7. Hopeless.
'Calm down. Let them help you, they want to help you,' the voice repeated over and over around Alice. She had slowly and painfully regained control over her body, no thanks to the voice that had calmed her.
'Who are you?' she asked, drifting back down to the floor, wincing as she looked at the two unconscious students.
Somewhere, within her, she wanted to believe it was Blaine – that he existed somewhere in the air around her, communicating with her, but her better judgment told her not to. Not to get her hopes up high in case she was wrong.
'Alice!' John Simons called as he ran into the room looking very pleased, 'that was spectacular! I didn't realize the true extent of your abilities! Wonderful!' he praised her.
'But, those two kids… I… hurt them,' she quickly realized, trembling at the pain she had caused another human being.
'They will be alright, we have a hospital facility! But my word! I am eager to see what else you are able to do!' John Simons beamed.
'Would you mind I rested? And I would like to make sure they're alright, I want to apologise when they wake up…' she bit her lip. Alice felt utterly disgusted with herself for what she had done. They didn't deserve to be hurt, she had stupidly lost control.
'I'm afraid we haven't got that sort of time,' he replied looking at her intently, 'It's just one small, last thing I would like to try, alright? It'll be just us, no more students who are keen on showing off their own abilities, is that alright?'
'I…suppose,' she replied wearily.
'Okay, so we'll move into my office for this, I fear this room might not hold out much longer,' he said with a grin, clearly still admiring Alice's powers.
The walk along the cold, grey corridors filled Alice with more apprehension as they got closer to John Simons' office. She wasn't sure what he meant by seeing what else she could do.
'Now, this won't take too long,' he started once they had sat down in the soft sofas under a large window, 'so, let's get started!'
'Alright…'
'So, I've been wondering about what you are able to do,' he began, 'and I do wonder indeed, if you are able to channel everything you've copied, or taken, into someone else. That is what we're going to test right now!'
He sat
there, waiting for something to happen, leaving Alice to decide what
to try and channel to him. 'As if I can, though… it's
impossible. How would I even consider doing something like that?'
she thought to herself.
Knowing
full well that he wouldn't be satisfied until it worked, or until
something happened, Alice decided that if she was going to try, she'd
channel the map of the school she had found useful.
So she
sat and looked into his eyes and opened up the door, but this time,
instead of jumping into his mind without restraint, she tried to
heave the image of the school through, with her. At first it was as
though it refused to budge from her mind, but with a few pulls it
fell through into his mind.
'That was… easy,' she whispered in surprise, looking at John Smith, who had a look of wonder on his face. 'I cannot believe that worked,' he thought cheerfully.
'A map to the school, nice. That must be quite handy!' he applauded her.
'Can I go now?' Alice sighed, glancing around the room. The blinds were down and the window was covered by a heavy maroon curtain; she had absolutely no idea what time it was, or what it could possibly be.
'One
more thing, okay? Let's try channeling abilities. You took that
boy's abilities to produce electrical currents, let's see if you
can pass it on,' he leaned over, looking at Alice right in her
eyes. Alice, too tired to fight simply sighed and nodded. She really
wanted to leave and to sleep for the next ten years.
Once
again she pin-pointed the boy's powers, which surprisingly were
still within her, and attempted to push it into his mind. Though,
strangely, it was a lot harder to channel than the map – it
required more energy than she had anticipated, so as soon as she was
done she collapsed into the sofa, struggling to keep her eyes open.
John
Simons' eyes were wide open. He could feel the power flowing
into his being, he could feel the power within him right now;
as if it were trying to adapt itself to a new body, trying to alter
his own body to better suit itself.
He looked
at the tired girl on the sofa and smiled, this girl is his very own
source to total, unlimited power.
'Is it ready?'
'We need to wait for her to awaken.'
Alice moaned softly, opening her eyes slowly.
'Sir? She's moving.'
She cringed at the blaring lights that were aimed directly at her, so she looked helplessly to the floor.
'Ah, Alice, you're awake! Wonderful!'
Alice tried to make out how many others were near her, but the lights were blinding, forcing her to keep her head down. She attempted to lift her arms up to shelter her eyes from the light but she couldn't move them – her limbs had been fastened down to the hard, rigid chair.
'Uhh,' she moaned, realizing that she was indeed, trapped.
'Don't mind the harnesses, don't… mind,' Simons' trailed off, not bothering to finish his sentence. The light that was hurting Alice's eyes suddenly ceased to reach her, and cautiously she let her eyelids flutter up, only to meet to hard stare of Simons.
'What are you doing? Where am I?' she asked, most defiantly confused.
