BrickTailor
Wildflowers Issue 4
“Jacee!” I run out the door to greet her. We hug for a minute, then she pulls back and looks at me.
“Man, Sue. You got taller!”
“Look who’s talking.” Jacee had always been short. Really short. But now she had passed six feet tall, and she was barely seventeen.
“Fair enough.”
“I’m more concerned about the eyepatch, though. How’d that happen?”
“Ah, it’s fine. I can still see. But if you must know, I was in a building that exploded. Well, actually it was blown up on purpose. It happened about a month after I left here.”
“Oh, my gosh. I’m sorry!”
“It’s fine. It’s actually something that helped me become who I am. I started practicing using my powers after that, so I could help if I was in a disaster like that again.”
“So, you decided to become a superpowered disaster relief worker?”, I ask with a smile.
She laughs, and turns around to look at the car she had pulled up in, and shouts, “hey Nick, you need some help?”
A muffled voice comes out of the trunk. “Nah, I’m good. Just need to get…this…stupid…tent…out of the way.” A boy, about seventeen or eighteen, emerges from the back of the car, brushing himself off.
“This is why I don’t go on trips very often.” He walks up to me, and extends a hand. “I’m Nick, Jacee’s boyfriend.”
“I’m Susan. Nice to meet you.”
“Same here. Now I should really get that tent out so I can reach the suitcases.” He walks off, muttering about packing too much stuff into a sports car trunk.
“Nick’s a little funny. You get used to it.” She grins. “So, how have you been?”
I sit down on the sidewalk. “Not bad. Kids stopped teasing me about having powers a few months after you left, after I started hanging out with Evan a lot. I guess they got over the whole thing, because now, no one even cares.
Nothing big really happened. This is Hanserville, remember?”
Jacee laughs and says, “true, that. Can’t expect too much here.”
“So, what about you? How’s life in the big city?”
She pauses for a second, then says, “Pretty great, actually. I met some neat people in the last few years. Nick is one of them. He was actually the first person I met at my new school. He has some friends who are really cool, too.”
“Does he know about you having…y’know?”
She laughs awfully hard at that. “Are you kidding? He’s got powers, too. And really cool ones, at that.” She looks back at Nick, who can be seen as a pair of legs struggling against something in the trunk. He’s managed to get one suitcase out, but seems to be stuck with the tent. “Let me go give him a hand.”
She walks over, and pushes him gently out of the way. She pulls out the tent easily, much to Nick’s feigned displeasure. “No fair. You packed the car in the first place, of course you know how to unpack it.”
“Oh, be quiet. You want to pack the car for the trip home?”
“Oh, heck no.”, he chuckles.
“Come here. Show Sue your powers.” She turns to me, and mouths, “coolest ones you’ve ever seen.”
“Fine…”, he mutters. He pulls up the sleeves of his jacket. Closing his eyes, he tilts his head back, and a glowing white blade slides out of his left wrist. I look at his right hand, and there’s a shining black blade there.
He pulls those in, and clenches his fists. His hands are enveloped in black and white gloves. Not just any gloves, though. We’re talking cool ones. Big, metal-plated gauntlets.
He opens his eyes, and looks at me. “So, what do you think?”
“Sweet! Those were great!”
“You wanna see something really neat?”
“Sure!”
He stands up very straight, and closes his eyes again. He pushes his hands downward, and a black and white pattern appears on the ground under him. A white snake and a black one, each swallowing the others tail. He opens his eyes, and tells me, “punch me.”
“Seriously? I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Just do it. Even if you do make contact, I’m plenty tough.”
“All right.” I wind up, and throw a punch at his chest. It never reaches him. As soon as my hand reaches the perimeter of his snakes, a beam of light shoots from his chest, and stops my hand cold. It doesn’t hurt, it just completely blocks me.
“Throw something now.”, Nick tells me.
More confident that I won’t hurt him, I pick up a rock and chuck it. The same thing happens. It reaches his snakes, and a beam, this time black, snags it out of the air. He reaches out a hand, and the rock drops into his palm. “Nice throw.”
“Thanks. That shield is cool!”
“I know, right? I have some other crazy stuff I can do, but it tires me out a lot. I’ll show you in the next few days.”
“OK. You need any help carrying stuff inside?”
Jacee pipes up. “Nah, I’ve got it.” She flips a baton out of her sleeve, points it at their bags, and a pink and purple glow appears around them. They lift into the air, and follow us inside the house.
Mom comes to greet them. “Hello, Jacee! Good to see you again!”
“It’s good to be back!”, Jacee says as she lowers the bags to the living room floor.
“And who’s this handsome fellow?”
“I’m Nicholas. You can call me Nick.”
