The Ables (37 page)

“Go!” I yelled.

It was a little anticlimactic for me. Since Chad was already invisible, I didn’t get to see him take off running. Heck, I wasn’t sure at first that he’d even gone. “Chad?” I asked, as another fireball smashed into the wall above us. There was no response.

“I hope he makes it okay,” I said aloud.

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Henry said skeptically. I’m sure he’d read my mind enough to have an idea of what I was planning.

“Me too,” I agreed.

We sat there waiting silently for what seemed like fifteen minutes, though I’m sure it was only a few. And suddenly, as though he’d never been gone, Chad appeared before us, beaming and holding a fire extinguisher under his one good arm.

“One gently-used fire extinguisher,” he said politely, like a butler fulfilling his millionaire’s most recent extravagant request.

“Awesome,” I said, unable to hide how impressed I was. I turned to Henry, smiling. “Didn’t I tell you he’d come in handy?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Henry reluctantly agreed, shaking his head.

“Okay, now I’m going to go out there. I want you to go invisible again and dash around behind the store. Cut over into the neighbor’s back yard, and come in around behind this guy, okay? I’ll keep him busy long enough for you to get into position.”

“Okay,” Chad nodded, understanding my words but still sounding uneasy.

“Stay invisible. You’re everything in this thing. When you see the distraction I create, Chad … you’re going to have to get in there and grab that woman and get her to safety while he’s not paying attention.”

“Oh God,” Chad said, feeling a bit more nervous now that he knew what he’d have to do.

“You can do this, Chad. He’s not going to have that good a grip on her—remember: they’re just acting. This is all just pretend. Some part of them probably even wants us to save that woman and succeed, okay? I don’t care how you get her away from him. Tackle him, maybe. Heck, tackle her if you have to, but as soon as she is free of his grasp, you turn both you and her invisible again, and get the heck out of there. Got it?”

“You make it sound easy,” Chad said. He’d lost some of the confidence that he’d had as a bully and as a person with two good arms.

“Wait until you see what
I
have to do,” I responded.

Chad thought of one more question. “What’s the distraction?”

“Believe me, you’ll know it when you see it,” I responded, still not 100 percent sure I could actually do what I had planned.

“What about me?” It was Henry.

“You?” I asked, smiling. “Why, you get to do exactly what you want to do, good sir. Stay here behind this dumpster, and make sure you keep your eyes glued to that screen so I can see what I’m doing.”

“Phillip, I commend you on having such a smart plan,” he said, smiling. “I will be happy to stay here in relative safety while the two of you risk your necks.”

“Thanks a lot,” Chad said sarcastically.

“Okay, boys. This is it. Wish me luck,” I said.

“Good luck,” they both said.

“Go, Chad. Go
now
!” He disappeared, and this time I heard his footsteps tear off around the corner of the building. And with that, I turned and once again reached my glasses around the edge of the dumpster.

From that angle, I could see about six or seven cars that were mostly between our position and the position of the bad guy. There were many more off to the right, but they wouldn’t come in handy.

Of the six cars, three were parked at the angle that I needed—one that allowed me a direct sight line to their gas tanks. I focused in on the first one, a giant pick-up truck. Concentrating the way my father had taught me, I reached out my hand and visualized the gas tank door popping open. I was still completely behind the dumpster, using Bentley’s camera as a way to “see” the vehicles well enough to use my powers.

One by one, I opened all three gas tank doors and mentally unscrewed the gas caps, dropping them to the blacktop.

I turned my attention back to the pick-up truck, which I’d noticed had a gas can in the bed. I took a deep breath, knowing my plan was out the window if that gas can was empty. Then I reached out my hand again, concentrating on the gas can while also watching it through Henry’s screen-vision. The truck was parked facing away from us, which meant that as long as I was careful, the fireballing attacker wouldn’t see what I was up to.

With little effort, I got the plastic can up into the air, hovering a few inches off the bed of the truck. Gently turning my hand the way one turns a doorknob, I caused the can to tip up toward its front, spilling out a tiny bit of gas. I felt a wave of relief come over me knowing there was gasoline in it.

