“Is it bad? How’s it look?”
“A thin line, just a graze I guess. Doesn’t look like it bled much. You were lucky.”
My first aid results looked pretty dismal when I’d done. I stuck the bandage closed with half a dozen adhesive band-aids. At least it didn’t seem to be bleeding through yet.
I sighed and tried to wipe blood from my hands with the already soiled cloth. “Yeah, well, we both must be lucky since we’re not dead. You should have just run. You wouldn’t have been shot at all. Why didn’t you run?”
Another shrug. No emotion I could read in his face or body language. He stood up and pulled a clean t-shirt from the drawers near the bed. He faced the other way as he put his shirt on in slow, careful movements. Muscles on his back shifted under the skin and I noticed how nice his body was. With the baggy clothes he wore I’d had no idea. I blushed, a mixture of embarrassment for staring and anger at my thoughts. How I’d stared so lustfully at the Empaths’ attractive bodies. Them and their work-out routines, creating those pretty shells.
“You work out?” I asked, sounding cattier than I ever meant to.
Dean finally had the shirt over his shoulders and let it drop loose to cover his chest. He turned back toward me, eyebrow raised. “I
work
. I do some cash in hand jobs for a construction company. Manual labor stuff.”
My thoughts were getting ragged. I was so angry at myself it overflowed onto Dean. I had no one to blame for my part but myself, but if Dean hadn’t been at the bank, maybe guns would never have come out. It would have been in and out. Easy pickings like Emma said. No one would have gotten shot. No one would have died.
“Why were you even at the bank? Were you following me?” I snapped.
Saying it aloud I knew how stupid it was. The bank wasn’t far from the mall and park, but we drove, and went around in circles for ages while I got my wig right. Dean could have walked to the bank in that time, but couldn’t have followed us in Donnie’s jeep.
Dean’s frown said just how dumb I’d been.
“The world doesn’t revolve around you. I don’t know where you’re from, but this is my town, that was my bank. I was in to cash my dad’s welfare check. I try and do it myself if I can so it doesn’t all go on… my dad.”
The shake in my hands had spread up my back, up my throat and my head shook as I tried to apologize, for everything.
Dean talked over me. “Who were those guys? What was the trigger happy fashion model talking about, about blockers and powers? Why was he set on shooting me? And don’t tell me it’s complicated.”
“They’re Empaths, like superheroes, but they weren’t superheroes, I just thought they were superheroes and that I was like them and I went with them but they weren’t, they were the bad guys, and you’re something else as well that does stuff to our super powers…” I kept babbling. I shook and tears streamed down my face, stinging the graze on my cheek.
Dean put his hands on my shoulders and I rattled under his touch. “Okay, crazy lady, you’re really freaking out.”
He steered me to the unmade bed and sat me down. I scooted across to sit with my back against the wall and pulled the covers up around me.
“Put the TV on and just try and relax a bit. You’re in shock. I’ll go make you something hot.”
I squinted at the small, blocky television sitting on the cluttered top of the drawers. “Where’s the remote?”
“Doesn’t have one.”
“Really? Retro much. You can’t even give this kind of box away anymore. I know. My mom’s tried.” I tried to smile a bit and lighten the mood, but my teeth chattered and I must have looked a little insane. I imagined how my hair must look after its release from under the wig and the mental image rounded out nicely.
“It’s a whole two feet away. I’m sure you can manage.”
Dean had made me a hot chocolate by the time I worked out how to get the television on and set the volume low, worried I’d wake his dad.
Dean went to take a hot shower, to shake off his own shock. I told him to keep his bandages dry if he could, but didn’t know if that would help.
I settled into the blankets with the mug of hot goodness balanced on my knees and my shaking became less intense. I still felt teary, confused, and sick to my stomach, and the news report on the TV didn’t help.
The bank robbery was the top story. Fortunately I’d missed most of it and it drew to a close. They showed some security camera footage, but too distant and grainy to worry about. I had been right, though. The old woman that got shot was dead. Was that my fault? If I hadn’t stepped in front of Jake and he hadn’t swung the gun away… no, then Dean would be dead. If Dean wasn’t there, they might never have brought out the guns. But if I hadn’t drawn attention to him they might not have spotted him in the crowd. If I’d refused to go at all, the whole thing might not have escalated. Or Dean would have been dead. I was like a hamster on a wheel, going round and round. I could go crazy thinking like this.
I thought the news report was over, but it continued. Another scene I recognized, the warehouse fire. Warehouse fire and theft, apparently. While the one building burned, valuable goods had been taken from others nearby. There was evidence of arson. The news reporter said police felt confident linking this event with the bank robbery and other crimes in the area over the last month. The pattern also matched crimes from a number of cities previously. They used the term ‘terrorist cell’ and I pulled the blankets up closer around my face.
I hadn’t even questioned Donnie and Jamie loading the car at the fire, or the extra luggage when we flew back from my home town. They were looters, but worse, even setting up disasters to take advantage of the emotions, making bad stuff happen on purpose. Not once had I seen them do anything heroic. I just assumed they did and they let me believe. Even Jake. I doubted whether he would have even saved me if I wasn’t one of
them
. He said he saw some of the fight before he helped. How long did he wait and watch until he decided to help, to make sure I was one of them, just because he wanted another ‘path on his team?
I could hear the shower still running through the thin wall between Dean’s room and the bathroom. Dean got shot.
I
got shot. Someone died. It was a mess and it didn’t even faze Jake. Just what else had he done in the past?
I had to stop them. The only way Dean and any other victims of these villains could be safe was to shut the team down. Permanently. Block off their powers for good.
