I ran for two hours more before my Meter went back to green. I wondered if the changing of my Meter was always the work of someone pressing a button somewhere, or if it was random except for the times when the powers that be, perhaps a Pied Piper member of staff somewhere on another floor, decided too much conspiracy talk had taken place; I doubted they had enough members of staff at hand to listen in on all conversations all of the time.

After a quick shower and a change of overalls (a mid-twenties and glum looking Pied Piper officer was temporarily working at the replaced kiosk had been the one to hand me a new packet of overalls) I headed to B-6 in line with the curfew which was in place.

I found Blain laid upright on his bunk which was set against the rear wall. He acknowledged my presence with a nod and then went back to brooding with his hands clasped together as if he were a knight laid to rest.

There were three other boys in the room who I had seen around but had never spoken to. None of them greeted or did more than give a quick glance in my direction when I entered; each were sat on their bunks brooding worse than Blain. There was a vacant bunk to my right which I moved to. I looked around and waited for a moment should anyone object (I knew how sensitive people could be here about bunk allocation all too well) and then sat down.

A rhythmic snapping sound drew my attention to a boy about my height with short blonde hair and a square-ish face. He was simultaneously snapping his fingers with his left hand and slapping his other hand at the same time. It was a tad annoying but nobody else was saying anything about it so I decided it was easier to just ignore it.

About a minute later the same boy eased himself to the edge of his bunk and fixed his attention on me. He had mercifully stopped snapping his fingers and instead held a deck of playing cards which he was shuffling with expert precision.

"Hey," he said to me, he held out the cards.

"Pick one," he said.

I noticed the boy's eye twitch, he twitched a lot, as if always restless.

"Go on, go on, go on," he said.

I did as he asked, taking a card. The boy shuffled his deck of cards.

"Okay," he said, "Don't tell me what card you took. Just think about it in your mind."

I did as he asked. The boy closed his eyes and pretended as if he were somehow reading my mind.

"Is it the Queen of Hearts?" he said.

"Want me to show you now?" I said.

The boy licked his lips like a lizard and nodded profusely. I showed him my card. It was the Queen of Hearts like he said. The boy gave me a look that said 'Aren't you impressed?'. I smiled back, both amused he had picked the right card but also happy he was excited about pulling it off. I knew better than to ask a magician how he performed his tricks.

"Burgess," I said, offering my hand to shake.

"Adam," said the boy, shaking mine.

I noticed then that he had fangs. He must have noticed the concern on my face. He smiled, showing off the fangs more. They looked like the real deal.

"Are you part of Holly's group?" I said.

"Yeah, yeah!" said Adam.

I kept a stoic look and gave a small nod.

"What's with the fangs?" I said.

Adam smirked some more, "It's our way of knowing who's in," he said, "Holly is showing us how to tap into our shadow selves."

I felt my skin crawl at the sound of this.

"Is that supposed to be a good thing?" I said.

"Yeah, yeah!" said Adam, nodding even more profusely. He started to excitedly shuffle the deck of cards over and over.

"Holly says we have to integrate with our shadow selves to become fierce. If we don't we won't be in control of our dark nature."

"What a load of crap, bruv," said Blain.

"Hey, shut up!" said Adam, "Shut your face!"

Adam was red faced and furious in a heartbeat. Not only that but in the blink of an eye his face changed to become more monstrous. His ears grew longer, his face more feline in nature, his eyes becoming cat-like slits. His lower set of teeth became pointed too. He was close enough to me that I flinched. Worse, his voice was both deeper, in a monstrous kind of way, but also had a feline quality to it too.

I noticed his hands also had small claws which looked very sharp.

Blain didn't move from his spot on the bunk but I could sense that he was ready to throw down with Adam if need be. He wasn't intimidated but he knew that Adam in a monstrous state was worth being wary of.

"You wanna be a fool, bruv you best not be a fool around me," said Blain.

