03x09: Thrust into Darkness

A Chapter by RA Fernandez

Happiness begins to fade away in this chapter where traumatic events take place.

THRUST INTO DARKNESS

The Monday after this was pretty normal. Ms. Becky required them to present a homage/parody/rip-off of a Filipino sitcom.

Austin did not watch any of these but he improvised with a script following the format of “Maalaala Mo Kaya” where it told a different story every episode.

Jade and Giannina were the main characters and they had to wear costumes. They were going to present on the bridge so they had to pass by DDN on the way there.

Later that recess, the gang teased Ernst because he was all dreamy during the remaining periods after seeing Maan in a dress. He denied it but everyone knows that Ernst’s denial in this matter was futile.

Fast forward to the final two periods, Austin, Ibarra, and Mo-on finally finished their fashion designing project. Austin handled the machine, Ibarra handled the design and hand-stitching and Mo-on was victimized by democracy seeing as he was voted “model of the group”.

Since there was nothing to do, Austin sewed together a purple bag that could easily fit a head. When worn, the wearer can see outside but the outsiders can’t see the wearer’s face. This was a bit fun since the wearer would feel like a more retarded and powerless version of Scarecrow from the Batman comics.

Austin stayed in the Busyard for a while, finally discovering Janella’s bus. To think it took him that long, he was definitely cleared of the stalker label.

He spent the time after Janella’s departure with Patrick and Ernst. They went to MFR’s place and just chilled for a while until they had to go.

Austin was going to take the Transport Cars back to the hotel when he saw Bam with the band and a new guy.

“Hey guys, what’s up?”

“The day before yesterday!” Bam said.

“No, it’s not!” The new guy said.

“Hey guys!”

“Oh, Austin, Aaron, this is Austin. Austin, this is Aaron.”

“Hello, Aaron,” Austin said.

“Hi. Bam, why don’t you ask him?”

“Austin, answer this. If yesterday was tomorrow and tomorrow was yesterday, what is today?”

“Ask Sean, he’s the chronokinetic.”

They all laughed at this.

“What did you say?” Sean asked.

“They have a little riddle, maybe you could answer it.”

“Hit me.”

They told Sean the riddle.

“Any ideas?” Aaron said.

“Impossible, Aaron. It’s a paradox,” Austin said.

“Just think.”

“Today is Monday,” Sean said.

Aaron began to clap slowly. Bam, Jolo, Austin, and the other guys followed.

“Alright, now that the bonus round is out of the way, take this one.”

“Oh yes, Aaron, did you notice you’re the only guy in the leaders?” Bam said.

“And being the new student, that isn’t too cool,” Jolo said.

“I wouldn’t say that. You’re the batch band and you’re hanging out with me.”

“Don’t ignore me!” Mary said. Mary Duritan was a student in DDN.

“Yeah, I mean about the coolness,” Austin said. “Screw the rules of society. Aaron’s cool, aren’t you?”
“Damn right. Now if tomorrow is Tuesday but the day after is Thursday, what day would twelve midnight fall upon?”

“Wednesday?” Sean said.

“Sean, shut up,” Aaron said as he began to applaud.

“I don’t understand. You’re questions don’t make any sense,” Austin said.

“Rule of Cool, man. Rule of Cool,” Aaron said.

“Hey Bruce!” Bam called. He went over to their group. “When are you returning?”

“I do not know.”

“Wait, you’re returning?” Austin said in joy.

“Indefinitely.”

Bruce began to leave as Jolo pulled him back in.

“Dude, stay for a while!”

“Sure.”

“I believe you have met Aaron, sole male member of the dancing committee?”

“That pretty much means I’m the only pair of balls in that committee,” Aaron said.

“Nice one,” Jolo whispered in his ear.

“Yes, I have met Aaron.”

“Alright, here’s the next one. If yesterday morning was Tuesday and this morning was Monday, what day is tomorrow at 3 o’clock in the afternoon?”

“This is way out of sense,” Austin said.

“Use your head, man! They told me you were a nerd.”

“I am a part time nerd unless you count my movie nerd… ness. But that’s beside the point.”

“What time does morning start?” Sean asked.

“Six in the morning.”

“Friday!” Sean blurted.

“Dude, if you don’t stop stealing the spotlight I’m gonna shoot you in the face,” Aaron said jokingly.

