Touch (Denazen #1)(36)

“Hells, yeah. Your Dad is a great man. He really looks out for us.” He laughed. “I take it you’re a Nix?”

“Nix?”

“It’s what we on the inside call the non-Six folks.”

Wow. Way original.

“You’ll love it here,” Flip continued. “Denazen is awesome.”

“Seriously?” I couldn’t hide the surprise in my voice. Thankfully, Flip was too oblivious to notice.

“Hells, yeah! We’re like frickin’ superheroes. Out there fighting the good fight. Making the world a safer place for mankind and all that.” He leaned in closer. “We take out the bad guys and restore order. We’re totally like X-Men or Justice League and shit!”

I wondered if someday Flip’s diarrhea of the mouth would become fatal. “So they treat you okay?”

“Are you kidding? I was a runaway. Totally clueless about things. Denazen found me, gave me a home, and taught me all the good I could do with my gift. We, like, help the government sometimes.”

Talk about frigging delusional.

“You’re not, like, a prisoner or anything?”

That earned me a funny look. “Prisoner?”

“You can come and go as you please?”

“I don’t see why not…but we don’t. We stay here. It’s safer.” His expression turned thoughtful. “There’s a lot of bad shit out there. Denazen’s pissed off a lot of bad guys. Made a lot of enemies. On the outside, we’re walking, talking target practice. In here, we’re safe. They protect us.”

“In exchange for your service,” I said, trying to keep the sarcasm out of my voice. If I didn’t know better—if I hadn’t met Kale first—the crap Flip was selling might have been more believable. But I’d seen behind Denazen’s mask. The truth was out. Now, if I had my way, I’d make sure everyone and their uncle knew. “And you’re all cool with that?”

He frowned. “Most of us, yeah. There are always some uncooperative ones. Some of us can be pretty dangerous. If Sixes starts hurting people, they bring them in and try to reason with them.”

Rehabilitate.

“And if they can’t?”

“The police have jails, right? Same concept. Anyone with abilities that goes on mass killing sprees or whatever are criminals.” He looked down at his watch. “Crap. I’m late for the weight room.” He stood, giving me a wink. Flexing his arms, carrot hanging from the corner of his mouth, he said, “They help us get and stay ripped. I’m a total babe magnet now.”

I smiled. “It was nice meeting you, Flip.”

I watched him leave, breathing a sigh of relief. I wanted to get things moving.

With the coast finally clear, I stood and made my way to the elevator. What I planned to do was risky, but it was the only hope I had of getting back into Dad’s office alone.

They hadn’t let me into that Six-only party because I was cute.

When I was seven, Uncle Mark took Brandt and me shopping right before Christmas. I saw a Barbie doll I absolutely had to have and begged him to buy it for me. He’d refused of course—money had been tight. When Uncle Mark went to check out, I snuck back. Grabbing the beautiful new doll, I clutched my old, raggy one, wishing she had the same beautiful, flowing white dress and shimmery crown sitting in a mass of golden hair. When I looked down, both dolls were identical and I threw up all over aisle eight.

As I got older, I figured out how it worked. I could mimic one object into another so long as I was still touching the original. As long as the general size was the same, it worked. I’d experimented and found that my limitations were almost nonexistent. If I had a tuna sandwich and wanted a cheeseburger, no problem. It tasted exactly like a cheeseburger. If I wanted beer, but had soda? No worries! Liquid fun was only a wish away.

You’d think with something as awesome as this, I’d be doing it like crazy, right? A teenager with the ability to basically get what she wanted when she wanted would go nuts. Other than the obvious I should keep this to myself opinion formed at an early age, the pain wasn’t worth it. Each time I did it, my brains felt like they were being yanked out through my nose with a fishing hook. Size mattered a little. The bigger the object, the worse the pain. But when mimicking something as small as an ice cube caused you to blow projectile vomit and see stars, there better be a damned good reason for doing it.

Last year, Dad had a brand new, fifty-two-inch flat screen delivered to the house while he was at work. I’d come home, messing around with some guy I met at a rave, and we’d knocked it over. After I got him to leave, I’d gone to the garage, dragged in the cardboard box, and voila! New TV. The hardest part had been getting rid of the ruined remains of the original with a blinding headache and gut-wrenching nausea. It lasted an entire day.

I’d never told another living soul. What would I have said? Hi, my name is Dez and I’m some weird human wish factory? Wish in one hand…and it comes true in the other. Um, no. It came in handy in an emergency, but still, it was freaky. Then, when I heard about that kid who was dragged away at Sumrun and never heard from again, I kept my secret for a whole ’nother reason. I was scared as hell.

When Kale told me about my mom and what she could do, it’d been so hard not to smile. Even though I’d never met her, it made me feel less alone. Like mother, like daughter—sort of, anyway. I’d never even considered trying to mimic myself into someone else. I mean, what if I couldn’t change back? And I couldn’t even begin to imagine the pain that would come with something that big. It’d probably kill me.