8 Deciding A Future

(Carter POV)

Looking over the jump document for the movie, Chronicle was happy to see that the ability to gain telekinesis was free because, unlike the jumper movie document, it cost me 600 choice points to buy the ability to jump.

Looking over each of the origins, I decided to choose drop-in again as a provided the discount necessary to buy two specific perks: the two perks being supernatural savant and secrecy insurance.

The first was meant to increase my skill, as well as my potential, when it comes to dealing with any supernatural powers, so it also would improve my ability to jump. The second could help me use my powers in public as it would unilaterally make it, so any showing of my powers in public would automatically seem normal.

Although making them seem normal is a bit of an overestimation, it's more that anytime someone sees me using powers, it would force them to try to convince themselves that it's CGI or some type of magic trick, but any protection for me using my powers in public is fantastic.

The secrecy insurance even assured me that if my powers were actually discovered to be supernatural in nature and not fake or CGI, unless organizations were targeting me, meant to take care of such things, no one would go out of their way to kill me just for having these powers.

Also, thanks to the drop-in origin. It came with the free, perk, magnetic personality, which would increase my natural charisma if such a thing existed for me. But what really drew my attention was the Lonely Fortress perk.

It would essentially allow me to put a mental wall between me and any problems. I was facing an order to disconnect myself from my problems, emotionally as well as mentally, but it wouldn't get rid of them, and the only cost was 100 points.

I bought it immediately in addition to a perk, more leaning towards my appearance and social aspects, and it was called the Chad 101. The perk would boost my effectiveness in trying to relay what I wanted to say and make it much more appealing.

According to the document, it said, I could enthrall people with only a few words, which I don't believe is most likely hyperbole, but overestimation sells much more than underestimation. I took the perk, mainly because it was only 100 points as well as it would improve my overall looks.

The last three perks really took the cake, though, as the first one, lifting myself up, would make it so that all of my powers would have unlimited growth potential. While it did seem pretty simple, it screamed, overpowered, and in combination with two other perks, my build was complete.

The last two perks were ones that really seem to synergize with my overall build so far. With great power comes excellent leisure, which would allow me to essentially use my powers without actually focusing on them and have reasonable control over them.

The last perk is even bad guys need sleep. It would make it so that if I'm ever unconscious or someone were to knock me out, I would be safe as long as I was asleep, so they wouldn't just try to kill me when I was resting.

A part of me started thanking the jump chain for allowing me to get these perks early as an uncapped potential for growth, plausible deniability for my powers, and increased social charisma with telekinesis. It's like an overpowered bargain sale.

But then the drawbacks came around, and I was brought back to earth or the warehouse. As with all these parks, I would need to buy at least 800 in drawbacks. I started light by making myself more awkward and conversation and having a weird quirk, which pulled up a small screen of weird quirks for me to pick from.

I chose one that is relatively normal. If I were ever thinking very deeply, I would start pacing in circles. Nothing too insane, and I already had 200 points.

The other 600 is where the problems came in as the other drawbacks would make it so that I would have a terrible home life while the other two would make it so I would bullied and have a developing apex predator-like mentality.

It was almost weird how I saw this as an absolute win, as it was just factually accurate that with enough power, you are quite literally an Apex predator, but it just depends on how well you can deal with the consequences.

But then you also remember that one of the fundamental aspects of being an Apex predator is knowing your opponent and being more intelligent than them.

So with that, I had 800 points, but sadly, no more points for items as I can only get the free dropping item, which would allow me to actually record my adventures in a sort of third-person point of view like a found footage film.

I assume that the recordings would go to the terminal in the warehouse, but I wonder where the camera would be, and I wondered if I could turn it off.

But hey, free is free, and I would like to be able to look at these first jumps to see if I could figure out if I did anything wrong. It's kind of like retroactively grading your work.

But after getting everything set up, I just stopped to read each and every one of the perks and get each of their wording in my memory, unlike Jumper. The world of Chronicle doesn't actually have any organizations that hunt supernatural, so this would actually be more relaxing as long as I wasn't stupid.

The worst I would have to deal with is going to high school, and speaking of which, I will have to roll for my age and school year. Grabbing the holographic dice that appeared before me, I threw both of them.

They began to roll across the screen, and as the number appeared, I was sufficiently happy as I was going in as an 18-year-old, and since I was a drop-in, I didn't have to worry about my body changing or having additional memories.