I knew I had to work quickly, so there wasn’t time for self-congratulation. Using subtle movements, I guided the gas can around the truck bed, spilling out a small trickle of fuel as I went.

“Jeez,” Henry said breathlessly, in shock at actually seeing my plan in action.

Once the truck bed was pretty well covered, I pulled the can back in my direction off the back of the truck and maneuvered it around the cars nearby. Without raising the can above the car roofs, I was able to pretty well coat a wide area with gasoline without our adversary even knowing we were up to anything at all. He just kept smashing fireballs into the wall above us to keep us pinned down.

Then came the hard part … the part where I had to actually go out there and do some things with my powers that I wasn’t even sure were possible.

I turned to Henry. “You think Chad’s in position by now?”

“He better be,” Henry cried, “He’s missing an arm, not a leg.”

Nice
, I thought sarcastically. But Henry was right. It had to have been long enough. Trusting that Chad was ready, I stood to my full height, turned, and strode out into the parking lot to face the villain.

He noticed me right away, and for a moment, time sort of stood still. He just stared at me. It was as though he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Not wanting to jump into battle any faster than necessary, I was willing to return the stare down. I even briefly considered that maybe I could talk my way out of this.

That thought died in seconds as he snapped back to the present by shaking his head and immediately firing three fireballs on a medium arc toward my current position.

I knew what I wanted to do. And I knew that, in theory, it was entirely possible—likely even—that I would be able to do it. But because I’d never done it, I still wasn’t completely sure. I wasn’t even close to sure. And yet, when you’re staring at three softball-sized fireballs hurtling through space at your body, instinct kicks in and pushes fear and doubt off to the side just long enough for you to act.

Without moving, I looked up at the three fireballs, tracking them with Henry’s eyes. I reached out my left arm, hand outstretched, and concentrated on the lead fireball. Suddenly, I “felt” something … it wasn’t a physical touch, and yet, it kind of was. I don’t quite know how to explain it, but it was as though the fireball had locked into my control. And I just knew it, instantly.
I’ve got it!

I flung my arm down toward the ground like a football player spiking the ball after a big touchdown. To my opponent’s horror, the lead fireball raced out of the sky, jerking out of its arc trajectory and plummeting straight down to ground level, where it made contact with the bed of the pickup truck.

Immediately, the truck burst into flames, and half a second later came a sound like a sonic boom as the truck’s gas tank exploded.

I’d initially planned on taking any additional fireballs and sending them straight into the gasoline-soaked parking lot as well, but I ultimately didn’t need to. The explosion of the truck ignited the rest of my trap, and two more cars exploded.

Clearly, my distraction was going to be a lot bigger than I’d intended, and I started to worry about the fire spreading and blowing up more cars. But one thing I knew for certain: there was no way the attacker was worried about what was behind him. His eyes were giant ovals, and his grip on the hostage seemed to loosen as he stared in wonder at the destruction this twelve-year-old kid had just rained down on him. He was dumbfounded, exactly as I’d hoped he’d be.

But after a few seconds, I began to wonder why Chad wasn’t making his move. The villain still held the woman in his clutches, even as he gaped at the destruction.

“Chad … go! Go now!” I said into the microphone that Bentley had added to my camera glasses. Everyone else on the team had earpieces, but mine was attached to the camera. It was a party line, which meant we all heard what was said any time someone spoke into their mic. It was a much better communication system than sending James teleporting around town delivering messages.

There was no response.

“Chad?”

Nothing.

I shouted. “Chad! Chad, you have to go now!!”

But all I heard in response was silence. Either Chad was gripped with fear to the point of turning to stone, or something had happened on his way around the grocery store.

I panicked, just as the villain shook off his amazement and got back into character. He fired six more fireballs in rapid succession over the raging fire, right at the spot where I was standing. This time, they came in on less of an arc and with a lot more velocity.
See, I was right, he
was
taking it easy on us.

