Donni stared at him a bit. She still wasn't sure of what to make of what she'd figured out earlier today. How the hell was she supposed to explain that she'd just turned into a human ice machine. Or that she'd just seen someone disappear into thin air. Or she thought she did. She still couldn't quite figure out if that was a trick of her eyes or if it really happened.

On the other hand...

She finally answered, "yeah, I've seen a few...strange things...It just seemed a little weird to me that you didn't know me for more than a night or so and still managed to recognize me and find my house. Any...?"

Donni was interrupted by the sirens outside the window. Or, more accurately, by Sparky's reaction to them, which was to stand on her bed and yowl his head off.

"Knock it off! It's just a cop car! Take it easy!"

A little closer than usual, though, they don't usually take off through this part of town...

Chris turned his head to the window, "Whats that about." He leaned a tad over watching the car fly-by, "Huh, strange, But that's not the only thing today I've seen that's weird."

He remembered the question that Donni asked before the cop car drove by. "I don't know why I remember you, but it just happened by luck I guess. " He turned around, his back facing Donni, looking down at his hand, he watched as he could change into into a gas. He sighed and turned back to normal.

Turning back around he asked again. "So is there any thing exactly that you know of that is out of the ordinary, I just want to know because I want to know If I'm alone in this."

Donni stared at him again. She looked down at her hand, then around the room.

She had to tell someone. She couldn't tell her family. They were already freaking out, she didn't want to bring up something to freak them out even more. And she'd be damned if she went back to those crack pot doctors. They'd lock her up in a lab the rest of her life.

She let out a sigh and said, "I'm gonna show you something but you're gonna have to keep your mouth shut about it, okay? My family's been freaky ever since they found us and they've only started calming down just now. They might start going batty again if they ever found out about this....Just give me a sec, I've gotta get something."

She quickly ran into the bathroom across the hall and came back with a cup of water. She stuck two of her fingers into the cup and said, "watch this."

She concentrated on those fingers. At first, she felt the cold flash go through her again, but it quickly centered on where she wanted it. She gave it a couple more seconds before pulling the fingers out...and revealing the decent coating of ice around them.

"Ever since we got back, I'd been getting chills. Cold spells. I didn't tell anyone cause I just wanted everyone to leave me alone and I thought they'd pass on their own. They didn't and eventually I figured out how to do this." She grabbed onto her iced fingers with her other hand to try and loosen the ice off. "I don't even know how I figured it out, I just did. I'm still trying to figure out exactly what...this is..."

Chris sighed and chuckled, "Wow, my gosh. Thats a lot off of my shoulders." He put his finger on the ice in the cup. He changed his hand into a gaseous state, then to a liquid, then freezing his hand back again. The water and his skin started to merge seamlessly together, he now hand a hand made of pure ice.

"Glad to know I'm not the only one that has had a wacky, day." He smiled looking down at his hand then back at Donni, "I don't think last night we meet properly. Do you think we can do it again." He opened out his frozen hand, "Hi I'm Chris Yyelstian, It nice to meet you."

Donni had to laugh at what she was seeing. She still didn't get any of it, but it was nice to have someone to talk to about it at least. She looked at his hand for a second, then held onto it. "Donni Haill. Nice to meet you, too, without the knock out gas."

She chuckled a bit. "I still don't get any of this, but it looks like we're stuck with whatever happened. So, now what are we supposed to do with it?"

One other thing was bothering her now. If they did this to a whole bunch of kids....Why?....And were they going to come back for them anytime soon..

Chris was thinking about the future of them and everyone else at the party, what would be the repercussions of this power, is there more that can be done for the better.

Donni chuckled a bit. "I still don't get any of this, but it looks like we're stuck with whatever happened. So, now what are we supposed to do with it?"

"I don't know." Chris said, "We've been given these powers, for reason that we can't explain, But I'm not gonna go around taking advantage of people just because I know I can. That wouldn't be me. Though we can't sit still letting it go to waste. Maybe we should use it for something better. I mean I don't want to be just another Superhero, I mean I do but, We just can't go running around and caps and crap. We at least got to be smart about this."

