Kinetics

by Andrew Peed

  "We don't keep secrets from each other that pertain to the two of us but this is your thing and that doesn't count." he remained perfectly cool.

  "I don't think that I have told anyone about what happened to me before I came to Hillside, partly because I didn’t remember most of my past." I laid back down onto my side.

  "Nope, I figured it was a touchy subject."

  "Well, I had blocked most of it out. What I could remember back then was pretty rough." I took a deep breath. "I was having problems with my abilities and Doctor Z thought that it was linked to a mental block. He gave me a drug that he created to get rid of blocks, but it got rid of them all. I just relived a memory that I wish I never had. I should have listened to Sam.”

  "What happened?" he listened closely.

  "At this old orphanage that I used to live at there was a male caretaker. His name was George. He tried to kill me." I forced the tears away.

  "Why?"

  I contemplated telling him everything that I had remembered but decided against it. "I don't know why. I went to therapy for a while before moving to Hillside. George was let go, or terminated was the word they used, and I never saw him again. Didn't bother me."

  "Wow, no wonder you got sick." he sat down on the floor next to my bed and leaned back.

  "Yeah." I chuckled, "I think that other than a therapist, you are the only person that I have told any of this to."

  “You want to know something?”

  “What’s that?” I let my hand fall off the side. He took it and held it like I imagined a brother would.

  “I had abilities before we were abducted.”

  “What do you mean?” I knew exactly what he meant.

  “From as far back as I can remember I have been able to heal things.”

  “Like how?”

  He let go of my hand and reached into his pocket. He took out a pocket knife and opened the blade.

  “Whoa, wait, what are you doing?” I grabbed his hand.

  “Just watch.” He placed the blade to the skin of his arm. He gently applied pressure and slid the blade slowly down his flesh. Blood began to slide out from the split skin. He cleaned the blade and closed it swiftly returning the knife to his pocket while his arm bled.

  “For God’s sake!” I got up to go for the light but he grabbed my pants, stopping me.

  With his other hand, he ran his index finger over the wound. As the blood pooled under his finger the cut vanished leaving no sign of a scar at all.

  “Don’t ever do that again.”

  “No one else knows that I can do that.” He cleaned up the remaining blood with his shirt.

  “Your secret is safe with me.” I got back into my bed.

  "I'm here with an ear." he stood from his spot on the floor, "Feel better?"

  I thought for a moment and realized that I did feel better, "Yeah, I'm going to try and sleep the rest of the night." I smiled.

  "Alright, well let me know anytime you want to talk." He left the room closing the door.

  It felt good to let things out. I knew telling him about the other ability that I may or may not have was a bad idea, but knowing that he had a second ability made me think that our ending up at that orphanage was not a coincidence.

  I wondered if any of the others had abilities as I began to get drowsy and fall asleep.

  Chapter 17: Sear

  The next morning Sam took us to his office; one of the buildings that I had thought was abandoned. They hadn’t gotten around to doing any maintenance.

  "What is on the agenda for today?" I looked like hell from my rough night.

  "Today we are going to figure out your government approved education level." Sam stood at the front of the room, while the rest of us sat behind a long table spaced evenly apart.

  "And how are we going to do that?" Ronnie leaned back in his chair and crossed his arm. He looked bored.

  "With the ELAT." Sam smiled.

  "What is the ELAT?" I asked.

  "The E.L.A.T. Education Level Assessment Test." He paced a few steps in either direction.

  We all groaned in unison at the prospect of a test. School was something that we were all ready to leave in the past.

  "I know. I know. Its two hundred and fifty questions and you have three hours to finish. We will go over the results together when everyone is finished." He passed out the tests to everyone. Each packet had a different designation on the front page making it clear that each one was very different.

  Once everyone had a test, pencil, and a calculator he sat down behind a desk at the edge of the room, "Get started." He pressed the start button on a timer.

  The test was simple, but it did get harder as I went deeper into the pages. All of the questions were based on information that we had seen dozens of times.

  I breezed through the material in about two hours. I closed the booklet and set back in my chair. I started to draw some lines on the corner of a scrap sheet of paper.

  Sam came over and took my packet without saying a word. He returned to his desk to grade my work.

  Everyone finished well before time was up, and we all sat quietly while Sam graded the tests. After he finished he passed them back out.

  "Here is how this works." He clapped his hands together and looked around the room, "The grade that you have determines your average education level. If you score high enough, we, and the government, will consider you a graduate and issue you a diploma. We have no way to pinpoint where you need to start without the test. Let’s just say that Aurora did not think your education was a priority.”

  "Alrighty then, I like the sound of that." Kenny blurted out.

  "Two hundred and ten points plus tells us that you are of high school graduate level education, 250 is a perfect score." Sam pointed to the tests.

  I opened my packet and turned to the front page. In thick black numbers two-two-nine was scrawled across the page. I breathed a sigh of relief.

  We all scored high enough to be done with school. Rachel had been the closest; she had been held for so long. When we asked how she could have known all the information she said that they were teaching her, but she left it at that, and didn't want to elaborate.

