Cherry Blossom Girls 8

by Harmon Cooper

  In the end, I set Dorian in almost a min-max sort of way.

  Main Second: Teleportation

  Tele-Sphere Radius: 9

  Conscious Spatial Awareness: 10

  Recharge Speed: 3

  Restoration Speed: 4

  Teleportation Rapidity: 7

  Teleportation Distance: 10

  Empathetic Teleportation: 1

  Banishment: 1

  Overcharge: 2

  I didn’t know if it would help her distance-wise, but I was hoping for some type of boost. Plus, there was another way we could go about doing this, and I had a feeling it would work.

  The elevator opened and the Japanese woman stepped out with food. “Let’s refuel and get started,” I said. “We’ve got a long trip ahead of us.”

  We appeared in the air above Wake Island, a stunning location with a turquoise lagoon in the center of the island. There was an airstrip on it, and Chloe and Stella took over immediately, lowering us to the long runway.

  American soldiers had already started to come out, only to be greeted by Grace, all the soldiers pausing and returning to their duty stations aside from one.

  “Can I get y’all anything?” the female soldier with a southern twang asked, a dazed look on her face. “Water? Food?”

  “How are you, Dorian?”

  “I’m fine,” she said, her hand on the side of her head, a vein pulsing. “Actually, I will take some water.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The soldier returned with a bucket of ice-cold water bottles. “Y’all traveling far?”

  “Not now,” Veronique told her, looking to Grace.

  “No problemo; if you need anything let me know.” And with that, the soldier returned to one of the barracks.

  It was a peaceful island, and just being on it made me want to research what it was all about, why the US had an airstrip out in the middle of nowhere. Of course, I knew that we had an island here because of World War II, but just because I knew the answer to the question didn’t mean I wouldn’t like a few more details.

  I sat next to Dorian and started healing her as she scrolled through her phone, now looking at pictures of Honolulu. We had settled on a hotel there, a Marriott, and had chosen a particular one that was quite tall with beach views. We had pictures from the sky, and of every angle, our only mission now to get from here to there.

  Of course, it was out of Dorian’s teleportation range, but I had cooked up a way to handle that which I was quite proud of.

  “And you are sure that you feel okay?” I asked her again.

  “I’m fine, Gideon,” she assured me. “Just give me about twenty minutes, and then we’ll go.”

  “Your call.”

  I moved over to Stella and Chloe, reminding them of what we needed to do.

  They nodded, and Michelle appeared on my right, a big smile on her face.

  “This island is so small,” she said, her Mt. Fuji hat casting a shadow on her face. “I saw some really pretty palm trees and beaches, and the water is a color I’ve never even seen before. There are airplanes and soldiers here, I think it’s a military base.”

  “Stay close,” Veronique said, patting Michelle’s shoulder. “We’ve got to get back to America.”

  “You would have liked the island,” Michelle told her. “Some parts of it are really pretty. Prettier than here,” she said, pointing to the barracks. “Trust me, you would have liked it, VeeVee.”

  “I’m sure I would have,” Veronique said. “And before you try again, ‘VeeVee’ won’t work as a nickname for me.”

  “Okay…”

  “Everyone should drink something,” Grace said, floating water bottles to each of the CBGs. She sent extra to Stella to put in her backpack. “While Dorian is doing most of the work today, we are all traveling in the sun, and we could get dehydrated.”

  “She’s right,” I said. “Everyone drink up. And we have two more hats, so whoever wants one, now would be the time to get them. I’d hate for any of us to get a sunburn.”

  “We totally shouldn’t have got beanies,” Veronique said, who wore the hat that she’d picked up in Ueno.

  “Yeah, that was dumb,” I agreed as Stella handed Dorian a hat.

  “Who wants the last one?” the vector manipulator asked. “Grace?”

  Grace’s skin began to darken until it was completely black, her hair still bleach blonde. “I’ve got my own protection.”

  Michelle laughed. “That’s so cool!”

  “Not a bad idea,” Ingrid said.

