September Writing Challenge: Powered Down

On the Origin of Meta-Humanity

Lani’s eyes snapped open. He couldn’t explain whether it had been a dream or a chill or what had woken him only that he was overcome with the unshakable sensation that something was wrong. He glanced at his clock. It read 5:34 am. Of course he hadn’t been able to sleep past six. Lani sighed and flopped back and intended to go back to sleep. His eyes drifted closed and his mind slipped into slumber.

Tremors woke him and it took him a moment to realize it was his power shaking his bed, not some sort of east coast earthquake. He sat up now and quickly calmed his power his eyes drifting to the door. He looked back at het clock. 5:38. He shook his head and got out of bed his bare feet getting a little shock as they hit the tile. Without explanation for his terror he raced to the door only pausing long enough to grab a sweatshirt and stuff his feet into shoes.

5:39.

It was when he opened the door that he wasn’t the only one. Ever soul in Hammel was looking out their doors and some were standing huddled together talking but all over was the air of fear. Lani wanted to find the people he cared about. He swayed and his power steadied him and kept him on course as he raced for the stairs. He jumped the last few and was lost in the crowd of people milling about. Some of the meta students were also racing about trying to find those they loved.

5:40.

Lani felt absolutely sick to his stomach. His eyes blurred and for a moment he fell to his knees. It felt like his mind was being torn apart. Oh god, what was going on with his power? Someone screamed not too far away and Lani didn’t even have a chance to look up to see who it was because he stood and was soon swept up in a mass desperate exodus from Hammel. He wasn’t sure why or where he was running he just felt the emergency and it overwhelmed his fight response and all he was left with was flight.

5:41.

The streets of Pilot Ridge were a mess. There were people everywhere, some calling out names others just standing there confused. Lani ducked into an ally and took a deep breath clutching his chest and breathing hard as he watched people in the streets desperately run in every which direction. His eyes started scanning but he didn’t see anyone he knew, every face that passed was that of a stranger and he felt a sting of worry. Where was Caroline?! He burst out into the crowd and became one of those shouting. He fought against the flow from Hammel. Maybe Caroline was still at the school. He shouted and run.

5:42.

He couldn’t hear anything for the ringing in his ears but he was sure he was still shouting for his throat was painful. Something big was happening he felt his power coiling in his mind it reached into the very essence of his being and Lani finally was sick of all of this running and flung himself upward using his power to propel himself onto the roof of a nearby building. He stood precariously on the ledge and looked at the turmoil. There was a blur of bodies and Lani smelled lightning but there were no clouds in the sky in fact it was too bright for this early in the morning. It was a mixture of color as people in their pajamas ran about and he watched with envy as people found each other and then everything stopped.

5:43.

Lani’s whole body went rigid and it felt like he was struck by lightning. His power roared as it buckled in his mind and for the first time ever Lani felt the distinct absence in his mind. He screamed and fought to keep the force. It reached out to him but it slipped out of his mind and for a moment it was blissful silence, it was so still in his mind and painless. Then Lani’s eyes rolled back in his head and he fell.

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It felt strange living here again. Boston had always been home but now that he was back with his parents and Caroline things just didn’t seem right. Partially because of all that had happened here, he had been trying to find Odion but he had lost the time turner back at Hammel and had been unable to locate him. Oh well. It was time to go on living again. It had been a month and Lani was slowly getting used to the silence in his mind and the stillness after the ever moving power. When Lani had woken he had been hysterical, he had landed on the ground falling from the roof and thankfully falling into a another person, who broke his fall but due to him had spent just as much time the hospital as he did. It hadn’t taken long for the meta community to be in uproar there were rumors that some sort of weapon had been used, some sort of bomb maybe. But then it was global and the conspiracy only became bigger. Lani was one of the conspiracy believers, after all he remembered how his power came to be and something like that didn’t just vanish.

He could still feel how the power was torn away from him, he could feel it reaching for him and he reaching for it and now it felt like part of his soul was missing. Lani sat in the middle of the room on the floor thinking about it all. There had to be answers out there somewhere. Something happened and Lani wasn’t going to stop until he figured it out. He stood slowly and filled a duffle bag with a few sets of clothing and his lock picks and gloves. Then he added his favorite books and his ipod and last of all a rather colorful bear that despite his powers being gone somehow still managed to find a way into his bed at night. It looked out of place stuffed in with all of the darker clothing. He sighed and closed it and looked at his cell phone one last time. Well, it was now or never. He had to find the answers. They had to be out there somewhere.

“You’re leaving?” His mother asked as he came down the stairs with his bag. He nodded. “Where?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Lani said and gave her a kiss, “I’ll keep in touch.” He did feel a little guilty, his father was at work and couldn’t stop him and Caroline was at school, he had said his goodbyes to her last night.

