Breed

Chapter Eight

"So, how'd things go with Elijah?" Linc asked. He was wearing a tank top and a pair of running shorts, and was still slicked with a thin layer of sweat.

"He's a good kid," Rox said, trying not to get caught staring at the way the moisture slicked the dark skin of the older man.

"I know. Just the kind we want here, and he is excited to start, even if he's still a couple more years away." He dabbed his forehead with a towel. "But what about you? How'd things go with you?"

"I don't know," she said, biting her lip. "I think I still feel..."

"Out of control?" he asked.

"Sort of."

"What happened?"

She exhaled. "This girl. She was, honestly she wasn't that bad, but for whatever reason, she was getting under my skin; one of those rivalries that in the moment feels justified, but in retrospect... anyway. She tripped. And I think I'm the reason why."

"You didn't trip her?"

"No. But bad things happen to people I'm not happy with."

"Or who want to hurt you."

"Yeah, but that's... different. You know, I don't care if somebody on his way to mug me gets hit by a car. That's karma. But some girl who basically just got on my nerves."

"Nerves you're aware are at least a tad touchy."

"Yeah," she said, and looked away. She liked that he knew her as well as he did, but hated that he knew that side of her so well.

"But she's okay?"

"Yeah. I saw it was happening, and I stopped it. But I don't like that I might hurt someone by accident."

"Most of us might," he said. "But that's part of being human. Normal people hurt each other by accident all the time, too."

"Normal?" she asked.

"You know what I mean. Homo sapiens sapiens. The old breed. I know it's not okay to call them normal, because then by default we're abnormal."

"Not better than normal?"

"Just different," he said. "Which is why I'm not crazy about 'Homo posse.' In my experience, we're better off with wise people, than powerful ones."

"Technically, we're a subspecies, homo sapiens posse, wise and powerful humans," she said with a smile.

"I think maybe they should have called us wise-ass humans," he said, smiling back. "I think of all of them, I like transhuman, evolving into something beyond what we are now. But my original point was that homo sapiens hurt each other all time. Making a mistake in a car, misjudging something at work. Accidental harm is a part of being human. I screwed up in Syria a dozen times or more. Sometimes I even got somebody killed."

"Except you didn't," she said.

"Just because I could restart my day, doesn't mean I didn't get anybody hurt. It just meant I was fortunate enough I could fix it. It's our responsibility to work hard at not hurting people, but we're human. We will. And a part of that is learning to forgive ourselves for our mistakes. But I need to hit the showers. If you want to stick around, we can try working on more drills. I'm not sure if your ability is one you'll ever have complete control over, but I at least want to see if we can get you confidence over when to trust it, along with experience enough to know when you'll have to fight it."

"I don't have any plans," she said.

"Good. I'm getting hungry. I'll get us pizza."