I pushed the toppled stone above off of me. After turning back into a human, I waved the dust away from my eyes.
I remembered Sage and Dad and started searching through the mess for them. I couldn't find any evidence of them even being here.
I looked up. Since the rest of the mansion had come down, I saw the afternoon sun hanging in the air, baking the town's inhabitants with waves of heat. That's right. The darkness of the night had been replaced by the noon sun. Weird day.
There was no way of knowing whether or not my plan had worked. Were we in the other dimension? Besides the obvious change of night to day, I couldn't tell.
I continued my search for the two. After some time searching through the remains, I gave up. They must have gotten away.
I stopped looking and sat down in a patch of grass near the rubble, getting lost in my thoughts. I didn't want to go home just yet.
Should I go start looking for my mom, or check in with the others first? They must have had a scare after I snapped Sage's and Metagor's necks. But was it worth it? Plus, I probably had to explain to Jake what happened earlier.
Speaking of, where was Metagor? Just like before, he was nowhere to be found. Was he alive? Could he have repaired his body just like Cassie's house did under the Master's- Dad's- control?
All of these questions were swirling around in my head, so I didn't notice until much later that a voice was calling my name.
"Jay," it said, very faint. I thought I was imagining it.
"Jay," it said, much louder this time. I go up, looking the origin of the voice.
"Jay!" it shouted. I followed it to a large mound of scattered stone. I tossed some of it away.
A hand fell out onto the dirt. I grabbed it with both of my own and pulled at it. An arm emerged, then a shoulder, then a head. Soon, her whole body was out.
Sage coughed out the dust in her throat. She lay on the ground, sucking in mouthfuls of air. I let her, but I didn't take my eyes off of her.
"Thank you for saving me," she said after gathering enough air to talk.
"You're welcome," I said coldly. "I guess the Master left you behind to rot in prison while he got away."
"He did. But I'm not under his control anymore," she said.
"How do I know you're not lying?" I asked.
"Just ask your girlfriend over there." Sage pointed behind me.
I turned around. Approaching us were Cassie, Jake, and Blink. "She's not my girlfriend," I said.
They stood awkwardly a few feet away, not sure if it was safe to come closer.
"I'm alright, guys," I called out. "Sage isn't even dead. I'm pretty sure Metagor isn't, either-"
"He's not," Sage said.
"I haven't killed anyone yet," I finished.
After being pushed over by Cassie's telekinesis, Jake and Blink slowly followed her over to us.
"I'm glad you're alright," Cassie said.
"Yeah, well, it takes a lot more than a mind-controlling psycho to kill me." I decided then that I wouldn't tell them who the Master was. It would be better for all of us if I didn't tell. Sage seemed to pick up on what I was doing and kept quiet.
"Are we in the other dimension now?" Jake asked me.
"I think so," I guessed. I hoped we were.
"Then that's half of the war won," Jake replied with a smile. "One thing Afterlight knows is that he can't control reality here. His mind control isn't as strong either, so he would've had to let a lot of people go to keep the rest."
Well, that was a relief. That also explained why Sage wasn't trying to kill me right now.
"I see you've acquired a...prisoner," Cassie said.
"Actually, no," I said. "She's free now. The Master isn't controlling her anymore, so she's good to go."
"I don't know about that," Jake said. "She still needs to be on trial for her crimes."
"And the rest of the people in the town?" I defended my sister. "They're just as guilty as she is."
"Whoa, there. I said she needed to be put on trial, not executed," Jake said. "Chill."
"So what do we do with her?" Blink chimed in.
Jake stared at me for a moment. "I think she should stay with Jay until we get everything sorted out," he said.
I didn't disagree. I was okay with my sister staying with me for as long as she needed.
"Hello? Do I get an opinion on this?" Sage asked.
"No," we all said.
She muttered something about her legal rights as a supervillain victim. Because that's what our father was now- a supervillain. He did supervillains things, in a supervillain lair, with a supervillain henchman. "As long as I don't get stuck at Afterlight for the rest of my life, I'm good," she said.
"What happened to the Master?" Cassie asked.
"He got away," I said.
"Hey, don't have the long face," Jake said, noticing my expression. "We won."
"You won," I said. "I still haven't found my mom yet."
"Our mom," Sage corrected me.
"Our mom," I said.
"Don't sweat it," Jake said. "Now that we're all in the same place, it'll only be a matter of time before we find your mother."
I believed him.
"What happened to Que?" I asked.
"He went back to Afterlight to give a final report. Nothing serious." He waved it off.
"Oh my gosh." Cassie looked like she had just figured out something.
"What?" I said, looking around for an oncoming attack. Was Metagor still here?
"If it's morning time right now, then aren't we late for school?" she said.
Oh, man, she was right! School would have started- I checked my watch, which had adjusted to the time change- an hour ago! And since the Master had lost control of all the people, they had probably gone back to their regular schedules!
"Okay, Sage, here's the key to my room," I said, producing the key from my pocket. My mind was on the fast track right now, already figuring out the shortest route to school and how to get there.
"I'll take Cassie in my car," Jake said. He was working it out, too. "Go on ahead. Tell the teacher we'll be there in a few minutes."
I ran to school as fast as my feet would allow. I didn't go into hypermode, but I tried to push myself at my normal speed. I made it there in great time.
After checking in with the office, I entered first period, already trying to come up with a good lie to excuse me, Jake, and Cassie.
But as soon as I entered, I knew something was off.
All of the students I knew were gone. They were replaced with kids I had never seen before. I wondered if I had gotten the wrong class.
The teacher wasn't in the room, so I decided to save my excuse for later and sat down.
Something was really wrong with these children. None of them were creating tiny whirlwinds in their palms, flicking small fireballs into the person's back in front of them, or using their telekinesis to write obscene messages on the board. They were all just on their phones, acting like this was a...normal class.
The teacher walked in a few minutes later. I had never seen this woman before. She was young and extremely pretty, but also bright. Her hair was orange and ginger-ish. She wore a spotless yellow mini jacket with a white dress underneath. A yellow bow tie sat around her neck. She had a smile that never seemed to leave her lips. She was completely different from my normal teacher.
"Okay, class, sorry I'm late. My alarm clock didn't go off this morning," she said cheerily. "Let's get started on today's lesson."
The class collectively muttered an "it's alright" and put up their phones slowly. They didn't want to learn today. Or any day, for that matter. My regular class would've done the same thing, but with a little more positivity. At least they had their powers to entertain them.
"Today, we will be learning about the day Highland, Alabama, disappeared off of the map," she said. "And with it, the first- and only- metas this world has ever seen."
Crap.