“Be careful Sean, he’s got ricochet bolts!” Jolo said.

“What’s that?” Sean said cockily.

“I can shoot this exploding bolt the ricochets rapidly until I stop. I can basically shoot out a ball of energy and keep supplying it with inertia ‘til I’m bored.”

“Give me a sample then,” Sean said.

“Fine!”

Aaron pointed his hand at Sean and shot a small yellow crackling bolt at him. Sean waved his hand in front of him and formed a purple field. The orb disappeared on impact and shot out of the same field after a split second. It went straight into Aaron’s hand and bounced back. He clenched his fist and the bolt disappeared.

“Impressive, both of you,” Austin said.

“Yeah, I’ve been practicing from my room. Ever noticed the crater I the east side of the hotel?”

“Yes, I did,” Austin said, remembering his frustration.

“I started practicing two weeks ago and the crater was getting pretty deep but last Monday, it reset itself and I’ve been trying again ever since. It kept resetting ‘til Wednesday morning where it was exactly as I left it the night before. It’s a good ten miles down now I think?”

“Well, I gotta go. Bye guys,” Bam said.

“Me too,” Jolo said.

Bam and Jolo left and it was only Austin, Aaron, Bruce, and Mary.

“Oh yeah, Austin, no offense but Janella’s kinda annoying,” Mary said.

“What?” Austin said in a menacing tone.

“I mean she asks the dumbest questions.”

“Like?”
“Sr. Leo said that infants are only below three years old and she asks what about the four year olds?”

“Mary, I would ask those questions.”

“No, Austin, not you.”

‘Yeah, dude, you’re a nerd,” Aaron said.

Austin glared at him.

“Not that it’s bad or anything. Nerds are cool.”

“Anyway, remember Patricia Port"“

“Mary, hush now!” Austin said.

“Who’s this Patricia?” Bruce asked.

“This is too intriguing, dude; to ignore this would be an exercise in, um…”

“Futility?” Austin said.

“Yes, that,” Aaron replied.

“Okay, fine. If you wanna hear about my first heartbreak, that’s fine. I trust you guys, keep this between us, ‘kay?”

“’Kay,” They said in unison.

“We met in second grade…”

“Holy s**t!” Aaron blurted out loud. “Sorry, carry on.”

“She was my seatmate and I made her laugh. For the first time in my life, a girl laughed at my attempts at humor so I fell in love.”

“Well that’s kinda…” Mary began.

“I know, okay? I was seven year old, give me a break. Anyway, that Christmas, me and my nerdy, nooby, mind went to her and I made her my ‘girlfriend’. I didn’t know how that worked exactly because the only relationship I know is Mickey and Minnie so that was stupid.”

“Carry on,” Mary said.

At this point, it was getting dark, a bit too dark for 5:50 PM.

“I continued loving her until fourth grade. When fifth grade hit, I went to school the first day expecting to see her. I didn’t. I went out before classes and searched all the org lists. She wasn’t in any of them.

“One of her friends finally told me that she moved to Leyte and I was probably never going to see her again. I still loved her, of course, living the rest of the year claiming she was my girlfriend, even though I had no idea what that meant.

“Finally, that summer, she put me down rather gently.”

“What? Elaborate!” Mary demanded.

At this point, it looked like it was going to rain.

“Well, she told me that she just wanted be friends and that she was never coming back here.”

“Ouch,” Bruce said.

“I couldn’t accept that so I lied to myself. I lived a lie for a year claiming that she was still my girlfriend and everyone just looked at me funny. I don’t remember my crushes in sixth grade because when I’m in love, other girls might come into my heart but they will never be recognized by my mind and I only realize afterwards.”

It started drizzling now.

“Aw, Austin. You made the sky cry with your sad story,” Mary said.

“Sucks,” Aaron commented.

“Anyway, when first year hit, I finally broke free and fell in love again. And now, I’m happier than ever. She means the world to me.”

“Aww…” Mary said.

“Mary, now you’re ‘aww-ing’ after what you said about her.”

“Hey, it’s a sweet story.”

The rain started to pour harder.

“Oh damn, time for transport cars,” Mary said.

They all agreed and went the cars. When they got there, all of the cars were turned off.

“There’s something wrong. The cars are offline.”

