crazyfurries

Psychologists might disagree, but there's a fundamental difference between a human's mental breakdown and a mental breakthrough. Particularly in those whose jobs revolve around politics and combat. Parties who've been through both of these agree.

A mental breakdown is when you are crying and sick with fear in your closet trying to drink your own goddamned skull into shutting up at the nightmares.

A mental breakthrough is the time when you look up into the middle distance and begin to methodically plan how to get something done. A decision reached, the final damning cut in stone for your epitaph in many cases.

And secretly, some will tell you, after imbibing in enough of whatever brain intoxicant is applicable to their species... The breakthrough is the point of no return.

At nine years old I, TYLER MARLOCKE, made the decision to put on my helmet and armor and bring my alter ego back from the dead. The time when I might've considered leaving the metahuman and superhero game had passed some three world-saving events prior to that. The decision to keep letting humans get superpowers was a world-saving event, I never really blamed the superpowers for the weirdness in my life. The thing about superpowers is this, they're tools. It's up to the people with them to use their powers responsibly, and not a lot of them do that. I'm not just talking about the metahuman community when I speak about this. The average baseline human often doesn't or can't ever really figure out the sort of power they have.

I didn't make the final breakthrough until much later after reviving my hero identity. I couldn't leave my world behind, as much as Milliways was home...I have family here. I have responsibilities here. In this world. In this universe.

I am a hero. This means I do what I can to prevent people from getting hurt, be it getting caught in political bullshit, stopping a mad metahuman, or making a mugger really sorry he picked his line of work. There is no super attached, and there is never going to be any need for it to ever do so.
I am baseline human, that means what I don't have in raw power I'm going to need to make up for in cunning, guile, trickery, gadgetry and whatever else I can learn. I will have to work for every skill in my bag of tricks and master all the mental and physical disciplines that I can.
I am a detective, this means I will figure things out, and find out who started things and what I can do about them.
I know knowledge is power. Ray taught me that, all of my adopted family in Milliways taught me and armed me with the best thing they ever could. Lessons. Sword lessons and meditation to keep a clear head from Ray Stantz. Boxing and detective work lessons from The Flying Squirrel and The Red Panda. Lawyering from Jennifer Walters and Peter Venkman. Forethought, preparation and scenario planning from Dominic Deegan and Atomic Robo... Marksmanship from Ellen, and survival skills from Adrian. These people are still the greatest ones I look up to, for intelligence, for moral standards, for perseverance in incredible odds, for being human and being able to cry and still do things anyways, and do them as right as possible.

I know I will never be able to lead a regular baseline mundane human life.

There is no such thing.

I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I turned my back on people like them.

I...I have a wonderful, brilliant warm woman I want to share this with. We've both been to the bizarre possible future of the human race...the Argonian empire. Neither of us want to see it happen. Not to our friends, our children, or our children's children and so on.

The world lost everything fantastic thousands of years ago to a stupid, stupid human magical mistake, because someone thought that not having superpowers would make everything better and safer. The other side of that coin is the world that could happen, but hasn't yet, where only superpowers rule but nothing has gotten better for anyone, not even the ones with superpowers.

I don't know where to start teaching that it isn't the powers that make the man, or what needs to be done...But I'll find out, and I'll start there, one at a time. Until then...some powers, must be reminded that they will be kept in check, and I'll start there.