Vial 126

Chapter 4

I awoke on the front table at a gas station. The cash register and all these papers were scattered across the floor.
Julius was staring at me, "She's awake everybody, she's awake!" He exclaimed.
Everything was tinted darker than normal. I reached out to see what was in front of my eyes, and I realized I was wearing a pair of sunglasses. I wondered what was going on once again. "What's - what's going on?" I asked very attentively.
Eian came up and started chattering. "You had these yellow eyes that looked like a cats eyes, you kind of looked like Catwoman."
I leaned forward. My eyes widened, even though I don't think anyone noticed through the sunglasses. "Seriously, what's going on?" I demanded.
Nigel walked up. "I told you there is a reason we needed your mind. You're magic!"
"No really, what's going on, why am I here, why did I even leave the room, why am I with you? What kind of joke is this? Really, did someone drug me?!" I half yelled.
I need therapeutic help. Too bad there are no therapists that are still alive.
Nigel said, "It's very important that you keep this watch on the right setting." He fiddled with my watch a little bit until it had some strange numbers. He continued, "If you need my help press 1 and if your powers are starting to make you feel hallucinative press 2, if you want to speak to me press 3, if you want to text message me press 4. That's pretty much it. Thank you for your service. Goodbye." He smiled, mimicking and answering machine.
Reba walked up to me. "Are you feeling better?" She looked concerned. I told her I was fine, and she continued. "By the way, it's probably time I introduce you to the rest of the group. This is Eleanor." She motioned toward the elderly woman. "This is Steven," she motion toward the little boy.
We walked outside to gas station door. The rest of the group started loading into the limo except Julius, Nigel and me. He stopped me and said, "There's one thing I need to figure out. I need you to trying to summon your power."
"I don't even think I have powers, how I'm I supposed to summon them?!" I responded. But even as I said it to him, words produced into my mind. I felt obliged to at least try, it was very tempting. 'Have faith.'
A voice said. It didn't sound like it was coming from anyone outside, it sounded like it was coming from in my head.
'Trust in yourself.' There it was again, and I thought at first that I was going mad, but if a voice speaks to you in your head, you might as well listen to it.
Ever since my dad died I had kind of slowed down on my faith. Suddenly, there was a burning glow coming from my fingertips.
"What the heck?!" I exclaimed.
I shut my eyes and kept concentrating, harder and harder. Finally, light shot up into the sky and fire hovered above my fingertips. I paused and concentrated on the fire. For a short time my mind slipped. Then it all went away.
"Oh no." My knees buckled and I started to fall. I stopped a little ways before I hit the ground. Confused, I turned around to see what caught me, then I saw Julius holding me. "Thanks." I said, embarrassed. I stood up and brushed off some dirt.
"That was a close one." He said. "That was amazing!" He said, "You know... What you did."
"Thanks." I responded. Roses of red blomed on my cheeks.
"Do you mind if I call you Kat?" He asked.
"No, I mean yes- umm, sure you can." My face felt hotter and hotter.
"One more thing, why do you always wear a hoodie?" He said taking off my sunglasses.
I shrugged. "My mission suit is not really my style."
"Neither is mine." He said pointing to his own mission suit it was short sleeved, but quite like mine in other ways.
We walked toward the limo. I didn't think Julius was really human. No boy would actually be flirting with me. I guess this proved that I had been drugged, but might as well enjoy it.
In the limo he explained that Mika had told him stories all about how 'nice' I was and how 'good of a person' I was while I was passed out. He also explained how she kept on mentioning that I had a crush on him.
"You act like you know Eian. Do you?" I asked.
"He was my former neighbor. Our parents were friends... He seems to be really hitting it off with Mika." I looked over to see them chatting. "I figured they would." Julius added.
"Well, you seemed reluctant on talking about your parents. What happened to them.
"I'm not exactly sure. Well, I know my dad is still has an apartment somewhere. In our apartment..." He trailed off "But my mom, she ran off long ago." He trailed off. "What about yours?" He asked.
"My dad got in a wreck while he was taking me for ice cream. That's when I lost my legs. As you can see I have legs now, but that's only because they swapped my body. My mom, well, you know that car wreck outside of the senior center? Well, anyway, that was my mom's car. That's where they found Mika. And also my mom is missing she wasn't at the wreck when we arrived. I'm not sure if Mika knows where she is or not."
He put his arm around my shoulder. I must've looked pretty surprised because he immediately backed away and apologized.
"Sorry," He said.
"Not you, it's just I'm not used to people actually being nice to me. In my old-school everyone made fun of me." I responded.
"Where here." Nigel said, pulling over the limo.