Austin tried forming a portal but it wasn’t working.

“I can’t teleport us outta here,” he said.

“My powers aren’t working,” Aaron said.

“Mine either,” Mary said.

“How about we get inside?” Bruce suggested.

They went in and they met with Froilan. Austin was pissed off.

“This cannot be happening. I won’t accept this!”

“What?”

“No powers, this place must be rigged with A.R.M.’s!”

“S**t, I left my homework upstairs,” Mary said.

“Let’s go then, wait, you did your homework for once?” Bruce said.

“Yes and I am not wasting it, let’s go.”

They went to the bridge and before they could enter the Mindanao Bldg., a guard stopped them.

“What’s your business here?”

“Our friend had to pick something up from the classroom,” Bruce said.

“Only she goes.”

“Guys, wait for me,” Mary said.

She went onwards as the guys just stayed under the bridge, water pouring all over the place. There was basically a waterfall on the side of the bridge.

“I might know whose fault this is. S**t! I gotta get out of here now!” Austin said.

“Why?” Bruce asked.

“A few weeks back, there was this chick named Accel who caused that big storm and the blackout in the hotel. Maybe she’s back and she has another guy with her.”

“Why are you in such a hurry?”

“She might be causing major damage in the hotel and maybe she’s fighting off Janella in this weather.”

Bruce and Aaron looked at Austin teasingly.

“Or anyone else I care about, that’s beside the point! I’m going!”

“Dude, no!”

“Why not, Aaron?”

“Maybe we’re in a horror movie right now and Mary’s the first to die. I’m not gonna be the final girl, man. I’m too awesome for that stuff.”

“Oh, please…”

Austin rushed to the front gate and ran towards the hotel. About halfway, Austin felt a power surge and tried teleporting to the rooftop. It finally worked.

When he arrived there, nothing was happening. Austin then heard an explosion and looked at the side of the hotel and saw it near the tenth floor. He flew down and hovered outside the hole that was blown through the side.

He saw Barrage, Accel, and a male teenager, the shortest of the three who looked like he was only thirteen. He was in black and had a sort of cannon attached to his right hand with a cord with a needle at the end, inserted into his wrist. His left hand had a dart gun with a similar cord also attached to his wrist.

He saw Janella, Kyle, and Patrick on the floor with Berna and John left standing while the doors near the scene were locked.

All the doors were shut. Some other students were also watching including Nica, Lanz and Cedric, a member of the ASG last year who had force field powers.

Janella’s consciousness went back and she lifted her head and saw Austin.

“Decel, hit him,” Accel said pointing at Austin. The teen turned around and fired the cannon at Austin. He fell out of the sky.

He felt powerless and weak. He looked up and saw Janella jump out of the building and form and ice path in front of her and she maneuvered downwards. She made a U-Turn and fired a fireball at the third floor wall.

She fired a giant iceball at Austin and it was aimed almost perfectly at the new opening, chipping the bottom part off, causing Austin to roll and lie on the ground in pain for a while. Still, it was better than a full fledged collision.

She flew in soon afterwards. She kneeled beside him and helped him stand up. A few people went out of their rooms.

Austin sat up and they looked at them awkwardly.

Janella looked at Austin nervously. He immediately thought of something to say.

“Nothing to see here folks, there’s a pest infestation on the tenth floor.”

They went back their rooms.

“Let’s talk and run, what happened.”

They started to run to the elevators.

“You don’t want to take the elevators.”

“Okay, tell me what happened,” he said as they headed for the stairs.

“Berna and I were in the loft then a portal opened and Kyle and Patrick went through and said there was messed up stuff going on so we went through.

“John was there, fending off Barrage and I went for Accel. Then they send this guy out and he blasts me with his cannon and I can’t use my powers and I feel extra weak. I drop to the floor and Berna starts battling Accel.

“Patrick goes for Barrage as well but the guy shoots him with the dart gun as well. A few members of the ASG on the tenth floor charge as well and the guy shoots one of them with the dart gun. John crumples up the dart gun but can’t crumple up the cannon. Then you arrived and you know the rest.”

Austin tried using his powers again and they were back.

“I have an idea.”

They opened the doors to the tenth floor and Austin had switched the band to Power Sap.

“Need some bait?” Janella asked.

