Gifted

Chapter Twenty-six

|Friday|

Courtney

Allan wanders into my room as I am blow-drying my hair from my shower.

“Hey, Allan,” I say, seeing him in the pink vanity’s mirror.

“Hey, Courtney. Mom and Dad want you downstairs ASAP, ok?” He leaves without saying anything else. Brothers.

I go down the stairs, wondering idly what I’ve done wrong. When I get to the living room, Mom and Dad are sitting on the sofa, all quiet. Mom has the cordless phone in her lap. Then she looks at me, her face tight and in pain, and I start to get worried.

“What’s the matter?” I ask.

Mom begins to cry, covering her face with her hands. Dad passes me today’s paper and I read the front page’s headline:

Terror Strikes New York Again:

Superpower–Registry Building is Bombed; Many Powered Persons Die

Written by Susan Nell, New York Times

September 2, 2011

At 4:30 pm, EST, on Thursday, September 1, 2011, the Registration Committee on Powered Persons, temporarily established in the decommissioned Earl J. Wright Gymnasium, located on Park Avenue, while the main premises is being constructed at Lexington Avenue, was subjected to a suspected terrorist attack.

“I was standing in the line, near the doors in the back of the room, when there was an enormous explosion in the front of the line, near the registration desks. Everyone was screaming. I managed to get outside, although a lot of them didn’t. It started a fire inside,” said Abigail Rymann, 78, with a stasis-age of 25 (in medical circles, once a powered person has attained a particular age, which is specific to the individual, and so far appears to be random, their bodies enter biological stasis, meaning they no longer physically age from that point onward). (Note, the subject’s name and her respective ages have been changed to protect her identity.)

Rymann chose not to reveal her abilities to the public.

The explosion is believed to have originated from a large incendiary-type IED (an improvised explosive device), planted near the inspection desks by a suspect or suspects unknown. The bombing killed an estimated 344 powered persons--ranging in age from 5-year old Diana Jones to 149-year old Adam Schotter--as well as 87 nonpowered persons, 23 of whom were employees of the Registration Committee.

One of the employees killed was nonpowered scientist Annalisa Rebecca June, the celebrated geneticist who discovered the genetic biosynthete sequence last November. June had celebrated her fifty-first birthday on Wednesday. She is survived by her wife, Jessica Potter, and their two children, two-year old Jake and five-year old Ellie.

The subsequent collapse of the gymnasium thirty minutes later killed a further 45 rescue workers at the scene.

If anyone has information which may lead to the arrest of the individual(s) responsible, please contact the New York Police Department’s CrimeWatch hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS.

My stomach goes all tight. Now I know why Mom is crying; it makes me want to cry, too. I give the paper back to Dad, feeling sick.

“Why would they bomb a building?” I ask in a small voice.

“I don’t know, honey,” my dad says, shaking his head. “Sick people in the world. Think only their way is the right one, and that all others are supposed to be destroyed if they don’t agree with them. They’re sick people, that’s why.”