  “Ingrid or Chloe, one of you can have the hat.”

  “But you look the hottest,” Chloe told me.

  Stella floated the hat over to Ingrid, who pulled it over her head to the point that the bill sat just above her eyes. The CBGs finished their water bottles and placed them back in the bucket that the soldier had brought.

  “I’ll be fine.” I tried to darken my skin but ended up with the old man Gideon face instead. “Dammit.”

  “Try again,” Grace said. “Just focus on your skin.”

  I did what she said, imagining my skin darkening. Eventually, I opened my eyes to see that my hand was a lot darker, almost a caramel tint to it.

  “Wow, Gideon looks handsome with a tan, right?” Michelle asked, much to the other CBGs’ amusement.

  After a few more minutes, Dorian stood, rubbing her hands together.

  “I’m ready.”

  “All right, let’s do this.”

  We gathered around Dorian and were gone in an instant, all of us barreling through the tunnel of purple energy and light.

  We kept going and going, Dorian pressing further and further ahead until she started to trip. Michelle was next to her immediately, helping her stand. Dorian kept pressing forward, almost as if she was running in slow motion, and suddenly, we appeared in the sky above the ocean.

  We landed on a platform that Stella had made out of vectors, bolstered by Chloe’s sound ability. It was creepy as hell to be on the invisible platform, the ocean beneath us, water as far as the eye could see, but it worked.

  My idea of having Stella and Chloe create an artificial platform for us had actually worked...

  “Have another water,” Ingrid said, taking one of the water bottles from Stella’s backpack.

  Once we were in Honolulu, Grace and I could get food again, mostly because the snack the Japanese hotelier had provided was small and, well, very Japanese. We would also need to get in some shade. The sun was blistering out here above the waves.

  “Too bad we don’t have someone who can modify clouds,” Michelle said, looking up at the sun, shielding her eyes with her hand.

  “That would be helpful.” I wiped to the bead of sweat away from the side of my head. “But it won’t be long, we must be at least halfway there.”

  “I think so,” Dorian said.

  She sat on the invisible platform, drinking from the water bottle, taking deep breaths in. Naturally, I dropped behind her, placing both hands on her shoulders, healing. Dorian loosened up a little, letting out a deep breath.

  “You can do this, Dorian,” Veronique told her.

  “We’re almost there,” she said. “Almost.”

  “We still have to get all the way to the East Coast, right?” Michelle asked.

  “Don’t remind me,” Dorian told her. “Let’s just get to California first.”

  “Where are we going in California?” Michelle asked.

  “To that one place we stayed at in Los Angeles,” I told her. “That director’s house.”

  “I liked that place,” she said with a smile. “That’s where we met Clarence.”

  “It is indeed.”

  “The director’s name is Scott Reid,” Ingrid said. “He directs superhero movies.”

  “I wonder if he knows Vince…” I said, figuring I’d ask if we ran into the director.

  About fifteen more minutes in the sun had my skin glistening. Luckily, Dorian was feeling better, and once we all gathered around her, we d
isappeared again into the tunnel of energy, Dorian charging ahead, Michelle keeping up alongside her.

  I wasn’t feeling nauseous at this point; I only wanted to get back to America and stop Natalie from doing something to the people that had raised me...

  Dorian started to slow, Michelle encouraging her to keep up.

  A determined look on her face, the punk rock teleporter charged forward again, energy spiraling all around us as we landed on the rooftop in Honolulu.

  “We made it! We’re not quite halfway there,” I said, catching my breath, “but we’re getting close. We’re going to do this.”

  “How far between California and Hawaii again?” Michelle asked.

  “Twenty-five hundred miles,” said Ingrid.

  “I need food, and I need water,” Dorian said, using me for support now. Her face was completely red, her eyes watery, her throat quivering. I was already trying to heal her, but she still seemed weak, almost like Jell-O in my arms.

