Melina started to pace as she recalled what happened. “I had an encounter with Lee. We didn’t talk long before he ran off, but I did get him to agree to meet with me again… sort of. Anyway, I was thinking of places where we could go to talk, and when I started to think about us walking through the park, that’s when everything fell silent and all of my surroundings turned blurry. Within a second I was here in the park, and then I had an excruciating pain in my head.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Walter said as he threw his hand up in front of him. “Wait a second now. You disappeared right in the middle of a bunch of people?”
Melina stopped pacing and gave him an exasperated look. “I didn’t mean to!”
“Oh dear.” Walter rubbed his hands over his face a couple of times and then he started to pace. “Hopefully it happened so fast that nobody noticed. What I think happened with you, though… well, it appears to be a few things all linked together. But the main trigger is your human emotions. You were thinking of a place, and even though you weren’t thinking that you wanted to teleport to there, you were thinking that you wanted to go there with Lee. Lee is your so-called charge, so your powers are linked to him, as well as your emotions. Your desperation to talk with him again triggered it all, and you wound up in the last place you thought of going to with him.”
“Oh wow,” Melina responded as she began to rub her forehead.
“Are you all right?” asked Walter.
“I don’t know. I’m not sure if I can control all of the powers. I’m getting better at tuning people’s thoughts in and out, but I can’t get rid of them completely. I’ve only had one vision so far, so not much practice there. My light shield apparently only comes out when I’m scared. And the teleporting business is a complete mess. Oh, and what about the massive headache I had? You didn’t say anything when I mentioned it earlier. Is that also a side effect of my human emotions?”
“No, I don’t think it’s your emotions, but I do think it has to do with you being human.”
Melina gave him a curious look.
“I think it’s what Adelia meant when she said that the powers would start to take their toll on you,” Walter said.
“You
think
?” Melina asked.
“Yes,” replied Walter. “And that’s the best I can give you, at least for now until I can speak to Adelia again. Like I said before, it’s only happened to three other humans, and what I know about their situations is just what I’ve been told. I wasn’t there in person for any of them. But,” Walter paused and gave her a sympathetic look, “I think it’s what we should assume. You seem to have developed all of the powers now, so the timing makes sense.”
Melina stared at him for a while and then gave him a simple nod. She bit her lower lip and turned her gaze to the ground. It was going to happen sooner or later, she knew that. But with the way Adelia had made it sound, she thought she would have had at least a week before the powers started to wear her down. It hadn’t even been two full days. Things were happening too quickly, and she felt overwhelmed again. Before she had time to react to her feelings, though, Walter spoke up again.
“I hate to continue to be the bearer of bad news, but you need to hear what I’m going to say next.”
Melina raised her head and gave him a woeful look.
Walter cleared his throat. “I think another one of my elder angels, Phinneas, is responsible for telling the demons about you and your new powers.”
“What?” Melina gaped at him, astonished. “That would mean that he’s the one who wants me dead then, right?”
“I don’t know,” said Walter as he shook his head. “It’s hard for me to think that he would be capable of such a thing, but the evidence is against him right now.”
“What did he do?” Melina asked. “Tell me why you think he told the demons about me.”
“I went to talk to the elders earlier today, and Phinneas acted strangely during the whole conversation. The other three suggested I seek out your guardian angel for help, but when I found him, he said that Phinneas had told him that he couldn’t help you. I tried to convince him that Phinneas was lying, but he said he wouldn’t believe me over an elder angel.” Walter paused and let out a heavy sigh.
“When I went back to my temple to confront Phinneas , he wasn’t there. Adelia wasn’t there either, only Cecil and Helene. I told them what Henry had said about Phinneas, but they didn't believe me. They said they needed proof. Like I said, I can’t see Phinneas wanting to harm you, but I’m going to figure out why he doesn’t want your guardian to help you.”
She nodded at him but was too stunned to talk. Her guardian angel wasn’t going to help protect her from the demons because an elder angel possibly wanted her dead. But why did the elder want her dead? Before she had time to think about things further, her cell phone rang. She jumped at the sound of it and then quickly pulled it out of her coat pocket. “Hello?”
