as if he would've poured one out in honor of someone if a convenient beer or soda had been handy.

"His name was Tyrone," said Dipper solemnly. "He wasn't long for this world, because it was a weird, magical, cloning copier machine thing that created him instead of reliable superscience. It meant he could be killed by being exposed to liquids and he accidentally drank a soda without thinking about it."

He still missed him.

"I don't know how I would've explained him to mom and dad, but if that hadn't happened to him, I still would've brought him home with us from my Grunkle's house, back to California. With me and my twin sister. That would've just been like having an identical twin alongside having a fraternal twin. We could've made it work. Somehow."

Dipper sighed.

"But I lost him. Even as he was melting, he was giving me life advice and being like the brother I never had. I still wish whoever had built that stupid magical copier hadn't left it with such a horrible design flaw."

[sofresh]

"Whoa. That's rough."

That got dark really fast. His own experience with clones was pretty limited—sure, it was fellow clones that had rescued him, but he didn't really know them, and he also didn't know yet about the failed Superman clones that came before him. He was also pretty fortunate in that, aside from his powers acting weirdly, he seemed to be "normal" in just about every other way. He wasn't aware of any weaknesses that he wasn't supposed to have.

"But hey, it sounds like he was a real good guy, looking out for you and all that even at the end. I don't know what I would do in a situation like that."

Superboy hadn't been alive long enough to think about dying, really. He'd like to think he'd go in a cool way, but he also liked to think he wouldn't be dying anytime soon, either. It was definitely better not to think about it.

"I'm not sure clones get to have clones, but I bet having a clone brother would be pretty rad."

Or... you know. Any family at all.

[captainbuzzkill]

"Well, if it's anything like having a twin, it's probably the best thing in the entire world," Dipper said, swinging his feet slightly and smiling. "My twin sister Mabel isn't here, but I wish she was. She'd be making this whole hero thing ten times better."

That was why her not being here was so rough. It wasn't that Dipper couldn't handle all this hero stuff alone, but it would've been so much easier if she'd been there to help him do it.

"Don't you at least have who you're cloned from?"

It seemed like that was something someone should do. If they were cloned, they should've taken him in and at least been his friend.

[sofresh]

"Nope," Superboy shrugged. "He's dead. That's the whole reason I was created in the first place—to replace him."

Despite how awful that might've sounded without context (not that... context would've helped too much), Superboy explained all of this casually. He'd never had a problem with it, honestly—being Superman was a pretty cool gig, and there were advantages to being 'made' for a specific purpose. He didn't have to spend his life wondering what he wanted to be when he grew up, for example.

"Sometimes, I wonder, like, what kinda guy he was? But it ain't like it really matters. I mean, I'm probably never gonna meet 'im."

And... Well, that was kind of a bummer. Because, maybe it wasn't real family, but it should kind of count for something, right? But such was life, he supposed.

[captainbuzzkill]

It didn't sound that awful to Dipper, but Dipper had dealt with a lot of awful things. It made total sense to him that someone would try to clone a dead guy. There were lots of reasons people would try to clone dead guys. It wasn't even that it wasn't an unpleasant concept, it was just he'd dealt with enough unpleasant things that that kind of unpleasantness didn't even really register on his radar anymore.

What did register was the idea that this kid was possibly alone.

And he totally was a kid. He didn't look much older than Dipper was. In fact he looked right around the age Dipper was pretending to be by telling the Legion he was actually fourteen when he was really thirteen.

Dipper's face fell a little.

"So, you don't have who you're cloned from. Do you have some kind of guardian or -- or like any friends that have taken you in? Something like that? A family adopting you?"

He had to at least have someone. Some adult that had gone 'hey, this random, parentless, superpowered clone boy needs a grown up.' A superpowered mentor. Some plucky random kids and their whacky, talking dog that had adopted him as their special, superpowered friend.

Someone.

[sofresh]

"I got friends," he said, mildly offended. "C'mon, do I look like the kind of guy that doesn't have any friends?"

He was totally cool. Of course he had friends. ...granted, he supposed they weren't particularly close friends, but of course they weren't. He figured he got a free pass on that, given he'd only been out and about for a couple weeks now. These things took time (probably). He would have gotten to know them better if he hadn't suddenly found himself here. But that aside...

"I don't know that any of them are here, though. They're not really the 'super' types." Or... the heroic types... It was probably for the best that no one he knew was here, honestly. "But that ain't really a problem or anything. I'm already used to doing things on my own."

