Solar used to believe in fate—a mystical and wonderous thing that fuels hope, but sometimes fate leads us believing that we aren't fated to be happy and live an easy life.

To put it simply, Solar gets skeptical when there's an easy way out from his problems.

"Yeah, your power levels aren't the most stable right now..."
The holographic screen showed a variety of charts and diagrams, many jumping either straight up or down.

"It's fluctuating way off, but that's usually means that your power is uprading itself.
...You're probably ready for third tier right now" Ochobot explained after the robot scanned Solar for the third time.

"Whoa, third tier? No way, i want it too!"

"Congrats, Solar!"

"Tch."

Came a various of responses from his brothers, whom approached the two when they see Ochobot began scanning Solar after arriving back at home.

Solar shake his head, "Third tier? That...doesn't feel right. Shouldn't i achieve even higher state of intelligence first in order to unlock that?"

Solar paused, "I haven't been doing anything drastic nor made any significant discovery. Don't get me wrong, i'll be grateful for the upgrade, but it feels really off for it to comes just like that"

Ochobot pondered for a moment and
flicked his steel fingers,
"...Ah! I think i might know the reason, do you guys remember when Retak'ka...absorbed your power?"
.

.

.
The room fell silent.

Of course nobody is going to forget that moment.

<flashback>

"SOLAR, STOP!"

if only he listened to Gempa and put aside his stubborness for a moment, maybe they all would've gotten away, safely.

But Solar only listened after a hand roughly holds in a chokehold, cutting away at his airway.

"L...let go of me..." was the only thing that Solar could weakly muster with the limited air that he had.

"This? This is how you all use your power? Don't you know that splitting all these power makes you WEAK?"

Horror filled Solar's face, what could he possibly means by that—

"—SEDUTAN GAMMA!"

"IT HURTSITHURTSITHURTS PLEASE STOP—!!ᵃᵃᵃᴬᴬᴬᴳᴳᴴᴴᴴᴴᴴᴴᴴ!!!"

<flashback ends>

Let's just say, nobody had a good time after that, some shivered when remembering that time again, some even still got nightmares.

"What does that have to do with this, Ochobot?" Halilintar stared at Ochobot, his jaw clenching and gaze cold as ice.

Ochobot stammered, "U-uhm, well. As you all know, when Retak'ka, do that, he, uh, used all of the third tier form of your powers."

"Um, so technically speaking, they all have been upgraded since. But when the powers came back to your body, the state of 'third tier' become dormant again, because it has not been yet 'unlocked' by your body. J-just like how you recieved your power in the first place!"

Halilintar went silent for a moment, "So what you're saying is all of our powers—except for Gempa's, Ice's and Blaze's, had actually been developed into the third tier, but when it came back to our body they had been 'reset'?"

Ochobot nodded, "Exactly! And to 'unlock' it again, you just need to trigger a certain phenomenon or activity to awaken it again.
...Aaand maybe that's what is happening to Solar right now"
he said as he pointed to Solar.

Gempa nodded his head, "That makes the most sense. Either way, I hope this 'upgrade' won't have any side-effects."

Solar pondered for a moment.

"...Let's hope that will be the case."

—

"...Solar? Why are you still up?" Ice, who happen to pass by Duri's and Solar's shared room (which its door was left opened invitingly to a certain night owl) asked nonchalantly.

"GOD! You almost gave me a heart attack y'know?!"

"Huuuh, I'm just finishing up my project, the admission's closing date gonna come soon.
...I'd better give this to Cikgu Papa tomorrow morning"
Solar said without missing a beat, catching his (almost) dropped and wasted experiment (again) just in time.

"...It's already one in the morning." Ice deadpan, munching at his chips as he walked inside their room.

Solar couldn't help but roll his eyes at Ice's comment, "I mean later in the morning, not right now. What about you? Why are you awake at this ungodly hour?"

"I was hungry so i 'borrowed' some of Hali's snack from the pantry" Ice said as he offered his bag of chips which was already half empty.

"Want some?"

Solar gave Ice a side eye look, "No thanks"

And as a response Ice shrugged, "Your loss then, goodluck on your experiment though. Don't blow up anything, I'm going to bed"

Within a few strides from his room, Ice's (already silent) footsteps cannot be heard anymore.

Moments of pure silence passed, until a groan was heard from the bottom bunk bed.

"Mmm...Solar..? Why's the light so bright? And it's just me or the door's open?" Asked Duri as he rubbed his eyes.

"Ah crap! Sorry Duri, i'll turn off the lights and close the door as soon as i finish this" Solar said as he hurriedly poured a black liquid from one of the vials to the beaker.

