Invincible (18 page)

rapidly that I couldn’t even
form a fully developed thought.

“But that would mean…,” I say, “that would mean…you would be my father.”

He shrugs his shoulders, and his lips slightly tilt upward. “Yeah, that’s right. I would legally be your father.”

Tears slowly start to flow from my eyes, my mind finally realizing that the proposal Brad was suggesting wasn’t some outrageous dream, but actually a truthful reality.

“You don’t have to do it, if you don’t want to,” Brad says. “It’s fine. We can just forget I even said anything.”

“No,” I say, the voice croaked from the tears. “I would really like that…,” I clear my throat and smile as the next word escapes my lips, “…Dad.”

Brad pauses, lost for words as he stares at me in surprise. “You just called me Dad,” he whispers, a tear falling down his cheek as he smiles in a surprising expression—one that, before this moment, I’ve only witnessed in pictures. “You just called me Dad!”

Brad unexpectedly runs across the room and tightly wraps his arms around me, and almost as if it were as an ins
tinctive reflex, I do the same.

I began to think at this moment that everything would be okay. That from now on, there would be no more problems to deal with, no more secrets to keep from others…

No worries at all.

I am surrounded by flames; the heat scorching the air as I lie on the ground, feeling as if I’m inside an oven that I can’t escape from. I black out again, but with all the strength I had, I open my eyes again, trying to figure out where I was. The flickering of the flames dominated the faint sounds of footsteps coming my way. In a matter of seconds, I witness a person jumping through the wall of fire. The person lands, and from the looks of it, it appears to be a man. But before I could even get a good look at him, I black out once more, and this time, I am unable to open my eyes.

When I do open them again, I am in my room, lying in my bed. I’m not floating in the air anymore. Not when I’m sleeping, nor when I'm having the dream, which still manages to creep into my head every few nights.

Every time I have it, new information seems to pop up, and the minute I
realize it, I wake up. It’s like listening to a broken record. My mind pauses at the good parts, and when I have it again, it goes right back to where it left off, only for it to pause again at another good moment.

I look at the clock and realize that I have almost an hour before school, which makes me a little mad because I’ve only been asleep for an hour. I get out of bed and notice my clothes scattered all over the floor. Among those items were p
ieces of my Lion-Man wardrobe.

Oh, man. I must’ve been so tired when I came back, I guess I just threw them on the ground and headed to bed. How could I be so careless?

I immediately reach for my leather gloves, put them inside my jacket, and shove it under my bed. I don’t really bother with the pants or boots, since those are basically everyday things. But the jacket was something different. No matter if someone knew me or not, if someone were to see me walking around with that thing, they would instantly know who I was.

After that, I take a long shower, spending a lot of time to myself so that I could think about the dream. Why was it always the same dream? Surely, it had to be for some reason. Did it have some kind of meaning? Was being trapped in fire some kind
of hidden message or something? And what about the man? The one who leaped through the fire? Just what exactly was he going to do? Save me?

I put on some fresh clothes and head downstairs to the kitchen, where I found Brad cooking breakfast, his back turned to me as he flipped a thin pancake from
his pan.

“Morning,” I greeted, taking in the intoxicating scent of buttermilk as I take a seat next to the table.

“Morning, kiddo,” he says back. He turns off the stove and removes the pancake from its pan, placing it onto a plate filled with a few others, along with a small portion of scrambled eggs. He divides the food onto another plate, and when he’s finished, he turns around.

“Oh,” I say, aghast. “Uh…Brad. You look-”

“Good?” Brad interrupts.

Brad’s appearance had suddenly changed overnight. His scruffy beard that I’d grown so accustomed
to was now…well, less scruffy.

“Yeah,”
I answer. “It’s look amazing.”

Brad blushes. “Thanks. Figured I go back to my old look. This beard really
started to look like a cry for help. Scratchy as hell, too, if I might add.”

I laugh as he sets my plate against the table. He grabs his plate and returns to the table, telling me after he returned from work, we would go out and celebrate for signing the adoption papers, which were already sent in the mail, and waiting to be finalized.

“Sounds like a good idea,” I agree.

“Great,” Brad says. And then, with a smile on both our faces, we begin to eat breakfast.

By the time I got to school, Jack—whose head bandage was now gone, leaving only a tiny scar on the right corner of his forehead—was already in front of the building, waiting for me.

“Hey,” I say to him.

“Hi,” he says back.

“Did you find anything?”

He nods his head. “Yeah. It’s all in my backpack.”

