“OWWWWWW!” Jackson howled in pain. He grabbed his jaw and staggered back against the den wall.
“Accident! Accident!” Artie cried, dropping his controller.
I read his mind. It really was an accident.
But Jackson let out an angry growl, like an animal. Rubbing his jaw, he moved toward Artie.
I read my brother’s thoughts. Enough is enough. That’s what he was thinking.
And then he thought: Help me out, Jillian. Let’s teach these Lerner twins a lesson.
I gazed at my sopping-wet notebook. And I began to feel as angry as Jackson. “Okay,” I said out loud. “Let’s do it!”
Nina moved beside Artie. Was she trying to protect him?
Jackson narrowed his eyes and stared at them both, concentrating … concentrating his powers.
I stared at them, too.
“Hey,” Nina shouted. Her eyes moved from me to Jackson. “Are you both freaking out? Why are you looking at us like that? What are you DOING?”
“Stop it!” Artie cried. “Stop staring at us like that! Are you crazy?”
“You’re giving me a migraine!” Nina said. She started to rub her temples.
But suddenly, her hands dropped to her sides. She gazed straight ahead, both arms hanging limply.
Both of them froze. Like statues. Their faces went still. They stared straight ahead and didn’t blink.
I tried to read their thoughts. But their minds were totally blank.
Jackson laughed. “Awesome! That was so easy! Look at ’em! I totally froze them!”
A chill went down my back. “They’re not thinking or anything,” I said. “They’ve totally shut down.”
Jackson pumped a fist in the air. “Yes! Yes!”
I grabbed his arm. “Maybe we’ve gone too far.”
He pulled free. “No way, Jillian.” He stepped close to Nina and Artie. “Maybe now you two will cut us some slack and stop being such wimpy, obnoxious pests!” he said.
He turned to me. “Think they’ll remember this?”
“I don’t know,” I replied. “I don’t know what they’ll remember.” My voice broke. “I don’t like this, Jackson. I don’t think we should have done this.”
“Okay, okay,” he said softly. “You’re right. We’ll unfreeze them, okay? We’ve scared them enough.” He began to concentrate.
The Lerner twins didn’t move. They stared straight ahead.
I had a sick feeling in my stomach. I couldn’t even tell if they were breathing!
“Hurry up,” I said. “Concentrate harder. This is too creepy.”
My whole body tingled with fright. Why did we do this to these two kids? We hadn’t even practiced our powers yet. We didn’t know what we could do and what we couldn’t.
Jackson squinted at Nina and Artie. He clenched his jaw and concentrated … concentrated his powers.
I stared at them, too. Trying to beam myself into their minds. I kept thinking the same words over and over: Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!
Jackson let out a long whoosh of air. He shut his eyes. “It — it’s not working,” he stammered.
The Lerner twins didn’t move.
“Keep trying,” I said. “Please, Jackson — do it! Do it!”
We both concentrated on them again. I gritted my teeth so hard, my jaw ached.
But no. No change.
I stepped up to Nina and shouted in her ear. “WAKE UP! Do you hear me? WAKE UP!”
No. She didn’t blink. Not a muscle moved.
Jackson and I grabbed the twins and shook them. We shook them hard, shouting for them to wake up and snap out of it.
Nothing. Nothing worked.
I staggered back, choked with panic. “What are we going to DO?” My voice came out in a terrified whisper. “Jackson — what —?”
I didn’t finish. I heard a door slam. The sound made me jump.
“We’re home!” a cheerful voice called.
I gasped. I stared in frozen horror at my brother.
The twins’ parents were back.
Panic rolled over me. I struggled to breathe.
The Lerner twins stared blankly straight ahead. They didn’t move.
Their parents would be in the room in a few seconds.
I grabbed Jackson’s arm. “Hurry!” I cried in a harsh whisper. “You’ve got to wake them up!”
He stepped up close to Nina and Artie. He squinted hard at them. He concentrated so hard, his face turned bright red.
