Secret Powers
Chapter 11

Let’s just cut right to the chase. I may have added a bit too much supernatural to this story. I gave them even weirder powers. I didn’t know what to do with that chapter, so I just did the first thing that came to mind. Now, I will never do that again. Even so, I published it, so I have to keep going with the storyline. I think that I will start having this story move faster towards the end. I promise there won’t be as much character vs. self anymore. I am working with what I have published now.

I want to get some more readers, so tell people about this! Add to your library! Comment! Thank you to anyone who has been reading this.

Also, just to let you know, this chapter will be very long and very detailed. No time skips in this one! My sister dared me to try it. I know this was a long A/N, so I am stopping it here. Happy reading!

– your author

P.S. I may or may not have a slight case of writers block, so don’t judge if this chapter sucks. I was just trying to publish SOMETHING.

“Let me get this straight. You can see the future, and YOU can read minds?!” Lucas exclaimed, pointing to me and then Jax.

“We think so,” I answered.

“No! There is no way that my friends are THAT cool! You used to be losers!” Cole said.

“Excuse me?! Losers?” I yelled, flashing my eyes on purpose.

I saw fear in Cole’s face. Good. They still though that I wasn’t in control of it, so it was nice to scare him. He deserved it. I was never a loser! How dare he!

“Well, I mean, you were still getting kinda pushed around by the popular kids. I thought that we were your only friends, and I was right,” he mumbled.

I started breaking down laughing, “You should have seen your faces! Priceless!”

I think I heard them all sigh in relief. Had I really scared them THAT much? Guess I had. I didn’t know I could terrify people that much. It might come in handy one day. I’ll just store that in the back of my brain for future use, I guess.

“Can we get back to the fact that my best friend can see the future?” Caitlin asked.

“Yes, of course. I can sorta see the future. I saw glimpses of things that I would never be able to dream up,” I said.

“You mean your boss experimenting on you?” Lux asked, “Why would he even do that? According to the news, he is a billionaire philanthropist.”

That was true. Why would he torture Jax and I? It seems like every minute, I develop more and more questions and answers.

“I don’t know, but we need to figure out if this is just Khione messing with her or if it is really a premonition about Blair and I being experimented on. For now, we need get to class, though,” Jax answered.

Oh, yeah. We were still at school. At this rate, I’m gonna have to repeat the entire junior year of high school!

I looked up at the clock on the wall. Five minutes until the final bell rang. We had been hanging out in a the gym on the bleachers, where we could be alone. My friends and I had been so wrapped up in our own world that we didn’t realize that the warning bell had wrung.

We started heading to homeroom. Caitlin and Lucas’ room was before the rest of ours’, so we said our goodbyes there. They said they would try to sneak out and meet up with us in Mr. Barber’s room.

Just our luck, the final bell rang as soon as we got into the doorway. Usually, Mr. Barber doesn’t care when you show up, but I guess today he decided to act like an actual teacher.

“Late!” he exclaimed as we started walking to our seats.

“We were inside!” Lucy defended.

“I decided who’s late and who isn’t, and I say you were late,” he told us.

“Come on! Please! I can’t afford more tardies!” I pleaded.

“No excuses,” he said, “You were late. Now go to your seats.”

I sighed. I had already missed so many days of school because of my issues, and now I had to deal with tardies on my report card? I was seriously starting to consider homeschooling.

“What a great way to start off the day!” Lux said sarcastically.

“Whatever, he’s already asleep. Let’s just talk about the bigger problem,” I suggested.

Nobody knew how to start. It wasn’t like you were taught how to discuss what you were going to do if you started seeing the future, which showed you being experimented on.

I saw everybody start looking over at me. Of course they are expecting me to start the conversation. I was the one who knew first-hand what we might be up against!

“Um... how about I tell you what I saw?” I suggested.

“Sure,” Cole said, “Break it all down for us.”

