Mom stalked back and forth throughout the kitchen like a general marshaling her troops as she waved her hand over a loaf of bread, blocks of cheese, salami, and seasoning. With a snap of her fingers, the variety of raw ingredients flurried around and assembled themselves into sandwich after sandwich until there were exactly four that levitated under her power onto the empty plates. On the other side of the kitchen was their coffee station, but instead of using their dedicated coffee maker, she lined up a few mugs partially filled with water, some sugar, coffee, regular milk (for her), and oat milk (for Dad and Lyra). With another snap of her fingers, coffee was perfectly made and ready.
"Too bad I don't have telekinesis," Mom muttered with a bitter tone. Eli teleported from out of his seat at the table where he'd been awkwardly waiting into the kitchen then turned to regard the table. He touched each mug and plate one by one to teleport them to the table. Another teleport dropped him in his seat as easy as sitting. It didn’t even wobble under his sudden appearance this time.
"Thank you, Eli.” She said as she sat down at the table.
"No, thank you for coo—", he started to say as a line of text interrupted his vision.
"Oh hey, teleportation just leveled up." He smiled.
"Nice.” She nodded as she pulled her phone out of her pocket and fiddled with it while she thought about something. “Cooking Enchantress hit level three and after making that hedge Phytomancy reached level one. It’s strange… the more I use them, the more I want to practice with them.”
Eli waited for his mom to continue speaking, but she had stopped to continue messing with the protective casing of her phone. He pulled out his own and sent out an email real quick to everyone letting them know lunch was ready. Email was about the only thing that was halfway reliable right now with the Internet. Most other website servers were crashing from the unbelievably high volume of people using them.
He took a sip of his coffee and was delighted at the warm, but not boiling hot temp while he waited for everyone else to come to the table. His phone vibrated as a response went through, but he didn’t bother to check it. Within a few minutes, footsteps rang through the house as everyone came from wherever they'd been.
"Oh wow, this looks delicious! Thank you!" Lyra cheered as she walked into the room as illusive almost 3D stars danced and twinkled across her skin. Each star twinkled and seemed to breathe from diminished light to sparkling radiance.
"Lyra, what level are your illusions at?" Eli asked before Mom could say anything. He had just realized he hadn't seen her at all that morning and had a suspicion she'd been holed up in her room practicing nonstop.
"Level four!" She beamed as she picked up a diagonal half of her sandwich and devoured it with relish.
"Level four?" He crowed with a sense of horror and jealousy.
"Oh, you hit level four too?" Dad asked as he walked around the bend from the staircase too. "Congratulations."
"No, Lyra did! I'm only at level two!"
"Where's Lana?" Mom asked, cutting across the conversation. Her phone still held in her hands as she popped it out of its case again and again.
"I'm pretty sure she's on the treadmill again, I sense it running." Dad shrugged as he pulled his seat out and then a moment later said, "There, I turned it off."
"Have you figured out that anti-technomancy code yet?" Eli asked slightly grumpily as he tore into his own sandwich. The sheer level of technology everywhere meant that his father could see and interact with a lot of stuff at any given moment. Lana's terror at what he could do was becoming more understandable each time he witnessed his powers in action.
"No, but I think I'm making progress. Some of the people at work have similar powers and we're working on it together."
"Making your employees work even when the world is ending?" Lana asked derisively as she entered the room still in her damp gym clothes.
"The world is not ending," Mom said warningly, despite how she’d been acting. Ah, the firstborn's natural right to parental terror never failed. "And she does have a point, love. Is it really fair of you to make your employees work right now? They should be spending time with their families."
"It's on a voluntary basis. The sooner this gets figured out, the sooner things can potentially start to get back to normal. Besides, I'd rather powerlevel technomancy then curl up in fear." He shrugged as he took a bite from his sandwich. "This is good, thank you for making us all food, Addy."
"My power makes it a breeze." Mom shrugged with a slightly coy smile. Eli hurriedly looked down so he could pay more attention to his food and less on his parents' egregious flirting.
"So it's okay for us to use our powers now?" Lana asked.
"As if you guys weren’t already.” She scoffed then sighed heavily. “I’d rather we know how to use our powers then be trampled over by everyone else using theirs. Just… be careful.”
Lana nodded slowly understanding dawning over her features. Her eyes darted left and right as she glanced at each of them. Finally after several seconds she gave a curt nod and said, "Okay. I'm glad you agree... but after talking to Dad earlier... I think that you were right a bit too. These powers are scary. Did you hear that practically every prison has had riots or escapes now?"
