Chapter Five - Experiments With Lightning

Matt woke up on a bright and sunny Monday morning. The birds twittered and the frogs croaked at the Albany pond, which was just a few yards away from his school. The sunlight shimmered into Matt’s room causing his eyes to awake suddenly.

He glanced around and looked at his new watch, which had a lightning symbol on its face. It was 6:30 a.m. This was the time when he did his lightning practice. He did a few warm-ups in his room, such as jumping jacks and curl ups. He then tiptoed downstairs to the glass door. He opened it and stepped into the backyard. He looked to make sure that no one was watching. He cried, "Lightning Powers On!" He felt the familiar static flowing into his body. He joined his hands together, took a big breath, and…

“Matt Wu! Come in here this instant!” Mrs. Wu cried from her bedroom window.
“Okay, mom!” He said. He loped to the house, and said “Lightning Powers Off!” on the way.

School ended with the usual long bell ring. Matt ran to the bathroom to change into his basketball uniform. In 5 minutes, he would be playing basketball with the Strikers. His team, the Matthianians, were ready to play, until they saw one of the Strikers’ tallest players.

“Look at that dude,” Sid said.
“He’s probably a descendant of the mighty giant in Jack in the Beanstalk,” Ben said.
“Dat is just a made up story.” Tim said.
“He’s looking at us.” said Vincent.
“Relax guys.” Matt said.
“Relax? RelAX? HOW CAN I RELAX WHEN THE TALLEST BOY I HAVE EVER SEEN IS GOING TO KICK OUR BUTTS!” Jack said.

Matt rolled his eyes. The basketball game started with the Strikers getting a basket in 10 seconds. Then they scored twice in just 30 seconds! “We are so dead!” Matt said to himself. He groaned and the game continued for 40 more minutes.

“Congrats!” Coach Nin said, “you lost, 70 to 0!” He laughed.

“Come on, Matt.” Vincent said, “it can not get any worse than this, can it?”

“Actually,” Coach Nin said, “it will. Here is your trophy.” He left.

Matt stood holding a 5 inch trophy made of rusted copper. “Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg!” Matt said, shouting as loud as he could. His lungs racked with pain as his brain hurt from all the shouting…

“How was your day?” Mrs. Wu said.
“Great.” Matt slammed the door behind him.

It was near night and Matt was practicing his lightning powers. He shot a small lightning bolt, which worked perfectly. He jerked his hand even harder, and saw that a bigger bolt exploded out of his hands. It made the tree explode into flame. “Cool.” Matt kicked his behind with his legs and suddenly, two lightning bolts appeared below his shoes. Matt was FLYING! He curved left and right, and zoomed into the air. The wind smacked his eyes, as he felt his nose leaving him from his body. Matt said, “Stop.” Nothing happened. Matt then kicked his behind again, and this time, Matt fell to the ground with no lightning on his legs. Matt was breathing with excitement as he thought that there probably was one more technique to be learned. Matt then heard his mom walking downstairs to probably get a glass of water. Matt ran inside, and smacked into the couch which broke into flame, and then disappeared. What was left was ashes and a horrible sulpher smell.

Matt quickly shoved the ash outside, and said, “Lightning Powers Off.”

Mrs. Wu entered, took a glass of water, and left. Matt had succeeded and said, “Yes.” He now knew all the moves of lightning. He tiptoed up and went to sleep.