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Flight 101
Topic Started: Jan 30 2010, 09:29 PM (399 Views)
BurningBright
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"I really don't feel right about this..."

"It'll be fine, trust me! If it's not fine, we can just get Ali to drop by the warehouse and fix me up, which I've still gotta do eventually anyways. Plus, if I could fly, can you imagine how much gas you'd save?! I could maybe even take the two of you with me eventually!"

Phil had been trying to fly since...well, since Matt first proposed the idea around a month and a half ago. So far, all attempts met with failure. Phil wasn't a quitter though-he'd fly, dammit!

Plus, after his recent adventure in the city, a bit of soaring through the air would probably do him good.

All very good reasons for why he should learn to fly-unfortunately, his plans to do it were somewhat...painful. So far, he had tried jumping off of the crate wall inside the warehouse, but only managed to slow himself down, narrowly avoiding a broken...everything. He also had tried flight while in pursuit of That Man, but the results had been the same, but with the added bonus of landing on broken glass.

After getting wise to the whole "falling hurts" thing, Phil decided on a tremendously intelligent idea-he'd leap off of a small building onto the trampoline he made Matt buy recently. OK, maybe not tremendously intelligent, but it was better than jumping off of a 30 foot stack of crates with only concrete to break your fall.

Phil spread his arms dramatically, taking in the surroundings-he and Matt were standing on the roof of an empty house, a two story one. The trampoline had been assembled below, ready to break the fall of the would-be bird man. Matt was afraid, but much less so than he had the first time Phil tried this stunt-after seeing his friend routinely survive 30 and 40 foot falls with nothing more than a complaint, he no longer really was afraid that Phil would mess up. Not too much, anyways.

The birds were singing as they flit through the air, not a care in the world. I'll be joining you soon. Those skies can't be yours forever, it's time for you to share.

"I still think this is a really bad ide-and there you go."

Phil had let himself free fall while Matt was talking, sick of Matt's naysayingness. He pushed up on his body, trying to achieve a form of flight...and predictably, he hit the trampoline. Hard. Not as hard as he could have, and not as hard as he should have, but hard, nonetheless. The cloth bounced him high into the air, where he was able to position his body to land on his feet when he came back down.

He looked back up at Matt, an infinite expression of optimism on his face-he didn't fly, but the trampoline was a good idea. Success. Of a sort.
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BurningBright
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As Phil ran through a series of freefalls onto a trampoline, and as Matt just sat there on the roof and watched him fail over and over and over again, Ben would climb up to the roof using the ladder they'd positioned for just that purpose. In his hands was a skateboard, his preferred (and, if Matt wasn't there, only) method of travel.

"He's still at it?"

Matt sat there, his chin resting comfortably in his hands. He sighed, turning his eyes skyward into the near empty blue sky. The sun was shining, birds were singing, children were playing, his best friend was jumping off of roofs...it seemed like a pretty decent day. And he was spending it watching said friend jump off of a roof, rather than sitting inside shooting some noob online. He sighed.

"Yup."

Ben sat down next to Matt, resting his skateboard across his thighs. I don't get on top of roofs often enough...Specials get all the fun. His hand both shot back to support him as he leaned backwards.

"Any progress?"

Phil would answer that himself by climbing the ladder enthusiastically and running past Ben, doing a running leap onto the trampoline. As he disappeared from sight, Ben nodded.

"Guess not."

Soon enough, Phil's head would emerge from the ladder again. "I'm getting close! I swear I'm falling slower than before. Every single time feels slower!" He finished his climb up the roof and ran to the edge, jumping off onto the trampoline again.

"Unfortunately, time seems to be slowing down for me too. The longer I sit here, the more it feels like time decided to stand still."

Both Ben and Matt sighed together as Phil ran his circuit again, to the same effectiveness as before.

"Maybe that's just really fun. Maybe he's given up on actual flight by now."

"We're not that lucky."
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BurningBright
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Day quickly turned to night, and Phil's seemingly limitless energy faded with the light. The three boys now sat on the roof together, one very exhausted, the other two simply very bored.

"Every telekinetic in every comic can fly. ALL of em. And I can't. Where is the justice in that?"

