A Disease of Magic

“Thank you,” I said to the young woman sitting in front of me. She was younger than me by a couple of years, maybe, dark circles permanently under her eyes, hair dull and flat just like her blue eyes were whenever she managed to make eye contact with me. The beeping in the background was persistent, the wires taped to her irritated skin tugging, the harshly clean smell of the hospital room, it all reminded me of my own stint in the hospital.

How long ago was that? Almost a month, so what, five weeks? Six? It felt like an eternity ago. My life had changed so drastically since then, it was unrecognizable to me when I thought about it.

And I was vibrating in anger, trying to keep my thoughts, my words, to myself. My life had changed for the better, but would hers? She was so far gone, it physically pained me to look at her. I couldn’t even imagine what she had been going through, was still going through. LaShoul’s usually didn’t present so quickly, so severely, in someone as young as her. She should have another few years, at least. But it looked like it was more like a few months, at the most. If she was lucky.

Why wouldn’t someone do something for her?

The girl, Amelia, nodded lifelessly in response to my thanks for her time, her eyes dropping again to the thin hospital blanket in her lap. Her long, too-thin fingers toyed with the hem, fraying it further. It felt like as soon as she was done unraveling the threads, she too would be unraveled.

I kept an eye on her as I finished packing my bag. I didn’t ask her my own questions today. She was dealing with enough, even though she would never know the difference. Her shoulders were curled inward like she was just waiting to implode.

It was heartbreaking.

Throughout the entire interview, I’d exposed her to small bits of gamma, teleporting a pen from my bag to the bedside table just out of her view, close to the IV stand. The chances of it making a difference were next to none, but I couldn’t not try.

The pack of sticky notes in my bag caught my eye. Without thinking too much about it, I ripped one off and scribbled my name and phone number on it. I hesitated just a moment before extending it out to her.

“That’s my personal number,” I told her. She didn’t react. “I have LaShoul’s, too.”

She spared me a quick glance, no doubt cataloguing how healthy I looked in comparison to her. I pursed my lips together, trying not to outwardly cringe.

“I was were you were weeks ago,” I continued. “If you need someone to talk to who understands…” I gestured to the paper still in my hand. “Or if you want someone else to talk to, there’s a group of us that meets every other week. I can give you the details. It…helps. To have others who understand.”

Slowly, so slowly I was afraid to even breathe, she reached out. As her hand made contact with me, I noticed the pen still sitting on the table behind her and quickly zapped it into my other hand.

Amelia jerked, as though shocked, pulling the paper with her as she recoiled from my touch.

“Sorry,” I apologized. “Did I shock you or something?”

Big, wide blue eyes met mine, suddenly shining with life. The monitor behind her started blaring an alarm. I looked, noting her pulse, blood pressure, and respiration all increasing. Her heart was pounding, if the monitor was to be believed, and her chest started heaving as she took in gulping breaths.

“Amelia, look at me,” I instructed. She hadn’t stopped, the whites of her eyes exposed. “Breathe in. Hold it. Two. Three. Four. Out slowly. Two. Three. Four. Again. You count.”

She listened, slowing her breathing. Her gaze never left mine as she wrestled her pulse back under control.

A nurse stopped by, clearly alerted by the monitors.

“Everything okay in her?” He shot me an angry look, as though I were responsible for Amelia’s sudden change.

“She didn’t do anything,” Amelia rasped, her voice sounding like she hadn’t had anything to drink in days. It was a vast difference from how she sounded earlier; meek, quiet, defeated.

“I didn’t say—”

“You were thinking it,” Amelia interrupted. She cleared her throat. “Could I get some water, please?”

The nurse hesitated, clearly surprised to be called out like that. He didn’t deny it though. Amelia was more observant than I gave her credit for. Hopefully my questions had been distracting enough that she hadn’t noticed the pen trick.

After the nurse took her water cup to refill, she turned her luminous eyes to me. It was such a stark difference than earlier that it had me standing up straighter, observing her just as she observed me.

“What’s the pen trick?” she asked.

Pen trick? How in the…?

My eyes darted away as a flood of thought crashed over me, each more disturbing, more exciting, than the last.

I couldn’t remember what her stats had been earlier when I first walked in, but they looked…good. Really good.

“Uh…” I didn’t know how to answer her. I couldn’t say anything, obviously. But I had questions, too. Namely, how did she know about the pen thing?

Well, she didn’t know, because she’d just asked me. So what did she know? And more importantly, how?

My bio-screen pinged, the little vibration pulling me out of my swirling thoughts. I shook my head in an attempt to clear it as I pulled up my stats with a couple quick taps, noting the S1 that was suddenly there.

