By some stroke of luck, Larkin convinced her aunt to let her stay home from school on the grounds that it would give her "time to recover from the traumatizing events of the past day."

Larkin would take anything she was offered. After all, she had left school after vomiting out her lunch in the cafeteria. I wonder when my friends will let me live that one down.

After texting Greta that she wouldn't be walking with her, Larkin settled into her aunt's leather couch for a marathon of Chopped. Aunt Libby was at work for the day, leaving the house to Larkin. She sunk into the col leather and scoffed at the ridiculous ingredients the competitors had to use in their dishes.

She watched two episodes of Chopped, only taking a break to get more food out of the refrigerator. Two cups of orange juice and three chocolate chip muffins later, Larkin stopped raiding her aunt's fridge and decided to get up and be productive.

Larkin pulled herself up off the couch. She walked through the white walls of her aunt's home. When she passed the first guestroom, she paused. Tentatively, she reached out for the doorknob. It didn't budge. Nonplussed, Larkin moved on to her room. She hadn't really expected it to be unlocked, but one could hope. If she really wanted to, she could have got in. The secret behind the door was something she would find out before she left. She knew that it couldn't have been simply untidy.

Gathering her backpack and other school supplies, she walked back to the living room and plopped down on the couch. She went through her homework agenda book, hoping to complete as much as she could so that she didn't have as much make-up work when she went back to school.

When she came upon her chemistry homework, the only thing listed was the partner project with Jacob. Groaning, she fell back on the couch. Larkin stared at the little dots on the ceiling, wondering how their next conversation with Jacob would go.

So, you tried to kill me. I've been good. Yeah, you don't have to worry about me. I'm fine and dandy. The gold you put in my food wore off—assuming it was you who did that. And now we have to do a chemistry project together.

She grimaced, hoping to prolong the day as long as possible. For a moment, she imagined never going back. She imagined leaving herself behind, becoming Coalescence. It would be so much simpler, she thought. I could be like Black Lightning.

And for a moment, Larkin thought she might like that.

()()()

She strained to hear it, but knew instantly what it meant. Even with her advanced hearing, the rumbles of distress were still present. The call for help was different than usual, however. There were no screams of terror or blaring alarms. She heard low murmurs. The disturbance seemed to sit in the air like a morning fog.

She rolled her ankles and threw her hair up before leaving her aunt's house through the front door. Walking at a brisk pace, she located the nearest entrance to her base. Feeling the tension in the air thicken, Larkin began to jog. Even though the situation required her to be unassuming, she wouldn't risk innocent lives being lost in the process.

She dropped through to her base and changed into her suit. Without wasting another second, she followed the distress call back to the surface.

Once she reached the streets of Markusville, she couldn't exactly pinpoint where she needed to go. Over on 25th Street, she could hear the blaring of car horns mixed with anxious yelling. On Maple Street, the murmurs of distress were quieter, but still evident.

Whatever the issue was, it was everywhere.

Larkin chose the loudest destination. In downtown Markusville, there was a large intersection close to the library, across from a local café. That's where Larkin felt the biggest disturbance.

Now full-on sprinting, she hurdled down the street. The people on the sidewalks gave her fleeting glances, but superheroes had long-since become a normalcy in Larkin's city.

When she was younger, she could remember reading about flying supers, like Black Lightning. Her childhood had consisted of the tales of supers from all over the country. It was always the same: good vs. evil, good fights evil, good wins. The villain would lose and the hero would be praised.

And just to her luck, Larkin had developed powers at twelve and got to live her dream. Her idealistic dream where good always trumps evil and no one gets hurt. Eventually, she learned that things weren't always that simple. This day would prove to be another example of that.

When Larkin arrived at the scene of the supposed crime, she stopped. She was utterly surprised.

She couldn't see any obvious villain. There was a group of pedestrians huddled in the middle of the crosswalk, and they were holding up traffic, but that was it. She watched as the cars coming down the street would stop. Sometimes, the person in the car would pull over and get out of the car to join the huddle in the street. Other times, the cars would turn around and find another way to get to where they needed to go.

Larkin watched the group grow from the corner. After only five minutes, the group spanned the street, and all the people seemed focused on whatever was in the middle of the mass.

With an ever-growing frown on her face, Larkin watched until she decided that it was time to intervene. She left her post at the corner and approached the group. A few of the people on the outside noticed her and moved aside. She attempted to look into the center, but the crowd was too thick.

"Excuse me, sir, what is going on here?" she asked, directing her question towards one of the men that had moved away to let her get closer.

"I got here just a bit before you," he said, running his hair through his almost nonexistent head of hair. "But there's a man closer to the center, and it doesn't look like he wants to move."

Larkin nodded. "Thanks."

She pushed her way through the crowd, excusing herself when she stepped on someone's foot. In the middle of the circle, a middle-aged man was sitting cross-legged on one of the white stripes. He stared straight ahead, ignoring all the people and clamoring voices around him. A solemn expression graced his face, but he occasionally twitched.

With a final shove, Larkin broke through the inner circle of people standing around the man. One person was talking to him.

"Sir, you need to move. No one can get through this light if you sit in the cross walk," she heard one woman say.