Ben held his hands close to the glow of the flames-what flames, you ask? Why, they brought a trashcan up here and lit it's insides on fire, those flames!

"Maybe the comics are just...yano...stories? Not real? Any thoughts on this one Matt?"

Matt held in his hand a large fork, the kind you roasted things on. At the end was a hot dog. Matt shrugged as he brought the slight singed dog close to his face, claiming a well deserved meal. Sorta. "Well...I mean, in theory, it's just lifting yourself. Shouldn't be that tough."

"I've only been able to lift...well, pretty much what I could lift if I walked up to it and lifted it. But I'm not that heavy...I should be able to do it!"

Ben spoke up, after setting up his own hot dog fork thing. "You're fighting gravity and speed though...maybe you should be practicing from a standing position and try to just get yourself off the ground first...yano?"

"I guess."

Phil held no fork, but a hot dog was roasting over the fire suspended on air. He'd bring the dog over to him and start eating it hands free. "But...do you..." He swallowed. "think that's the only way? I've been doing this stuff for like 2 months now...you'd think I'd eventually be getting better."

"You ARE getting better. When's the last time you had to really think about locking or unlocking a door? Remember that first time I made you do it? Damn near passed out!"

Phil thought back to those early days. Ben was right, of course-the strain had been incredible back then. Nowadays, it was as difficult as manually locking the damn door. I don't wanna wait a few months to just get my ass off the ground though...gaaah!
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Today was a new day, as they said. Today, he'd try a different training method, one that, if successful, could potentially show him what he needed to do to get through this "flying" issue.

He was heading to the nearest public swimming pool.

Under his jeans, he wore swimming trunks, and his skateboard was getting him there almost as quickly as a car could-some would argue maybe quicker, since he didn't have to worry about traffic signs or traffic lights or anything of that nature. He was ready to get shit done.

The theory was that if he could propel himself telekinetically through the water, he'd be able to do the same through the air. Sorta. Granted, people could already propel themselves through the water, but that was besides the point. Especially when taking into account that Phil had never, in his 19 years of living, taken it upon himself to actually figure out that swimming thing. Yes, he could not swim, but he would soon-hopefully-become one of the best swimmers in Veritas City.

When he finally arrived at the community pool, he was quite pleased to find that it was empty. The ride over had been the usual attack on his sensibilities as he felt every emotion one could think of-he didn't need the extra stuff floating around in his head when he was trying to figure this kind of stuff out.
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As he sank into the waters, he let the cool liquid envelop him, getting his body adjusted to the temperature before trying to zoom around down here. He waded around in the shallow end for a while before he felt like he was ready. He looked around, wary of his surroundings-he'd likely feel any kind of excited feelings before anyone got too close, but one could never be too careful. After all of his preparations were in place, he took hold of his body and leaned forward, pushing off of the bottom with his feet.

To his surprise-and smug pleasure-he moved forward through the waters easily and smoothly. If this was what flight was going to be like, he was more than ready to get to that point-if only he could do it already.

He zoomed around the waters for a bit longer. Well, not really "zoomed"...admittedly, he was only "flying" as fast as most could swim anyways-he was just doing so without moving his arms or legs. Soon, however, he decided that this wouldn't get him anywhere. If the training wasn't difficult, it wouldn't produce any results, after all.

Plan B then.
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BurningBright
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Plan B would consist of standing in one spot and trying to make one's head explode. At least, that's what it felt like, as difficult as Ben's "get floating" method was. So far, there had been little success. Little, because he DID float...sorta. Maybe. It could also have just as easily been a Push that got out of Phil's control.

"This isn't working."

Ben was with him this time, watching with his arms folded across his chest. It really wasn't working, and Phil had been here, going at it for roughly an hour now. How he managed the patience to watch someone stand still for an hour was beyond Phil-maybe he got some sort of sadistic enjoyment out of watching Phil fail over and over and over and over again.

"Try just your feet."

Phil instantly stopped all effort-that was Ben's suggestion roughly 40 minutes ago.

"Just my feet? Just my feet? WE DID THAT ALREADY!"