The bus was easy to find but where he was headed he had no idea. The bus just kept going and going through alternately crowded cities and abandoned farm houses. It was when the great obelisk rose from Capitol Hill that Lani finally made his exit. If any place in the States was going to have information it would be here. He stepped off and was thrown into the throng of tight city life. He called an old contact from Boston and got a meeting with the man who runs the underground show in the capitol.

Lani greeted the man and followed him up to a dingy loft in one of the more rough areas. “Thanks,” Lani said dropping his bag by the door and looking around. It was small, there was a bed against one corner and a bathroom off one wall and besides that there was a microwave and a refrigerator.

“Boris say’s you’re the man to call if something is impossible to get.” The man said sitting down on the bed.

“If that’s what he says that’s what I can do,” Lani said, “Information or material?”

“A mix of both, if I have a job I’ll let you know,” the man said rising and holding out his hand.

“Anything I can do,” Lani said taking the hand and the exchange of paper between them. Lani waited until the man was gone and the door closed before opening it. It wanted a priceless artifact from the Smithsonian. Lani’s brow rose and his lips twitched. Just what he was counting on.

Walking past a news stand a few weeks later Lani handed over a dollar for the paper. He walked and a little smile cracked onto his face. The police were having a fit. The headline read ‘From Boston to DC, Moving crime’ Lani loved the fact that he was in the paper, even though he wasn’t named directly, he certainly hadn’t lost his touch. There were a million times he had wished he had his power but hey it hadn’t been too hard to fall back into old habits.

Lani touched his temple and it pulsed with pain for a moment before it subsided. It kept doing this, but at least it wasn’t the constant pain from before. These phantom pains though were strange and sometime he still imagined he could feel objects in his mind. It was all so strange, but oh well Lani had a job to do. The Library of Congress. From what he was told it was hard to get into and so he was scoping the place out.

Entering the building sent a chilling aura down his spine, this place was powerful. Lani found himself distracted by the sheer size of the building and the history and knowledge he held. Always having been a fan of books and of history Lani was struck by awe. He couldn’t believe they wanted him to steal from a place like this. But hey, who was he to ask, a buyer want a book on meta humans and Lani was to get that for him and not ask questions. Lani was not a person, he was a job and jobs do not have emotions or concerns. But should he find said book he would gladly take a peek at it.

He got himself under control and started walking toward the reference section; he needed all of today to seek out and find said book. After hours and hours of searching Lani was starting to get frustrated and distracted, pulling random books from the shelves and pulling them enjoying the smell of old books. But on meta humans he found nothing. Literally nothing. It was as if they had never existed. Lani frowned and shook his head. When he asked the librarian she had given him a strained look and told him that he should get his head checked because there was no such thing. They had been wiped completely from the records.

Would a government really censor something like this. People knew about it, so why were people suddenly forgetting? Lani remembered, but perhaps only those who had had it before remembered. Perhaps every baseline human had forgotten. Perhaps everything was, so to speak, back to normal. Lani backed himself out of the great library after surveying the cameras and their angles and asking a few causal security questions. No one ever suspected someone asking right out about the security. Hiding in plain sight.

So that night Lani perched himself on the roof of the great library. It wasn’t hard, no one really expected anyone to break into the Library of Congress. But then Lani wasn’t just anyone, he was a shadow. Lani scaled the wall to the nearest window and slipped inside without a trace. He stayed to the shadows making sure he was no more than a flicker to the cameras. He made his way down the stairs and he pressed his hand over the walls feeling the hollowness behind the door hidden in the back. He made short work of the lock and let himself into the stairwell. Closing the door behind him he pulled the small flashlight from his pocket and followed the beam of light down the steps.

It wasn’t long until he came upon a small room full to the brim with boxes and stacks of books. He flashed his light over one and the first title was a familiar one. It was an encyclopedia on powers, one that was rather common at Hammel. He touched it and then placing the light between his teeth he started shoving books around and every piece of literature was about meta humans. They were trying to bury it. He went the shelves and there were old leather bound manuscripts. He picked one up and frowned it dated back hundreds of years. How strange. He grabbed one randomly and his brow furrowed as he didn’t see anything on the side or front to identify it.

He flipped it open and almost dropped the flashlight, this was from the thirteenth century. It was late in the century and the first page was faded and handwritten with the date, which he didn’t understand save the year. It was a struggle to read. It wasn’t until the later pages where the date reached into the early 1300s that it got easier to read, more legible. This was someone’s journal that was clear, a woman’s from his guess. She was in love but she was also in trouble. It was written in a strange language at first but it almost felt like for a moment that the text moved and spelled out things in English.