  Ryder met me outside of Sam's office. He seemed excited about talking to me. We walked along in quiet for a few minutes past the house and just kept walking.

  "I had a word with Sam." he broke the silence finally.

  "Really, was it just one, or was there an entire conversation?" I laughed at my own joke then felt stupid for being so self centered. He was kind of acting awkward, but happy.

  "Yeah, we think that it would be great if you wanted to work up in the observatory. Fade tried to teach a few people to care for it, but no one was as interested in it as she was." He kept his eyes averted.

  "Really? That's cool."

  "Well, you seemed so interested the other day. A hobby would be good we think. I’ve seen some downward spirals from a user getting too bored."

  "When can we get started?" I squinted up to the top of the mountain. I could just make out the sparkle of the landing at the mountain’s highest point.

  "We?" he seemed surprised that I'd want his help.

  "I assume that you would want to come up and help, given that it used to be Fade's project." I didn’t care if he wanted to help or not, I really didn’t want to be alone on the top of a mountain.

  "How, um..." he looked in the air around my head for the word.

  "Presumptuous." I said.

  "Not what I was going to say, but I guess that works." he scratched his head awkwardly; "I don't know if I'll be much help."

  "To be honest I don't care how much help you'll be." I said bluntly, "I don't want to be in a new place on top of a mountain alone."

  "I don't think that I can go up tonight. How about tomorrow?" He checked the time on his smart phone.

  "Yeah, that sounds good." I was disappointed that I couldn't get started immediately, but I hadn’t even opened my new laptop yet, and I woul
d want to use it to keep up with my work.

  We looped back around and returned to the house. The whole group was home either watching TV or using the computer in the den.

  I went up to my room and grabbed my new computer. I opened up the box, took out all of the packaging, and tossed it into the trash. I plugged the charger into the wall, and into the computer. When I opened the lid and pressed the power button it didn't take long to boot up.

  The computer asked me a few questions about where I was and what the current time was. When it booted to the desktop it notified me that there were wifi networks available. I connected to the one with the strongest signal that didn’t require a password.

  I opened internet explorer, I hadn't been online in over a month. I tried to check my e-mail, but the account was gone. Every account that I had had was gone. I searched for myself on Google, but only found pictures of the girl who had replaced me.

  Even my Facebook page was changed to reflect the replacement’s life, which was better than mine according to her page. More power to her.

  I was happy to leave it all behind.

  I remembered that Sam wanted us to come up with code names that we could use when we went on missions. I went to back Google, and typed synonyms for fire in the search bar, and hit enter. I clicked on a link and read the page. There were dozens of words and one the stuck out was Sear. It was kind of plain, but it was quick to say, and easy to remember.

  Sear: Verb, to burn or scorch the surface of something with a sudden intense heat.

  There was a knock on my door.

  "Come in." I closed the lid on the computer.

  Ronnie opened the door and sighed, looking troubled about something, "Can we go for a walk."

  "Sure, let me get a hoodie. What's up?" I got up, and put the computer on the bedside table. I went to my closet and grabbed a sweater pulling it on over my t-shirt.

  We left the house and started to walk down the side of the road. He didn't say anything, but he seemed like he was trying to start a conversation few times.

  "Would you spit it out already?" I stopped him and turned him to look at me.

  "I don't know what to say exactly." he said wringing his hands.

  We started walking again.

  "Just say whatever it is."

  "Well you see I have been spending a lot of time with Rachel lately." he said stammering like a school boy with a crush.

  "You like her. You want to hold her." I said in a sing song voice.

  "Stop Grace. I'm serious." he looked at the ground.

  "Sorry." I backed away.

  "I have feelings for her. Feelings that I have never had before." he smiled but looked like he was going to be sick.

  "What? Do you want my permission to date her?" I was amazed that we were even discussing his love life.

  "Well?"

  "Ronnie, what did I tell you right after your fight with Josh at school?" I stopped him again, but less forceful.

  "Well, I just want to know that if we really got serious, things wouldn't get weird between us." he had the hardest time making eye contact with me.

  "I will always love you like a brother. Nothing can change that, no matter what. No matter who you are in a relationship with, things will always get weird between us. Now." I took a breath, "Where was I. Oh yeah… You LOVE her." again in the sing song voice.

  "So... What does this mean?" we started back towards the house.

  "We're still friends and now I get to mess with you because, you love her.” I chuckled pushing him.

  "Thanks." He playfully shoved me back.

  Rachel waited for us right inside the front door. He gave her a little nod and she grinned at me. They walked into the kitchen arm in arm.

  I shook my head.

  I returned to my room and surfed the net until I fell asleep with the laptop on my stomach.

  Chapter 18: The Will

  Ronnie and Rachel spent no time getting close. I sat at the table during breakfast a few days later trying to keep my food down while being subjected to their displays.

