I opened my eyes and sat up on my bed recalling the events of yesterday. After my scary encounter with the psycho with claws who for some reason was always smiling or grinning, I felt so drained and exhausted. I had never used my powers like that before, the moment I got into Mr. Park's car and felt relaxed I was forcing myself to stay awake, I remember him dropping me home and my parents were waiting outside the house, I assume when they couldn't find me at the carnival they came home to wait. I remember my mum hugging me and thanking Mr. Park for bringing me home, after that it was all blurred, next thing I know I'm waking up in my bed. I picked up my phone and saw over ten missed calls from Chris and surprisingly Susan. There was a knock on my door and then it opened slowly.
"Hey, you're awake. Are you okay?" My mum asked.
"I'm fine, just trying to process yesterday"
"We all are" Mum replied with a sigh. "We'll take it one step at a time. Come downstairs, I made breakfast"
I followed my Mum downstairs and met my dad in the living room having a cup of coffee.
"Hey, you're up? How'd you sleep?" he inquired.
"Surprisingly good. Have you guys heard anything?"
"We were just watching the news this morning, there's no work or school today and more AMU soldiers are coming into town to hunt whatever that thing is" My Dad answered.
"So the whole town is on lockdown?"
My Mum scoffed "You would think so but for some reason Mayor Darien Stowe wants to act like everything is okay, he announced that all offices, businesses and school return to work in a week"
"He's always been like this about anything concerning Stowe" My Dad stated. "Remember when there was an accident on the major road and diverting traffic caused all other roads to be slammed and he still insisted that everyone report to work"
"That's true" My Mum agreed. "The Stowe's always seem to have a stick up their butts"
"Mum!" I said in disbelief, I don't think I've ever heard her use those kind of expressions before. We all exchanged glances and laughed.
My Dad cleared his throat and drew closer to me "We need to talk about last night. When you…"
"I know, I know" I interrupted. "I'm sorry, I couldn't find you guys at the carnival so I assumed we'd just meet at home"
"We're not mad we couldn't find you at the carnival" My Mum said. "You did what we've always taught you which is safety first, but that's not what we want to talk to you about"
I was surprised "It's not?"
"No" My Dad responded. "We want to talk about later that night. When Mr. Park dropped you off he mentioned you had a confrontation with a man with claws and horrible looking skin"
"Oh that?" I tried sounding casual. "It wasn't really a serious confrontation"
My Mum held up a piece of cloth "This is a stranger's coat you had on last night and one of the sleeve is torn to pieces"
"I'm fine really, he didn't hurt me"
"What your Mother is trying to say is that we want to know everything that happened last night with this man with the claws"
"Nothing much to tell, he just came out of nowhere and attacked Karen and I until Mr. Park intervened"
My Mum glanced at my Dad briefly and then directed her stare at me "When he attacked you did he say anything?"
My parents were about to start worrying again so I thought I'd talk casually to give the impression that it wasn't a big deal "I didn't really pay attention, I was obviously distracted by the claws and fangs"
"I'm serious Fred" She snapped. "You might not understand but I need to know what the man with the claws said"
Seeing the seriousness in my Mum's tone I decided to comply "He was just bragging about being behind the attack in the woods"
"Did he say anything that would indicate he was after you?" My Dad asked.
I expected my parents to overreact as they've always done when I'm involved in an incident but my Dad's question surprised me "Why would he be after me?"
"Just answer the question. Did he say anything that might show he has interest in you" My Mum said.
"I'm not going to answer until you tell me what's going on"
My Dad was clearly surprised at my response and the tone I used to deliver that response "What?"
"I'm sorry but I'm not a child anymore, your repeated questioning of my every move and being overprotective was believable when I was a kid but now it's very obvious you guys aren't telling me something"
My parents exchanged a look which just proved to me that I was correct. My Mum looked at me "It's not like that sweetheart, we just worry about you"
"It's not true Mum and you know it. For as long as I can remember you guys have always been like this, always asking if I'm going through any changes, throwing a huge fit when I hit puberty and basically stalking me, at a point I thought I had cancer. Just tell me what the real issue is, what's with the constant questions and shadowing?"
My Dad used two of his fingers to pinch the bridge of his nose, eyes shut, as if trying to physically hold back a headache "I'm sure you know this but I'll still say it, everything we do and everything we will do will be to protect you, so I'll ask again, is there anything you'd like to tell us about the incident yesterday or anything at all?"
"No" I responded. I was angry, I knew I was keeping a big secret from them too but I wasn't going to come clean until they told me what they were hiding. Do they know something about my ability? Why did they ask if the stranger with claws were after me? These thought were running through my mind.
My Dad wasn't convinced "Are you sure?"
