All of the Soldiers are here when we return for dinner.
I spot Nox sitting with Diego at one of the tables in the far corner of the mess hall. They're not speaking to each other—just eating whatever it is they gave us for our final meal of the day. I bring my own tray over to their table, weaving through the throng of bodies. The Freak from earlier is still fresh in my mind, but I push it down as far as it can go. No one can know. No one.
Nox looks up when I slide my food onto the surface opposite his chair, nodding once in greeting. I nod myself, lowering into the chair slowly. It takes a full thirty seconds of trying to find a comfortable position atop the chair to realize my muscles from the fight with the Freak earlier do not feel normal. I must have been unconscious for a long time if I'm feeling like this.
Even though using my abilities against the Freak made me slightly weaker, I've never felt so powerful before.
"Rough morning?" Diego says from next to me, his spoon still in his hand and slightly dripping with the stew they gave us.
I nod once slowly, the feeling of the Freak's abilities against me and the fact that he had multiple powers still weighing heavily on my mind. Trying to push it away feels fruitless now; it's all I can think about. "To say the least," I reply quietly.
Diego agrees with a deep hum in his throat and goes back to eating, not saying anything else to either of us as he spoons food into his mouth and looks around the room at all the other Soldiers.
It's only when I turn away from facing Diego do I realize Nox is staring right at me, his brows raised in question. What happened to you? he asks inside my head. Did you find any more Freaks? Taylor and I were trying to contact you for ages.
I give the subtlest shake of my head. No, I didn't find anyone, I reply, lying, and not answering his first question. Did you?
Nox gives the faintest smile, first one in probably forever. I did, he says. The kid was a teleporter, so I told him where to go, and... He gives a small shrug, still smiling.
I nod once, my chest clenching, stopping me from replying.
That's good. It's good that Nox saved a Freak. Even though I didn't, at least he saved one today.
I push through his head again as I say, So Taylor didn't try to—
Someone suddenly slaps Nox on the shoulder, leaning down to his height and interrupting my words. It would be considered a nice gesture if it was a different person.
But not him.
"You thought I would forget what happened that night, Hayes?" the Soldier says. It's the same one that punched him at the club, I realize. He squeezes Nox's shoulder, the material under his fist rippling.
"You remember me?" Nox replies, smiling as his words drip with sarcasm. "I should feel so special."
The Soldier's hand clenches into a tight fist, dangerously close to Nox's face. "You are really asking for it now, aren't you?"
I slowly stand up from my chair, holding my hand out so he can see it clearly. "Get the hell away from him," I say slowly, calmly, even when I feel anger burning bright behind my eyes, "before I ram this spoon into your eye."
The Soldier stares at me for a few seconds before he scoffs at my words and takes his hand from Nox's shoulder to slam it against the table, the sound trying to make me flinch, but I don't move. "I'd like to see you try, Parker," he asks lowly, a wicked smirk pulling at his lips.
In my mind, I picture a single bolt of electricity striking through his chest, burning a hole into his flesh much like Veronica did with the dummy. Then I see myself shoving the spoon into each eye socket, hearing his screams as he tries to pull it out. I almost do it. It's so tempting to do each. I feel the familiar crackling at the tips of my fingers, and I think Nox can sense that, because he kicks me under the table and subtly shakes his head with a warning clear in his eyes.
I look back to the Soldier as I say, "Lucky for you, I'm hungry."
"That's what I thought." He turns to face Nox again, his face even closer than before. "If you ever come near her again, Hayes, I'll blow your brains right out of your skull." He shoves Nox's shoulder. "Something to consider."
He gives one last sneer at me before heading for his table again.
"Are you okay?" Diego asks once the Soldier is out of earshot.
"I'm fine," Nox almost snaps back, keeping his voice calm. "I'm fine."
I watch the Soldier return to the others he was sitting with. He high-fives one of them and takes his chair and slides it out from under the table. Smirking and feeling stupid at the same time, I flick the chair farther back with a quick movement of my fingers as he lowers himself onto it, making him fall to the ground. He tries to grab the table to stop his fall, but his hand slams onto his tray—
And the contents dump all over his head and body.
People laugh at him as he bolts up from the floor, red-faced and soup dripping off his face, his chin. The stew soaks his clothes and he tries to wipe it away, but it stains even more. He runs his hands through his stew-soaked hair and grimaces, letting out a loud grunt as he kicks at his chair, cursing at everyone still laughing at him.
Nox turns around to face me with an amused smile on his lips, raising his eyebrows in question. I shrug once, looking down at the bowl in front of me with my own smile upon my lips.
The Soldier got what he deserved.
And so did the Freak earlier today.
A sudden whistling sounds all around the dining hall, but it's not the usual kind, to tell us that our dinner is over. Every head in here snaps to the entrance, watching as Hartman and two other Soldiers walk into the room, one of them the same one that found me the night of the day off when I saved those five Freaks. It's the same Soldier that saw me before I threw him into a wall and knocked him unconscious. I can't see the other Soldier, though; Hartman is blocking him from view.
