Chapter 10: Is there a connection?

Sept. 1, 2015

Things were finally starting to go somewhere with Jessica. The two of them were walking through the park in the middle of a nice conversation, when suddenly, time stopped.

Rick wanted to swear.

He had specifically told Cadi not to do anything!

For a moment, he stood there impatiently tapping his foot and starting his stopwatch.

But then his head started to hurt.

It came on suddenly and without warning, and he had to sit down for a second.

As the headache started to slowly fade, he started to wonder what his sister was doing…

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“Are you ready?” Juno asked as they looked over their handiwork.

“Yeah. Do you think putting the car in park will help stop it?”

“I hope so. Just in case, everybody is out of the way.”

“Ok.”

Cadi took a deep breath, her head still hurting a little bit, and unpaused time.

Chaos came immediately, which now seemed weird since they had time paused for such a long time. The car lurched to a stop, and kids were running to parents crying, and adults were freaking out...

The car kept running. Cadi wondered what it would do next.

Before any of the adults could see that there was no one inside, it seemed to put itself in reverse before driving off. There were no license plates.

Juno and Cadi stood there dumbfounded amidst the chaos.

“Yes-some crazy driver almost hit-.” they heard one of the adults say over the phone, probably to 911.

“Do you think anyone realized that there was no driver?” Juno asked so only Cadi could hear. She shrugged.

“I guess we forgot how fast this all really happened. I paused time for us, so we had time to let it all sink in.”

“I guess you’re right.”

A few moments later, Cadi’s mom showed up.

“Does your mom know you can stop time?” Juno asked quietly as he watched Cadi’s very confused mother step out of the car.

“Yeah. Hi Mom.”

“Cadi? What happened here?”

Juno and Cadi looked at each other.

“It’s a long story.” she said flatly.

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Harry was still hiding in the bushes when his girlfriend finally showed up again.

“What were you thinking?!” he exploded in an angry whisper. “You almost killed a bunch of little kids!!”

“But I didn’t.” she sneered, grabbing the camera. Harry folded his arms disapprovingly.

“I take it you didn’t ask West permission if you could use his car? He’s been working on that thing for months now.”

“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

“Does he even know about the additions you’ve added?”

“Nope.”

Harry narrowed his eyes as the two of them walked to their car. As soon as they got in the car, Emille turned on the camera to see if she could find anything.

“I didn’t really see anything unusual just so you know.” her boyfriend said a bit grumpily. Emille smiled as she watched the footage he had taken.

“You did, but you just didn’t realize it…”

“What?”

“Look.” She told him, starting the captured footage from the beginning. She paused it right before the car crashed into the group of people.

“Ok. Now notice where everyone is positioned right here. If we fast forward just a little bit…”

Harry’s eyes grew wide.

“Everyone is in a different spot…”

“Exactly. And did you notice one of the windows of the car is gone? Not broken, just gone.”

“Man you're observant…”

“Thanks hon. Just one more thing-in this footage you've captured, do you notice anyone who doesn't even seem mildly concerned about what had just happened?”

Harry watched carefully as he looked at the recording.

“Those two kids. Right there.” He said finally, pointing. “The little girl in pigtails and that little Mexican boy.”

“I think the two of them may have had contact with something in the time stream. It's just a hunch, but as you know, my hunches are usually right.”

Harry rolled his eyes.

“Wait a second!” He exclaimed suddenly, bending down to get a closer look at the screen. “Isn't that the little girl that was in our yard the other day?”

Emille’s eyebrows furrowed forward as she studied the screen.

“Is it?”

“I think so.”

“Hmmm…”

“No. I’m positive. That’s her. I swear it is.”

“Well I guess we know she’s friends with whoever lives here. Maybe we should keep an eye on her…”

Harry nodded. “Yeah. Maybe somehow our machine transferred some of the energy to her accidentally. She wasn’t wearing lead aprons like we were, and she was kind of in close proximity. I hope some of the energy doesn’t bring unexpected consequences. I’d hate for anyone to get hurt.”

Emille nodded absentmindedly, staring at the little girl on the small screen of their camera.

“Yes… That would be a shame now wouldn’t it?”

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“What happened at the party?” Rick asked immediately and jumping up from the couch as Cadi and her mother came through the door. His mother sighed.

“There was a car that almost hit some of the kids.”

“WHAT.” Their father exploded, dropping the remote to the television.

“Don’t worry. No one was hurt. Cadi was able to act quickly and get everyone out of the way with her… new ability.”

“They get the license plate number on the guy?”

