August lay panting on the floor as he mentally cursed at everyone that had dragged him into this mess.
The room had a polished wooden floor and horribly bright white lights. When Dex had brought August here, he complained that it looked like a school's gym. August had never been to school, so he wasn't sure what that meant. But now, as the hours of his "initiation" went on, he grew to dislike it too.
The high that had come with a momentary mastery over his powers had quickly faded once he realised that maintaining focus in the way that his instructors demanded was nowhere near as easy. He had been asked to lift and form water into certain shapes - which he managed to do, but with extreme effort. The lifting part was fairly easy, he just couldn't make it change shape. They started out with simple things - a sphere, a cube, and then moved on to more complex shapes. August had managed to hold the liquid water in the shape of a sword for just a little under a minute before it collapsed into a puddle. As for changing the state - he found it impossible. No matter what he did, he could not change the water into ice or steam.
August groaned and sat up. He had just gone through the physical exam. He had great endurance but not a lot of strength when it came to lifting things. He had tasks ranging from lifting weights, running laps, long jumps, high jumps, and some parkour exercises. He felt completely worn out.
"August, August, August." Raven said. August didn't know when Raven had come in, but he was comfortably seated on the metal chairs at the side of the room. "Come here for a moment."
The instructor snapped at him. "Raven, we are in the middle of initiation. He needs to complete the physical examinations before we can move on -"
"I think he's proven himself enough." Raven smiled, with just a hint of coldness in his voice. The instructor went quiet and watched as August slowly removed himself from the floor and made his way to the chairs. The instructor walked out of the room soon after, muttering something to himself. It was strange to see the effect that Raven had on people. He was clearly feared and respected, and yet some people still seemed to have a degree of distrust and even contempt towards him.
"August," Raven started speaking. "You are unique. You have a limited amount of control over the elements such as water right now, but you cannot truly manipulate them - hence why you cannot freeze water." Raven paused, gesturing to a ball across from them. "Try lifting that ball."
August concentrated, feeling the rush of adrenaline and energy inside him. He focused on the ball by staring intently at it, and willed it to move. To his surprise, it began shakily floating up and it felt no different to him than lifting the water had.
"Just as I thought. You are a telekinetic, August. You can't truly control any elements." Raven said.
August thought about it for a moment. "Is that bad?"
Raven laughed. "No, not at all. In fact, it's great. The only other known telekinetic of our time was Nyx. I'm sure you have heard about him. Telekinesis is incredibly rare, and for good reason. Most people, even the pure-blooded ones are not fully able to control a single element. You, on the other hand, can lift and control anything you desire. Maybe you cannot change water to ice just yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if you develop that skill later on. You are incredibly powerful just as you are right now. But," He paused, looking closely at August's curious face. "Don't push yourself too much. I take it you've only recently begun to use these powers. It feels good right now, but it will take a toll on you. The more of the power you use, the more energy it consumes. It is very possible that if you try to do something which is out of bounds of the amount of energy you have, that you die. And we can't have that."
August's heart beat a bit quicker hearing that. He wasn't sure what to make of this whole thing. It still felt like he was dreaming whenever he started using his powers. Everything from being told he was such a rarity and being compared to this Nyx he kept hearing about - it was all a lot.
"What sort of power do you have?" He asked Raven.
Raven smiled widely. "Only those of a common man."
August spent the rest of his day wondering how true that was. There was a certain energy to Raven that made him feel different somehow. Whenever he stepped inside the room, he was noticed. Raven felt unusually powerful - it didn't make sense for him to be so powerful without any Ichor in his blood. It was his third day on the island now, and the place he had sat with Dex at the beach had become a regular spot for him. He found that no-one bothered him there.
The next few days went by similarly. He didn't see Dex or Catriona around, or even Raven. He woke up, went to the training room and worked on his skills with his instructor, who was a grumpy old man that August grew to dislike. He went to the cafeteria at meal times, and after his training was over, he sat by the water until it got dark. He found the familiarity of having a schedule enjoyable - it was definitely better than the days where he would have to spontaneously decide and change plans as he went along. He felt secure here, and he hoped he wasn't making a mistake somehow.
Before he knew it, a week had passed by. He felt that his skills hadn't really improved much, but he realised that it had become instinctive to him one day when he was in his room. He had been trying to move something on his table and knocked over a full glass of water. Before it hit the ground, he had stopped it and both the glass and the water gently bobbed up and down a few inches from the ground. He carefully moved the glass back on to the table, and the water into the glass. He had to concentrate so hard in order not to drop either the water or the glass that he felt beads of sweat form on his forehead. He realised that until now, he had never tried to lift more than one thing at a time.
August gulped down the glass of water and sat down on the floor, trying to be comfortable. He looked around his room slowly, taking in everything around him. He began with a pillow, which was light enough that it was fairly easy to lift on its own. Once he was satisfied about the height at which the pillow was hovering in the air, he pushed it to the back of his mind and began focusing on the now-empty glass of water on the table. Slowly but surely, it began shakily rising up from the table. Next, he tried to move the telephone. Gradually, he had his pillow, the glass, three pens, the telephone receiver, a shirt and his soap floating in the air around him.
