Cari looked at her left hand where smoke was rising from her fist. The wall of the bank in front of her laid in pieces, and the alarm was sounding at a level just under supersonic jetfighter. She slowly opened her hand and examined it. Nothing looked different at all. It looked exactly the same as it did just thirty seconds ago, but nothing was the same. She looked up just in time to see a man poke his heavily balding head out to see what had happened. “Sir, please help me,” she pleaded. All that seemed to do is frighten him back behind the wall.
Cari looked back and forth, trying to figure out what to do. She felt drained, almost like normal. It was hard to believe that pill had changed her that much. Matt had told her to point her hand at the wall and think about knocking it down. Just keep calm and she would be done. That’s all she needed to do to get her daughter back. That’s all she could think of.
The man came back to the hole, but this time with a gun in his hand. Cari threw her left hand behind her back. “Don’t shoot,” she screeched. “I’m not armed.”
“Both hands in the air!” screamed the man. “Do it now!”
“I’m not armed,” Cari cried. She was in a panic, not wanting to move. The panic fed the power. It began to intensify.
“Do it now!” screamed the man. He took aim at her. “Do it!”
Cari began to cry. She slowly lifted her right hand, and then her left. The power was beginning to hurt as she tried to keep it in check. “Help me,” she said. “Please.”
The man climbed over the rubble and out of the hole. He kept his gun trained on Cari the whole time. “Down on your knees!” he commanded.
Cari heard the sound of sirens coming closer. She felt like she was burning up. Time seemed to stretch almost to a breaking point. All she wanted was to have one more chance to hold her daughter. The power fed on her anxiety and fear, growing stronger and stronger, screaming to be let free. Her world shrunk to a haze of pain and overwhelming sadness.
The man stopped and yelled at her again, but she didn’t understand a word he said. She looked at him and mouthed goodbye to him, her daughter, the world.
The explosion set off alarms three miles away. Matt smiled waved his team into action.
Never Short On Words 