Where would I even start? There is so much one can experience in an eight-hour time slip. I saw so much. For example, I saw my skin getting cut open over and over again to see me heal. I saw me getting forced to use my powers on live subjects. They made me freeze a mouse’s blood! I am pretty sure I started crying in my sleep at one point.

I think Lucy saw me starting to freak out because she started talking.

“Why don’t you tell us about one thing at a time, ok?” she asked, “Start with the easiest thing to recall and go from there.”

Little did she know, I could recall everything perfectly. Every scream as I was shocked by a cattle rod. Every astonished look on Mr. Moore’s face as I did something unexpected. It was sick. He was sick. Inside, I was terrified of what he could do to me. On the outside though, I was a statue. Nothing would get to me. I needed the others to think I was okay. They were used to me being strong, not letting anything under my skin. That was, just, my nature.

“Ok. Well, I remember them cutting me with scalpels over and over again, observing my fast healing. You know, when the ice covers the wound and it heals? That. I remember them starting with small cuts, and then eventually ending with stabbing me multiple times and seeing how fast I would heal,” I said, looking down.

“Wow,” is all Lux said.

I snorted, “Yeah, wow.”

“And you went through this ALL NIGHT?” Jax asked.

“Yeah, but it changed a lot, getting worse. For example, they made me keep freezing a room until I was too tired to continue. When that happened, they shocked me with a cattle rod, getting me to start again,” I answered.

I finally looked up. They all had shocked expressions. Cole’s mouth was even handing open slightly. Lux had a hand over her mouth, a tear pooling in her eye.

“That HAS to be the worst of it, right?” Lucy asked.

“No, it wasn’t,” is all I said.

“What else happened?” Jax asked me, starting to hug me under his arm.

“Well, they started to realize I would just resist them more and more with pain, so they came up with something more...motivating,” I answered.

I didn’t want to tell them. It would break them. Hell! It had already kind of broke me! It was so much worse than having to kill animals or even people!

“What was it?” Cole asked.

“They started to hurt Jax. I had known they were doing to him what they were doing to me, so he was already exhausted. They threatened to shoot him, even doing it in the leg once. He healed with his powers, but it still hurt him. To make them stop, I had to hurt people,” I said, feeling a weight come off my chest now that I had told them.

“We won’t let this happen, ok? This will not ever come true!” Jax stared into my eyes.

The bell chose that time to ring. I practically ran out of the room. Jax and I had History class next. It was just us in there, so I could open up a bit. I am close with the others, but they still aren’t my twin brother. Jax and I may fight sometimes, but, in the end, we are still brother and sister. We’re best friends, since birth.

“You okay?” he whispered to me as we sat down. Our teacher was taking role.

“No,” I answered simply.

“Ok...you want to tell me what you were holding in back there?” he asked.

He knew me too well. It’s like he could read my mind! Wait...

“Did you read my mind!?” I whisper-yelled.

“What? Of course I didn’t! I was too overloaded with everybody else in the entire school’s thoughts!” he answered.

Now that I remembered he could read minds, I decided I needed to keep some of my personal thoughts a secret. I started blocking him out. I was thinking about random things to cover-up what I was actually thinking.

“Come on, it’s me! You can tell me!” he pushed.

“Fine! I felt every single thing I felt in the dream, ok!? I felt everything! I can remember every single thing that happened to me!” I yelled.

I realized what I had done too late. Class had started and people were now giving me weird looks from my outburst. I smiled at them.

“Sorry,” I muttered, starting to write notes.

“This conversation is NOT done,” Jax whispered as he started to follow my example.

“I don’t expect it to be,” I thought, knowing he could hear me.

He rolled his eyes. I smirked. At least I still have the ability to be me on occasion.

Class went on as per usual. Nothing worth noting. Well, I mean, we DID take note of things. History class is pretty much filled with taking notes and having tests and quizzes. Our teacher likes being able to get paid to not teach us anything. We teach ourselves most of the time.