Tally

Weighted

P1

22

22

P2

3

6

P3

0

0

P4

0

0

P5

0

0

S1

2

0.67

S2

0

0

Total

27

28.67

As I watched, S1 increased again to three. Meaning I was currently being exposed.

I looked out of the room to the hallway. Rude nurse wasn’t back yet, so it couldn’t be him. There were a few people sitting at the central desk, working. It could be any of them, though I was barely within range if that was the case.

“Exposed to what?” Amelia asked.

I turned back to her, my brows together in confusion.

“Exposed?” I repeated. She nodded, leaning forward.

“You think you’re being exposed,” she clarified. “Exposed to what?”

As it all came crashing down in my head, Amelia winced, closing her eyes and rubbing her temples.

“Too much,” she moaned. “That was too much.”

“Too much what, Amelia?” I asked.

“Just…stuff,” she said unhelpfully.

“What kind of stuff?” I pressed, grabbing the railing at the bottom of the hospital bed and leaning in.

“I…I don’t know,” she moaned. She opened her eyes again and looked at me. I saw the slight flinch. “How do I make it stop?”

“What needs to stop?” Her pulse was increasing again. In a moment of what might be temporary insanity, I reached forward and grabbed her hand, giving it what I hoped was a reassuring squeeze. “Breathe, Amelia. Close your eyes and just breathe.”

She listened, her pulse slowly ticking back down as she focused on her breathing. Good. We didn’t need rude nurse coming back in on his high horse to kick me out while I was trying to put together what my brain had already figured out.

I could call Alex, probably. He could send someone else who could probably help better than I could. Maybe that person would know what was going on and how to help.

Because Amelia had just developed an ability.

Telepathy came to mind as the most logical answer to what her ability was. How good she was at it, could become, was undetermined. As I continued to hold her hand, I checked my bio-screen again, noting that S1 was up to five, but was no longer increasing. That had to mean she’d turned it off.

“Good, Amelia. Can you look at me?” I asked. She opened her eyes, blinking furiously, and let go of my hand.

“What was that?” she whispered.

“I’m not positive,” I answered honestly. “But I think I know someone who can tell us.”

“Alex?”

With the greatest effort known to mankind, I hid my shock. “Alex knows some people who know more than the both of us. You mind me hanging out here while I call?”

“That’s fine.”

I pointed to the hallway, towards the nurses’ station. “I’ll be right out there. Shout if it starts happening again, okay? I’ll come and help you.”

She nodded just as rude nurse came back in with her water. I deposited my work bag on the visitor’s chair and stepped into the hall to call Alex.

Thankfully, he answered on the third ring.

“Hey, I was just thinking about you,” he said upon answering. “Want to meet for lunch?”

“Um, I kind of have a situation here,” I said quietly into the phone.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes,” I answered quickly. “But…she’s not and could use some help from, uh, people who understand better than me.”

“Callie, what do you mean, exactly?”

“I was interviewing,” I began, checking the hallway for any eavesdroppers. “And then…Alex, I think she’s telepathic.”

A beat of silence. Then, “I don’t understand.”

“She got an ability while I was here,” I whispered hurriedly. “She doesn’t understand what’s happening, she has no one here to help. I don’t know what I’m doing. Can you just…send someone here to help her?”

“Oh. Oh shit. Yeah. Yeah, I can. Um, stay on the line. I’ll just add someone to the call, and then you can explain it again so we’re not playing telephone.”

I waited, crossing my free arm across my middle to hold the opposite elbow, tapping out an erratic beat with my fingers. I tried not to fidget with my whole body. Drawing attention to myself right now would not be a good idea.

The silence of being on hold disappeared, and Alex’s voice started speaking again.

“Callie, I got a hold of Aaron. Can you explain again what’s going on?”

“I’m at the University hospital, interviewing a patient, and at the end when I was getting ready to leave, I think she got an ability. Telepathy, maybe? I don’t think she could really read my thoughts clearly, but she mentioned Alex’s name when I was deciding to call him for backup. I never mentioned his name out loud.”

The silence—there was a lot of that lately, and it unnerved me—was tense for a moment.

“Alright, Callie. Can you stay there with her until someone gets there? We’ll be able to better asses what’s going on in person.”

The voice was familiar, but with everything else going on I wasn’t going to try to place it.

“Um, yeah, I can do that. It’s kind of freaking her out a bit. I mean, that makes sense, I would freak out too. But, um, how long will it be? Because I don’t know if it will happened again. I think it stopped. At least for now.” Damn, the word-vomit was appalling. If I wasn’t so concerned for Amelia, I might have cared. This was someone higher up in the rankings of the Organization, someone I probably wanted to make a positive impression on to help me get higher clearance. This surely wasn’t doing me any favors.

