Override

Chapter 12

I’D BEEN TRAINING with Adrien’s mom for the last week—and had the bruises to prove it. But I deserved it. It had taken two hours for Jilia to get all the bits of mirror glass out of Adrien’s back. The look Sophia had given me when she came in to see him had cut sharper than the glass splinters embedded in my arm. She had pulled me aside and said she’d arranged for me to train with her every afternoon until I could get my power under control.

It felt like all I did was train now, morning till night. Mornings with Tyryn, then I usually skipped lunch to spend an hour meditating with Jilia, followed by afternoons with Sophia. And still, other than a few rare moments here and there where I’d felt right on the cusp of calling my power voluntarily, I wasn’t any closer to controlling it.

“Your power is linked to your emotions,” Sophia said, lifting the pellet gun at me again. “But obviously meditation isn’t working,” she continued. “So let’s try getting you angry.”

I tried to prepare this time, to gather my telek, but before I could even try to focus on the dim buzzing in my ears, a rubber pellet smacked me in the forehead.

“Why didn’t you deflect that?” Sophia asked, her gray-blond dreadlocks flying behind her as she spun around.

“I’m trying,” I said through gritted teeth.

She raised the pellet gun in response. “General Taylor doesn’t need you to try. She needs you to do. She had this place rebuilt to accommodate you because she needs your power to work. She needs you to be a weapon.”

“I don’t see how shooting me in the face is supposed to help me focus—”

Two pellet rounds smacked into my ribs.

“Hey!” I shouted. “I wasn’t even ready.”

She sneered. “You think in a fight, a Reg will stop so you can have a moment to get ready?” Another bullet flew toward me. I held up my hands to deflect it, but it just smacked into my pinky finger.

“Ow!” I cradled my finger and looked up at the woman, so frustrated I could scream. We’d already been at this for half an hour, and I was sure I was going to have small pellet-sized bruises up and down my body. I bet she couldn’t wait to volunteer for this task. I could almost feel the satisfaction radiating off her. My hands started to shake. I looked down at them in dismay. This was exactly what I didn’t want to happen. I didn’t want to lose control with Adrien’s mom. It would just be that much more ammunition for her hatred of me.

I held up my tremoring arm. “Maybe we should stop for a little bit.”

Sophia ignored me, not lowering her weapon. “I told Adrien that he should stay away from you. That you are dangerous.”

“I’d never hurt him.”

“Oh really?” Her eyebrows raised.

“The mirror was an accident,” I mumbled, looking down.

“What if these were real bullets? When you’re out there running missions, you need to be able to take care of yourself. My son is strong and smart, but he’d jump in front of a laser weapon to try and save you. Are you going to let him get killed because of you?”

“No.” The buzzing got louder in my ears, but I tried to tamp it down. It was coming on too quickly. I knew I was supposed to be trying to access the power, but the truth was, I was terrified of it. Sophia was right. All I did was get people hurt. And our training sessions weren’t helping much.

Whenever I walked into the Caf these days, talk quieted at all the tables. Furtive eyes glanced at me, and then quickly darted away. I could tell they’d all heard about what had happened with the mirror, and Ginni had probably filled everyone else in about my repeated failures at the glitcher training sessions. This morning several of the Rez fighters had stared at me in open hostility, making my cheeks flame in embarrassment and shame. They’d all expected me to be this powerful leader. I was supposed to be a sign of hope, a secret weapon against the Chancellor.

But I was none of those things. My torso started shaking with frustration at my repeated failure.

I tried to calm down and take deep breaths, following Jilia’s instructions. But all I really wanted to do was run out of the room and go Link myself.

The tremors got worse.

“We’ve got to take a break,” I said, trying to keep my voice even.

“Are you angry yet?” she yelled. “You can feel your power, can’t you? Now try to harness it. Control it, don’t let it control you.”

I looked down at my shaking arm in dismay. Yes, I could feel the power. Maybe Sophia’s way, as much as I disliked it, was the path to finally getting control. Now, if I could just direct it the way that I wanted to this time.… I gritted my teeth together and tried to remember the breathing methods from meditation class. Deep breath in, deep breath out. I could do this. No one else had to get hurt because of me.

The shaking started to subside a tiny bit, and when I closed my eyes I could feel the shape of the room around me. It was almost like there was a 3-D projection cube of the whole room in my head. I could feel the objects filling the space and sense Sophia’s movement without even looking.

Then Sophia launched another pellet at me and my eyes popped back open.

“If you would wait a second—” I started.

Another pellet thumped into my side.

“Just let me get—”

Another pellet.

“Stop it!” I yelled, all my frustration bubbling up and over.

Sophia flew backward six feet into the wall and then crumpled to the ground. I rushed over to her. “Are you okay?”

