“Well, we wish that we could help you but we have to think about what’s best for the rest of our team and we can’t put one person before four. Sorry,” said Tamoia.
“I understand,” said Taqmaine as fresh tears began to fall from her eyes.
“Yeah we’re sorry,” said Dezzie. “We really can’t risk being caught. It’ll blow everything that we’re trying to do. I wish you the best of luck though.”
Taqmaine nodded and headed back into the trees. I almost called out to her to stop her but I didn’t. Ahshay would flip and I didn’t want to deal with that on top of hiding the fact that our dad was alive so I just let her go. We waited a few moments until she was out of sight completely and then we started to head back towards the shelter. No one spoke and it was easier that way because my emotions were all over the place and I didn’t want my powers to drain me anymore.
Soon, we saw the clearing where everyone else was. I was relieved to see that they were all still safe and in one piece. I looked over at Ahshay and she smiled wide and it tore me apart that I was going to have to keep this big secret from her and I didn’t know how long I would be able to hide it. Because eventually I knew that I would have to say something.
“How was it at whipipo headquarter? Were you nervous?” asked Ahshay as she rushed up to me.
“It was interesting. I learned a lot and we got what we went there for,” I said as I smiled at her.
She eyed me suspiciously. “What are you hiding?”
I looked at her in confusion. “What are you talking about? What makes you think that I’m hiding something?”
She glared at me. “Really Tysim? When you’re hiding something you smile and become vague. So I know that there is something that you’re not telling me.”
I sighed. “There’s nothing I’m not telling you Ahshay. We went in there and I kept watch as they went through the files. Then on the way back we ran into Taqmaine.”
“Taqmaine? What did she want? To turn y’all into the whipipo?” she asked as she rolled her eyes.
“No, she wanted to join us but your brother didn’t trust her so we let her go,” said Dezzie as she took a sip of her water and sat down beside us.
“Well, we don’t trust her and we would have walked if she came here. She almost got us killed,” said Ahshay.
“Yeah, that’s what he said,” said Rahz as he flashed her a smile.
Ahshay looked over at me and studied my face. “Are you sure that’s it? It seems as if it’s something else you aren't’ telling me.”
I glanced at the ground and looked back at her with the straightest face that I could. “There is nothing else to tell you. Now can we all sit down and find out what was in these files.”
She looked at me one last time and we all sat down on the ground with the files in between us all. Breyrian looked over at me and I knew that he could sense that I was hiding something. But I would talk to him about everything later when Ahshay was asleep. Maybe he could help me make sense of the situation at hand. But, I doubt that he could. I doubted that anyone could. It was a messed up situation but I knew that I had to get through this.
“Okay, so the files that we took today are very important. They are the last files that we need before we begin to prepare for the trip to Africa. They are the files on the last few experiments that they did. Also, files on what they plan to do next. There’s a lot of information in these files and it will take a few days to get through. And we need to make sure that we all understand what’s in them. Are you all ready?” asked Tamoia.
We all nodded.
“Alright, well let’s get this show on the road,” said Tamoia.
Chapter 11
We all watched as Rahz opened up a folder and spread out the contents in front of us. There were several pictures of melanins laid out in front of us. A lot of them were in glass cages but a few were spread out on the bed dead and they were cutting them open. It was a sad sight to see and I couldn’t even begin to imagine the type of pain that they were dealing with.
“Okay, so we all have clear heads right now correct? These will be some of the worst things that you ever see or hear about,” said Rahz.
“We know. We understand. We got it,” said Breyrian.
I raised my brow at him. “Impatient huh?”
“Just ready to learn,” he said. “I realized today that I can’t do this much longer.”
“What happened?” I asked concerned.
“Nothing that we can’t talk about later,” he said.
I nodded my head and looked at the pictures that was spread out in front of us. They were gruesome and my stomach once again turned. I picked up one picture of a little girl in a glass cage and my heart broke for her. Life wasn’t supposed to like this for her. She was supposed to be able to enjoy her life and be a kid. But, now she was nothing but a science experiment to the whipipo and that was a messed up thing. I just hoped that soon we could bring all of this to an end soon. None of us deserved this.
“Okay, so all of these melanins that are being experiments on have shown signs of exhibiting their powers. The whipipo are trying to figure out how to tap into all of that,” said Rahz.
“They have been poked and prodded trying to get the powers to arise and exploit them,” said Tamoia.
“They’re even trying to extract the powers out of the melanins and trying to place them into other melanins with hope that they will be able to implant the powers inside of themselves,” said Dezzie.
“But you can’t extract powers from someone can you? I mean that’s just crazy right,” said Ahshay.
“They mapped the powers to a certain part of the brain. It reads that when they get emotional the powers arise. Which I’m assuming is how you guys powers popped up,” said Tamoia. “You brought out powerful emotions in one another.”
“So what are they trying to do exactly? Are they trying to extract it out of the brain directly?” I asked curiously.