“I see,” Aaron said. “If I can’t get someone there in twenty minutes, I’ll come personally. You said the university hospital, yes?” He rattled off the address, and I checked my phone to make sure it matched my location.

“Yes.”

“Someone will be there soon. And Callie? Quick thinking. That’s exactly the type of response we like to see.”

My chest inflated with pride, even though I still couldn’t figure out who was on the line.

“He hung up,” Alex said. I nodded before realizing he couldn’t see me.

“Okay. Thanks, Alex.”

“No need to thank me. Anyways, about lunch…”

Twenty-five minutes later there was a soft knock on the door. Amelia had drifted off to sleep five minutes earlier, but roused easily as…Dr. Goodwin walked into the room.

That…actually made a lot of sense. I knew he was a part of the Organization, having seen him previously. And being able to access my schedule, of where and who I was interviewing, also checked out. No one had asked where exactly I was in this building during the earlier phone call.

Amelia looked startled by his presence, and I stood up and gave Dr. Goodwin a smile.

“Amelia, this is Dr. Goodwin. He works with Hubert Industries, and knows a lot about what we think is going on. He’ll be able to help figure everything out for you, okay?”

Amelia took a deep breath and nodded. She scooted up on the bed into more of a sitting position.

I made to leave, introductions having been made, but Dr. Goodwin stopped me with a hand on my shoulder.

“Callie, why don’t you stay? You might be able to fill in some gaps and offer another perspective.”

Amelia looked relieved at his suggestion. There was no way that I was going to say no now.

“Sure,” I answered. “If you don’t mind, I need a second to let Alex know of the change in plans.”

“Ah, yes, Alex. He’s a good one. Remind me, how did you two meet?”

I tapped out a message to Alex and sent it before answering so my words didn’t get mixed up and result in an undecipherable message to him.

“The support group. After that first meeting, he actually asked me out. And, well, here we are.”

“O-ho! You’re dating, then?”

I nodded, a little sheepishly. I didn’t like this attention, not when it involved my personal life at least. But I wasn’t going to give Amelia any reason to doubt Goodwin, not when she needed his help.

“I can see it. No wonder you called him. And here we are!” He gestured to the room broadly, arms extended. “Now, Amelia. I’m sure this is all very confusing. Can you start at the beginning and tell me what happened? Then I’ll ask Callie to add anything else, and then we can figure this out.”

I had to give it to him. Goodwin had a way of putting people at ease. Amelia visibly relaxed, her monitors clearly showing the same shift.

Twenty minutes later, Goodwin had the story from both of us. Amelia had looked shocked when I explained that she verbalized, more than once, what I had been thinking. She’d thought I’d been muttering to myself.

Even though she knew now that wasn’t true, the brain often tried to classify things into groups based on what it knew. Toddlers were notorious for this, Goodwin explain. Any four-legged creature might be considered a dog, for example, instead of a cat or a cow. The categories were broad when information was limited, and in Amelia’s case, she had no idea this other category could even exist.

“I think we have Callie her to thank for her quick thinking. You’re not the first telepath I’ve met. Unfortunately, I knew of a few who went a little…let’s say, off, in the head, because they didn’t understand what was happening. One was diagnosed with schizophrenia, even. But thankfully, none of that will be a problem for you, my dear.” He reached out and patted her hand reassuringly, like a grandfather would.

“Am I going to die?” Amelia asked. In that moment, she looked so young and hopeful.

Dr. Goodwin chuckled. “Eventually, we all die. But if you’re asking if LaShoul’s will be the reason, the answer is no. You will need to learn about this ability of yours. How to control it, use it, turn it on and off. But we have time for that, and facilities for you to do so safely in a controlled environment. I believe Callie can speak on that.”

He turned to me expectantly, eyebrows raised slightly, awaiting my response.

I cleared my throat. “Yes, that’s true. I’ve just started there, but I discovered my ability on my own, by accident.” I gave a casual shrug. “I’m learning more about my ability and limits right now.”

“Amelia. Here is my card. Once you’re feeling better, and once you’re discharged, you call me and we’ll get you started. Okay? And if it starts happening again, you find someplace where you can be alone, and you call me.”

She reached out and took the card, thanking him. Dr. Goodwin caught my eyes and nodded towards the door. I nodded once, turning to say my own goodbye to Amelia as he stepped outside.

“It’s going to be great, Amelia,” I promised. “And you can still call or text me, too. I’d be happy to go with you if it makes you feel better. Okay?”

“Thanks, Callie. I will.”

I grabbed my bag and left, looking around until I found Dr. Goodwin standing near the elevators down the hall. When I approached, he turned and smiled.

