Launch Read online

  “So why did you fall out of bed?”

  Harry rubbed his head. “I was dreaming about teleporting into the intersection again. You know how you’ll jerk if you dream you’re falling? I think it was like that. And I landed right on my goose egg from last night.”

  “Dude, have you ever read any comic books?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Isn’t the first rule something about not talking about your powers in public?”

  Harry shook his head. “I think it’s more, ‘with great power comes great responsibility.’ Either that or ‘no capes.’”

  Demarcus pushed the door open for the cafeteria building. His stomach dropped when he heard nothing but the echo of the door hitting the side of the entryway. Had they missed breakfast?

  They ducked into the meal hall. The kitchen staff was finishing up polishing the silver buffet tables and sweeping the floors.

  A worker looked up at them with an eyebrow raised. “Did you guys forget something?”

  “Yeah, our alarms. Is there any breakfast left?” Demarcus asked.

  The woman wiped her hands on her white apron while a corner of her mouth pulled up in annoyance. “I’m afraid not. I can pull some fruit out, but that’s it. You really are late.”

  No bacon? Shoot. Demarcus could smell the lingering scent of sizzling pig. This was going to mess with his whole day.

  Harry’s shoulders slumped. “You mean I don’t have time for a cup of tea?”

  Demarcus turned to him. “Really, dude?”

  The cook pulled out a bowl of fruit and slammed it on the counter.

  The boys both grabbed bananas and apples. Hopefully they could eat in their group lab. They hollered their thanks as they hit the door. Demarcus started to accelerate too quickly to make up time. With a crunch, he smacked into the back of someone. Both bodies tumbled into a heap on the floor.

  He scrambled off the guy. “I am so sorry—”

  Demarcus had just run over Simon Mazor.

  “Oh, wow. I am really sorry. Here, let me help you up.”

  Simon took Demarcus’s extended hand, Demarcus pulled the billionaire entrepreneur up. What a stupid mistake.

  “Don’t worry. I’m okay. What are you guys doing?” Simon straightened his shirt as an assistant rushed over to check on him.

  “Uh, we just overslept and snagged some fruit before going to lab.”

  Simon looked down the hall with a curious look on his face. “You just left the cafeteria?”

  Demarcus looked at Harry, who stood as still as a statue. “Yes, sir.”

  “The cafeteria that is ten yards away?”

  He hadn’t noticed the distance. He’d just barely cleared the doors. At least, that’s what he thought. Sure enough, the doors were down the hall.

  Simon scratched his head. “Please be more careful. Not paying attention for that long, we don’t want any conference attendees to get hurt.” He looked at his watch. “You’d better get moving, guys. You’re late for lab. You don’t want to miss that. I can’t wait to see what you all come up with.” A wide smile spread over his lips.

  Harry tugged on Demarcus’s arm. Yeah, time to go. After the initial shock of hitting Simon, he wanted to hang with their host. But Simon had said go.

  “Again, so sorry, sir. Thank you, Mr. Mazor. See you later.”

  “He gets the picture. Excuse us, please.” Harry finally pulled Demarcus out of his star-struck daze to get moving. They pushed out the doors, looking for Redwoods Hall.

  “Wow. I just met Simon,” Demarcus said.

  Harry raised an eyebrow. “Yep, made quite an impression. Literally. I think he’ll have a mark on his chest now.”

  “Did I really go fast?”

  Harry shrugged. “You turned the corner pretty fast, so I didn’t see what happened. Maybe.”

  “Great.”

  Simon rubbed his lower back where the kid ran into him. The teen was a little shorter than him, but he packed a wallop. He was about to go on with his next appointment when a thought hit him.

  “Kelsey?”

  The brunette jumped to his side. “What do you need, Simon?”

  “It’s 8:35 A.M. Go to security and have them check the footage of my little encounter here. I might have just run into our next exceptional candidate.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Lily sat in a world of blonde.