“No, not you.”

“I didn’t say anything about me.”

Janella stopped by Ernst’s door. He answers and Janella pulls him along.

“We need you as bait, Ernst,” Janella says.

“No, not him either,” Austin says.

“We need sacrifices, Austin!”

“I’ll do it,” Ernst said.

“Just walk in from that hallway,” Austin said, pointing at the hallway where John, Berna and Patrick were. “I need you to send laughing gas into the hallway. Janella, tell John to tackle Barrage as hard as they can out of the opening on the wall. He can scale back up anyway.

“Also, tell Kyle and Berna to help pushing them away. We have to isolate Decel.”

“What about Accel?”

“You can deal with her, right?”

“Of course!”

“Good luck.”

She ran to the hallway with Ernst.

Austin went to an alternate route and prepared a power sap to fire at Decel.

Janella broke the news and Ernst sent in the diversion.

John turned his body into steel and charged Barrage at full force. He tried shooting an explosion beam at him but John crossed his arms and shattered the beam. He grabbed Barrage and pushed him off the opening.

They were in free fall now. Barrage punched John in the face hard with a charged fist, knocking John unconscious and turning his skin back normal. He then took out his Telegun and shot it below him. A portal formed and they passed through it.

Barrage dragged John to the other side of the portal in the building they were in right now. It looked a lot like the Base. He kicked him in and stuck his head through.

John was now falling all the way down. Barrage stuck his head and one hand out, hanging on using the other end and aimed at the open field on the other side of the hotel. He fired a portal there and a big bulky man passed through the portal. He went back through his portal and closed both of them.

Janella sent Accel flying to the adjacent hallway, punching her in the face with alternating fire and ice, burning and freezing her.

She retaliated by shooting a flurry of wind at Janella, sending her back a couple of meters. She then charged for a kick to the face.

A portal opened near where they are and Barrage came out.

“Accel, Momentum’s back, let’s go.”

“Wait, where’s Decel?”

“Scarlet!”

Accel responded to this, looking across the hallway where Austin was holding Decel down on the ground.

Accel grabbed Janella tightly.

“Let him go or she dies!”

Austin fired the Power Sap at Decel and stepped off. Decel was knocked unconscious.

“I let him go, your part of the deal!”

“What did you do to him?!” Accel yelled.

“Power Sap, simple as that.”

“NO!”

“Oh, God,” Barrage yelled as he took out a cube that looked suspiciously similar to the UnVoStoC, an invention of Austin that could fit a collection of molecules in it regardless of size.

Austin soon knew why they had such a negative reaction when Decel began convulsing on the floor. His face began to “bubble” and soon, his entire body was “bubbling”. Everyone in the hallway watched in horror as Decel appeared to be decomposing before their eyes.

After a while, Decel stopped and he looked normal again.

“Is it over?” Ernst asked.

“Danny?” Accel said, worried.

Decel suddenly burst into a flurry of green light. Barrage spun the top of the cube which was a bit different in design from the UnVoStoC. He aimed it at the flurry of light and it all went inside the cube.

“You b*****d!” Accel shouted at Austin. “You heartless wretch!”

Austin was speechless.

“And you!” Accel said, turning to Barrage. “What is that?! What did you do to him?!”

“Not here, Scar, let’s go.”

“Austin,” Janella said, gesturing towards them. Austin still couldn’t move. That was the first time he killed a man as himself and not as an out of control psychopath.

Barrage and Accel had already gone through the portal. Janella suddenly came rushing into the portal. John followed her, presumably pull her back was too late.

Out of nowhere, a huge explosion beam came out of the portal, blowing up the entire tenth floor, also affecting the ninth and crumbling all the floors above.

Cedric put everyone from their floor up in a force field and lowered them slowly. Afterwards, he shielded everyone from the crumbling building above.

After all the carnage, Janella was in shock as they looked at the remains.

Cedric removed the force field.

“Janella, what’s wrong? Austin can fix this up in no time,” Berna said.

“Yeah, nothing to worry, right Austin?” Kyle said as he looked at Austin. He was still and appeared catatonic.

“Hey, Austin!” Lanz said.

Janella collapsed to the ground and just sat there and stared into the distance.

“Austin!” Lanz said, waving his hand in front of Austin’s face.