Ben laughed and started walking away, evidently bored with this. "I know!", he called. "I was seeing if I could get you to do it again!"
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The next day was solitary time again. This time, Phil stood atop a high building-and by high, I mean high. It was easily 10 stories-a fall from that height would not be fun, even WITH telekinesis acting like a brake.

Of course, not even Phil was THAT determined to fly. He was just up here for the fact that no one else was. There wasn't even anyone in the building anymore-he had made sure of that. When he had been several yards away, the fire alarm had mysteriously been pulled, to his and everyone else's surprise. Alright, maybe he wasn't THAT surprised about it, but he would pretend to be, at least long enough to be sure that no one would stay around.

After everyone left, they'd find that every single entrance had been locked shut, making the goal of checking to see if all was well rather difficult. Additionally, everyone who had a key mysteriously found the key that would unlock the door bent, as if someone had purposefully bent the key for the very purpose of keeping someone from unlocking the door. No, that's silly.

Phil sat with his legs crossed and his eyes closed, far from the emotions of all the rabble-up here, he was perfectly alone with himself. Which might have been another reason why he was so intent on flight. It was hard to be disturbed by emotions when there wasn't another person within a mile of yourself in any direction.

He focused on the image of himself flying. He had done the force choke and a force push so far...why not force meditation?

Several pebbles around him would start floating, but he, predictably enough, remained grounded. After thirty minutes of this monotony, Phil decided to call it quits and left, taking the stairs down and using his powers to open a locked emergency fire escape. As he walked around the other side of the building, everyone would find that their keys had straightened themselves again-not that they'd need them. The doors all decided to unlock themselves.
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BurningBright
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Training today would consist of...not training. Phil laid down on his couch, flipping through the channels, coming to rest on the news. It was funny, seeing events that were caused by himself. Most of the time.

Quote:
 
-from a grappling hook in front of Marilou's Grocery last week. The murderer is at large, and the local police have yet to comment on whether or not they believe a Super was responsi-


He muted the set telekinetically and floated his phone over to him. Lantern can fly...Ali can fly...both of the other specials who aren't trying to ruin the world can fly. Why can't I?...maybe I should get Ali over here and see if she can help. Of course...it's probably different for her, the whole flight issue. Lantern's is probably a similar method though. He probably just makes his suit fly, and him flying happens to be a happy consequence...

Unfortunately, the way he could call the Lantern was set up almost like an emergency beacon-he wouldn't feel right about calling on the Lantern in any less than an emergency.

Guess it's on Ali then...tomorrow. Not today.
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Once again, he would put off calling Ali in favor of doing some pointless training that likely wasn't going to accomplish anything. Today, however, it wasn't flying.

He was on the baseball field again. It had recently been restored again, and now was host to a few games-sometimes, even organized ones. Today, he was offering a challenge to anyone who'd bother to listen. Anyone who could strike him out would receive 100 dollars.

Yes, it wasn't a fair challenge, but who said anything about being fair? This was training, dammit.

Predictably, every ball thrown was hit-Phil made the balls move towards his bat. Two and a half months ago, this would have been tough-now, it was hopelessly easy. Phil would leave the field that day a hated man, and having upped his batting average considerably.
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BurningBright
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When he got home, he'd get on his computer in search of research. He doubted anyone would be posting accurate descriptions of how to fly, but there was always the off-chance that a real telekinetic had figured it out and posted the answers for his fellow telekinetic buddies.

It took Phil about five seconds to determine that the internet would assist him almost as well as strapping a massive firework to his back would. Most of the posters were obviously not real telekinetics, but nutjobs who insisted upon the power of willpower, or inner strength, or the Sun God Ishgalaminikeenaboo, or something to that effect.

Even the ones who claimed to be real telekinetics couldn't be trusted-Phil found someone who claimed to be able to do it by lifting his clothes with his mind. Phil knew this to be false because he had tried that very method before-it ended with several new rips in his clothing. Another posted that lifting just one's feet would do the trick. Phil briefly looked at the username of the poster-PZBen180-and promptly typed a very rude message, essentially telling PZBen180 where he could stick his feet.

You've failed me, interwebz.
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BurningBright
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He still had a good number of ideas to try out, several slightly less dangerous than one in particular. Since his most dangerous idea was quite frightening and required a fair amount of mental preparation, Phil opted to spend his time with the other, maybe less dangerous ideas. This one in particular operated on the same principle as the "lifting your clothes" or the "lifting your feet" method. He'd lift something under him.

