Chapter 9 : *Snore* Snooze (Patreon)

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The Sage of the Mind: Chapter 8

Axle’s Apartment, [10th November, 2006] 

–Axle Riddle–

It had been a week since that incident with the vampires. After that incident was brought to light and the woman’s interview went viral on TV, he had sensed no other vampires, even at night. He had thought that the vampires would have some sort of pull with the authorities to make the case disappear or to silence the witness but to his shock, nothing of the sort happened at all. She was put on the list of the protective watch and was let go from the police station as soon as her statement was taken. He had also sensed the NYPD doing their job and keeping watch over her apartment for the past week. Somehow, despite being alive for thousands of years, the covens of vampires do not have the necessary power to make this case disappear before it could reach the common man’s ears OR do they just not care about it all?

It could be plausible enough that they thought that there was no evidence of this incident aside from the floating police officers being brought onto the scene. Yeah, that was also the unfortunate side effect of not being able to communicate over vast distances. Apparently, the unexorcised spirit, i.e. He was being blamed for the woman’s incident as well, even though she clearly stated in the short interview that it was two men who had assaulted her, not some invisible entity.

Still, there he was, J. Jonah Jameson, doing his job. The job was to flame the rumours and generate hate all day long but hey, he was good at what he did and figured out how to earn money through it, so…Respect.

That brought him back to square one. His effective spatial range was somewhere between 2-2.5 miles in every direction so that was pretty good going. His strength was also very high, judging from the vampire paste he made last week. He was struggling with control. He had nobody to teach him about this stuff and every time, he thought that he had some baseline level of control, it all got shot to hell soon enough because his powers were increasing rapidly. 

Just last month, the amount of effort required for him to lift the garbage truck just enough for it to be noticeable had him lifting it almost a foot in the air. He had to figure out some way to clearly control his powers. Unfortunately, he did not know who to turn to, in that regard. Kamar Taj would be the best option and yet he did not trust them enough and honestly, it would be best for him if he grew his powers enough so that he could enter anybody’s home without having to fear for his life. Stupid, he knew but it was the best he could come up with, considering the situation.

He was not blessed with the intelligence aspect of the Sage Force. He had just the telekinesis and the body to show for it. Speaking of body, he had grown strong enough to throw around everybody’s PR around him at the gym. He had stopped going after only 2 days, despite paying for the entire month (RIP his hard-earned money) because he was starting to gain the wrong kind of attention. The gym owner had actually approached him about some sort of underground fight club where he could earn money. While that would have been attractive had he not had a stable job, identity, and a place to live, he had all of that now and was more than happy to stay in the same place.

“So, what to do?” He mumbled to himself even as there was the sound of utensils being washed in the kitchen. Ah, it was so nice to have powers like this. He was able to multitask with ease, which made household chores a breeze. Cooking? Done. Cleaning? Done. Deep Clean? Not necessary because he used his powers and got the dust and grime out of every single corner of the house. It helped that it was not that big of an apartment anyway, considering it was Manhattan but his powers definitely did come in handy. Speaking of his apartment, the couple’s apartment had been auctioned and the buyer was some investment firm he did not know about. They had conducted a survey of some sort, approaching every single owner if they wanted to sell it to the firm at 20% above market rate for some reason but he just told them he had only dealt with the management firm of the owner and never the owner directly. He got some bad vibes from them because why would the sales team of an investment firm be walking around with enough weapons in the trunk of their cars to shoot up a block or two? Nevertheless, he did not investigate further because he was late for his shift that day.

Today though, it was a holiday because Mrs.Sanchez and her husband had gone on a vacation and he was also given a break for the week because Mrs.Sanchez thought that he was working himself too hard even though the working hours were absolutely normal for the service industry, let alone for someone like him, who could now maintain optimal performance without sleep for almost an entire week before he started feeling some effects like a dull headache.

