"Watch what you're doing with your metal West! You just sliced up my hands!" Small shards of iron fly from my hands to behind me, narrowly missing my head, and stop right in front of Allan.
"Sorry!" Allan just goes back to training. I turn around, stick my tongue out at him and put my hands in some water, letting out a hiss of pain.Good thing my hands heal pretty quickly. Unfortunately, there is no way to get rid of the scarring that will be left behind.
"What are you two doing here?" Gracie pops into our headquarters with a duffle bag and pillow in hand. "We're supposed to be going to school right now. Or did you two forget?"
"I didn't forget anything. All my stuff is over there." I point to the corner where my bag and pillow are sitting. "Don't know about Allan since I'm not seeing anything else." Tossing all the water back into their pools, I seal them off and grab a towel.
"I can't believe you'd assume I forgot about this whole trip!" He protests, sitting next to me. "Besides, all my stuff is in my car and not down here where it can get damaged."
"Well considering what you did to my hands, there's a good likelihood I would've torn it up."
Small flakes of metal emerge from my hands and I let out a yelp. "What was that for?"
"Don't kill me yet!" He holds his hands up in self defense. "Just clearing out the little bits of iron you missed." Floating between Allan's hands, the metal changes shape over and over again.
"I'm not the one who can manipulate that stuff so it's no shocker I missed some." Now that the wounds on my hands have been reopened, I grab my water bottle and use part of it to reheal them. "Gimme a minute and I'll be ready to go. Need to change out of these clothes really quickly."
"Okay. Don't take too long!" Gracie calls after me.
I pull off my shorts and sports bra and replace them with a dark blue sweatshirt and jeans. The weather has finally cooled down just enough that I can wear whatever I want. Pulling on my sneakers, I throw my dirty clothes into the hamper I have on the way back to the training room.
"Let's go!" Duffel bag and pillow in hand, I activate my teleporter and appear right beside my car. It's already in the school parking lot and I head inside.
~~~
Excited chatter fills the band room as everyone files inside. In order to get everyone's attention, I yell, "DO WE HAVE EVERYONE HERE?"
"I think so."
"What about the directors?"
"I saw them out by the bus."
"Where is our stuff going?"
"Everything is going to get stacked in the back of the bus," I answer. "If you want to keep your pillow with you, feel free to but don't lose them. Now, let's go get on the bus!"
Scrambling, everyone rushes to grab their bags, run down the hall, and out the door to where the buses are waiting. The directors are waiting in the very back of the bus and all suitcases and duffel bags get passed back to where they get stacked up.
Once everyone is seated and the headcount is done, the doors are shut and we head to Knoxville.
~~~
"Hey Celeste, wake up." Allan is shaking me.
Yawning, I ask, "Are we here?"
"We are. Now I know my shoulder is comfy, but you can go back to sleep once we get everything unloaded."
"M'kay." Making my way to the back of the bus, I find my duffle and quickly exit. Once everyone is off the bus, the directors pass out a sheet of paper.
"This is your room number," Mrs. Smith announces. "You will be staying with who you signed up to room with so I don't want to hear any grumbling."
"If you want to combine rooms, feel free to do so. Just no funny business." Mr. McNeal stares all of us down. "Understand?"
"Understood," we say.
Once the cabin doors get unlocked, the halls flood with everyone trying to find their room. Voices fill the halls as rooms are found and roommates claim beds.
Once bags are unpacked, we all pile in the living room and turn on a movie.
~~~
"RISE AND SHINE EVERYONE! WE'RE GOING TO AN ESCAPE ROOM TODAY!"
I sit up with a jolt. Quickly looking around, I see the rest of the leadership team asleep on the floor around me. Being as quiet as I can, I stand up and head to the bathroom. With all the girls we have on the trip (and some of the guys), the quicker I get in here the better.
Once we've all eaten and changed into escape room appropriate clothes, we load the buses and go to Escape Game Knoxville.
2 Hours Later…
"No! Don't stick that in the electric outlet Tyler!"
"What made you think lifting the sofa was a good idea?!"
"Why did you break the jar!? You could've just opened it!"
Voices fill the room as we tell people not to do dumb things. Unfortunately, Noah broke a glass jar and now has a cut on his hand.
