Capture (4 page)

"Rainstorms, winds and fire..." the reporter murmured with a small smile. "That sounds amazing. What else can a descendant or outcast do?"

Simon slowly smiled. "The real question is what can't we do? And that all depends on the individual...what bloodlines they're from, how hard and often they train, their level of determination, and whether they work alone or with others. It doesn't always have to be a conscious thing, either. For example..." He leaned forward again. "In Iowa we have some pretty long winters. My eldest, Eli, was something of a history buff as a hobby and liked to spend those long, cooped up months studying world historical events. And he noticed a kind of pattern developing."

A pattern.

My breath caught in my chest. Slowly, carefully I slid to the edge of the armchair, my heart pounding in my ears so loud and fast it was hard to hear the TV. "Turn it up, Dad," I muttered.

Simon continued, now several levels louder. "If you take a look at the news, especially ever since the creation of the Internet, you might see what he did...a kind of cause and strange effect happening all over the world between mankind when it gets riled up over something and nature's response. And I don't mean global warming."

It was all I could do not to nod. But remembering Mom was in the room with me, I just barely managed to hold myself still.

"Meaning...what exactly?" the reporter asked. "Are you implying that the Clann is somehow
actually
causing
natural disasters on our planet?"

Simon hesitated. "
Well, see, that's the thing my boys and I could never quite agree on, as to whether it was the Clann doing it on purpose or..."

"Or...?" the reporter coaxed when Simon paused again.

"Or...if it's the outcasts doing it by accident. Because not all of us know what we are and what we can do and just how dangerous we can be. If so, if we are the ones behind it, then it's even more important that the walls between the Clann and the outcasts come down once and for all so the outcasts can be identified, educated about who they are, and trained up in how to control what they can do. For the sake of everyone on this planet."

Finally my dad’s face and shoulders appeared on the TV screen.

The reporter’s voice said, “To try and understand the possible science behind Simon Phillips’ abilities, we spoke with Sterling Williams, PhD, professor of human genetics at the University of Texas at Tyler, who has written several widely referenced articles on the possible future evolution of the human species. Dr. Williams, in one of your articles you stated that you believed humans might currently be in the process of evolving to exhibit special abilities someday. Do you still feel this is true?”

The
recording of my dad on TV said, “Absolutely. All species of life are constantly evolving to better suit the changing climate and environment in which they reside, and the human species is no different. In the case of the development of special human abilities, I believe it’s more likely that we’d only see the evolution of these new abilities within a few segments of the population based on their geographical location, genetic characteristics, and their family’s predisposition towards exhibiting certain…anomalies, if you will. And of course that evolutionary reaction would probably depend on what kind of exposure they had and how long that exposure lasted to a wide array of environmental factors.”

“
What sort of environmental factors are we talking about here?” the reporter asked, still off screen.

The televised version Dad let out a heavy sigh.
“Where do I begin? It all comes down to—"

But in my living room Dad suddenly shut off the TV. As Mom tried to protest, he shook his head. "No, no, absolutely not. There's no need to hear my reply
now, because they've made me look like an idiot. I went on and on about how pollution and fracking and genetically modified organisms in our food and groundwater could be inhibiting human's evolutionary capabilities, when all along what they really wanted from me was what I just said. That new abilities in humans could show up in certain genetically predisposed family lines." With a heavy sigh and a grim set to his mouth, Dad dropped the remote onto the table at his elbow. "What a waste of my time. I spent hours showing those people charts and graphs and countless pages of research!"

I bit my lower lip. I could just imagine the tidal wave of data Dad had probably poured onto them.
The first time he introduced anyone to his theories, it was always a bit like being swallowed whole by a whale...overwhelming and way too much to comprehend at first. I'd been working with him on delivering his supporting evidence for his ideas in easier-to-swallow bite-sized chunks. But he'd been this way for decades before I came along. I doubted the transformation would happen overnight.

Then I thought of my own mountain of evidence hidden in my closet.

I was halfway across the room before I even realized I'd decided to stand up.

“Tarah?” Mom said. “Is everything okay? This show didn’t...upset you, did it, hon?”

Her voice had slipped into that careful psychiatrist tone calculated to both soothe and get me to spill my innermost thoughts and feelings.

But I’d falle
n for that trick once before and learned the consequences of telling her my secrets.

I turned
to face her with a smile pasted on my lips. “Nope, I’m good, Mom. Just going to get caught up on some homework, is all. Sorry about your interview, Dad.”

Mom’s gaze searched my face for several long seconds, checking for
signs I was lying, before she finally nodded.

Dad caught my eye before I could turn away. He cocked his head an inch to the
side in silent question.

But I shook my head.
Mom's quick dismissal tonight of Simon's abilities as nothing more than a hoax made it clear she still hadn't changed. Her inflexible mind just couldn’t wrap itself around the idea that there might be more to human capabilities than she could fathom. So it would be pointless to push this issue with her again. If we tried, it would only lead to a lot of yelling and Dad sleeping on the couch and all of us going through yet another long round of family therapy sessions with one of her peers. And I’d already had more than enough therapy to last a lifetime.

I gave Dad a sad smile then
made my escape.

In my room with my door
safely shut and locked behind me, I walked over to my closet then hesitated, my hands resting on the bifold doors' plastic knobs.

