Chapter 1

The picture of me didn't look too bad, I guess. Considering that my hunting form looked like a glowing silver mannequin. I mean, you can only see my general features in the feature, like arms, hands, and such. You couldn't make out my eyes, ears, or any small details.

I wasn't that fond of the name the media had given me: Shimmer. Perhaps Fury would have been better, even though I don't know if I was actually a Fury, or merely an agent of one. Or something else entirely.

Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself.

My name is Samuel Reed. Everyone calls me Sam, except my grandmothers, and my Mom when she's pissed off at me. I'm a pretty average seventeen year old student-athlete--at least I was before I was given "The Gift of the Furies."

It happened on my best friend Jim's seventeenth birthday. We were having it at Jack's Safari, which may sound lame, but is actually a fairly cool place. It's a sports bar/entertainment complex located in downtown River City which caters to young adults above the age of twenty-one. Usually, there's a restriction on underage attendees, such as teenagers having to be accompanied by an adult and no one under the age of twenty-one allowed period after ten p.m. at night. Jim's Mom was the manager, though, and arranged for Jack's Safari's semi-annual downtime for maintenance to be at the same time as Jim's birthday. As you can imagine, everyone who was invited showed up, even though Jim's Mom made it perfectly clear that the party was definitely going to be dry.

Jim and I weren't the most popular kids in high school, but we did OK. We were both starting players on the school's varsity baseball team, which meant we weren't in the top echelon of athletes at our high school, but we were in sight of the apex. So with a party at Jack's Safari, we did have the top clique of the school represented.

I was there with Sara Belle (yes, that's her real name, even though it sounds like the name of a line of frozen desserts), who had been my one of my two best friends since grade school. Me, Sarah and Jim had been best friends forever, and we all wanted to keep things that way. Unfortunately, both Jim and I had developed 'feelings' for Sarah over the last year, and it was pretty confusing for all of us.

Sarah was a real cutie, and in good shape too (she was on our high school's cross country team). At the time of the party, she wasn't dating anybody, and the three of us were still circling the possibility of her dating me or Jim seriously.

The party was going great, and the were a good cross section of people from the school. Everyone was enjoying themselves, until the arrival of the Alloy Men.

River City isn't like Gotham or Metropolis. Gotham had Batman, Metropolis had Superman, both both cities also had their share of supervillains. River City is a fairly big city, but we're lucky that we haven't drawn the attention of the major league villains. What problems we do have are handled by Reaction Force, a team of elite individuals drawn from the state police and national guards of our state and the state across the river from us. Reaction Force members are given special training and high tech weapons to handle the terrorists and criminals River City does attract. If anything happens that is over their head, they can always call on the Justice League, which has recently expanded its membership from the original seven.

Reaction Force was pretty much all River City ever needed, until the Alloy Men arrived on the scene. From what I understand, the Alloy Men were suspected to be ex-military with special forces training who used high tech battle suits to commit lightning strike robberies. So far, the tactics they've used had helped them elude being apprehended by Reaction Force.

On the night of my best friend's birthday party, the Alloy Men hit River City's Diamond Exchange, home of one of the largest coalition of diamond and gem dealers in the country. Before they hit the Diamond Exchange, the Alloy Men set off several explosions across both states, luring away members of Reaction Force. Then they hit the Diamond Exchange.

Unfortunately for my friends and I, the running battle that happened between them and the local police force took them through downtown River City and right through Jack's Safari.

I know it was later said that the Alloy Men had expected Jack's Safari to be closed that night, but that doesn't matter to me. It took the Alloy Men fifteen seconds to literally rip Jack's Safari in half. Nobody was killed, but the attack would leave my two best friends in comas.

While everyone else was reeling from the impact, my eyes locked on the broken bodies of my two best friends in the world. At this point, my vision went red and everything was kind of hazy, but I think I've been able to figure out what happened from things I learned later on.

Across town, at the River City Memorial Hospital, a man chose this moment to die. Actually, he had been dying for the last week, and his attending doctors were amazed that their patient had lasted this long.

The man in question had "The Gift of the Furies", and was waiting until "A Spirit of Pure Vengeance" appeared that could receive the Gift.

In this case, that Spirit was me.

When it descended upon me, I completely lost it. I found myself running down the path of destruction the Alloy Men had left behind them. I didn't know it at the time, but I was invisible. And literally flying above the ground. You're probably wondering how I couldn't be aware of either of these things. It's simple. I was angry as hell at the what the Alloy Men had done to my friends before the Gift had descended upon me. When the Gift hit me, my anger exploded a hundred fold.

I vaguely remember catching up to the Alloy Men, and after that, it's a blur. Fortunately for me, there was a news copter hovering nearby who caught the whole battle.

The footage they shot showed a shimmering man suddenly appear in the middle of five Alloy Men. By shimmering, I mean like the air above a hot sidewalk on a particularly warm August day. Every blast the Alloy Men landed on the silver man (me) dissipated; every blow was stopped cold in a shower of sparks against the shimmering air around the silver man.

The silver man tossed the men around like empty aluminum trash cans. When they tried to escape, the silver man pointed his hand at an Alloy Man. A wave of silver shimmering air flew from that hand, knocking the Alloy Man out of the air.

