<Ruth>

After parting ways from Kevin and Zoe for the time being, I sit alone in the stands. It's distressingly soon afterwards when I hear his voice again.

"Attention people of our state. A warning; our system indicates that a known traitor may have entered our core. We have already sent a detachment to apprehend them. The weapon will be launched, as we should have just enough energy to rid ourselves of the hoodlums plaguing us. When it does, please stay calm and remain in your seats. E pluribus unum."

My insides begin, not squirming so much as trying to leap out of me.

Are we too late? Our plan not enacted in time?

Or did we cause this? I don't know how they were found out, but perhaps their infiltration pushed them to activate it early out of desperation.

Did I just send Zoe and Kevin to their doom?

We need a plan B, and fast. But… there's nothing I can possibly do. I am separated from everyone else on the team, with no powers. Any possible thing I could do would be incredibly foolhardy, with a low chance of success.

People keep telling me that I'm only one person, that I shouldn't blame myself for what goes wrong around me. But what else am I supposed to do here, sitting here like a lame duck while my friends are likely about to be captured?

A memory… Charlotte standing over me, uncharacteristically angry, close to tears, desperate… do something, anything. She would simply run out and try something at random, unable to take the pressure of waiting. Perhaps accomplishing nothing more than simply getting herself captured as well.

My cousin Sam… she also told me 'don't blame myself,' but she was also firmly against giving up and doing nothing. Would she have done the same as Charlotte, simply charges out and did something at random?

No, her message was about resilience… she was willing to simply stick with the same course of action, with enough vigor so as to eventually bring about success.

All in the name of making sure Roberto was not forgotten.

I rocket up to my feet.

I couldn't save him, but there is a window to save Kevin and Zoe.

I don't know exactly how, but…

Half-considered scraps of a theory, casual observations in the back of my mind… I don't have enough data… not enough time to form a cohesive idea…

So perhaps I must gather more evidence.

If I fail, well, I'll be no worse off than I am right now.

Feeling hyper-aware of my surroundings, like I'm living in bullet time, I quickly walk to the nearest entrance.

"I changed my mind," I tell the attendant, a blonde-haired woman in a formal uniform. "I'm entering as a player."

"Um… you are a sponsor," she says confusedly, frowning and looking through the notes on her clipboard as if expecting to find the answers there.

"I am both sponsor and player now," I say.

Her eyes widen and she freezes up, as if this were too much of a contradiction to be resolved within the purview of her simple purpose. I make use of this moment of confusion to simply walk past her and enter.

I scan my surroundings. Rocky dirt trails… occasional scattered grass and trees, but long dead. Yet some grass and trees can grow even in arid climates… an enigma.

"Whoah, who's this? Do we have a spectator in the area?" The man in the cowboy, doing the commentary that I had long since tuned out, has turned to staring down at me with interest, no doubt tipped off by my improper entry.

As it's unlikely he'll leave me alone if I don't say anything, I call back, "Please, don't mind me. I'm only here to…"

"Get her out of there!" he shouts. "We can't have anyone interfering with the game!"

I hiss with annoyance. "No, just ignore me. You can go back to watching men beat each other in peace soon…"

I don't have much time… grass. I find the nearest patch and kneel down to it…

I hear footsteps behind me.

I feel the grass… it is well and truly dead. The blades are crumbling apart at the touch…

"Hey, what's a lady doing in here?" a gruff voice says.

"Didn't you hear Harvey? She's not supposed to be here," a more hushed, raspy one responds. "What do you say we each take one arm, and split the credit?"

"I wouldn't do that if I were you!" I shout, doing my best to pretend to be intimidating.

Grass… if it's here, it must have been alive at some point not too long ago.

I reach for the soil, and start to dig under, feeling the roots. I gasp…

I see it.

"Why not?" the gruff voice says challengingly. "Do you want to take the credit for us? This is how I make a living, you know! Or, let me guess, you want to shut us down!"

"Be quiet," I chide. "I'm thinking."

"Bah, I've had enough of it!" he says.

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I growl. I just need a little more time.

I focus on that feeling in the roots. Somehow, I can see them; not with my eyes, but with my other sense, the one that's been blind since we came to this stadium.

No living plant life here…

Potted plants…

But…

Algae, mold, vines growing over brick, the surrounding woods…

A lush forest…

And if this is…

The footsteps get closer, and I feel someone grab me under the shoulder.

"No!" I shout.

I'm winging it.

I focus on that feeling in the roots and PUSH…

And new grass sprouts up from the ground, green and fresh.

So I can…

I get grabbed by my other shoulder and abruptly lifted to my feet…

I nudge the grass with my feet… yes, I can still feel it!

I make the grass start spreading, growing in a circle around us…

"What… what's going on?" A raspy voice says.

I make the grass grow tall, enough to poke the arms of the men holding me. The surprise is enough for me to wriggle free…

But grass won't get me far… I need a tree.

I bolt it towards the nearest tree at my two o'clock…

"H-hey!" One of the voices says. "What are you…"

I ignore him.

"Whoah nelly!" the commentator says. "Not just a spectator! One with a… er, what was it called again? …A… stand?"

I nearly stumble over a rock- I catch myself, but it jams my leg- I ignore it and simply stumble into the tree. I begin feeling the bark…

"Look at that!" one of the men says, chortling. "A treehugger! You can't make this shit up."

It's dead… but isn't the oldest part of the tree…

I begin peeling back the outer layer of bark…

Then, inside, I see it…

It's like watching a timelapse, a decade passing in a few seconds in front of my eyes, as new leaves sprout… new branches form, thin at first, then gradually widening, as the old growth is shed.

I climb into the center of the tree, perching on the bend of a trunk like the squirrels who skitter through our hometown.

