"Child of the Atom" by Matvei Hazlikowiczna

Privyet, hello friend. The name is Matvei. What with the difficulty in pronouncing it, even for myself, I never liked my name, I thought I was unlucky to be burdened with it. HazMat is much catchier, and much more appropriate. If you will allow I will explain why.

I am from Ukraine, where my family have lived for many generations. I do not live where my family used to though. They were forced away from Pripyat by the disaster that I believe gave me my ability.

My father worked nearby for a time, until the accident. I'm sorry, just to be clear he worked at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. It had such an effect at the time, and throughout Ukraine since, that I forget some people nowadays do not know as much about it as I.

My father was also called Matvei, the closest equivalent to that name in English I think is Matthew, and he was an engineer at the plant, stationed at reactor four - the one that failed. He had not been working there long when the accident happened, but he was still there. I think he must have been exposed to some radioactivity when the reactor ruptured, there are not many other explanations for my powers.

Everyone had to move after that. It was a slow process for some but my parents left Pripyat as quickly as they could and headed to Kiev where my mother's parents lived. Even though it is close to Chernobyl, the direction of the wind saved Kiev from radiation. I think there are still some families living in the exclusion zone around the plant, but they chose to stay so may God have mercy on them.

I am indeed religious, a member of the Orthodox Church, and my view of getting my ability through science may seem contradictory. I do not deny science, we are not in the past any more and I see that religion and science must coexist peacefully if faith is not to be shunned. If God exists or not I do not know, but I like to believe. Most people, including my family, may not agree, but that is their choice.

Anyhow, after my parents moved to Kiev they decided not to have children, in case any possible child would have a radiation-induced problem. Obviously that didn't work. My father was never permitted a vasectomy as the population of Ukraine is decreasing due to not enough births, so my parents had to rely on other forms of contraception. Whatever they did failed, and my mother fell pregnant with me.

Just as no hospital would give my father a vasectomy, none would give my mother an abortion either. They took a great risk in trying to import the chemicals given to reluctant mothers in other countries to kill the foetus, but for reasons I will explain later that did not work.

In the end my mother thought that there must have been a reason for my survival so far, so she kept me. I was a perfectly healthy child when I was born, much to their surprise, with no complications. My parents were very happy and they regretted their worries, and they have never stopped trying to make up for trying to get rid of me.

My childhood was normal, just like anyone else. I am much luckier than some of the other students I have met on Øya Helter, as my powers do not affect me as much as the others. I am on par with those like Gerard, Jordyn and Harold, as they are here because of objects. I don't have to shy away from the public in case I am labelled a freak and I can touch people without harming them. I know I still haven't explained what that ability is, but I am getting to it.

It was during a science lesson at school that I discovered what I could do. Before I continue, I must assure you that I am not saying Kyiv Secondary School No. 189 is rough, but there will always be bad eggs. Now it is Alexander, then it was Olha.

Olha was a girl in my class and, though I do not mean to be rude, I use the term "girl" in the loosest form of the worst. She was the first child in my grade to grow facial hair, so now you see what I mean.

She had had it in for me for years but to this day I do not know the reason for her hatred of me. Even with the help of William's tactothymesis there is no reason I can remember for her aggression towards me at school. I must thank her though, as were it not for her dislike of me I may not have ended up at The Academy.

Her hatred of me reached its height in a science lesson. Once again, I did nothing to provoke her, unless she took offence at the burliest child in the lesson getting on with his studies, and I can assure you that I am built like a bear, but that is bordering on bragging so I will stop now.

We were studying the reactions of acids and bases in the particular lesson, all gathered around our teacher's demonstration while we took notes. It was just as she had poured some sulphuric acid and water into s flask to dilute it that Olha grabbed the flask of the more concentrated acid. I looked up from my work just in time to see the look of pure anger on her face as she flung the contents of the flask at me.

I jumped back and fell over a chair while the other students screamed around me, the acid eating through my shirt. The teacher rushed to my aid and found me completely unharmed, even with the concentrated acid covering my face and torso.

