Lizzie
Everyone is unique. Different. However, some people are more different than others, like my friends and I. Until I was 14, I thought I was the only one like that.
I'll tell you about our lives, but let me get you caught up first.
It started off as a normal day, I got picked on at my locker in the morning, was late to class, got called out because I was late to class, etc. That's about where the normal stops that day.
Between first and second periods, one of the many people who picked on me approached me while I was at my locker.
Jordan.
I sighed and continued to exchange the books in my bag with the ones in my locker. I glanced at him and raised an eyebrow, "What do you want, Jordan?"
My single glance at him had apparently made him nervous, as he had begun fidgeting with the hem of his shirt. He put his hands at his sides and looked at me, "You," he began, "you're different."
I stop exchanging my books and turned to him.
"Excuse me?"
"You're different," he says again with more confidence, "I've heard what happens in the bathrooms when girls try to pick fights with you. Sinks just happen to explode and cause a distraction and you happen to make a get away."
I stared at him and opened my mouth to respond when the bell rang. I swore under my breath and slammed my locker shut.
"Look, I don't know where you heard that, but first of all, its bullshit, second of all, now I'm late to class," I say, beginning to walk to my science classroom.
He nodded and headed to the social studies wing.
I sigh, shaking my head. The amount of tardies I had was getting high, and I knew I'd be getting a detention soon, so I tried my best to hurry to class.
I thought about what Jordan said. Its true, I am different, in ways you'd never expect. But how did he know that? Why did he want to know more about it? All he'd ever done was pick on me for trying to express myself, so why did he want to know more about me now?
When I walked into Mrs. Ruiz's class, everyone turned and stared at me.
"Ah! Ms. Daniels! Decided to join us after all, didn't you?"
I rolled my eyes and walked to my seat as Mrs. Ruiz kept going, "One more tardy for you," she typed something into her computer and confirming my suspicions, she said, "Oh! Ten tardies! That's a detention, I'll see you after school."
I slumped in my seat and got started on the worksheet that had been passed out before I had gotten to class.
About halfway through class, a woman I had never seen before walked into the classroom and went straight to Mrs. Ruiz's desk. I watched as they whispered back and forth. Maybe this woman was a teacher that worked on the other side of campus? It is a pretty big school. As I was watching, they both sent a glance my way. Mrs. Ruiz nodded and stood up.
"Lizzie," I glanced at her, "Ms. Peak needs to speak to you in the hallway."
The woman, Ms. Peak, gestured for me to follow her out the door. She had shoulder length hair the color of chocolate and matching eyes. She was about my height and had fair skin.
When we exited the classroom, there were three younger kids in the hallway waiting. Two boys and one girl. One of the boys and the girl both looked pretty young, and it dawned on me that they were probably from the elementary school on the other end of the campus. The young boy had curly blonde hair and shocking blue eyes. The girl had dark, almost black, hair and grey eyes.
The other boy was probably about middle school age and had bright red hair down to his ears. He looked familiar, and was probably only a year or so younger than me.
Ms. Peak began walking down the hall. The other three kids began to follow her, so I followed them.
When we stopped at another classroom Ms. Peak smiled at us and told us she'd be right back before emerging into the classroom. The small girl broke the silence first, introducing herself, "My name is Jade, and I'm 7," she beamed in pride at her age before introducing the small boy, "this is Percy-" she gestured to the young boy "-he's 8!" The young boy smiled shyly and waved at me and the other boy. "Um," the other boy started in a small voice, "I'm Kai, I'm 13."
As everyone got quiet, I realised they were waiting on me to introduce myself. "Oh! Uh, hi, I'm Lizzie, and I'm 14."
They all smiled at me.
Suddenly, Ms. Peak burst out of the classroom with another girl. She had wavy blonde hair, green eyes and a face full of freckles. She awkwardly waved to greet us.
Ms. Peak began moving again, this time toward the social studies wing. She stopped outside of the door of a history classroom and went in. We all stared at the new girl, who smiled awkwardly at us.
"I-I'm Jazzi. I'm 14."
I smiled at her, "I'm fourteen too. My name is Lizzie."
She smiled at me. She had a nice smile. Her eyes kind of crinkled at the edges and seemed to light up a little more. Her smile seemed really genuine, and it looked really good on her.
Before long, Ms. Peak emerged from the classroom with two people, a girl and a boy. The girl had curly shoulder length that was dirty blonde with blue streaks through it. She had a blue beanie on that matched her highlights.
I looked at the boy and groaned when I saw who it was.
Jordan. With his short perfectly gelled blonde hair and blue eyes that I had come to hate. If he hadn't picked on me so much, I'd honestly probably think he was cute. But, he had made my life a living hell for the past several years.
Ms. Peak wasted no time and began walking again, this time toward an exit. We were all frozen in place. Were we supposed to follow her out of the school? Was she even allowed to take us out of school? It was the girl with blue streaks in her hair that spoke up.
"Where are you going?"
"To my car," Ms. Peak responded, turning to us.
"Are we supposed to follow you?" the girl asked.
"Yes, I'd like to take you out of school for the day."
Jazzi cheered at this and began walking toward Ms. Peak. We all shrugged and hesitantly went after them.
Ms. Peak's car was a red mini-van with a plush interior. We all piled into it. Jordan, the girl with blue streaks in her hair, and Percy were in the very back row, Jazzie, Percy, and I were in the middle, with Kai in the front.
