Redesign Me, State of the Art (Jalex)

You're Not Quite Satan, But I Really Think I Hate You

Jack's POV

The next couple of days weren't horrible.

He hadn't actually done anything suspicious. The only thing weird about Luke was that every time I was around him, he was thinking the same thing, almost like he was forcing himself to think of nothing else.

Gotta help them, gotta help them, gotta help them.

It felt ingenue. Like he was feeding into my thoughts, trying to convince me. If anything, it had me more concerned. I first noticed it when I got in the car from the facility, but thought it was just a heat of the moment thing, like that was all he was actually thinking about because he was really trying to help us. But now, it was just strange.

"Today's the day boys!" Luke proclaimed, striding into the living room. Alex and I were on the couch, watching some dumb reality TV show. It was a luxury I didn't know that I missed up until recently. This was pretty much all we had done since we got here. I figured the two of them were trying to give me some time to decompress.

"The day for what?" Alex asked, sitting up and crossing his legs.

"Training day," Luke smiled.

"Training for what?" I questioned skeptically.

"Not for what, but with what," he explained, looking to Alex rather than me.

"What?"

Luke rolled his eyes.

"Remember what I said about control? Well, I'm gonna teach you."

"And how would you know anything about how to control these.... these whatever they are?" I asked, not too keen on where this whole thing was going.

"I made the genes Jack, I know how they work better than both of you probably do."

I groaned. Alex elbowed my side and I forced a smile. It was one of the things I hated about Luke, and Alex knew it: his air of superiority. Everything he did, he did like he knew how to do it better than anyone else. He could be making a sandwich for god's sake and he'd act holier than thou. It was probably because I already didn't like the guy, but that was beside the point.

We were instructed to get dressed in something appropriate for working out, seeing as Alex and I were currently in our pajamas. Luke had been providing us with clothing since we'd shown up here. Mostly generic stuff, like plain t-shirts you could buy in packs at K-Mart and stuff like that. I threw on a pair of red basketball looking shorts and a grey v-neck and walked outside to the open field that sat to the right of the house. Alex and Luke were already there waiting for me, chattin' it up.

That was another thing that pissed me off a little: how chummy Alex seemed to be with him. They had apparently bonded over the week that I hadn't been there. Maybe it was because Alex viewed him as our only hope. I however, was keeping my options open, praying for some other miracle to arrive and save us.

"Good! Now let's begin," Luke jabbered excitedly, rubbing his hands together like a little league baseball coach. Or an evil villain, whichever.

The next three hours were spent painstakingly doing drills and control exercises. Luke had a notepad that he kept scribbling things down in every so often. It was almost like he was experimenting with the powers, but I didn't want to point that out and risk upsetting Alex. And ok, it might've been kind of rad all the stuff I was learning that I could do.

After the incident the other day, Luke had me exploring my more "telekinesis" type abilities, attempting to move rocks and lift sticks off of the ground. Without the intense emotion backing it up, it was actually quite difficult to try to summon the strength out of nowhere. Alex had pretty much been focused on cloaking other objects besides himself. I obviously couldn't tell if it was working or not, but Luke seemed to get pretty excited staring at an old oak tree like it wasn't really there, so I was assuming Alex had been doing a good job.