According to the exact wording of the jump document, all I would get is a basic identity and a house. Still, I already had that if I imported my items from Jumper, I would have my bank account and apartment, but the apartment would be moved to Seattle.

Mentally, I was crossing my fingers and helping that all of my money was saved in my account because it said that the money transfers over between jumps and the currencies can be changed.

Sitting back in my chair and then went into another tab relating to my warehouse, as since I had completed a jump and gained 20 more choice points for my cosmic warehouse, I could make a new choice.

I had already made the decision when I looked over this initially, and using my 20 choice points, I decided to buy the robotic sorting system, which would automatically sort through all of my loot and items.

In the next jump, I will probably get the gravity link, which will allow me to lessen the amount of weight objects have if I have to lift them up myself because, to be honest, even with stronger-than-trained human stats, lifting up stuff over 700 pounds is not fun.

After buying it, I then noticed an option on the jump document that would allow me to take two stasis pods after each completed jump. After getting my two free ones for surviving jumper, I think whoever allowed for this option, as usually each pod would cost 20 choice points alone.

I most likely wouldn't even be using stasis pods for a while, as I don't imagine many people would want to leave their home world unless I went to a truly terrible place. Some of the entertainment media I was able to read spoke of worlds like that.

Like that Warhammer universe I found when I was searching the Internet, and dear God, if there's one universe, I never wanna go to. It's that one.

Sending a mental thanks to the chain. I received an almost amused answer, like someone rubbing my head as if I were a child. Shaking my head and trying to be rid of the feeling, I looked over my build, as well as my other purchases, and nodded to my satisfaction.

Placing the build into the computer, I looked at my bruised hand, which was already healing inside to myself for my little outburst, because it was not because of the drawback that I was so selfish. It was just because I was.

Swallowing imperfections is much more complicated than swallowing down compliments. I did not confirm my choices on the terminal for a few minutes as I just came to terms with the fact that I had just spent 10 years in the world that I may not return to for hundreds if not thousands of years.

It's like a really messed up vacation, but the vacation primarily includes me having to set myself up in the world and train myself while trying to avoid any issues. The more I think about it, the less it sounds like a vacation.

But I couldn't really complain, as even with the terrible wake-ups from the nightmares and the remainder of my imperfections, I wouldn't trade this for anything.

I needed to be stronger, and I needed to be better. Keep moving forward and never backward. A small part of me was even excited to actually be able to go to high school, even if only for a year, as with my age of 18, I would most likely be a junior, at the youngest, or a senior.

I imagine 99% of students would look at me as if I were some alien species if I expressed that opinion. At least, with this version of the drop-in origin, I would actually have a plausible reason to meet the main character or characters in this place.

Matthew, Andrew, and Steven are the three teenagers who got access to great powers, but one of them, Andrew, would die along with Steven. It would be good to keep that friend group from falling apart as it did in the movie.

Matthew at least tried to lay down some ground rules for using their powers, but even he underestimated the limits of their own abilities.

The one thing that sucks, though, is that since I am dropping in in the year 2012 and I have ten years, I'm going to have to live through the three years of the pandemic or at least the first year and a half before the vaccine came out.

And since my jump in the previous world ended in 2018, I couldn't even grab a sample of the vaccine for the COVID-19 virus as it didn't exist yet. I know I probably wouldn't get sick as my body modification made my immune system extremely resistant to nearly all standard forms of infection.

Looking towards my storage of toilet paper, I did feel an inkling of embarrassment, as I never realized how much of a hoarder I was. It was all for a good cause, at least a good cause for myself.

Locking my eyes with the jump document, I pressed confirm and watched as my warehouse shifted around me, and from the wall that split my house from the rest of the warehouse, tiny little cubicles appeared. From them, tiny robots just started pouring out of them.

If I were to compare them to anything, they looked similar to those Wall-E drones, and the ones that could float looked like Eva. I watched as the worker drones on the floor began organizing the stuff they could carry into various sections.

The Eva drones, when the floor shelves ran out of space, would place them above them, and in a matter of only 30 minutes, all of the stuff I saved over ten years was neatly organized across the various shelves, and all of the robots just disappeared.

Watching this with a bit of wide-eyed wonder, I saw the holes in the walls where the robots came out of closing by themselves, and in milliseconds, they all just disappeared as if they were never there.

But before I could even think about how that was possible, the warehouse itself started to shift, and I found my eyes beginning to close, and I fell into darkness.