The Gifted (20 page)

Men started opening their packs and taking
out rations as fast as they could. “He’s welcome to it,” said one
of the men. “I’m sick of this stuff.” He pulled out a packet and
opened it. It could have been meatloaf or beef bourguignon for all
I knew, but I could smell it, and so would Billy.

Billy started climbing down faster. “Now
where are you going to lead him?” I asked.

“I don’t know. Into the other room,” said one
of the men. “Let’s get him into the other room.”

Meanwhile the man who had yelled had already
climbed the stairs halfway to the top. He was taking the stairs two
at a time.

Other soldiers held open their packs and I
saw all kinds of food, from corn to sausages to cereal bars. Billy
got to the bottom and started following the men as they ran to the
other room. As they ran by, I started to feel light-headed.
Numbness began to creep over my body.

The only one left was the man on the stairs.
He reached the top and was examining the wires inside and shouted
down to us, “It’s a miracle he didn’t blow us to kingdom come! In
all of his tearing and ripping, he missed the main chamber!”

I would love to tell you what happened next.
I’d love to tell you about how the nuke was disarmed and we saved
the eastern seaboard. But I can’t. I had passed out.

When I awoke, I was on a stretcher. I don’t
know how they got one there since I had never seen medical
supplies, let alone something as big as a stretcher. I looked up
and one of the men carrying me smiled. My effect again, I
suppose.

“Did he disarm it?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said. “We won’t be blowing up in a
cloud of uranium today. We left some men there to guard it. By the
way, you should know that you almost gave our resident scientist a
heart attack when you had that troll up there. When we got it out
of the way and saw what was left of the missile, the troll had
taken apart everything needed to get access to the uranium without
anything disturbed that would have blown us up. It’s a bit of a
miracle, really.

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m believing in those
lately.

“How’s Billy?” I asked.

“Who?”

I heard Tracy’s voice, “Billy’s okay. I made
sure they didn’t hurt him. I think our scientists want to study him
though.”

“Great,” I said. I lay down my head and in a
couple of minutes passed out again.

When I opened my eyes later, a howling wind
was blowing on my face. I was on the floor of the cave and the men
were all crouched down talking in loud whispers. I listened. “Look
at all those trolls. How are we going to get through to the other
side without shooting our way out?” said one man.

A different voice said, “Remember the other
troll? We can use food.”

The first voice, “There are too many of them.
They would crush us or eat us or whatever they do.”

“What else would work?” a new voice.

“Have you tried fire?” I blurted out. “They
might be drawn to it or afraid of it.”

A commanding voice, “Hey, sedate that kid.
Now!”

I immediately felt the pressure of a needle
in my leg, but couldn’t feel any pain.

There was a pause, and then one of the men
said, “You know, that’s an idea. We haven’t thought of fire.”

“How are we going to get a fire started? It’s
too windy down here,” said one of the men.

“Tracy,” I said. I was starting to feel the
effects of the injection hit me hard.

“Yes?” she must have been close by.

“Can you m-make f-f-ffffllllthhhhh?” I
said.

“fire, right!” she said.

Just before I started to dream, I heard, “I
have some extra shirts you can light. That ought to work!”

I think I heard some troll sounds for a few
seconds and then I didn’t hear anything. I was dreaming.

Later again, “Okay, men. You go around back
and come from those rocks. If you can get a clear shot, then tranq
them.”

I slowly opened up my eyes and we were
outside again. Looking around I saw snakes and pieces of snakes on
the ground. I knew we were dealing with the gifted kids again.
Brock came over to me and said, “Is there any advice you can give
me about these guys? You were with them a lot longer than I
was.”

The only thing I could think to say was, “If
Abe, the leader, comes out. You have to plug your ears.”

“Right,” said Brock. “We’ll pull an
Odysseus.”

“Huh?” I said.