I didn’t know if my powers could help. But I concentrated, too. Wake up! Wake UP!
I uttered a cry as they started to move.
Artie let out a groan. His shoulders slumped. He blinked his eyes and took a staggering step forward.
Nina let out a long whoosh of air, like a balloon deflating. Her head rolled around on her shoulders. She stared at me as if she didn’t recognize me. “Jillian? When did you get here?”
I was so happy, my legs were trembling. My heart pounded like a bass drum.
“Jackson — you did it!” I cried.
“Did what?” Nina demanded.
Artie stared at the TV screen. Then he turned to Jackson. “Did we finish our boxing match?”
“Uh … yeah,” Jackson said. “You won. You knocked me out.”
Their mom called from the back of the house. “Artie? Nina? Come here and check out the birthday decorations we found at the mall.”
“We’ve got to go,” I said breathlessly. I grabbed Jackson and pulled him to the front door.
Nina frowned at me. “Don’t you want to see the decorations?”
“No,” I said. “I want it to be a surprise. Bye. Catch you guys later.”
They stared at my brother and me as we ran out the door. I left the soggy science notebook behind, but I didn’t care.
We were out of there. And the Lerner twins were no longer the Living Dead, or whatever we did to them.
It had begun to rain, and it was coming down pretty hard. I raised my face to the sky. The cold raindrops felt soothing on my hot forehead.
Jackson and I started to run, splashing up puddles. “That was close,” I said. “Too close.”
“We have to practice,” Jackson said. “We don’t really know our powers. We have to figure out what we can do and what we can’t do.”
We ran under some trees. Rain washed down on us like a waterfall.
“Should we tell Mom and Dad?” I asked.
Jackson shook his head. “We’d better keep it a secret.”
“Mom and Dad have that dinner party tomorrow night,” I said. “We could check out our powers then.”
“Tomorrow night,” Jackson repeated. “Yes. Tomorrow night. We’ll do it!”
The next night, Jackson and I ate frozen pizza for dinner. Mom and Dad were in their room, getting dressed for the dinner party.
Jackson leaned across the table and whispered to me, “I’ve been trying to think up a good superhero name for myself.”
I laughed. “How about the Tomato Sauce Mutant?” I whispered.
He squinted at me. “Huh?”
“You’ve got tomato sauce all over your face,” I said.
He growled at me. “Your name can be Fantastic Funny Woman. Ha-ha.” He plucked a piece of pepperoni off his pizza slice and flicked it at me.
It landed on my lap. I picked it up and started to toss it back at him. But Dad walked into the kitchen. “What are you two talking about?” he asked.
Jackson and I both answered at the same time.
“Pizza,” I said.
“Superheroes,” Jackson said.
Dad squinted at us. He adjusted his tie. He hates ties.
“We made up a superhero called the Pizza Surfer,” I said, thinking quickly. “Kind of like the Silver Surfer. Only he travels on a giant pizza.”
I know, I know. Very lame.
But Dad wasn’t really listening. He was searching for his car keys.
I spotted them first. They had fallen onto the floor beneath t
he kitchen counter.
Jackson saw them, too. He stared at them and made them float up onto the countertop. “There they are on the counter!” he shouted to Dad.
Dad scratched his head. “Weird. Don’t know how I missed them.”
A few seconds later, Mom and Dad said good night and headed out to the car. Jackson and I watched them drive away.
Jackson stuffed a whole slice of pizza into his mouth. Then he grabbed his Windbreaker and started to the front door. “Mmmmph mmmmph. Let’s go,” he said.
We stepped out into the clear, cool night. The rain had finally stopped that afternoon. The ground was still wet and marshy. Puddles glowed from the pale quarter moon hanging low over the trees.
We trotted to the small park on the next block. It was surrounded by tall hedges, so no one passing by could see us. The park had a playground for little kids and a picnic area with tables and benches.
There were tennis courts behind the picnic area. They were surrounded by a high wire fence. The courts were empty because they didn’t have lights.