“Pleasure to meet you, Nick.” She shakes his hand, then says,” make yourselves at home, and if you need anything, just ask me or Sue.”
“Thanks!”
“So, where do we start?”, Nick asks. “I’m all for just unpacking the sleeping bags and do everything else tomorrow.”
“Sounds good to me. Then we can go meet up with everyone else.”, Jacee responds.
“All right, then.” They get their sleeping bags out, and then stand up and ask where they can find the bathroom.
About fifteen minutes later, they come back, and in new clothes. Nick’s dressed in pale blue jeans and a white t-shirt with a band on the front that I’ve never heard of. Jacee looks like an older version of the little girl I remember her as. Red hoodie, tattered jeans, and cowboy boots.
Jacee asks me to text the gang, and then borrows my phone so she can get their numbers. When she takes hers out out, I gasp a little. I’ve never seen a phone like that. For starters, it seems to be made of thick metal. Second, it glows.
Jacee sees me staring, and answers a lot of questions without me asking them. “I got it from one of Nick’s friends. He heard I kept breaking my phone, so he made this.”
“Ah. So why do you have so much trouble with breaking stuff?”
“Let me go get a rock.”
She comes back with one, and tells me to watch. She squeezes, and the rock starts to crack. She grits her teeth, and it cracks fully in half. “There’s your answer.”
“Wow. Here I thought you were clumsy and dropped them.”
“That too. But after that, I got a good phone case. Which I crushed when I got mad with my phone in my hand. After that, I wasn’t allowed to have a phone. Then I met Nick’s friend, and he decided to make this thing. It’s made of quarter-inch steel, with a graphene layer over the screen. I’ll have trouble cracking this.”
“Sounds like he’s quite the techie.”
Nick chimes in. “Not really. He just knows how to make durable stuff. He’s got strength about like Jacee, so he knows what it’s like.”
“Cool!”
My phone beeps, and I check. Donovan just texted back, saying he’ll come over to see Jacee and Nick. I text back quickly, telling him I’d see them in a few minutes. Speaking of which, it was getting to be late.
“I totally forgot to ask, are you guys hungry?”
“Are you kidding? I haven’t eaten for eighteen hours!”, Nick exclaims.
“Right this way, then. You like chili?”
“I love it! Lead on”, he says with a grin.
I hope you enjoyed this issue! Let me know what you think.
Wildflowers Issue 4
“Jacee!” I run out the door to greet her. We hug for a minute, then she pulls back and looks at me.
“Man, Sue. You got taller!”
“Look who’s talking.” Jacee had always been short. Really short. But now she had passed six feet tall, and she was barely seventeen.
“Fair enough.”
“I’m more concerned about the eyepatch, though. How’d that happen?”
“Ah, it’s fine. I can still see. But if you must know, I was in a building that exploded. Well, actually it was blown up on purpose. It happened about a month after I left here.”
“Oh, my gosh. I’m sorry!”
“It’s fine. It’s actually something that helped me become who I am. I started practicing using my powers after that, so I could help if I was in a disaster like that again.”
“So, you decided to become a superpowered disaster relief worker?”, I ask with a smile.
She laughs, and turns around to look at the car she had pulled up in, and shouts, “hey Nick, you need some help?”
A muffled voice comes out of the trunk. “Nah, I’m good. Just need to get…this…stupid…tent…out of the way.” A boy, about seventeen or eighteen, emerges from the back of the car, brushing himself off.
“This is why I don’t go on trips very often.” He walks up to me, and extends a hand. “I’m Nick, Jacee’s boyfriend.”
“I’m Susan. Nice to meet you.”
“Same here. Now I should really get that tent out so I can reach the suitcases.” He walks off, muttering about packing too much stuff into a sports car trunk.
“Nick’s a little funny. You get used to it.” She grins. “So, how have you been?”
I sit down on the sidewalk. “Not bad. Kids stopped teasing me about having powers a few months after you left, after I started hanging out with Evan a lot. I guess they got over the whole thing, because now, no one even cares.
Nothing big really happened. This is Hanserville, remember?”
Jacee laughs and says, “true, that. Can’t expect too much here.”
“So, what about you? How’s life in the big city?”
She pauses for a second, then says, “Pretty great, actually. I met some neat people in the last few years. Nick is one of them. He was actually the first person I met at my new school. He has some friends who are really cool, too.”
“Does he know about you having…y’know?”
She laughs awfully hard at that. “Are you kidding? He’s got powers, too. And really cool ones, at that.” She looks back at Nick, who can be seen as a pair of legs struggling against something in the trunk. He’s managed to get one suitcase out, but seems to be stuck with the tent. “Let me go give him a hand.”