Second period was the same as first: just Jax and I. To say the least, I was completely lost. I have missed WAY too many classes recently. I have no idea what I am doing! Jax understood more than I did, and that’s saying a lot! My new goal is to graduate with the rest of my friends. At this rate, it might not happen! I need to focus more on my studies than, you know, the other stuff. When class was finally over, I was ready to get out of there, but Ms. Blue, our teacher, stopped me.

“Blair! Can we speak real quick?” she asked as I passed her desk.

“Yes? What is it you wanted to talk about?” I said as politely as possible. Better to be nice considering all the lessons I’ve missed.

“You’ve been missing quite a few days, and I’m worried that will affect your grades. Now, I’m willing to offer extra credit work, but I need something in return. I want you to talk to me. You’ve been pretty distracted lately, and I want to know why, ok?” Ms. Blue answered.

This is exactly what I was worried about! I knew that at one point somebody would question my recent absences. It had completely slipped my mind because of all that’s been going on! I wanted to do the extra credit work to get my grades back up, but what was I going to give her in return? It’s not like I can tell her that I was having an internal war with my alter ego while she was teaching polynomial and rational functions to the rest of my class. Fortunately, my brother decided to make an appearance at this moment.

“Ms. Blue! I forgot to let you know while Blair was gone! My family recently discovered that Blair is deathly allergic to cats. Blair was getting over an allergic reaction to them while she was absent. I’m sorry I didn’t let you know sooner. Is there any chance she could make up what she missed? I’m sure she would really appreciate it,” Jax said.

“Oh, um, yeah. Why didn’t you just say that, Blair? I would have understood. Allergies are no joke! I happen to have a serious allergy to peanuts that has given me some problems in my life,” Ms. Blue started to ramble.

“Nice save, Phoenix!” I thought.

“I didn’t want you to think I was making up excuses. Anyway, can I have my make-up work? I really have to get to my next class,” I asked.

“Yes! Here you go. I expect this to be handed in by next Friday,” she handed me an inch-thick pile of papers.

“Thanks,” I muttered as I started walking away.

The pile is huge! I have no idea how I’m going to finish it all by the due date. I already have enough on my plate with Jax and I having new powers and Khione being MIA. Now this on top of it all?

“Come on! Snap out of it! Third period starts in thirty seconds!” Jax started pulling me towards my next class.

“I’m coming! I’m coming!” I said.

Third period is different than first and second. Jax has wood shop, and I have journalism. Caitlin also takes journalism. The first two classes were to help me prepare to explain my dreams once again. Lucas had third period with Jax, so he can get the explanation from him. At least Caitlin isn’t as pushy as some of the others.

Conveniently, we had a sub today. Our teacher just tells all the subs to give us a free period, so I can tell Caitlin everything without worrying about getting detention for talking in class. It also means I can take her somewhere private, where nobody can overhear us. I do not want to deal with another Jason Smith situation!

I decided to take her to the bleachers in the gym again. That way we would be right where we needed to be for fourth period: PE. Plus, nobody has PE during third period, so it’s almost always empty at this time.

“Ok, what is it that you wanted to tell me?” Caitlin asked.

So, I told her everything. Well, minus the whole feeling it part. That, I wasn’t ready to tell anyone but my brother yet. It took almost the entire period. This time, I could go into more detail. Let her know everything that happened. The good thing about Caitlin is that, if you need to get something off your chest, she’s the one to go to. She will just sit there quietly waiting until your finished to ask questions or to give you a hug or something. She’s THAT kind of person.

Even though Caitlin can hide her true emotions about something unless you want them to be shown, she was being unnervingly calm. There wasn’t ONE tiny change in her face the ENTIRE time I told her about my dreams. All she did was sit there and occasionally nod her head. It’s safe to say I was suspicious. Then it hit me! She probably had a class with Lucy before she had journalism with me! Lucy just can’t keep her trap shut sometimes. It can come in handy on some days, but today is not that day! She was going to hear it from me!