“Apparently there was no license plate…”

As their mother tried to calm down their father, who was rambling about how Cadi’s new power just might lead into trouble, Rick regarded his little sister with concern.

“Are you ok Cadi? You look… tired.”

Cadi rubbed her head subconsciously, wincing.

“...Yeah… How did your date go?”

“It was fine.”

“Good…”

Rick stood there folding his arms as she weakly gave him a thumbs up.

“Did you get a headache earlier?” he asked suddenly. Slowly, she nodded.

“Hmmm. What did you do that caused it?”

“I turned glass to sand.”

“What?! Really?”

“Yeah…”

Cadi didn’t say anything else, obviously not feeling well. Rick scratched the back of his head.

“I… also got a headache earlier…” he told her quietly. Cadi blinked.

“Do-do you think that maybe…”

“I don’t know. Did you get the headache a few minutes after pausing time?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s when I got mine. Maybe they’re connected somehow…”

“Maybe.”

The two of them glanced at their parents. Their father had calmed down now, and their mother seemed to be talking to him about super human abilities.

“I think I’m going to go lay down…” Cadi mumbled, drudging off to her room.

“Ok... Get some rest.”

Cadi ended up sleeping the rest of the day and all through the night. At first, Rick was starting to get a little bit worried about her, but when she woke him up by barging into his room the next morning, she seemed perfectly fine and chipper.

After church, Rick did something he hardly ever did.

He invited Cadi into his room.

“So what do you want to do?” she asked, trying to be careful not to touch anything. Last time she touched something in his room, it had broken and he had yelled at her. Even though she knew she could fix it now, she still wanted to be careful.

Rick jumped on his bed and pulled out a notepad and pen.

“I want to write a list of all the things that are easy for you to do things with and all the things that are hard for you.”

“What do you mean?”

“For example-things like wood-or your pencil or backpack were easier for you to rewind right?”

“Yeah.”

“But the banana and the glass on the car weren’t easy at all.”

Slowly, the eight year old slid onto his bed and sat criss cross applesauce from him.

“No. I still can’t do the banana at all. I tried again this morning cause I wanted to practice.”

Rick tapped the pencil a bit disapprovingly on his chin, trying to think.

“As I said before Cadi, don’t strain yourself. You did something very difficult yesterday, so try to take it easy today.”

“Fiiiine.”

The eight year old watched as he made two columns, one labeled easy, and one hard.

“What else is easy for you?”

“Um… Electronics. Like your laptop. And clothes. Clothes are super easy. And toys.”

Rick wrote those things down.

“Ok. So we know glass and bananas are hard for you, but is there anything else?”

Cadi thought about it.

“Plants.”

“Plants?”

“Yeah. You know like on that movie ET where he does the thing with the flower? I wanted to do that too, and I think I can do it, but when I tried it out…”

Rick tapped the pencil on his chin again.

“Hmmm. Maybe you have a hard time on organic matter.”

“What does that mean?”

“Things that are living or used to be alive. And then there’s glass. Maybe glass is just really hard for you for some reason.”

“Maybe…”

The two of them sat in silence for a moment, considering these things.

“And another thing…”

“Yeah?”

Rick bit his lip, and then hesitantly put down the notepad, where Cadi could see the lists he had written down. Her bigger brother took a deep breath.

“I have a feeling Dad might be right. Your… powers might bring trouble…” Cadi rolled her eyes.

“So what-you don’t want me to tell anybody else right? I’m not stupid Rick.” Her brother shook his head.

“No. That’s not what I was going to say…”

At that moment, he looked around and then pulled a little piece of paper from his pocket.

“I found this taped to my bedpost when we got back from church today.”

Cadi reached for it and opened up the folded piece of paper.

Get ready.

Something’s coming.

-T

Cadi stared at the note, feeling goosebumps travel up her spine.

It was the same mysterious T that had given them a note before.

“But… what are we supposed to get ready for?” she asked, puzzled. “What’s coming?” In response to this, Rick shrugged.

“I don’t know… But I think what it means, is that you need to practice with your powers and get ready for whatever might be coming.”

Cadi swallowed.

When she first got this power, she simply thought it was going to be fun. But now, she started to wonder if it was really worth it all.

Were they in danger?

What was coming?

Cadi scratched her knee nervously.

“You-you’ll help me right Rick? And-and you’ll help protect me if something bad happens right?” Rick rolled his eyes, giving her one of his awkward teenage smiles where it was only on one side of his face.  

“Of course you weiner. You want to play Turtles through Time with me on the super nintendo?”

At this Cadi’s eyes lit up.

“Yeah!!!”