text: Dear Diary, Why are heroes so destructive, and why is insurance so hard to get these days? I feel like the two are connected. Seriously though, it’s frustrating. While they fly around, smashing into buildings, throwing away bystanders' lives like worthless trash, the rest of us are left with physical and financial reminders of our average-ness. Yeah, I get it, Spectacular-Man. You can shoot lasers from your eyes and I can’t. Did you really have to slice my aunt’s car in half, though? Was that really necessary? My mom suggested I start keeping a journal of everything that’s going on. “A mess like this only happens once in a lifetime,” she said. “You’ll want to be able to tell your kids one day.” If I live to have kids. Anyway, I’ve never been much of a writer, Diary, so please excuse my lack of linguistic expertise. You’ll get used to it quickly. Dear Diary, It’s been two weeks since the aliens touched down and three days since my first entry. It’s scary how quickly I’ve become accustomed to the chaos around me. When the end of the world seems imminent, you’d think people would be too busy losing their minds to worry about anything else, yet here I am, sitting at school, watching teachers scramble to put up sound-proof padding on the walls. As if that’s enough to keep out the muffled sounds of the intergalactic war going on outside. The worst part? This shitty school lunch sitting in front of me is the most upsetting part of my day so far. I forgot to pack my lunch this morning because I was too busy trying to save my neighbors from the wreckage of their apartment. Somehow, a tussle between a gang of “teen heroes” and some aliens made its way to my part of town. I only caught a glimpse of their faces before they flew away, but I could have sworn that one of the “heroes” was my science partner last year. He couldn’t even dissect a dead frog without passing out, and now we’re expecting him to help save the world? The aliens have a slimy appearance, somewhat similar to frogs, so I’m not sure how he held it together through the fight. You may have noticed my quotation marks around the word “hero” in that last paragraph. When you think of a hero, what comes to mind? Most likely someone who saves people, right? Maybe with huge muscles and an even bigger ego? Not a scrawny white kid with shitty energy-manipulation powers and a savior complex. Definitely not a scrawny white kid with a severe lack of upper-body strength (such a lack that, after realizing he was not able to lift the rubble HE created in an unnecessary fight, decided to flee the scene and leave his old science partner to save the people whose lives he ruined.) Definitely not that, right? Right? So yeah. I didn’t have time to pack my lunch. I hate being treated like a device for character development. Dear Diary, I’m becoming more and more glad that I chose this thick leather notebook over the flimsy composition book I was considering using for this... documentation? Is that the right word? I don’t know. My education has gone sharply downhill these past few weeks. My aunt finally got some compensation for her car, though. She found some loophole in her insurance agency's “no coverage for super-human accidents” policy since Spectacular-Man is technically part demigod. God, that’s not a sentence you get to say often. When I was a little boy, I use to pray every night that I would magically wake up with powers. Teleportation, or maybe fire breath. Anything I could use for good. I’m glad God never answered. I shit on these super-freaks a lot, but it’s gotta be a lot of stress for them to suddenly be thrust into the spotlight like this. We had a lot of good Samaritan types before, just intercepting muggings and pulling cats out of trees. Local stuff like that. Nothing nearly as destructive as foreign life forms with a thirst for human brains. I didn’t even know that Scrawny Dude had powers. I guess “energy-manipulation” (whatever those buzzwords mean) isn’t a very useful power for everyday life, so it’s not surprising he kept it secret. Dear Diary, My mom says I should make copies of my entries in case you get destroyed. She seemed adamant about it. I think she’s still in disbelief I even listened to her. I was too lazy to copy all my writing again, so I just took pictures of the pages with my phone and copied them onto my computer. I think that’s good enough. Dear Diary, My mom was right. Your first body got destroyed, along with everything else in my locker. And every other locker at Standard High. Thanks, Tornado-Woman, great work keeping us safe! Now you’re that flimsy composition book I mentioned earlier. Should I rewrite everything, or just print off the pictures I took and tape them in here? I’m leaning towards the second option. I hope the library is still offering students free printing privileges. On second thought, I hope it’s even still standing. Dear Diary, Boy, oh boy, oh boy. Where do I begin? Tell me which phrase sticks out to you most: Alien egg nest, rip-off Teen Titans , hospital stay, or super-science-buddy? Should I just go in order? I think I’m just gonna go in order. It all started last Thursday. That’s when my notebook got destroyed. I briefly mentioned that a hero named Tornado-Woman was responsible for the locker massacre. I criticized her techniques, which, in hindsight, I must apologize for. I am sorry Tornado-Woman. You were definitely right to tear through the rows of metal cubbies with no explanation while all the confused high schoolers around you begged you to stop. My bad. I’m only half-kidding. Basically, she had noticed that a lot of the aliens were congregating around the high school and snaking somewhere underground. She suspected that it was some sort of nest and thought they were using our lockers as incubators. Her hunch was halfway right. At lunch the next day, an announcement was released to the whole school calling for an evacuation. Everyone filed out in line, except for a few kids. Remember “Scrawny Dude” who almost killed my neighbors? Well, apparently he has a whole super posse . These “heroes” decided that this infestation was their moment to shine. Literally. One of them has the power to turn into a ball of light. How useless. I’m getting off-track. Anyway, they all ran back in and decided to handle this mess all by themselves, once and for all. This lasted about five minutes before they realized they’d bit off more than they could chew. Most of the freaks retreated, except for Scrawny Dude and the Light Girl. I guess it was like, dark, or something, down in the basement where they found the nest, so Light Girl did her thing and became... light. Here’s the thing: she doesn’t actually turn into solid light. There’s some sort of core or center that is super hot. Usually, this isn’t important, because usually, she’s not surrounded by highly flammable gross-alien-space-egg-goo-shit. So long story short, the whole basement erupted into flames. Light Girl was fine, she just phased through a wall in her light form to escape, leaving Scrawny Dude alone and really wishing he had a different power. Ok, get ready, because this is where I come in. I, in a stroke of absolute genius-ness, remembered that the main entrance to the basement was only a few steps behind the exit I used. Adrenaline took over my body and before I knew it, I was in the building. Within seconds, I located the door, crept along the wall, and finally wrapped my fingers around the handle... but, before I could pull, I heard thunderous applause from outside. My mind raced. Was it for me? I hadn’t even done anything yet. Were my peers so amazed by my bravery that they preemptively gave me a standing ovation? The possibilities whirled through my brain before I saw it: Scrawny Dude, draped across the shoulders of an invisible form, emerging from halfway across the building. The figure set him down on the ground before materializing as a short blonde girl, now doubled over and coughing. Someone got to him first. I didn’t even have time to react before a blast of heat from the staircase in front of me shot me backward, straight into a giant window. I had been holding the door open as I took in the scene around me, and in that time, the fire spread onto some explosive chemicals in a storage closet. That’s what I’m told, at least. I lost consciousness pretty soon after. When I woke up again, I was in the hospital. I’m writing this entry in the so-called privacy provided by the flimsy blue curtain strung in the middle of the room. Due to the recent influx of injuries these past few weeks, the hospitals have had to get crafty about making more space. I caught a glimpse of the person behind the curtain; it’s the blonde girl who saved Scrawny Dude. I’ve watched feet shuffle in and out of the room all day, all of them barely noticing me before ducking behind the cloth wall to bring her gifts and kind words. Nobody came for me. Scrawny Dude showed up at one point. He looked fine, just a few bandages here and there, maybe a cough or two every few minutes. He gave me a sad smile and wave before leaving. Now I feel bad for forgetting his name.