'Lab 24 C, I'm sure it'll look familiar. We are here to finish the experiment,' he answered, clearly becoming anxious.
'But you know everything I can do, why are you doing this?' Alice pleaded.
"You can enhance any mutant's powers. There is no way that you can leave here without us knowing how much another can gain from you," he crossed his legs and peered at her, 'it's simple really. I've graciously allowed myself to be the subject of this experiment,. All you need to do is copy my powers – my original powers – and then return them to me.'
'No!' her jaw dropped. He was using her like one would use a machine, an object. She tried to escape, wildly thrashing about in her chair, whilst he looked at her, grinning. 'That electricity power you took! Use that,' the thought suddenly appeared in front of her. She grinned back at him and threw a bolt at him.
Or, at least she thought she did.
Though, there was nothing visibly wrong with him – apart from that sick grin.
She looked up at him, completely confused.
Of course… it was only logical. If she gave powers away, they would leave her for good. It made sense.
'Damn,' she thought, already giving up.
'Realized it was useless? Look at me,' he got right up to her face and held her chin in his hand, not releasing his stare.
'No,' she replied, deciding not to give in.
'Do not push me, if you do not use your powers I will force you to,' he told her in a deadly voice, and in response to stared defiantly at the ground. And out of nowhere a intense pain ran through her body, she looked up, hurt and baffled.
'That's right. You forget that I have both my pow- abilities, and Jake's. Power over biological matter and the ability to create electrical currents, now, will you do as I say?' he fired another bolt at her body, causing Alice to cry out loud in pain.
'Alright! Just, stop hurting me!' She yelped as yet another invisible bolt hit ran through her.
His mind was clean and sterile, just like the buildings he worked in, and similar to those very same buildings, it got dirtier as she continued through. Memories tried to make their presence known to her; memories of all the times he hurt other mutants that could steal powers to try and use it for his own gain; mutants that didn't make it any further than where she is now. The shock sent her straight back into her own body and she retched, gagging at the site; at this twisted man's mind.
All those other helpless human beings that he had used and killed for his own sick gain started filling her whole being with anger – pure hate.
'You…killedthem,' she muttered, her anger still rising.
'They aided me and my research,' he replied flippantly, waving his hand as if it were nothing.
'You are sick and you are twisted, and I will NEVER help you!' she boomed, and at that moment she realized that her body still contained some remnants of Chontelle's telekinesis. The bonds around her wrists and ankles rattled, trying to loosen themselves so that she could escape – her mind busy trying to pull out whatever power she could find. This was the only way she could escape – she had to leave, she had to get help.
Fellow
doctors flooded into the room upon hearing the commotion that was
occurring within, trying to use their own powers to calm her down.
John Simons, however, waved his hand, telling them to stop. She would
burn out soon enough.
Alice
didn't notice his indifference as the bonds snapped and she raised
herself in the air and flew towards a set of double-doors. Using as
much power she could muster, she forced the structures apart and
raced out of the room.
As soon as she left the room, her battle to maintain control began. Her mind couldn't handle the over-bearing nature of enhanced telekinesis much longer. Her vision went white, and she felt her body slam into a wall.
'Just…let my…find my…friends,' she winced, pleading to herself.
Why was it so hard for her to maintain control? Was Chontelle naturally crazy? Wild? What was it?
Determined to find and rescue her friends, she forced herself to keep flying, despite being thrown around like a ragdoll.
But she had no control.
She had to admit it.
She was hopeless.
'Just go.'
It was back.
'Blaine!' she screamed, 'HELP ME!'
A brief wispy outline formed in front of her, but it was so vague Alice almost instantly began to question if it was real or not.
It's mouth moved, but the sound came from all around her.
'Just go,' it repeated.
'I can't! Not on my own!' she cried, trying to see Blaine's faint image as it faded out of view.
She felt her anger die away as she half ran, half flew despondently through the halls, throwing herself around the corners and out into the facility's grounds.
She was greeted by a sudden cold darkness that she knew wasn't going to relent, but she had gotten too far to stop, and there was only one obstacle left.
The fence stood tall above her, only about ten meters away – far enough not to start nullifying her powers – she knew that if she got too close she would be far too weak to climb it, so she was forced to use her second option – to destroy it, or fly over it.
She poured as much of her powers into making the fence move, and after feeling like her head was going to explode it submitted to her powers and a small portion of it fell before her, and with a solemn look set on her face, she ran outside the compound, jumped and began to fly as far as she could carry herself.
A/N: Done! (...or is it?) Hehe! Thanks to everyone who got this far through the story thus far!