His body had begun sweating with the effort and he felt his muscles strain as if was attempting to hold a boulder over his head. He was determined to keep going. He couldn't stop here - if he was really as strong as everyone kept telling him then it shouldn't be an issue. Right?
He picked up more and more things around the room until almost all of the small objects in the room were floating around. He felt a wave of nausea hit him just then, and a piercing pain in his head. He felt exhausted, the same as he would have if he had just run twenty laps around the court. His body was heating up, even his eyes felt heavy and began to droop from the sheer amount of concentration it took to lift all those items.
August heard a knock at the door. His eyes felt even heavier now, and he struggled to keep lifting his eyelids. His vision began blurring, both from exhaustion and the sweat that had began dripping from his eyelashes. He tried to say "come in", but all that came out was a strange, slurred noise. He heard a worried voice coming from the other side of the door, but he didn't have any energy left to think about that. August groaned as he felt his energy depleting, and now it felt like he had forgotten how to let go of the objects he was lifting up.
The door opened with a loud crash, and he saw Catriona and Dex both standing there, along with a third person he didn't recognise. He slowly looked over at them, fearing that he would puke the moment he opened his mouth. Catriona was shouting something at him, but he couldn't hear it. His vision was swimming now, and he felt numb.
Catriona kneeled down next to him, grabbed his shoulders and shook him hard. August felt his eyes go wide but he still could not let go of the pull of the power - it demanded that he let it consume all of his energy. All of a sudden, he felt that his power was a separate entity sharing a space inside his mind. And now it felt malicious, like it was trying to destroy him.
August felt a stinging pain in his face and he realised that Catriona had slapped him. She was grabbing his collar now, and had her hand raised again when August's eyes focused on her again. He felt himself begin to lose control of the objects he was holding. Catriona slapped him again, this time on the other side of his face. August gasped, sighing in relief and collapsing to the floor as all of the objects came crashing down with him.
"What the hell were you thinking?" He finally heard Catriona say. He couldn't pay enough attention to process whatever other words of abuse that she was yelling, but he was thankful for it nonetheless.
The new person that he didn't recognise, a girl with dark skin and curious wide-eyes knelt beside him. She placed her hand on his forehead gently. Her skin felt cool to the touch, and he began to feel better almost instantly. He felt as though she was physically removing the tiredness from his body as if she was lifting a veil.
"He was very close to passing out," She said. "if the power had kept the hold over him after he passed out, he would have died."
August suddenly felt guilt and shame hit him. He had been lucky - if they hadn't come when they did, who knows how this would have gone. He remembered Raven telling him not to push himself too much and sighed.
He saw a faint, warm glow around the girl's hands as she placed them on his head again.
"My name is Dare. I'm a healer." She said, carefully. "I've heard a lot about you, August."
August didn't have the energy left to speak, and even if he had, he wouldn't have known what to say. Instead, he just tried to look as grateful as he could and settled into watching his teammates' worried faces looking down at him from where he was laying on the ground. He watched Dare carefully. Her hair was large, dark and formed a cloud around her head. She had a peaceful sort of atmosphere about her which put August at ease. As she performed whatever movements she was doing, August began regaining his energy.
"Thank you." He finally managed to say.
"You're very welcome," Dare said at the same time that Catriona said, "You should be thankful."
They helped him to his feet.
"We were coming to get you to go to the lighthouse." Dex said, seeming a little bit shaken. "Well, we aren't leaving right now, of course."
"Lighthouse?" August asked.
"We have our own small base on another island a few kilometres off from here. We need to head back there to finish some research." Dare explained. "We spend most of our time there, actually. Don't worry - you'll still have your own room."
August considered what he had just been told, and decided not to ask why he hadn't been told about this sooner. He had just begun to feel comfortable in the room at the headquarters. He didn't want to cause a disagreement.
He spent the next couple of days dreading the idea of moving out of his room. His training continued as usual, and he was given a routine to follow after he moved to the Lighthouse as well. His instructor told him that he would have to come back to the headquarters every two months to do check-ups to see if he was maintaining his fitness levels. To both Dex's dismay, assigned him to give August history lessons.
"Why me?" Dex grumbled. "It's not my fault that someone failed to raise him properly."
August tensed up, but didn't say anything. Dex quickly noticed that this seemed to be a sensitive topic for him and didn't comment on it any further.
When the time came to leave, August was both excited and full of dread. He had packed the clothes he found in the dresser, and what meagre belongings he had. And all of his gold, of course. Raven had come to see them off, and raised an eyebrow at the bag full of gold and jewels that August was dragging to the boat.
"Careful you don't sink the ship." Raven said, amused.
"Where did you even get all of that stuff? Don't tell me you stole it." Dex said.
August looked him in the eyes. "I did."
Dex just sighed and moved on. Catriona smirked. "So, how does it feel to finally meet someone more annoying than you?"
"Shut up," Dex scoffed.
Raven smiled at them. "Ah, you two twins, always fighting."
"We really aren't twins." Dex said.
August wondered if he was the only normal person of the group. But then, he thought, this was probably as normal as it would get when you worked with people who were basically a bunch of spies and assassins.
Soon, they boarded the ship and set off - Dex was the captain of the boat again, with Dare by his side. It was the same one that he had been brought to the headquarters in, and the sense of familiarity August felt with the ship comforted him. He braced himself for the six-hour journey and decided to sleep through it.