by Jakob Farrar
“I know!” exclaimed Mark as he leapt forward. He hit a soldier, who went down. However, the soldier behind him let off a few bullets, forcing Mark to leave his main target alone for now. He ran at the soldier with the gun, yanking the weapon out of his hands and throwing it aside. Mark went to work, punching and smacking at pressure points that he didn’t even know had existed before this encounter. A hand grabbed his shoulder. Mark grabbed the wrist and flung it over him, making the soldier that had grabbed him collide with the one he had been fighting. Mark kicked behind him, pushing a soldier out of the helicopter, which was several hundred feet in the air now, screaming.
Byron wasn’t having any difficulty at all with his enemies. He saw their movements before they made them and was able to parry and counterattack more times than he could count. Soon, the helicopter was empty of all but one soldier, who dove aside from Byron’s attacks, whipping out his pistol, which he used to shoot in a seemingly random direction towards the front of the ship. Byron kicked the man, sending him flying. Byron stood up straight, heading towards where Phoebe and Stephen were being held up to the wall by metal bars, unconscious. The helicopter rocked, telling Byron what the soldier had been shooting at. He had shot the pilot in the neck so that the copter would crash. “Hurry!” he shouted to Mark, although he knew Mark didn’t need any encouragement. Mark ripped the restraints off of Stephen and Phoebe. Byron picked up two backpacks and threw one to Mark. “What’s this?” he shouted over the wind.
“A parachute!” Byron said, “Hurry, put it on and grab Phoebe. I’ll get Stephen. We’ll have to jump!”
Mark nodded, gently bringing Phoebe away from the wall. Stephen wasn’t lucky enough to experience the same fate; the helicopter rocked and Stephen fell onto the cabin floor face first. Byron ran over as fast as he could and picked him up.
“Don’t open your parachute until about 500 feet!” Byron shouted.
“Isn’t that kind of low?”
“Do you want to get sucked up into a helicopter blade?!” Mark looked at him, nodding. Byron knew this wouldn’t end well, but they had no other choice. “I’ll go first!” Byron said. He looked out, at the quickly upcoming ground. He took a deep breath and jumped, suddenly feeling weightless.
It took Mark a little longer to summon enough courage to leap from the cabin. He looked down at Phoebe’s peaceful sleeping face and found motivation to jump. He might survive an explosion, but Phoebe most definitely would not.
When Mark jumped, he was much too close to the ground to open up his parachute, but he did anyways. Immediately, he felt himself being sucked up. He flew straight past the helicopter, dodging the blades. His parachute did not, however. One of the strings that held it together snapped, and, suddenly, Mark was without a parachute. He hovered just above the copter for just a second, then plummeted. The ground approached him quickly. He cocooned himself around Phoebe’s body. Maybe he could save her from the impact. Mark could feel an explosion just below him rock his body, and, somehow, he slowed. He still hit the ground with a crash, but not hard enough to kill them. It was, however, enough to make him go unconscious.
Mark awoke in a grey, dimly lit room. He stood up, wondering where he was. The room he was in was octagonal. Was he just dreaming again? Mark couldn’t tell; the room seemed real enough. A door slid open across from him and in walked three familiar figures. Byron, Stephen, and Gabe.
“Byron,” Mark said, “Where am I?”
“There’s been a slight change in plans,” Byron said, “I was wrong. We won’t be able to flee the country; we’ll always be trapped here. So we’re going to fight back. We’re going to destroy the government and take it over and remake this Nation for good. We want you to join us, but there’s something you must do.” Stephen stepped forward and handed Mark a pistol. Another panel in the wall opened up behind Mark. Mark didn’t have to turn around; he already knew what was there.
Tied to a chair, her nose bleeding and face bruised, a gag in her mouth, was Phoebe. She looked up at Mark, eyes pleading.
“She refused to join us,” Byron continued, “She believed we could reason with the government. We’ve already determined that this is impossible. If you want to join us, if you want to live, you will kill this traitor.”
Mark looked into Phoebe’s eyes. She was helpless, captive. Mark wouldn’t kill someone like that; especially not someone he loved.
“No,” Mark said steadily.
Byron sighed in disappointment, “I was afraid this was going to happen. Gabriel.”
Gabe stepped forward, his giant hand scraping against the wall, the concrete material running up his arm. Mark looked back at Byron. Mark brought the pistol up, putting the barrel against his head. Mark felt the cool metal against the skin of his forehead. “What are you doing?” Byron said.
“Dreaming,” Mark said.
Mark pulled the trigger.
Chapter Eleven
Hydrokinesis
Mark woke up, his head throbbing. “He’s awake!” he heard the voice of Ashley yelling, although dull as if from a distance. He sat up, looking around him. Littered across the ground was the wreckage of the helicopter crash, some of it still burning. He had survived. That was amazing. Even without the parachute, and holding Phoebe-
Phoebe. Where was she?
“Where is she?” Mark shouted, his own voice ringing in his ears. “Where’s Phoebe?”
