The first thing Ethan Cole ever heard already bearing his mother's surname was that his father would not stay.
The words were not spoken to him directly. They were too heavy, too adult. They existed somewhere nearby, in a space his awareness was only beginning to recognize. But the tone was unmistakable.
Raised voices. Controlled anger. The kind of argument that never truly fades, even when the meaning of the words is not yet understood. Something was wrong and everyone in the room knew it.
There was a man who appeared beside the hospital bed only once.
Tall. Well-dressed. The scent of expensive cologne clashed with the sterile smell of disinfectant. His shoes were costly, polished, and they never crossed the invisible boundary in his mind. He stood a few steps away, as if physical closeness were a decision he could not allow himself to make.
He did not touch the child.
He did not smile.
He looked at Ethan the way one looks at a result something that exists, something real, but never part of the plan. A variable that could no longer be removed from the equation, only ignored.
The argument took place in the hallway.
Muted, but measured. Adult voices pretending at reason, modulated to avoid drawing the attention of hospital staff.
"I'm not ready."
"You don't get to decide that."
"I won't take responsibility."
Between the words was silence. Brief. Tense. The kind in which decisions are finalized.
Then footsteps.
Moving away.
Then absence.
The door closed with a soft click that sounded louder than it should have.
The man never returned.
Ethan cried.
Not out of grief. There was no understanding yet, no emotional attachment to the man who abandoned his own child. The crying was instinctive a reaction to disruption, to the sudden loss of a presence his mind had already registered as part of its environment.
A break in continuity.
Later, when cognition matured, he would give it a name.
For now, it was simply recorded as fact.
Father: absent.
His mother stayed.
Her name was Margaret Cole.
She moved through the hospital with quiet efficiency the kind born of education, money, and a refusal to fall apart in public. She did not raise her voice. She showed no urgency. Her emotions were buried deep, sealed behind layers of control.
She asked precise questions of the doctors. Requested data to be repeated. Reviewed charts. Signed documents without hesitation. Politely, firmly corrected staff when necessary.
Ethan had a private room.
An extended stay.
Money was not a concern. There was no panic, no rush to escape rising medical costs. Margaret paid before anyone had to ask.
The hospital was one of the better ones in Manhattan. New equipment. Controlled access. Surveillance. Windows overlooking a city that never slowed.
It was 1995.
Outside, New York moved at its usual pace sirens, traffic, horns, helicopters slicing through the sky. Supes already existed, though they were still observed from a distance. Homelander had been appearing on television for years, already framed as America's protector, a symbol of stability, something larger than life.
Vought International was powerful.
But cautious.
Compound V was not public knowledge.
Not yet.
Officially it did not exist.
Margaret never spoke of any of it.
But Ethan listened.
The television played almost constantly. News channels. Conversations between nurses at the station. Whispered remarks from technicians. Through them, he learned more than anyone would ever suspect even if he could not yet put that knowledge into words.
Weeks passed.
Then months.
Time behaved strangely in the body of an infant. Awareness came in waves clarity, then sleep, then sensation: light, touch, sound. Thought was compressed by physical limitation, but it remained ordered, patient, intact.
And the interface was always there in the background.
Inactive. Observing.
When Ethan slept, it dimmed.
When sunlight touched his skin filtered through glass, reflected off white hospital walls it responded.
A digital reflection of growth unfolded within his awareness, even if it was not yet fully readable.
Human infants developed in stages.
Ethan did not.
Bone density increased along smooth, accelerating curves. Muscle fibers layered rather than replaced one another. Cellular efficiency rose with every exposure to light, even indirect.
The nervous system was the most disturbing.
Neural density exceeded human norms almost immediately. Synaptic connections reorganized constantly, folding inward, compressing delay until reaction time approached zero.
His brain did not merely grow.
It optimized.
By three months of age, his cognitive capacity exceeded that of an adult limited only by an undeveloped body. Memory was sharp. Pattern recognition rapid. Emotional processing lagged behind logic.
The imbalance was familiar.
It reminded him of his previous life.
And at the same time, it promised a new beginning.
Eventually, discharge day arrived.
Margaret took him to an apartment in a high-rise near Central Park spacious, inherited, flooded with light. Glass and steel. Clean lines. Silence broken only by the distant hum of the city.
The walls were lined with shelves.
Not children's books.
Economics. Medicine. Corporate law. Political history.
It was the home of someone who planned for the future.
Margaret worked from home when she could. When she couldn't, a nanny came professional, attentive, discreet. Skilled at her job. For Ethan, it was another challenge. He had to pretend to be a normal child while subtly acclimating his mother to an intelligence far beyond human norms.
Normalization was critical.
If she accepted the differences early, she would not fear them later.
Upper middle class.
A strong beginning.
No fight for survival.
Access to resources.
It mattered immensely.
Ethan absorbed everything.
Language emerged early. Faces were recognized faster than expected. Movement patterns. Footsteps. Heart rhythms. Breathing.
At six months, he distinguished voices in neighboring rooms.
At eight, he sensed stress before it entered speech.
At ten months, sunlight stopped feeling warm.
It became active.
One afternoon, held near a window
Energy flowed inward, distributed with ruthless efficiency. Cellular structures reinforced themselves in real time, adapting faster than any human biology could endure.
Ethan's fingers closed around the nanny's hand.
She startled.
Her hand went numb.
He released immediately, hoping she would dismiss it.
Restraint came naturally.
Control followed soon after.