He kind of prided himself on being independent, anyway. Superman was independent.

[captainbuzzkill]

Dipper didn't understand that idea. Being used to doing things on his own. Oh sure, he needed his occasional solitude and there were a lot of things he liked doing that Mabel didn't like doing, and vice versa, but when it really came down to it, when it mattered the most, he never had to really go it alone. And after everything he and Mabel had been through recently, the idea was almost anathema to him.

That was why he found this place so difficult sometimes. He had friends here -- even grown ups looking out for him a little bit, like Hal. But it really wasn't the same as having Mabel doing everything with him, shoulder to shoulder. And while he knew non-twins did it all the time, he never had really managed to wrap his head around the concept of total independence.

For a little while, he'd thought that was what he wanted and that was why he'd almost agreed to stay in Gravity Falls as Great Uncle Ford's apprentice. But he'd realized that the idea was crazy in the end. Growing up and becoming a teenager was an adventure and maybe he could've done it by himself, sure, but having someone else to do it with made it ten times better.

"You shouldn't have to, man," Dipper said quietly, and then he pressed his lips together, because he wasn't sure if he was saying was going to come off right. He shrugged. "It's good that you can. Everybody needs to know how to take care of themselves, and hey, if you popped out of your test tube or whatever it was, already knowing how to do that, good for you. Some grownups can't even manage that."

Look at his grunkles. He loved them but they were kind of walking disasters sometimes. Causing apocalypses, not bathing and hoarding canned meats.

"But it's one of those things where even if you can, you still deserve someone watching your back. It makes things easier. And more fun. And less scary." A pause. "At least during the scary parts of life. That happen. Inevitably."

Another long pause.

"Because they happen. Scary parts happen. Eventually. Always."

[sofresh]

"I guess it depends on what you mean by 'scary,'" he said. He wasn't taking this too seriously, at least not yet, but he'd hear him out. "Like, how scary are we talkin' here?"

It just wasn't a thing he could relate to. Like, at all. He could count on one hand the number of truly dangerous situations he'd faced, but even then, he wasn't sure that he'd describe any of them as being scary. Maybe it was because of what he was, but even in his first three weeks of superhero-ing, something he was completely new at, he had yet to really know what it was like to feel vulnerable. The closest he'd gotten to that was probably just before he ended up here, and that was less him being vulnerable than an entire city of people that he was supposed to protect being vulnerable. But even with as awful as that would have been, he would have still been fine, himself. He was invincible. ...barring a few very particular exceptions, anyway.

For Superboy, the situation was just the complete opposite of Dipper's. He'd been helped before, and he'd been helped more than once, and it was nice. Totally. But it never struck him as something he needed or truly wanted. What could possibly be so scary or dangerous that he wouldn't be able to handle it by himself?

[captainbuzzkill]

"Like 'blood rain' scary. Apocalypse scary. That's what I'm used to. A bunch of demons tried to bring about the end of the world back home, in a massive explosion of unholy horrors and otherdimensional weirdness. Luckily, we stopped it."

Dipper shrugged.

"Hopefully, things won't get that scary here in the Legion's universe, but those kinds of things happen sometimes. Sometimes life can get that way. Weird. Weird and horrifying."

Which was something Dipper figured maybe a very young clone without a ton of life experience might not understand.

"And we're in a totally strange universe that sometimes has totally dangerous stuff. So I guess I'm just saying, if things do get freaky, there are nice people here. Annnd we've got your back. You may be fine doing things on your own, but it just seems like something you should know -- that when it comes down to it, you don't have to."

[sofresh]

"I think I could handle an apocalypse or two," he said with a shrug. Was he serious or was he joking, a question for the ages. Of course, if he actually had all of his powers, or maybe if this wasn't a very far future that he had yet to experience, or... if he'd had any experiences at all... then joke or not, his words might have held a little more weight. "But I guess I hear ya. I mean, that's the whole point of bein' on a team, ain't it?"

At least, it was in theory. He supposed that technically was what he'd signed up for. It was just— he sort of imagined it more like him helping everyone else out, not vice versa.

"But I mean, if you're gonna have my back, you could probably at least tell me your name."

Might as well get comfy, he thought, because it sure didn't seem like he was going anywhere anytime soon.

wanna wrap after your next tag?

[captainbuzzkill]

As someone who had handled one apocalypse, Dipper was skeptical that anyone could handle two, but that the other boy thought that was all the more reason to try to watch his back.

Dipper held out his hand, smiling.

"Dipper Pines."