Crack. Hiss.
Steph took a tiny sip of soda and smiled, leaning back in the chair across from Enchantra’s neat, nearly empty desk. The classroom was otherwise vacant, all of the other students having poured out the moment the bell rang. But this was Ms. Nelson’s time with her star student, the younger sister of her arch nemesis, Gizmo Man.
Enchantra rolled her eyes. “Where did you get that?” she asked. “I know your parents don’t send you to school with junk food.”
Steph shrugged in the traditional thirteen-year-old fashion. “Aiden gave it to me.”
Enchantra peered suspiciously at Steph, trying to extend the tendrils of her telepathic awareness into the folds of the young student’s mind, but just like her brother there was a barrier. She could only hear the loudest, most careless thoughts. And like her brother, Steph was careful and guarded about what she let Enchantra sense. So she sighed and decided on a more conversational approach. “I’ve noticed a lot of students have been exceptionally nice to you lately.” She said it with more than a hint of accusation.
“Really?” Steph asked casually. “I didn’t notice.”
Ms. Nelson sank into her chair, defeated. There was something about this girl, something unique, but she couldn’t place it. Somehow her uniqueness felt like the key to unraveling her rival’s defenses, or perhaps it was a lead to understanding how he was always a step ahead of her.
“Alright,” Enchantra said, acknowledging the dead end. “Let’s work on your probing. Last time you made good progress at the surface level, but you need to go deeper. I think fear is holding you back, so let’s…”
“It’s not fear,” Steph said defiantly. “I just don’t need to go as deep as you want me to.”
Enchantra stared at her, listening for any stray thoughts that might emanate from the girl’s enigmatic mind. Was her unique ability the same as her brother’s, whatever it was? It was almost like he could see into the future, like he knew all of her actions before she did.
“He can’t see the future,” Steph said dismissively in response to her thoughts.
Enchantra suppressed a tiny gasp. She hadn’t even detected Steph listening in. “How do you know?” she asked.
“Because I’ve surprised him,” she said. “If he could see the future it would be impossible to surprise him. And I’m not talking about him faking being surprised. I’ve scared the living daylights out of him coming around corners when he least expected me. No, he definitely can’t see the future.”
In a way, that relieved Ms. Nelson, especially given the note he’d written her. She exhaled and allowed her mind to wander to the folded papers in her desk, the homework packet where Gizmo Man had written…
Steph began cackling and howling, setting the soda on the desk so she could double over, nearly rolling out of the chair. She wiped tears, gasped for air, and continued cracking up for a good long minute.
Enchantra groaned. “OK, OK,” she said, not bothering to contain her annoyance.
“So that’s what the note said?” Steph cried between breathless laughter. She pushed the chair back and fell onto her hands and knees before rolling around on the classroom’s hard tiled floor.
“Very funny,” Ms. Nelson sighed. She put her elbows on the desk and dropped her face into her hands. This was, perhaps, the most humiliating thing that could have happened in today’s session, and the moment wasn’t lost on either of them.
After a while Steph made her way back into the seat with the theatrics of a mountain climber heaving herself onto the summit of the highest peak in the world after a grueling, death-defying ascent. “Oh that’s awesome,” Steph giggled. “Can you imagine? You, and him? On a…”
“Enough,” Enchantra barked, desperately wanting a change of subject. “Don’t forget that you are my apprentice. We are training your psychic abilities for the express purpose of defeating your brother and making my vision for this city a reality. Let’s not get distracted.” She worked to maintain an icy, stony face. Internally she took steady, deep breaths to regain control behind the facade.
It worked.
Steph froze and eyed Enchantra impassively. After a moment of silence she shifted her weight in the chair and leaned forward. “So why do you think he can see the future?” A perceptive question for someone so young.
Enchantra leaned back in her chair and rolled her eyes. “He is always a step ahead of me. I unveil a bomb and he’s already defused it. I bring a loaded shotgun and somehow he’s switched it for one without any ammunition. I vent poisonous gasses into the parliament building, he’s already installed neutralizers in the ductwork.” She took a heavy breath and let it out quickly. “I know he’s good with gadgets and technology, but this is driving me crazy. If he can’t see the future, how is he perfectly anticipating my every move?”
The two sat quietly, staring through each other.
“Time travel?” Steph suggested.
“Ha!” Enchantra’s laugh echoed off the hard surfaces of the classroom. “Impossible,” she said. “I’ve been studying the complete history of supernatural powers my entire life, everything from the first humans to modern times. There was one man about a thousand years ago who became powerful enough to attempt manipulating time, and the outcome was…” Enchantra got goosebumps at the thought. “Let’s just say it wasn’t pretty and it took weeks for his followers to clean up the mess.” She shook her head. “No, we’d know if he could manipulate time. He’d be the single most powerful entity in the universe if that were the case.”
Steph pursed her lips to the side and cocked her head. “I mean, he is undefeated. You’ve never even scratched him.”
Enchantra paused and let herself consider the possibility, then she shook her head. “No,” she said with finality. “I’d know it if I was dealing with someone that powerful.”
“You can’t read his mind.”
“I can,” Enchantra blurted out, flustered. “Just…” She consciously relaxed her shoulders. “I can’t get deep enough to really know what’s going on in there, you know? Like how you refuse to go deeper, because you’re afraid.” She glared at the girl. If she’d try, perhaps she could read her brother’s thoughts.
Steph grabbed the soda and took a long pull. As she set it down she hissed through her teeth and smiled. “I doubt I can do any better against him than you,” she said. Then she let out a long, dramatic belch that shook the fabric of Ms. Nelson’s loose-fitting blouse.
They sat quietly for a moment, neither thinking anything loud enough to be heard. Eventually Steph got to her feet and grabbed her backpack off the floor. She looked down at Ms. Nelson’s desk, her eyes lingering on the clean, empty surface as though she were looking for something. Then she grabbed the soda can and turned to leave.
“I’m going to walk to my brother’s place,” she said. “You want to stop by later and give me a ride to my parents’ house?”
A brief thought flashed by in Enchantra’s mind, like a car driving by at high speed and evaporating before she could tell what color it was. It gave her the odd feeling that she had already had this conversation with Steph. Perhaps she had.
“I think I was already planning on it,” she said. It made sense. Steph’s house was on the way to Enchantra’s apartment. She wasn’t sure why they hadn’t done it this way before. Or maybe they had?
Steph smiled and something about her eyes made Ms. Nelson squirm softly in her chair. “Cool,” Steph said. “See you later this evening.” She paused and glanced at her teacher again. “And maybe we’ll get milkshakes on the way home?” She grinned.
Enchantra smiled. “You read my mind.”
Steph raised her eyebrows and smiled big with her mouth wide open while pointing at her teacher and winking.
Ms. Nelson laughed. “Get out of here,” she moaned.
As the girl walked out of the classroom into the hall, Enchantra looked down at her outfit, then fought off a ridiculous feeling of panic. It didn’t matter what she was wearing. Besides, last time she’d worn this tight skirt she’d caught Gizmo Man staring at her. She smiled. Maybe that was the secret to defeating him. Seduction.
Mermaid Pirate Dispatch 
Leave a comment