Jessie remembered the driver yelling, he remembered the sudden shift in terrain. He remembered the screams and the sudden impact. the sirens as well. He was a few yards from what was left of the vehicle. The sirens drew nearer, they had lost them before but now they had found them again. Wrapped around the telephone pole was his homies and there car. The cops circled it, Jessie felt the gun tucked in his waist. He guessed the new found talent worked when he was unconscious too. He had a gash on his hairline that ran down his hair and dripped like a facet. His blond hair now pink with it. He needed to get away.

He found himself near the suburban part of town in no time, they had made a big circle and crashed near where they started. Fate was a cruel lady, he recognized a pick up truck in one of the many driveways. His decision making was severely diminished by the blood loss. With a his white bandana wrapped crudely around the wound and now very red and his gangbanger-ish look he rang the doorbell hoping somebody would answer before he passed out again.

Superhero.

The word jarred Donni a bit. Superheros were people in comic books and cartoon shows. It never even dawned on her tht she might count as one now. That she might now count in the same category as people that ran all over the city, catching bad guys...The idea intimidated her a little....

The doorbell rang. As usual, Donni stepped away a bit to take a look out the window, forgetting for a second that she was doing it right in front of a guy she'd done it to not even half an hour ago.

The sight on the porch shocked her. It was some guy that looked like he'd been put through a machine. He was such a mess, Donni couldn't recognize, plus the fact she was looking at him at an angle from the window, that it was the guy from the ice cream shop.

Mark, who got up to answer the door, had much the same reaction as Donni. "What the hell?!"

The guy was dressed like a punk, but the fact that there was blood all over the place kind of overshadowed the rest of it. "Hey, you alright?! What happened?!"

Meanwhile, Donni had taken off down the stairs to get a closer look.

Jessie moved a blood soaked hair out of his vision as he lifted his head in response. He was slightly surprised someone had answered and hadn't already called the cops, he got that response a lot. His brain was moving in slow motion but after a short pause he came up with a plausible and at least partially true story. "I got hit by a car...." the words were slightly slurred as he proped himself up against the doorframe. It was true, a car had hit him he just failed to mention he was inside the car when it happened. His baggy hoodie hid the gun stuck in his back waist band but he had forgotten it was even there.

"Looks like something's going down...Maybe we should get out of here."

Chad nodded. "Yeah. Let's go home."

========

Peter walks back in, finding the house empty.

"Guess they're out doing something else..."

He peeks in the fridge, finding a plastic-wrapped plate and a note on the table.
Peter-

We went out. There's something in the fridge for you when you get back.

-Mom

"At least they left something for me to eat..."

He popped the plate of food in the microwave, and when it was done, walked into the living room and flipped on the TV.

Maybe I should talk to someone else from the party about what's going on...

=======

Chad came home to a dark house.

I guess they turned in early...

He grabbed a snack and flipped on the TV, quickly finding a movie he liked.

Wonder if anyone else at that party ended up with this kind of thing...

"Must have been a hell of a car," Mark thought out loud. That must have been what the cop siren was for, some jerk speeding and hit someone. But how the hell did he end up on their doorstep then instead of with the cops or an ambulence? He didn't really give it much thought with all the blood all over the place.

"What the hell happened here?!" Mark turned to see Donni coming down the stairs.

"Good, you're here. Um...You stay here and look after this guy, someone hit him on the road, I'm calling an ambulance."

Mark darted back into the kitchen before she could ask him anything else. She turned back to their visitor, getting a bit nervous. What the hell was she supposed to do? Without really thinking, she said, "what'd they hit you with, a dump truck?"

"Good question.....Tell that guy....no ambulance. It's ain't that bad. "

Jessie dabbed the cut with the bandanna that was once white but now was only red. He took a step inside holding the make shift bandage to his head.

"Seriously, I'm ok. I just need to....clean up a bit."

Jessie might be right, it was just a cut, a big cut but nothing worth an ambulance.

"Mind if I use your sink, ya know to clean up a bit?"

The girl was almost his height which made Jessie feel small. The tall gene had passed him by.

Chris stepped out the hallway, looking down the stairs, seeing Jessie. He released the ice in his hand that melted to the ground. Chris moved his hand to the door, and shut it slowly.