Austin snapped out of it and looked at Lanz.

“I killed him. I killed a person…”

“You’ve done it befo"“Ernst started to say before Austin suddenly stood up and grabbed him by the shirt.

“That was not me who killed that man, alright?! That was not me!”

“Okay, cool down, Austin,” Ernst said, trembling. Austin let go of him and dropped to the ground beside Janella.

“You okay?” Austin asked Janella.

“Pretty much. I never thought I could stand an explosion in the face like that,” Janella said, still in shock. “How about you?”

“No… I’m not alright.”

Austin switched the band to Time-Manipulation. He fixed the hotel up, with Cedric handling human transportation.

“Look at the bright side, it stopped raining,” Lanz said. No one minded him as they went back to their rooms.

The next day was pretty normal but Austin was still in a terrible condition.

During recess, he sat near the Patola Area.

“Then she just goes medieval on her a*s and starts punching her with fire and ice, fire and ice,” Nica said.

Janella was somewhat flattered that Nica was telling her story but she couldn’t help but notice that Austin was definitely not alright.

“Austin!” Janella said.

Austin slowly turned his head.

“Come here,”

“This should be totally awesome!” Nica said.

“Nica, not now, please?”

“Sure,” she said. Austin was thankful for this.

Austin stood in front of Janella. She gestured him to sit beside her. He did so.

She held his arm and cooled it down.

“What’s bothering you?”

“I just can’t believe I killed a man.”

“It’s okay Austin, it wasn’t you fault. They attacked and you were protecting us.”

“But still, I took a kid’s life. He’s older than me but he had his entire life ahead of him.”

Janella didn’t know what to say.

“Austin, just forget about it. Try to clear your mind of the incident. If you need help, I’ll be right here. And hey, you’re best friend is a psychic, right?”

“Yeah, but.”

“Look, just calm down okay? You don’t deserve this.”

“Okay, I’m a little bit better now.”

RING!

Janella stood up and turned to face Austin.

“Come on, smile.”

“I said I was better but not completely. I’m sorry but I don’t think I can smile yet.”

They went back to their classrooms.

During Computer class, they were studying Photoshop. They had to use feathering.

Austin put a picture of him miserable into a picture of the pensieve from Harry Potter.

Beside him, Jib was clearly having fun, putting the head of a student, Meldon, onto the body of a woman with large breasts.

Some of the boys saw this and gathered around Jib’s computer, laughing at his masterpiece. Austin couldn’t help but laugh at this and some of the girls were also laughing.

This stopped, of course, when Ms. Laurice saw it. It was okay since it put Austin out of his funk temporarily.

It was quarterly test week already. They were to submit a lot of portfolios for the week and Austin wanted to get ahead but wasn’t in the mood to do them yet so he fell asleep for a while.

He woke up at around 10:00 and panicked so he turned on his laptop and started to do the homework that didn’t need research.

After he was finished, he logged on to Facebook and opened a new tab to Google and compiled the Filipino portfolio.

This bored him so he decided to go to Facebook for a while but he saw something that caught him by surprise and sent him back into his pseudo-catatonic state.

There was a page named “R.I.P. Ms. Naj Vargas. We Will Miss You.”

Austin just sat there with a look of shock on his face. He was thinking that if this was a joke, it was definitely not a funny one.

He clicked on the link and saw people he new posting on it. These were not goofballs but serious people.

The first stage of grief is denial. Austin was here. He never had anyone he knew die since he was six.

The minutes passed and he was reading the posts one by one. Juniors and Seniors filled the page with some Sophomores also expressing their grief.

It had been twenty minutes and he still couldn’t believe it.

He scrolled down and saw a post from Sr. Peter, a CCF teacher, confirming it. It was real. Austin couldn’t believe it…

The next day, he arrived first. Ibarra arrived soon after. Austin was reading his CCF book when he came in. He put it down.

“Ibarra…” he said with a shaky voice.

“Yeah?” he said, setting down his things. From the cal m tone of his voice, it didn’t seem like he knew.

“Did you hear?”

“Hear what?”

“About Ms. Naj…”

“What happened?”

Austin hated to break the news to Ibarra but he couldn’t believe it either. In fact, most of the student body was in denial.

He went to DDN after a few minutes. For once, the hallways were dead silent that morning.