There was a thin layer of padding covering the training room wall, but I knew it was solid rock beyond. I felt sick at the thought of having hurt someone else, even her. Her hair was tossed in her face. I pushed the thick strands aside. “Are you okay?” I asked again anxiously.

She let out a pained groan but sat up, rubbing her shoulder.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, and reached to help her up. “I didn’t mean to—”

“Exactly.” Her voice was cutting. “You didn’t use it on purpose. You can’t control it.” She jerked her hand back from me and slowly got to her feet. She picked up the pellet gun from where she’d dropped it and shoved it at my chest.

“Your telekinesis is extremely powerful, but if you don’t get it under control, and soon, all it makes you is dangerous. I don’t have visions often like my son, but I’ve seen enough. Without control, you are a ticking time bomb. I don’t want Adrien around the next time you go off.” Her eyes were hard as steel, and she paused to enunciate every word. “Stay away from my son.”

“Did you and Adrien get in a fight?” Ginni asked.

Ginni and I were sitting at the long table in the corner of our dorm room. Her half of the desk was covered in different colored fabrics and a small machine that seamed the pieces together with thread. My side of the table was empty except for my tablet. Even though I’d been sitting and staring at the screen for an hour, I couldn’t remember a thing I’d read. I’d been like this all week. I couldn’t seem to concentrate on anything.

“What?” I asked, looking up.

“Well you two haven’t been sitting together as much lately, and you always leave class early without waiting to walk with him. Are you mad at him or something?”

I hadn’t meant to be so obvious in avoiding him. “Do you think he thinks I’m mad at him?” He hadn’t said anything. But then, we hadn’t really talked since the mirror incident, and that was almost two weeks ago. We’d say hi and joke around in the Caf. But we hadn’t had a real conversation, the kind that went below the surface, in a long time.

“Are you?” Ginni pressed.

“No, I just…”

I just felt helpless when it came to my powers and I was afraid of hurting him again. Part of me wanted to com him and ask if we could meet somewhere alone, but then his mother’s words would echo in my mind. Stay away from my son.

I didn’t want it to be true, but Sophia was right. Strong emotions made my power unpredictable, and being alone with Adrien was always inherently emotional. As much as I wanted his arms around me, how could I willingly put him in harm’s way?

Before I could think of what to say to Ginni, Xona burst in.

“Looks like I’ll be joining you for meditation during lunch tomorrow,” Xona said, tossing her tablet case roughly on the ground and then flopping onto Ginni’s bottom bunk. “I got sentenced to extra sessions all week.”

“What happened?” Ginni dropped the two squares of fabric she was holding.

“I caught that ex-Reg Cole following me on my way to a private training session. It’s not the first time either.”

Ginni looked at me, a secret smile playing on her face. She got that look whenever one of us started talking about a boy at the Foundation. She’d always nudge me with an elbow or nod and wink. It probably had something to do with the books she was always reading. She’d pause periodically to look up from the words, clutching her reading tablet to her chest and sighing loudly.

“And…?” Ginni prompted.

Xona smirked, leaning back to lazily entwine her fingers behind her head. “And I gave him a quick elbow to the throat. Now he knows better.”

Ginni gasped.

“City saw me do it and reported straight to Jilia. So, anger management meditation it is.”

“But what if he was following you because he likes you?” Ginni asked. “Maybe he just wanted to talk.”

Xona glared at her, all traces of humor gone from her face. “Don’t try to turn ex-Regs into romantic heroes like in your books. They’re killers. That’s all they know how to do.”

“Well it’s not like we have a lot of options.” Ginni’s face soured. “Adrien’s with Zoe. All the other students are too young. Which only leaves Rand.”

Xona scrunched up her nose. “Oh honey, you can do better than Rand.”

Ginni looked down at her sewing again. “He seems to like City anyway. They’re always flirting.”

“Rand flirts with everybody,” Xona said.

“You should give Cole a chance,” I said to Xona. “He’s not like the other Regs. He even smiled at me when I knocked him over during training.” Sophia had brought him in to train with me after I’d thrown her against the wall a second time. She figured an ex-Reg could take the hits better.

“Are you finally getting control of your power?” Ginni asked excitedly.

“Sort of.” I sighed. “I can call it up sometimes, but usually only when Sophia gets me mad. And then I never direct it the way I’m supposed to. I just knock things over. I might as well not have the power at all.”

“Well as long as you’re banging up a Reg, it sounds great to me,” Xona said.

“And it does sound like you’re getting somewhere,” Ginni said, with a comforting smile.

“Maybe.” It wasn’t exactly progress, but maybe it was something after all. I hadn’t had any more seizures because I was releasing my power regularly. I still had to be Linked when I slept, but that wasn’t so bad.