  “Let’s get inside the hotel and chill out for an hour,” Grace said. “We have time, and once we have relaxed some, we can continue on our way. I’ll take care of everything else. Whatever you want to eat, whatever you want to drink, let me know.”

  “Eat?” Dorian smiled at Michelle. “Pizza. Drink?” Dorian smiled at me. “Fucking whiskey.”

  “Pizza and whiskey it is,” Grace said as we turned to the rooftop entrance, the psychic shifter leading the way.

  Chapter Thirty-Five: The Final Stretch

  “Nice vacation to Hawaii, right?” Dorian asked, a grin on her face.

  We were in a hotel room with ocean views, the balcony door open, the sound of the beautiful blue waves echoing into the space. There were a couple empty pizza boxes, and Dorian had a tiny plastic bottle of Jack Daniels.

  Michelle and Ingrid were on the balcony, looking out, and Stella, Veronique, and Chloe were in the other room watching a home improvement show about Millennials trying to pay off their outstanding student loan debt by flipping houses.

  I was happy to be sitting in a nice chair, Grace on the arm rest, her hand wrapped around my shoulder, Dorian in front of me, finishing the last slice of pizza.

  “Are you feeling better?” Grace asked me, her skin still dark.

  “No, I’m feeling full, but I’m at least content here. It’s nice.”

  “Understatement of the year,” said Dorian. “How come you haven’t taken us to Hawaii yet?”

  “We sort of didn’t need to come here for anything in particular…”

  Dorian rolled her eyes. “Next time we go to Asia, we don’t take the airplane, okay? We go through teleportation, and we spend a day or two in Hawaii. Deal?”

  “I mean, I’m always down to get down, you know that.”

  Grace snickered. “Where do you get these phrases?”

  “I thought they were your phrases?” I asked, looking to her. “Aren’t you always speaking through me?”

  “I only say smart things.”

  Dorian laughed, throwing back the rest of her little plastic bottle of whiskey.

  “I want to go down to the ocean,” Michelle said for the seventh time as she peeked in from the balcony. “Please, please, please…”

  “No,” Dorian, Grace and I all said simultaneously.

  “But it looks so pretty down there. People are playing. And people are also getting their tans, and then there’s a lifeguard, and probably cool fish…” Michelle confirmed with Ingrid. “Yep, and there’s some people on floats, and everyone’s having fun.”

  “There’s no fun allowed for today,” I told her. “We have business to handle.”

  “I can be fast…” The expression on Michelle’s face changed. “Okay, I’ll stay here and not bother you any longer.”

  “Thanks,” Dorian told Grace once Michelle was gone.

  “It’s my specialty.”

  We hung out in the room for another twenty minutes or so, giving Dorian plenty of time to recharge. Once she was ready, I reminded Stella and Chloe to be ready with their invisible platform.

  We flashed away, reappearing in the tunnel of oscillating purple energy, all of us taking off and running forward, trying to keep up with Dorian and Michelle.

  As it happened previously, Dorian started to grow tired, and once she did we appeared over the ocean, all of us falling until we were cushioned by an invisible platform. Dorian sat almost immediately, and Ingrid walked over to her with a water bottle.

  “One more teleportation and we are back in the States,” I told the group.

  The sun was blocked by a cloud this time, which made being on the platform more bearable. I noticed my skin was white again, probably an aftereffect of relaxing in the borrowed hotel room and not paying attention to the form I had shifted into.

  Concentrating again, I was able to darken it.

  “Wait a minute, are those dolphins?” Michelle asked, an excited look on her face as she stepped to the edge of the platform.

  Sure enough we saw a school of dolphins moving through the waves, heading in our direction.

  “Oh, that’s so awesome,” Grace said.

  “This happened to us before,” Michelle explained. “When we went to that island. I forget the island’s name.”

  “Santa Cruz Island,” I said. I looked to Chloe and Stella. “Lower the platform a little.”

  They did as instructed, lowering the platform until it was about five feet above the sloshing waves. Chloe stepped forward, making a sound with her throat. The dolphins stopped, a few of them lifting their heads above the water.