That something today was the top of a trashcan lid. It was theoretically perfect. Wouldn't give into his weight, and it was even somewhat light, so it wouldn't add too much weight either. Of course, it was still lifting all of his weight, so there was still an issue there, but it hopefully wasn't as big of an issue as the other methods had been.

As he focused on the lid, Phil would find that the hovering was slightly working better than his previous tries, even with his weight on it. He managed to get about an inch of air, but quickly found an issue with this method-balance. Phil fell backwards off of his improvised flying saucer, and the lid, after having the full force of a focused telekinetic intent to fly forced upon it, launched itself into the air. Phil caught the lid as it came down, almost hitting him in the face.

As the lid hovered there, he sighed-he'd probably have to eventually try THAT method, since nothing else was really working.
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Ben had provided his next idea. It was mechanics-just like a person's legs were stronger than his arms, perhaps Phil was just using the wrong part of his head to lift things, or maybe the wrong emotion-it was a possibility, after all.

And so, Phil took a trip to the city streets.

Whenever he got a different emotion, he would use it to try to lift himself as he was walking. Unfortunately, nothing seemed to work...turns out, most people, when having the very powerful emotions, weren't walking the streets. Nothing was really strong enough to give Phil the extra oomph he needed.

So, he'd try the different part of the head method. Til he realized, at least, that the idea was...hard to test. Generally, he didn't know what part of his brain was being used when moving things...or doing anything, without a scientist or a book telling him. So, there was no way for him to tell whether or not he was using a different part...he'd just tell Ben that it hadn't worked. That would work well enough.
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His next idea was another one of those "in theory, this should work" ideas. Just like being able to move things through water should have gotten him used to air movement of the same variety, being able to move OTHERS through the air may have given him the experience necessary to do it himself. In theory.

The problem, of course, was that he couldn't lift anyone without hurting them. He'd have to either drag them somewhere or push them, he couldn't actually pick someone up, as he and Matt quickly discovered. Matt would feel some pressure around his midsection, and he'd be forced up onto the balls of his feet, occasionally he'd find himself launched onto his back, but he'd never float in midair.

He also found, however, that when Matt curled into the fetal position (completely of his own accord, of course), he was easier to lift, and floating was possible. The instant Matt stretched out again, however, he dropped painfully to the ground.

"There. Be constantly in the fetal position, and you can fly."

Phil shook his head and walked away. As much as I'd love to be the human cannonball, that simply won't do. Plus, he only got a few inches off the ground. Not good enough.
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There were just 2 more schemes before he gave in and tried the incredibly dangerous idea that was thought up by Ben, as most incredibly dangerous things were. This one, he expected to work about as well as the others. Worse, actually, since it was guaranteed to not make him fly just by definition.

His next idea was to simply Push. Over. And over. And over again. The theory was that, through a series of successive Pushes, he could keep himself aloft. Of course, he'd only be able to maintain a height of about 4ish feet, even if it DID work, and it'd also be an incredibly bumpy ride...he was almost tempted to skip this method entirely, but his stubbornness made that rather impossible.

He pushed, launching himself into the air, and followed it up with another push. He immediately knew that this was a bad idea-the first push would merely be launching himself away because it was right against the earth. Now, he would be pushing air...it'd be like jumping, then trying to jump again in midair. It didn't work. At all.

Just two more before I bring in a tutor.
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His next and final idea was only slightly less dangerous than the big "wtf" idea Ben had cooked up. He got Ben and Matt to set up a ramp on the steepest slope they could find-Phil then rode his skateboard down said slope, using his abilities to crank the wheels speed up to stupidly unsafe levels. As he hit the ramp, he was launched horizontally through the air-SUCCESS!

He was flying! Genuine flight, horizontal, unassisted, and obviously free from gravity!

Then he realized that his telekinesis was just helping his momentum, not keeping him aloft. There would be no soft landing at the end of this...it'd just hurt. To his credit though, he made it to the point where the slope started to turn upwards again-though, at this point, he was using his telekinetic parachute method to avoid breaking every bone in his body.