The perfect place to try out our new superpowers.
I tried to open the gate. Then I saw the big silvery padlock and the chain. “It’s locked,” I said. “We can’t go in.”
Jackson shoved me out of the way. “No problem for Wonder Warrior!” he exclaimed.
He stared hard at the lock, gritting his teeth. I could see the muscles in his jaw flexing as he concentrated.
The padlock popped open and fell to the ground.
“Way to go, Wonder Warrior!” I cried, slapping Jackson on the back. I wanted to tell him that was the lamest superhero name I’d ever heard. But it didn’t seem like the right time.
I swung the gate open, and we stepped onto the court. I carefully latched the gate behind us and gazed around. Someone had taken the nets down, so there was plenty of room to run around.
“I’m kind of psyched,” I said.
“Me, too,” Jackson replied. “Know what I want to do first? I want to see if we can fly.”
I laughed. “Fly? Really? I never even thought about that!”
“I know we have powers we haven’t even thought about,” Jackson said. I’d never seen him that intense before. He was always the laid-back, easygoing, “whatever” guy in the family.
“How do we test it?” I said. “Just raise our arms in the air and try to take off?”
We both raised our hands high above our heads. Then we bent our knees and leaped into the air.
Our sneakers thudded right back down to the asphalt court.
“We need to get a running start,” Jackson said. He leaned down and put his hands on his knees, like a runner in a track meet. “We can do this, Jillian. I know we can.”
We both took off running across the court. Faster … faster … Our sneakers pounded the asphalt.
As I rocketed over the ground, I raised my arms to the sky. “Yes! YES!” I screamed. “I’m FLYING!”
I let out a startled cry as I crashed headfirst into the wire fence.
“NOOOOOO!”
I bounced off the fence and staggered backward, struggling to keep my balance. Pain shot through my body.
Jackson hit the fence with a loud clannnnng. He bounced off and tumbled onto his butt.
He kept blinking his eyes. He looked totally stunned.
“Sorry,” I said. I shook off the pain and ran over to him. “Sorry. I lost it for a moment. I thought I was flying. But I wasn’t.”
“Just help me up,” Jackson said with a groan.
I pulled him to his feet. His Windbreaker had a long smear of dirt down one sleeve.
“Okay, so we can’t fly,” Jackson said. “Cross that one off the list.”
“What’s next?” I asked. “Oh. I know. Superstrength. Maybe we have amazing superstrength.” I gazed around the tennis court. “How can we test it?”
Jackson rubbed at the dirt smear on his sleeve. “Let me try to pick you up,” he said. “That’s a good test.”
I gave him a hard shove. “Huh? Why? Because I’m so superheavy? I weigh almost the same as you, Jackson!”
Jackson grinned. “I’ll try to pick you up with one hand. Is that good?”
I made a disgusted face. “Well … okay.”
He stepped toward me. He wrapped his right arm around my waist. And tried to pick me up.
I laughed. “Not happening,” I said.
He tried one more time. No way.
“Let me try with two hands,” he said. He grabbed me by the waist with both hands and struggled and strained. Finally, he lifted me a couple of inches off the ground for a few seconds.
“Forget superstrength,” I said. “Cross that one off the list, too.”
Jackson let go of me and took a step back. He totally froze.
“What’s your problem?” I asked.
He wasn’t looking at me. He was gazing past me. His eyes were wide with surprise.
I spun around — and saw someone standing in the shadows by the fence.
Who was it? How long had he been watching us?
He stepped slowly out of the shadows.
“It’s a kid,” Jackson whispered.
A boy. He moved slowly across the court.
And as he stepped into the pale light from the moon, Jackson and I both opened our mouths in screams of horror.
At first, he looked like a kid. He was short and thin, with pale blond, spiky hair. He wore a dark T-shirt and straight-legged jeans.
He had a kid’s body — but his face was ancient!
I mean, it was a terrifying old man’s face. The skin was tight against his forehead and cheekbones. Thin as paper, and so taut you could see the skull underneath.