  “Just don’t get any closer,” Veronique said, at my side now, gripping my arm tightly.

  “We’re not going in the ocean,” I assured her. “Don’t worry.”

  “I can swim, you know,” she said.

  “I’m sure you can.”

  The dolphins started circling us. Ingrid had her phone out, trying to capture it on video.

  Yet another moment that I would think back to sometime in the future, a strange sliver of time in which all this made sense, where I had this idea to just abandon it all and disappear with the CBGs forever.

  But reality returned once Dorian was able to teleport again, and after another trip down the purple lightning tunnel, our group took shape in Director Scott Reid’s Los Angeles home, on the rooftop near the hot tub where I’d first hooked up with Chloe.

  “You did it…” I said, breathing heavily as I turned to Dorian.

  “I’m just glad we made it,” she said with a satisfied smile.

  “How are we doing timewise?” Ingrid asked.

  It was nighttime in California, lights glittering along the horizon, hills in the distance, a dark cloud sitting over the city. I’d purposefully kept the clock on my phone at Beijing time, which would make it easier to calculate twelve hours than continually dealing with time zone changes.

  We’d been at this for about three and a half hours now.

  “We have about eight hours,” I said, giving us a little extra time just in case.

  “I’m getting hungry again,” Michelle said.

  “You just ate in Hawaii,” Grace told her.

  “I know, but we’re close to home, and I am thinking about Clarence’s food now.”

  Chloe smiled at her, the sound manipulator taking a seat on a plastic chair. “I’m sure Clarence will be able to whip something up for us while we rest.”

  “Two hours,” Veronique said. “That’s all the rest time we have in Colorado.”

  “Three hours tops,” I said. “Then we can move to New Haven. It’s a long teleportation, but it still should be under two thousand miles. I’ll check everything to be sure. From there, we move to Vermont.”

  “What’s Vermont like?” Michelle asked.

  “Lots of trees, but we aren’t there to be tourists.”

  “Focus, Michelle,” Dorian said, the punk rock teleporter now sitting on a chair next to Chloe, her elbows on her thighs, hands in her hair.

  “Need any h
ealing?”

  Before Dorian could answer I placed my hand on her shoulder, bringing it up to her cheek, pushing forth some of my power. Her skin cooled off a bit, the redness leaving her face.

  “The director is home,” Grace said, her eyes flashing white.

  “Let’s not bother him,” Veronique said.

  “I’ll make sure he doesn’t come up here.”

  “He’s awake?” I asked.

  “He’s sort of a night owl.”

  “I’m so excited to get back to Colorado,” said Michelle, spinning once and grinning. “Even if it is nighttime. I love going home.”

  “I want you to try to get some rest tonight, Michelle, okay?” Chloe said. “We may be in for a serious fight in the morning.”

  “Because this is clearly a trap,” Veronique said, finishing Chloe’s line of thought.

  “Clearly,” I said in agreement.

  About twenty minutes later, we teleported from Los Angeles to our headquarters in the Rocky Mountains. Michelle immediately burst inside, ran straight through the door and announced to Clarence that we were home.

  The bearded man was ecstatic to see us.

  Before we could even settle in the living room, Clarence launched into the kitchen, whipping up food, turning on the oven, all the sounds associated with intense cooking filling our living space as he chatted with Michelle.

  Father stepped into the house wearing a terry cloth robe. He greeted everyone, eventually making his way over to me.

  “Have a minute?” I asked him.

  “I have more than a minute,” he said.

  After I took some of the items out of Ingrid and Stella’s backpacks, we headed down to the CBG situation room, the basement, where I explained to him what had happened, and why we were back so suddenly.

  “And you are aware that it is a trap?” he asked.

  “Deadly aware.”

  “But it’s something that you have to do, I understand that,” he said.

  “It is.”

  His eyes glowed orange and fizzled out, Father shaking his head. “I’m sorry, Gideon. I can’t get a feel for this one; I can only wish you luck.”