“It’s Tessa. What happened?”
“What do you mean?”
“I was standing at the front of the tent, waiting for you to return, when a group of people started to freak out about a young woman who disappeared right in front of them. Was that you? Did you teleport?”
Tessa sounded frantic, so Melina tried her best to sound calm. “Yes, that was me, but I didn’t mean to teleport. It just sort of happened when I was thinking of places I could go to with Lee. I'm at the park now, and Walter’s here with me.”
“I’ll be there—”
“No,” said Melina, cutting her off. “Stay there and enjoy the festival. And try to refute any more talk you hear about a woman disappearing.”
Tessa hesitated then said, “Okay, but what are you going to do?”
Melina glanced at Walter. “I really need to spend the rest of the weekend practicing with my powers. I have to get them under control, especially now that…”
“Now that what?” asked Tessa.
Melina closed her eyes. “Now that I’ve developed all of the powers, they’re starting to affect me.”
“Wait, do you mean…”
“Yes. But Tessa, I’m going to be fine. That’s why I’m going to practice the rest of the weekend. I’m not going to let the powers, or the demons for that matter, get the best of me.” Melina stopped and waited for Tessa’s response but received none. “Tessa?”
Tessa sniffled loudly into the phone then replied in a shaky voice. “It’s just that the seriousness of everything is just now hitting me. You’re my best friend, and I don’t want to lose you.”
Tears welled in Melina’s eyes, but she quickly wiped them away. “I don’t want that either, Tess. That’s why I need to focus on working with Walter right now.”
“Yeah, you should go,” Tessa said. “I’ll see you Monday morning?”
“Yes, I’ll see you Monday morning. Oh, and Tess?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you for being the best friend that anyone could ask for.”
“Likewise,” Tessa replied.
Melina could hear Tessa crying again, so she whispered a quick “Bye, Tess,” and ended the call. She slowly placed her phone back in her pocket and looked up at Walter. “Where do we start?”
Chapter Eleven
“I think we should start with your power of teleportation,” Walter said. “You have the least amount of control over it, so I’d say it needs the most work.”
“Right,” Melina replied.
“I’m not sure if we can get you to stop doing it, though, whenever you think of going somewhere with Lee. Unfortunately, for now, that’s a side effect of your human emotions. But what we can do is get you to teleport to a destination by thinking of that place and saying you want to teleport to there.”
Melina nodded.
“Try to teleport back to your apartment,” Walter said as he gave her an encouraging look.
“Okay, I’ll try.” She closed her eyes and brought up a mental image of her living room — light blue walls, brown suede couch and recliner, plush beige carpet.
Teleport to my living room.
She repeated it over and over in her head, but nothing happened. She opened her eyes and looked at Walter. “What am I doing wrong?”
“My guess is that you’re doubting if you can do it or not. Get rid of the doubt, Melina.”
“Get rid of the doubt,” she repeated as she closed her eyes and thought of her living room again.
Teleport to my living room. Teleport to my living room.
Within a second she felt plush carpet replace the hard ground under her feet.
She opened her eyes to see her living room when suddenly she felt excruciating pain in her head again. “Oh, this is awful,” she moaned as she stumbled over to the couch and lay down.
A few seconds later Walter appeared in front of her with a proud smile on his face. “I knew you could do it.”
Melina groaned.
Walter’s smile faded. “I told you the pain would return. The more you use your powers, the worse it’s probably going to get.”
She put her hand up to her forehead. “I don’t see how it can get any worse than it is right now.” She started to sit up, but Walter stopped her.
“Take it easy for a couple of minutes. Hopefully the headache will lessen some and then we can try again.”
Try again. The words made Melina cringe. But she knew she had to keep working with her powers. A couple minutes later her headache began to subside. She stood up slowly and looked at Walter. “I think I’m ready.”
“Good. I’m only going to have you teleport one more time, and then we’ll get to work on your other powers.”