He didn’t appear to have lips. His mouth hung open in a skeletal grin of jagged, cracked teeth. His eyes were dark and sunk deep into their sagging sockets.
He slowly raised a bony, pale hand and waved it at us.
Jackson and I stepped back. “Who are you?” I managed to cry. “What are you doing here?”
When he finally spoke, his voice came out hoarse and raspy, like wind blowing through dead leaves. “Are you enjoying your new powers?”
“P-powers?” I stammered. “What powers?”
“We were just goofing around,” Jackson said. “We don’t have any powers.”
“My name is Finney,” the little guy croaked. “You shouldn’t lie to Finney.”
“We — we’re not lying,” Jackson said.
I tried to read the guy’s mind. But I couldn’t pick up anything.
Was he a kid? Was he an old man? Was he some kind of weird monster?
“The Institute sent me,” Finney rasped.
Jackson and I stared at him. The Institute?
He reached into his jeans pocket with a bony hand. “They picked up your vibrations at The Institute. So they sent me to get you.”
I turned my eyes to the gate. It wasn’t that far away. Jackson and I could probably run right past this weird guy. He seemed to move so slowly.
I glanced at Jackson. I read his mind. He was thinking the same thing — make a run for it.
“We don’t know anything about vibrations,” Jackson said. His voice cracked. I knew he was as scared as I was. He started to edge toward the gate.
“We have to go now,” I said. “I think you’ve made a mistake.”
“The Institute doesn’t make mistakes,” Finney whispered. Something crackled deep in his throat. His eyes sank back into their sockets till I could see only black holes in his face.
“Are you enjoying your new powers?” he repeated.
“We really have to go,” I said. My legs were trembling. But I started to move sideways, inching my way to the gate.
Finney pulled something from his jeans pocket. He held it up to the moonlight. A large jewel. It gleamed red in the pale light.
“You have to see the Inspector,” he croaked. He raised the jewel higher and it glowed more brightly, sending rays of red light over the dark t
ennis court.
“You’ll like the Inspector. He’s very nice.”
“N-no,” I said. “Jackson and I have to go home now.”
But I suddenly realized I couldn’t move.
The red light pulsed from the jewel in Finney’s hand. The light wrapped around Jackson and me like wisps of fog. Red clouds folding us inside them.
“You’ll like the Inspector,” Finney repeated. But his voice was even fainter now, and very far away.
I couldn’t move. I couldn’t see. Only the billowing red light, flowing around me … over me … through me …
And then suddenly the light vanished. Everything went dark. I shut my eyes tight. And when I opened them, Jackson and I were no longer on the tennis court.
We were standing in a small room. The room was crammed with lab tables, computer monitors, all kinds of scientific equipment.
We were facing a wide wooden door. And in big black letters, a sign above the door read: THE INSTITUTE.
A wave of cold panic swept over me. I turned to my brother. He stared openmouthed at the sign.
“What are we doing here?” he whispered. “How did we get here?”
“I — I don’t remember,” I replied. “Jackson, I don’t like this. I —”
The door swung open. A smiling man in a long white lab coat stepped into the room.
He had tiny, round black eyes and a long bent nose stuck in a large bald head. He wasn’t much taller than Jackson and me. His head appeared too big for his body, and his bald scalp glowed like a lightbulb under the bright lights.
He had thick gray eyebrows and a small gray brush of a beard on his chin. When he smiled at us, a gold tooth glowed in the front of his mouth.
He carried a clipboard in one hand. The other hand was buried in his lab coat pocket. His smile faded as he saw the frightened expressions on our faces.
“Don’t be afraid,” he said softly. His voice was warm and smooth, like a TV announcer. “You won’t be harmed here. I’m a scientist. A normal scientist — not a MAD scientist!”
He laughed at his own joke, a dry chuckle.
“Why did you bring us here?” Jackson demanded. “What do you want?”
“How can you do this?” I said angrily. “How can you drag people here against their will?”