“Greek Mythology, freshmen year,” he said.
“Wax in the ears. Thanks.” Then he took out some earplugs and put
them in. He motioned for his men to do the same. He went away and I
was still lying on the stretcher on the ground. I heard yells and
some guns and eventually, I tuned most of it out. I don’t really
know what they put in me, but it made me really tired. Even with
all the noise, I kept falling asleep.

I guessed this went on for a few hours
because when I first opened my eyes, the sun was just above me and
when I closed them it was already far to my right. It was a pretty
day, actually. There were a few wisps of clouds above me and they
were painted red and orange by the sunset, and somehow green got in
there. I’m not sure how much the drugs were affecting me. I said
aloud, amidst all the shouting and gunfire, “Thank you God for my
life and that, at least for now, I’m still alive.” Then I fell back
to sleep.

Like I said, a lot of this was uneventful for
me. I didn’t see everything so I can’t tell you all the details. I
had always felt that I was in control of my destiny, but I realized
then that I really had no control over my future. I couldn’t even
walk! It was clear now that my life was not in my own hands. I
thanked God again and lost track of what was going on.

I must have missed all the action, because
when I awoke again I was in a hospital bed. In fact, seeing the
room again felt like déjà vu. They had put me in the same room
where I started, and I was again by myself. I realized there was no
more ringing in my ears and I lay there relaxing, hearing myself
breathe. Then I heard the flush of a toilet and turned my head.
Guido limped out of the bathroom wearing one of his customary
Hawaiian shirts. “Hello, roommate.”

“Hey,” I said, “I can see you.”

“New clothes,” he said. “I wanted a
change.”

“How are you doing?” I asked.

“Feeling better,” he said with a smile. “I’m
only going to lay around here another couple of days and then they
say I can start walking more. They’ve started having me walk some
now. They call it therapy, but it hurts like my leg’s on fire.
Something for you to look forward to probably.”

“Great,” I said.

“Did you know they had to do surgery on you
twice?”

“Really?” I said. “I didn’t even know about
it.”

“They kept you out the whole time. They said
your knees were torn up pretty bad. I don’t think you should jump
from a troll in a pizza rage at fifty feet again. It’s bad for the
health.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said.

He smiled at me again. My gift in action.

“What happened to everyone?” I asked.

“Well, Han comes around a couple of times a
day to see how we are doing, and Tracy comes in probably six or
seven times a day.”

I could have made fun of him then and there,
but I didn’t really feel like it. Good teasing grounds for
later.

“Does anyone know what happened to
Hayasa?”

“Oh yeah,” he said, “he’s on his walk right
now.”

“Someone’s able to take him for a walk?” I
said.

“Well,” said Guido, “actually, Hayasa kind of
takes the guy for a run. He likes to fetch, but he’s so fast you
never have a chance to rest your arm.”

I heard footsteps outside the door and
someone walked in. “Hi, Guido,” she said. I thought it might be
Tracy, but I couldn’t tell.

“Is that you, Tracy?”

“It’s me!” she said. “Can’t you tell?”

I thought I was looking where she was, but I
couldn’t be sure until she put her hand on my arm.

“She doesn’t know yet,” said Guido. “I
haven’t had the heart to tell her.”

“Tell me what?” said Tracy. She smiled at
me.

“Tracy,” I said, “When you came in, I wasn’t
sure where you were.”

There was a silent pause for a second, “So
that’s what’s going on!” she said. “I just thought people were
ignoring me these days.”

“She’s been here with me quite a bit lately,”
said Guido with a shy smile.

“That’s okay,” said Tracy. “But if we’re
getting each other’s gifts, can you make heat?”

Guido laughed, “You bet I tried, once I
figured out what was happening. So far I can only make things a
little warmer, but I can’t make fire yet. I’ll get it though.”

“Guido,” said Tracy, “have you told him about
our zoo?”

“Zoo?” I said.

“It’s not really a zoo,” said Tracy, “but
remember all those animals we fought with gifts? Ones like
Hayasa?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Well, they found more,” she continued. “And
the scientists were fascinated, so they built this kind of zoo
where they can study them.”