Adam was shaking with fury but he stayed sat where he was. The other boys had moved to the edge of their bunks (both were on top bunks) and were looking down. One boy was tall and gangly, with brown hair which reached down to his collar bone; he had thick-lensed glasses and a mouth which was small, reminding me a little of a bird's beak.

"You integrate with your shadow-self to gain control," said the boy with glasses, "Don't make us look bad."

"Shut up, whatever, whatever," Adam muttered quietly.

His sudden change reverted and he was his normal self again. He scooted up onto the bunk, set his deck of cards aside, and hugged his knees. He continued to mumble to himself and to fidget (he never stopped fidgeting).

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I considered questioning Adam and the other boy more about Holly's sessions and her beliefs, but decided against it. Things were already tense enough in B-6 and the third floor overall. Every teenager had the possibility of becoming a George, and that in itself was terrifying.

It was the third boy who came down from his bunk and wandered to the doorway to B-6 who elaborated further on what Holly had taught them. The third boy was also tall, even taller than the gangly boy, and also had glasses. His hair was also long and sandy blonde with streaks of brown. I spotted a tattoo of an open hand and an eye in the center of it on his neck. The third boy stood with his arms crossed and one foot over the over (he had quite long legs too); he peered out to the corridor like some cowboy.

"These powers we have appear to focus in on how we identify ourselves," said the third boy, as if talking to himself, "The more we fail to integrate our shadow selves, the more likely we are to be at the mercy of our powers controlling us."

I considered his point of view.

"Are you sure?" I said, "Because as far as I've noticed these powers require us to will whatever we do. I've yet to have any change I've caused thrust upon me. At some level I'm always in control."

"I hear what you're saying," said the third boy, fixing his attention on me, "The power is the power. People are people. Who we are comes before how we use our powers. Even before any of us started to manifest powers Jungian concepts like integrating with the shadow-self has been one of the key ways of taking control of one's life."

Everything he said had a loftiness to it. I knew only vague things about Carl Jung's theories myself so I couldn't debate the third boy much there. I just had to go off what I knew to be true based on my own experience.

"So," I said, "How does growing fangs fit into that?"

The boy smiled, showing off his own set of fangs.

"Our inward transformation displays on the outside too," he said, "The myths of vampires and werewolves and the like are all derived from spiritual truths as well as humanity's shared subconscious. In a way we are merely becoming a more honest and integrated form of ourselves."

"If becoming your true self means needing a litter box count me out," said Blain.

I chuckled despite not wanting to cause any tension between me and the others. I had to agree with Blain on that one.

"Those things are make-believe," I said, "Vampires, werewolves, and so on. One thing I think is pretty much agreed upon in all the folk tales of these creatures is that they're bad news."

"That's a matter of opinion," said the third boy, "Your subjective opinion. Whose to say the vampires and werewolves of the world aren't justified in what they are?"

"I don't know," I said, scratching an itch on my cheek, "Maybe because those creatures murder people?"

"It's all survival of the fittest anyway," said the second boy from his top bunk, "It's evolutionary that the strong dominate the weak."

"Ugh," said the third boy, "You're making my argument sound ablist. Everyone should be able to live out their own truth without fear of what anyone else thinks."

"True," said the second boy.

"Yes," said Adam.

I was trying my best to keep up with where this conversation was headed.

"So," I said, "If I wanted to use my powers to become a blood-sucking vampire, for instance, and that was my subjective truth, none of you guys would have a problem with that?"

"It depends on how you do it," said the third boy.

Blain kissed his teeth in frustration listening to all this. I blinked slowly and said, "How could I be a bloodsucking vampire in a way that's okay with everyone?"

"I think consent is a big factor," said the second boy.

I couldn't help but raise my eyebrows.

"So it's not the sucking someone's blood that's the problem for you guys," I said, "It's whether or not the person whose blood I would be sucking consents to it?"

