When we get back to the school I don't really know what to do now. Mike's funeral is going to be in another hour and then Weaver has a meeting that I have to attend. So I go to my room and close the door behind me. I put my backpack down on my bed and ruffle through it until I find what I'm looking for. I take out the Book and sit on the bed with it on my lap. I don't know what made me think about this, I guess Mike's death really hit home. I had lied earlier to Hal when I said I didn't have any other pictures of my family besides the Christmas card and the picture of me with my siblings. There's a picture of everyone in my family in the Book along with their page. Some pages are so old the pictures are drawings since they hadn't invented a camera yet. I flip to the middle, where my family is. All the pages before it are my ancestors. I find my mom's page and see her smiling face in the picture. I scan the writing underneath it in her neat scrawl. Her handwriting usually wasn't this good, but she wrote with extra care when she wrote in here. I flip to the next page and she my face. There are two pictures, one when I was young and one more recent. Most of the writing is in my mom's handwriting and the last few sentences are in my handwriting. I read what she wrote about me and smile, running my hand over the writing. There are indents in the page from where she pressed the pen on the paper so hard. I flip the page and find Jimmy's face from when he was a toddler staring up at me. I flip through Marie's page, not really being able to look at it because that pain is still too fresh, but flip to James's page. James, he was the second oldest. I haven't seen him since he was taken, but I have hope that I will find him. My dad doesn't have a page in here because the abilities came from my mother's side of the family. He knew of course, but he never had any abilities. After James's page there are a few blank pages. My mom must've put them in for when her kids had kids. Now I think about how slim that chance is. Half of my family is gone or missing, the other half barely just holding on. I close the Book, resting my elbows on it and start to cry into my hands. A few minutes later I hear the door being pushed open.
"Laura, the…" the voice stops when he sees that I'm crying.
"Laura?" Hal asks and I hear him close the door. His shoes squeak on the floor a little and I feel him sit down beside me.
"Are you ok?" he asks.
I shake my head. "Not really."
I put my face back in my hands and I feel him shift on the cot. I put the Book beside me as he puts his arm around me and I lean into him, burying my face in his chest. I feel his chin rest on the top of my head and feel him shift closer to me, wrapping his other arm around me. We don't say anything; he just holds me as I cry. Five minutes later he breaks the silence.
"If we want to be at Mike's funeral, we should hurry."
I raise my head and nod. He stands and I wipe the tears from underneath my eyes and then I get up too.
"Ok, let's go," I say. He nods and opens the door for me. I walk into the hallway and wait for him to close the door. He leads me outside to the back of the school. Almost everyone is already here and I'm relieved that everyone wasn't waiting for me. Mike has already been buried and there's a stake with his name written on it. Jimmy comes to me and I put my arm around his shoulder. After everyone gets here, the service begins. Dai and another fighter unfold a battered American flag and Hal steps forward.
"Mike was a good man; a good father. I could tell from being around him how much he loved Rick. Like all of us here today he was faced with a decision. He could've run and saved himself, but instead, he stood his ground and fought for us. I'm gonna miss him. We're gonna miss him," Hal says and then comes to stand beside me again. I take his hand and squeeze it, hoping it might comfort him…and me. Tom steps forward next.
"If this was a proper military funeral, we'd have somebody playing TAPS. That's a bugler's song from the Civil War. It used to signify the end of the day's work and in a way it's a lullaby. To tell soldiers that all was well and that it was safe to rest. So rest easy Mike. We'll take it from here," Tom says and I start to cry again. He returns to his spot next to Anne. Dai and the other fighter start to fold the flag up and Lourdes steps forward. She starts singing a song that I don't recognize, but it's fitting for a funeral. Dai takes the folded flag and walks to Rick. Rick accepts the flag and Dai walks past Hal to stand behind him. People start to walk forward, laying flowers they've gathered on Mike's grave and walking back into the school. Hal steps forward to pay his respects and I follow him, our hands still joined. Jimmy follows right after. I turn to go back to the school, but Hal drops my hand and starts walking the other way. He just needs some alone time. I look at Jimmy, who is walking toward me. I put my arm around his shoulder and sadly pat his other arm with my other hand.
"Come on Jimmy," I say, glancing at Hal retreating figure on more time before turning and heading back to the school.
Later that night Hal comes to me as I'm staring out the window.
"You alright?" he asks and I know what he's referring to.
"Yeah," I say, "Mike's death just kind of reminded me of my family."
"Yeah, me too," he says. He's silent and I can tell he's thinking about something really hard, so I let him think.
"Listen, we need to talk… about what happened with Clayton when the bullet, um, stopped," he says.
I straighten; Tom said he'd give me some time, but I knew that Hal wouldn't. I had been thinking about what to say to him when he finally wanted answers, but now my mind is drawing a blank.
"Ok, um, let's go somewhere a little more private," I suggest and he follows me back to our shared room. I lean against the window sill and he leans against the opposite wall. I try again to think of what to say, but I can't come up with anything, so I just start talking.
