A Disease of Magic

As soon as I closed the door behind me and Amelia, a bit of unease settled in my stomach. She was basically a stranger and I had invited into my apartment. Not to mention the whole telepathy thing added on a whole other level of risk, even though she wasn’t well-trained or even trained at all. Right?

“Have you started any training yet?” I asked, toeing off my shoes by the door. Amelia didn’t answer me right away, taking in the space in front of us. I had to have cashed in some serious karma to get this apartment so perfectly decorated for my taste, even if it was still next door to Leo.

“Training?” Amelia echoed, finally looking at me. She tilted her head to the side, and my bio-screen buzzed once.

“Yeah, for your telepathy,” I clarified. I could have just thought it and she likely would have heard, but it wasn’t something I was used to.

Amelia shook her head. “Not exactly. I’m just working on turning it off when I need to. It can get overwhelming if I can’t manage it.”

“Didn’t you mention something about some pills or something you could take to help?”

“Yeah, for emergencies. But I don’t want to rely on them, you know? I’ve had to take more than my fair share of meds in my life.”

Didn’t I know it. Up until recently, having emergency meds on my person was just as natural as taking my phone everywhere with me.

“Who came up with those? That’s a clever idea,” I said, honestly curious. It was news to me. Alex had never mentioned a way to put a damper, or even stop, someone’s abilities, even temporarily. It was likely a useful tool, in the event someone started going too far and couldn’t stop. It would be easy enough for Amelia to leave hers on and forget about it, eventually burning herself out.

Amelia shrugged. “No clue. But I’m grateful.”

“Can you hear just people? Or animals, too?”

She considered, twisting her long blond hair in her hands. “You know, I don’t know that they really have thoughts I can interpret. They have instincts, you know? Maybe some general feelings. I might be able to get an impression, but I don’t think I’d be able to get much more. But thanks for the idea. I’ll definitely try it out sometime.”

I put up my hands. “Just don’t blame me if it goes terribly wrong.”

She turned the conversation to me. “What about you? What can you do, exactly?”

I sighed, walking to my right into the kitchen to make a coffee. It was only the early afternoon, but I was tired. Caffeine would mentally wake me up a bit, but it did nothing physically. It would do.

“Mine it teleportation, specifically bending the space between objects. I don’t manipulate the objects themselves.”

“That’s cool. So could you, like, send me across the country?”

I shook my head. “I’m not that talented.”

“Yet,” she added for me.

“Yet,” I allowed. “We’ll see how crazy things can get. I’ve only ever teleported myself and one other person a few feet. I’m still learning my limits. It’s kind of like a muscle. If I use it too much without practice, I’ll strain it and that can cause problems.”

“So you have to slowly level up.”

My coffee spluttered into the mug, and I reached into the fridge for my creamer. I gestures towards Amelia with it. “Exactly.”

She sighed, helping herself to one of the bar stools at the peninsula island that was almost identical to the one in Leo’s kitchen. I ate all my meals there, choosing to use the small kitchen table at the other end as a catch-all instead. It worked pretty well for folding laundry, which I’d done all of once since moving in. I was getting pretty low on some necessities, and knew I’d have to schedule a day to get caught up.

“This is complicated.”

“Yep,” I agreed. “We’ve been working on trying to figure it out for a little while now.”

“We?”

It was my turn to sigh. “Me and the ex-best friend.”

“Ah, the one who kissed you?”

“Yeah, though honestly that wasn’t even his worst offense.”

“Do you want to talk about it.”

I shook my head and stared down at my coffee. “Not particularly. At least, not yet. Things are…”

I met Amelia’s gaze as I searched for the words to describe my current feelings towards Leo. Her expression was open, and she waited patiently.

“Complicated,” I finally decided on. “He thought he was keeping me out of trouble, and went to some extremes to do so instead of just talking to me. He betrayed my trust that way. Which is part of why I live here now.” I gestured to the space we occupied. “Before, we were roommates. We both seemed to be on a similar timeline for LaShoul’s, and thought it smart not to live alone. Now, he’s just my neighbor.” There was more to it than that, of course, but I didn’t elaborate.

“Sounds like a real peach,” Amelia teased. “I’d love to get in his head sometime. With your permission, of course, and maybe some leading questions.”

“I may take you up on that offer. I have questions.”

“What questions?”

“I don’t know that I even know what questions I have.”

Amelia laughed. “Girl, I feel that way, too.”

“Maybe I know some answers?” I suggested. “Ask away. I’ll share what I know?”

Amelia didn’t waste a beat. “What caused this? Will everyone be able to eventually do something? Why us? Why the LaShoul’s? Does this impact how long we live? What kind of other abilities are there? Are there hard limits that we won’t be able to train up to? Will we ever get a different ability?”

I took a long swig of my coffee. “Great questions. No answers.”

Amelia’s shoulders slumped. She began drumming her fingers on the quartz countertop. “Those aren’t even half of my questions.”

Let out a short bark of a laugh. “Trust me, you’re not alone. We’re trying to figure this out, too. But what I can tell you, which is secondhand information, so don’t quote me, is that no, people have only one ability. So far. There’s probably ways to grow and manipulate it, but beyond that I haven’t heard of anyone with a second ability. I don’t think you can change what your ability is, either. It seems like once it manifests, that’s what you’re stuck with. Again, this is based on what I’ve been told, and a bit of what I’ve read between the lines.

“As far as limits go, that’s a great question. To start, you will have a low limit, because you’re still learning how to use those mental muscles. There’s also a theory that it may tie in to your physical health, that using the ability affects your body. So the healthier you are overall, the more you’ll be able to do. That I have been told is a working theory, one that I’m going to be working on at Farley Tech.”

It took Amelia a few moments to absorb my words, and another minute or so to digest them. Just like she had, I waited patiently.

“Huh.”

I gave her a grim smile. “Yeah. We really know hardly anything right now.”

“That gave me more questions.”

My smile was more natural this time. “I’m not surprised.”

We were interrupted by a knock at the door. I looked to Amelia.

“Can you tell who that is?” I asked.

She shook her head. “No. I need eyes on a person.”

“For now,” I added. “Maybe that’ll be something you can build up to.”

I walked over to the door, pulling up the camera feed built-in. I didn’t turn on the camera on my side, hoping that the man standing on the other side would take the fucking hint and leave.

In true Leo fashion, I wasn’t so lucky.

“I know you’re home, Callie,” he said. “We need to talk.”

I turned to Amelia. “Ready to meet the ex-best friend?” It was sooner than I personally would have planned, but if situations presented themselves so easily, who was I to say no?

She smiled widely. “Oh, yes, this should be good.”