I don't know what persuaded my teacher to do it, but he decided it would be a good idea to mop the acid with paper towels. Maybe it was the fact I was unscathed, and he hadn't seen my shirt. Whatever the reason, the acid ate right through the tissue and started burning his hands. My fellow students were more surprised that I was unharmed than at my teacher's pain, so he had to deal with that himself.

I had no idea what was going on, but everyone was talking about it for the rest of the day. When I got home I had to find out if I could do whatever I had done again, and although it was a risk, I dipped my hand in bleach. Nothing happened, absolutely nothing. It was as if my skin offered some sort of unnatural protection against these things.

Any time after that lesson that I saw some potentially harmful substance I would risk a touch, and always there was no damage. Nothing corrosive or poisonous could harm me, and it explained why the chemicals my parents used to abort me didn't work.

As time went on, and all of my friends grew ill of the cold in winter I remained healthy. Looking back I realised that I had never been affected by illness - I was immune to that also.

Heat, however, I cannot avoid. To this day I have a scar on my arm from where I decided to test how far my abilities went with an iron. That was quite a painful experience, but the nature of my ability means I have to take risks to see how far I can go. It is a lot easier to find these things out at The Academy, as Holly is very helpful in the event of something going wrong. I never felt comfortable trying myself with poison until I met her, but now I know I am immune to that as well. She has left my scar though - it is a reminder of my limits.

By the time I had tested what I could do, the news of the classroom incident seemed to have travelled throughout all of Ukraine. There was a man who had come here from America to film for a television show about 'real-life superpowers', and apparently there were quite a few people in Ukraine who were interviewed with him. There was a boy about my age, whose mother lived in Pripyat and met his father after they evacuated, who could stick cutlery to his skin, and a man that could make a lightbulb work by merely touching it.

The man said I was remarkable, and filmed me pouring acid onto my hand, then made me take a bath in bleach. The final part of the show involved the presenter taking me and my family back to where he thought all of this started - Chernobyl.

Nowadays they actually take tourists there, give them a guided tour of certain areas. It won't be inhabitable for humans for 20,000 years, but the government can still make profit out of misfortune. My grandfather always compares it to Stalin's economic policies, and how some people thought he caused famine in the countryside to force peasants into urban areas to further industry.

The presenter and my parents wore hazmat suits as we walked around the area that we were allowed to. I did not, but there were people monitoring my health from a safe distance. As we walked further into the areas that were more heavily radiated the presenter would check the surroundings with a Geiger counter. They would cause it to beep more and more as we went further and further. The hazmat suits did the same, but I didn't.

The presenter took a very large risk taking me out there, but he was right. Radiation didn't affect me at all. It seemed as though my skin had a protective coating, that is what shielded me from the acid and the bleach, and it is what kept the bacteria and radiation away. It is like the magnetic field around the Earth that keeps the Sun's radiation away, and as good the code-name HazMat is I always feel slightly jealous of Elizabeth, as she thought of Aurora before I did. Anyway, the heat of the iron must just have just stopped it temporarily, the way enzymes become denatured in high heat, and that it how I got burnt.

After the Chernobyl scene the presenter left. It took a while for the show to be aired, and by the time it was playing in Ukraine I had already left, so I missed out on my celebrity status. It had, however made its way onto the Internet, if you looked hard enough for such an obscure show, but somebody must have done.

I know this because of the visitor we had one day when I came back from school. He was tall and muscular with slicked-back brown hair, how I imagine I may look when I am his age, but I prefer much shorter hair.

Anyway, as you have most likely heard from all of the other students whose stories you have read by now, he was the man who came to take them to The Academy. Some had letters, like Jordyn and Rod, Gerard even got a welcome package, but Mr Helstrom liked to do things on a more personal basis, as Elliot will have most likely told you. I was one of the students who received a visitor and not a piece of paper.

Mr Helstrom was much nicer than the television presenter, he was actually interested in my wellbeing and not just visiting Chernobyl to get ratings. He told me all about what goes on at The Academy, and how it would be a safe environment to learn how far my powers went.

Now I am sure you must know the rest of what happens after that, boat journey, new friends, saving the world, that sort of thing, so I won't bore you with the details. All I will say is that this school has helped me so much, and I hope you have enjoyed, or at least not disliked, everything I have told you.