Dad winced a bit at her throwing out that particular piece of news. Mom turned towards him with a raised eyebrow. "You told her about that?"
"And Eli, but I wanted them to realize the scope of things a bit more. Last night I was a little too excited about it and I didn't want them to treat these powers like a game or think they can use them to fight like comic book characters or something.”
"Fine." Mom sighed. "So, with that said, I think we should go around the table and talk a bit about what this means for us as a family and set up some ground rules."
"Like what?" Lyra asked while she spectated over an illusionary war of miniature people fighting on her otherwise empty plate. One side wore dark flagless mercenary fatigues while the other wore medieval suits of armor and waved around shining swords.
"First of all, no powers at the table, please?" Mom asked pleadingly with a hard look at each of them. Dad and Lyra both shifted guiltily. "Also, Eli, I know you're pretending to eat normally. As weird as it is and sounds, I can sense food. Stop teleporting it into your mouth and just eat."
"Okay." He grumbled as he ate the last bite of his sandwich 'normally'.
"Secondly, I think we should talk a bit about what each of our powers does and where we are level-wise. We should also start coming up with an emergency plan. What if something happens outside or around us? I want us ready for that just like we are for a fire. Sounds good?"
Murmurs of 'yes' or 'sure' echoed around the table.
"I'll start. I have my cooking power at level three. It lets me basically cook ingredients without actually cooking them as well as enchant any food I cook or eat. I've made food that can heal, provide a rush of energy, increase focus or strength, and a bunch of little things like that. I haven't figured out everything I can do with it yet, but it's what I've been focusing on the most. Next, I have Phytomancy which allows me to control, grow, and mutate any living plants near me. I haven't done a whole lot with it other than repairing the fence your father broke, but I want to try some things out with it later."
Everyone nodded as they listened along waiting for their turn. Lyra started speaking next. She went through her list quickly before pausing briefly to take another sip out of her own coffee. Lyra couldn't do anything but visual illusions yet, but she said that she thought she was getting close to creating tactile and auditory illusions.
Dad rambled for what felt like several minutes about all of the kinds of things he could do with technology, and how he wondered why he couldn't control more 'simple technology' like tools and other things like that, but Eli quickly tuned him out. Until he started talking about his storm power, "I played with it a teensy bit more while in the shower this morning, and I can create clouds and control them pretty easily. But it's a power that can definitely get away from me easily. I want to wait a bit more to mess around with it until everything opens up a bit more and I can head out to somewhere more secluded."
Why couldn't Eli have gotten something a bit more cool like his parents? Teleportation was incredible, but so far, it seemed heavily dependent on what he could touch or see. A part of him was curious if he could use his other senses to teleport. What if he could hear a sound and teleport towards it instead?
"Well, you guys all have more flashy powers than I do, but mine is the best." Lana shrugged nonchalantly. "I've run the course of a marathon today as easily as if it was a stroll. I also need less sleep, food, and water, and also heal a bit faster as well as being more... more resistant." Her voice trailed off slightly as she blushed lightly under everyone's gaze.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
"So, what do you want us to do Mom? Train like we're superheroes and hone our powers?" Lyra asked once Lana finished.
"Wait a second, Eli hasn't gone yet. And no, I want us to be mindful of what we can all do so we can rely on each other if the worst happens."
"I can teleport anywhere I can see," Eli shrugged. "I can teleport objects, but only light objects so far. My power's level is the lowest at level two."
"Only level two? What have you been doing all day?" Lana asked with a snort and a raised eyebrow. The rest of the group groaned audibly.
"I haven't been able to push my power's limits!" He protested hotly as Lana tried not to laugh aloud. After calming down somewhat though, he continued explaining himself after taking a deep breath. "Look, I'm pretty sure that my power levels when I can teleport farther distances or when I use increased weight. I can't really do that very easily inside, now can I?"
"We have weights in the basement hidden away somewhere. You can teleport them across the room, then again to pick up and just grind out some levels. I've been using technomancy practically all day. It almost feels like an extension of me now, not a tool." Dad said proudly, patting the table absentmindedly. Everyone else stared curiously at him.
Lyra finally spoke up next. "You probably have a point about pushing your power's limits, but I think its continual use is just as important. Lana has been exercising all day. Dad's had his fingertips all over every tech in the house apparently. Mom's made food twice today and probably had a snack. And I've been creating more and more complex illusions all day long as I try to perfect them. You should do the same."