“So do you think they’ll let you go on a mission soon?” Ginni asked. She averted her eyes and flattened the fabric on the table.

Xona looked over at Ginni curiously. “Why? What do you know?”

Ginni bit her lip. “Well, I might have heard something about it is all. Word is that General Taylor is prepping for another big mission.”

“I heard a rumor about it too.” Xona sat up straighter. “Tyryn let me borrow some practice weapons, and I’ve been training every minute the center is free.” She popped two shiny weapons out of her holster.

“Not that he’ll let you take any ammunition outside the training room,” Ginni reminded her.

“Well, some live rounds might have accidentally fallen into my bag in the equipment room.”

“Xona!” Ginni sounded appalled.

“What? I’m the only non-glitcher on the team. When we get into battle I can’t hocus-pocus my way out of it. I need these beauties,” she patted her weapons affectionately. “But about the mission. Tyryn wouldn’t tell me any details. What have you heard?” She looked back at Ginni.

“Well, I might have overheard that the General is planning to pit us against the Chancellor’s group of glitchers.”

Xona let out a low whistle.

“I wonder what kinds of powers they’ll have,” Ginni said. “What do you think, Zoe?”

She turned to me and I felt like shrinking down in my chair. I was sure the General was well aware of my lack of progress. Sophia would have made sure of it. If the General was planning a mission, she wasn’t going to take me.

“I don’t know,” I mumbled. But then I really considered the question. If we were going up against the Chancellor’s glitchers, would that include Max?

“Ginni—” I sat up suddenly. Why hadn’t I thought of it before? “You can locate anyone in the world, right?”

She looked up in surprise. “Yeah.”

I grabbed her hand. “Can you find my friend Max?”

“I’m sorry, Zoe. Molla’s already asked.” Ginni’s eyebrows drew together. “Whatever it is about being a shape-shifter, it makes him invisible to me. He can fool anyone into seeing him as someone else, and it fools my power, too.”

“Oh,” I said, feeling a mixture of relief and disappointment. I tried to picture him escaping the Chancellor and running off on his own, impersonating an Upper somewhere and living the luxurious life he’d always wanted. But I knew it was unlikely. He’d gone back to the Chancellor. She wouldn’t have trusted him again and would be sure to keep him under constant control with her compulsion power.

“I don’t see why you or Molla even care,” Xona said. “He chose to join the Chancellor. He helped her.”

“It’s more complicated than that,” I said. “He made some really bad choices. The Chancellor got to him right when he was new to glitching. He thought working for her would keep us safe. He didn’t realize what she was planning—”

“Yeah, maybe,” Xona scoffed, “but then he stayed behind when he had the chance to escape. After he knew how evil she was.”

I opened my mouth, but then closed it again. I couldn’t deny she was right. Max had done some horrible things. But I truly believed he’d started out with good intentions, and I wasn’t blameless either. If I deserved a chance at redemption, after what I’d done to my older brother, didn’t Max? After all, no one had died because of him.

And he’d only stayed behind with the Chancellor because he couldn’t bear to come with me. I didn’t know how to explain that, if circumstances had been different, I was sure Max could have been a much better person. Or how, in spite of everything, I still considered him family. “I’ve got to believe there’s still some good in him.”

Xona smirked. “I knew it. You really do think you can save everyone.” She turned to me, her face dark. “Look, you’ve been protected in one bubble or another your whole life. You haven’t seen what’s really going on out there. But I have. Trust me, sooner or later you’re going to find out that not everyone makes the right choice when it matters most. Not everyone is worth saving.”

I felt my face heat up. “Who are you to decide who’s worth saving and who’s not?”

“I don’t really care who we save and who we don’t.” She leaned in. “I just want to kill as many Regs as I can and, maybe if I’m lucky, take out some Uppers too. I want to make them all pay.” She spun one of the guns around her finger and then resheathed it.

Ginni had been ignoring our conversation and kept pushing material through her machine, but she stood up and dramatically twirled the fabric in a circle. “All done. It’s called a skirt!” she exclaimed. The skirt was patchwork, made from odd-shaped squares of old Community uniforms, some ex-Reg coverall blue, browns from the service worker uniforms, even the surgeon’s reds. “Isn’t it pretty?”

Xona touched the cloth skeptically. “Looks like it’d be hard to run in.”

This time it was Ginni who rolled her eyes. “It’s not for running. It’s for looking pretty.” She grabbed the skirt back from Xona.

“Who you trying to look pretty for anyway?” Xona asked.

Ginni turned to us, mouth open like she planned on mentioning something or someone. But then she paused and frowned. “I can’t remember.”