I'm running east on Princeton and I can't stop. My feet keep moving even though my brain is screaming at them to slow down, to think about this rationally, to process what just happened, but the rest of my body isn't listening. The cold February air burns in my lungs with every gasp and my heart is hammering so hard I can feel it in my teeth. My actual teeth, not the ones I can grow - those are quiet right now, thank G-d, because the last thing I need is to start sprouting defensive dentition while having whatever this is.
Panic attack? Is this what a panic attack feels like?
My lithium is back at the Music Hall, which might as well be on the moon right now because I'm not stopping, can't stop, have to keep moving.
The fingers on my right hand are killing me. The tips of my fingers, where the claws usually come out when I grow teeth from them, hurt backwards, like everything's moving the wrong direction, like someone's jabbing needles up through my nailbed. For a second, I get this deep, miserable fear that my powers are going haywire and I'm about to explode like a bag of teeth. My heart feels like it's about to burst out of me like a chestburster. It feels bad.
I flex my hand as I run past the Wawa (three cars at the gas pumps, old guy smoking where he shouldn't be, teenage cashier looking bored through the window), past O'Neill's with its neon Coors sign that's only half lit (even though it's barely four PM), past Marinucci's Auto Repair with its perpetual pile of tires out front (seventeen of them, stacked in three crooked columns). The ache doesn't change or shift or get better or worse, it's just there, constant, like it's trying to tell me something but I don't know what. My fingers look fine, and I'm not growing teeth anywhere weird where they shouldn't be.
So why do I feel like I'm getting attacked by something?
My vision keeps trying to tunnel down to a pinpoint and I have to force myself to look around, to stay present, to not spiral completely out of control. The sidewalk is cracked and uneven under my feet (I count three major cracks, two spots where tree roots have pushed up the concrete, one section that's been patched with asphalt instead of cement), and focusing on these details helps a little, gives me something concrete to latch onto besides the memory of that bright red fire and the way it made something in my hindbrain just shut down completely. I feel like a lizard afraid of a person, like I'm about to get stepped on.
It wasn't even that big of a fire - just a garbage can, probably some kid's idea of after-school entertainment - but something about it was wrong. Yellow fire I can handle, that's expected. Orange fire, sure, that's normal. Even a blue fire is just a really hot one, right? But that particular shade of red, like a road flare or a signal light, it triggered something in me that I didn't even know was there to trigger. It made me think about that last scene in The Thing, where neither one of them can tell which one is the alien imposter, so they just resign themselves to dying in the snow.
There's no snow here, just slush, sluicing around my shoes. It feels bad. I drag my heels through and the liquid part of it seeps into my socks, and once it seeps into my socks it starts wicking up my legs like wax up a candle wick. Immediately, it gets in my sweatpants, or maybe that's just my running causing the slush to spray upwards. It snowed a ton on Valentine's Day two days ago and now it's all just melting into road-grey sludge like vomit. Damnit, I didn't even get any chocolates. Why do I care about that now? RUN! Run, Sam, Run! Something's chasing you! Scream!
I avoid screaming - barely. Mostly because I'm too busy panting like a dog. Not out of exhaustion, because I'm in basically as good a shape an almost-16-year-old can be, maybe even better than that, but from something more animal than that.
The Tacony Library looms ahead, red brick and white trim against the grey February sky, and my feet carry me around to the loading dock on the Knorr Street side without any conscious input from my brain. Mom doesn't work here anymore - she's over at Northeast Regional now - but this building still feels safe in a way I couldn't explain if someone asked me to. There's this little alcove behind the emergency exit where the dumpsters create a sort of private corner, blocked from street view on three sides, like a nuclear bunker made of garbage.
The concrete platform is freezing through my sweats when I sit down, and I pull my knees up to my chest, trying to make myself as small as possible. A delivery truck rumbles past on Torresdale (I can tell it's a delivery truck from the particular rhythm of the engine, the way it downshifts at the intersection, and from seeing the side that says exactly what company it's delivering for - Coca Cola), and I press my back against the cold brick wall, counting the individual blocks I can feel through my hoodie. One, two, three, four - my fingernails throb in time with my heartbeat - five, six, seven - someone's car alarm goes off in the distance and I basically almost shit myself - eight, nine...
The back door creaks open and I nearly jump out of my skin, but it's just Mrs. Chen taking out some recycling. She doesn't see me, thank G-d, because I really don't want to explain to anyone why I'm hiding behind the library having some kind of meltdown. The door clicks shut again and I try to get my breathing under control. Four counts in (my right hand won't stop shaking), hold for seven (the brick is rough against my palm when I press it flat against the wall), eight counts out (I can smell old paper and car exhaust and someone's cigarette smoke drifting over from Torresdale). None of it helps. Every time I close my eyes I see that red light again, feel that instinctive wave of wrong-wrong-wrong that sent me running in the first place.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
What's wrong with me? It's not even like any of the supervillains or petty criminals I've fought before. I've only had a couple of fire guys, and only a couple of red guys, and none of them crossed over with each other. Most of them weren't even interesting. Most of them were Jumpheads. Nobody who could make a road flare fire like that. But something about the way it just ate all the other light by being so much brighter than it, I don't know.
It's like it hacked my brain. No, now I'm scared of some mind control villain. Didn't Fury Forge mention that? Or someone in the DVD. There's mind controllers. Be afraid of them. Boo!
