The Ability (Ability, The) (17 page)

Lexi giggled. “No, did you?”

The professor walked over to Rex and put his hand on his shoulder.

“Now, now, let’s be kind, children. Perhaps telekinesis isn’t for you, Rex. I’m sure there are other areas that you excel at,” said the professor.

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” said Lexi. She gave Rex a smug smile.

Rex glared at her, then turned suddenly and stormed out of the room.

“Oh, dear, he seems rather upset, poor chap. Perhaps
you’d best go console him. Your lessons are finished for the day.”

The children all thanked the professor and left quickly, back into the garden, where they ran up the hill and collapsed around the foot of the tree.

“Do you think it’s true?” asked Chris.

“What?” asked Lexi.

“This Ability thing. I mean, it was a good computer program, but I can’t believe that we can really do what Sir Bentley said. Do you think we really do have the Ability?”

“Of course it’s true!” exclaimed Daisy. “They wouldn’t lie to us.”

Philip shrugged. “Chris has a point; we don’t know anything about this place.”

“Well, there’s only one way to find out,” said Lexi, standing up.

“What are you going to do?” asked Daisy, looking concerned.

Lexi reached up and pulled a leaf from the branch above her head. She placed it on the ground and stood back up over it, arms crossed, and stared down at the ground.

For a few seconds nothing happened, and then the leaf began to shake and rise slowly, until it was standing on its stem.

The children all watched intently as the leaf rose slowly up in the air and hovered in front of Lexi’s face. Lexi didn’t blink, her focus completely on the leaf, which began to rise up farther and then started spinning in circles in the air.

“It works!” cried Lexi, as the leaf flew down and began
to circle Daisy’s head, then suddenly fell to the ground before rising up again.

“I’ve got it now,” said Philip, excited. “Look, I’m going to put it in the swimming pool.” No sooner had he said the words than the leaf began to spin and then dive down to the back of the Dome, where it hovered for a moment over the still waters of the swimming pool before landing gently in the center.

The children all watched the leaf floating in the blue waters before Sebastian broke the silence.

“Incredible!” he said.

“What’s happening?” cried Daisy.

The children all turned to see that Daisy was cross-legged and hovering a foot above the ground.

“It works on people, too!” said Lexi, laughing, watching as she lifted Daisy up higher, so that she was hovering above them, her legs kicking from under the skirt of her dress.

“Help!”
screamed Daisy.

Lexi laughed as Daisy continued to rise up.

“Put me down!”

And then, as if from nowhere, Ron and John appeared, running toward them up the hill. Ron grabbed Lexi and lifted her, pinning her arms to the side, and Daisy dropped down, hitting the grass with a thud.

Ron, who was still holding Lexi by her arms, looked up at John, who was helping Daisy to her feet. Chris and the others sat completely still in shock.

“What now, John?” asked Ron, breathing heavily and looking confused.

“I haven’t got a clue, Ron,” said John.

“Let the girl go, Ron,” said a voice. Chris turned and saw Sir Bentley striding purposefully up the hill.

Ron looked up at John, as if he wasn’t sure what to do, and John gave him a nod. Ron stood up slowly, leaving Lexi to sit up, unhurt but in shock.

“This girl was . . . well . . . I don’t know what she was doing, to be honest, but it didn’t look good,” explained Ron, brushing the grass off his trousers while never taking his eyes off Lexi.

Sir Bentley nodded. “I understand. I should have briefed you sooner. Meet me in my office in ten minutes and I’ll explain. I need to talk to the children first.”

“Yes, sir,” said Ron and John in unison.

Sir Bentley watched Ron and John walk out of the Dome. Only when the door closed behind them did Sir Bentley turn to face the group. Chris saw the anger in Sir Bentley’s face and suddenly felt very nervous.

“You must never, never, use the Ability on one another. Or on any person, for that matter, unless you have a teacher with you. Do you have any idea how powerful the Ability is?”

The children all looked sheepish and stayed silent.

“What you are learning to do could kill someone if you’re not careful—that’s no exaggeration. We have to be able to trust you to follow the rules. If you can’t do that, then Myers Holt is not the place for you. Do you understand?”

Sir Bentley looked about at the children and, seeing the looks of remorse on their faces, he softened.

