This choice: Julian goes back to the crowded beach and uses the pendant there • Go Back... The pendant around his neck, Julian hurried back over to the packed beach, thinking about all the things he could do now that he had this power. Part of him wanted to make drastic, massive changes right away, totally conforming the world to his will and whim, but Julian shook those feelings off, remembering the words on the paper that came with the pendant: "Power comes with a price". Even if he had almost-unlimited abilities, he didn't want to overuse them. As angry as he had been with his family before, this discovery had overcome all that, and he knew he had to be responsible.
Once he got to the middle of the crowds, he slowed his jog to a steady walk, looking around for the first interesting thing he could test out. His eyes landed on a red-haired, pale-skinned boy a little younger than him who was playing in the ocean a few dozen yards from where he stood, running out and getting his feet wet, then retreating back gleefully when a large wave would come in. Julian recognized that this boy had just checked into the same floor of the hotel that Julian's family was. He hadn't really had much interaction with the boy, only seeing him in passing in the hall once and a couple of times down in the lobby. He didn't even know the boy's name; all he knew was that he was from England, and he spoke with a thick British accent.
"He's so fair-skinned," Julian said to himself, "he'll get completely destroyed by the harsh sun here." His hand brushed against the pendant and he smiled. "Maybe I can help that!" He took a deep breath. This would be the first time he had changed a person other than himself, so he didn't know what variables would come into play. "At least it'll just be a small change. I wish for that red-haired English boy to get a nice, even bronze tan."
After a second, the boy's skin started to glow, as more and more melanin started to appear, his skin gradually growing darker. It was quite a sight to see, this boy going from extremely pale to tan so quickly, and Julian's eyes widened as he watched, even though he knew it was coming. Julian looked at the people near the boy, and no one else seemed to be reacting or paying any attention to the change that was occurring. Even the boy didn't notice his skin becoming more and more brown. "Maybe people are oblivious to my changes unless I specifically wish them to notice…" Julian guessed, "…if I can even wish for that."
Ten or fifteen seconds later, the changes seemed to have stopped, the boy's skin now a healthy tanned light-brown, giving him a much more Mediterranean look. The only thing that indicated his previous skin color was his shock of bright-red hair, which now looked kind of ridiculous and out of place in comparison to his tan, but Julian found it kinda neat-looking. The boy still had the same gleeful expression, and the same playfulness to him, he just looked more appropriate for Hawaii now. The rest of his family that were nearby still had their fair complexion, and Julian held his breath as the boy's mother, a short, squat woman, walked over to her son.
"Harry," she called out, "we're all putting on some more suncream now. C'mon, Love, get out of the water."
"But mum," the boy replied, "I feel fine!"
The woman sighed, shaking her head. "I guess you can skip this round. I don't know how you got lucky enough to be born with such sun-proof skin."
The woman turned and walked back to where the rest of the family was sitting, while the boy squealed gleefully as he continued to splash in the waves. Julian sighed in relief, realizing that his first test of the Pendant on another person was a complete success. He also felt a little thrill from helping someone else out, even a stranger. "This is so cool," he whispered. "I'm almost like a super-hero." A smile came to his lips he thought about what to do next.  | Members who added to this interactive story also contributed to these: |
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