"Attention, all Soldiers!" Hartman's voice booms all around, the sound amplified in the spacious room. Every single voice silences within a second, leaving an eerie silence in its wake. "I'll just cut to the chase. The night of our day off, a Freak came into the prison and broke out multiple prisoners."
My heart has never been so fast before. I stare at Hartman, then at the Soldier beside him, my hands clenching into tight fists. I even ignore Nox's gaze sliding to me. I just focus on the leader of the Soldiers, everything else slowly morphing into a smear of the colour red.
Hartman holds up the poncho I was wearing, the same one I stuffed in the pipes lining the ceiling. "We can confirm the Freak was wearing this that night," he continues, shaking the material once so it droops down. "And within this poncho, we found this." He takes out a small scrap of light material that looks like it could have been a part of the poncho itself. Except, it's the complete opposite colour to the poncho.
No one says anything—we just look at each other in question.
"This," Hartman continues, his voice sounding angrier, "is from a Soldier's uniform. It's the material of the white T-shirt you all wear."
Murmurs arise from the crowd. I cautiously touch at my hip, right where the material should be. I pull down my uniform so it covers it up, my heart still pounding. Nox and I exchange a long look before our gaze finds Hartman and the two Soldiers again.
"Now, this is going to sound ridiculous, but we think the Freak is with us here, right now, posing as a Soldier," he says, looking down at each of us in turn. "So I'm going to ask you all to stand and get in a line so we can take a blood test."
My heart is going a million miles an hour as I rise from my seat, the hunger that was deep in my stomach suddenly gone, replaced with a sickening feeling that I can't shake off, no matter how hard I try. Even the exhausted pain slowing my limbs down is forgotten.
"Hold on a second, sir," a Soldier near him pipes up, twisting in his chair so he can face Hartman clearly. "The blood testing kits only show the Freaks' ages. How will we be able to test if they are Freaks? The one that broke them out could be close to our age."
It's hard for his words to register, as my heart is going too fast. Focus, Luca. Focus.
"That's a very good point," Hartman agrees, gripping the black object tighter and lifting it in the air for us all to see. "But this is not like other blood testing kits. There's a slight difference in the Freaks' blood compared to ours. This device will detect it. Now get in line!"
In a matter of seconds, we have created a line cutting all the way through the dining hall diagonally. Nox, Diego and I are at the back of the line, but that makes the anticipation that much worse.
Stay calm, Luca, Nox says inside my head, his voice strangely reassuring. If Hartman or any of the Soldiers see you freaking out, then they'll immediately suspect you. You can do this. Just. Stay. Calm.
That would be so much easier to do if it wasn't me who left the poncho in the ceiling, of all places. I should have thrown it outside or burnt it or something. It's too late now. How could I have been so stupid? Why couldn't I have been cleverer?
A slightly different beep sounds from the blood testing kit, and I look to see them testing the first person down the line. Then Hartman's deep, rough voice says, "Clean," as he moves the Soldier away from the line. I watch the boy move to his seat again, shaking his head as he goes back to eating, still facing us with a confused and curious expression covering his features.
"With all due respect, sir," someone in the line says, "but this is absurd. You know none of us are Freaks. We would've caught 'em by now."
"I know that, my boy," Harman replies. "It's just a precaution."
The Soldier doesn't say anything back. The closer Hartman gets to me the more I want to throw up. I look to see how far they are, catching Brianna's eyes a moment later. She's only about two people down from me. She rolls her eyes and shrugs in my direction, her actions saying words I either can't understand or don't want to, I can't tell. I nod once for her benefit and turn away from her and Hartman to focus on my shaking hands. I press them firmly against my sides, resulting in shoving them in my pockets to stop them from shaking.
You are looking nervous, Nox says from my right, the words buzzing in my head. Relax. Everything might be okay.
It's not going to be okay. They'll take my blood and see that I'm a Freak. Kill me on the spot probably. Shoot me right in the head to get it over with. Will they be that kind though? Will they torture me? Force me to tell them where I brought the other Freaks?
What will happen once they take my blood? Do I even want to know?
As Hartman and the two Soldiers come closer, I see the other one when I couldn't before. I know this man. His unusual face was burned into my head ever since that day. That day.
It's the Soldier that shot my friends and brought me here all those years ago. That shot Zaire when he should have brought him here where he would have been alive, with me.
Scar Face.
I can't help it—I see red. My friends' faces flash across my vision and I can't help my hands curling into tight fists at my sides. I squeeze so hard I feel blood start to form on my palm, but I just don't care about the pain.
He's the reason my friends are dead. He shot them without hesitation.
He's the reason I was about to be executed.
And he's the reason I do this now.
I crush the blood testing kit with a curl of my fingers and fling it upwards, out of the Soldier's hand, hitting Scar Face right on his nose and mouth. He staggers back, holding his hands against his bloody nose. He curses and stumbles over chairs, hitting the floor a second later.
Hartman looks up, directly at me, and the realization is clear on his face as his eyes slowly widen.
He knows I am the Freak.