Both the third and second boy nodded and mumbled affirmatives.

"Right," I said.

I sat back on my bunk.

"You should come along to a session, whenever we can do it next," said the third boy, "You could learn a lot. Holly knows this stuff best."

"I plan to," I said, "But I doubt they'll let anything like that happen now we're all under arrest."

The third boy shrugged and turned his attention back to the corridor.

"For now," he said, "We all haven't come into our power yet. But we will soon enough."

Before I could ask what he meant by this there came a sudden voice on the speakers dotted throughout the third floor.

"The cafeteria is now open," said Mike, who was making the announcement, "All members of A-block you will go first. There will be a second announcement for when all members of B-block will take their turn eating in the cafeteria."

Mike repeated this announcement three times over.

After an hour it was b-block's turn to go eat. I left B-6 with the other boys.

"Ugh," said the third boy to the second and Adam when when we neared the cafeteria, "Separating us by gender is so gross. Oppressive Pied Pigs."

"I've got to get our of here, bruv," said Blain, tiredly.

Our meals were pathetic compared to what we had enjoyed before. There was no choice but to have sausages and bread with a side of bland mashed potato without butter. The only condiment to add any semblance of flavor at hand was tomato ketchup, and barely a squirt of that each. Blain and I sat with the other boys from B-6 because there was no other option; each table had to sit with their respective block inmates.

The third boy, who I had managed to learn through eavesdropping was called Reece, wasn't happy about having his only food option be meat.

"I'm vegetarian!" he said in frustration, slamming his fist on the table and breaking his plastic fork.

"Yeah," said the second boy, whose name I also eavesdropped to learn was Christopher, "Pied Pigs."

"Hey," I said to them both, "If you keep saying stuff like that they're going to beat you within an inch of your lives. Cut it out."

Christopher and Reece looked at me like I was a bit of dirt for what I had just said.

Whatever, I thought, Don't say I didn't warn you.

Meanwhile Adam and Blain stuffed their faces with all the food until there was nothing left. I joined in. The food wasn't great but it wasn't much worse than the cooking I knew growing up where everything was boiled and smothered with mayonnaise for flavor.

After our meals (Adam and Blain ate the sausages Reece and Christopher didn't want), we cleaned up our trays. Before we could head back to B-6 however there came an announcement from Mike on the speakers again.

"Anyone wishing to join Holly Bownass's mindfulness session this evening may do so in the exercise area in half an hour's time. The mindfulness session will last for one hour and then curfew to your blocks will be mandatory. These mindfulness sessions are allowed under special permission by Pied Piper staff. Any other unsanctioned gatherings during curfew are not permitted. Attendance to the mindfulness sessions are not mandatory."

I couldn't believe my ears. How on earth were these so-called 'mindfulness sessions' being permitted by Pied Piper staff? Did they not understand the dangers of what they were allowing to take place? The answer to this question was painfully obvious. They want more incidents to take place here, I thought, with cameras set up everywhere in the facility they would have all the footage they would need to sway public opinion on powered individuals.

What would the world think already if footage of George's nightmarish havoc in the facility got out? Maybe that footage was already edited together and sent out to the world? I knew how much the Pied Piper officers held us all with disdain so it wasn't out of the goodness of their hearts they were allowing these sessions to take place. I could feel another panic attack coming on so I closed my eyes and tried to breathe steady. Reece, Christopher, and Adam were excited that the sessions were still going to take place.

Everything here was a ticking time bomb. One way or another things were just getting worse.

"Are you going?" said Blain.

I opened my eyes and looked at him. His face was stoic.

"Yeah," I said, "Someone has to try and put a stop to this before it's too late."

Blain nodded and offered me a hand to shake. I took it and we bumped shoulders.

"Good, man, good," he said, "We got to put this booky crap to rest."

Reece, Christopher, and Adam heard all this, and were looking at us with barely controlled malice. Fine, I thought, Can't please everyone here.