“Lucy told you this already, didn’t she?” I asked Caitlin.

“Maybe...” she answered.

“It’s fine. I’m not mad at you, but I AM mad at her. How long was she able to keep it in?” I said.

“Five minutes,” Caitlin told me.

“Five minutes! She has an issue!” I exclaimed.

“At LEAST I was prepared for what you told me! Without that, I would have been a shocked mess right now!” she defended.

“Whatever. Just don’t stop me when I unleash my anger on her, ok?” I told her.

“Don’t worry, I’m not stupid,” she said.

That made me laugh. Then Caitlin started laughing. We ended up just sitting there cracking up until the bell rang. I guess it’s part of the freaking-out process.

It didn’t take long for our friends to show up for class. With every other class, they would take their sweet time, but not with PE. With PE, we get a break from our brains getting fried from all the learning. Plus, everyone in our group has this class.

The first thing that I did when they walked in was pull Jax to the side. The others went to change, but I needed to ask him something ASAP.

“Did you fill in Lucas?” I asked him.

“Yes, he freaked out,” Jax answered casually.

I snorted, “Good. I just thought I should let you know that I’m mad at Lucy.”

Then I walked away. I know he hates when I state something and walk out. That is exactly why I always do it. What’s life without annoying your siblings?

When I got into the girls locker room, I just walked right up to my locker and started changing. Lucy’s locker is right next to mine. My luck is the best ever, right?

“Blair? Why did you need to talk to Jax?” she asked.

I didn’t answer, just looked over at Caitlin. She knew what I was doing. It’s my classic silent treatment fight. It’s part one of a three part fight. It starts with the silent treatment, then goes to the talking through friends, and finally ends with a big verbal fight. The last one was between Jax and I. It lasted for three months. You know it’s serious when I start ignoring you.

“Oh, crap,” Lucy muttered, realizing what was happening.

“Do we really have to do this right now, B?” Lux asked, looking over at me from her locker.

“Yes,” I answered and walked out.

I know that some might think I’m being overdramatic, but that’s only because you think that I’m doing this over Lucy telling Caitlin about my dreams before I could. That is only part of it. My anger for her has been snowballing recently, and, right now, it has reached it’s limit. I need to let it out. All the pushing for answers. All the untrustworthiness. It became too much for me to shove down so bigger things could take importance. This needs to be settled, here and now. No matter the circumstances, even if they ARE the worst.

“Ok class! Today we are going to be running the mile! I know, I know, you can’t hold back your excitement,” Coach told the class.

“Hey, are you ok? You have your angry face on,” Jax asked me quietly as I walked up.

“Fine, and I DO NOT have an angry face!” I told him.

“Tell that to your eyes,” he smirked.

I looked down at the gym floor, which was shiny enough to kinda see your reflection in. Sure enough, my eyes were icy blue. Crap. I forget to keep a handle on my powers when I’m angry. I turned them off.

“There. And I think you’ll replace out what’s going on soon enough,” I said.

“Mikeals! No more talking!” Coach yelled at us.

“You got it, Coach!” I smart mouthed.

It seemed like he was gonna fire back at me, but he didn’t. I guess he’s finally learning some self control. Took him long enough.

The rest of our group had walked in by now, but they had made the smart decision to steer clear of me right now. When I’m quiet, they know to not mess with me.

“Let’s head out to track! Come on! Hustle! Hustle!” Coach yelled at the class.

As usual, Jax and I were running at the same pace. Being trained the exact same way our whole lives has made us equal each other out. Even out powers do that!

On our third lap, Jax shoved me back and yelled, “Try to keep up!” as he passed me.

“How does my dust taste?” I asked him with a smirk as I passed him.

“I don’t know, why don’t you tell me how mine does,” he said as he passed me again.

It was at times like these that I forgot my life. Right now, we were just two siblings exchanging completely normal banter. We weren’t two teenagers who had superpowers. It was nice.

Jax and I ended up tying, but I wasn’t gonna let him know that.

