A Time To Change

Chapter 1
A Time To Change: Or Is It Alright To Have The Title Of The Story Be The Title Of The First Chapter?

Chapter Description: Here we meet up with the main heroes, and their Introduction, to this "Strange New World" within their own "Strange Old World"

A TIME TO CHANGE

We start this story, with Joseph Youngston, Rebecca Smalls, Benjamin Wyldz, Nicholas Achilles, Jackson Move, Julia Youngston, and Jonathon Smalls as they are all leaving a theater that was hosting a movie based on a show, that they were fond of as kids.

"You know? That! Was an excellent movie!," said Joseph as he was finishing up on his soda, "and I’m not saying that because of nostalgia."

"Uh huh?," remarked Julia.

"Oh come on Lil Sis! It’s true!," was Joesph’s reply.

"Oh man! Can you imagine if we had powers like that?," Nicholas asked as he began to absent mindedly look at his muscles.

"Oh dude! That would be sweet!," replied Rebecca as she took out a keychain figurine out of her pocket, spun it around, then put it back away, "what do you think honey?"

"Well sweetie! I think it would be kind of cool!," was Jonathon’s reply, "It’s too bad I never heard of this show when I was growing up."

"Yeah man it’s a great show!," Joseph replied in excitement.

"So are we still doing that picnic thing?," Benjamin asked as he was hoping to enjoy the nice spring weather and get to do some fishing.

"Yeah man! We are!," was Joseph’s reply.

"Good! Because I want to catch some Bass if I can," was what Benjamin said, as he began licking his lips.

Later that day

Our heroes, are all relaxing on a blanket, as they are getting the stuff ready, for their little picnic. Each one took out something different for their little picnic. Joseph took out some macaroni and cheese, Rebecca brought soda, Benjamin went to try to catch some fish as he was going to cook any he caught for them, Nicholas actually brought a bucket full of chicken for all of them (thus making Benjamin’s fishing slightly unnecessary, Jackson brought along the utensils, Julia decided to bring along her very own homemade batch of muffins, and Jonathan brought the cooler.

As they were all relaxing on this fine and lovely day, with Benjamin coming back to grab a soda, a strange figure appeared and walked up towards them. Now when I say "appeared", I mean he appeared. As in OUT OF NOWHERE! The man seemed to be a strange yet friendly type. He looked to be a person you could walk up to and strike a conversation with, but at the same time, he did just appear out of thin air!

"Why hello there!," the man said with a smile on his face, "nice weather we’re having! Eh?"

"Uh yeah!," was Joseph’s reply as he and the others began looking at his man in both curiosity and fear.

"Oh sorry! Please forgive me!," the man said with a sweet and gentle smile, "My name is Mr. Meister. But you may call me Haus!"

"Ok? So what do you want? Is there anything we can do to help?," asked Nicholas as he began to feel annoyed at this strange yet friendly man just talking to them.

"Hey now! Be nice!," Julia scolded him, "I’m sorry about that! But is there anything we can help you with?"

"Actually! I was wondering if I could help you," was Haus’ reply.

"Look buddy! Whatever it is you’re selling, we ain’t buying!," Nicholas angrily rejected.

"Oh on the contrary!," said the man as he began to sit down on a chair, that wasn’t their before, "I am here to offer you, each of you, a power of your very own."

"Yeah right!," mocked a very disbelieving Nicholas.

"Oh? But it’s true," said the man as he conjured up their discarded movie tickets, "after all, you all like superheroes. Don’t you?"

"What’s the catch?," asked Rebecca as she began wondering how ANY of this was possible.

"Ah! Well there are certain rules you must follow:

rule #1: You May Ask For Any Wish, So Long As It’s Within Reason," the man was about to explain the other two rules, when Jonathon interrupted.

"What do you mean ’Within Reason’," he asked.

"Good question!," was the man’s reply, "basically you can’t ask to be immortal, or a god, or to control the forces of the universe. It’s really messy and an overkill to deal with," a ton of papers formed and fell to the ground, "ESPECIALLY THE PAPERWORK!," Haus continued with his speech about the rules,

"rule #2: You May NOT Take Or Attempt To Take The Power Away From Others"

rule #3: You MUST become five years old again!"

"Woah! Woah! Woah!," Benjamin soon interjected, "why do we need to become five years old again?!"

"Ah! Another very good question!," Haus said as he began to show them a little video on a theater screen that depicted a man "talking" to the man they were talking to, by using pictures, to convey a story, "now say you’re like this man over here. No! Not that handsome devil to the right! That’s me! Now he wants to be super strong! Of course being Super Strong overnight can have its ... problems," the video shows the man unable to control or use his newfound strength, "he doesn’t know how to control or contain his powers. As he uncontrollably breaks things, smashes things, and he ACCIDENTALLY causes a MASSIVE CAR PILEUP!," of course the last scene was ONLY mentioned by Haus, soon the townspeople form outside of his house, with torches and pitchforks, "boy! Don’t they look mad?! Now what if we looked at that situation a little differently? Shall we?," soon they were back to the beginning of the video, only this time it was slightly different, "now watch what happens, when we make him five years old again!," the man (now a five year old boy) still has trouble with his strength, but he is now able to get proper training to get to the right level of power that needs to control, "now as you can see, the *ahem* little boy can get all the training that he needs. And trust me! It’ll take roughly ten to twenty years to even remotely master all of the possible powers I can give you."

"But wait!," asked Julia, "why not just train us as adults? Do we really need to become five years old again?"

"Ah! Another good question!," was the man’s reply, as the screen, tickets, and papers soon disappeared from the scene, "you see, there’s another reason as to why we make you younger for. It’s because kids can have a better resilience to newfound changes, like superpowers and what-not."

"Then why not just ask us when we were five?," Jonathon asked now more confused than ever.

"Ah! Well you see, kids can physically handle new powers, but they can’t handle it mentally. So it’s the best of both worlds!"

"Well this is a lot to handle!," stated Joseph while contemplating this whole situation, "could we have a week to think about it?"

"Tell you what!," stated the man, "what if I give you a month to try out your newfound powers, and if you don’t like them, then I will turn you back into adults, remove your powers, and just pretend like this day never happened!"

"Well ....," they all said in thinking unison.

"Well I don’t want to force you, and there’s no payment on your part AT ALL," the man told them.

After about five minutes, they all agreed.

"We’ll take it!"

"Good!," said the man as became overcome with joy, "now what will your powers be?"

End Of: A Time To Change (The Chapter. Not The Story.)