Unauthorized Use

You know that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when you just know something bad is coming. An engine roared as a truck swung wildly around the corner on my left, barrelling down the street toward me. I could hear sirens in the distance, getting closer.

I gripped the bench hard, crushing the wooden planks with my fingers. I could stop this. This bench wasn't heavy enough to stop the truck, but tossing it into the cab might scare the driver to stomp on the brakes. I spotted several three-foot high cement planters decorating the outside of the office building behind me that I could toss into the road. I could possibly flip the truck over with a running start, or at least knock it onto its side.

No, I thought, as I loosened my hand from the bench. I couldn't use my power. That was the one condition of leaving The Agency: No Powers. And sure, I might've used my strength here and there just to hold open a particularly heavy door during a powerful windstorm or unscrew a frozen bolt from an old tire. Luckily The Agency seemed to overlook those little instances, or at least they never sent a team after me yet. It was only a matter of time until they caught me using my power. And if they were watching me now, they'd definitely catch me this time tossing 200lb planters into the street. One strike and it was off to prison, or worse, forced into servitude as one of their government thugs.

Sirens blared and a cop car swung around the same turn. The passenger of the truck leaned out and fired several shots from a handgun. Through the windshield, I saw the driver take a hand off the wheel to fire shots out his window too. In front of the truck, the light turned red and pedestrians crossed into the intersection. Some broke into a run at the sight of the truck and the sound of the sirens. Others wouldn't make it across in time.

I was barred from using my super-strength, but I couldn't just sit back and do nothing. Maybe just a small act, something no one would notice. I reached into my pocket and pulled two coins, resting one on each of my thumbs. Timing it just so, I flicked both toward the truck. The first coin popped the passenger side front tire. The second coin hit the passenger in the side of the head, knocking his head back and smacking it hard on the window frame.

The next second felt like it was moving in slow motion. Though he looked unconscious or at least soon to be, the passenger continued to pull the trigger, now firing wildly into the buildings and crowds of people gathered on the sidewalks. When the tire popped and the truck skid, the driver dropped his gun and jerked the wheel. I heard another loud pop and instead of straightening out, the truck flipped, aimed at the pedestrians still in the road while the passenger hung limp out the window.

The truck started to roll but before it could crush the passenger and then all the pedestrians in the way, I heard a loud snap and the world stopped.

"You can breath now, Jackson," said a female voice behind me, one I hadn't heard for years and hoped to never hear again.

I exhaled a breath I didn't know I was holding and turned to find a woman in a dark suit and sunglasses. Captain Evanston, my training commander before I left the program. "Is this you?" I asked motioning to the frozen moment we were currently in. She just stared at me, as if that was enough of an answer. "So, The Agency has been watching me?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "Just checking in. We do that every few months with all the recruits who opt-out of the program. We come by, observe for a few days, then move onto the next."

"So you didn't set this whole thing up just to see if I was using my powers?" I said, glaring at her as I waved my arms wildly at the chaos behind me.

She took off her sunglasses and looked around behind me, and just shook her head. "There's enough going on in the world that not only would there be no point into adding to the madness, but we just don't have the resources to set up scenarios for every individual we are currently monitoring." She put her sunglasses back on and stepped passed me and into the disaster. "Now, where is he?" she said, walking across the street. I hurried to fall in next to her, curious about who she was looking for in all this madness.

"Your plan was almost perfect. Stopping a moving vehicle with minimum damage to people and property while maintaining anonymity as this would be an illegal use of your powers. Knock out the passenger to stop him from firing, especially into the crowd of people. It also isolates the driver, psychologically he knows he's now alone. Popping the tire not only disables the vehicle but also puts the driver's focus back on steering the truck."

"Yeah, well, as thought out as you make it sound, the truck still flipped so I guess it wasn't that great of a plan," I said, staring at the truck hanging suspended in mid-air.

It was in mid-roll, the passenger-side about to meet the asphalt with the upper-half of the passenger hanging out the window. The rest of the roll might take it through the intersection, crushing one or two people still crossing the street before hopefully stopping when it slammed into the cars stopped at the light on the other side of the street. Worst case, perhaps the truck is pulled by the weight of the cab or the way the driver turned the wheel at the last second and the momentum pulls the roll into the larger crowd gathered on the sidewalk, then through a large glass window of a small convenience store at the corner.

