3. TAKING ACTION

I went back downstairs after putting away my school stuff and went to the kitchen to help myself to something to eat before training.

I practice every day so that I know how to control my superpowers and I also learn how to defend myself without using the powers. My dad said it’s good to know both ways so that I am ready for whatever tough situation I may get to face in life.

So I started training after my dad woke me up as a new person. He told me that he wanted me to be like any other kids around and even go to school, but to do that I had to learn how to control my powers. So I learnt that at a young age and I got to go to school but I didn’t feel like other kids. I felt different and isolated. That’s when I met Mya, in kindergarten.

My dad came in the kitchen to help himself to some lunch before we went to practice. He found me there.

“So dad, do you remember the guy I told you about? The new kid in school?” I asked him.

“Yeah. What about him?” he asked me.

“Well, I kind of noticed that he’s not like the other kids in school.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Umm, he seems to be a superhuman. But I’m not really sure about it.”

“What?” he exploded. “How do you know that?”

“Like I said, I’m not sure about it. But there’s something weird going on. He came to seat by the desk next to mine and introduced himself to me and Mya. He said his name is Ashton Turner, but when I looked up at him it felt like I was seeing him for the second time.”

“Lina, what do you mean by ‘seeing him for the second time’?” he asked.

“I felt like I knew him from somewhere, dad. And then when I thought about it I remembered seeing a picture of a boy from a missing people’s website. He looks exactly like the boy but that he’s older. The picture was posted a long time ago though.” I paused a bit and then continued. “I don’t know Ashton’s birth date yet so I can’t link that to the boy from the picture but the name of the boy on the picture is Joel Ashton McKenzie.”

“Are any features of the boy similar to this Ashton guy?” he asked.

"Well, their faces are shaped the same way but the difference is that Ashton is older. They have the same eye shape. The boy in the picture has stormy grey eyes but Ashton’s eyes are onyx.” I answered.

“Wow.” He said that and took a sip of water from his glass. “This is one hell of an equation to solve but tell you what, get to know more about the guy and then we’ll take it from there.”

“Ok dad.”

I walked off to the backyard of the house and I heard him mutter something that sounded like, “Strange thing this is” when I was walking away.

I kept it off my mind throughout practice and I got all my homework done before dinner-time. At least we had a maid to help out with all the house work and cooking but she didn’t stay around the house most of the times. She knew that I’m always in school and dad is always working but she didn’t know where. My dad’s lab was situated in the basement and had a secret elevator used to get there. She only saw my dad going around the house in his lab coat but he would disappear and she thought he would have gone to work. No one knew about the lab except him and me.

So I came downstairs for dinner. It was just my dad and I, the house-help had taken off. We ate quietly, although I could still hear his thoughts. He was just meandering around his lab work, taking his mind off something that I didn’t know about. It was clear that he didn’t want me to know about it just yet but I didn’t bother asking about it. So I took the liberty of putting the dishes in the dishwasher after we finished eating. I waited until the rinse cycle was complete and I put the dishes away.  My dad was already stationed in the sitting room in front of the flat screen TV.

“’Night dad”, I said to him.

“Goodnight honey”, he said over his shoulder before I began climbing the stairs to my room.

I didn’t feel like watching TV that night so I just went upstairs to my room and logged onto the chatting zone on my laptop. Luckily, Mya was online and so I started chatting with her.

“Hey”, I started the conversation.

“Hi girl. You took off early today after school. Everything ok?” she asked.

“Yeah sure, all is well. I just felt tired, that’s all.”

“Oh ok.”

“Anything happened after I left?”

“Yeah. Our ‘friend’ Isabel made a move on Ash-boy!”

“You don’t say!”

“Seriously. I saw her talking to him by the parking lot before he got in his own car to leave. She was kind of making those ‘actions’, you know.”

“Wow. And then what happened?” I pressed on.

“I’ll fill you in tomorrow at school”, she said dismissively.

“Come on, Mya. I know you’re dying to let me know about it.”

"Yeah, but I’ll tell you tomorrow. I want you to see it for yourself in Isabel’s face first.”

“Oh, ok. I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

“Sure thing. Now let me just get my homework done before I watch my favourite TV show.”

“Alright. ‘Night”, I said.

“’Night”, she ended the conversation.

Mya loved watching Lab Rats on TV daily and the show consisted of three teenagers that had superpowers and lived a life that I was living. She believed that everything in that show was fiction, little did she know that it really happened in real life. I remembered one day at school when she was telling me that if ever she saw one person with those kind of powers in reality, she would forever worship him/her as her idol. She would shout it to the whole world that she had the greatest person on earth as her idol. Which was one of the reasons why I kept my powers a secret to her and the whole world. If it came to be known that I have special powers, I’d be in grave danger of being taken away from my dad and locked up in a place I wouldn’t be able to escape from.

So I logged off the chatting zone since Mya was now offline. Brendan was probably in the kitchen at his house by this time because he loved doing the women’s job. So I went on to playing a game on my phone although my mind wasn’t really into it. All that I could picture in my mind was Ashton Turner. His face was almost as if it was glued on my mind because I couldn’t keep from seeing it. What is it with him? I asked myself this question severally that night. I didn’t have the answer to it though. So in the end, I decided to retire to sleep early. I clicked on the code on the mirror and the control buttons to my capsule came to be visible.

I set in the right temperature for my capsule to be warm and I added a little bit of light in it. I hate the dark because it makes me feel really threatened. I changed to my night clothes and got into the capsule. In a few minutes I was under.

I woke up earlier than the day before and I took my time getting ready for school. I went downstairs for breakfast and I found my dad’s note on the kitchen counter.

Lina,

I went out for a few supplies in town. Before you go to school, go down to the lab and you’ll find a device that I left on the desk next to the elevator. Take it with you to school but make sure that no one sees you with it. It’s a detector that detects anyone bionic within a 10nm radius of you. I thought it might help you out with your issue that you told me about yesterday. Be careful and enjoy your day at school.

Love you kiddo.

I was amazed at first and I almost forgot about breakfast as I was thinking about Ashton. So I quickly put together cereal and some milk in a bowl and sat down to eat it. My phone rang at that moment and I picked it up without checking who was calling.

“Hello”, I said.

“Hey Lina, it’s me”, said Brendan.

“Of course it’s you. But why calling me so early?”

“I wanted to check if Mya told you about what Isabel did yesterday after we left school”

“Brendan, seriously?  So early to ask me that?” I snorted over the phone. “Yes she did but we’ll talk about it on the way to school so you’d better be ready because I’m coming to get you in a few minutes.”

“Yes ma’am. You’ll find me waiting so you better hurry”

“Alright. See you in a few minutes” I said that and hung up the phone.

I quickly went through my breakfast and dashed down to the lab. I found the detector right where dad said it would be, alongside with its manual. This was one of the latest inventions that my dad came up with. So I took it with its manual and went to collect my school stuff. I went to the garage and jumped into the car. I drove at the same time reading the manual of the detector. It was a good thing that I had the road to Brendan’s house memorised in my head and I knew how to drive without actually looking at the road. I read through it as quick as I could and I set it to the required settings before stuffing all that into my bag. I reached Brendan’s house at the same time he exited it.