“Okay,” Melina replied.
“Most of the town is at the Fall Festival, and we don’t want to go there after your little disappearing act. Plus, we need people that aren’t all grouped together in one place for you to practice your powers on. Therefore, I want you to teleport to the next town over.”
Melina stared at him. “The next town over? That’s too vague of a description, and I’ve only been there a handful of times. What location would I focus on?”
Walter shrugged. “One of the locations you remember seeing when you visited there.”
“They’re all very public places. We’d be seen.”
“Not necessarily,” Walter replied. “Recall the locations from your memory and think about the surroundings.”
At first, Melina wasn’t sure what he'd meant, but she did as he'd said. There was a small Italian restaurant that she had been to on a date one time, an old gas station, the public library, and the town square. She tried to think about the surroundings of each place, but it wasn’t until she started to think about the town square that Walter’s words made sense.
She remembered there was an alleyway between a couple of the buildings on the northern side of the square. If she could recall it with enough detail then she could teleport to it without being seen. “There’s a dark alley on the northern side of the town square. We wouldn’t be seen teleporting in right there.”
“You know what to do then,” said Walter. “Bring it up in your mind, and I’ll be able to follow you there. And remember, you can do it.”
Melina nodded. She closed her eyes and tried her best to recall what the alley looked like. It was between two older brick buildings, and because of the large, overhanging roofs, there wasn’t much light. It was also a narrow alleyway, just big enough for a small car to enter. Once she thought she had a good enough image, she started to chant in her mind.
Teleport to the alleyway, teleport to the alleyway.
She knew she had teleported by the sudden sound of cars driving by. She opened her eyes and saw that Walter was already there with her. “Give me a minute,” she said as she leaned against the side of one of the buildings and rubbed her forehead.
When Melina’s headache finally went away, she and Walter took off on a walk around town. First, he took her to a few crowded places so she could practice on amplifying one person’s thoughts while shutting all the others out. He wanted her to be able to focus solely on Lee’s thoughts wherever she was with him. Walter would pick out a person, and Melina would single out his or her thoughts successfully every time. She still couldn’t shut out all the other people’s thoughts completely, though, no matter how hard she tried. She was becoming frustrated and was also starting to experience frequent headaches, so Walter suggested they take a short break for lunch. They decided on a small café that didn’t have many people in it so Melina could relax a bit.
Once inside, they went up to the counter to order. Melina ordered a bottled water along with a sub sandwich and chips. Walter ordered nothing. They sat down at a table by the window, and Walter allowed her to take her time as she ate. Twenty minutes later, Melina said she felt somewhat better and was ready to continue with their work.
“Let’s get to work on toning down the effects of your visions now,” said Walter as they exited the café and started to walk down the sidewalk. “Since the visions happen sporadically, it may take us the rest of the afternoon for you to have enough to sufficiently practice with.”
Melina nodded her head.
“We’re going to have to go to crowded places again so you don’t have to run into people on purpose. It’ll just happen. That means you’re going to have to try and control your reactions, okay?”
“Yes, okay,” she replied.
She took in a deep breath as she started to twirl a piece of hair around her finger. Even though she had only experienced one vision so far, it was the one power she dreaded. She wouldn’t just experience a headache after having one. She would also feel whatever pain the individual was going through in the vision. It would be double the amount of pain. Melina shuddered and tried to not dwell on it as they continued to walk.
The first place Walter took her was the city’s park. They could hear music a couple of blocks away. When they arrived, they saw that an outdoor concert was being held. In the center of the park, a soulful blues band was playing on a large stage, surrounded by a crowd of dancing and singing people.
“Perfect,” said Walter.
“Perfect,” Melina muttered. She took in a deep breath and followed Walter into the crowd, trying to block out everyone’s thoughts the best she could.
She tried to keep in mind what Walter said about controlling her reactions as she bumped into one person after the other. After her experience with the first vision, she knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but she would try. She could only hope that she didn’t have one when she was right in the middle of the huge crowd.