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The teacher guarding the door that we were facing tucked his book under his arm and walked off.

“That’s not a very good guarding system,” Cameron observed.

“Well, it’s good for us,” I muttered.

“Yeah, well, the teachers are pretty annoyed that they have to stay guarding some decrepit door after school hours,” Andrew laughed softly as he crossed the hallway and opened the door.

The room was almost exactly how I had left it. However, the lights, bright white when I turned them on before, had faded to dull yellow-orange. I squinted at them. “Why did they get dimmer?”

“You control pure electricity. Since they are no longer being powered by you, but the school grid, they’ve lost some of their power.” Andrew explained. He shut the door. “The teachers probably won’t bother to check in here. But if they do, we can always hide behind those couches,” he pointed to a couple of sagging, corduroy covered futons. “I’ll give an advanced warning if that happens.” He smiled crookedly.

I pointed at the lights. “Are you going to tell me how to fix this?”

Charlotte stepped forward. “I will do that,” she said, “My powers – metal working – are closer to yours.”

I nodded, waiting for her to begin helping.

“First, you must connect with the lights.” A strange expression flitted over Charlotte’s face as she fought to explain. “The electricity essentially flows through you, as it does through the wires in the wall. So you must learn to direct it.” She stopped.

I waited patiently for a few seconds. “How?”

Charlote smiled mysteriously. “Just try.”

I glanced at Cameron, who shrugged, though her face betrayed her confusion. “This isn’t how you taught Cameron, is it?” I couldn’t imagine her patiently accepting this explanation.

Andrew shook his head. “We taught Cameron differently.”

I sighed, and craned my neck backwards to stare at the lights. They flickered, slightly. Just as my eyes were beginning to water, I felt a jolt in one of my fingers. I jumped, blinked, and kept staring. My ears began to hum, not unlike the mosquito ringtone, or the sound I heard when someone left the t.v. on in the next room. I saw, suddenly, that electricity was all a connected series of particles that flowed together. I saw the patterns that flowed in and out of the lights, creating the thing that was light. It was calming; the energy flowed in and out of the light fixtures like waves on a beach. In. Out. In. Out. I just wanted it to go out. Slowly, little by little less electricity flowed in through the wires and more and more went out.

At the back of my mind I was aware that the light in the room was getting dimmer and dimmer, but my eyes were fixed on the point where electricity was flowing out, and out, and out.

“There.” Charlotte’s contemplative voice echoed hollowly in the dark room. “Well done.”

“Thanks.” I looked back up at where the lights should be, but the energy was gone. All I could see was the static darkness of the isolated room.

“How do you feel?” Andrew asked, his voice rumbling through the quiet.
I thought about it. “Fine, actually.”

“Really? No tiredness, no buzz, nothing?” I could almost feel Andrew raising his eyebrows.

I nodded in the dark, then realized that no one could see. I wonder if this is what Cameron felt like, I wondered, bemused. “Really. I’m fine.”