When the Reaction Force showed up detain all the combatants, the silver man simply disappeared.

I don't remember the battle, or how I got back to the destroyed sports bar. Somehow, my disappearance or reappearance was never noticed. I just remember a paramedic helping me up, giving me a once-over, and then telling me how lucky I was, then waving over a police detective. The detective asked me a few questions, took a few notes, and then turned me over to my parents.

My Mom and Dad went nuts when I emerged from the police line surrounding Jack's Safari. I was still dazed as I watched my classmates emerge from the ruins of Jack's Safari, some under their own power, others on a stretcher.

The paramedic who had checked me out walked over to my Mom and Dad and told them I was OK, but it would probably be best if I saw our family doctor in the next day or so.

My Mom led me to the car and sat me in the back seat. On the drive home she would turn around, talk to me and watch me intensely. Me, I just sat there, trying to make sense out of the half-memories haunting me.

My parents continued trying to draw me out that night, but eventually just let me go to my bedroom. My Mom checked on me once more, then left me to go to sleep.

All things considered, I fell asleep fairly easy.

I had bizarre dreams that night, with flashes of the battle with the Alloy Men. Sometimes it was from my view, sometimes from the view of the news camera (which I hadn't yet seen), and sometimes from the view of one of the Alloy Men.

And then she came.

She was beautiful and hideous, sometimes nude, sometimes covered with feathers (and with wings), and sometimes wearing Grecian robes. She talked in words and images, and it was both the most erotic and most horrendous experience of my life.

I'm still not sure about a lot of things that she was telling me, but this was the basic gist. The power that had descended upon me was mine because seeing my friends like I had made me a sort of a magnet for the powers. I could pretty much do with the powers what I wanted, except if I abused them too badly, I wouldn't appreciate the consequences. I could even use the powers to be a superhero, but those weren't why I had received them. On occasion, I would be called to hunt down someone or something that had escaped from a place. I wasn't sure what this place was, but I would be required to drop everything I was doing to hunt down the beings who had escaped from this place.

I would later learn who had been the source of my dream, and what this 'place' that people escaped from was, but that's further down the road.

The woman didn't go into detail exactly what my powers were, and even suggested that they were partially determined by something in my subconscious. But I would learn about them as time went on. Or so she assured me.

Then she kissed me.

I woke up screaming.

My Mom ran into the room, hugged me, assured me everything was all right, and helped me get back to sleep.

I really didn't want to go back to sleep, afraid that she might be waiting for me there. Fortunately, the rest of my night was dreamless.

The next day at school was surreal. Counselors were there for everyone who knew someone at the party. So far, no one had died, though three of the party attendees were in ICU, and both Jim, JIm's mother, and Sara were in comas. Everyone at school knew how tight me and Jim and Sara were, and were insisting on consoling me. Even Katherine Phillips.

Normally, I wouldn't mind Katherine Phillips consoling me. She was one of the most gorgeous women I had ever met, and if weren't for the fact that I had feelings for Sara, and that Katherine was completely out of my league, I would have gone after her big time. She was five foot three, tiny little waist, long, straight dark hair, a dazzling smile, sparkling green eyes, and large, firm breasts that looked to be much larger on her tiny frame. She was also, despite her fantastic looks and status as cheerleader/school beauty, one of the sweetest people I had ever met.

She didn't say anything when she saw me. With tears welling up in her eyes, she made me lean down so she could throw her arms around my neck and hug me tightly. Then she disappeared as quickly as she could.

Later on that afternoon, I learned about one of my new powers quite by accident.

I was going down the hall when I saw Ms. Taylor heading toward me. Normally, I like Ms. Taylor. She's a guidance counselor who actually tries to help her students while being realistic about their chances of achieving their goals. She reminds everyone of what their idea of a perfect elderly aunt should look like, right down to the homemade oatmeal and raisin cookies she sometimes has in her office.

Ms. Taylor saw me in the hall and made a beeline for me. As I said earlier, I like Ms. Taylor, but I had been pretty much "consoled out" by this point. I ducked down a side hall, then belatedly realized it was a dead end. I turned around and wished I was invisible as I gritted my teeth, ready to endure more consoling.

Ms. Taylor appeared at the entrance to the side hall, a puzzlee look on her face. She looked right at me, but didn't seem to see me. Shrugging her shoulders, she headed back to her office.

I stood there for a second, wondering what had happened. Then I looked down at myself.

I wasn't there.

I almost freaked, wondering what happened. Then the air around me shimmered and I reappeared.

I stood there stunned, then looked around quickly. The side hall I was in led to a few storage closets; there weren't even any of the omnipresent lockers that lined most of the halls in the school. Luckily, any fellow students who had walked by the entrance of the side hall hadn't noticed my disappearing/reappearing act.

I went through the motions for the rest of the day, trying to figure out what was happening. None of my teachers were calling on me, putting my distracted air to my recent trauma.

When I got home, I went up to my room, locked myself in, and experimented with this new power. It was true invisibility. I didn't cast a shadow, and I didn't appear in misty form when I steamed up my bathroom. When my Mom got home, I walked around her while she put up some groceries, but she never noticed me. I was tempted to suddenly appear behind her, but considering how rough a time she had had last night (with having to come pick me up from a disaster zone), I didn't think that would be a decent thing to do.