So, he can now choose to not sleep at all, for an entire week. He did not do that though, for obvious reasons. He loved sleeping. Even though he barely required 4 hours of sleep every day to wake up fully refreshed, he slept more than that because leaving his bed was so hard in the morning, especially with his powers and he can stay cozy in his bed and have already started his chores for the morning. Of course, that didn’t help in increasing the strength of his body so he would have to go on runs frequently all the while his powers pressed down on his body so that it would get exhausted far often. 

That plan had hit a snag though. He was running around at 5 in the morning, as usual, when he stepped on a pavement that was already in bad shape and the added weight of him on top of his powers just broke that, making a big hole on the sidewalk. The noise it had made was very loud and he had been startled so much that he had fallen down with a very manly yelp. That had made him realise that he was probably stomping around with huge weights on his body. The stronger his body got, the more weight he would have to put on his body and the more likely he was to break the ground he was running on.

For that, he would probably have to look for a natural running track but even that had its own set of risks so for the time being, he had suspended running in the morning. The added effect was the extra sleepy time he got in the morning but his darned body would not let him sleep more.

That was why he was in his bed, thinking all these things instead of just getting up and doing something. He had the entire week off, might as well make something productive out of it.

He had a lot of things to do on his to-do list but all of those were long-term goals. Today, he was going to do something that he had never tried before. He was going to the edge of his prison and see if his range actually extended out of his prison. If true, it would be a massive help since he calculated that by the time Loki would turn up in New York, his range would be around a hundred miles instead of the measly 2 miles it was now. If that range continued to expand outside the limits of his prison, he could do a lot of stuff.

“Alright, time to get going,” He muttered to himself as he woke up, the toothbrush, already washed and topped up with toothpaste, floating out of the bathroom into his waiting hand. Huh, he really was using his powers like they were a part of his life. Like it was a limb and not a supernatural power that most people would kill to have.

He would have to be more careful in the future when the proliferation of cameras would skyrocket to untold levels. IT would be wise to assume that one was under constant video surveillance and act accordingly. Today though, he was going to figure out another aspect of his powers so he was psyched up for that.

Whistle

He whistled a merry tune as he walked up to the edge of the railing. He could see the huge orange curtain ending just a few feet away from him. Being so close to the curtain, he could feel its powers and it was heart-chilling. If it was something else, he might have had some hope of breaking the barrier and then not letting the CHitauri INvasion happen but feeling the sheer power wash over his skin, he could say with confidence that not even mastering the entirety of the Sage Force could have helped him break his curtain before its purpose was satisfied. He had his spatial awareness tightly wound up around his body only as he looked at the majestic power of the curtain and the way it was hidden from all the common people.

Speaking of the curtain, could other people sense it? Probably all the beings who were mystically attuned should be able to sense something so overpowering on its surroundings. Probably the Ancient One could sense it with ease. Wait. Was the curtain the reason he had not encountered any mystical beings on his side? Including any high-ranking vampires or spirits?

No. he was getting off-topic. He shook his head and looked at the curtain that was his prison for the next 5 years and let his powers loose. Almost immediately, as if an umbrella had been opened, the fog receded and his awareness range exploded, reaching for the curtain. He winced in preparation for some sort of pain but none came. He opened his eyes to see his awareness range had extended the curtain. He could sense the fish in the water below.

He tried lifting one of them and almost immediately stopped as he felt a spike of pain in his head.

*huff*

“So that's how it is,” He mumbled to himself as he staggered back and sat on the bench, understanding the limits of the curtain. It would not hinder his spatial awareness range but the power he could exert out of it was severely limited. Combined with the natural weakness of his power being the weaker force being exerted the longer the distance, yeah, he could not do much outside the curtain. Maybe lift a car or two once 2012 rolled around the corner but that’s it.

Sighing, he put his hands in his coat and turned away, heading to his favourite pizza place. He needed some of that sweet sweet gluten and cheese to soothe his ego.