"That tree's made a miraculous recovery; and it's only getting bigger!" the commentator calls out, sounding equal parts perplexed and concerned. "I can't believe my eyes, folks…"

Indeed, I find myself ten, no twenty, feet in the air, and climbing fast…

"RUTH? IS THAT YOU?" a familiar voice calls.

I look down to see Kevin and Ruth, having just emerged from a sliding metal door in the wall, both looking up at me with shock akin to witnessing the second coming of Christ.

They, of course, wouldn't have known this was possible…. I really didn't even know myself, until about a minute ago.

But as the tree grows, leaves grow, as do white flowers- I recognize that I am sitting in a Eucalyptus, a tree from Australia, only mine is growing far taller than a wild specimen would ever grow. With flowers comes pollen, and I feel a euphoric thrill when I realize that I can see again.

And that it- the final bit of evidence needed for my theory. So seemingly preposterous I never bothered to voice it aloud, even to myself.

I see through plant life… and, apparently, I have some power and control over it as well. I never would've guessed, never attempting to use my powers offensively before, content to only use them to see.

The whole arena comes into view without the need for my eyes… all the people watching, mindless constructs and flashes of memory alike… I can even clearly make out Zoe and Kevin on the floor, standing near the trunk of the tree which has grown to the size of a small building, roots as broad as entire cars. I feel their wonderment, their questioning, and a terror of something entirely unrelated.

Which reminds me…

I ride the tree's growth off at an angle, towards the floating pod…

"Hey now! Don't come no closer!" The commentator calls out.

A look upon him- a larger-statured man in a fancy white cowboy hat and brown suit. He's looking straight at me. Afraid. Yet clinging to his microphone all the same.

"You're not launching the weapon," I say sharply.

He bares his teeth at me. "Too late for that, missy. It's been activated remotely."

"Then turn it off."

His grimace falters a bit, and he simply awkwardly looks side to side, as if awaiting someone's orders.

"Don't be a fool," the governor's voice says.

From behind the announcer spins that floating, hovering cube. It's hardly larger than a Rubix Cube, but with no design to speak of- just gray metal.

"Turn. It. Off," I say to the cube.

"You and your allies are charged with terror and conspiracy against the state," he says coldly. "And given the urgency, we will forgo a trial… for it is obvious who you are when you intimidate me to my face!"

I reach out with my hand, and a branch shoots off from the tree to follow it, straight towards the cube that contains Schneider…

It zips upward, out of the way before my wooden appendage can grow to snag it… I redirect it upwards, like a sprout adjusting to face sunlight…

The commentator grabs the branch and snaps it off.

And the cube quickly floats upwards and away.

"Why protect him?" I ask.

"I… I have a great relationship with the governor!" the man says, regaining his courage.

'Harvey,' they called him.

"Harvey Woods," I say, sliding the pieces together in my mind.

"What's my name got to do with it?" he asks.

"You have a 'great relationship' because he lets your company get away with practices that pollute and destabilize the environment people rely upon," I spit at him.

"Hey now! We follow all regulations!" he says defensively. "As much of a headache as it is to navigate them all…"

"Only because the Texas Railroad Commission doesn't enforce them properly," I say.

"You can't…"

Our back and forth is interrupted when, suddenly, the arena around us begins to shake violently.

<Anja>

Back into hell I go. I find myself at first in a completely deserted area along the edge. Ashley and Ted are long gone. Finding the others is gonna be hell given the size of this place.

It happens while I'm trying to wade through the crowd, held up by a long line for a beer stand. I've never lived in a place that gets earthquakes, so I initially had no idea what to do when the ground I stood on began rumbling. I guess I'm supposed to duck and cover? But there's nowhere to take cover. And as the people around me scream and begin running in random directions, I'm likely to be caught in a stampede if I don't get my ass out of here. I use a light gust of wind to propel me over the heads of the people around me and glide to the inner wall.

And normally I'd be alarmed to hear voices that aren't mine in my head, but when I hear Ruth say, Anja? Can you hear me? I feel a sweet wave of relief.

Hey Ruth. You got your powers back! I think back to her.

I don't know what you were off doing by yourself, but we need to re-group, now, Ruth urges. Schneider's 'weapon' has been officially activated. We were too late by a hair.

Well, shit, I say. What is this weapon? Clearly it's humongous, the floor's shaking where I'm at.

We haven't exactly figured that out yet, Ruth admits. Anyway, Ashley, Charlotte, Nova, and Ted are all together, so we should regroup there. Forwarding you the coordinates.

If you were here, I'd kiss you, I tease. I'll make my way there.

<Ashley>

"What the FUCK is going on?" Nova asks. As if any of us know.

The crowd scatters like a flock of sheep with no shepherd, screaming and pushing, no regard for anything but themselves. The food court must not contain any exits, because they thankfully aren't bothering with us.

"Er… something one of the others did?" Charlotte offers nervously.

"I don't think so," I say. "Nobody on our team has the power to… cause earthquakes."

"Where IS our team?" Nova asks, his voice going a bit squeaky. "Where's Anja???"

"Pull yourself together, lad!" Ted urges.

Privately, I agree with Nova. I'd feel much better knowing where Zoe and everything else are… have we been divided and conquered yet again?

Then, Nova flinches as a blaring, loud voice, a gravely cowboy-like one a bit like Ted's, says over an intercom system, "Attention everyone! Please make your way inside the stadium within the next five minutes! The governor urges everyone to move in an orderly and calm fashion. This is all in the name of your protection!"

"That's not good," I say simply.

"What'll happen if we don't go…?" Charlotte asks nervously.

"OH SHIT!" Nova says suddenly. "IT'S… FULL METAL SCHNEIDER! JANE WAS RIGHT!"

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