P.O.V: Elizabeth Harmon.
We had to wait a few days for my ribs to heal up before I could train again, but Jacob was sure I should be good today, telling me that we’d start after breakfast. It still hurt to move too fast but now it was merely a dull ache that id actually gotten used to. There was barely any talk as we all scarfed down breakfast. The others were going to come with us, but probably, as I’ve been told before, just to laugh at me. After we had all ate we headed for the Training Center, and my mind kept thinking over what Jacob had called me. A Connector. The word felt both strange and familiar at the same time, though everything in my life lately has been like that. But what else could explain what happened on the mission? Surely that wasn’t normal, and everybody’s reaction was just further proof of that, but nothing about me has ever been weird, or strange, or odd. I’m just me. My brother was the one who was odd, unique, and definitely weird- but me? I’ve always been the normal one in the family: I have friends, I do teenage things, and like half of all kids I can do special things. But I’ve, never in my life, been called strange. By any means, end of story. But now, it seems that that’s exactly what I am, strange because I have a power that, before, I had been blinded to. A power to combine other’s powers, something so odd that even Jake seemed to be scared of it, and Jacob doesn’t seem to be the one to be easily scared. And if Jacob was scared, I knew to be terrified. Jacob told me to stand in the section that was cut off from the rest of the room, with ‘Mutant Training Active’ with flimsy tape sectioning it off from the rest of the room. Behind Jacob, Donny, Renae, Logan, and Tommy stood behind the tape, a look of anticipation on all their faces, but Jacob’s was a look of relaxed calmness, with a bit of mischievous glint, as he walked over the tape and stood in front of me. His eyes were totally focused on me, clicking his tongue as he thought about something, when he said, without removing his eyes from mine,
“Renae, come here, please.” She smiled at Donny before letting go of his hand and walking over the tape to join us, and I thought I saw Donny hesitate to let go of her hand, but I could’ve been easily wrong. I was very distracted today. Jacob took his eyes off me to whisper something in her ear. She smiled at him and jumped back over the tape and disappeared out the door. I was torn between my burning curiosity to know what Jacob was planning, and my simply not wanting to know in case I wouldn’t like it. But, with me, curiosity often won out.
“Jake,” I said slowly, eyeing him. “What are you doing?” but he just smirked at me without saying anything.
Renae walked in holding a young girl’s hand with a boy that looked to be a little older than herself. The little girl was Mia, Renae’s little sister. I’ve been at the base long enough to know half the people here, and sleeping in the same room with Mia might help also. Mia was eight, with the same green eyes and fiery red hair as her sister, though there was something off about her, but I couldn’t quite place it. Maybe it was the way her eyes darted toward everyone and away quickly and back again, the way every step seemed to use up all her energy. Or maybe it’s the way everybody seemed to shift when Renae brought her in, the way they smiled so kindly at the young girl, the way Renae moved closer to her every time she moved like she was ready to protect her at any point. Yet, I couldn’t understand what it was, and nobody seemed inclined to tell me either. The boy, or man since he looked like he could’ve been well into his twenties or thirties, had dark brown skin and eyes. He wore dark blue shorts and T-shirt with a tattoo that I couldn’t quite make out since half of it went under his shirt. But it looked like a symbol of some type.
“Liz, meet Richard Barker, or Ricky for short.” Donny introduced us, and Richard gave me a polite nod and focused his attention back to Jacob, raising his eyebrow slightly in question.“Ricky, this is Elizabeth Harmon, one of the biggest dumbasses you’ll ever -” he didn’t get to finish his sentence before I sent one of the knifes at him, knowing he’d be able to deflect it easily. And sure enough, he caught it and was chuckling, twisting the knife between his fingers carelessly.
Jacob walked over to Mia and Richard and gave Mia a soft smile, whispering something in her ear. She nodded, her eyes had an odd far-away look in them, and pulled her small hand out of Renae’s and stood directly across from me, looking down at her shoes.
“Okay, Liz, you’re just going to throw this-” he tossed me an apple and I caught it easily, still confused. “to Mia, got it?”
“Okay...” I raised an eyebrow at him, letting my sentence tail off in uncertainty.
“Just trust me, Liz.” Jake said soothingly with a sneaky kind of smile that I didn’t trust at all but I conceded anyway. What was the point in throwing an apple to Mia, though?