Duri yawned as he pulled his blanket, "Mhm, then don't sleep too late. Goodnight Solar."

Solar smiled softly.
"Goodnight, Duri."

—

Solar did NOT sleep soundly that night.

In fact, he did not sleep at all. The suspect for that? His powers fluctuating, maybe. He can't really explain it like he usually do (read: backed by data and facts), he just feels weird.

It's like every atoms in his body is screaming, fighting and deconstructing at the same time. It's not painful, it just feels extremely uncomfortable. Solar ends up tossing and turning the whole night and gets up first thing in the morning.

"Good morning Gempa" He greets Gempa by the hallway near the kitchen.

"Good morning Sol—DEAR GOD! Are you okay?!" Gempa, who was literally holding a knife, hurriedly approaches Solar with that said knife.

Maaaybe Solar just looks a tad more exhausted that usual, more zombie-esque in the type that he could fell apart any moment now. Solar sighed, "Yes, Gempa. I'm fine, please get that knife away from my face."

"Oops, sorry, my bad! What happened? Why do you look worse than usual? Is it because the 'upgrade' that's happening? I knew it shouldn't be taken lightly..." Gempa said with a worried face, gently caressing Solar's head.

Solar took a deep breath, "Calm youself down. As i said before, i am okay. It's just too uncomfortable for me to sleep soundly, but i should be functioning just fine. Where's Ochobot? I need to speak with him for a minute."

Gempa's face softened, "You really shouldn't push yourself too hard, okay? Just like last time..." He tapped the youngest's shoulder, "Just let us know if it's bothering you too much, okay?"

Solar exhaled, 

"I know."

—

Ochobot said that while it has progessively develops faster than before, it wasn't supposed to give him much discomfort. They're supposed to feels like a gushing fresh air, splash of water on a sunny day, a warm blanket by the winter. In short, pleasant.

Pleasant is NOT word Solar would choose to describe the dull, somehow prickly sensation throbbing all over his body. He feels like it's one of those days he had just finished a brutal workout session with Halilintar, aching and tired. All he wanted was peace and quiet for the upcoming competition, but oh boy, it wasn't supposed to get easier isn't it?

It was by the fourth class session he really find the sensations annoying. It's like a stubborn itch that won't get away no matter how much you scratch them.

For obvious reasons, that got him in trouble as well. He wasn't paying that much attention to the lecture and didn't notice the teacher that had been trying to call him to answer the question on the whiteboard. 

But once he does, all he heard was a "unacceptable behavior for a model student like Solar" and "this is rather unsual for him".

Solar blinked, the teacher was trying to give him a punishment for not paying attention. "Although i regret to say this, for that you are an oustanding student, not paying attention in class is a behaviour that i won't condone. Regardless of your past marks and achievements, rules are still rules. Please stand by the hall, Solar. I hope by the time the class ended, you have learnt your lesson." The teacher gave a heavy sigh and urged him to get out of the classroom.

What?

A punishment? For this?

For a perfectly scot-free history of never getting into trouble, always obedient, neat and straight As student?

.

.

.

He was enraged.

This wasn't fair!

Nothing of this was supposed to be on his agenda.

He gritted his teeth as he stands up from his seat, "With all due respect, Miss Aria, i was merely spaced out for a minute there. It's a normal thing to happen, humans have short attention span, and i think that's ridiculous for asking all of us to always pay attention every minute of the lesson."

Miss Aria huffed and folded her hands in annoyance, "While it is physically impossible to always pay attention to class, i believe that each individual students should try to minimize distractions."

She walked up to Solar's desk and continued, "And from what i've seen before, you've made no effort whatsoever to pay attention earlier and even ignored my call. I'm only letting you off with a simple discipline this time, but don't expect me to let any misbehavior easily, model student or not."

The classroom was silent, waiting for Solar's retort or protest.

.

.

.

But none came out of the boy's mouth.

"...Of course, Miss Aria."

For the first time since he ever stepped foot here,

Solar is speechless.

But what more can he say?

All happy endings are mere bedtime stories anyways.

—

A/N:

Hi, hi, hello!

I'm sorry for leaving this fic suddenly, but the good news is i've been accepted to medicine school! (Which is also the bad news, as i can't update regularly due to my hetic schedule and busy nature of med school).

But that aside, i'll try to update more if possible! As you can see, things started to 'heat up' in this chapter. Don't you hate it when teacher nitpick you for every little mistake that you did?

Stay tuned for the next chapter, thank you for reading!🦋

-Catherine