“I won! Slowpoke!” I exclaimed as we slowed to a walk.

“Did not! We tied!” he said, “Plus, I can read your mind. I know you agree with me.”

Dammit. I had forgotten about that little issue. I really needed to get around to having a real conversation with him and our parents about our newfound abilities. It was nice to have our friends’ help, but they had just been introduced to this world. If anyone knew anything about what was going on, our parents would.

“Whatever,” I muttered, getting water.

Lucas and Cole walked up then. (yeesh! awkward! Sry!) They were panting, out of breath. That surprised me at first. I forgot that most kids grew up doing little league rather than learning how to judo flip someone in under two seconds. That’s my life for you folks!

“No matter how long I know you two, I will NOT get used to your stamina,” Cole said in between wheezes.

“Need an inhaler there, buddy?” Jax asked, smirking.

“You know, you have always been the most heartfelt friend I have. You know that?” he answered sarcastically.

“I know,” Jax said.

I ignored them. I needed to check up on Lucas. See how he was dealing with the news. I had forgotten to in the wake of my new fight with Lucy.

“How you doin’, Lucas?” I asked him.

“I’m good. It took a while to get used to, but I’m fine now,” he answered.

“Is he lying, lava boy?” I asked Jax.

“Nope, and that was a good one! Have you been studying me?” he answered.

“Haha,” I rolled my eyes.

The rest of our little friend group showed up right at that moment. It seemed like the temperature dropped three degrees. Actually, it probably did. My anger was starting to get the best of me. I could NOT let that happen. No matter how angry I was at Lucy, nobody deserved to receive my uncontrolled power.

“So...class is about to end. Why don’t we go change,” Lux suggested.

“Ok. Let’s go,” I said and started walking to the locker room.

They thought I couldn’t hear them, but I could. My friends started questioning Lucy about what happened. I heard Caitlin tell them what happened during third period. They thought I was overreacting because they thought this was all over Lucy telling Caitlin the news. What kind of anger issues did they think I had? Well, I mean, I guess that it’s not completely unreasonable. I have been having an internal battle with a bad girl version of myself.

By the time I was finished changing, the others had come into the locker room, gotten changed, and left. It was lunchtime next, so we all took our times getting to our regular lockers. I put my stuff away and headed to the lunch line. Today was hotdog day. One of the few days that the food didn’t taste like trash. I got my food and sat down at a table without saying a word to my friends. I wanted them to make an effort to start the conversation they were all dreading. It seemed like they weren’t gonna do it at all, but eventually they did. Surprisingly, Jax was the one to speak first.

“Ok, I can hear all your thoughts, and I don’t like it! Can we just skip this one and the next part and get to the speaking one? We don’t have the time or patience to do it right now,” he blurted out.

“Fine by me. Blair, why are you mad at me?” Lucy asked.

I can not believe she doesn’t know why! It’s pretty obvious! I was ready to cover her in ice at this point!

“Why! Why?! You should know why! Your so pushy and won’t just take a simple answer! You have to have the entire truth! Nothing left out! Plus, you can’t keep your mouth shut long enough for me to tell Caitlin about my dreams! You weren’t the one who went through it! You weren’t the one who got tortured all night! That’s why I’m mad at you!” I screamed, knocking my chair back.

We had created a scene, but I didn’t care right now. I was seeing red, or more appropriately, white.

“Ok, let’s just take a breath and move this somewhere more private, ok?” Caitlin suggested.

“If it wasn’t for me, we wouldn’t know about your secret! There would still be something you and your brother were keeping from the rest of us! As for telling Caitlin, I’m sorry that I wanted to let her know about something that the rest of is knew about! You let Jax tell Lucas about it! Why can’t I do that?!” Lucy yelled back.

“Jax is my twin brother! He knows what I’m going through more than you ever could!” I screamed back.

I hadn’t even realized that the others had dragged us out to an empty hallway. When I looked around, I was expecting to see a bunch of staring teenagers, but, instead, I saw lockers.

