I couldn’t blame them, but I had work to do.

I jumped over four rows, then another four, then another four, because I’m just that tall and athletic.

I reached the bottom of Hannn’s mysterious balcony and I peered upward. The stream of smoke was getting thicker, the sparks had turned into a full-on blaze, the crackling and zipping were deafening, and below us people were running and screaming for their lives.

I’ve always been great at judging distances—just one of my innumerable talents, I guess—so I could tell that there were exactly 146 inches between the floor and the edge of the balcony. That’s 12 feet and 2 inches. And that’s a really long way.

For a normal man.

Thankfully, as you probably noticed, I am not that man.

Using my razor-sharp mind, I quickly did the math. I am six masculine feet and eight strapping inches tall. My pterodactyl-like wingspan is an incredible seven feet and three inches, and my standing reach is nine feet and one inch.

That meant that to grab the edge of the balcony and lift myself up to finally confront the evil Lord Hannn, I’d need a vertical leap of three feet and one inch—or exactly thirty-seven inches.

Are you with me? I know—you didn’t think you’d get a math test in the middle of a high-intensity kick-ass action scene. But excellence is earned!

Now, I’d jumped pretty high before. Once I’d been trying to swat a mosquito in my Top Secret Command Center, and I’d jumped thirty-two inches. Then another time I was walking up some stairs, lifted up my foot, and BAM—jumped thirty-three inches, just like that.

But that was just me fucking around.

To jump a full thirty-seven inches? In a high-pressure situation, with thousands of people staring and a fire blazing and knives and throwing stars flying through the air and the fate of a global criminal organization resting on my next move—that’s a big-ass jump!

For a normal man.

I crouched down, felt that elastic stretch in my calves, the burn in my thighs, and the atomic critical mass in my glutes, and I sprang into the air…

A Short Break

Can we just stop for a moment and truly appreciate just how many inches are in thirty-seven inches?

That’s not one inch. That’s not two inches. That’s not three inches. That’s not four inches. That’s not five inches…

Well, you get the idea.