“And then- and then I just dropped him!” Penny was saying, laughing as she talked. “Poor guy. He had no idea what was happening!”

“The forest is your element, isn’t it?” Carrie remarked.

“Yeah. The plants tell me everything. We were one of the first ones here.”

“Not the first?”

“No,” Amelia said. She nodded towards a different campfire, where five other students chatted quietly with s’mores on sticks in their hands. “They were. By far. Which worries me.”

“Why?” Lyssa asked as she patted the crumbs off her own hands.

“Because at least one of these games are going to include a fighting element. A team versus another. From what I have heard, they made it here in time for breakfast.”

“It could just be a lucky match-up,” Carrie said. “Who knows how many combinations of gifts work well against ungifted.”

“Ungifted are most common type of people heroes apprehend. It would not do to underestimate them.”

“I suppose.”

This wasn’t a game, after all. For the sake of selling tickets and graphic design on billboards, it was called a game. The M.A.G.E Annual. The Youth Super-decathlon. Nascent heroes often made it or broke it on these events. The differences in perspective were stark. One person’s life was a thousand others’ entertainment. Moments and realizations like this gave her strength. Her resentment.

Lyssa had had time to introspect. Ever since she made it out of the forest, she had wandered with her friends while half-awake, spending most of her attention actualizing the metaphor of her mind mansion, building stronger foundations, reorganizing the rooms where she kept her selves. They wandered about as they pleased, offering their own unique—and unwanted—thoughts on her memories, but at least she knew where to find them. Sethlana had been furious when she remembered what grandfather had done. Izanami simply acknowledged that he had saved their life; she was neither thankful nor resentful. Mercurial did not care at all; she did not seem to react to anything except the implication of danger. Lyssa herself did not know what to think, but she remembered how she would have felt if she was a lot younger.

Now she knew where her power came from, and where she came from. Bildungsroman, her telepathic self, was a category 6 psychic, placing her above the vast majority of telepaths on the planet. Even now her mental weight was palpable. Her sheer psychic mass like a tumor, or an aneurysm hiding in a swollen artery, taunting her like a time bomb with no visible timer. Lyssa had every reason to hate her life. But in truth she didn’t, not because she was a natural stoic, but because she had created a self to absorb it. All those years beset by selfish people. How she had resented them. If only she knew what they were thinking, at least she wouldn’t be threatened. Resentment fed Bildungsroman, made her bitter and strong.

Lyssa needed control yesterday. They had barely made it out last time. And for the next leg of the game they were not going to have a ready supply of cover. Lyssa needed all of herself to win.

She seems distracted. Is she okay?

“Hey, are you alright?” Carrie asked.

“I’m just tired. Thank you. I think I’m going to turn in.”

“Ok. Good night.”

Lyssa made her way to the sleeping tents.

I am pleasantly surprised she made it.

I hope she has it in her to make it to the next break point.

She was hearing their thoughts. In fact, she was hearing everyone’s thoughts all over the camp.

She couldn’t stop. As she became aware of her resentment, she began to come into her telepathy. Her selves were never separate from her to begin with; they were all parts of her. In that very moment she hated, and resented. She hated how weak she was without other people. She resented how little control she had over herself. And she was alone. All around her, confident, self-assured men and women her age, projected their thoughts outward, an oceanic tide of security she lacked.

Lyssa did not go to bed yet. She sat on the edge of the hilltop, looking outward at nature unfold until the path of the forest met the highway they had arrived from. Further yet, the city’s gleaning towers twinkled, brighter than any star.

She opened a palm. Five wavering torches of flame danced at her fingertips.

“You think you ought to be in control!? Without me, you’d have been dead at the hands of that pyrokinetic. You’re nothing without me!”

“I… own you,” she said.

The winds blew. Metallic dust swept past her hand. A trail of it stayed, swirling between the curled pillars that were her fingers.

“We should never have come here. We were safe alone. You’ve brought us into danger.”

“I cannot have no goal in life.”

The dust froze above her palm inside a bubble of pale fire.

“I will not hide from my own history,” she said.

Black mist collected around her limbs, ready to take her into a supersonic world. But Lyssa held herself back, priming herself like a spring.

“I must decide where I want to be.”

“You think you can just talk yourself down?” Bildungsroman’s voice echoed from somewhere deep within.

“I never had a good childhood. You were born from my resentment. You shouldn’t be my drive.”

“What makes you think you know what’s best for yourself?”

“For better or for worse,” Lyssa said, “I am my own master.”

The voices and thoughts of the other students in the camp faded away. She focused the lens of her telepathy somewhere else. On air, perhaps. Or on the flecks of metal bending at her will. On the panpsychic specters that lied in all matter and existence, however inanimate.

And then it all collapsed. Her selves split from her, pulled back into their respective rooms and realms in her mansion. The chattering in her mind returned, quieter than before, but unmistakably there, all while Bildungsroman laughed in some far away recess of her thoughts. Lyssa fell on her back, gasping for breath. For just one minute, she had achieved unity, and complete control over her gifts. But it was the most liberating minute of her life. It was hope. Mental illness wouldn’t exist if people could fix it by concentrating very hard, but if she could extend that minute…

“Getting there.”

Lyssa blinked. That was the self in the cave. The one that refused her control entirely.

“I will meet you,” Lyssa whispered. “Eye to eye. And you will acknowledge me.”

--

Aaaand we are officially on day two of the M.A.G.E Annual. Already we’ve had some pretty exciting twists and turns occur. We’ve seen young Dark Ravager envelop an entire platoon of soldiers in a night so intense they came out in a fetal position crying for their mothers.

Not a very G-rated name, if I may say so Joe.

Borderline sexual, Tim. But none of my nightly romps ever left me in tears.

What about the girl, huh?

Ask your wife about it. Moving on with the recap. We’ve seen some action with Colossi’s group too. If we recall, that’s Giantsbane’s protégé!

Giantsbane, the second strongest hero here in the West, trailing closely behind Victory.

Or so he insists, hahaha!

We also never forecasted Vortex’s group’s explosive escape from that harrowing situation.

I remember that. Something really strange happened with their group. We were laughing about it yesterday! Why can’t I recall…

Hm… must have been forgettable, Joe. Oh well. Let’s pan our drones over to the starting line, where the students have had their strength restored and their convictions redoubled. Aaaand they’re off already with a spring in their step!

I wonder if they can keep up that momentum with what’s coming for them. Whoa nelly.

These games are getting more Hitchcockian by the year.