"I never thought anyone who find out like this. I mean I knew that someone would find out eventually, I just never thought of what to say that could really explain it," I babble.
"How about starting with what "it" is?" he suggests.
"Right… well I guess it would just be easier to show you," I say. I walk to Matt's bed and pick up a ball underneath it.
"Hal, catch," I say and throw it. He raises his hands to catch it, but I freeze it before it reaches him. He tilts his head and looks at it and I see that his eyebrows are like up to his hairline.
"Wow," he finally says.
"Actually it's called molecular deceleration," I joke. I walk up to it and circle it as I talk.
"The very molecules of the ball are slowed to the point where they appear to have stopped. The ball is still moving, but the distance it's covering is so small that you can't see it," I explain.
"And you did this?" he asks.
"Yep, just like I did with the bullet," I say. I watch him for a reaction.
"Ok," he finally breathes out. I sigh in relief; at least he didn't run screaming from the room calling me a freak.
"So, um, so this is what I can do. My parents called it a special ability. It's passed on through your blood lines. With each generation, the stronger the effect it has. The first person in my family that could do this was my great grandmother and she could only freeze things the size of a fly and only for a few seconds. My ability I can hold out for a minute. Actually fifty seven seconds is the record. My mom counted, but that was a while ago and I think I can hold it out longer now. But anyway, I control this power through my hands, so when Clayton tied them, I couldn't use my ability," I explain all at once. I wait to see how he's processing all of this. He thinks about it for a second before asking a question.
"Ok… so how did Clayton know you could do this?" he says, waving at the ball in mid air.
"Oh, yeah, um, before we move to that though, you might want to get ready to catch that," I say pointing to the ball, "because it could unfreeze anytime. And when it does it's going to move at the same speed that it was moving at before I threw it."
"Ok," he says raising his hands.
"Oh and I can also unfreeze things that I've frozen. I don't have to wait for things to unfreeze by themselves."
I raise my hands and unfreeze it and Hal catches it easily.
"Ok well to answer your question, Clayton knew about my ability because he found something. Every family has a book that's passed through the generations. It has a page of each family member in it that has an ability. Like in my family, my mom had an ability, so she's in the book. All of her children have a page in there too. Now my dad isn't though because he isn't from my mom's bloodline; in other words he doesn't have any abilities. Now everyone has a page in the Book, just because you have the potential of having an ability through the blood in your veins."
"What do you mean by "the potential"? Do some people not get powers even though they're a part of the bloodline?" he asks and I'm impressed. This is the first time I've had to explain this to someone before so I'm amazed that he can follow.
"One thing that my family is big on though is that we say that we have abilities, not powers. My parents were very strict in pointing out that we are just regular human beings. They didn't want us to think that we have divine powers or anything like that, so they called them abilities," I say. He nods his head.
"And to answer your question, yes, you can be… "skipped over" I guess you could say. All your siblings could have abilities, but you might not. You still get a page in the Book though just because you are a part of the bloodline. Also because your children have the potential to have abilities," I tell him.
"This book, where is it?" he asks.
"It's… safe," I answer. I see a look of disappointment on his face.
"Hal, it's not that I don't trust you, but this book contains all the secrets of my family; our weaknesses and strengths, all the secrets of our spells and potions. If you were to accidently slip and say something, I don't want to know what would happen," I say.
"Wait, do you say spells and potions?" he asks incredulously. "What are you and Jimmy witches or something?"
"Hardly. The spells are more rhymes to help us remember the potions and the potions are ready just herbal remedies that our ancestors created because that was the only medicine they had. But they can still prove valuable, especially now since we don't have everything that modern medicine used to offer before the invasion. And Jimmy's ability hasn't appeared yet. Usually they appear when you're around thirteen at the youngest, fourteen at the oldest and he's only twelve," I say.
"So why keep this a secret; why not tell Weaver about your abilities? You could really help," he comments.
"Well if I need to use my ability, I will, no matter how many people see. It's just easier if everyone doesn't know. I mean, people won't trust you and some, like Pope, will try to take advantage of them," I explain.
"If it's easier if people don't know then why tell me?" he whispers.
"Because I know I can trust you," I say, coming to stand next to him.
"And how do you know that?" he asks a little pride showing through.
"Because out of everyone here, you're the first friend I made here. Really my only friend," I say.
"Oh, I'm touched," he says, covering his heart with both hands.
"Oh shut up," I say, playfully nudging him.
"Now why aren't you freaking out? I just told you one of the world's most kept secrets of all time and you're acting like it's perfectly normal," I say.
"What's normal anymore?" he says and snorts.
"True," I agree.
"Just one more question; what are you called? I mean if you don't call yourself witches, what do you call yourself?" he asks, turning to face me.
"I don't know; we never really came up with a name. Our ancestors didn't want us to think that we weren't still human or that we were better than them, so they never came up with one. But I guess that if I had to create on, I would say… the Silence," I answer
"Why?" he asks.
"Because for many, many years hundreds of people like us managed to keep our existence unknown and… silent."