“We think so,” said Tamoia. “But I don’t think that it’s possible. I don’t think the powers come directly from the brain and they’ll never be able to extract the power from the brain no matter how hard they try.”
“So where do you think that the powers come from?” asked Breyrian.
“The heart,” I said. “The powers come from the heart right?”
Tamoia looked at me in disbelief. “How did you figure it out?”
“When people become emotional it’s because of feelings. People associate feeling with the heart, hence heart attacks, panic attacks, anxiety attacks and things like that. People don’t get emotional by just their minds. Most likely you become rational when you try to think things through or try to make yourself rational. People become emotional with emotions like I said. And everything with emotion comes from the heart,” I said.
“So how long do you think before the whipipo figure that out?” asked Dezzie.
“Probably not anytime soon,” said Tamoia. “Whipipo are rational. So they’re going to overthink the situation way too much to get close before we get to where we need to get.”
“So what powers do these melanins have?” asked Breyrian.
“They all have the same powers that presented in you guys. Except the whipipo exploit them so they’re a lot stronger,” said Tamoia as she flipped through the pages.
“So kind of like my power when I got upset?” I asked.
“What do you mean?” asked Ahshay. “Why were you upset?”
I looked over at Tamoia and then back at my sister. I knew that I had said too much and had to find a way to cover it. “Nothing serious. Was just upset that we couldn’t do more and my power flared up. The electricity spread all the way up my arm and I ended up shooting a lightning bolt at the ground.”
Tyleah, Ahshay, Breyrian, and Dizzie all looked at me in disbelief as Clayahr just smiled at me.
“So should we start calling you lightning man?” asked Clayahr as he chuckled.
I laughed. “No, I don’t think that
I need a nick name just yet.”
“So how did it feel?” asked Dezzie. “I mean you and I have the same power amd I’m curious to know how it feels to have all that power running through you at one time.”
“I mean it was just a warm tingly feeling. It didn’t hurt or anything but it was weird to see my whole arm glowing. But, I think that once I learn how to control it that it will be a handy power to have against the whipipo,” I said.
“Is there anything in the papers that details how the power grew and developed?” asked Dezzie.
Tamoia flipped through some papers. “No, not a lot. It is more of recent discovered power and they’re still trying to figure it out. But hopefully we can figure it out over the next few days now that we know what controls them and we also can study the files in a lot more detail. And all of us will begin to gather supplies over the next few days just to make sure that we’re really prepared for this journey. Any questions?”
“No,” I said.
“I do,” said Ahshay. “Did we ever find a boat or something to travel with?”
“We have that covered,” said Clayahr. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Okay, so did you all find any supplies today?” asked Tamoia.
“Yeah, we found some water and first aid kits,” said Dizzie. “Pretty soon we will be ready to go.”
“Alright, well everybody take some time to yourselves and regroup and in about an hour we’ll be headed back underground. The same schedule from last night will apply tonight,” said Tamoia.
Everyone nodded their heads and broke off into their own little groups. I motioned for Breyrian to follow me a short distance away so that Ahshay wouldn’t overhear our conversation.
“So how was the day and why do you seem so down?” I asked Brey as we both sat on the ground.
“It’s nothing,” he sighed as he stared intently at a rock on the ground.
“Come on, I know you better than that. What’s wrong?”
“Well, I’m just a little jealous that I don’t have a power yet. I feel kind of useless compared to the rest of you guys.”
“But not all of us have powers yet. You could still get yours.”
“Yeah, I know but then y’all are off finding things and exploring whipipo headquarters and I’m just gathering supplies. I just. I don’t know.”
“Well we need supplies.”
He shot me a death look and I held up my hands in mock surrender. “I’m just saying Breyrian, we do need supplies. We can’t survive without them so what you’re doing is important to.”
He sighed. “I guess you’re right. But I still feel out of place. I’ll work through it though. So what’s wrong with you? Like your sister I know when something is bothering you.”
I took a deep breath and checked to make sure that Ahshay was still out of ear shot. “My dad is alive.”
His eyes widened in disbelief. “What! How do you know? Did you see him?”
“Yes, he was walking through the hallway while we were in the file room. And I can tell you that they broke him. He’s nothing like the man he was when he left. They broke him down bad. He’s a shell of the man that he once was.”
“Oh man. I can’t believe that. Your dad was one of the strongest men I knew. Are you sure that it was him?”
“I would know my dad anywhere Brey. It was him.”
We both sat in silence. The magnitude of what I just said weighed heavily on the both of us. After Brey’s parents got captured my dad was a father figure to him and took him up under his wing. Even before ‘the end’ came he was always such a strong father figure to him that I knew that this also had to be hard for him to hear.
“Do you think that my parents are alive?” he asked with a pained look in his eyes.
“I don’t know. But if they are, it’s a possibility that they turned out just like my dad.”
“So, I’m going to ask you a hard question and I want you to answer it for me.”
