Selfish superpower

[HelloHound]

write a bit about a genuinely altruistic and caring superhero whose powers only activate when they're in mortal danger.
How would one go around that specific activation method? would it work consistently? how would someone be heroic with this power in mind?

 

[NotaNuffian]

Scenario: Earth constantly bombarded by foreign invaders.

The protagonist: someone who does not want to have his world destroyed because it is his home. His family is here.

Power: Basically becoming Ultraman.

Fyi this is a shounen, so please no "darkness of human heart".

 

[RepresentingCaution]

I let her babysit my toddler because she always jumps between my toddler and the mortal danger, and that activates her powers.

 

[Lloyd]

What about diseases like cancer

you don't have cancer anymore

 

[Lloyd]

Then what if the entire planet got destroyed will the bearer of the superpower resurrect again and again In the void

yeah, until they die of old age

 

[TheMonotonePuppet]

write a bit about a genuinely altruistic and caring superhero whose powers only activate when they're in mortal danger.
How would one go around that specific activation method? would it work consistently? how would someone be heroic with this power in mind?

The woman stood on top of the towering behemoth of metal and glass, one of the taller skyscrapers of the city. She peered through binoculars for the 7th day in a row, tears running down her face as she pulled at her hair in two directions, a fitting gesture to compare the two warring desires in her heart.
She halted at the rim of the roof, peering down the walls flexing in the wind.
A thought crystallized.
She really wanted to be selfish.
Arms held out to either side, she let herself fall.
Wind rushed by her, the buildings blurring by as she dropped face-up. Her hair whipped up, transparent tears trailing above her grimacing face. She happily waited for the impact.
Then the better voice of her consciousness whispered “Don’t you need to help others?”
Altruistic and selfish desires intermingled in her heart, setting off the power inside her heart like an atom bomb.
A turbulent portal of threads of black whipped around by the boiling rivers of glowing dark- and light-purple opens beneath her.
She emerges from the portal at terminal speed, pasting a criminal robbing a store for cash with her now-indestructible body. Another portal opens, receiving her hurtling body, covered in blood and guts.
She slams down into a gang boss, a portal appearing beneath the entire gang building to receive it and her.
She fell down into to the ocean like a fallen angel, with grace incomparable, skin dyed scarlet like the Devil. She left behind the plummeting building, a small portal receiving her. Indiscriminately, the gang died to the unforgiving embrace of New York harbor.
Her ping-ponging body slaughtered everyone in judged guilty of life sentences, murder, or rape. The New York prisons were cleared that day.
None of this required the woman’s influence. The pilot was her desire to protect everyone she loved and knew.
That was enough.
That, and her ultimate expression of her selfishness. Her power created itself to protect her from herself and fulfill her better side, oxymoronically requiring the mortal danger she presented to herself to activate.

 

[Ai-chan]

A lot of heroics involves being in danger.

A hero who can turn hands into carapace pincers and a legs into a shelled tail.

Shellfish superpower.

So, a power that only activates if the hero is selfish? And activating in peril? I would just pair it up with survival instinct. Get fully animal-like, doing everything to live.

Like how Suzaku acts in Code Geass after Lelouch geass'd his stupid ass.

Then... go into active war zones? Join any military or paramiltary group like the police or army. Take on gangs and drug cartels as a vigilantee. If there's supervillains, track down and confront the more violent ones.

Like... finding potentially deadly things to do is easy to do. The real question is, "what activates when in mortal peril" because that's a bigger question. If our nameless hero becomes a flying brick like superman, then they just jump in front of bullets or whatever. Its effectively an invincibility power with some quirks. If said superpower was, say, the ability to become Sherlock Holmes on steroids, that's going to be a completely different paradigm.

This is big winner number 1
-------------
NUMBER 2
is clearly indebatably : destroy the corrupted government
(me look at a certain big country with lot of snow, and a certain big country on the west that have lot of bullshit going on, and countries on east that keep hating each other, and the big east country with a dictator that directly brainwash people with patriotism.....wait...isnt it everyone? /joke)

Edit : Bc nothing stop the gov from abusing the "invincible" hero MC at the frontline THAT FUCKING TANK BULLETS AND TANK SHELLS, by declaring wars OR inducing other countries attack them. Or reducing the pay of soldiers. Or giving crappy materials/weapons as "MC is here" being a reasonable reason for them.