‘Such power,’ she wrote, ‘It’s amazing, feeling the rush of the sea and the power to control people and move things without touching them. It’s amazing. They say that I’ll be able to reach adept status by the time of my training’s conclusion. Magic, how can people live without it, it is so glorious. Just the other day I witnessed my master heal a broken leg by just touching it…’

Lani’s eyes widened as he read more. She wasn’t just a meta human, she had magic. She had all of the powers he had ever heard of and more all grouped in her one person.

‘Master Kevren is dead. I know it is Ja’lem’sa. He denies it but I can read the guilt in his soul, and he knows it. I am next.

No one believes me. But we have been dying off, no, not just dying off, we have been being drained and our bodies killed. I have seen him do it. Cha’risa may be the only other one of us left. We saw when Tharso battled him and his power was stolen and he lives in the reserves of Ja’lem’sa. How did he become so dark? So power hungry?’

The next few pages were smeared and illegible and Lani felt as if the woman writing might have been sobbing while she was writing due to the streaks.

‘That’s it. Me. Only me. I know what I need to do, and I have found the spell to do so. After this day I will give this journal to Tah and send him away. This power it is corrupting. It is too much for one person. Already it has corrupted my best friend and now he feeds on the powers of the dead. And it is starting to corrupt me. I know what I must do, but I am afraid. I know this price will be high. But I will do this. I will do this for Cha’risa, and for Master Kevren and the others. I will avenge them and I will destroy this forsaken power.

I know how to do it now and I pray to the gods that this will be the end that these powers will be destroyed and kept out of the hands of humans, mage or not. It is too much power. So before I give this journal to Tah I will write my name here. I am Adept Mage Mira of Stars, the Red Queen. Now I say farewell to this world. I only pray that I may gift the world with a future.’

The writing stopped there and Lani turned the page desperately but there was nothing more. This woman, this woman with ultimate power had sought to destroy it. But she had not succeeded. He felt a strange feeling of vertigo and he saw flashes. A man whose skin was gray and moved like a flash of lightning. He got close. He was in the library. He was in the castle and there was a woman her hands were raised above her head and there was a flash of light so bright Lani was sure he must have died.

No, she had not succeeded in destroying it, but she had broken it, not only for herself but for anyone with magic. The shattered remains had become the meta humans. That was why records of meta humans appeared soon after that. It all made perfect sense but what no longer made sense was why it was suddenly gone again.

Lani dropped the journal and the flashlight as lights flooded the room. How had he not even realized that the room had been filled with people all guns trained on him. He raised his hands his power was not going to help him and a quick glance around told him that he was surrounded. Blinded Lani felt more than saw when the men handcuffed him and the rights they rattled at him fell on deaf ears. But his focus fell on a man. He was so strange, his skin gray and moving.

“Congratulations, Mr. Hunter,” the man said, “You have figured out the game.”

“Ja…”

“That was my name before. They call me Legion in this world.” He smiled and walked toward Lani who was for once glad for the hands on his arms because his knees were going weak and he was terrified. Was he going to die? “I see you saw my sister’s failed attempt to destroy me. Clever witch she was, but not nearly as powerful as me. Though it did take me a little longer than I thought it would to figure out how to unravel it.”

“What?” Lani’s voice was found and it trembled.

The man cocked is head and smiled. “I have my power back and the Power is no longer broken and it is mine. It is time that you sleep now though. I’m afraid it’s going to be maximum security for you when you awaken though.” Lani attempted to back away but the man reached out his hand and placed it over his eyes before he was able to do more than squirm and a bright flash of light came from behind his eyes and everything went dark.

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5:43am.

Lani wasn’t sure what it was that always had him awake at such an hour but day in and day out he woke up and checked the clock to see that number. He sighed and decided to rise from his cot and move to pace his tiny cell. It was early when the cell block alarm buzzed indicating that it was time for breakfast. Lani moved with the rest of the people numb and bored with this gray life.

Before he went back to his cell he was pulled aside and told he had a visitor. He frowned, his parents couldn’t be back already, but perhaps they were finally allowing him to see Caroline. This doomed existence of his had been so long and he missed his little sister. But apparently trying to save his sister’s life was not a good excuse for becoming a master thief. Oh well, he followed after the guard to the visiting room and sat in the cell with a few tables and looked around before leaning against the wall and watching the door curious about who might be walking through the door.

His brow creased in confusion when a redheaded man walked in. He felt like he should know this man, perhaps he had worked for him once upon a time. Part of Lani woke up from the stupor and screamed at himself that something was wrong. He struggled to remember the name but as the man greeted him and sat down Lani couldn’t figure it out. Something stirred in his mind but he hit a wall and found nothing. “I’m sorry,” Lani said holding out a hand to stall the man’s sentence. “But who the hell are you?” The shocked expression on the man’s face spelled out that something was indeed wrong.