She walks over, and pushes him gently out of the way. She pulls out the tent easily, much to Nick’s feigned displeasure. “No fair. You packed the car in the first place, of course you know how to unpack it.”
“Oh, be quiet. You want to pack the car for the trip home?”
“Oh, heck no.”, he chuckles.
“Come here. Show Sue your powers.” She turns to me, and mouths, “coolest ones you’ve ever seen.”
“Fine…”, he mutters. He pulls up the sleeves of his jacket. Closing his eyes, he tilts his head back, and a glowing white blade slides out of his left wrist. I look at his right hand, and there’s a shining black blade there.
He pulls those in, and clenches his fists. His hands are enveloped in black and white gloves. Not just any gloves, though. We’re talking cool ones. Big, metal-plated gauntlets.
He opens his eyes, and looks at me. “So, what do you think?”
“Sweet! Those were great!”
“You wanna see something really neat?”
“Sure!”
He stands up very straight, and closes his eyes again. He pushes his hands downward, and a black and white pattern appears on the ground under him. A white snake and a black one, each swallowing the others tail. He opens his eyes, and tells me, “punch me.”
“Seriously? I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Just do it. Even if you do make contact, I’m plenty tough.”
“All right.” I wind up, and throw a punch at his chest. It never reaches him. As soon as my hand reaches the perimeter of his snakes, a beam of light shoots from his chest, and stops my hand cold. It doesn’t hurt, it just completely blocks me.
“Throw something now.”, Nick tells me.
More confident that I won’t hurt him, I pick up a rock and chuck it. The same thing happens. It reaches his snakes, and a beam, this time black, snags it out of the air. He reaches out a hand, and the rock drops into his palm. “Nice throw.”
“Thanks. That shield is cool!”
“I know, right? I have some other crazy stuff I can do, but it tires me out a lot. I’ll show you in the next few days.”
“OK. You need any help carrying stuff inside?”
Jacee pipes up. “Nah, I’ve got it.” She flips a baton out of her sleeve, points it at their bags, and a pink and purple glow appears around them. They lift into the air, and follow us inside the house.
Mom comes to greet them. “Hello, Jacee! Good to see you again!”
“It’s good to be back!”, Jacee says as she lowers the bags to the living room floor.
“And who’s this handsome fellow?”
“I’m Nicholas. You can call me Nick.”
“Pleasure to meet you, Nick.” She shakes his hand, then says,” make yourselves at home, and if you need anything, just ask me or Sue.”
“Thanks!”
“So, where do we start?”, Nick asks. “I’m all for just unpacking the sleeping bags and do everything else tomorrow.”
“Sounds good to me. Then we can go meet up with everyone else.”, Jacee responds.
“All right, then.” They get their sleeping bags out, and then stand up and ask where they can find the bathroom.
About fifteen minutes later, they come back, and in new clothes. Nick’s dressed in pale blue jeans and a white t-shirt with a band on the front that I’ve never heard of. Jacee looks like an older version of the little girl I remember her as. Red hoodie, tattered jeans, and cowboy boots.
Jacee asks me to text the gang, and then borrows my phone so she can get their numbers. When she takes hers out out, I gasp a little. I’ve never seen a phone like that. For starters, it seems to be made of thick metal. Second, it glows.
Jacee sees me staring, and answers a lot of questions without me asking them. “I got it from one of Nick’s friends. He heard I kept breaking my phone, so he made this.”
“Ah. So why do you have so much trouble with breaking stuff?”
“Let me go get a rock.”
She comes back with one, and tells me to watch. She squeezes, and the rock starts to crack. She grits her teeth, and it cracks fully in half. “There’s your answer.”
“Wow. Here I thought you were clumsy and dropped them.”
“That too. But after that, I got a good phone case. Which I crushed when I got mad with my phone in my hand. After that, I wasn’t allowed to have a phone. Then I met Nick’s friend, and he decided to make this thing. It’s made of quarter-inch steel, with a graphene layer over the screen. I’ll have trouble cracking this.”
“Sounds like he’s quite the techie.”
Nick chimes in. “Not really. He just knows how to make durable stuff. He’s got strength about like Jacee, so he knows what it’s like.”
“Cool!”
My phone beeps, and I check. Donovan just texted back, saying he’ll come over to see Jacee and Nick. I text back quickly, telling him I’d see them in a few minutes. Speaking of which, it was getting to be late.
“I totally forgot to ask, are you guys hungry?”
“Are you kidding? I haven’t eaten for eighteen hours!”, Nick exclaims.
“Right this way, then. You like chili?”
“I love it! Lead on”, he says with a grin.
I hope you enjoyed this issue! Let me know what you think.