Mage Among Superheroes

Training in a safe environment before combat made sense to me, but I hadn't expected that training to involve so much running. I wasn't bad at it, but I quickly realized how big the difference was between myself and the others. I usually only ran enough to get away from everyone chasing me, but here we were running laps around an underground 'gymnasium' and were told to continue more or less until we couldn't do it anymore.

I didn't recognize most of the people since I was new, but Sophia and Meztli were both faster than me. I was considering pushing myself to go faster than them, but then I couldn't run for long. As for the others, many wore super-type uniforms made out of colorful 'spandex', and even masks. The way most masks didn't cover anything but a small circle around each eye made me wonder what they were for, because I could still easily recognize someone without.

Most people appeared to be human. However, there were a few with widely varying body types which I wasn't sure were from some sort of power or being an alien. There was a small chance they were also extradimensional, but that was usually rarer from what I'd heard.

"Hey newbie," someone said as they passed me. I was jostled to the side from their motion, but I didn't mind that.

"Hello," I replied. It was hard to believe they were already to the corner in front of me, and around it.

"Sup, newbie," said another figure, and once more I was jostled to the side. There was plenty of room for people to pass, but apparently they couldn't be bothered.

"Hi," I said in response.

"Morning, newbie," said a third person. The figure was very familiar. The same colors as the other two. Triplets, or just some sort of trio?

"Good morning." I also realized that they weren't going all that close to me, yet I was getting pushed to the side. What would cause that? I had a glance over my shoulder and saw them coming up behind me once more.

They slowed down as they got close to me, their thin frame coming into focus. "Aww, you figured it out already?"

"Of course," I said. I'd actually thought that maybe they were teleporting. But it seemed they had just been going very fast. Was that even possible? This track was a tenth of a mile and they ran the whole thing in a couple of seconds. "You're just very fast."

Somehow, they seemed offended at that. "I'm more than just fast." Though I was looking directly, their figure blurred and disappeared, leaving behind only a blue line for a moment. I staggered backwards slightly. Then I saw the blur again. Once again the force pushed me back. Was it a strong gust of wind?

"Come on newbie," they said as they passed once more- briefly slowing to speak- "You stopped running! You'll be the slowest person at this rate."

I had stopped running. It wasn't smart to read and run at the same time.