Janella and Nica found out about it and they were also in disbelief.

Austin stayed here a while to review when Maan and Anne Nicole passed by.

“DDN, later during the prayer, let us have a moment of silence.”

They nodded and Maan and Anne went on to proclaim the news.

Austin wished Janella good luck and went to the fourth floor where the CV boys were situated.

The girls of Sulu led the assembly. This batch of girls had been taught by Ms. Naj last year in P.E.

The prayer leader prayed the routine Our Father but then started a personal prayer for Ms. Naj.

“Lord, please protect Ms. Naj up there. We all loved her and she was one of the best teachers in this school. She made all of us feel special and I hope…,” she stopped blow her nose. The rest of the class was also in tears, whether it was physical or just deep inside.

“I hope you make her feel special up there as well. This we ask in the name of Jesus Christ.”

“Let us now have a moment of silence,” Sr. JM, the proctor, said.

They all bowed their heads and then the leader continued.

“Mother Seton.”

“Pray for us,” they responded.

“God has done great things for us.”

“May God be forever praised, Alleluia.”

“In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.”

They sang the National Anthem and the Panatang Makabayan after. This was followed by the Mission-Vision then finally, the Elizabeth Seton Hymn.

Through some wonderful coincidence, the entire building began the hymn simultaneously. It was a painfully honest singing of the hymn as everyone was, for once, united in the Setonian spirit.

When that was over, everyone sat down and they began the test.

The rest of the day was uninteresting. Everyone was just silent but it was a very sad day for all of them.

When Austin got back, he went on the page and there were more posts. Austin decided to post for himself.

“Ms. Naj, although we weren’t able to spend much time in class this year, we will still miss you.”

Austin then remembered the last meeting they had. They were barely listening.

He went back his wall and saw a few posts.

“Our last words to Ms. Naj were, ‘Good-bye and thank you.’ Little did I know that that would have a completely different meaning. :-(“

Austin remembered the day after he got a high score in AP, a lot of the teachers said hi to him but aside from Sr. Jojo and Ms. Mac, Ms. Naj was the only new teacher to actually say hi to him in the hallways.

He posted that on his wall and called it a day. The last words she spoke to him were, “Hi, Austin”. It hurts how hellos can sometimes become farewells.

The next day, the tests were Math and AP which were literally Heaven and Hell for Austin. It was a pretty straightforward day and Austin ended by submitting his AP portfolio.

On the way out, Sr. Dhani, a close friend’s of Austin’s, said, “Hi, Austin.”

It took a while for Austin to notice that he read his status and said Hi back.

When Friday finally hit, they breezed through the final tests. The atmosphere lightened up a little but it was still pretty melancholy.

Austin waited for Janella after the final test which was Filipino.

“Hey there,” Austin said.

“Hi…”

“Want to walk?”

“Sure.”

They walked towards the bus area while talking.

“How are you?”

“I don’t know anymore. I’m totally screwed up. After what happened last Monday and this news I can’t stand this.”

“I know. This really sucks.”

“How about you?”

“I’m holding up.”

“Nice one, Janella!” Rennalyn said behind them.

Janella then distanced herself from Austin. He looked behind him and saw Rennalyn with Marla (her friends from awhile back), Riez and Jem.

They refused and when Austin returned his attention to Janella, she was already far ahead. He ran to catch up.

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I gotta go and relax. It’s the end of the week.”

“Join me for a movie marathon, please.”

“I’m sorry Austin, I can’t. I gotta juggle undercover and relaxation.”

“It’s okay; you can have the weekend off.”

“Austin. We were attacked this week! We don’t know if they are on the Mastermind’s side or not. We don’t know what they want, for Pete’s sake!”

“Oh yeah, what did you see when you went through?”

“I don’t remember. I was hit by that explosion beam before I can make out anything.”

“I’ll ask Kyle to take your shift, just please watch a movie with me. Just a movie.”

“No, Austin. I’m really sorry.”

She held his arm and gave him a reassuring smile.

“You’ll be okay.”

“Want me to take you there?”

Janella thought of this a little.

“I would love that.”

Austin finally smiled after almost a week. He switched the band to space-manipulation and teleported them using the Space Loop. They arrived in the loft in Woodridge.

“That was cool, hey, Austin!”

“What?”