“I suppose you weren’t to know. Just . . . don’t do it again. I don’t want to see any of you come to harm. Understood?”

They all nodded.

“Good. Now,” he continued, looking around him, “where’s Rex?”

“We don’t know,” said Chris. “He left the class before we did.”

“Yes, Professor Ingleby explained what happened. He can’t have gone far,” said Sir Bentley.

Sure enough, they all followed Sir Bentley back into the student quarters and into the Map Room, where they found Rex standing at the pool table, arms folded, staring at the balls on the table, eyes scrunched up in determination.

Lexi laughed and walked over to the opposite end of the table as the other children and Sir Bentley walked over to the sofas. She looked down at the felt, and after only a few seconds the balls all exploded in movement, bouncing off the sides of the table and into one another. Lexi turned her head toward one ball and then the next, sinking each one with only a quick glance. Within seconds all the balls were potted, and she looked up at Rex, a sneer on her face.

“Maybe you should stick to bubbles,” she said.

Rex, bright red in the face, looked up at Lexi, tried to think of something clever to say, then stormed off toward the door. Sir Bentley stepped back and put a hand on his shoulder to stop him.

“Rex, you have skills too; otherwise you wouldn’t be here, I promise you. Give it time—you will find out what they are.”

Rex shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t even care.”

“Yes, you do,” said Sir Bentley, “and that’s good. Determination is the key to success. You mustn’t give up at the first hurdle.”

Rex looked up at Sir Bentley, and the children could all see that his eyes were red.

“Come now, join us,” said Sir Bentley gently. “I know this has been a hard day, but it will get easier. Maybe we could all start again as friends.” Sir Bentley looked over at Lexi with a nod of his head toward Rex.

Lexi sighed. “Fine. Just stop being such a baby, Rex, and sit down.”

Rex considered the idea and then, after a pause, straightened himself up and walked over to the armchair by the fireplace.

“Wonderful, that’s everything back to normal, then,” said Sir Bentley. “And now I must ask you all if you would like to stay.”

Chris, Sebastian, Lexi, and Philip all nodded enthusiastically.

“Daisy?”

Daisy pursed her lips together in thought, then smiled. “I’d like to stay.”

“And Rex?”

Rex shrugged his shoulders. “Yeah, fine, I’ll stay. Even stupid bubbles are better than an hour of history at my school.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” said Sir Bentley. “I have great faith in each and every one of you to make this the most successful team at Myers Holt yet. Now, I must go and have a
chat with Ron and John, who probably have quite a lot of questions for me. Your dinner will be served in an hour, and then I suggest you all have an early night—you have a full day of lessons tomorrow.” He turned to walk out, then stopped and turned back.

“One more thing. I want to stress to you again how powerful the Ability is. I know that you’ll all be keen to try out the new skills you’ll be learning here at Myers Holt, and we encourage you to do so . . . within reason. It might also interest you to know that the metal lead blocks the Ability. The entire facility is lined in it—it’s there to protect you and to make sure that you only practice the Ability within the confines of the school. As for your teachers, well, it’s simply not practical for us to wear lead—the whole head would have to be covered, including the eyes. Instead, all the teachers have been trained to block you from entering their minds. It might be worth remembering that, if you are considering testing out your Ability on any of our members of staff, though I’m sure I can trust you all not to attempt such a thing. Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir,” they replied.

“Good. Well . . . that’ll be all. Good night—I’ll see you all tomorrow.”

•  •  •

Dinner was served by Maura in the dining room, the classical music barely audible behind the sound of the children discussing the day’s events enthusiastically.

“He was old, a bit like my old headmaster, and he talked in a really slow, low voice,” said Lexi, describing her teacher from the training program.

“What was his name?” asked Daisy.

“Prometheus!” said Lexi, laughing. “I had to ask him, like, ten times, and he kept saying it really slowly—Prooo . . . meee . . . theee . . . us,” she said, in a low, booming voice, imitating him.

“Mine was called Baltasar,” said Sebastian. “He just wear a white shirt and jeans, and he speak in Spanish, too.”

Chris told them all about Cassandra.

“Ahh, she sounds lovely,” Daisy said. “Mine was a bit like that too—her name was Astra.”