"What did you use to take out the tires?" Captain Evanston said. At some point while I stared at the truck and the carnage about to ensue, she must've walked right passed me and now stood next to the truck itself.

"A coin," I replied, making my way to her. "A quarter, I think. I was waiting for the bus. And I only got the one tire. I used the other coin on the passenger."

She waved and I walked over to her next to the driver's side front tire. "Coins, right? So I take it this wasn't you?" She took off her sunglasses and pointed to a blown tire on the driver's side, except the hole punched into it looked melted through. The second popping noise right before the truck flipped.

"Over here Jackson," she called, now standing in front of another guy several years younger than me mixed in with a small crowd that must've just come out of the deli to see the commotion. He was dressed casually, blending easily with the crowd. Luckily Captain Evanston must've known what to look for. It took me a little longer before I noticed the red eyes and a slight tan around them, darker than the rest of his skin. "This is what you didn't plan for, a second person acting on the threat. Same idea, disable the vehicle. Heat vision, I'm guessing, to melt a hole in the tire. I'll have a team pick him up."

Captain Evanston put on her sunglasses and started back across the street to where we were originally standing at the bus stop. "That's the problem with subtle," she said absently, as if teaching a class to no one in particular, "If you had chosen to do something big and bold, it would've stopped the amateurs from interfering with your plans." She pointed at the large planters behind me. "Toss one of those into the road or onto the truck's hood. That would've stopped the chase. But you were too afraid of being caught, concerned about your own well-being."

I looked away, embarrassed knowing that was one of the plans I'd originally come up with the foil the getaway.

She stepped up close to me and grabbed my arms. "Or just jump in front of the truck and stop it with your own two hands."

I yanked my arms away. "No way am I that strong to stop a barrelling car."

She stared at me. "You could have been. Our projections showed that you might've been able to stop something twice that size at that speed if you just stayed with us."

I shook my head, forcing away the flashback coming on from my time at The Agency's mandatory training camp for anyone caught using their powers without authorization. "I'm not cut out for that, to be one of your thugs." I forced the sneer from my face and tried to replace it with a grateful smile. "But luckily you guys were here this time to save the day, to prevent this tragedy. I guess The Agency can do some good."

Captain Evanston just started at me blankley before shaking her head and raising her right hand. "Actions have consequences, as does inaction. A lesson you should've learned by now." Then she snapped her fingers and everything went to hell.

Bullets whizzed by, shattering glass windows or hitting bodies with dull, flat thuds. The crunch and snap of bones and flesh as the truck landed was just loud enough to be heard over the screams of the people around me. The truck rolled and it was the worst-case scenario: its momentum pulled the roll through a dozen onlookers, including the young man with heat vision, and into the building before it finally stopped inside the corner store. People were sprawled on the ground, blood splattered everywhere on the concrete.

I spun around and grabbed Captain Evanston by the shoulders. "What is wrong with you?! You could have saved them all!"

"You could have saved them," was all she said before she vanished. In my hands and in front of me one moment, gone the next. I felt a sharp thin stab in my neck and the world started to go dim. "You can save them. I will show you how."

Once again, Reddit Writing Prompts: "You have superpowers but aren't allowed to use them." A simple prompt that didn't force the me into too much of a corner on how the story should go. Mostly I'm just happy that I finished it, but other than that, yeah, I know it isn't ... I was going to say the best but really, it's barely good just on the standards I try to have for myself. Of course, I've still got a weakness when it comes to description as you might've seen from the lack of detail with Captain Evanston (I opted for some generic government suit type character) as well as "The Agency" (I really couldn't figure out what to make this out to be). I also rushed the beginning, that first paragraph, because, well, figuring out how to start is hard. This was another one that it took me a while to figure out the action, how everything moved together, as you could tell from the shitty diagram I pulled from my notebook. I've been trying to get something done once a week but last week... I was just lazy.