I knew I wasn’t accomplished enough with my powers to handle redirecting six of those things, so I did the next best thing I could think of: I held up my fire extinguisher and started spraying. There was far too much fire coming from my impromptu car bonfire for me to spot the individual fireballs flying toward me. So I mostly just sprayed in front of my face, strafing the nozzle left and right to add coverage.

And then I felt … nothing. I saw nothing.

I had expected the fireballs to be doused, but I thought they’d still hurl in and clobber me in the head like stones. I didn’t know anything about how fireballs worked, but I imagined them having a solid center mass surrounded by flame. Instead, despite the massive force with which they crashed into their targets, it turns out there’s nothing but fire inside those things. So the ones doused by my extinguisher merely dissipated into thin air.

I grinned and lifted my head up to look at the bad guy. He seemed rather annoyed, so much so that he instantly sent off another round of ammunition, this time ten fireballs in one volley.

It was clear that the extinguisher, while effective, would not last long enough for me to keep this up.

I tried one last time. “Chad?! Can you hear me?”

“Where the hell are you, Chad?” It was Henry, sounding just as scared as I was, despite being in the relative safety of his secured position.

And that’s when a new idea hit me.

“Bentley, can you hear me? Come in, Bentley.”

“Yeah, Phillip, we can all hear you. Are you okay? What’s going on with Chad?”

“I don’t know. But I need James. I need James right now!” I figured with Chad out of commission, James could simply teleport in and grab the hostage lady. There was an urgency to my voice, and Bentley could tell I wasn’t kidding around. But that didn’t mean he could give me the answer I wanted.

“Um … that’s going to be a little tough, Phillip.”

“What? Why?!”

“Well, James sort of got captured.”

“How in the—” I realized I didn’t have time for follow-up questions. “Crap!” I said in frustration.

“What now, genius?” Henry shouted, his voice dripping with his signature sarcasm and a touch of fear.

The fireballs reached the peak of their orbit and started back down toward my position. I lifted the extinguisher again, firing constantly for at least seven or eight seconds. At that point, it was empty, and the remnants of white goop spat out of the nozzle with a hiss. I’d survived the second volley, reducing the ten fireballs to vapor, but I was out of my own ammunition and a sitting duck for the next round.

“It’s going to have to be Donnie, then,” I said to Bentley over the radio, realizing that the big guy was indeed my only remaining option.

Bentley sounded confused, like he’d misheard my request. “Donnie?”

“Yeah, he’s our only chance now.”

“Sure, Phillip,” he said cautiously. “He’s listening. Go ahead.”

“Donnie, can you hear me? I need your help, buddy. I need you to use your power—remember when we talked about that? I need you to use your power and run really, really fast over here to the grocery store. There’s a man in the street, and he has a woman in his arm he’s holding hostage. I’m in the parking lot of the grocery store, and I’ll keep him distracted so you can swoop in and grab that woman and take her to safety, okay?” Mr. Villain decided to stop playing games and tossed about twenty-five fireballs my way, which sounded like a machine gun. “Donnie … I need your help, buddy. Go fast—go real fast! Please, buddy, I need you to go now … hurry!”

I paused a moment. “Is he coming?”

“Are you kidding?” Bentley asked. “He took off before you were even done talking.”

I knew that Bentley’s team had been at the car dealership, which was on the opposite side of town. And I had no real idea how quickly Donnie was able to run, so I wasn’t sure how long it would take him to arrive. But if I’d ventured a guess, I would have been wrong.

Almost as soon as Bentley had ended his sentence, I both heard and saw Donnie approaching from several blocks away. Audio-wise, it sounded a bit like a military jet soaring far above. Visually, it was a tiny but powerful blue light that started as a dot five blocks down the street from where I stood. But I still knew it was Donnie. He was coming to my rescue to help me … as I knew he would.

It only took a fraction of a second for Donnie to go from five blocks away to right up on us, that’s how quickly he was moving. I’d never seen anything like it.

But before relief could flood my soul at his arrival, something awful happened.

We know now that it was Chad. Or I should say, Chad’s body. He was apparently lying unconscious in the middle of the road. And he was somehow still invisible, which meant that Donnie couldn’t see him.