"Do you need me to wrap that?"
"No?"
Exasperated, I sigh. And proceed to grab a piece of the glass so I can cut off the hem of my shirt to wrap his hand. "Count yourself lucky it's not deep. I'm only doing this so we don't get blood everywhere."
"How do you know how to do that?" Andrew asks.
"I read a lot," I flatly answer, tying the knot on the makeshift bandage. "There. Now, let's get this thing done."
~~~
Mrs. Smith opens her mouth as if she's going to say something, but she stops herself. Finally, she asks, "So does anyone want to tell me why Noah has his hand wrapped in what looks to be part of Celeste's shirt?"
No one answers. But since it's my shirt acting as a bandage, I answer. "He sorta broke a jar in there and cut his hand."
"And how bad is this cut?"
"It'll heal pretty quick since it's just a scrape. We just wrapped it to stop the bleeding," I explain.
"Let's just get back to the buses. We're heading to Sweet P's Barbeque for lunch before going hiking."
~~~
"Can someone kill me?" I ask, practically falling onto the sofa in the cabin.
"Why?" Adrianna asks.
"I hurt all over."
"Baby."
I stick my tongue out at Tyler.
"What? I've seen you take on worse things than that trail."
At that moment, Noah walks in and immediately turns around. "Yeah, I'm not dealing with that today. You guys have fun!" He says on his way out.
"I'm going to take a nap. Adrianna, please don't wake me up." Standing up, I retreat to our room. I shut the door and open the window. Silently dropping to the ground, I dash to the woods, click my bracelet to activate my suit, and fly off the ground.
Knoxville is so different from Murfreesboro and Nashville. Residents are still hurrying from place to place, but it feels different. More relaxed than what I'm used to.
"What if I came here to go to UTK? But then that would be too far from Nashville and there can be limits on curfew in the dorms." At this point I'm just rambling to myself while I fly through the sky. "Will I even be able to get out if I need to? And then there's the possibility of a roommate…"
I have no destination in mind. Nothing I want to do other than fly for as long as possible. Once it starts getting dark, I turn around and head back to the cabin. The sun is fully set once I get there so I fly straight to the window.
Right then, the door opens and in walks Adrianna.
"Shit." I freeze, half in and half out of the window. I lash out some water, pull her to her bed, freeze her there, and slam the door with some wind.
"Well that's just rude. You better count yourself lucky that I was the only one walking in here, Celeste. Now, start explaining."
Reluctantly, I retract my suit and sit on my bed. "I don't even know where to begin. You obviously know who I am and have known for a little while."
After I unfreeze the water, Adrianna rubs her wrists and turns towards me. "Just start at the beginning," she instructs.
"Okay."
~~~
"So you know how every other hero in the country got their powers, but you don't know how you got yours?" She looks confused.
"Yep. Only idea I have is that it's somehow genetic but none of my parents or extended family members have powers."
"What the literal fuck."
"Sometimes that's just how everything works. There's a lot we don't know about our powers or if anyone around the world can get them at a random time."
"So you know who everyone is? Nyx? Halo? Ash? Crosscut?"
"We all know each other. But you can't say anything to anyone. Ivy, Renegade, and Shift were killed because someone got hold of their identities."
She gets really quiet. "Have you found them?"
"If you're talking about the bodies, they were found a month and a half ago, right before we went in front of the committee." Tears well up in my eyes and I do everything possible to keep myself from crying. "Whoever killed them killed my family. And they won't get away with it."
"Protecting family is important. My dad decided he wants to get to know me. I've never met the guy but I also have two siblings," she tells me. "I know I have an older sister, but he won't tell me who she is and then I have a younger sibling."
"Who's your dad?"
"Daniel Ricci."
I stare at her in shock. "As in Campbell Ricci?"
"They're my sibling. At least I think that's what I call them."
"Campbell is one of the sweetest people I've ever met." Reaching under my pillow, I pull out the knife I brought with me for protection and start fiddling with it.
"Then why won't they talk to me?" She asks, eyes wide at the sight of my knife.
"I don't think that's something I can answer. You'll have to figure that out yourself. When we get home tomorrow night, sit down and talk with them."