“It’s physically impossible. You are too powerful.”
“Wait,” I said, moving away from the group and backing up toward the door. “You’re telling me, my relationship with Lysander and the twins is the only thing keeping me from blowing the world to pieces?”
Dr. Fagan shrugged. “Possibly, we don’t know. In fact, we can’t know. What we do know is that you are different from anyone or anything we’ve seen before. We can contain that energy to some degree, but only to the degree you allow us to contain you.”
“I don’t understand. Why haven’t you told me this before?”
“You weren’t ready,” Dr. Fagan said to the silent room.
“And I’m ready now?” I asked, panicking.
“No, you probably aren’t, but you do need to understand the stakes, Kaden. Lysander, like it or not, plays a very significant role in your emotional equilibrium, not to mention your powers. You can’t dismiss and avoid him for the rest of your life.” Dr. Fagan looked over at the older woman who’d suggested it, and she blushed.
“I need some time to think. This is just too much.”
No one tried to stop me as I dashed out of the small hut and darted into the forest.
I found a small stream that flowed down a steep incline, and I assumed out into the ocean. I hadn’t cried in years—more years than I could remember—but the tears came unbidden now. I lay in a small clearing next to the little stream and cried for what felt like hours.
I really was a monster. I was the doomsday creature one of my foster moms used to read us from the last book in the Bible. I was the seven-headed, whatever it was. Did I even have the power not to be a monster?
I heard a noise, and somehow, I knew it was Dr. Fagan coming to find me.
He sat on a rock not far from where I lay. He didn’t say anything for a long time, just let me lie there and cry. “Son, I know this is difficult, but you have a right to know who and what you are. You also have a right, and maybe even a responsibility, to understand how important it is to control what you have, to keep everyone around you safe.”
I nodded. I wasn’t angry at him for telling me, I was angry at myself for being this way.
“I’m gonna tell you my story, it’s not as difficult as your life, but it holds some similarities.”
Dr. Fagan told me about when he was young, how he’d grown up in a very religious home. They believed special powers were evil and came from the devil. So, they kicked him out when he got angry with his sister and caused the plumbing to explode.
“I hated myself for having powers, Kaden, and as a result, I isolated myself from the world, living in an old cabin on the property I now own and live on with my friends and family.”
I sat up, intrigued by where his story was going. “Did you do something? Is that why you're so against isolation?” I asked.
He nodded. “It’s not something I like to talk about. I ended up getting angry when a man trespassed on my property. He was being a jerk, but what I did, well, he didn’t deserve what happened to him.”
“So, you did the same as I did, to the men in the trafficking house?”
He nodded. “I understand what it feels like to be a pariah. I understand how you blame yourself and how easy it is to force yourself into a small space to try to be small and disappear. But I’ll tell you now, that way leads to disaster.”
“Tell me how the community grew to what it is now.”
Dr. Fagan chuckled. “Well, I met Erudo. I knew about the school, but hadn’t paid much attention to its existence. I was arrested after the incident, and Erudo bailed me out of jail. He got the charges dropped, and he took me under his wing. He helped me overcome my hardships and became a de facto dad to me.” Dr. Fagan looked sad. “He remained that until he died.”
“You created the community after he died?” I asked.
“No, sorry, son, I digress. There were so many people like me back then—people who’d acquired powers either by being born with them or the ones who’d woken up one day with them. There didn’t seem to be any pattern to who acquired them and who didn’t.” He paused for a moment, and I knew he was thinking about all the theories. We’d discussed these in our orientation classes. One theory was that we’d become supers because of genetic traits. Others thought it was due to exposure to radiation, or other such chemicals that caused trauma to the human DNA... no one knew for sure.
“So, with Erudo’s assistance—” Dr. Fagan continued, “—we began creating guild-like organizations. I went back to the old cabin, bought the land from the government, and built the Water Elementals' winter clan. I continued studying at the school until I got my PhD., but we built that community over time into what it is today.”
He looked at me, smiling. “We used to call ourselves the mountain of misfits.”
I was getting it, seeing his point finally. “You think I should let Lysander be a part of this experiment.”
“It doesn’t really matter what I think, Kaden. What do you think?”
“I just wanna protect him,” I said, and the tears started falling again.