Walking down stairs he kept his focus on Jessie, though not always giving him direct eye contact. Walking behind Donni, he whispered into her ear, "So whats going on who is this guy." His eyes shifted back an Jessie's face, noticing the blood dripping down his cheek.

Donni looked back at Chris and answered, "said he got hit by something...Must have been a hell of a something..."

Mark glanced out from the kitchen, phone in hand, "he told me a car...um...Sure, go ahead and use the sink if you want...You sure about that, kid? I mean, you're bleeding all over the place, it looks pretty bad. You're sure you don't want help."

Donni kept looking at the guy. The blood and everything made it a little hard to tell before, but now that she was face-to-face, it started to dawn on her. She was pretty sure this was the guy from before....Yeah, she was really sure about it...But, she was still trying to confirm if she'd really seen what she thought she saw or if her mind had just gone crazy...

"I made it to your door fine. Plus I'm still conscious. I think that's a good sign." He said this as he ran his head under the running facet. Flinching as the water hit the wound. As the blood ran away and his hair returned to it's blond color he stood back up and dried his head of gingerly with a nearby washcloth.

"That car probaly ended up worse than I did, I just remember a beeping horn and waking up with this bad boy." He lie of the top of his head, a talent trained over the years lying to his parents about his gang affiliation. What the didn't know couldn't and wouldn't hurt them. He pointed to the cut following his hair line around 3 inches long. It wasn't deep, it had just his a minor vein and that was the reason for most of the blood.

"I think I know you from somewhere. You been to a party lately?" he said with a grin. He might be the only one that remembered that day with a happy demeanor. He had enjoyed that day, the following days and hospitalization not so much though.

"I think I know you from somewhere. You been to a party lately?"

That pretty much confirmed her suspicions. This really was the same guy she recognized. And, if he was anything like her and Chris, then he probably really did do what she thought he did earlier.

Donni hesitated a bit. She was getting nervous about this. This party was coming up pretty often all of a sudden. And he was bringing it up with Mark in the room, who was now leering at the group from the living room. Maybe having a couple of guys her age in the house set off the big brother alarms....But the mention of he party couldn't have helped at all.

"Um, yeah, I think I know what you're talking about." He was talking about things she really didn't want to discuss out in the open, but she either had to figure out how to code everything in front of her family. Tommy was probably just upstairs and Mark was already here. It looked like Mom was out on errands and Dad still wasn't home from work...But they could walk in the door any second now and then she'd really be hearing it.

"Um, yeah, I think I know what you're talking about."

That also confirmed Jessie's suspicions. He wrung out his bloodstained white bandanna and glanced up at the clock, nearly 11. He noticed the worried tone and tiny expression also, he decided to cover for them.

"Yea, about a year ago, back in freshman year. I'm pretty sure I saw you there."

It was late, he was still dazed from the exiting and traumatizing series of criminal events had caused. His parents were either asleep or drunk, they were used to him not coming home often. He knew he'd never be allowed to stay for the night but his choices were slim.
Finishing cleaning off his bandanna he looked up from the sink.

"You know a good place to crash round here? My parents are outta town and I lost my key."

His lying tongue came up with another decently plausible excuse. He spotted a towel to dry off his hands across the kitchen. He teleported over to it lucky while the man who had answered the door's back was turned. If he had powers why not use them?

“Not no but hell no; I’m not going through this again.” Derek threw his arms up as he spoke. The idea of having more tests run on him wasn’t an appealing one. “I just want to go home ok?”

“Derek, please understand. Your mother and I only want what’s best for you. We need to figure this out. Son, this change that you’re going through it’s…”

“It’s what dad? What’s happening to me huh? You don’t know! They don’t know and I’m not going to be their lab rat so they can find out!”

“I’m sorry son, I wanted you to understand that if we can figure this out we can prevent any future accidents.”

“I do understand dad. I don’t know what happened and I’m sorry for what happened to mom but, if I go through these tests I’ll no longer be your son. I’ll be a case file with a number attached to it. I’m sorry, but I can’t live that kind of life.”

“I’m sorry too son. As your father I have a responsibility to keep you safe and as long as you’re like this you are danger to yourself and others. I’m ordering the tests.”