“You’re smiling again.”

“Oh, am I? Haha, I guess I am.”

“Hi, Janella, Austin,” Berna said.

“Berna, school’s over?” Janella said.

“Not really, it’s lunch time and I’m spending it here.”

“Why?”

“I just wanna finish this up.”

Berna pointed to a notebook she was writing in.

“What’s that?”

“Remember what we found out the other night?”

“What?” Austin asked.

“We found the base underground. It was like the last time only it was accessible and we didn’t need the Telegun.”

“You only tell me now?”

“You were catatonic and all of us were depressed, it slipped my mind.”

“Okay, okay, what is in the notebook?”

“We found this in there,” Berna said, taking out a rolled blueprint.

Austin took it and unrolled it. It was the blueprints for the Dome of Power.

“This is a Dome of Power! How did this get there?”

“That’s not just a dome of power, if you compare it to your blueprints, there are some minor changes.”

“Yeah, they took off the manual function and made the spoke in the middle bigger. No big changes.”

“Except for this component.”

Berna stood up and pointed her pencil to the bottom.

“This is what I’m finishing up. This is the missing piece.”

“Why didn’t you ask me?”

“You were not well,” Janella answered.

“Okay, I am sorry for that. Let me have a look at it.”

Austin took a look at it. It seemed vaguely familiar.

“How exactly were you planning to find out what it was?”

“It said S-21 so maybe it’s an element or something.”

“Berna, I’m afraid you wasted your time. This isn’t an ‘S’; it’s my symbol for Spoke. They extracted the twenty-first spoke from the rock and used it to enhance the effect.”

“What is the twenty-first spoke, then?” Janella asked.

“Power Give, the ability to temporarily grant another person powers of your choice. It’s the most useless power in my opinion and I believe the only people from the planet the rock came from that have this power are sages.”

“So what does it mean?”

“They might be creating an army, and if they are, the Mastermind has full control. S-20 or Power Sap has extremely powerful effects on anyone who was affected by S-21. The Mastermind might be using this to ensure that if one of his soldiers goes out of line, he can dispose of him immediately.”

“How? He only has psychic powers,” Berna asked.

“He extracted it once; he probably used John’s method for the Telegun and made a Power Sap Gun.”

“But wait, does that mean that Accel, Barrage, and Decel are on the Mastermind’s side?”
“Probably. We can’t conclude that yet.”

“I do think there was something unstable about Decel,” Berna said.

Austin began to go back into his pseudo-catatonic state.

“Please don’t mention that,” Janella said.

“No, it’s okay. I can handle it. Now I know why that happened. Technically, whoever charged him with that power killed him.”

“Why was he so unstable?”

“He was probably given the S-20 or Power Sap using the Dome with the S-21 enhancement. That was unstable enough. I don’t know if the devices attached to him were adding to that but I think I triggered the disparity between the Power Sap and the S-21. That’s why he blew up like that… because of me…”

Austin sat down and stared at the table in front of him for a while.

“Austin, you said it yourself; it’s not your fault.”

“I know. I know. Going back, maybe the reaction won’t be as violent if it’s on someone who doesn’t have the S-20 power”

“Like Barrage or Accel?”

“Yes but I won’t risk it. We can only use A.R.M.’s to disable these. A.R.M.’s are temporary. Unless you’re exposed them for too lon… D****T! I can’t take this!”

“Why? What’s the matter?”

“Can I have the blueprints? I’ll ask John to recreate this and we’ll test it on someone.”

“What?!”

“Or maybe a rat or something. I can’t risk it, not anymore. And if we make Power Sap Guns or some s**t like that, I don’t want you guys to go through what I went through.”

“That’s sounds good enough. I pity the rat though,” Berna said.

“It’s the only chance we’ve got. I’ll take this back now. See you on Monday, Janella. Just drop by if you change your mind.”

“Sure, bye Austin.”

Austin teleported away.

“Janella, how’d it come to the point where she takes you home?”

“He asked. He never asked before, at least this school year.”

“Haha… good luck with Austin.”

“Haha,” Janella said sarcastically. “Good Luck with Kyle.”

“You think they do this?”

“Don’t know, really. I guess so.”

“Oops, Time’s up. Gotta go, I got us a racing game, try it out!”

Berna took a Telegun and fired it.