  Seriously. This was supposed to be an epic conference with special youth, and they gather all the blondes together in one room? How original is that? At least that left Missy out for now.

  Sarah Jane sat next to her, along with seven other girls. The glass room let in all of the morning light, and the smooth white furnishings added to the gleam. She wondered if they’d hand out sunglasses to protect their eyes.

  The two female leaders came in from the door on the left. The women wore knee-length lab coats and matching light blue polos and khaki pants. The pair screamed conformity. They looked around the room and gave the big Alturas smile.

  “Welcome, everyone. I’m Alexia, and this is Belinda. We’re excited to have you for our first lab of the weekend. I can say that I think your minds will be blown here, so we won’t waste time.”

  Lily raised her hand and simultaneously blurted out, “What’s the purpose of this session?”

  Alexia pointed at her after the fact. “You had a question. Well, your groups will rotate to different stations as the weekend progresses, so make friends along the way. You’ll be mixing and matching in various combinations.” She glanced at her partner. “I can tell you that I think this one is the coolest we’ve got going. But like I said, why wait? Everyone come up here.”

  Lily rolled her eyes and heaved herself out of the chair. The two techs led them to the front of the room where a large pillar embedded in the wall formed a half cylinder. Belinda slid open a panel and tapped in a code.

  A whirring started and the room shuddered a little. As Lily glanced around to see if it was an earthquake, the rest of the group let out a collective, “Ooooh.”

  She turned back and saw what the big deal was. “Oooh.”

  The smooth wall of the pillar retracted, revealing a large hole in the floor. A fireman’s pole threaded through the middle.

  Belinda flipped her coattails behind her, grabbed the pole, and slid down through the gap. Alexia turned, her orange curls flipping behind her. “Who’s next?”

  A petite girl standing in the front recoiled a little. “You want us to go down that?”

  Alexia smiled wide. “Yep! Don’t dawdle, everyone. Get down.”

  Sarah Jane and Lily shared a look. Why not? Lily stepped forward and reached for the pole. Now this was kinda cool. A sense of fun bubbled out of the two leaders, so why not play along? She hopped over the space and dropped down with a whizzing sound.

  Stepping back to allow the others to come, she surveyed the room. If the last room was a glass house, this was the whitewashed room. Smooth rectangular panels of some kind of stone material formed the walls. The only structures in the room were ten hooks spaced evenly, five to a side. The hooks each held a spherical metallic frame, with the front angling into a point that had a blue lens on it.

  She fingered the device. It looked like a helmet of some kind.

  Her curiosity welled up. What were these guys up to?

  One by one, there came a whoosh and a thud from girls sliding down the pole. The last girl was the fraidy-cat, who landed with a squeal. Alexia plopped down beside her and pulled out a small tablet computer from a lab pocket.

  “Everyone gather along the sides and grab a Focuser.”

  The girls did what they were told. They each turned their weird appliances around, inspecting them. Alexia tapped a few times on her device and the pole retracted into the ceiling. The hooks did the same into the walls.

  After everything retracted, the room resembled a plain white box. Packed with blondes. There didn’t even seem to be a door. The washed-out walls and floors reflected light from glowing ceiling panels. Nothing stuck out from the walls at all. Perfectly symmetrical and sheer.

  Okay, this was weird.

  Their guides stepped into the center of the room. “Sorry, but it’s more fun to experience it rather than being told. This is the room where each new group of interns and employees come to get started at Alturas. It’s more than that, though. Everyone needs to put on her Focuser. It will fit like a helmet, with the blue piece in front.”

  Belinda demonstrated with the extra headset while Alexia did all the talking.

  Sarah Jane poked at the inside of the space hat. Lily examined the circuitry around the lens. A very intricate pattern was engraved into the raised border. The metal band that held it was the purest silver color she had ever seen.

  Well, this was part of the deal. Lily slipped the funky headgear on. Too bad there was no mirror. All the other girls looked like some kind of android. Her stomach fluttered with uncertainty.

