School the next day dragged on, as I was really focused on the flashlights I'd left at home. As soon as I got home, I told my mom I needed to finish my bio homework outside, even though I'd already turned it in. 914Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpObdEntmxG
Thankfully, it hadn't rained all that much in the last five years, and though that was an extremely worrying sign otherwise, it was convenient for the box. I went directly to it and picked up another handy flashlight. In the better light, I could see the rings read visible, X-ray, LED, desaturated, orange, night vision, UV, and strobe. I turned it to night vision. 914Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPiyRz6nWEY
A pair of goggles popped out of the base, apparently hiding in the bottom compartment. I threw them on and pointed the faint neon green light at my house's shadow.
Since it was broad daylight, everything was cast in a way too bright green glow. I quickly turned off the flashlight to alleviate my sudden light-induced headache.
After my headache calmed down, I walked back to the crate and found a broken flashlight. It was in pieces, the battery's silver pouch broken open. That was probably the result of my crowbar failures. I picked up the pieces to examine it.
The lightbulb was shattered, and the stainless steel casing was broken open, exposing the battery and its contents to the air. Surprisingly, there were no burn marks, and I did not remember any fire when I first broke open the crate. I picked out the battery for further examination.
As before, the battery was extremely light. Inside laid a dark, crumbly sheet that looked faintly of lithium oxide. The battery probably didn't burn because it contained a flame-retardant plastic electrolyte instead of a highly flammable gel one. How would I know this, you ask? The label on the pouch read Li Plastic Electrolyte Flame-Retardant. Yeah, I'm so good at figuring things out.
I carefully put that one back in the crate and took out a working one.
Time passed quickly as I played with all the working flashlights. Each one seemed to be the same, though I wasn't satisfied until I went through every setting, X-ray, UV, orange, and all, on all of them. It took to dinner to go through four of them, so I sneaked the remaining four flashlights home. I tried to stuff them all in my backpack, but after it refused to close, I settled on taking two to school and hiding the other two in my room. 914Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7DVxowKI76
The next day at school was really cool, as you can imagine.
During Lit 1 Honors, the freshman English class for nerds, I settled on spying on the juniors next door. Mrs. Greene was not amused when she noticed the back wall appeared to disappear.
In PE, I showed my usual gang the flashlight. Jason was especially keen on it, though I refused to lend him any of them. I made Gabe orange, cast Jack in a desaturated light, and found out what the inside of the PE department storage room looked like with the X-ray. Mrs. E. was impressed, but that didn't stop her from ordering me to put it back in my locker before badminton.
At break, I switched to the other flashlight. I turned it on at visible, but no light came out of the bulb. Turning the ring did nothing, and there was no click to the settings. It was as if the ring floated above the head, instead of being part of it. Next, I pointed at my hands.
"They're blue," Robert said smartly. Jack laughed.
"More cyan," I said. And it was really more of a shimmer or a glow than covering my hands in blue light. I then trained the light-less light on Robert.
Robert's aura was purple, weaker at his knees and face, but strong elsewhere. Gabe and Jason arrived from getting food and we found Gabe had a dark green aura and Jason's was yellow.
"Does that make me golden?" Jason asked.
"No," Cole said. We laughed, Jason giving us a sheepish shrug.
Cole's was dark blue and though Jack tried to avoid the lightless beam, we eventually got him with it. His aura was a weak gray, with most of the color at his red shoes. 914Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2356Afzsdx
"At least you have strong feet," I joked.
"Ha," Jack said without laughing.
"What do you think it is?" Cole asked.
"Where did you get it?" Jason asked.
"Why are the colors different?" Jack asked.
I stepped back. "Hey, I have no more idea than you. I just got these things. How am I supposed to know?"
Robert eyed me suspiciously. Though his memories of past adventures were wiped, there were always things left over. He looked like he remembered being all-powerful. He looked like he wanted to demand exactly what my writer was doing, and that would be very, very bad news for the others.
"Well, they're kind of cool," Jason said before Robert could say anything. 914Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPDXzqHUDb5
"Yeah," I agreed.
The bell rang for third and I stuffed the normal one back in my backpack. "See you guys later," I said.
They replied with a mixture of byes and we departed for our classes. 914Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVT1GnYRrYX