The television played in the background. News cycles repeated familiar names. Vought International appeared often always positively framed. Supes were already celebrities. Symbols. Brands.
A young girl appeared briefly in a local segment.
He recognized her instantly.
Still a child.
But one destined to introduce a major variable into this world.
Annie January.
The name settled into place.
The timing matched.
She had been born a year earlier.
Same generation.
Same era.
The interface became clear gradually.
Not as something new, but as something that had always been there waiting. It did not announce itself with sound or light. It simply became readable.
He lay awake in his crib, staring at the bright ceiling, when the data synchronized.
The world dimmed not visually, but cognitively.
A second framework of reality unfolded beneath perception.
A full-scale schematic of his body filled his awareness.
Not an image.
A living model.
Every layer visible at once, selectable by intent alone.
OBJECT: Ethan Cole
SPECIES: Non-human (Kryptonian-origin framework; unrestricted growth potential)
AGE: 0.11 years
DEVELOPMENT STAGE: Infant (physical) / Adult+ (cognitive)
The First Three Years
During Ethan's first year, nothing earth-shattering happened.
No disasters. No sudden revelations. He simply grew quietly, steadily alongside his body.
For Margaret, it was a moment to breathe.
Stability, after the chaos into which motherhood had thrown her.
She never spoke of his father. The past had been sealed cleanly, without drama or explanation. What mattered was the future and it began to take shape far earlier than she had expected.
Margaret Cole approached life rationally rather than emotionally. She trusted preparation, structure, and long-term thinking. Miracles held no interest for her. Logic did.
After only a few months, it became clear that her son did not fit neatly within statistical norms.
The difference was subtle.
Ethan didn't merely observe his surroundings he registered them. His attention focused quickly and returned to details with regularity, as if each one carried weight. His gaze lingered with intent, not curiosity.
He began, slowly and deliberately, to reveal his uniqueness.
One afternoon, the nanny remarked casually,
"He really pays attention. More than most children."
Margaret nodded. She had reached the same conclusion already.
Presentation
Ethan knew how to present himself.
He understood how to avoid appearing unsettling while still displaying the traits of a gifted child. He understood Margaret just as well.
She expected potential, not disruption. Exceptional ability that could be guided never something that demanded explanation. Ethan adapted to that 8expectation.
He didn't suppress his intelligence. He controlled how it surfaced.
His reactions were quick, but never instantaneous. Curiosity showed itself through questions rather than fixation. Memory revealed itself gradually, spaced in ways that felt natural.
Margaret began keeping records.
Dates. Behaviors. Small milestones. Nothing obsessive pure observation.
When Ethan associated words with objects earlier than expected, she wrote it down. When he tracked faces for longer than usual, she noted that too.
"He's developing quickly," she mentioned during a routine appointment.
The pediatrician smiled politely, then added more openly,
"Congratulations. You have a wonderful child very intelligent, developing early."
In a world shaped by superheroes, that phrase often implied something else entirely.
For Ethan, it meant something simpler.
Margaret accepted the comment calmly. The note remained.
Visits with Family
Visiting her parents made the difference more apparent.
Ethan's grandfather was a quiet, composed man and, above all, fiercely intelligent. In a world like theirs, that level of wealth rarely came without it. He observed silently, measuring behavior rather than reacting emotionally. The steadiness of Ethan's attention did not escape him.
"There's intelligence there," he joked. "He clearly takes after me."
His grandmother reached a similar conclusion, though instinctively and with humor.
"Let's just hope he doesn't grow up to be a playboy like you," she shot back, smiling.
"He understands more than he shows," she added warmly.
Margaret didn't disagree.
Around family, Ethan allowed small imperfections: brief hesitation, mild frustration, short impatience. Enough to keep the image believable.
Control never disappeared.
It couldn't.
He had no intention of ending up in a laboratory, cut open under artificial lights, deprived of sunlight.
The Second Year
By the second year, Margaret had no doubts.
Speech developed smoothly and logically. Sentences formed without chaotic trial and error. Vocabulary expanded at a pace that suggested brilliance yet still believable without powers.
"He listens constantly," Margaret explained during one of her mother's visits. "He absorbs information like a sponge."
It was true.
Ethan absorbed tone, rhythm, and context. Conversations carried meaning beyond words. What he revealed remained carefully measured.
When Margaret tested his understanding, the answers matched her expectations sometimes correct, sometimes incomplete.
"You're clever," she told him once.
He paused.
"I just like learning," he said slowly, choosing his words.
The response reassured her.
Family gatherings became lessons in observation.
Ethan remained present without drawing attention. Relatives noticed him, made brief comments, then returned to their conversations.
"He'll do well," someone said once.
"Smart kid," added another.
Margaret neither corrected nor encouraged those judgments.
Superheroes appeared on television more frequently now interviews, advertisements, public appearances. Ethan recognized the pattern long before he grasped its consequences.
The Third Year
By the third year, the questions changed.
One afternoon, as they assembled puzzles on the floor, Margaret paused.
"What are you thinking about?" she asked.
Ethan looked up.
He adjusted his expression before answering.
"How the pieces fit together."
The statement was true.
Incomplete.
Margaret accepted it without hesitation.
"You have a talent for seeing structure," she said.
That was enough.
To her, Ethan was gifted. Intelligent. Valuable above all, hers.
To him, the role was perfect.
A gifted child receives support.
The world saw a calm, bright boy with potential.
Margaret saw the future.
And Ethan saw his own.
All he had to do was wait.