Archer Warrick March 21st,20XX

Uncomfortable.

Wow. Is that him? The guy that got the award? He’s so little.

So tiny.

He stopped the terrorist?

Why is he moving so fast? I wanted to talk to him.

Wow, he walks so fast for such a little guy. Maybe I should ask him to join the track team.

I hated all of it. Every single comment that the crowd made in their minds and forced into mine, I hated it all. Even if they were curious. Even if they were burning with the desire to see me, couldn’t they have at least been nicer about it?

This was the reason I hadn’t wanted to get up on that stage to collect the award, but Joyce had encouraged me to do so. It would also be a lie if I hadn’t said I hadn’t felt the thrill of having parental figures attend an award ceremony on my behalf for the first time.

Even before they’d passed, our parents had been busy. They had attended as many as they could, but once we had moved in with my uncle, never mind attending our events, it had been a struggle to get them to send Eva to school.

I shook off the thoughts of those awful people and focused on getting to my next class. Because I was stressed out, I couldn’t really turn off my powers, but I needed to get to a calm place and make sure I still could.

Destia was still stuck in the building, trying to get a grip on her powers, and Kaja had seemingly caught the bug. From the grotesque large arms she randomly grew to the comically miniature version of herself I sometimes saw running around the apartment, her powers had gone haywire. As of now, it was just me, Eva and Tillo that could leave the building.

Aaron hadn’t wanted to let us go, but Tillo and I had been adamant about going to school as much as possible. Destia was a senior, and to the public eye she already had a guaranteed job, so she had petitioned her school to let her study from home. The excuse she had given the school was that she needed to focus on her new job. It had gone smoothly with Joyce’s support and assurances that Destia was still on track with her studies to graduate with the rest of her class.

There was no such option for freshmen and sophomores like myself and Tillo and there was definitely no such thing for an elementary schooler like Eva. We’d gotten pagers to push if we felt something happening and of course we had our phones.

I’d specifically told Eva to yell for me if she felt her powers going out of control but I still worried. I didn’t know what was going on, but from Destia who’d had her powers for the longest to Kaja who was super proficient with her powers, they were slowly going out of control.

Aaron was super worried about his powers going haywire and had wanted to lock himself up at home, but his job hadn’t allowed it. I’d never met his manager, but from the way Aaron’s eyes widened whenever his phone rang the customized ringtone, I could guess he was a pretty strict person.

The morning classes passed by in a blur, although I had to field a lot of intrusive thoughts from my classmates during class. Questions about myself, about the missing Kaja and even curiosity about my younger sister.

I knew Eva had been excited about returning to class and impressing her classmates with the stories of what she had done over the impromptu break. Of course, I’d worked hard to make sure she didn’t say anything that we were supposed to keep secret but I couldn’t help but still be nervous.

Hopefully, anything she said would just be dismissed as a child’s ramblings.

The bell that signaled it was time to switch classes went off and I quickly packed up my things and prepared to move to the next class. There were about ten minutes between each class but I didn’t want to get dragged into any conversations by any of my classmates.

It wasn’t like that was any different from any other day but today especially my head hurt, and it was somehow getting harder and harder to block out other people’s thoughts. Maybe it was because I was the subject of a lot of them, or maybe it was because I hadn’t slept well the night before, but the mass of loud thoughts amalgamated into a colossal headache and blurred my vision.

“Woah! Are you okay!”

A classmate offered to help me as I stumbled over my feet, but I waved them off. It wasn’t that I didn’t appreciate the help, but my headache worsened by the second and made it hard to focus on anything, never mind my own thoughts or actions.

“Archer! Are you okay!”

Ember, the gentle giant, approached me from out of nowhere and I barely made out Thelma’s slight figure beside him. If they were here, then Tillo should have been close by, but I somehow couldn’t ‘hear’ him.

I took a few deep breaths as I tried to calm down but my head refused to quiet.

Joyce had been right; my powers were going out of control. It was terrifying enough to realize that, and being in such a crowded environment didn’t help at all.

But wait… if mine were going wild, then what about Eva?

“Where’s Tillo?”

As much as I hated to acknowledge it, I needed help, and if Tillo was in a similar situation as I was, then Ember and Thelma were likely the only support I had.

Thelma gave me an answer while Ember fretted over me.

“He’s in the bathroom. He’s looked ill the whole day, but he ran in there a few minutes ago. He told us we should go check on you and that he would call a Joyce.”

So, he was out of commission.

“Yeah. Could you two help me get to Eva?”

Almost on cue, I heard a loud, painful roar that ripped through the fog of thoughts in my head.

ARCHER!

It was Eva.

A couple of people around me flinched and looked around, clearly startled. It looked like she had misaimed.

Thankfully it didn’t look like everyone had heard it. But at the rate this was going, it was only a matter of time.

As far as I was aware, Eva couldn’t project this far to begin with, and even if she could, it shouldn’t have affected anyone but myself. But then again, all of our powers had been going crazy lately. There wasn’t much I could do but try to get all of us stabilized until Aaron and Joyce got here.

“We can go check on your little sister, but you need to rest.”

I gripped Ember’s large arms and tried my best to get my vision stabilized on him.

“Ember, you remember last time? Remember we just asked you to close your eyes and wait for it all to be over? Can you do that again? Please? Just… don’t ask questions and help me get there.”

He stiffened at the memory of the attack a few weeks ago and anxiously looked around.

“Is there something that you know? Archer, if you saw anything again we have to tell a teacher!”

And there were the questions. Ember was a pretty timid person, so it had been a poor call to ask him to take the lead. I turned to Thelma, who looked similarly anxious, in the hopes that she would be a better bet.

“Thelma… please.”

She debated with herself for a little while, and her thoughts overwhelmed the mass of voices that currently assaulted my mind. I tried to focus on her and her thoughts, but instead of the surface-level thoughts I’d tried to access, it plunged me right into a deeper level of consciousness, and I started to gather memories of her childhood and all the relevant information that might lead to her agreeing to help me.

I pulled back as quickly as possible and sealed my lips shut, fearing that I might accidentally say something and manipulate her into helping me. Even though that might have been easier than begging her for help, I wasn’t desperate enough to do that to someone I somewhat considered a friend.

Thankfully she made up her mind and pulled me away from Ember.

“Let go Ember. If you don’t want to help, then at least don’t get in people’s way.”

Her notoriously brutal way of speaking shocked Ember back into awareness of my terrible state.

The larger boy stood still and watched us hobble away before finally making up his mind and taking my other arm.

“I won’t ask any questions now, but I’d like some answers later Archer. There’s something weird about all of you guys.”

This is getting really scary.

Oh, stop being such a baby. What’s the point of being so big if you aren’t even willing to move when someone asks for your help? Archer’s just sick and wants to check up on his little sister.

Well, you don’t need to be so cruel about it. I’m still helping. Why is Thelma always so mean to me?

I’m not being mean! I’m just being honest. It’s not my fault if the truth is too difficult to hear.

As intense as the conversation was, I was too shocked to answer.

They… Neither of my two friends was actually speaking.

I could hear them conversing, and thankfully both of them were so stressed out that they didn’t quite realize what was going on, but they held a full conversation with only each other’s thoughts.

And from the strain on my body, I could tell it was happening because of my powers.