Chương 12: Finding a Teacher

Bruce seemed to land on something, and asked the question that had clearly been sitting with him.

"You people. Every Viltrumite has this same kind of ability?" Kaelvorn nodded.

"Yes. Strength varies, though. There's supposed to be a royal bloodline that outclasses everyone, but they vanished long before the civil war even started."

"Then how are you so sure what you have counts as a superpower." Bruce made a small gesture.

"What I mean is, by any reasonable logic, this stuff should feel as natural to you people as eating or drinking water."

"Oh, Viltrum has its own scientific development too. Honestly further along than what Earth shows on the surface." This part counted as common knowledge back home, so Kaelvorn had no trouble laying it out.

"First. Outside of the elite bloodlines who are born with it, most ordinary Viltrumites don't have any ability at birth. It usually surfaces by sixteen at the latest."

"Second. Our abilities present as physical traits, strength, speed, that kind of thing, but we can also fly. And the calories we actually take in have nothing to do with the output we're capable of." Kaelvorn patted his own stomach.

"Even fully starved, I can keep fighting for over a week straight. Strip the superpower label off that and it breaks conservation of energy outright." Bruce kept his face steady, but he was filing every word away. It only deepened how strange this whole thing felt to him. Even after a real conversation face to face, everything about Kaelvorn confirmed, without a shred of doubt, that Viltrum was a genuine, physically real place.

The culture, the tech, even the way the species studied and understood itself, all of it lined up with the normal development curve of an actual civilization exploring its own nature. If anything, the fact that Viltrumites had developed their own scientific awareness and actively studied their own abilities only made Bruce more wary, not less. If it didn't show up anywhere in the known universe, then maybe Viltrum sat in some other universe entirely. Or some pocket dimension.

Which left the open question of exactly how Kaelvorn had gotten here. Once testing wrapped, Bruce brought him back up to the top-floor office and handed him a white ID card. Not a real identity document. A shelter intake record from a nonprofit organization.

"Your paperwork's sorted. Name's Kael Lee, registered under a nonprofit shelter program in Metropolis. Wayne Enterprises will handle your ongoing support quietly from behind the scenes." Bruce paused, then kept going. You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

"Anything else you need help with, now's the time to say it." Kaelvorn took the card, running his fingers over the printed details, and stayed quiet for a while before speaking.

"I think I need a teacher."

"A teacher?" Bruce looked genuinely surprised.

"For Earth culture? Some other subject?"

"Neither." Kaelvorn shook his head, a tiredness in his voice he wasn't quite hiding.

"I grew up on Viltrum. Over a decade, and the only two things I ever really learned were destruction and killing." He paused, then kept going.

"I can hold back and get by fine day to day without using anything. But the second I actually use my ability, every instinct I have defaults to breaking something. I need someone to teach me how to use this strength without wrecking everything around it." Bruce looked at the kid in front of him and, all at once, understood what he was actually wrestling with. A warrior raised entirely inside a slaughterhouse, trying to unlearn the instinct to destroy. That was a considerably harder problem than it sounded.

Bruce thought it over for a moment.

"There's someone in the League who might be able to help you with that." Kaelvorn looked surprised.

"You're bringing in the League? They handle this kind of thing too?" He'd assumed Bruce would quietly arrange something as Batman, off the books.

"Something you might not love hearing. You're an off-world arrival packing destructive force well past nuclear-weapon territory. Of course they handle this." Bruce smiled, sliding back into that easy, playful register that Kaelvorn had never quite gotten comfortable with. He waved at Kaelvorn to give him a second and picked up the encrypted phone on his desk.

"Wait in the lounge a minute. I'll get in touch with Batman, have him send someone over." Kaelvorn watched Bruce Wayne perform this little one-man show and pressed his lips together. Honestly, watching the act was exhausting in its own specific way. He stepped into the lounge next door, and hadn't been sitting long before a sharp sound cut through the air outside the window. His body reacted before his brain caught up, the old combat reflex kicking in on reflex.

That particular sound, something powerful closing in fast through the air, locked every muscle in his body tight in an instant. Strength started gathering under his skin automatically, until it clicked. This was Earth. Gotham's reputation aside, this place was still, relatively speaking, safe ground for him. He let the tension go, stood, and walked to the window. Looking up, he caught a golden shape dropping fast out of the sky, coming to a stop on the platform at the top of Wayne Enterprises.

When the figure walked into the office, Kaelvorn's pupils contracted slightly. She wore a red battle dress with a gold belt cinched at the waist, black hair loose over her shoulders, a coil of rope hanging at her hip that gave off a faint golden shimmer. The whole presence carried the steady weight of a real warrior.

"Wonder Woman?" Kaelvorn recognized her, and something about it genuinely surprised him. One phone call from Bruce Wayne, and he'd pulled in a core member of the Justice League directly. Wasn't that a little conspicuous? Wonder Woman's eyes settled on Kaelvorn, curiosity flickering through them.

"Bruce. This the boy who needs help?" She could read what was on him clearly. A fighter's presence, layered with the marks of countless battles, blood and slaughter worked into the bone of it, and all of it held down on purpose.

"If you hadn't told me he was from off-world, I might have guessed Zeus dropped some berserker's bastard son straight out of the divine realm."

"His name's Kael. He's from Viltrum. A civilization that takes pride in war and conquest." Bruce gave her the short version of Kaelvorn's background, then explained what he needed.

"He wants to learn how to use his ability without defaulting to destruction. I think you're the right person for it." Diana nodded, didn't answer right away, and pulled a small bronze sphere out of seemingly nowhere, tossing it at Kaelvorn without warning.

"Catch." The sphere cut through the air toward him with real force behind it, loud enough to hear over the distance. Kaelvorn's hand shot out on reflex, and the ball landed in his palm with a solid thunk. Before he could work out what this was about, Diana spoke again.

"Open your hand." He did, and found the sphere, solid bronze, crushed into a warped, irregular lump, the deep imprint of all five fingers pressed into it hard enough to have nearly destroyed it outright. Something serious settled into Diana's eyes. She looked at him and spoke slowly.

"You're a strong fighter. Combat instinct's carved straight into your bones at this point. But whatever raised you did it through something so brutal that every reflexive motion you make with your strength defaults to destruction. To ruin." She paused, her tone easing.

"But you're willing to change. That's enough for me. I'll teach you."