Human

48.

            Relentless beeping and an annoying humming sound pulls me from my sleep.

I open my eyes, but have to immediately shut them again against the blinding brightness of the room. The White walls almost seem reflective with all of the sunlight bouncing off of it from the two large and uncovered windows. I groan and bring my hands to my face, shielding my eyes more. The light is giving me a headache.

"I told you it was too much."

"Do you always have to be such a know it all? I thought she might like some light after having been asleep for three days, Carrianne."

"Must you two always bicker like little children?"

I slowly lower my hand from my face and sneak a peek around the room again. Carrianne is hovering at the foot of the bed, looking her usual beautiful self again. Any traces of the epic battle we'd just had were entirely erased from her. She smiled brightly at me, making her dimples dig deep into her cheeks.

Charles stood to my left, at the head of my bed, looking down on me with that happy yet worried expression he always seems to be wearing whenever I'm around. He too looks well put together again. His hair is slicked back, and his nice suit is without a single wrinkle or stain.

To the right of my head stood one of the most beautiful sights. "Garrett." I whispered, my voice a little hoarse. He smiled that perfect, beautiful, annoyingly amazing smile. I smiled back at him as best I could. I was still feeling a little weak, and my limbs felt heavy on the bed, but looking up into those perfect smiling blue eyes I hardly noticed any discomfort. He leaned down to brush the hair off of my forehead and kiss it gently. I could smell that he had definitely showered recently. "Where are we? And what happened? You said something about three days..." My mind was drawing up blanks.

The three of them smiled sweetly to me. "Darling, everything is alright." Charles told me.

"Yeah," Carrianne agreed with him. "You've been sleeping like the dead for three days, but you're fine. The doctors said they didn't know what was keeping you out, but that they thought you'd be awake soon. They were right." She grinned, turning her body to sit on the bed. "Cade, you should see your doctor, he is so gorgeous. Literally, like sign me up for med school please."

"Carrianne." Both Garrett and Charles said at the same time.

"She's fine." I said rolling my eyes and coming to her defense. Carrianne smiled and winked at me. "I do want to know what happened though." I repeated. "Did we do it? We won, right?"

"Baby, you did it." Garrett beamed proudly. "You should be so proud of yourself, Cade. You did it all. The Order is gone, and already there have been so many other Potentes that were in hiding who have come out and made their presence known again. We have so many more than we even thought. Everyone is calling you a hero."

"A hero?" I repeated.

Carrianne snorted a laugh. "Well I called you a superhero, but I got scolded for it." She said eyeing her father. "So we'll just call you a hero."

I laid back on my fluffy pillow and looked around my hospital room again. "I can't believe it's over. I mean, wow."

"Wow is right." Charles nodded with a warm smile. "I'm so unbelievably proud of you."

"And Cade, daddy has been elected to be our new leader." She beamed.

"Really?" I asked him.

He sat down in the chair beside my bed. "I was quite surprised, and I wasn't sure how I felt about it at first, but yes. Someone does need to be in charge of our people, but I will never run things the way that The Order did. I'll have you to kick my butt if I ever tried, so I'm not too worried."

"That's so amazing, Charles." I told him. "You'll be a fantastic leader."

I'm still a little in shock at how well everything worked out. Somehow our little band of rebels actually took out The Order, despite all of their tricks and brute force. We managed to outdo them, and the whole prophesy about me had been true. I shook my head. Who would have thought a regular California teen with a messed up family would be the one to save a whole class of people from their dictator leaders? Not me, that's for sure. If someone came to me before all of this and told me that this is where I'd end up, I would have kept my distance from them because they are clearly a complete whack job, but it was all true.

I couldn't fight the smile that spread across my face and the little laugh that escaped my lips. "We did it." I said to them. Each of their faces returned my joyous expression. That's when I noticed someone's face that was missing. I had been so focused on the battle itself, I had forgotten what had happened in the aftermath. I shot up in my bed, suddenly feeling queasy. "Derrek?" I asked loudly to no one in particular.

Garrett took another step toward me with his hands outstretched for me. "Cade." He said gently. "Hey, look at me." He demanded as he grabbed my face in his hands, forcing me to look at him. "He's ok." He smiled at me.

"He's ok?" I gasped.

Garrett's face lit up with his returning smile. "Yes, he is completely fine. He's here, just in another room. He had to have surgery to remove the bullet, but he is doing great."

I chewed my bottom lip. "You promise? You wouldn't lie to me, right?"

Carrianne slapped my foot to get my attention. "Derrek is fine." She smiled. "Whatever it was that you did to him...It brought him back. He was dead, and then all of a sudden he wasn't. The doctors were so confused and said over and over how they didn't understand how he had survived and that it was such a miracle."

"I can't believe it." I said amazed. "Have you ever heard of someone being able to do something like that?" I asked Charles, but he shook his head. "Wow." I muttered, then began to throw my blanket off of me.

"Whoa, what do you think you're doing?" Garrett asked, stopping me from getting off the bed.

I looked at him like it was obvious. "I don't want Derrek to be alone." I rolled my eyes.

Carrianne laughed and I looked to her questioningly. "Oh, he is not alone." She giggled. "Scarlett hasn't left his room since the second he woke up. Those two have really hit it off, and his sister is home from college to be with him too."

I smiled to myself. Now that she mentioned Scarlett, I remember him asking about her when he first saw her back at the warehouse. Good for him. Derrek deserves, almost more than anyone, to be happy.

As I sat back in my bed I noticed a certain change in the mood of the room. "What's wrong?" I asked Charles.

He hung his head. "There is something we should talk about." He said slowly. "It's about your abilities, Cadence."

"What about them?" I asked confused. Garrett sat next to me, holding tightly to my hand, and Carrianne reached out to rest her hand on my leg. "Well, whatever it is, I am sensing that it's bad news." I said dryly.

"Cadence, I think...I think you may have lost your abilities." He finally spit out.

"No." I said shaking my head. I focused on the flowers sitting on the table across the room and I willed them to move, but they didn't budge. I turned my gaze to the trashcan and tried to set the things inside of it on fire, but again, nothing happened. I began to breathe heavily, closing my eyes.

"Stephen?" I called out desperately. "Stephen? Please?"

When I didn't get a reply, I turned my head to Charles, looking deeply into his eyes. "Can you hear me, Charles?" I asked, but he only looked at me with a sympathetic expression.

This is what my mother meant by a high cost. This is why they both told me goodbye.

Saving Derrek had stripped me off all of my powers.