“She’s fine,” he heard Byron say. “She’s a little shaken up but she’ll be able to perform the tasks ahead of her today.”
“How did I survive?” Mark’s hearing was getting better. He saw Byron walking towards him as he slowly stood up.
“I’m not sure,” Byron said, “I think you might have manipulated the fire by some sort of instinct of yours. Used it as a fan to slow your descent. You had a rough landing, though, so it’s a good thing you won’t be coming with us today.”
However, his frustration of the lack of adventure could not outweigh the puzzlement he felt over the dream he had imagined while he was unconscious. He had had a dream every time he went to sleep, each stranger than the last, ever since he had dreamed of Byron when he was still in Sector Two.
It wasn’t time for thinking, though; the group had begun to move, heading to Sector Six, the smell of lake water in the air.
Willard Poore had never been so nervous. The Unnatural were coming to him, now, trying to rescue Kaytlen Williams, the Unnatural he has captured. Willard was the only governor who had managed to successfully subdue one of the Unnatural. They had moved quickly to imprison her, hacking into the Secret Service’s tracking technology to discover which of their citizens the deformity was. Willard smirked at the memory. He would have thought that only a highly experienced scientist from Sector Eight would have been able to accomplish such a feat, but his team had done so flawlessly, going in and out in a matter of minutes, leaving no trace of their having been there. From there Willard had sent a team of soldiers out to arrest Kaytlen before she let her power loose. Now she was in a cell several stories underground a command center that had up-to date, triple-layered defense technology from only the finest in the art.
Even with all of these layers of security, however, Willard still felt nervous.
There were three ways this could end, he had concluded, and only one of them was good.
One: The Unnatural would invade his base and level it, killing him, and rescuing Kaytlen.
Two: The Unnatural would invade, yet spare him, rescuing Kaytlen. This would humiliate Willard, and he would be executed by the other governors for his failure.
Three: The Unnatural would invade and be caught in the process, making Willard a hero.
Willard, publicly, expected the third, but, inwardly, wondered, even assured himself, that he would fail. But Willard was no coward. He would face the Unnatural, and, if he had to, die to stop their path of destruction.
“Sector Six,” Byron said as they neared the border. “Production of all things water. This is where
we’ll need to split up.”
“Alright,” Mark said begrudgingly. “Let’s go, Stephen.” Stephen nodded, grabbed ahold of Mark’s arm, and the two vanished.
“You know where the next person is, right?” Phoebe asked as they began walking into the Sector.
“Yes,” Byron answered, “And I don’t like it. She’s being held captive beneath the Control Center.”
“So why are we leaving people behind? Even with his injury Stephen could still help us, right?”
“Possibly, but he is a liability at this point and that is a risk I am not willing to take. Besides, the plan I have in mind is going to require that we have a small amount of people going in.”
“Why didn’t you tell Mark that? He seemed pretty upset about having to stay behind.”
“Mark is more thick-skulled than you think, Phoebe. If I had told him, he would have wanted to come even more.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s like me,” Byron said, “He doesn’t want to see us hurt.”
“I’m sorry,” Stephen said as they walked, “It’s my fault we had to leave them.”
Mark looked over at the small guy. Mark did, secretly, accuse Stephen of his having to leave, but, now, he saw that he was genuinely regretful about the situation.
“It’s fine,” Mark said, “You did what was right to get hurt.”
“What?”
“I’m sorry,” Mark said, “I was never good with words. What I meant was that you were willing to sacrifice yourself to make sure that Phoebe was able to be safe. And you shouldn’t be sorry about that. In fact, you should be shown appreciation. So, thank you.”
Stephen looked up at Mark.
“Thanks,” he said.
Mark nodded. “Now,” he said, “We need to get around Six before the others. Do you think you could teleport us over there right now?”
“I won’t be able to get us there right away, but I can teleport a while at a time,” Stephen said, “But I should probably wait for a little bit to recharge. This last one was a bit far.”
After a pause, Mark asked, “Are you ever worried about Grace?”
“Constantly,” Stephen said, “All the time. Why?”
“I’m just-” Mark stopped for a moment. “I’m worried about Phoebe.”
“Wait, are you a thing?”
“No,” Mark said quickly. “Not at all.”
“But you wish you were, right?”
“Right. I at least feel like I should be closer to her.”
“I get it.”
“What do you mean?”
“I used to think that my getting closer to Grace would help her…issues. And overall I think I might have. But a lot of times I doubt that. I don’t see as much improvement because of myself as I do failure on my part. Grace does her best to convince me otherwise, but I still have doubts.”
“Do you think she’s going to be alright while you’re out here with us?”
“I think she’ll be fine as long as I’m around to come back for her.”
“Do you have doubts about that too?”
“I know this isn’t safe. And after getting stabbed I don’t exactly feel secure doing this. I’ll go through with it though, so long as I get to go back for her. I mean, it’s either come out here and look for a way to be free or go hide in a basement for the rest of my life. So I’ll take my chances out here.”