“Okay, what is it?” I asked him even though I suspected what the question was.
“If we had to go up against your dad would you be able to take him down?”
“Of course. I saw him and how he is and I know the man that he once was is no longer in there. He’s gone. And I would not hesitate to take him down if it meant saving all of us,” I said with more confidence than I actually felt. In all honesty, in my heart I was hoping that it wasn’t going to come down to that because even though I spoke the words I had a feeling that I wouldn’t be able to go through with what I said.
“You answered that quickly.”
“Because I thought about it the whole way here. But I would hope that it wouldn’t come down to that. I don’t ever want to see him like that again. Seeing that once already scarred me a little bit. I never thought that I would see him that type of situation.”
“Would you speak with him? Have one last conversation?”
I thought about it for a moment. “No I wouldn’t. I don’t think that he would remember me or us and it would place us in imminent danger. If he was who he was before all of this then sure, but now. No.”
“So you think that it would cause more harm than good?”
I nodded my head.
“So what are you going to do about Ahshay? Are you going to tell her? I don’t think that she’d be able to handle that type of news. She’d want to see him and try to save him. You know how close they were. She was the ultimate daddy’s girl.”
I sighed. “I know. That’s why I’m trying to figure out exactly what to do. I want to tell her. I really do. But, I know that this would destroy her. And she would risk her safety and ours to save him.”
“Not to mention kill you for wanting to kill him.”
“You’re right about that. She really would try to harm me. She loves me. But, that’s our dad.”
“I still don’t know what I would do if I were to see my parents. I don’t know what reaction I would give out if it were to happen.”
“If they’re anything like my dad then you know you would have to do what you have to do.”
“I guess but I’ll be in too much shock to do much of anything.”
“It’s not something I want to relive personally. It killed me to see im like that and as I said if I never see him again. I’ll be okay with that.”
“Okay with not seeing who again?” asked Ahshay as she sat next to me.
“Why are you always minding my business?” I asked as I rolled my eyes at her. I hated whenever she just butted into conversations. But, even if I said something about it I knew that she would still do it because she knew that it aggravated me.
She smirked. “You know you’ve been really snappy today. What happened out there besides you guys running into Taqmaine? And I know it must be serious because you won’t even look at me in my face.”
I sighed. She was right but I didn’t really want to look at her and giveaway what I’m hiding from her. “Ahshay, just let it go.”
“No, I want to know. We don’t want to start keeping secrets from each other, especially when we’ve never kept secrets from each other before.”
“Look Ahshay, I don’t tell you everything. And this is something that you really don’t need to know.”
“Tell me Ty.”
“No Ahshay, now leave it alone! You don’t need to know so just drop it!” I screamed at her before I got up and stormed off. I didn’t want to catch an attitude with her but I needed her to back off of me. She had to realize that I had her best interest at heart and respect that or we would never get anywhere. I sat down a short distance from where Rahz and Dezzie were sitting. Dezzie gave me a weak smile and came over to sit beside me.
“I know it must be tough to argue with your sister. When Dizzie and I argue it’s usually over nothing as big as what you’re keeping from your sister. You sure you just don’t want to trust her and tell her? She might surprise you.”
I shook me head. “No, she’s not going to surprise me. I know how she’s going
to react. I’m not going to tell her just yet.”
“I’m just saying, the secret may tear you apart before you finally get the chance to tell her. I know you love your sister and I see the bond that you two have and you don’t want that to be broken. So just tell her and trust her. Maybe she will understand,” she said as she gently squeezed my arm and looked over my shoulder.
I looked back and saw Ahshay standing there. I took a deep breath and patted the ground beside me. “Sit, we need to talk.
Chapter 12
Ahshay took a seat beside me and I could see the worry all over her face.
“Look, I understand that whatever it is you’re keeping from me is for my own good. I understand that. But, I just don’t like to see you worried like this. We are all we got Ty. And I don’t know, I guess I was just being hard headed.”
What she said almost made me reconsider telling her but I knew that it wouldn’t be right. And if I was her I would be mad at me for not saying anything. “Look, I didn’t want to tell you what was going on because I was still processing it myself but I’m going to go ahead and tell you anyway.”
“Okay, what is it?” she asked a little worried.
“It has to do with dad.”
Her face paled and she stared at me with tears in her eyes. “Wh-wh what about dad? Did you find out something else about him?”
“Um, Shay, um, I guess I’ll just come right and say it. Dad is alive,” I said slowly.
She stared at me wide-eyed and in disbelief. “H-h how? After all this time he’s still alive? Why didn’t you bring him back with you? Didn’t he want to be with us? I mean does he even remember us? What was he like?”
“Whoa Shay, slow down. I can’t answer anything if you don’t stop talking.”
She nodded her head.
“I saw dad, but he didn’t see me. And he’s not the man that he once was before he got captured.”
“How do you know if you didn’t talk to him?” she asked suspiciously.
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