Here With You

I would have given everything to stay away from walking into that school on Monday morning. The further away I could stay from the evil girl, the better. But of course that wasn’t happening.

At least the first part of school was normal. But lunch was when things got weird. There was a crowd around the evil girl and they honestly looked like mindless zombies. They were all staring at her and hanging on to her every word. Like it was some kind of honor that she was talking to them. Then she looked at our table.

“Does anyone else feel that?” I asked looking at my friends who all nodded. I was feeling like this weird tugging feeling, like my brain and thoughts were being changed but I was fighting it. “It is like a tugging of thoughts?” Once again they all nodded yes and looked at Medea.

Unlike her little following we didn’t look like mindless zombies, we all just looked pissed. “Stop whatever you are doing. Now.” I mouthed out. The tugging got stronger.

“Never.” She mouthed out back to me. She finally stopped doing whatever she had been doing and we all felt normal again.

“What the hell was that? I’m the newest so someone please explain in my language.” I rested my elbows on the table and put my head in my hands. That couldn’t have been a good sign.

“No idea.” This was not what I wanted to hear, much less from everyone at the table.

“Well it looks like I’m going to the library to find out after school then.” I lifted my head and looked at Matt. “Will you go with me?”

“Yeah of course.” I heard the guys coughing to conceal their laughing. Matt then gave them that shut up look and they went silent. I didn’t say much for the rest of lunch since I was lost in my own thoughts.

Later that afternoon when I walked out of art class Matt was standing there waiting for me. “How’d you get here so fast?” I asked him as we started walking.

“Class got out early. So I came to wait for you.”

“Thanks.”

“Uh, no problem.” When we got to the library we were the only ones there. We went directly to the books about vampire abilities. We had a stack of about 10 books, then we found a table that was well hidden. We opened the first one and looked through the index.

“What about this one?” I pointed to one and we opened it to the page. Nothing fit perfectly though. Nine books later and we had a list of possible abilities. But none of them seemed to fit a hundred percent. “Last one.”

Matt opened it and looked down the index for something we didn’t know anything about. “Mind control?” He looked over at me. I shrugged, it was after all worth a shot. We looked at the page and began reading.

Vampires with mind control are not very common. However, although they are not common the ability is not as rare as other abilities such as any elemental abilities. Mind control does however come with a large amount of responsibilities. A vampire who possesses the ability to perform mind control has two main responsibilities, one is to never control someone to do anything bad, and the second is to refrain from using mind control as much as possible even for good. A vampire who is under mind control will not know that they are, however if the vampire can block the mind control they will feel as if their thoughts, hopes, dreams, and even emotions are being tugged or trying to be changed.

I looked at Matt who met my stare with almost the same one. “We are screwed.” I let my head fall onto the table as the reality sunk in. That is how she’d get everyone on her side, that is how whatever she was planning would work. And it would be beginning and ending cause of our demise.

“Maybe not. There has to be a way to beat her. You are after all the second most powerful vampire there has ever been.”

“I cannot compete with mind control!”

“Have you tried?” I moved my head so I was glaring at him.

“No.”

“Then how do you know that you can’t?”

“Now is not the time to be a smartass Matt.”

“I’m just saying. Will you sit up please?”

“What?” I asked sitting up and looking at him. I wanted to crawl into a hole and just live there at the moment.

He didn’t answer, instead he kissed me. “Now listen to me, there has to be a way to stop her, and if anyone can do it, you can. Besides you’ve got all of us on your side. We’ll help you find away. Just don’t give up.”

“Well I don’t really have a choice do I?”

“I guess not. Not if you want to stop whatever she is going to do.”

“Why can’t I just be normal?!”

“Define normal.”

“Like everyone else. With no elemental abilities.”

“But then you wouldn’t be you. Saph the one thing you can always count on is no matter what, I’m always going to love you.”

“Even if I screw this up?”

“Even if you screw this up. But I know you won’t.”

“I can’t even pretend to be human for a few days Matt! How the hell am I supposed to find a way to beat mind control?”

“You are asking the wrong person.”

“We are all screwed.”

“No we aren’t. Come on, we might as well get out of here.”

“You have a point.” When we got back to the girls’ dorm house the living room was pretty full. Lilly, Mary, Dani, Lola, Rave, and Victoria were all seated in various spots watching TV.

“Did you find anything out?” Lilly asked looking directly at Matt and I. Everyone’s attention quickly followed.

“Yeah we are screwed. And apparently none of us can be put under mind control.” I sighed sitting down on the arm of the last free chair, pulling Matt into the chair so that I could have him next to me.

“Mind control?” Mary repeated.

“Yeah, mind control? Full blown mind control?” Dani chipped in.

“Can’t you use the elements to stop her from being able to use it?” Lola asked.

“Yeah there has to be some way right?” Victoria sounded a bit shocked like everyone else.
“Sapphire you can stop her right?” Rave asked looking at me with an intense stare.

“Yes it’s full blown mind control from what we could find out, and no I don’t think I can use the elements to stop it.” I felt a surge of sadness and helplessness flow through me at the words.

“Well we can’t just do nothing.” Dani stood up.

“I agree we can’t!” Lilly jumped up next to her. Everyone else was riveted in place still in shock. I knew that after vocalizing what I already knew that I was too shocked to move.

“I think that if Saph wasn’t too shocked to speak at the moment that she’d say we need to find out more before we do anything.” Matt’s arm wrapped around my shoulder. At least he knew that I was too shocked to speak at the moment.

“Uh yeah. What Matt said. I’m uh going to go up to my room.” I shook my thoughts clear and stood up before going upstairs. I could now hear everyone talking but I couldn’t bring myself to stay and listen.

Once in my bathroom I turned on the sink and cupped my hands before splashing the water onto my face. When I turned the water off I looked at my reflection in the mirror. It wasn’t just a nightmare anymore, it was real. All of it was real.

What if I didn’t just have these abilities to be special? What if there was a reason that I had them? What if I was supposed to take her down? And if it was all true and I was supposed to, how was I supposed to? And why me? “God why me? I can’t do this.” I mumbled aloud as I kept looking at the girl staring back at me.

She wasn’t special on the outside, she was just a teenager. Just an average 17 year old girl. At least she appeared to be on the outside. On the inside her life had been torn apart that fateful day that she’d been beaten and sent to the hospital. And that girl, whose life seemed so unrealistic, was me.

I wasn’t just another 17 year old, I couldn’t be. I’d been forever changed. I couldn’t turn back, no matter how much I wish that I could. There are still days where I feel like it’s all a dream and I’m going to wake up in Miami with Mike and Cludia and nothing has really happened. But for whatever reason, that I probably won’t ever understand, I had to do this. I didn’t have a choice.

Something in my stomach was telling me this wasn’t an accent or anything like that, it was my destiny or fate. There was another feeling that was telling me something else. It wasn’t just my future in jeopardy because of the bitch, my the future for all my friends was in jeopardy too.

With one more long look in the mirror I straightened myself up and dried my face. With a sigh I backed away and walked out of the bathroom. Time to face destiny, whether I want to or not.