"Yeah, okay. Fine." Eli sighed as he glanced over towards the entryway of the house and teleported in a zig-zag down the stairwell into the storage area of the basement where there were piles upon stacks of boxes filled with old stuff. There wasn't any heavy lifting equipment here either; instead, there were various sets of dumbbells and a single barbell tucked away which he started dragging out.
Exhaustion and frustration plagued him as he pulled out five, fifteen and twenty-five pound dumbbells before he collapsed with his back against the wall. Spots danced in front of his eyes as he panted out breath after breath. Going straight through three teleports into the physical labor of moving boxes and weights around had wrung him out; his stomach gurgled in complaint, but at least the nausea wasn't quite as bad as it had been previously.
Irritation prickled at how everyone immediately acted as if they knew so much more than he did about the phenomena that had literally only existed for about 24 hours. Eli closed his eyes tightly shut and mentally forced himself to focus. His body ached from head to toe, but he pushed those thoughts aside. So what if he was the one with the lowest level?
He'd show them! Show them all exactly who was or who wasn't a disappointment. With gritted teeth, Eli leaned over and touched and teleported the five pound dumbbell across the room. Then the fifteen, and the twenty-five. His vision swam and pulsed with smears of color and specks of light, but he climbed to his feet and leaned against the wall for a few seconds before he reached an equilibrium.
Eli teleported across the room with his pile of weights and touched the five pound dumbbell with his foot and teleported across the room again with it. He smiled as he reappeared with the weight in his hand, and his body turned around facing the way he'd come. He waited half-expectantly for a status message to appear, but none came.
He hissed in annoyance and teleported the dumbbell with a flex of anger and then stopped as it crashed and rebounded off the wall and rolled towards him. A dent caved in part of the hard cement where the weight had teleported. A notification scrolled across his vision, but he ignored it as he crept over to study the weight and grinned at the lack of distortion. Did that mean he was safe from accidentally teleporting himself into objects?
A vibration thrummed from his phone. He pulled it out with a frown and ignored the goodnight message from his parents with a reminder to not stay up too late. He turned it off and shoved it back into his pocket without another thought.
He had some training to do.
This time, however, no matter how many times he repeated the process, nothing happened. Frustration bubbled within him, rising until he could feel heat radiating from his face and arms. Even still, he didn't stop trying to teleport an object with force into something.
"Okay Eli, let's break it down..." He said to himself as he paced. Something had clearly happened and obviously did every time he teleported. Whenever he did so, he always displaced some air, so there had to be some force involved. Maybe he teleported the dumbbell with more force...?
But then why couldn't he repeat it?
Eli tried to slow the process of teleportation and paid as astute attention as he was capable of: first, he had to decide what he was teleporting and where, then his vision gradually tunneled (slower with more distance), then bam! Teleportation.
With an extreme amount of will, he was able to slow the process bit by bit as he teleported again and again throughout the basement. Tunnel vision could be delayed, but once it narrowed to an absolute focus on something he would either be forced to teleport or abort and start over.
Only his nausea seemed affected by the delayed teleport, he had almost none when he took his time.
But what if he chained a series of teleports together, each delayed as long as he possibly could?
After a quick zip over to the ping pong table, he filled his hands with three balls each and turned to study the far wall where the crack in the floor carved its passage through the concrete. Slow inhale, tag one ball to teleport on the crack, gently restrain the tunnel vision...
The ping pong ball rolled free from Eli's grasp with a Plink! as it clattered on the ground. The next two bounced were the same, but he started to notice something. It wasn't just his vision that was tunneling, but his other senses as they were compressed to a single location. Longer teleportation time, tighter tunnel vision. Ideas peppered his mind as he gathered up the loose ping pong balls.
Could he exclude things to teleport?
Eli willed himself to teleport across the room, but restrained it as long as he possibly could. Darkness eroded his vision until a single point remained across the room, but he'd kept his focus on his sense of touch. The sensation of his clothes, his bare feet pressed flat into the stone floor, the slickness of his sweat on the ping pong balls. Smells of the relatively still air of the basement cloyed in his nostrils. Creaks of wood and echoes of conversation from upstairs reached his ears.
Silence filled his ears as he let the void dull his hearing. No aroma or scent wafted as the dark slowly devoured him. Numbness iced along his skin from the crown of his head to the balls of his heels, but he noticed how the tension from his clothes remained as well as the touch of the ping pong balls. With a thought, he denied the ping pong balls.