“We are your best friends! And we may have only known about your powers for a short time, but that doesn’t make us any less capable of handling things!” Lucy screamed.

“Enough! Lucy, Blair has just been stressed lately, and she had been holding in anger towards you, so she decided to let it out as a stress releaser. She isn’t really as mad at you as she says. Blair, Lucy was just trying to help. She may have overstepped a couple of times, but her heart was in the right place. I think this fight is more about your experience last night. You need to let more people know about it than me. Can we just say our apologies and move on?” Jax stepped between Lucy and I, “And Blair? Get a handle on yourself. Your freezing the room.”

Turns out, my brother can be right sometimes. For more than just the freezing the room part. I needed my girls right now. I had gone through some of the worst things imaginable and not told them about it. It was tearing me apart.

“I’m sorry. It’s just...I really need to tell you something,” I started tearing up.

“I’m sorry, too. Whatever it is, we’re here for you, ok?” Lucy said.

“Ok. Well, I felt everything that happened in the dreams. All the shocks and slices. Everything,” I told my friends.

I thought that they would freak out. Start crying and run away, but they didn’t. Instead, they gave me a hug. Even Cole and Lucas. I was right about the crying part, by the way. Caitlin, Lucy, and Lux were practically balling into my shoulder.

“Why didn’t you let us know sooner? We would’ve supported you,” Lux asked.

“I was too afraid that you would think I was broken, I guess,” I answered.

“Your the strongest of all of us, snowflake! We would never think you were broken!” Cole exclaimed.

Wow. I didn’t expect that from Cole. Today was full of surprises.

The rest of the day went pretty smoothly. We had gotten a hold of ourselves before fifth period, which we had altogether, too. It was science class. Nothing of importance happened. We learned about time a bit, I think. I wasn’t really paying attention. My mind was finally starting to make a plan about what to do about Mr. Moore, my boss. I had been too distracted today, but not anymore. I was on full planning mode. Nothing was gonna break my focus.

“Hey, Blair! Guess what! Mr. Hanley brought donuts for English class today!” Lux said during sixth period.

My mind had been so preoccupied with my plans that I hadn’t even realized when class had ended and we had walked over to sixth period. In this class, it was just Jax, Lux and I.

“Donuts?” I looked over, and sure enough, there was two dozen donuts sitting on Mr. Hanley’s desk, “Yes!”

It was a pretty nice way to end a horrible day. With donuts. They were celebrate Mr. Hanley’s wife and himself replaceing out they were having a baby! We spent the entire class just discussing baby names and eating donuts. It was awesome.

It’s weird how time seems to speed up when you having fun. Sixth period flew by. Soon enough, I was saying goodbye to my friends at the front of the school. Jax and I got into the car and headed home. This time, I got to drive.

When I looked over at him, I saw a weird expression on his face. I knew he was trying to read my thoughts. I had been singing the T-Mobile song over and over again in my head the entire trip home. It wasn’t like I was trying to hid anything! I was just messing with my brother. It looks like it worked!

“Having some trouble there?” I asked.

“Huh?” he asked.

I smiled, “Enjoying my mind?”

“Yeah, it’s real fascinating!” he exclaimed, sarcasm dripping off each word.

“I thought so,” I said as pulled into the driveway.

As I sat in my room doing homework, I thought about something. At the beginning of the day, Jax had predicted that today would be a long one. Looks like he was right once again. It felt like this one day could be a month! I knew it wasn’t even finished yet. I still had the conversation with my parents! At least Jax is gonna be there to help if I need it. With my friends, I put on a brave face, but, with my parents, I can’t do that. They will see through it. They can also tell if I’m not telling them the full truth. Parents are like that sometimes.

Wow. 5242 words. I can’t believe it! This took three days to finish! I accomplished my goal to not use time skips! I hope you liked this! Comment! Add to your library! Follow me! Happy reading!

– your author 😜