"Does everyone know each other?" Ms. Peak asked. "You have Jordan, Jaedyn-" the girl in the back cut Ms. Peak off, "Actually, I go by Jae." Ms. Peak nodded, "Okay then. So you have Jordan, Jae, Elizabeth, Jazmine, Kai, Percy, and Jade." We all nodded. "Oh! And my name is Aysa." Ms. Peak said. Aysa Peak, I thought to myself, that's a pretty name.
Aysa checked that we were all buckled up and began driving.
"Where are we going?" Kai asked.
"It's a surprise., Aysa responded, smirking.
The rest of the ride was silent.
Soon, we arrived at a small building and Aysa stopped the car. "Here we are!" She said, "Home sweet home!" We all glanced at each other, confused. She walked in and we followed her. When she flicked on the lights, we were greeted with a small kitchen and a dining table. She led us to a hallway and pointed out the rooms.
"Here's the den, you can come here if you're bored or if you just want to watch TV. Here's the bathroom, it has a toilet, a shower, everything you need in a bathroom. Here's Jade's room, Percy's room, Jazzi's room, Lizzie's room, Jordan's room, and Jae's room."
We all stared at her. "Oh! And of course my lab, but you only go in there if I tell you to."
"Why did you bring us here?" Jae asked, crossing her arms.
"I know that you all have something very unusual in common," we all leaned in, "you can do extraordinary things. Control the elements, move things with your mind, things like that. I just want to know why you can do it."
She smiled at us. We all were glancing at each other, looking uneasy. Based on everyone's reactions, I assumed that everyone had been told the same thing that I had about these extraordinary things.
Hide it. Don't let anyone know.
You've got to love overprotective parents
"I'll leave you all to get to know one another," Aysa said as she walked out of the door, followed by the sound of the lock turning in the door.
"Well," Kai began, "couldn't she had picked us up after lunch? I'm starving."
Jae began walking to the kitchen. "I can see if she gave us any food. If so, I can see what I can make."
We all nodded, liking the sound of that.
While Jae rummaged around in the kitchen, the rest of us migrated to the den. Jordan, Percy, Jade, and Kai took the couch, leaving Jazzi and I to sit on the floor. Jordan had turned on the TV and was flipping through channels.
"Do you think we have baseball?" Kai asked.
We looked at him.
"What? I'm just asking. The Dodgers are playing the Cubs tonight."
I rolled my eyes, "We just got kidnapped and found out we're going to be experimented on and your biggest concern is if we have baseball on TV?"
"I mean, it's going to be a good game."
"Oh come on! If we're going to watch baseball, let's at least watch a good team!"
"Are you saying the Dodgers aren't good?"
"I'm saying there's better teams."
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah."
"Like who?"
"Like-" "Guys!" I was cut off by Jae, who had stuck her head in the den, "first of all, stop yelling, second of all, I can make grilled cheeses if you want."
We all agreed in unison.
When the grilled cheeses were done, we all sat at the dining table, happily chomping down on the sandwiches.
"So what can you guys do?" Jordan asked.
We all looked up from our sandwiches and at him.
"Because, like, I can make trenches and stuff, but what can you guys do?"
"I-" I start, but suddenly stopped as everyone's attention snapped to me "-I can create force fields and control fire and water."
"I do ice," Kai interjected, "by that I mean, I can make ice, like Elsa."
We all laughed at that as we went around the table explaining our powers.
"I can go from one place to another like this!" Percy shouted, suddenly appearing on the other side of the room, "I can also do this!" he thrusted a hand and a strange dark swirling mass appeared. "It's a portal!" We smiled at him.
"I can move things with my mind," Jazzi interjected, just as a pillow flew from the den to the kitchen.
"I can make a plant grow as fast or as slow as I want it to and in whatever shape I want," Jae explains, "I can also talk anyone into or out of something."
"I don't know what I can do." Jade said, with a pout.
"It's okay, little one, you'll figure it out," Jae says, wrapping her arms around Jade.
As the day went on, we got to know each other better, and as night fell, we didn't really know what to do. In the bathroom, there was shampoo and body wash, and in closets and dressers in the rooms we had all found clothes that were about our size. This made me wonder how Aysa knew our sizes. Maybe she had just guessed? It was creepy however she did it.
Jae and Jordan, being the oldest, helped Jade and Percy get ready for bed. The little ones were asleep by 9, leaving the other 5 of us in the den.
"I can't believe we're stuck here," Jazzi said.
"Me either," Kai shrugged, "but we're here, and we're stuck so.." he trailed off.
I sighed, "Guys, I'm tired. I think I'm going to turn in for the night."
After a chorus of me too's, we were all headed to our rooms.
My room was painted a nice teal color with a bed pushed against the wall with sheets the color of Jae's hair. The dresser was pushed against the opposite wall and had a picture of Frank Iero from My Chemical Romance stuck to the mirror. Again, how did she know so much about us? A knock came from the door.
"Come in."
Jae stepped into my room, a soft smile on her face, "Hey, Lizzie."
"Hey."
She sat next to me on the bed and asked, "What should we do?"
I looked at her, puzzled, "What?"
"We can't stay here forever."
"I guess not."
We sat in silence for a minute or two before she looked at me, her face pulled into a determined expression, "What if we escaped?"
"What?" I whispered back.
"We could pull it off, we all have powers."
I thought about it for a second. We were seven kids who all had amazing powers that defied science. If anyone could escape, it could be us.
"Yeah. We could."
She smiled at me, "We could do it tomorrow night."
I nodded. We could do this.