* * *

We pulled up by the base of the mountain. We would've drove up closer, but the terrain was too rough and Nigel argued that we needed to sneak up silently.
"Where are we anyway?" I asked.
"I call this the mountain of Teresa. That was my sisters name." He recalled.
"That was my mom's name." I remarked.
"The watches point to the building that this is where the gas was released from. Well, at least this was one of the places that gas released from. There were other places located all around the U.S. There is one for each state in America. But this is found to be the main control base of the west." Reba informed us.
"By the way guys, what do you think we should call this gas. Because I don't think the name 'gas' is going to cut it, because it reminds me of something totally different." Mika said.
Eian started to laugh.
Eleanor looked at me "Children." She sighed.
"Hey!" Mika said. "We are right here!"
I put my hand on my forehead and shook my head.
Julius said, "My thoughts exactly."
"Well, you know, I was actually cool and hip like you Younghans back in the day." Eleanor started.
A new and younger boys voice suddenly spoke, "Yeah, no you weren't." This was Steven. This was the first I've ever heard him the entire trip.
"The first thing that comes out of you mouth is smart comment!" Eleanor exclaimed.
"Okay everyone. Here's the plan: so Julius, Mika, Katherine and Eian come with me and Reba to go up the fort. Eleanor and Steven stay down here at the limo. You guys aren't in the right to fight. I am sorry if I offended you." Nigel apologized.
"So, that's a fort up there?" Mika asked.

* * *

On the long hike up the mountainside, we learned that if you twist the top of the watch, it shoots out a thin stream of flame that acts almost like a laser.
Yeah, in the process of that, we also burnt part of my hoodie. Luckily my skin wasn't scorched, we also found out the suits were mostly fire resistant.
"Sorry." Mika apologize for the sixth time.
"It's okay, none of us knew that the watches shot lasers." I told her. Nigel and Reba his a smile, Nigel bursts out laughing. "Wait you knew!? Why didn't you tell us?!"
"I figured you would find out on your own." They said.
Even after my sweatshirt was burnt, I still kept it on. I also still kept the hood up.
It took about a half an hour, but finally we reached the bunker. One time Eian almost fell down the mountainside.

* * *

"How are we supposed to get in?" Eian asked.
Reba spoke up, "We could blow a hole through online integrity of this bunker. That would unlock the bunker, but first we would have to figure out how to do that, and it might take hours. Maybe even days. Any other ideas?"
Before anyone else could speak, I turned my watch to burn my way through the electric lock.
"Or we could just do that." Julius offered.
The door popped open and I slipped in.
The others followed.
We walked through the halls, our footsteps echoed through the white halls.
This wasn't right, there should be some security. I mean, if you're gonna knock out most of the Earth's population, then you should have an army of people that aren't sleeping.
Loud foot stomps filled the air suddenly. They were coming from an upper level. We tried to quickly figure out a way to escape them, but they were getting closer. Left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot... They were gaining on us very quickly.
The footsteps kept advancing. We got a glimpse of their outfits, they were wearing black mission suits quite like ours. We tried to run back toward the entrance, but there was another group already coming from that way. So quickly, I told the group, "Everyone act like you're one of them." Saying so, I ripped off my hoodie and threw her to the ground and we started marching. We are marching fast for the first little ways, to catch up with the other groups. At first no one seemed to notice. We thickened ourselves into the group. We were going deeper and deeper into the group and suddenly a trumpet sounded.
A woman with a pretty robe advanced with a small group of people wearing red. They were all heavily armed with weapons.
"Intruders, come forward." The woman said calmly her voice was like an old England Queen's, Husky, strong, and had an accent spin of some kind.
At first no one moved, then the group of soldiers around us grabbed our arms and were plowing us through the group of other soldiers. They threw us to the ground so we are on our knees in front of the queen voice lady.
"Kill them, but not here, that would be too messy." She commanded.
The men in red pulled us to our feet and angled guns to our heads, forcing us to look up.
The lady looked up at us, her eyes were hard but surprised, like she was looking at something she's known for a long time, then suddenly she spoke up "Oh my dear. You have brought me prisoners and I nearly killed you. Why wouldn't you say something before I killed my beautiful daughter?" I looked around at my companions before I realized that she was talking to me.
That must have been the most confused moment of my life, because I had never met this woman. This was more confusing than switching bodies...
"I wanted to surprise you mother. I wanted to please you." I paused for a minute for effect. "One more thing. To make it up to me, may you let me kill them?"
"Sure." She offered.