Children Of The Crucible

James Part 2

Author's Note

Hey everyone, sorry this chapter took a little bit longer to publish. As always, thank you so much for continuing to read!

James' PoV

I lay in bed, splayed on my back, staring at the ceiling. Soft rays of the morning sun shone through the blinds onto its surface. I wasn't bothered to move. Why couldn't I just stay here, not go to school?

Sighing, I reached down to grab my phone off the floor. Not used to the single bed I was sleeping in, I rolled over and fell onto the floor.

Ouch, that bloody hurt.

Wait, single bed? My bed was a double! Where the hell was I?

I sat bolt upright and realised I wasn't even in my own room. I had managed to fall asleep in front of the TV on the living room sofa. Wow, I must have been tired- usually I could never sit comfortably on our sofa, let alone fall asleep on it.

Now awake after my sudden encounter with the floor, I turned on my phone, narrowing my eyes as the bright screen light hit my face. I had two missed calls: one from Gwen and the other from Tommy. Weird. My friends hardly ever called; they were texters, like me.

I called Gwen back first, knowing she liked being my priority. I tapped my foot impatiently as it dialled, having now moved from the floor to sit back on the sofa. The phone rang out and went to voicemail. I was surprised at her lack of answer. She was the type of person who spends most of her life on her phone, posting pictures and messaging her friends every spare second.

Slightly worried now, I decided to leave a voicemail. Having already ended the call, I had to phone once again, despite knowing my dad would go mental at my phone bill if this kept up.

'Hey this is Gwen's phone, sorry I can't answer right now, I'm off living the dream. Leave a message and I'll call you back later.'

I waited for the tone and left a brief message, wanting the call to cost as little as possible.

'Hey Gwen, it's me, James. You called me earlier so I was just checking to see what's up. Call back whenever. Bye.'

I hung up and phoned Tommy.

'Hey, finally you call back.'

I was glad he actually picked up, but confused as to why he wanted to speak to me so badly.

'Hey. What did you phone me for earlier?'

'Just wanted to know why you aren't in school today. You feeling alright?'

Shit. What time was it? I hadn't checked when I woke up. I looked over to the big clock on the wall and realised it was half 11. For the nine hundredth in my life I wished that my parents didn't work night shift so they could wake me up in the mornings. Alarm clocks just didn't cut it. But they would have come in and gone straight to bed, not even noticing me passed out on the sofa.

Not wanting to explain to Tommy, I just went with the easiest excuse for my absence.

'Yeah I'm fine', I said, without missing a beat. 'I had a dentist appointment this morning but I'm coming in at lunch. Have I missed much?'

'Well actually yeah, everyone at the after-school chemistry class has encountered some pretty unusual ... um ... skills. I'll explain it all when you get here.'

'Ok, well that sounds assuring. Hey sorry I didn't tell you about the appointment- I completely forgot about it until I woke up this morning. Also, how come you answered your phone? Shouldn't you be in geography right now?'

'I'm in the canteen. I asked to go to the toilet about 15 minutes ago but I wasn't arsed to go back. Should probably go now though, seeing as my bags are still there and my teacher is going to be extremely suspicious.'

'Haha, well, if she asks about it just day you were taking a massive dump. See you at the beginning of lunch.' I grinned.

'God, she would hate me for the rest of the year if I did that. Tempting, though.' I could hear the smile in his voice. 'See you.'

He hung up the phone and the room was silent once more. I shook my head at myself. My parents couldn't find out that I had missed school. They worked so hard to support me, and cared a lot about my school work. Ugh, why hadn't my subconscious had some sort of internal panic that woke me up? Oh well, I could still go in for the afternoon.

I stood up to face the window and was blinded by the sunlight pouring into the room through the blinds. Squinting my eyes, I turned away from the brightness and as I did so I noticed two beams of light which seemed to follow my gaze, shining wherever my eyes rested. That was strange.

I turned around, trying to find out what was reflecting the light. I looked around the room to see if there was anything the light could be bouncing off of, but there was nothing. It was then I noticed that the two dots had disappeared. That was rather odd. Wow that made me sound posh; 'rather odd'. I scoffed at myself and went to my room, getting changed in record time. I grabbed my phone and school bag before heading for the door. The time on my phone said 12:01, so I had 14 minutes until lunchtime at school started.

I was in the process of putting my key in lock when I looked down and noticed two familiar light beams on the floor. I shaded my eyes from the light hitting my face through the glass of the door to make it easier to see the beams, but as soon as I did so they vanished.

I removed my shielding hand and the dots on the floor reappeared. What was going on here? There was no mirrored surfaces near me which could have produced them, and light from the window would create a full square not just two small dots.

I took physics in school and I was surprisingly good at it but I had no possible way to explain what was causing this.

Suddenly, I remembered Tommy's words on the phone earlier- 'encountered some pretty unusual ... uh... skills'.  Skills as in...unexplainable skills? Powers, even?What if I was the one doing this, not any reflective surface? I turned my head gradually around the hallway and sure enough, the light beams moved with my sight line. I turned my head further, until there was no longer any light hitting my eyes, and the light beams disappeared. I blinked a few times and tried again but nothing happened. Maybe I could only do it when light was in my eyes. That would make sense- I could only bend light, not produce it.

Facing the light again, the beams reappeared. I blinked a few times, and they disappeared again. Not only did it seem as if I had the power to bend light, but I could also turn this 'power' on and off.

Consulting the time, I realised I now only had 7 minutes to get to school for the beginning of lunch. I replaced my key in the lock and headed out the door. I raced towards school, wondering all the way what the other ' unusual ... eh... skills' could possibly be.