  Alexia paced the center of the room while Belinda stood where the pole had been. Alexia continued, “All right, ladies. This is our Focuser. It amplifies your core thoughts, the essence of who you are. We all have latent abilities, strengths, and talents. For most people it takes years to figure this out through trial and error.

  “However, here at Alturas, we have worked hard to find keys to unlocking that centering principle of our lives, of our being. When you discover what you love—what resonates most with you—then you can chase that with passion and a drive that is unparalleled to just casting about, trying to find yourselves.”

  Belinda took two steps forward. The woman hadn’t spoken yet, and when she talked, a lilting Aussie accent came forth. “You don’t realize the privilege you’re about to experience. This is going to shape your life. Are you ready?”

  Lily glanced around, as did the rest of the girls in the group. Well, we’ve already got the funky hats on. Why not? She couldn’t really imagine what the future held for her. A murky veil had draped over any hopes she’d once dream about for the future.

  Alexia continued. “There aren’t any objects in the room, no protrusions, because the Focuser needs to reflect off of the special surface here. It’ll take about ten minutes, but it might feel like years pass by. When it activates, you’ll hear a gentle sound, and your vision will wash out. You won’t see anyone else. The sensory centers in your brain will override things, and you’ll experience who you were meant to be.”

  Lily wanted to quip about a fancy 3D experience. The better plan was probably to hold her tongue.

  “If you’re ready, give me a thumbs-up sign.”

  Lily stuck out her thumb, ready to hitchhike in this strange circumstance.

  “Belinda, power up.”

  The last thing Lily saw was the wide grin on Alexia’s face.

  Chapter Eighteen

  A soft thrumming sounded behind Lily’s ears. The helmet clamped down on her temples and the back of her head. The tightening startled her. What was this thing doing?

  Her body froze. She couldn’t move her arms. Her legs stiffened like oaks, rooted to the ground. If she’d wanted to tear the Focuser off, there was no way.

  The scene before her faded into a whitewashed glow. A warm sensation flowed through her skin like waves. Heat massaged her body, filtering every cell from the outside in. Her bones radiated heat inside. She’d never experienced anything so comforting and relaxing. The anxiety from her immobility sank into the ground.

  The soft radiance streaked past her eyes, and she plunged into darkness, inky and tangible. She floated now, and instead of her peasant blouse and shorts, she wore a flowing, thin linen gown that drifted around her body, her bare toes searching for footing. The fluid space around her chilled her skin wherever it touched. The warmth from a moment ago seeped from every pore, and she shivered from the change of temperature.

  Lily tried swimming through the thickness, but she couldn’t move through the murky substance. Claustrophobia tightened its tendrils around her body, encompassing her mind and her heart.

  The dread overwhelmed her resolve not to panic. She wanted to thrash about, break through this muck, and find her core. What kind of finding-yourself exercise was this?

  Now the lightless material forced her eyelids closed. It entered her ears, crawled up her nostrils, and dripped down her throat. Lily tried to clamp her mouth shut. The gloomy ooze seeped through her lips and past her clenched teeth. Her lungs seized. She was drowning in darkness.

  She’d wanted to embrace the black over the last few months. Now it was taking her.

  Her thoughts fuzzed, and she could barely hold on. Please, I need help. Can’t someone see I’m dying?

  Mercy!

  The darksome material flinched. The progression of death stopped.

  I need a way out!

  The throes of midnight loosened its grip on her. She coughed and sputtered as it retreated from inside. Her eyes snapped open.

  She could barely make out something in the distance. A light. A pinprick of something, the barest glimmer that seemed so far away. The tentacles of ice that held her fast didn’t let go, but now there was something besides an absence of all hope. In her mind she focused on that light, willing it to brighten.

  The single point twinkled.

  What was that? It responded to her. There was something in this void that she could control.

  It slipped back, fading from sight.

  No! Lily needed that light.