“Like hell you are! This is my body! My life! You know what? I’m out of here.” Derek stormed passed his father feeling his hand grip his shoulder. A surge of power went through him and he heard body collapse to the floor. “Dad?” He turned to see his father on the floor behind him. To his relief he was still breathing. “I’m sorry dad. You won’t have to worry about me anymore. There will be no more accidents.”

Derek rushed down the hall. He stopped at a floor map to get his bearings then headed for the elevators. The doors were opening upon his arrival. A security detail stepped from double doors telling him to halt. They held strange square guns in their hands. They were Air Tazers. “Please, leave me alone. Just let me go.”

“Derek Masters, we are here to escort you back to your room. Please come with us without incident.”

Derek didn’t like the guard’s tone or use of the word incident. He wasn’t a criminal or anything. “You can’t force me to stay here. I know my rights. I’ll sign a waver; just let me go… ah! My head.” He had that pain behind his eyes again. What the hell was going on? He closed his eyes until the pain subsided. When he opened them the world had changed.

“Jesus Christ! Look at his eyes!”
“What the hell is he?”

Derek heard voices but he paid them no mind. The world seemed to have turned into a giant circuit board or maybe grid was a better term. He could see the pulses of electricity moving through the three people in front of him, in the cables that lay beneath the floor and behind the walls. It was amazing/ “How… how I am doing this.”

“I’m gonna light this freak up!”
“Wait!”

It was too late though. The freaked out guard had let loose with his tazer. It it’s mark but appeared to be ineffective. One of the others followed suit but the result was the same. The third guy ordered the other two to stand down but it was too late.

Derek saw the streams of blue light shoot toward him but it didn’t register right away. He felt the additional power but it didn’t seem to affect him at all. One of the words that were said bounced around in his head. Freak; that’s what he was to these people, what he had become. The blue lights registered. They were tazing him. The absurdity of it all made him laugh. The laughter must have unnerved the third guy because there was now stream of blue coming from him as well.

“Heh heh ha ha ha. Freak am I? Perhaps I am.” He grabbed the wires that protruded from his chest. When he grabbed them though, a surge of power left him traveling back along the wires to the men that held them. He saw there bodies light up like the flash bulb from a camera then they collapsed. His vision was returning to normal. When he saw the three men on the ground he looked down at the wires that were still in his hand. Unlike his mother and father, the three men on the ground were no longer breathing.

He began to tremble when the realization struck him. “I… I killed them. Dear God I killed them.” His mind was racing, his eyes taking in everything around him. Part of his brain was distraught, lost at the fact that he just killed three people. The other half was trying to rationalize it all while figuring a way out. The eyes picked up the cameras. They had seen him. He needed to run, to get somewhere safe.
He forced his trembling to stop then ran into the elevator.

Mark cocked an eyebrow at the request. The guy seemed a little healthier than before, the shock must have worn off. He thought about it a bit, then turned to Donni. "You do know this guy, right?"

Donni nodded, thankful that, despite being rammed by a car, he was thinking a step faster than she was. "Yeah, he's from school."

He thought about it again. "We're gonna have to wait till Mom and Dad get home, but I'm pretty sure you can stay a night if you don't cause any trouble."

Tommy came down the stairs, then blinked a couple times at the sudden crowd. "Having a party here or what?"

Mark shrugged. "I dunno, they both know Donni from school....Spent all this time telling us how the guys at school didn't like her type and act like morons, but look what materializes."

Donni started turning red.

Tommy laughed as he continued down the stairs. "Just when Dad thought he'd be safe, she turns out to be a late bloomer."

She turned even redder. This whole thing was turning into one big mess for her...

"My head hurts too much to cuase trouble."

That wasn't a lie or an exaggeration, his head was killing him from the wound. All he wanted to do was rest. With that he walked over to the couch and sat down, not wanting to waste anymore willpower on teleporting. He collapsed on it and closed his eyes.

"Better late than never...."

He said behind his sleepish state. It was too much in one day for him. All the adrenaline packed day had finally run out leaving him exhausted, his brain was one running at a 100mph now was like a snail. He yawned.