I threw the apple up in the air and was going to use my Telekinesis to move it her way since I don’t really have much aim without it- but it didn’t happen that way. As soon as the apple left my fingers and felt my eyes start to change, somebody reached out and grasped my wrist. It was Richard, and his eyes were glowing a brackish- red. Or, at least, one eye was. The other was glowing a bright yellow. I know I Connected with Thomas before, but maybe it was because I now knew the cause, or because I didn’t quite know Richard as well as I did Thomas, but seeing me actually Connect with someone, it was truly freaky. The weapons around the room shook and zigzags of white hot electricity zapped across the metal and and before I could even scream out a warming, five of them zoomed toward Mia’s still figure, each sharper than a knife. She didn’t even look up, just kept starring at her sneakers as if they were the most enchanting thing on the planet, and the others made no move toward her either, just starred as the weapons flew toward her. I tried to pull my wrist away from Richard but he only squeezed harder. Didn’t he understand what was going to happen? Did any of them even care? But I soon understood why none of them even looked worried that Mia was about to be impaled. The moment any of the weapons got within half a foot of her, they disintegrated, creating a circle of ash around her feet. I gaped at her, my eyes practically popping out of their sockets. The others were laughing at me, Richard included. He finally released my wrist and held his hands up in surrender as I glared at him, but he was also still chuckling. Mia was looking up at Renae, who had walked over to her little sister, smiling proudly. Renae noticed me, and started to laugh harder.
“Do you really think I’d let my little sister get hurt, Liz? We’re not that mean, I do promise you that.” She chuckled and shook her head at me in amusement.
“We just wanted to test it, Liz, that’s all.” Jacob swore and walked closer to me and even though I was mad at being tricked, I understood that they never really would’ve put Mia in danger.
“It seems that your power is solely Connecting by touch, not just by proximity like I thought.” He said, gazing at me like I was a puzzle that he wanted to solve.
“And you seem to have almost equal amount of control as the person you’re Connecting with, though it did tilt to his side a bit but that’s probably just from surprise. But that could also be bad if you were to Connect with the wrong person.” He added, almost to himself, and looked over at Donny though neither said anything.
“Let’s try it again. Everybody, get back.”
They did, and left only Richard, Mia, and myself to stand in the large open space. I had no fear for Mia anymore, for I now had more fear for the weapons we were destroying in this process than her getting harmed.
“Wait,” Jacob thought for a moment. “See what happens when you try to use it differently.” Jacob suggested and drew back into safe distance.
Richard offered his hand to me this time instead of just grabbing it, knowing that he didn’t have to surprise me this time. I took it and gripped it tightly. I focused on two arrows and a sword not far off from me and felt my eyes start to turn, and looked over to see that Richard’s eyes were blackish-red/ bright yellow too. The three weapons started to zing and spark with electricity as they rose into the air. Richard nodded over to one side of Mia, the left, and with his other free hand, motioned to me, then to Mia’s right side. I understood: I send the weapons to the right side of Mia and he’ll try to send his electricity to her left. To be honest, I’d already forgotten about what Jacob had said, but I went along with it anyway, mostly out of curiosity. But I don’t really think any of us could’ve predicted what would happen when we tried it. The second that mine and Richard’s focus shifted from the other’s- disconnected, it felt like- I felt a pain race up my hand and through my arm, like electricity. I heard a shout from Richard as he tried to rip his hand from mine, obviously feeling the same pain I was. The weapons that I had been focusing on had zoomed toward Richard at the same moment that it felt like the pain had bolted in every inch of my body. I tried to concentrate on removing my hand from Richard’s- maybe if we both tried at the same time?- but it stayed stubbornly frozen in his palm. Just when the pain couldn’t possibly get any worse, blinding my eyes with pain so intense I couldn’t bear to move, frozen like my hand, when I felt myself being blown away from Richard. The second my hand had lost contact from Richard’s the pain was gone, as if it had never been there in the first place and I heard the weapons clatter noisily to the floor. My head smacked against the wall, replacing the pain but not as brutally. I felt a small hand touch my cheek gingerly, as if afraid of hurting me, and opened my eyes. Mia was crouching in front of me with a concerned look on her face. When she saw my open eyes, she cocked her head to the side, as if asking a question. Why doesn’t she just ask? I didn’t dwell on it too much, instead I stood up and looked around, the pain in my head all but gone already. On the floor where Richard and I had been standing were the weapons, jabbed into the now scorched floor. I didn’t even want to know what would’ve happened if we’d been standing there any longer. Tommy ran over to us, making sure Mia was alright before turning anxiously to me.
“Are you okay, Elizabeth? What happened?” He asked. I could see Richard behind him, he’d been blown into the opposite wall, but he seemed to be doing okay, standing and talking to Donny and Jacob in a calm voice.