“Great,” I say, holding my hand out, “let me see.”

Jack grabs onto the strap of his backpack, and quickly takes a few steps behind him. “No,” he says.

“Why not?” I ask.

He looks around for a moment, searching for any sign of someone that might be watching us. Then when he realizes the coast is clear, he leans in closer to me. “Trust me,” he whispers, “you’ll want to see this in private.”

I understood what he meant. I had almost forgotten that Jack had sneaked into his father’s study. So not only did he have news, it was top secret news. News that nobody but Mr. Colfer and the workers at ColferTech had known. Until now.

I nod in assurance. “Okay.”
             

After suffering through a brief moment of silence, I decide to break the tension by telling Jack
my
good news.

“Are you kidding?” he says ecstatically. “That’s great, man! I’m so happy for you.”

“Thanks,” I reply, laughing my way through the feeling of embarrassment, the feeling of being happy.

When Taylor arrived and I told her about the news also, she was surprisingly happier than Jack. Before I even finished telling her, she jumped into my arms and kissed me, as if I’d just a
sked for her hand in marriage.

“That’s amazing, Troy,” she says after we p
ull apart. “I’m happy for you.”

I didn’t tell her thanks. Instead I kiss her back, which she didn’t seem to mind me doing. As I pull away, I laugh.

“I’m happy for myself, too,” I say.

And with that, the school bell began to ring and we all headed inside.

During our lunch period, Jack and I decided to meet up at the library, where it would be a lot more quieter, and more importantly, private. We picked a table in the far back of the huge room. That way, we would go unnoticed and not disturbed.

Before I could have a chance to relax in my seat, Jack slams an enormous stack of papers against the table. The number of pages alone made me wonder how long Jack stayed up to get this stuff—the closest guess I could think of was three hours.

“Wow,” I breathe, laying them all across the table, “you found
all
this?”

“Yeah,” he says in a satisfactory tone.  He then eyes me with a worrie
d expression. “Is it too much?”

I shake my head. “No, not at all. It’s perfect. I mean, the more the better, right?”

He chuckles as he nods his head in acceptance, pulling up a seat next to me. As I look through the papers, I noticed contacts and different forms, and I began to get confused. I couldn’t understand any of this.

“I’m kind of lost,” I tell Jack. “Could you explain some of this to me?”

“Sure,” Jack says. He then gets up from his seat and stands over me. “Well, from the looks of it, it seems as though my dad has been doing some kind of work for the government. Creating weapons and such for the army.”

“Okay, well, what does this stuff have to do with Davidson?” I ask.

“Well, my father has recently been working on a new project for the government,” he says. “And that’s where Dr. Andrew Davidson comes in. Thirty-eight years of age, graduated from New York University, never married; this guy came in four months ago, helping my dad find resources to create some kind of performance enhancements for the army—giving them more strength and energy during battle. But unfortunately, they were unable to find a resource.”

All this information seems strange to me. How could this smart and somewhat lonely guy know about powers from performance enhancements, and say that the origins from the powers came from me?

I explained the situation to Jack, who hung onto every word I was said, trying to be as much of a help in any way he could.

“So, what else are we missing?” I say. “I mean, surely, there m
ust be something more to this.”

Jack remained silent for a few moments, and suddenly, his face lit up with a realized expression.

“Actually, there is,” he says, sorting through the papers we already saw to find new ones. “I had almost forgotten about this.” He then shows me a page from his father’s journals. “From what my father has said, and from some of the other papers in here, they had actually found a resource. In a rock.”

“What?” I ask surprisingly, waiting for Jack to laugh at the comment, only to realize from the expression on his face that he was being serious.

“A rock,” Jack repeats. “Some kind of special rock they found outside of town. I guess from these notes, they’ve reported to have studied it, but decided not to use it. It turns out it didn’t fly well with Davidson. He actually tested the substance on himself, against the company and my father’s wishes. After that, I couldn’t find anything else.”

It didn’t make sense. If what Jack said was true, and Davidson got his powers from a rock, than that meant I
got my mines from a rock, too.

But what kind of rock was it? Was it some kind of special rock? Was it a magic rock? Did it get bitten by a radioactive spider or something?

I wanted to ask Jack more about it, but before I could even get the chance, we noticed it was only two minutes left until passing period. So with little time to spear, I helped Jack put the papers back into his backpack, and followed him into the hallway.

The moment I’d realized I would be playing Volleyball in P.E., it made me wish that Jack and I had stayed a