CS; Adam's Story

Day 1

I wake up colder than I have ever been in my life. The term "frozen solid" and "cold as ice" seem applicable, though they fall far short of describing the enormity of this cold. 

I love it! I know that seems weird, but I've always been weird in that I like being cold, and just coldness in general. Actually, I may have spoke too soon. Given how cold I am, there's a good chance I won't be able to move. Images of cartoon animals frozen solid shattering into a million pieces spring to mind. I wonder if that sort of thing could actually happen. I'm not too keen on the idea of finding out, but I'm also not to keen on the idea of lying here until I starve to death. And more importantly, I can't lie here forever; I have to get to class. 

I try opening my eyes. Good, no shattered eyelids. Well since that worked, lets try standing up. Wow! Not only am I still in one piece, I've never felt so good. My body is moving exactly how I want it to. I try running around my room and doing push ups, the results are a pair of bruised shins and sore arms, coupled with mild amazement. But as I'm getting dressed, a question comes unbidden into my mind: How did it get so cold in my room? It might be Alaska, but it's only just turning fall now. And anyways, my window is closed, the thermostat is on and reads 66 degrees. And even if I think back to the coldest winter night I can remember, it just doesn't compare with how cold I am now.

As I brush my teeth, I look in mirror over the sink and drop my toothbrush in surprise. My reflection is white. Whiter than anybody I've ever seen before, certainly whiter than I was yesterday. So white that I seem to be emitting a light glow. Like an angel, or to put it more accurately; I look like a corpsicle. 

As I watch, my eyes change from dark blue to an ice-blue so clear and sharp that it seems to cut into me. I can't hold my gaze, so I drop my eyes to the countertop. Without realizing it I'd gripped it tightly, and spreading outwards from my hands is ice, coating the counter and creeping down the cabinet doors and into the sink. I stare blindly, too shocked to process what I'm seeing, until a suddenly voice breaks me out of my revery. It's mom saying we'll be late for school. I look back at my reflection, my eyes are back to normal, but I still look like I just came out of the ice in Antarctica. As I walk up the stairs I consider skipping school, but it's only the second day, and more importantly, I want to talk to Jake and Carl about this.

On the car ride to school I mess around, trying to make the ice form again. Thinking with amusement of a anime I can't remember the name up, I hold up hand and try to imagine ice and power flowing through me and gathering in the air above my palm. To my amazement a bead of ice appears suspended in the air. I imagine it growing bigger, and it does, then the car suddenly dies, breaking my concentration. The bead falls into my hand and I quickly pop in into my mouth before looking guiltily at my mom. "That's odd," she says as she turns the key and the engine roars back to life. The rest of the trip goes smoothly, but as I open the door I notice a thin handprint of ice on the seat exactly where my other hand had been.

I came to see them, but somehow I'm unable to meet up with Jake and Carl until after school. Nobody else seemed different than normal, but they also didn't seem to notice my new and unusual look, so the day passed seamlessly. Until the final bell. 

I find Jake almost immediately, he's covered in soot and his skin seems to be so hot that a faint red glow is coming off it. "What happened to you?" I ask without thinking. "How the hell would I know? Probably the same thing that happened to you." He responds. For some reason he sounds surly, but it could have just been my imagination. We just started discussing where Carl might be when he comes running up to us, his face a very interesting shade of extremely freaked out, and equally confused, and it I'm not mistaken a tad concerned, with his hair sticking up comically. I struggle to maintain my composure and not burst out laughing, but before I can get over how funny the usually serious Carl looks, he's pulled us into the locker room, looked us straight in the face and said "show me". 

I look at him, my mind blank and still not fully recovered from the shock of his appearance. Then Jake brakes the awkward moment by sticking out his hand to reveal dancing flames, and Carl responds by sticking out his hand with a ball of light floating above it, arcs of electricity leaping from it back to his body. I remember the pitiful ice cube I made in the car. Annoyance at being outdone in the kickass movie effects department flowed down my body and out of nowhere I know what to do. I close my eyes and fling my hands towards the ground; in an instant ice coats everything, and in another it's been covered by a layer of snow. I looked at my two friends and we all grinned, the only people in the school who had, as Carl called them at the time, "Gifts". 

As soon as I got home that night I started practicing using my talent.