What about a super power that creates a perfect clone of you with all your memories each time you die.

Become old and wrinkly on a death bed and keep dying and resurrecting

I
If you die of old age the power doesn't work.

What about diseases like cancer

you don't have cancer anymore

Then what if the entire planet got destroyed will the bearer of the superpower resurrect again and again In the void

yeah, until they die of old age

So suicide won't work

Guys, remember where you are. This thread is posted in the writing prompt section. All comments should be a story unless it's a commentary on a story posted in the thread. Put your discussions elsewhere.

 

[Lloyd]

Guys, remember where you are. This thread is posted in the writing prompt section. All comments should be a story unless it's a commentary on a story posted in the thread. Put your discussions elsewhere.

Actually I'm a freeform writer, so a discussion counts as a story for me. Just look at Isekai Tower Defense, if that's a story, anything can be a story.

 

[MintiLime]

The so-called hero stood, facing the so-called villain.

“You… I wont’t fight you” the hero whispers, allowing the drawling syllables to reach the ears of the villain.

“Ha! All these people are at risk! And you won’t fight me?” The enraged villain grits their teeth, anger oozing from every pour, killing intent strong enough to wither every flower in the county radiating from their very soul.

“I don’t want to,” the hero states again, knees moments from buckling, not that their face showed anything other than a callous nothingness.

Their power needed selfish motivations and mortal danger to themself. Selfish? Of course they could be selfish! When have they wanted to fight this menace? When did they want this “power,” this curse to place a target on their back? When had they not worried that the power would not activate? Worried that the danger would not be strong enough to kill them, just to maybe paralyze or torture, such that the power would not be activated. Luckily, this villain above villains, the final boss per say, could take care of making sure the danger was dangerous enough.


“Fine! You don’t get a choice! Why don’t you just stand there and die!”

As the villain comes toward them, the hero smiles.

Their selfishness this time was different from all times before. Before, it was a selfish desire to BE a hero that they used. They placed themselves in ridiculous situations because they wanted to feel better about themselves, to feel worth something, to be loved. They wanted to force themselves into situation beyond their control, to save people for their own sake.

Once the true villain had emerged, the stakes had changed. People truly NEEDED them. The crushing pressure of it all, the danger, everything came crashing in at once. And they didn’t want it. They didn’t want the accolades, they wanted someone who could save themself. They wanted it to all end, for no one to fight.

At least this horrible, selfish power could use that desire to make sure they didn’t, you know, keel over when the villain’s murderous stabby stab item of the day came piercing towards them, ready to split their heart in two.

 

[Ai-chan]

Actually I'm a freeform writer, so a discussion counts as a story for me. Just look at Isekai Tower Defense, if that's a story, anything can be a story.

No, it's the rules. What your opinion is doesn't matter. This is writing prompt section. There are two other sections for author discussions, go there for discussion. Let's have some class, at least in this section.

 

[Raymann]

write a bit about a genuinely altruistic and caring superhero whose powers only activate when they're in mortal danger.
How would one go around that specific activation method? would it work consistently? how would someone be heroic with this power in mind?

My name is HH, you will know soon why I am known as such.
You see unlike other superheroes who either got rich parents or alien parents, mine were normal parents.
So are my powers. (laughs awkwardly)
My power activates when I am in mortal danger. To be exact when I feel like I am in mortal danger.
Like the time I first experienced a jump scare while playing five nights at Freddy's with my friends.
Or the time of my first job interview.
Or the time when I decided to propose to my crush.
Or when I tried to jump off the bridge after being fed up by this.

My power you ask, I turn into 400ft tall Cereberus that spawns hell gates and breaths three different types of fires.
Godzilla vs HH.

While walking with the TV. interviewer, HH replies.

Currently, I have joined the Revenger initiative and going through some therapy that helped control my powers a bit.

(stubs pinky toe on stairs)
Aaaahhhh.......

Bonny Stark:: (drops the food tray) SHIT NOT AGAIN. EVERYONE EVACUATE!!!

(Outer scene from a hovering helicopter)
News live report:
A Shin-Cerberus has appeared in New City and is spawning hell gates from which interdimensional devils are pouring in.

(A sad 400ft puppy sits in the middle of all the chaos.)

 

[ThrillingHuman]

The New York prisons were cleared that day.

more like only wrongfully jailed imigrants and black people were left - which was basically 90% of the jail population anyway - and the New York's Wall street was cleared that day