There
is no such thing as magic, Tarah,
my mother’s often repeated argument echoed through my thoughts.
That’s just your father’s crazy love for fantasy books stirring up your imagination.

I slid the doors open then used both my arms to shove back the clothing that hung inside, parting them to reveal my own "research lab" of sorts...
two black framed bulletin boards I’d secretly had Jeremy screw into the closet’s back wall for me before he left home. Mom never saw them since I'd been doing my own laundry for years now. Which was a very good thing, because if she'd seen these, she really would have insisted on more family therapy sessions.

The boards were covered with news articles printed
off from the internet, each one held in place by clear plastic push pins. Around each push pin, a red string looped and stretched, connecting causes with their events throughout history. Taken at a glance, anyone else might see only a crazy, tangled up mess of a spider web. Unless they took the time to see the dates I'd circled in red ink on each news article.

But what
alway drew my focus and made my heart hammer like crazy was the
length
of time that stretched between each historical cause and effect event.

It was getting progressively shorter.

Tonight wasn't the first time I'd heard about the Clann. East Texas was full of rumors about it. In fact, just a half hour's drive from Tyler was a mid sized town called Jacksonville, which was rumored to be the Clann's headquarters and full of all kinds of strange people and even stranger things going on. A few years ago, Jacksonville had even been nearly destroyed by what locals claimed to be some sort of Clann civil war, though the news had blamed it on gang violence instead.

Until tonight,
I'd always thought it was the Clann who should be blamed for the rising disastrous pattern of cause and effect tragedies. I'd never considered the possibility that the Clann might have outcast members who could be behind it all.

Simon's theory
made sense, though. In fact, it was the
only
thing that made sense. I'd never been able to find a good motive for the Clann to cause all those disasters. Why create so much chaos and pain and death and loss and risk bringing attention to themselves in the process?

But u
ntrained outcasts could easily be making things happen worldwide accidentally without even realizing the power they were wielding against their fellow humans. Especially if certain events in the news managed to stir them up collectively and lead them to feeling a kind of group negativity in the same direction at around the same time.

The question was...if the
outcasts learned what they could do, would this stop the cause and effect pattern?

Or would it only make things worse?

Monday, November 23rd

Hayden

Kyle slammed his tray down beside me on the table the next day in the cafeteria. Everyone at our table looked up.

“
What's up with you today?” I asked around a mouthful of pizza while Kyle flopped into the plastic chair beside me.

He looked at me like I was some kind of alien.
“Seriously? You don't watch the news, do you?”

I shrugged.
“Sometimes. Why, did I miss something new?”

Kyle's girlfriend Becky, captain of the Raiderettes Varsity Cheer Squad, laughed at me and shook her head.
Her short, curly red ponytail with its extra shellacking of hair products never budged beneath its crisp red and black bow. “Uh, yeah. The father of those D.C. terrorists is claiming he's some kind of real life Merlin.”

I froze.
“You're joking.”

“
Nope,” Kyle replied. “It was on TV last night, and Yahoo's been running news features on it ever since.”

Someone bumped into the back of my chair, but I barely felt it.
“You mean like he's saying he can make broomsticks dance and turn lead into gold?”

Becky jumped in again.
“No, like real stuff. He made a ball of fire appear right there on his open hand in front of the cameras and freaked the reporter right out of his chair. And he claims that's how his sons blew up the president and that airplane. That they just lost control or something.”

“
Yeah, and now there are hundred of people on YouTube claiming they’re outcasts from some group called the Clann, and posting videos supposedly showing what they can do,” Kyle hissed.

There was that term again...
the Clann
. Goose bumps raced down my arms.

“
They have to be making it all up though. Right?” Becky asked.

An uneasy silence formed at our table
.

“
That reporter ought to be jailed for not helping the police catch Simon during the interview,” Kyle said, glaring at the empty center of our table's fake wood grain laminate. “He was right there! Now he's out running around on the loose somewhere. Isn't there some law about aiding and bedding a wanted criminal?”

“
Abetting,” I corrected him even as the pizza turned into cardboard in my mouth. “And since the dad's not being directly blamed for the D.C. explosions, technically I think the reporter wasn't really aiding a wanted criminal. But even if he was, why are you so ticked off about it?”

Kyle scowled.
“Dude, think about it! What if there's more outcasts and descendants out there running things from behind the scenes like he claims? What if these freaks are all around us, and we don't even know it?”

A couple of guys at our table nodded in agreement.

What if one of those freaks was sitting beside you right now?

The thought made my mouth twitch.
“Okay, so what if they are?”

Kyle stared at me.
“We'd have no idea what they could do to us. Blow us all up in a second, like the D.C. bomber brothers.”

“
Or drown us inside a building,” someone else suggested.

“
Or read our minds and rob our bank accounts,” Kyle added.

“
Exactly!” Becky said.

I couldn't decide whether to laugh or feel sorry for them.
Or just feel sick with worry. “Y'all are really that worked up about this?”

“
Everyone should be,” Becky replied. “Look at what these so-called outcasts have already done! Hundreds died on that plane in D.C., and hundreds more at the White House. They even killed our president!”

Kyle's scowl darkened as he slammed a hand flat against the table.
“I tell you, man, if we don't find a way to track down all these freaks of nature and exterminate them, the rest of us are history.”