I heard heavy footsteps and Brock came in.
“How are you soldiers doing?” he asked.

“Okay,” said Guido, “but look who’s
awake!”

“Andy,” said Brock, “nice to see you in the
land of the living. How do you feel?”

“I’m alright,” I said, “But I still can’t
feel my legs.”

“Right,” he said. “At this point that’s a
good thing. Otherwise you would probably be screaming. If what they
gave you wears off too soon, let them know and they’ll give you
something for it. They said you’ll be able to stand in about four
more weeks. Longer before you can walk. You’ll have to take it
really slow though.”

“Hey Brock,” I said. “Whatever happened when
you were fighting the gifted kids at the end?”

“Your tip was very helpful,” he said, “Almost
right after we had plugs in our ears Abe came out and tried to
sweet talk us again. You should have seen the look on his face when
it didn’t work! Finally one of our guys shot him with a
tranquilizer. Now he’s in a special kind of juvy for gifted
kids.”

“So he’s locked up?” I said.

“Right,” he said. “He and some of the other
kids. Most of them snapped out of it once they had more distance
from Abe, but some were really committed to this thing.”

It was over two months before I was able to
walk. Just as promised, they started physical therapy which was
very painful. The good thing was that I was able to get out of bed,
something I had wanted to do for a long time.

It was January when I got here and it was now
mid-March. Other than reading books, chess was one thing I could do
while lying in bed. Guido and I played at least once a day. I was
only able to stand for about an hour a day so far, but that was
expected to change.

One day while playing a game, I asked, “Hey
Guido. I remember when we were on the island we discovered that we
had a spy here at the facility. It was the general, right?”

“That’s right,” he said.

“What happened?” I asked.

“He was gone before we got back,” said Guido.
“We don’t know where to, but the hunt is on.”

About a week later, after I finally beat him
for the first time that week, he asked me to take a walk with him.
I got up and wrote down the time on a whiteboard so I could log how
long I had walked; something they made me do.

We walked down to the end of the hallway and
then turned left and walked some more until we came to a door that
said, “Underground Garden.” Guido, who I could locate, only because
he was holding my elbow, said, “Let’s take a look.”

“Okay,” I said.

We stepped through the door and onto a
balcony. Below we could see an enormous garden, and I could smell a
mixture of flowers, vegetables, and wet dirt. This place was huge,
with grow lights everywhere, stretching out before us. No one was
there, and it was really quite beautiful. Guido turned to me and
looked serious. “Listen,” he said, “I’m your friend. I don’t know
if you believe that sometimes because maybe you think every time
anyone acts nice to you it’s because of your gift. But you’re
wrong!”

“Huh?” I said.

But he just kept on going like he had
rehearsed this or something. He sounded kind of mad. “Sure, we can
feel your gift, but we’re your friends because we like you. Really!
And we wouldn’t care if you looked and smelled like a troll. We’d
still be your friends. Got it?” He yelled this last part, like it
had been building up in him for a while.

I paused for a few seconds, not sure what to
say, “Uhhhh, I think so,” I said quietly. And then I started
crying. I really didn’t even know why, but I couldn’t help it. It
felt good, but it was also embarrassing. When I turned to the door,
I saw Tracy and Han were there also and they were smiling. And I
decided that this time, I believed their smiles.

Early one morning, before most of the
facility was awake or had come to work yet, I was looking out of
our fake window again. It was too early for sunshine, but I still
saw the bird that flew over to the same tree over and over, and I
knew it was just a screen, but it was still beautiful. I knew that
we were far underground, but didn’t know where. I guess the
military like their secrets.

As I lay there by myself I thought I heard a
high pitched screeching sound. At first it was very faint and I
wondered if my ears were ringing again from all the gunshots I had
heard on the island, but then it got louder. I heard a grinding
noise on top of it now. I wondered what was going on. The room
started to vibrate a little and that’s when I started to worry. The
wall, where the image of the lawn and trees were projected, started
to crack, and then dust fell through the cracks. I tried to back
away.