Perception Filter

It was the following day, after the amazing events of the night before. I found myself coming out of a daydream in school, still excited and overjoyed at the gift I had been given by the Doctor, from my Kryptonian grandparents. My friends and teachers had noticed my enthusiasm and some got a little irritated, because I interrupted the lesson a few times, shouting the answers before anyone else could. I noticed that on some occasions, my clothes changed slightly when I got too excited, as I was wearing the suit to school and it was responding to my thoughts. I had to really calm myself down and focus, so as to not give the game away. Odd things would change, such as the pattern on my tie, or the colours of the school logo on my blazer. Thankfully, no one seemed to have noticed any of this and the rest of the day passed by completely normal.

I kept thinking about the Doctor and his impromptu visit to our house, even if it was a mistaken landing. I couldn't help but wonder about that particular detail. If it was a mistake, why did he have the package on him and how on earth did it fit into his pocket? My brain wondered for a while on the subject, but it was soon overtaken by my desire to play with my new 'toy'.

As we were moving off to our next lesson, I discovered another of the hidden features that my costume contained. I was walking along the corridor, when a younger student came up to me and started addressing me as one of the teachers. I must have looked incredibly confused, because he gave me a very strange look, stopped talking and walked off muttering something I suspected was quite rude. I rounded a corner in the corridor and came across a full length mirror attached to the wall outside the drama rooms.

The reflection that looked back at me, was not my own. It was showing me the image of Mr Jones, my English teacher. No wonder the younger student had come to speak to me. My figure shuddered in the mirror and I took on my own appearance once more. I had my own cloaking device built into the suit. Fantastic! So many pranks could be played with this feature and I really wanted to tell my friends, but once again, I thought about being sworn to secrecy about my powers. I also thought about the responsibility of having and wearing the suit. It was so frustrating, the great things I could do and no one was allowed to know what they were.

A sudden thought of realisation came into my head. Surely someone had seen me turn from Mr Jones back to myself. I glanced around the corridor at the many people who were milling around between classes, but no one had seen anything. How was that possible? Someone must have seen something. There was a sudden vibration in my pocket, as a text message came through on my phone. I pulled it out and unlocked the screen so I could read the message. It was from a number that wasn't in my contacts list. The message read:

"Hello there Jason. How are you doing? I thought it about time to introduce myself to you, because we will be getting to know each other quite well over the coming future. I am your costume. I was built as an organic suit, which can respond to your emotions, thoughts and spoken commands. In answer to your question, the cloaking device contains a perception filter. This makes people around you see any image that you want them to. There is no physical change in your form, the effect is sent mentally to the brains of those around you. People didn't notice your change, because the perception filter alters how they see reality. They wanted to notice, but they are made to not see what is in front of them. It effectively makes you invisible for a moment and then when people do notice you, they just think they weren't paying full attention and nothing out of the ordinary is happening. I hope that clears up any confusion you had. If there are any more questions, I can talk to you again soon."

"Did that actually just happen?" I asked out loud.

My phone buzzed again. "Yes," it said on the screen.

Wow. A costume that could actually communicate with me, this was even better than I could actually believe. The bell sounded and I remembered I was supposed to be on my way to class. I rounded the final corner and came to my PSHE (Personal Social Health Education) classroom. This class was one of my favourites, because we never really did anything and what we did do, was have a fun and jovial conversation about the topic we were studying. Most of the time, we just watched films and had a good laugh with our teacher. School was soon over and I was on my way home with my friend Wally. Wally and his family were also from America and they had moved to the UK when his Dad had got a job at a large chemical company. His Dad was one of their top researchers. We were chatting about how our day had gone and what we were going to do that evening at my house. We settled on the idea of playing on the PS4 and getting on to some online games.

We soon arrived home and dropped our bags and shoes by the door, before heading into the kitchen to grab a couple of drinks and a bite to eat. Mum didn't like food to be taken into the living room, so we finished up and then headed through to get the PS4 set up and game loaded.

We played several games together, continuing for a couple of hours, before Wally said that he needed to head home. That was when our lives were going to be turned upside down again and nothing was going to be the same again. Life was really taking several twists and turns at the moment and I didn't know if it was going to be for good, or for bad.


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