The Seventh Avenger

Chapter 7: Control

          Stunned, Betty stares at me, the look of utter surprise and perplexity on her face almost comical. She jerks forward and hands Bruce and I a blanket each, her eyes never trailing from the hand that I had used to show her my abilities. Silently, she sinks down onto the cream-coloured couch beside Bruce, who raises a hand to comfortingly grasp her shoulder.

           "How?!" She breathes.

          The smile slips from my face at this. "I can control the elements. I was experimented on and this is the result."

          She glances at Bruce over the corner of her eye, who only gives her a small nod of confirmation.

          "Did a company do this to you?"

           "Yes. But I don't know who they are."

          "How did they do it? I mean, people throughout generations have theorised that humans of high intellect could do such things, but there's never been any proof until now." An excited spreads across her face, the curious scientist in forgetting about the initial shock and realising on the potential instead. "Did – was there drugs that you took? Or some other methods they used –?"

          It is best not to move, Subject 207. It won't do you any good.

          Aching, throbbing, stinging, pain –

          "Please stop –"

           My name is Lydia Hathaway.

           Screams echoing off the walls –

           "Again."

           "Betty," Bruce quietly warns.

          It's his voice that pulls me from the memories that had swam to the surface of mind, ugly and unwanted as they forced me to endure flashes from my painful past. Fingers digging harshly into the palms of my hands – when had I started to clench them? – I quickly release them, flexing them out and forcing myself to remind myself that I am. I am safe, and I am no longer there.

           At the warning underlying his words, the excitement quickly dies from Betty's face as she looks at me fully. My obvious distress must show on my face, as her shoulders sag and she sends me an apologetic frown. "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be nosy."

           "It's OK," is my feeble response. It is far from OK, but it is not her fault. She hadn't known. "I just don't like talking about it that much."

          Pity takes a hold of her face as a silence threatens to descend on us at my words, though it's prevented as Bruce leans forward and says, "Betty, we came back to Willowdale for a reason. The data from the Gamma experiment that we did – do you still have it? Or does someone else?"

          Rather than answering, Betty pulls herself to her feet and walks across the room to a bookshop filled to the brim with books, photos, and other belongings. One of these belongings is a small and old silver jewellery box with delicate flowers engraved on the sides, and I watch curiously as Betty plucks it from where it sits on the shelf before turning and bringing it back over towards Bruce and I. She offers it to me, and I take it from her fingers, the box cool against my fingers. Gingerly, I lift the lid up and am greeted with the sight of a small, white USB stick which I am quick to pry from the box.

          "It's the data," Betty explains as I hand it to an eager Bruce, who stares down at it as it weighs lightly in his own palms.

           "I got in there and got it before they went in and carted it all away. A small part of me hoped it might have different results and tell us something about what we were intending to do someday."