“I feel like they’re getting closer and closer every minute. After what happened outside Sector Five, and last night, and now they’ve apparently caught one of us. I could see why you wouldn’t feel safe out here.”
“I’m sure we’ll make it though,” Stephen said, “Now come on. I think I’m ready for another jump.”
“We’re going to need two soldier uniforms,” Byron said to Gabe, Phoebe, and Ashley as they approached the governor’s home.
“We can sneak around back and get some,” Phoebe said.
“Correct. There will be some security guards there, and it will be hidden enough that we should not have any witnesses. However, there are security cameras, so we’ll have to distract them so that they’ll go out of sight.”
“But why only two?” said Gabe, “There are three of us.”
“Because, my friend, we will be leading you down into a cell.”
“What?”
“You will be the one to get us in. We’ll pretend that you are our prisoner, and we’ll lead you down to where Kaytlen is. We get her out, then we fight our way out ourselves.”
“I think I’ve seen this movie before,” commented Phoebe jokingly.
“Let’s go,” said Byron.
They walked behind a couple of houses that were far enough from the governor’s home to not raise much suspicion. Surprisingly, very few people were out. Apparently everyone worked at sea. They soon reached a point where they could see, but not be seen, behind the governor’s house.
“Go, Gabe” said Byron, “Bring two of them over here.”
Gabe nodded and took a cautious step forwards. He wasn’t noticed at first, but, as he advanced further, the guards took notice of him. Suddenly, there were more than just two. Gabe ran back to their hiding place, several security guards on his tail. Byron and Phoebe stood, Phoebe lifting all of their weapons out of their holsters and smacking them against their heads. Several crumpled to the ground, and all that didn’t were either smacked again or dismantled by Byron.
“That was easy enough,” he said. He quickly worked on taking the outer armor off of a soldier about Phoebe’s height. He tossed the armor to her. “Ashley, you know what to do.” She nodded and began to morph into a soldier.
Byron looked down at a belt one of the soldiers had been wearing, taking a pair of handcuffs out. “Don’t worry, Gabe,” Byron said, putting them on the man’s wrists, “Once we get to a fighting point, absorb the handcuffs, break them off, and join them.”
Phoebe stumbled around, not quite used to the heavy feel or the tinted facemask of the armor. She walked over to Byron. “You ready?” she said.
Byron sighed. “This is going to be fun,” he said sarcastically. “Now, Ashley, I’m going to get into the heads of one of the soldiers inside. I’ll get the layout of the Control Center and relay it back to you. It’s your job to get inside, find Kaytlen, and get her out.”
“No problem,” Ashley said, stepping next to Gabe. Phoebe stepped to the other side of him. “I think I’ve seen this movie before,” Phoebe said jokingly.
Ashley approached the back door to the Control Center cautiously. She had stripped the gun off one of the soldiers, but the armor she wore as her outer skin, while it may have looked solid, was still thin cloth. Going into the Control Center she would have to be extremely careful.
“We found this guy outside,” she said to the guard inside the door. “We’re taking him down to where the other one is being held.”
“Understood. Go ahead,” the guard replied. Ashley quietly let out the deep breath she had been holding and walked onward. She could feel Byron in her mind, instructing her on where to go. She felt a sense of comfort with him there; at least she wouldn’t get lost or stranded.
They walked through two doors that led to stairs that went down. Occasionally, they walked into a long hallway that was lined with security guards standing at attention, ready to leap into action at a moment’s notice. The sight worried Ashley; they would most likely have to fight their way out. If Kaytlen didn’t have a great offensive power, like Ashley, and wasn’t trained in self-defense techniques, they would have a hard time getting away.
As Ashley observed their route from inside his disguise, she noticed several things: security cameras lining the walls, air-locking doors, panels in the ceiling that could slide back, probably holding turrets inside them. They would have a difficult time getting out.
Soon the air started getting cooler, thinner. Ashley couldn’t tell how far down they’d gone, but she hoped that they were close. And she was right. Soon they reached the bottom of a fligh
t of stairs and walked into the room. In front of them were five glass cages suspended in the air. In one of them lay a young girl, her body curled up in a corner, her eyes, dark circles surrounding them, glaring out at the metal room. Her skin was s dark chocolate color, and her hair was the same color, as were her fear-filled eyes. She wore a black tank top and jeans. She looked up in surprise as they entered the room. Her expression changed from fear to confusion as she looked anxiously around the room. Byron must have been talking to her.
Ashley walked over to a desk with lights blinking on and off. Three guards sat, talking. “Excuse me,” she said. They all looked up at her. Ashley grabbed one’s head and slammed it down on the desk. The other two stood up and grabbed their rifles, but they were too slow. Ashley kneed one in the stomach and then, when he keeled over, the face, sending him down. The last one had his rifle locked and loaded, ready to blast Ashley down, but a large metal hand reached over and grabbed his gun before he could do so, firing it at the ceiling. Gabe punched the guard in the back and Gabe threw him onto the floor. Ashley morphed back into her preferred form and gazed over the desk, looking for something to set Kaytlen free.