“Bet she wore pink,” said Rex.

Daisy nodded excitedly, not noticing the sarcasm in Rex’s voice. “Yes, she did! A beautiful, long pale-pink dress, and it glittered in the sun.”

“That sounds just lovely,” said Rex, eyes rolling.

“It really was,” said Daisy dreamily.

“What about yours, Philip?” asked Chris.

“He had a long white beard and was wearing white robes. His name was Zeno.”

“And yours was in the military?” Chris asked Rex.

“Yeah. He was nasty, too. Kept shouting all the time—don’t know why I got one like that. I’d prefer a teacher in a dress, like Einstein’s.”

“Not a dress, a
robe
,” replied Philip, annoyed.

“Dress, robe, whatever—still better than being shouted at for an hour,” said Rex, putting down his knife and fork. “I’m going to have a shower.”

Rex left the room, and the rest of the children followed him out soon after and said good night.

Back in their room, Chris gave an amazed Philip a tour of their moonlit bedroom.

“What’s in the cabins under the beds?” asked Philip.

“I don’t know; I didn’t really look before,” answered Chris, opening the door of his cabin. He stepped inside and saw a small desk with a lamp on it, which Chris switched on. Chris sat in the comfortable swivel chair and looked up at the books that lined the shelf to his side, most of which were A-level textbooks. He opened up the drawer of the desk and found it full of new stationery and exercise books.

“We have PE first thing tomorrow . . . swimming,” called Philip from the inside of his own cabin.

“Where did you see that?” asked Chris.

“Look inside the Myers Holt folder, on the shelf.”

Chris looked up and saw the plain spine of a black folder on the far end of the shelf. He pulled it out and opened it up on the desk. It was empty except for a set of new dividers and a laminated timetable at the front. Sure enough, Chris saw that they had PE first lesson on a Tuesday, followed by Mind Access with Ms. Lamb at ten thirty and think-tank training after lunch, and they ended with Academia with Miss Sonata.

Chris closed the folder and stepped back into the bedroom. He peered into Philip’s cabin and saw Philip scanning the pages of one of the books from the shelf.

“I’m going to have a shower; do you want to go first?” asked Chris.

“No, you go ahead. I want to finish some extra advanced physics that I’m working on,” said Philip without looking up.

“Okay,” said Chris. He turned to walk away, when a knock at the door interrupted them.

“Come in,” said Chris, and the door opened.

“It’s your mother on the phone, love,” said Maura. “Do you want to talk to her?”

“My mum?”

“Yes, she asked if she could speak to you, but you don’t have to, pet, if you . . . don’t feel ready.”

Chris reddened, very aware that Philip was listening.

“No, it’s fine. Where’s the phone?”

Chris followed Maura down the hall, past the other bedrooms and into a small room equipped with only an armchair and a phone on a small table. He waited until Maura closed the door behind her, then picked up the handset.

“Christopher?”

“Hi, Mum. Is everything all right?” Chris asked, still worried about her despite everything that had happened.

“I’m doing okay. Chris . . . I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have told you to leave.”

It was the first time that his mother had ever apologized after an argument, and any anger that Chris might have been feeling disappeared completely in that instant.

“It’s all right, Mum.”

“No, it’s not. Your teacher came round and made me realize that I wasn’t fair on you. She offered to get me some help, and I said yes.”

“What kind of help?”

“They made me an appointment to see a doctor.”

“You’re leaving the house?” asked Chris, amazed.

“Yes. Tomorrow,” she said, and Chris could hear the nerves in her voice.

“You don’t have to, Mum, if you don’t feel well enough.”

“I do have to. I can’t go on like this.”

“Do you want me to come home?” asked Chris.

“No, darling, I need to do this myself. Are you having a nice time?” she said, suddenly changing the subject.

“Yeah,” said Chris, “it’s good. Did you eat?”

“Yes, the supermarket delivered some food today. I don’t want you to worry about me; just enjoy your new school.”

“Okay, Mum.”

“Good. I’m going to bed now; it’s been a long day. And Christopher . . .”

“Yes?”

There was a pause.

“I love you.”

Chris didn’t speak for a minute. He hadn’t heard those words for years.

“Chris? Are you there?”