Another woman who was listening to the one-sided conversation butted in. "We have tried asking him, Karen, that doesn't work."

"It doesn't hurt to try again," the first woman, Karen, responded.

Approaching the two women, Larkin asked, "Could you explain what's happening to me?"

The second lady's eyes widened. Then a smile of relief broke out upon her face. "Coalescence! Thank god someone's here to finally help!"

"I can only help if I understand the situation," said Larkin.

"Well," began Karen, "Elle and I were driving to a business lunch when we came upon this man sitting in the street. When we arrived, there were only a couple of others stopped. Obviously, he's been here a while. He doesn't talk to us. And he won't move. And you can't forcefully move him either because he struggled when one person tried to drag him off the street. I don't know if it's some kind of strange protest, or what, but no one knows how to get him to move."

Larkin was scowling at the situation by the time Karen was finished speaking. "Interesting." Larkin bit her lip before continuing. "Describe what he did when he was forcefully moved."

This time, Elle spoke. "One of the men attempted to pick him up and move him to that bench over there," she said, pointing, "but he kicked and screamed the whole way. When he was released, he immediately walked back to the middle of the street and sat down again."

Larkin smacked her lips and heaved a breath. "I don't actually know if I'll be able to help you this time. This is not a situation I have dealt with before."

Larkin watched as the women deflated, disappointed that their hero couldn't do everything. Still hoping she could do something, Larkin crouched in front of the man. She looked into the man's eyes, but he looked right through her, as if she wasn't there at all. His lips moved quickly, occasionally emitting an incomprehensible noise.

Frustrated, Larkin looked to the side. Through a gap in the circle, she saw a girl, late-teens, sitting against the wall of a building. She had already been looking at Larkin when Larkin glanced over. The girl straightened her back, sitting up straighter, when Larkin took her in. A sneer lit up on her face. Larkin would have liked to call it an ugly sneer, except for the fact that it showed off the girl's straight, white teeth.

Looking away, Larkin said, "Has anyone tried calling 911?"

All the people within hearing distance chimed in with 'no,' or 'should have thought of that earlier,' or shook their head.

"If he doesn't do anything in ten minutes, call 911. I'm sure they could sedate him and get him out of here," she announced.

Larkin excused herself from the crowd and shoved her way out of the mass, heading over towards the girl on the sidewalk.

Larkin sat adjacent to the girl, also leaning against the wall. The girl sneered again, showing her bright teeth. Larkin noticed how almost everything else about the girl was dark. Her clothes were black, but not in the way that made her seem emo. It was a different kind of style. Her back jeans and leather jacket paired with black suede booties pegged her as different. She looks like someone who should ride a motorcycle. Her brown eyes matched the tone of her skin, and her brown hair was frizzing from the August humidity.

"What gives me the honor of sitting next to the Coalescence?" she asked.

Larkin smiled. "You almost had me stumped. I might have looked right past you."

"I suppose I should take pride in that, but I've defeated supers twice my age. Tricking a couple of thirteen year-old supers feels like taking candy from a baby: bittersweet."

"We are sixteen," Larkin commented. She didn't look at the girl; only stared off at the mob of people. "I would enjoy getting to know my company. How old are you?"

"I stopped counting when people stopped caring."

Larkin almost stumbled over her next words, but brushed it off. "Most people don't stop counting until they're real old, you know? When they want to pretend they're still young and beautiful, when they're almost dead. You don't look very dead to me."

"I could be."

"How old were you, then? Is that question one you'll answer?"

"Age is but a number. I am sure you have an estimate in your head already. I'm sure you feel like you've got me all figured out." The girl paused and drew in a breath, as if she were planning on saying something, but changed her mind.

Larkin couldn't argue with the girl. It was true. Seventeen or eighteen, maybe. I don't really know what she did to the man, though.

Ever the curious one, she asked, "Is it paralysis?"

"No," came the girl's stony reply.

"Hypnosis?"

"No."

"Brain death?"

"No."

"Muscle control?"

Pause. "No."

"So that's a yes!" exclaimed Larkin.

"No. It's just not as wrong as the rest of your stupid guesses."

"That's good. I'm getting closer. You control people don't you? I guess that would make sense. Not just muscles, though."

The girl sneered, and Larkin decided that she sneered because she had forgotten how to smile. She then turned her head away from the man at the cross walk and focused solely on Larkin. As soon as she turned her attention to Larkin, people from the crowd gasped. Larkin perked up.

"He might be fine," said the girl. "He also might not be fine. Same with the other five." At Larkin's face of confusion, she continued to explain. "Are you so dense as not to notice the widespread disruptions? Did you not notice the other five people sitting in the middle of other streets?"

"I did notice," she mumbled.

"Of course you did." The sarcasm was obvious.

"Tell me what you did," demanded Larkin.

"There is no need to be so rude to returning citizens of Markusville," said the girl.

Larkin could sense some kind of meaning in what the girl said, but couldn't quite connect the dots.

"You can call me Newman. Magnolia Newman. I can assure you I have no need to keep my identity a secret. If you told anyone, they wouldn't believe you anyway," she said. The girl chuckled. It was a wry, scratchy sound that grated on Larkin.

It was a dead chuckle that was supposed to belong to a dead girl.