Ben and Matt both ran to his aid, but it was clear that he was fine by the time they arrived. Well, mostly. His arm received a particularly nasty gash, his ankle seemed to have gotten itself sprained, and his vision was doing this weird spinning thing, but he figured that all of that would be easily solved by a few seconds of Ali's Booboo-Be-Gone light. And so...it was time to move on to the big finale.

Car flying.
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Car flying would consist of finding an empty road, getting down on all fours while one the roof of a car, and hoping for the best. Essentially.

Even Phil wasn't enough of a daredevil to try this kind of thing without protection-he wore an old baseball helmet thing, and old elbow and kneepad things from when he was a kid and his parents warnings about wearing that sort of stuff still mattered.

With only slight hesitation, Phil climbed on top of Matt's vehicle. Matt, predictably, was put off about the whole thing, so he was left blissfully unaware that Ben and Phil had ran off with his car. As Phil prepared for the first run to start, his eyes narrowed-this was it. Do or die. Actually, do or land painfully on the concrete. It was essentially the same thing anyways.

Ben slammed on the gas, forcing Phil to hold onto the roof through any means possible.

And, predictably, it didn't work. Phil flew off the back of the car, only managing to slow his descent slightly before hitting the ground. Due to the lack of space between the top of the car and the ground, there was very little time to slow down...so he hit the ground hard. Were he not wearing his protective things, he may have cracked a bone or two.

Ok...fine...I'm done. For now.
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If Ali could keep up, Phil would lead her to a long, never used road-in particular, the one where Phil fell off of the car. The skidmarks from Ben's drive could easily be seen on the road, and though it wasn't actually visible, Phil could pick out the spot he fell off.

He picked this location out of all the other possible locations for a few reasons: first, there weren't many large objects that could accidentally go flying-just pebbles and whatnot; Second, there was rarely anyone here. A few streets had been constructed that basically made this one obsolete. The only people who ever went down it were people who missed their turn, which hopefully wouldn't be too many.

Here, they could practice, and hopefully make some sort of progress. Phil was more than ready to go-skateboarding for him was almost effortless, thanks to his abilities.

"Alrighty! Let's get to work."
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Thanks to her hoverboard, Alairis easily managed to catch up with him. Surprisingly it was a lot of fun as she raced him a bit, only to drop back and let him lead. It’d been years since she’d ever set foot on a skateboard… or skateboard look-alike.

She scanned the area curiously, and somewhat hesitantly. It was open enough that any mishap wouldn’t end up with crashing into anything. Of course there was the ground, but that was something he’d have to deal with.

“Hm, I suppose this’ll do.” She nodded more to herself than him. Banishing her ‘board’, she set her back pack down. Digging threw it she produced a hand sized box. In that box was a huge wad of clay-puddy. She always kept some with her for when she got bored.

“Catch.” She grabbed the wad and threw it right at his face.
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Alairis Kai
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The clay stopped in midair as Phil caught it mentally. He wondered for a few seconds why Ali would randomly carry clay around with her, but dismissed it soon-after all, they were heroes...a few strange items could be forgiven.

"Clay? Why clay?"

The clay glided to Phil's opened palm, and as he grasped it, he manipulated it around for a few seconds. This brought him back to his toddler years...he hadn't played with clay in years.

"How is this supposed to help me fly?"
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AleenaGrey
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She smirked at his confusion as he messed around with the clay. “Don’t touch it with your hands. Mind only.” Alairis crossed her arms over her chest and surveyed him up and down as she thought.

“Now I’m pretty sure, being the typical boy, you went around trying to lug around the heaviest items you could find, yes?” She shot him a knowing look. Boys were boys. “Well that’s great and all, but it doesn’t do squat for your fine-point control. In the air you’ll need that fine point. Else you’re going to have a really damn rough time trying to get around.”

She raised her hand and pointed to that clay. “Now whatcha gonna do is to make shapes and mold the clay. Try the basic shapes first. Like squares and spheres and whatnot. Then get more complicated as you master them. Now, you have to make Perfect shapes. You can’t move on till their perfect. A mind is able to make them faultless unlike one’s hands.”
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