I looked up at the night sky, thinking. The stream below me gurgled quietly and I could hear the crickets chirping. Farther off, closer to the desert, a lone coyote howl rose up. The others had split today, some going with the self-appointed king, some with the boy who just wanted this to end. But not me. I stayed alone, just as I had since the beginning. I was the neutral third party, but no one knew me. No one ever even considered my existence.

I knew them both, those two boys, Sam and Caine, so well it even surprised me. They didn't know me or know I knew them, but I did. It was best that they didn't know me, though. The lower hungry one would see me as a threat and destroy me, resulting in his destruction. Even if he joined his brother to take me down, I know the other could never kill me. No matter how much he hated me he could not, once he knew the truth.

I laughed. I had complete and utter control over them and their reactions, just because of who I was. They were far too predictable. I was surprised no one had been able to figure them out before me. But my planning, and my watching, and my strategy, and my powers had paid off.

They had no idea I had ever existed, and I knew their every thought and reaction and flaw. It was their blindness, their preoccupation, their failure to dream that would lead to their downfall. They believed they were two parts of a whole, two fraternal twins, when really they were two thirds of the puzzle. Yes, my cleverness had paid off, giving me the upper hand, but it also helped that I was their sister.

I looked down at the six scars that ran across the back of my hand. It was a reminder of my powers. My reading. Six bars. Yes, I was more powerful than Caine and Sam both. It was funny, really, that the sum of our powers, four plus four plus six, came out to fourteen, the last year of the FAYZ, if you chose to disappear. That may have had some significance, or it may not have. In the FAYZ, nothing was certain. Everything was constantly changing.

I thought back to when this all began, a few months ago. I had been outside the public school, and suddenly the atmosphere changed. A feeling of dread, uneasiness (or was it anticipation) had crept over her, settling over everything. Car alarms sounded in the distance. Intuition told her that all the adults were gone. I had to find him. Sam. Find him and discover what this was bringing to him. I walked into the school, acting like I was scared and confused like the rest of them, and from there I began to use my power to draw from the atmosphere.

This was my power. I took power from my surroundings and used them to my advantage. If I was near water, it would rise up, surrounding me, keeping me safe. Fire could be manipulated with my breath, blowing this way and that as I exhaled. It worked with intangible things too; I was currently drawing from the overwhelming emotions in the room and creating a mask for myself. I would not stand out. I would just be one more fearful child. No one, not even Sam or that intelligent girl he always seemed to stare at, would suspect a thing.

Sam looked tired. The smart girl looked contemplative. That strange boy who was a friend of Sam's looked terrified, anxious, and tearful. I almost laughed. He was such the opposite of me, him so neurotic and I so calm.

This new development would be an opportunity. I did not want to rule over anything, as did my other egomaniacal brother. I did not want to play hero, like Sam. I wanted to watch the horror show that would soon unfold from this. I would find a place where I could see but not be seen, and let the fun begin.

I had made myself several things over time. I christened herself Sarah, diagnosed myself as severely sadistic, and marked myself as a mutant, a freak of nature, a freak no one else spoke of or cared about. I had seen my mutant brothers. Sam attacked his stepfather, and Caine practiced his telekinesis with that attractive girl he went to school with. I found more sympathy with Caine, both of us the abandoned ones, the unloved ones. But he had found a family, I had been tossed to the streets, as if my mother could have known I was the worst, the one to be sacrificed. But I had been given the most power, as if to shield myself from the anger and fights the boys were constantly getting themselves into.

I was sadistic, anyone who had ever known me could tell. I hunted for food now, but even before that I hunted, just to see the animals' blood everywhere, the lights in their eyes going out, twitching and convulsing as I tortured them to death. I still took my time when I killed things, but less now because I had to make the meat count, or I would go hungry. I was incapable of most emotions. I felt hate, and a sick sort of pleasure, but not happiness, not sadness, and certainly not love. It was comical to think of me ever falling in love with someone. It was impossible. How completely wrong I was.