  Something in her chest clawed at the inside of her rib cage. She strained forward, wriggling her hand to move, just a fraction at first. Her fingers flexed and curled. If she could point at the light before it winked out …

  Her index finger straightened and she concentrated on forming a line from her fingertip to the tiny spark out there. Come on.

  No more darkness!

  A blaze erupted.

  The thick gel that enveloped her burned away. The faraway star that rescued her wasn’t the only light anymore. Sparkles popped up all around, dotting the black canvas. Lily laughed as she spun around in a floating pirouette. The new glints of starlight danced with her.

  Her hands! She held them up in front of her eyes, slowly turning them. She was glowing. The illumination stretching out into the night came from her.

  Fires spread in the heavens. Now the sky above and the space below her feet looked like the view of a telescope, like a can of glitter had exploded into the night air and hung suspended right there. The pinks, oranges, and yellows of a supernova gathered together. Blues and purples of a distant shaft of radiation flashed in a blinking pattern.

  She drifted in space, and instead of the suffocating fear, joy stole through her heart. Lily was gliding on sunbeams. She raised her hands and the luminosity around her swelled. Wow. She lowered her arms, and the horizon started to dim.

  Okay, don’t do that. Light is good.

  The finger that triggered it all continued to shine. She twirled it around her, and it left a streak behind like a Fourth of July sparkler.

  This was amazing.

  Like a conductor, Lily waved her arms to and fro, and a symphony of radiance responded to her command. Beams shot past her as she gestured where they should go. The night shimmered when she spread her arms and fingers out high above her head.

  A hum penetrated her personal firework show. The high-pitched sound whined in the background. Was it almost over? She didn’t want to go. The ecstasy of painting with the spectrums of each ray around had banished the terror of the pitch-black that had swallowed her.

  She stretched out with her arms extended high above her head. A deep breath calmed her racing heart from the excitement. The Focuser was drawing her away.

  One more image from far away shimmered like a mirage in the desert. Her eyes strained to bring it into relief. The stars around changed into lines as she started receding back into the real world. What was that last sight trying to push through?

  Another person was out there. A face flickered into view for just a moment. His eyes crinkled with his smile, and a hand stretched out in invitation.

  Had she seen the face of Love?

  Chapter Nineteen

  The squeeze of the helmet released, and the Focuser sat loose on Lily’s head. Her eyes fluttered open.

  She expected to be blinded by the sheer white of the room. Instead, compared to what she’d just seen, it resembled a dingy t-shirt. Her legs and arms tingled, and she had to shake them out after her psychedelic trip. She slipped the helmet off and turned to find that the hooks had protruded again.

  The other girls looked at each other in excitement, but Lily didn’t pay attention to the chatter around her. She didn’t want to be in the real world—she wanted to create with light. Never before had she experienced such an epiphany. This Focuser must be something, because now she wanted to read and study optics, to figure out the properties and abilities of something she’d taken for granted all her life.

  Alexia directed them to the end of the room. Instead of a door sliding open, a panel retracted into the floor. “The Focuser needs to have minimal interruption on the sides of the room. That’s why we have the pole and the trap door. It doesn’t matter in the ceiling or floor. Plus, isn’t it just cool to do something different?”

  With that, Alexia took a step and disappeared down the tunnel with a whoop. Belinda directed the other girls down one at a time until only Lily remained. When she stepped to the edge, Belinda held her arm, and her stare bored into the younger girl.

  “You’re special.”

  Then she tugged enough that Lily had to drop into the tube. She hit a slide made out of a soft surface that absorbed her fall yet was still slick enough that she careened down and shot out onto a mat in a different room.

  What did that mean, she was “special?” What kind of experiences did the others have?

  Alexia started talking again. “Okay, here you are in room 9-C. While we’re sure you want to talk over the exciting things you experienced, we recommend waiting until your debriefing tomorrow. You may not understand some of the images and feelings. Our specialists will process the brain function readings. Don’t worry, everything falls under strict confidentiality for privacy.”