Space vibrated as the darkness ignored the white balls, then light slashed through the cocoon of darkness and he stood across the room. He turned around and smiled at the pile of ping pong balls that bounced in a clatter where he had previously stood, but then he furrowed his brow once he realized he still held something.
It was a halved ping pong ball sheared down the middle; both halves sliced without a hint of resistance. Shivers of nervousness, fear, and excitement roiled through him as he waited expectantly for the notification that still refused to come. Why hadn't it worked?
Was it because he cut off too much sensory input? Or maybe he needed another way to delay the effect of teleportation? But how? What else could he try? His eyes flicked back and forth between the remaining ping pong balls and then the weights he'd left out.
Eli refused to give up as he teleported across the room without slowing it down and then stood shock-still in surprise. The transition had been quick as a blink and yet he still didn't feel any nausea. He thought about teleporting back across the room as he started to reach down towards the—
Plink... Plink. Plink!
Something had peeled off from around him and unfurled to wrap around each of the ping pong balls. Motion sickness wrenched at his body as he collapsed bonelessly at the same time all of the ping balls piled up on the floor teleported across the room before he could even touch them. He convulsed in revulsion as vertigo spun his senses in loop after loop.
His... his sense of touch had extended into the balls without him touching them and he'd still teleported them. Intimate levels of detail etched themselves into his brain in a neverending symphony of synesthesia from the void he slipped into in order to teleport. Eli tried to sit up, but his limbs flopped like limp noodles.
A tug at his telep—
Vomit spewed from his mouth as his body recoiled at the crick-crackly ink feeling of the void. The strange second skin felt as if it had ripped and tore, but it now draped loosely around him as it flapped in an invisible wind. Whenever he thought about moving or going somewhere it drifted then snapped back into him like a rubber band.
Inhale... exhale, breathe in... hold... and out.
Eventually, his mind and body calmed enough that he could sit up. He wiped at the crust of his vomit in disgust as he gingerly prodded at the... at the spatial field around his body and winced at the snap of tension that pulsed in his head. Yeah, he wasn't teleporting again tonight. He shakily climbed to his feet and limped towards the bathroom so he could wash off his face, grab some towels and spent what felt like an eternity cleaning up his sick.
Then he headed upstairs and went to bed in the solitude of the night. When morning came, he would have no choice but to go downstairs and deal with the mess of weights and ping pong bells he'd left scattered everywhere. But, for now though? He desperately needed sleep. More than that even, he was eager for his morning shower.
Every step was an uncomfortable mess of pinpricks and needles as he forced his way upstairs close to his room. He winced at the lack of light streaming in through anyone’s doors except for his parents. Lana’s room was across from his with Lyra’s right next to hers, but neither of them were awake. He started to open his door when he heard one of his parents whisper-shout about something.
He leaned against the wall as quietly as he could while letting his senses ease into his spatial sense or second skin. It warped and fluttered around him, but he split his focus on wanting to stay where he was, while pushing his attention and focus down the hall.
Crackling pops echoed in his ears while he felt his away past their office next to their room. His spatial second skin shuddered in a series of broken twitches, eager to yank him across the void and drop him in front of their door, but he held it back. He wasn’t teleporting. He was trying to anchor himself in place.
Voices whispered with sharper clarity as if he stood in front of their door.
“...tell them about Dave or Sandra. What we did to them?” Dad’s voice asked hesitantly.
“We did nothing wrong, Rick. They were using our startup to launder their money for fuck’s sake! It was thirteen years ago. It’s fine.”
“Is it? With all of this prison breaks and riots… I’m afraid they’ll get out and come after us. We turned them in Addy.”
“We did the right thing, okay? We’re fine and so are the kids.”
“I hope so. I hope you’re right,” Mom sighed. “Speaking of, are any of the kids awake?”
“I don’t think so. Lyra and Lana’s phones are charging, but Eli turned his off. I could try and turn it on?” Dad said quietly. Eli yanked his spatial skin back and had to grit his teeth to stop himself from yelping as he teleported through the door then again into bed. Another teleport shucked all of his clothes off and his phone into his hand so he could plug his phone in.
Just in time as his phone started to boot up.
He rolled over onto his back as he fought to push away the nerves and pinprick feeling of nausea that swelled from his multiple teleports, but the conversation he had overheard bothered him far more. Mom and dad were keeping secrets.
Secrets that sounded vaguely familiar… didn’t he remember a ‘Dave’ and ‘Sandra’?
He tossed and turned for the rest of the night.