The Superhero takes a break

The Superhero takes a break

Breathing deep breathes, he listened to the blessed silence, his bare feet clenched the maria in between his toes. Looking out at the endless whiteness stretching before him, he did his level best not to look at the blue marble which caught all who came here, all but him. For Earth was in the final respects the source of all his problems, and today, well today was the day he took a break. He did not want to be reminded of who was in danger, which culture was committing which genocide, or how far the world was from utter destruction every day. There are some who would have counseled him to stay, saying he was too needed to leave, but he replied the world dealt with itself before him and would long after he left the world behind. But in the truth, the reason he took his break was he was starting to hate the whole stupid race. When you start to the entertain the idea of actually letting that nuclear missile hit  the city, when it even seems to be a pleasing concept, when the inner you cries out in joy at the prospect; then it’s time to take a break for patently  obvious they have taken too much from you and not left enough time to just be you.

Running he moved at normal human speed, across the stark moon, just luxuriating in the feel of the empty cool vacuum on his skin. The hard radiation and punishing environment of space was one of the few things that he could feel; though it too did no harm to him it was better than the feeling of numbness he felt on earth. Invulnerability came with a price, and that price was to never feel anything; or nigh invulnerability anyway, He wasn’t quite sure what could kill him, but just the fact that he could feel out here indicated something in the universe probably could. 

Concentrating he jumped into space, pushing against the very Planck scale of space itself, and flew through the space between planets until he alighted on Mars. Touching down first on Olympus Mons, he watched the deep black of space touch the surface of Mars. Even here he could hear their radio chatter, the network of satellites, and probes passing signals back and forth. Even the moon was quieter, and so sighing he again pushed against space and flew through space towards Venus. The place was quiet, almost oppressively so, the weight of tons of pressure feeling no more than he imagined a cool morning breeze would feel to a normal human, and the hot scalding lava felt like cool water between his toes.  This world had never seen much of humanity and it pleased him, too much of the romance of space flight had hung around Mars.  It was a pity, for as he scanned deep into the atmosphere, he saw strange life forms made of sulphur and breathing CO2; if they had gone here they would have really found traces of alien life such as they had never imagined. He wouldn’t tell them about it, nor about the other life forms he saw in the system, it was up to the humans to discover it for themselves if they survived long enough to.

He was not quite sure if he was extraterrestrial, he remembered a great deal, even predating mankind, but such were limits of his own memory that he could not remember his beginning, perhaps he had blocked it out deliberately, he likely would never know for sure. It was time to move on, and he once more grabbed the fabric of space, and lit out for the sun itself.

The Sun was glorious, his skin baked there like he imagined a human would when getting a sun tan. He flew between solar flares, and touched the almost wavy feeling of the interface between the not quite solid and the solid. Feeling light that had taken thousands of years to make its way to the surface, was invigorating and brought flashes of life before, of memories that he did not have the context to understand, of times when he was not quite so alone.

Grabbing space time, he poured the light of the sun and ripped space asunder, and created a conduit to the outer edges of the radiation bubble from the human solar system. Going through, he closed it behind him, leaving a blast of plasma to percolate in the depths of space. It was here he could find quiet and true peace, only the endless roaring of the universe sounded in his senses. No din of human signals, no pain, no anguish, just emptiness, and a quiet that seemed to stretch everywhere. It was peaceful, and he luxuriated in its feeling, but then his senses searched out, and saw life everywhere, and intelligence almost nowhere, but to many dead husks of those that had lived. The galaxy was a graveyard, only here and there lit with the sound of mind. It fell to him to keep this portion of mind lit. It was rare enough, and so fragile, concentrating, he watched the earth from afar, then moved his senses inward, watching it evolve, moving still further in the development of life, and then in the patina, the very scum of time left  the spark of mind lit and looked at the universe.

With a sigh he looked once more around him, it was time to go back. Grabbing space time he warped space around him and pulled himself through the oscillating wormholes underlying reality, and came back to Earth once more. His day off was gone, and it looked like once more the stupid primates needed his help once more. Keeping the image of that empty graveyard of universe in his mind, he set about saving the day, for the light of mind was so precious and rare, the embers always so hard to keep alight.