Jake said Dean could do that. How, I had no idea. Dean probably wouldn’t know either. He might not even want to help. I finished the hot chocolate and put the mug on the drawers next to the TV. My eyelids were leaden and sound of the running water lulled me.
But Dean could learn how to shut down Empaths. He could practice on me. I would give up my powers. I’d give up the whole super hero fantasy if it meant everyone would be safe again.
***
I stared at the screen of my phone. I’d been staring for half an hour since I woke up, according to the clock. I’d tapped in my home number but couldn’t hit Call.
Dean slept on the beanbag. I’d fallen asleep in his bed before he got out of the shower. He curled on one side, holding the bandage on his arm with the other hand. It didn’t look comfortable. I noticed no coldness from him while he slept, but couldn’t read any emotions on him. That could just be because he was asleep.
I sighed and looked at my phone again. I should call my parents, but at this point what could I say?
Sorry for leaving, I’ll be back as soon as I take down a bunch of super-powered criminals.
Yeah, that wouldn’t freak them out at all.
The beans in the beanbag rustled and hissed like a snake. Dean shifted and opened his eyes. I gave him a shy smile in return. He probably felt more awkward with me here in his bed than I felt. I could only make guesses though, as the coldness crept into me again.
I put the phone down on the top of the drawers.
“Morning. You calling someone?” he asked.
“I was going to call my parents.” I took a deep breath. Time to sell Dean on my plan. “But I want to finish all of this first.”
I started again, trying to explain the Empath powers, who Jake and the team were, and what Jake said about Dean being a blocker.
Dean still looked skeptical.
“I know you think I was babbling like a madman last night, but it’s real, the powers, the whole thing.”
“Then show me.”
“I
can’t
. You’re a blocker remember? When you’re around, you stop my powers working. At least unless you’re surprised by something and let go a bit.”
“I’m not doing anything on purpose.”
“I know. But I need you to believe me. I need your help. Let’s go outside and I’ll see what sort of range the blocking has. Maybe I can demonstrate from a distance. I’ll still need some strong emotion to tap, though. Anger emotions are easiest.”
“Sure, okay. But you probably shouldn’t go out looking like that.”
Dean dropped his gaze to my chest and I blushed. Then I looked down too and saw the bloodstains across the front of my shirt. Dean dug out what he assured me was his smallest t-shirt and I went into the bathroom to change and clean up.
I tried to tuck the shirt in, tie it to the side, do anything to make it not look like I wore a tent.
Dean paused and looked me over before we left the trailer. “Looks good on you.”
He said it in the same matter-of-fact way he’d complimented my smile before. I just shook my head and tried to cool my face. I never understood why guys liked girls wearing their shirts. Wearing a guy’s t-shirt felt like the most unflattering fashion ever.
It wasn’t too early, but no one else seemed to be out and about in the trailer park. Finding some anger to tap proved easy. Just a few trailers down the sounds of a domestic came clearly though thin walls. I stood outside, and Dean backed away until I felt the cold leave me and gave him a thumbs up.
I let the heat of emotion radiate into me and my muscles burned with strength. A ‘Caution Children’ sign across the laneway became my target for a demonstration.
I checked Dean was still watching, grabbed the pole with both hands and put my foot against the middle. I pulled with my hands and pushed with my foot, and the solid metal pole bent dramatically.
It felt good to be so effective with my powers and I couldn’t resist a smug smirk when I saw Dean’s jaw drop in the distance. I probably looked the same when Jake demonstrated his powers by smashing that bench. Ugh. Way to break a mood. I didn’t even care then how much work someone must have put into the careful mosaic artwork on that bench. Neither did Jake. He just destroyed it to make a point.
I strained to straighten the pole back up, which proved harder than bending it in the first place.
A red flash in the corner of my eye made me look down the long laneway through the trailer park toward the road that passed the other end. Jake’s Maserati cruised by at a speed designed for scoping.
I dashed back to Dean as fast as I could until my powers waned in his presence again. I still had just enough momentum left when I reached him to drag him out of the middle of the lane and into the cover of the nearest trailer.
“Okay, I believe you!”
“No, it’s them, the car down there.”
The Maserati continued on, and we snuck back to the sanctuary of Dean’s room.
The minor effort of our excursion left Dean looking paler than normal. Some blood showed through his bandage, and I worried if it was healing.
He took a seat on his bed and I paced while I presented my plan to block Jake and the team’s powers for good. As I thought, Dean had no idea how to even begin.
‘That’s why I want you to practice on me. You can learn how to do it by locking away my powers.”
He didn’t respond. He just stared with an expression I couldn’t read.
“Look, I know it’s a lot to ask making you learn how to do this and take those guys on, but you saw how dead set Jake was to get rid of you. It’s the only thing I can think of to keep you safe. Without, you know, turning to assassination or something. We can’t even call the cops on them, not while they still have their powers.”
Dean nodded. “I understand. I can try, but it still feels kind of crazy. I don’t even know where to start.”
“Me neither. We just experiment I guess.” I slumped down onto the beanbag. “I only really found out about my own powers last week. I know less about yours. When I use my powers, it feels like sun warming my skin, spreading heat through me. When you’re around I just feel cold.”
Dean made a face. Normally I would know exactly what that meant, but without my powers as far as I knew the emotion could be anything from anger to just-passed-gas.
“I just mean, if energy is warm, it’s like a cold lack of energy. Can you, I don’t know, try and project more coldness?”
It felt stupid even as the words came out of my mouth, but Dean tried anyway. I could see him concentrating, but nothing changed. We gave up and had toast for lunch.
Dean’s dad wasn’t around and we sat in the lounge room. It smelled of stale alcohol.
“Why are we even like this? How do these powers work? If I understand them more we might get further,” Dean said with his mouth full.