His gun is out in a second but I throw it up and into the ceiling along with the blood testing kit, making sure it stays there as I force Hartman back, against the far wall. More and more guns around me are removed from their holsters, but all I see is red and feel the anger coursing through my veins to care about them.
I feel the tension in my blood as I crush each of the gun's barrels, forcing them out of their hands and to somewhere I can't see. The pain I feel at using my abilities is no longer important, not now that there's nothing in my head anymore.
Nothing at all.
If someone says something to me it's drowned out by the rush of blood in my ears. Something strange covers my gaze, like I'm seeing the world through cellophane. I move forward without even realizing it, lightning traveling down my left arm to my hands and fingers, and fire coursing through the other arm, the heat intense but I hardly feel it.
And then I erupt.
I just... explode.
Some of the Soldiers around me scream but the sound is no longer important in my ears. I watch them run in all directions, trying to get away from the line of fire and lighting forcing its way out of my hands and into the air before me.
But the Soldiers are where I'm aiming.
All the anger I felt against seeing Scar Face and the Freak from the roof comes back to me quickly. I see nothing but the tears in my eyes, threatening to escape even though I'm not letting them. I see a blur of orange and white all around me, the heat overpowering, but I still force the energy out of my body, towards wherever it hits first.
I just don't care anymore.
My body is forced to the ground by a pair of arms wrapped around my middle. The fire and lightning stop as I struggle in the person's grip, writhing and struggling as much as I can. I think I'm screaming out loud because I feel the pain in my throat, but I can't hear anything but a buzzing that's driving me even more insane.
Calm down, Luca, Nox shouts inside my head, maintaining his grip around my middle. Stop struggling. Calm! Down!
I don't listen to him. I force my head backwards, colliding cleanly with Nox's nose. His grip on me snaps open and I whirl around, yanking him up with a hand clasped around his throat. His dark eyes bulge as I slam him against the wall, seeing a trail of blood dripping from where I hit him.
His hands grapple uselessly for my wrists. "Please, Luca," he gasps. "It's me. It's Nox." He grits his teeth, red forming where I've got the hold on him. "You... don't... want to... do this." His face is starting to turn purple. I can see the colour travelling from his neck and up, slowly towards his face. "This isn't you, Luca!"
My grip on his throat loosens, only slightly. "It wasn't me," I say slowly, my voice no longer my own. "I don't know who he is anymore."
Something hard hits me in the back and I drop Nox to the ground, lurching forward as he sprawls forward. I whip around to see Brianna holding a chair up in the air, her clothes burning with soot and ash covering almost every inch of her skin.
It takes me a moment to take in my surroundings. Everything is on fire. The tables are a charred mess and the walls are already starting to crumble to the ground. The ceiling looks like it's caving in.
The smoke and the heat is intense, but I don't feel anything.
Brianna runs to me with the chair again, but I yank it out of her grasp and towards the fire to her right. I force her backwards into the wall, hearing a thud as she slams against it, then to the floor.
As I come back to my senses, the heat is the first thing I feel. Then the smoke enveloping me is the next. I crouch down and cough, spitting out the poisonous gas as I feel it enter my lungs painfully.
I raise my hands into the air, feeling the pressure of the water in the pipes lining the ceiling in my blood and my veins. I form a fist like my hands are curling around the lone pipes, quickly yanking my arms to the ground—
And water spews out from the ceiling.
The fire is gone within seconds. The holes in the roof allow the billows of smoke to escape. The heat stops as I am drenched head to toe in the cold water, but I still don't feel nor think anything. As soon as I know the fire has gone, I stop the pipes with a simple squeeze of my hands, shaking the lingering pressure from my head.
I rise from the ground and turn around to face Nox. He lays with his back to me against the wall, his whole body drenched in water from the pipes and still stained with soot from the smoke that surrounded us only a few moments ago.
A weird silence settles around me as I carefully approach him, like he's a wounded animal. He doesn't move even when I crouch down beside him. He doesn't respond when I shake his shoulder once, twice. He doesn't reply even when I say, "Nox?" I shake his shoulder again, then again. "Nox, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. Nox?"
I shake my head as I continue to shake him, shouting and shouting his name and turning him around to check his pulse and leaning down to feel his breathing.
"He's gone," I hear from behind me. I turn to see Brianna carefully walking over to me, clutching at her side which is stained with red. "You've killed him."
"What? No." I shake my head and look back down to my friend again. "No, I couldn't have. He's not dead. He's not—"
"He's dead!" Brianna erupts. "You've killed him—"
I see red again as I lock her in a grasp and move her to the wall beside me. She doesn't struggle but I can see the fear in her eyes as I approach, my hand hovering in front of me, in front of her face.
"You don't want to hurt me," she says, keeping her body flat against the wall.
"Yes, I do," I say, still moving closer and closer to her.
The next thing she does happens in a flash. She grabs hold of my exposed wrist and I gasp and drop her as the familiar pain slices open a part of my back. A new power finds its way into my system, coursing through my veins in seconds.
I look up at Brianna, shocked.
She's a Freak.