  I left the house and walked aimlessly towards the town. The sunlight felt wonderful on my skin. Sam and Ryder came out of Sam's office and as I passed by, their words fell to a whisper.

  "Morning." I tried to interrupt their conversation.

  "Good morning Grace." Sam smiled but returned quickly to the hushed conversation.

  "Hey." Ryder nodded. The two of them continued down the sidewalk.

  Once they had finished, Ryder nodded then ran to catch up with me.

  "What's up?" I stopped and sat down on a concrete half wall.

  "I was hoping that we could go up to the observatory tonight." he sat down next to me. His phone went off but he ignored the message.

  "Yeah." We still hadn’t gone up to the top of the mountain. We had planned to, but things came up each night, "What were you talking to Sam about?"

  "Nothing." He kept his face expressionless.

  "Hmm... Ok, I've got your number." I also remained straight faced, "Well how about this? I came up with a code name."

  "Really and that would be?" He asked relieved for the change of subject.

  "What do you think about..." I paused for effect, "Sear?"

  "Sear?" the words came flatly and it irritated me.

  "What? I like it."

  "It's good, it’s to the point." he hopped down from the wall and pulled his phone from his pocket.

  "I'll see you tonight." I jumped down and continued towards the area where there were a few small shops set up.

  "Wait." he held out his arm trying to stop me but he didn’t look up from his phone.

  "I'll see you tonight Ryder." I held up my hand.

  ~//~

  The hours seemed like they would last forever. I must have checked the time a hundred times, sure that any second Ryder would call canceling on me again.

  He didn’t call. He knocked on the door just as the sun was disappearing over the horizon. We walked to the observatory entrance bathed in the glow of street lamps.

  "So where do you want to get started?" we rode the elevator up, and got out onto the landing at the top of the mountain.

  "We need to clean the mirrors and we also need to reconfigure the computers." I clapped my hands together and looked around the room.

  "I'll take the mirrors, I think that will be the safest thing for me to do." He went into a closet and found cleaning solution and a bag of rags. He disappeared into the first dome.

  I sat down at the center work station and booted the computer. I set my computer up on the table next to the monitor and booted it as well. My laptop booted ten times faster.

  Everything on the main computer was the same as the first time we had visited the observatory. I clicked on the settings icon. There were two options, manual configuration and the other was automatic configuration using last known good configuration. I didn't click on either, the telescopes would start moving and I didn't want to get Ryder hurt.

  I joined Ryder outside in the first dome, "How goes it in here?"

  "Luckily the filth on the mirrors is coming off very easily." he wiped sweat off his brow. I had no idea how he could be sweating, it was like less than fifty degrees in the dome.

  I grabbed an extra rag from the stack that he had sitting on the ground next to the door. I put some of the cleaning solution on it and then went to the next mirror.

  "You don't need to do that, go on inside and turn on the heat." he smiled. He got really close to me, and looked over my shoulder at the mirror that I had started on. The hairs of the back of my neck stood on end.

  He snatched the rag out of my hand, "If you insist." I slipped underneath his arm and walked back into the control room.

  I found the thermostat and turned the heat to seventy. Almost immediately, I could smell burning dust from all of the vents. I had a flash back to high school when they would fire up the heaters the first cold day of the year.

  I returned to the computers and s
tarted to boot the rest. I went to my laptop and searched for things that were cool to look at in the night sky. I found a few suggestions and bookmarked the sites in the browser. Each one had detailed instructions on locating the anomalies.

  "All done." Ryder rejoined me in the control room after replacing the cleaning supplies in the closet.

  "Well let's see how this works." I clicked on configure using last known good settings. I hoped that when the hard drives lost their data they didn’t lose the configuration files.

  The computer started to work on its own. The first monitor showed two windows. One flickered on and a live camera feed from inside the dome appeared. The telescope started to move around in all directions. A timer flashed on the main screen 2:00:00.

  "We've got two hours until it's finished with the configuration." I swiveled in my chair to look at Ryder who was leaning on a nearby wall.

  "Well this is the perfect time for us to talk." he walked out of the room. When he returned he had two glass soda bottles in one hand and a folder in his other hand.

  "What's that?" I didn’t care about the drinks, the folder worried me.

  "It's something that is very important." he handed me one of the bottles, and pulled up a chair. I opened it and took a sip.

  He took a deep breath.

  "What is it?" I asked again, he was getting very serious.

  "I have spent some time with Sam the past couple of days and we have been looking into Joseph Madison."

  "Really? What did you find?" I was suddenly very excited.

  "Well he and his wife died two years ago." he paused.

  "You told me that." I leaned back into my chair.

  "I did, but I didn't tell you how. Until now we never needed to know why. We found the police, and coroner's reports, and the deaths are interesting to say the least."

  "Interesting how?"

  "Well, there was no cause of death, and they died at the exact same moment. The police were positive that it was a murder, but without a cause of death, and zero evidence at the scene of the crime, a hotel in Las Vegas, which I found weird, they had to drop the case."

  "So what do you think?"

  "I think that they were killed by a mod or nat."