I hear footsteps approaching - boots on concrete, the specific click-clack rhythm that could only be Jordan in those ridiculous platforms - and tense up anyway until they round the corner, looking way too graceful for someone who just jogged six blocks in what are basically small stilts. They're not even breathing hard, which is completely unfair.
"Found you," they say, holding up their phone. "Your location sharing is still on. You okay? Because you kind of bolted back there and I'm pretty sure I saw Alex try to follow you for about ten feet before he remembered he's not actually in shape." I try to answer but my throat closes up, so I just shake my head. Jordan sits down next to me, close enough that I can smell their stupidly expensive cologne (the one they definitely shoplifted from Macy's) but not so close that we're touching.
"Need anything? Water? Meds? An elaborate heist to distract you from whatever this is?" Jordan asks.
"Lithium," I croak, throat burning with painful dryness.
Jordan props me up with one arm as we walk down Princeton, keeping just enough space between us to let me breathe without making it feel like they're holding my hand. They keep glancing sideways at me like they're waiting for me to keel over, and I know they're just being careful, but it makes me feel pathetic. I take a deep breath, try to walk a little taller, or at least steady myself enough to keep from swaying.
"You still look like you could use a little more stability," Jordan mutters, adjusting the bag slung across their shoulder. I can't tell if they're actually serious or just trying to make me feel better by pointing out how obvious my freakout was. The fingernail pain is still there but it's dulled to a throb instead of a stab, which is something. I'm not sure if that's progress or if my brain just got tired of processing it.
"Yeah, thanks," I say, rolling my eyes even though the cold air is biting at them. "I'm fully aware."
"Hey, just making sure we're on the same page," they reply, hands shoved deep into their hoodie pockets. They do a quick sidestep around some black ice that's spread across the sidewalk like a trap. I almost trip over it, but they nudge my shoulder just enough to keep me balanced. "Also, you probably shouldn't take more than, like, the exact dose of your meds when we get back."
"Can you overdose on lithium?" I ask, half-joking, but mostly because my brain's too rattled to remember.
They give me this look, like I've just asked the most basic question in the world. What are they, a pharmacist now? I thought you were a computer nerd, Jordan, not a psychiatrist. "Yes. Absolutely. Do not chug the whole bottle, please."
When we finally get back to the Music Hall, I practically collapse on one of the old sofas once we're up the stairs, fumbling through my bag for the meds. I don't find it, not until I go hunting and find it on top of the filing cabinet, where I probably left it, but do not remember leaving it. I dump two pills into my hand, then look over at Jordan, who's standing with their arms crossed, eyebrow raised.
"What?" I say, holding the pills in my open palm like I'm waiting for them to disappear.
"Just... thinking," they say. "Maybe we should NetSphere if you can double up safely."
I huff, rolling my eyes as I toss back both pills with a quick swig of water from my bottle. "If I get liver damage, I'll heal from it. Chill."
"That is not a very good way of thinking about the world, Sam," they reply, but their mouth twists a little. "Okay, so, alternative coping mechanisms," Jordan says, watching me carefully as I swallow just double my usual dose instead of the whole bottle. "We could rob a pharmacy. No, hear me out - not for drugs, just like, maybe some fancy hand cream or something. Very low stakes crimes only." I give them a look and they hold up their hands defensively. "Or we could hack into the school's grading system and give everyone straight C's. Maximum chaos, minimal harm."
I groan, pressing my palms into my eyes. "Jordan, please. I'm begging you to be a little bit helpful. And straight C's would ruin people's lives. And I don't think you even know how to hack like that. And that's still a crime," I point out, getting up from the couch so that I can instead be sinking into the beanbag chair that I'm pretty sure they stole from someone's curb on bulk pickup day. It exhales a small cloud of static-charged foam pellets. "Besides, aren't you still dealing with that whole whistleblower site thing?"
Jordan's face does that thing where they're trying not to look annoyed but failing completely. "Don't even get me started. The ISP guys basically told me 'stop being cheeky if they're willing to file an injunction and a judge was willing to grant it.' Like, sure, let's just let the school keep covering up their racist bullshit because someone has more lawyers than we do." They start typing again, probably working on whatever complicated tech thing they're always doing. "I could probably get around it if I really wanted to, but then we're looking at actual criminal charges instead of just civil stuff, and-" They stop, looking at me. "You're doing the thing where you ask about my problems to avoid talking about yours."
"Is it working?"
"No. Want to tell me what actually happened back there? Because I've seen you handle way worse than some random trash fire." Jordan's voice is carefully neutral, which means they're actually worried. "Did you recognize someone? Spot something suspicious?"
I shake my head, trying to find words for the wrongness of that red light. "It wasn't... I don't know. It wasn't normal fire. It was too red. Like a road flare or something. And my hand started hurting, and..." I flex my fingers again, still feeling that deep ache under the nails. "I think I need to go on patrol."
"Yeah, no." Jordan spins their chair back around, pulling up something on one of their monitors. "That's exactly what I would do, which means it's probably the worst possible response. You know what we should do instead? Actual normal teenager stuff. When's the last time you had a real sleepover?"
"Jordan, I sleep here like half the time anyway," I again point out.
"No, I mean an actual sleepover. With, like, stupid movies and junk food and painting our nails and stuff. Normal people things." They pause. "Well, as normal as we get, anyway. Come on, when's the last time you did something that wasn't either school or super stuff?"