The next day, I tried for about the tenth time to see Ms Ellis. My previous attempts had been stopped by a secretary telling me she was in a meeting elsewhere in the school and would be back later. She always seemed to be coming back later.
“She’s in a meeting with the principal.” I was told on this visit. It was the second time the excuse had been used, clearly I was being avoided. That and I could feel that little niggling feeling people get in their heads when they’re lying only because they’ve been told they have to.
“Will she be back later?” I asked, exasperated.
“She said she would be. Although she said that yesterday too.” The secretary said.
“And the day before.”
I left the office and went back to my free period. I went outside to the tree to sit on my own. Even though most of my friends shared my free periods, I was in a solitary thinking mood, and the big tree behind the science block was a good place to sit and be nostalgic and convince myself that I didn’t have to kill my old friends in order to ensure my own survival.
Of course solitude is a great ideal, and one that rarely works, especially at a place where groups of friends used to hang out a lot.
“Needed some thinking time too?” Came a voice from behind me.
I turned around to see Matt walking down the hill. Thankfully alone, but I stood up and almost started to run out of instinct.
“It’s okay.” He said. “I would say I’m not armed but that’s not true. But I didn’t come here looking for a fight.” He sat down on the bench. “I guess I needed to think about things just as much as you did.”
“Trying to think up new ways to get me killed?”
“Hey! I’m not killing anyone. That’s Chris’ thing. I’m just tagging along so I don’t get excommunicated.”
“Yeah I’m sure you’d hate to get the whole ‘you’re still our friend but we don’t want to talk to you or hang out with you anymore’ speech from a crazy person.” I said bitterly.
“Yes, that was harsh. Again, not my idea. But no...I’m not looking to piss Chris or Nathan off right now. Although in case you didn’t notice Chris hasn’t come to school today...you guys did a good job of messing him up last night.”
“He started it.” I sat down on the seat next to him. “So what’s your plan anyway? Just follow Chris and Nathan to that terrible end where everyone is dead and you guys are sitting in a jail cell? Are you sure that’s what you want?”
“Well that’s assuming that I get to live that long and don’t get turned into an icicle. Your friend Emily certainly packs a punch lately. Do you know what it feels like to have one of my barriers frozen? Dear god it’s the worst ice cream headache. And one of these days she’s not going to stop at that...”
“...which is my problem. My new friends are going to kill my old friends. Or get killed by them. And noone’s even sure of why were actually fighting. On my side anyway.”
“Yeah it’s not too clear on my side either. We’re just following orders, playing the game and all. And let me tell you...it sounded so much cooler when we first got the job description. I mean, stopping random ghosts around the school...that’s a cool thing.”
“And now it’s all about beating us and it’s just going to end up with someone dead isn’t it?”
“Exactly. I mean we weren’t even supposed to kill Neil, just scare him. But then that kid could fight, like Chuck Norris only not quite as awesome, and then Chris got a bit too excited and bam...there’s a corpse and blood. And it’s the same with you guys. That night in the locker room, it started off as Chris just trying to cover his ass, and then it became this thing, we can beat you guys so we’re going to. Of course I don’t think they expected you guys to fight back, so everyone’s just trying to get stronger to beat each other...”
“Yup that’s how I read it. It sucks doesn’t it?”
“Why are you even doing this though? I mean, you’re not supposed to be involved. Hell, I don’t think they knew about you and Chloe and Lisa until that night in the locker room. You could just walk away from this. I’m stuck here, I got put on a team and I’m Mister Invisible Wall and if Nathan and Chris go down I go down with them.”
“What’s to stop you running away? Like, skip town for a few weeks, let this blow itself over?”
“Dude, I have parents. They would flip if I suggested that. And even if Chris and Nathan understood, this thing is bigger than them. I don’t want to know what would happen if I try to leave this. I’m stuck being the guy who can’t really hurt anyone, but can very much be hurt.”
“At least you can do something...”
“Yeah, I used to think you had this cool thing you could do. Same with Chloe. But it seems like you guys got the short psychic straw. I mean, telling how people are feeling is a pretty neat party trick, but...I can do forcefields, and Nathan can float stuff with his mind...”
“And all these wonderful powers are the reason that you guys are all killing each other. I think it would all be nice and simple if you had these lovely passive powers. Couldn’t hurt a soul. Hell, I’d give you a week with my power in a situation like this and you’d be a wreck, feeling all the anger and pain and shit...but I think as crazy as she is Lisa’s got it right. The less we use our powers the better off things are.”
“HA!” Matt said. “She’s just an idealist. Plus you can’t exactly use your power less. You’re stuck with it on full all the time, knowing exactly what these people are doing. The only upside is you can’t actually do anything to anyone with your power...Plus Lisa can do a lot more than she lets on. I’m sure if she was stuck in a confined space with a ghost who could rip her eyes out her power would end up like Chris’...”
“Chris couldn’t always do that?” I said.
“When he first got his power. He was our healer. Our first few ghost fights were pretty rough, but Nathan and I could handle them. Until they locked Chris in a room on his own. He screamed and banged on the door to be let out...and then...he was doing what he can do now. He says sometimes he’s just bringing old wounds back out, re-opening scars, and other times...he can feel he’s making all kinds of new hurt on a person. At first he hated the feeling...but now...”
“Wow...okay so who the hell is doing this? Who locked him in a room with a ghost? And who the hell told you guys about them in the first place? I just keep bumping into them and no one has locked me in a room with one..”
“We started not long after we stopped talking to you guys. And as for who’s in charge...you really should have that conversation with Ellis...”
The bell rang, Matt got up.
“Well...was nice chatting. At least I know you’re not trying to kill me.” He said. “Look...I’ll try to have your back, make it so you don’t get killed in this mess. But Emily and Dane just put Nathan and Chris through a world of hurt...so I don’t know how far they’re going to go..”
“Same on my side. I don’t want anyone to get killed, but I’m not the one making the decisions when the time comes...”
I know it might be considered stalking by some people, waiting a safe watching distance from the door to their office to see when they go home for the night. I like to think of it as affectionately following. It took a good few hours after school finished, but Ms Ellis finally left her office.
“You’re avoiding me.” I called out to her as she went to leave the building.
I could see her shoulders sag as she recognised my voice. “I was doing a good job of it too.”
“Which is odd considering how much you could help me. Apparently you know what’s going on here.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She said, and then looked at my expression. “Dear god, they were right. You empaths are a pain in the ass. Human lie detection...”
“Well at least you know what I can do. It’s a good start. Know about anyone else being able to do things?”
She sighed and started walking back to her office. “Come on, you should sit down for this, it might be a while.”