“Honestly, Callie, you handled that extremely well, all things considered.”

“All things considered?”

He nodded as the elevator dinged with its arrival. He held a hand out, encouraging me to go first, and filed in behind me. I stabbed the button for the ground floor, and we started moving.

“Typically for situations like this, there’s a certain way we do things. You obviously haven’t had that training. Even so, I’m impressed. You kept her calm and kept her ability from burning her out.”

“Has that happened before?”

He nodded solemnly. “Unfortunately. We’ve learned that the abilities housed in the mind, like telepathy, are more difficult to turn on and off. It’s more difficult to navigate when the magic happens on the inside. Your ability, for example, affects external objects and beings, and your brain has an easier time controlling it because it can see what’s happening and what it’s doing.”

“I had no idea,” I said quietly.

“That’s part of why we need to be careful with the information we share. If you weren’t there to calm her, ground her in reality, it could have gone very differently for her.”

“Glad I was there for her, then.”

“Indeed.”

We fell quiet as the doors slid open in front of us, Dr. Goodwin once again insisting I go first. Once we walked outside into the chilled autumn air, I took a deep breath in to cleanse my lungs of the antiseptic smell of the hospital. Even spending time at least once a week in a hospital for an interview, I didn’t know if I would ever grow used to it.

Turning to say my polite goodbyes to Dr. Goodwin, I found him looking at me as though trying to figure something out. I fought the urge to fidget.

“I can tell that you care about people,” he said as he slowly nodded. “I think that, if you’re interested, you’d be a great addition to out team of Level 3’s.”

I wanted to jump on the chance, but I wasn’t stupid. “Thank you, Dr. Goodwin. What would that mean?”

“I think at this point, Callie, you can call me Aaron. As to your question, you’d be a part of a team, working under someone. Like Alex, though I don’t know that I’d allow him to be your superior,” he chuckled. “You’d be trained on how to help people who develop their ability in your presence until someone else can get there. Like what happened today. You’d also be trained to look out for possible signs and report back, so we can look into those people.

“Our goal for Level 3’s, your goal, is to keep people safe. And you did exactly that with Amelia today. You might have saved her life.”

I blinked, the possibility never crossing my mind before. I…could have killed her. If my gamma exposure had triggered her ability, but after I left, would she have been able to turn it off on her own? Would she gave gone crazy, harmed herself?

I swallowed thickly.

“That’s…a lot of pressure,” I answered slowly. “But I’m interested. I want to help people. That’s always been my goal.”

Dr. Goodwin—Aaron—clapped his hands together once, loudly. I jumped, my hand flying to my chest to calm my erratic heart. “Excellent! Well, I will get in touch with Alex, and he can get you set up for training. Probably not until next week sometime, but we’ll get you there! If that happens again before you’re trained, give me a call. You can skip Alex.”

“Okay, Dr. G—Aaron,” I corrected.

He beamed and dropped a hand onto my shoulder. “I’m very glad that we found you.”

“I am, too,” I answered, feeling a little befuddled at the comment. I wasn’t that special. Right?

I stood there awkwardly as Aaron got into a black SUV with tinted windows that pulled up to the curb, like he was some celebrity or something. I was still distracted with my thoughts when a hand brushed against my lower back.

I whirled, simultaneously jumping away, nearly falling flat on my ass. Only by some miracle did I stay upright.

Alex stood there, one hand holding a bag, the other extended out to me.

“Woah, there. Easy, tiger, it’s just me,” he said. “You good?”

“Sorry, yeah,” I apologized, putting a hand to my forehead and closing my eyes. “Distracted today, I guess.”

“It was a pretty exciting day, huh?”

“You could say that.”

“Everything go alright?”

“Yeah, I think so. She’s okay now.”

“That’s good. I brought lunch since you said you couldn’t meet me.”

I looked at him again, then at the bag that must be the take-out.

“What did you get?”

“Sushi. Not the raw kind, though. I know you don’t like that.”

“Mmm.” I stepped into his space and planted a kiss on his cheek. “Thank you.”

“Goodwin say anything to you?” he asked as we began walking towards some picnic benches outside the hospital.

“He insisted I call him Aaron, now. And he offered me to train for Level 3.”

“Wow, that’s great! You can be part of my group,” he said excitedly.

I shook my head. “Aaron,” I emphasized, still trying to get used to the name, “said that he wasn’t sure he should put me with you.”

“Oh, I’ll convince him. Don’t worry. Unless,” he paused with mock concern, “you don’t want to be with me?”

I just rolled my eyes, not dignifying that with a response, as we sat at the table to eat in the cool breeze.