[Fiction] Growing Pains

[Seven]

9:00 am

Seven wandered the ruins of the old church in a daze as those lying under the rubble cried out in pain, begging for someone to help them. He sat heavily on the dais as masonry fell to the floor behind him. “What have I done?” he whispered softly to himself in fear and horror. Tears slipped down his cheeks as he covered his face with his hands.

“Murderer!” A woman shrieked in anger and pain. “Devil-Pig! Look what you’ve done! Monster!” She picked up some of the debris from the floor and hurled it at the remorseful Nova. The debris stopped suddenly about a foot in front of Seven and just fell to the floor. Seven looked up at the woman, his cheeks stained with tears. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” he said with a shaky voice. “I, I have to go...”

And in the blink of an eye, before anyone could think, before anyone could move, he was gone.

10:30 am

“Tangy Maguire here with N! News Now and we’re standing just outside a small church in Queens, New York, where we have received reports of a Nova going berserk about 1 ½ hours ago during a Church of Michael Archangel function.”

“Witnesses say that the unidentified Nova entered the church and after a heated exchange with Reverend Andrew Cartwright, opened fire with some sort of energy blast, hospitalizing 10 people. While the assailant remains unidentified, descriptions of him are identical to those given at last week’s incident at the Central Park zoo and the riot at Club Quantum 2 weeks ago.”

“Authorities say they are doing everything in their power to identify and apprehend the alleged assailant and have called on Project Utopia’s investigation division to help them track this rouge Nova down….”

Dr. Molina hit the remote and the TV went dark. The eight people in the room remained silent as the doctor stared out the window before continuing. “This is exactly what we feared,” she said calmly as she turned to the assembled doctors and scientists in the room. “We must recover patient #7 before he does any more damage out there. I’m open to suggestions on how to accomplish this.”

A small weasely-looking man raised his hand and cleared his throat. “Excuse me Doctor, but isn’t this the responsibility of Project Utopia? I mean, we are doing the research for them aren’t we?”

“True,” Dr. Molina said thoughtfully. “Perhaps we should involve them. More than likely Team Tomorrow will be involved anyways, but still, I’d rather not answer any of their difficult questions just yet.”

“How about Dancer and the others,” a second man, tall, dark and wearing an impeccably pressed suit said in an even tone. “Jorgenson says their ready for field-work and this just might be an excellent field test for the new training program.”

“That could be risky,” Dr. Molina said. “This is going to take precision work, we can’t have any more media coverage than what patient #7 has already caused.”

“I assure that they can handle this with the utmost discretion Dr. It is what they have been trained for.”

Dr. Molina looked over her glasses at the tall doctor. “I pray you're right Dr. Alvers. Lets just hope they can handle him”