"Yes I'm sure"
My Mum started to walk to the kitchen "I'll make breakfast"
"I'm not hungry. If anyone needs me I'll be in my room" I said and walked away. I could hear my parents whispering to each other but I was too annoyed to try to listen, I picked up my phone and texted Karen to meet me at Chris' place. I was confident that my parents wouldn't let me leave the house so I decided to climb out my window again, I got out as quietly as I could and got into town, my parents weren't kidding about the extra AMU soldiers in town, if I were new to Stowe I would think this was a military base. I decided to take the route where I and the Alchemist fought the dire beast and the stranger, it was crawling with spectators and AMU soldiers, I didn't pay much attention to the damage my lightning outburst did last night but seeing it all in daylight I couldn't believe that I actually did that. The scorch marks from my lightning were scattered all over the place, on the walls, trees and the street, the office were one of my lightning streaks started a fire got burnt and there were also large spills of blood on the street from the wound my lightning inflicted on the dire beast.
"Hey" Karen said as she came up to me, she looked at the widely spread destruction "You did this?"
"Yep, I'm starting to think I've not really understood the full scope of my...." I looked around to see if anyone was close enough to eavesdrop "My powers"
"You may be right about that, the limits of your abilities continue to expand"
I scoffed "Limits of my abilities? If we're being completely honest we don't know what those are"
Karen placed her hand on my shoulder "We're trying our best, you are trying your best"
"Well it isn't enough, if there were people around I could've killed somebody, I could have even killed Mr. Adler"
"But you didn't, that weirdo and the dire beast are to blame for all of this and you know it so what's this really about?" Karen asked.
"I wanted something good to come from these powers, with all this power coursing through me and I couldn't do anything useful, I got my ass handed to me last night" I said. "He basically threw me around like a ball"
Karen looked around "Let's continue this conversation somewhere an AMU soldier can't overhear"
We arrived at Chris' house and were about to knock when the door flew wide open, clearly he was eagerly waiting for us "Last night was insane! Are you guys okay?"
"I'm a lot better now, nothing a little werewolf healing can't fix" Karen answered as we entered and shut the door behind us.
Chris turned to me "Whenever something like this happens it would be nice if you could answer a call to let people know you're fine or send a text at least"
"Really sorry, after excessively using my powers I felt drained, I barely remember anything that happened after I got home"
He observed me "You seem fine, no injuries I suppose. We got lucky"
"Really Lucky" I said. "I think I might be invulnerable"
"What?"
"Last night he took a shot at me, I felt his claws on my skin but there was no blood, the jacket I had on was practically shredded"
Chris looked surprised "That could be a good thing, it shows that your powers are similar with the super soldiers"
"We can deal with that later" Karen said. "That chimera said a lot of things that we need to focus on"
"Things like what?" Chris asked.
"Things like he's been hunting me for years" I answered. "He also mentioned someone else, apparently someone told him that I would be difficult to kill"
"Who?" Chris inquired.
"I have no idea obviously, I don't even…"
There was a knock on the door, we all went silent.
"Is that your mum?" I asked.
"It can't be. The hospital has all its workers working overtime because of the attack" Chris answered.
"Who is it?" Karen asked.
"Guys open up, it's Susan"
"How'd she know we were here?" Chris inquired.
Karen sighed "We were texting and I might have mentioned we were all meeting at Chris' place. I thought with her Dad being hurt and in the hospital she would be occupied"
"Obviously you thought wrong" I stated.
Karen rolled her eyes and headed for the door "It's not a big deal, just pretend you don't know anything"
Susan knocked again "Guys? What's going on?"
Karen opened the door "Hey! Sorry for the holdup, Chris didn't want you to find out how messy he really is"
"Dude!" Chris exclaimed.
Susan came in and joined us in the living room.
"I heard your Dad got hurt at the carnival yesterday, I'm so sorry" I said.
"It's not your fault. He's okay though, just a couple of mild injuries. He's sleeping and I decided to get some fresh air and I ended up here"
Karen embraced Susan "We're here if you need anything"
"Thanks guys. By the way have you guys been to town this morning? I've never seen so many soldiers in my life"
"I know right" Chris said. "Stowe is trending worldwide, there hasn't been a supernatural incident like this in years"
"Do you think this stranger and his beast are crazy enough to attack with the AMU in town?" Karen asked.
"Well he attacked last night at the carnival with the AMU serving as security" Susan answered. "This isn't over, that psychopath wants something and until he gets it the people of Stowe are collateral damage"
"I'm just glad that due to eyewitness testimonies, people finally know that it wasn't the werewolves that did it" Karen said.
"Finally some good news. I guess we just wait and see how this all plays out" I said.