“I’m fine, but let’s not try that again.” Unlike Richard, who’s voice was coming out as clear as a bell, mine was cracked and barely a whisper.
Donny, Jacob, and Richard came to make sure I was okay. And even though nobody really knew why or exactly what had happened, we all agreed on one thing: we were so not trying that again. Someone was tugging on my arm, pulling as hard as possible. It was Mia, her eyes were wide and fearful.
“What, Mia?” I asked, looking down at her. I wish she would talk already!
But instead of talking, she pointed toward where the others had been, safely out of danger. But she wasn’t pointing toward the roped off section, she was pointing to someone writhing on the floor, a look of pain on their pale face, their clear white eyes wide bright and horrifying, their vivid red hair stuck to their face. Red hair!
Apparently Donny was already one step ahead, running toward her, trying to pin down her writhing body as she squirmed against him. “Calm down Renae, calm down.” His voice was soothing as he pushed her shoulders against the floor. He didn’t have to wait but a moment before Jacob was pushing past me and the others that were blocking his way and pinning her feet down too. After a few minutes her body stopped moving and went entirely limp in their arms, and her eyes turned back to their former- and far less frightening- emerald green. Jacob let go of her, and after a long moment, Donny set her carefully down on the floor. She was sleeping? No, I realized, passed out. Richard- who looked like he had recovered far better than I had- and another boy grabbed her carefully and carried her out the door and probably to the Hospital. Mia quickly held the door for them as they walked out and followed right behind them. I had never seen Renae have a vision, which is what I was assuming that was, considering that her eyes went entirely white. I don’t really know what I thought it would look like, just her eyes changing, maybe her voice too like how some Physics do on movies. But not that. I never expected that her body would do that, that she would act like that, like even her own mind couldn't stand what she'd seen I know one thing, I do not want to know what she had seen. I turned to Tommy but said nothing, but he knew what I was wanting to ask anyway.
“She’ll be alright, it’s happened before, we all know what to do.” But he looked as worried as I felt, though it didn't quite seem to be for the same reason I was.
“Is it... always that bad?” I wasn’t sure how to word it without making it sound bad, even to my own ears.
“No,” It was Jacob answering now, shaking his head and glancing at Donny’s pained face. “It doesn’t happen very often. Not unless it’s bad.” He said bluntly and I shivered.What could she have seen that was that bad? And then I remembered that I didn’t want to know and tried to switch to a different though, but that wasn't easy.
No sooner had those words left his lips, had the door burst open and Kaylee raced in, holding two earpieces in her hand.
“We got a mission, or, you two do.” She tossed the earpieces to Donny and me without pausing. “A house on the east is supposed to be attacked soon, an old buddy of mine that's spying in an Order base let me know. I need you two to go in and grab the people in there before they get there.” We both nodded, even though the others started to object.
“It’ll be a in-out mission, better with just the two of them. Swifter.” Even though the others disagreed with her, they now kept their mouth shut. Because Kaylee was boss, what she says goes. Even I had picked that up, same reason that we follow Jacob's orders, the same reason that I decided to trust Jacob just now and do as he had said- because I trust him.
“Good. Thomas, make a portal, somewhere close but not too close. Maybe a few blocks away,” She told him the location and he did, even though he still looked like he wanted to come with us.
Donny gave me a nod and when the portal grew to the right size, we jumped in without much goodbye to anyone, and watched the portal close with a zap behind us.
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P.O.V: Jacob Wills.
There was no reason to stick around the TB, so instead we all hurried to the Hospital, not wanting to miss it when Renae wakes up. It’s often better to hear about her vision sooner than later, so you can have a hope of changing it. We were all sitting in those stupid uncomfortable chairs and waiting silently when it happened. Renae’s face had gained back it’s color and she was looking much better than before, but that didn’t mean anything. It was a little over half an hour before she woke though.
"No!” Her voice was so terrifying, so filled with fear and worry that it chilled me to the bone. She started shaking in the bed and, out of fear, Mia gripped her hand. But I was more worried about what she’d seen than about her current state of mind.
“Renae!” I yelped and grabbed her shoulder tightly, but not tight enough to hurt her, just to get her attention. “What did you see?!”
“Have Donny and Elizabeth gone on the mission?” She asked just as fiercely.
“Yes,” My heart sank. This has something to do with them.
“No! No, no, no!” She wailed and started to slip from me but I tightened my grip on her.
“What did you see?” I shouted and her terrified eyes stared back at me.
“The spy ratted them out Jake. They know that they’re coming,” She whispered.
“And they have orders to kill them.”
ns 15.158.61.20da2
