The first light of another cold November day at Lake Tahoe pierced through the windows, hitting Riley's face and causing her to stir. Whatever she had been sleeping on, it was uncomfortable. Her head hurt, her mouth felt unpleasantly dry. Plus, she didn't even know where she was. Slowly, her memories settled in and took their seats in her mind where they belonged - her dad, seeing her. Running away from home. Teleporting to Tahoe, with Abigail. She was at the cabin.
"Good morning, sleepyhead!" Abigail said and set down a plate with toast on the coffee table in front of the couch, along with a mug of cocoa she handed Riley. "How are you feeling?"
"Horrible" she muttered and ran a hand through her hair. It was sticky, greasy, unpleasant. She needed a shower. "You?"
"Nasty headache" she admitted, although she was either lying or very good at covering up her pain. "I think that teleport made me sore."
Riley accepted the mug. "But we're still in one piece." She looked over to the kitchen, where a saucepan with milk was still steaming. "You managed to fix the power?"
"No, but I did fix the heating. Gas furnace. We have warm water and we have the stove. Anything else, well..."
"I need a shower. And then we gotta get to work."
"Work?"
"We're training." Riley said and climbed out of bed. "We need to be more familiar with our abilities, and we need a backup plan in case dad does find us here."
"Riley, it's snowing outside, and it's cold, and I don't want to-"
"Fine. You can stay here if you want, but I have to do something. Can't stay here doing nothing. You said there was a town nearby?"
Abigail nodded. "Tahoma. Half an hour from here."
"Can you take me there?" Riley asked and put on her shoes. "I need some stuff from the store."
"You want to go now?" Abigail asked. "What about laying low? You haven't even eaten anything yet."
Riley was already lacing up her boots, her movements quick and determined. "The longer we wait, the more likely it is that someone will be on the lookout for us. We should go now."
"Fine, but I'm not teleporting anywhere on an empty stomach. Last night was... different. Drained me."
"Yeah, I noticed." She had grabbed her log, scribbling down some notes on a new page. "We need supplies. Anything that doesn't easily expire. Canned food. And I'm getting hair dye, if we're gonna live undercover here, we should change our appearance."
"I'm not dying my hair" Abby said as she ate the piece of toast she made for Riley. "That's ridiculous."
"Fine, don't." She didn't feel like arguing, and the headache was getting worse. "Ready?"
"Gimme a moment." Abby answered, between mouthfuls of toast. She swallowed quickly, then took Riley's hand. They both closed their eyes, and with the familiar tug as reality stretched and warped around them, they were behind the convenience store on the edge of Tahoma, California - population small enough for nobody to care.
The dumpsters they materialised next to were teeming with small vermin - flies, grubs, other harbingers of rot. It made Riley's stomach turn a little, but she didn't let it show.
The sliding doors of the convenience store chimed as Riley and Abby went inside. Aside from the clerk - a middle aged man, unkempt, reading a magazine about tractors, it was empty - and aside from the television mounted above the checkout tuned to a local news station, it was quiet either. The clerk didn't seem to notice or care that they were here.
"So what do we need?"
"Food. Beans, that sorta stuff."
"I hate beans," Abby mumbled, but went and put some of the cans in her shopping basket anyway.
"They're cheap."
"Oh, that's it? You're gonna eat beans for weeks cause they're cheap?"
"Pick up something else then. Just nothing fresh. Or nothing that needs refrigeration" Riley replied as she went through the very limited pharmacy section. Soap, deodorant, and... red hair dye. "What do you think. Red?"
"Any other options?"
"No" Riley said and put the box in the basket.
"Not exactly inconspicuous, right?"
"You play the cards you're dealt" Riley answered, not wanting to admit that Abigail actually had a point. "What's all this?"
Abigail had added a few extra items to the basket. Chocolate bars, peanut butter treats, marked down candy that was still left over from Halloween. "Nobody around to say no, right?"
"I guess not."
They went to the till, where the clerk eyed them suspiciously as he rang up their items. "Nineteen eighty-nine," he said, took a crumpled Andrew Jackson from Riley's hands and took his sweet time processing the change. "You girls new in town?"
"Staying by the lake-" Abigail said before Riley could stop her. "-I mean, just passing through."
"Where to?"
"Uh..." Riley thought for a second. "Reno."
"What's in Reno?"
"Our... uncle!" Abigail lied, a bit too loudly.
The clerk nodded. "Well, stay safe. Winter's cold up here and those jackets don't exactly look warm."
"Thank you for your concern" Riley said and took the grocery bags. "And goodbye."
"What was that? Our uncle? Do we look anything like sisters?"
"I panicked! What do you want me to say?"
"Nothing! Nothing at all! Just shut up and let the pros handle this. I'm way better at lying than you are."
"Don't think you should be proud of that."
"You do what you have to do." She adjusted her grip on the paper bags and prepared to teleport back.
"Can I hitch a ride with you?"
"You can teleport."
"I know, I know, I'm just... exhausted. Don't think I'd make it back all the way if I tried."
Riley rolled her eyes. "All right, come closer." Abby held on to Riley's arm, and Riley focused on the space in front of the fireplace. The wooden floor, how it creaked when she stepped on it, how the couch in front of the fireplace was old and worn, but in a comfortable and familiar way. How the fireplace crackled, how everything smelled of pine and the holidays.
Reality folded in on itself again, stretching them out over the distance between themselves and the cabin, then snapping Riley and Abby in place like a rubber band that had been pulled a little too far.
"Whoa." Abby said and steadied herself.
"Feels different, doesn't it?" Riley set down the grocery bags on the kitchen counter. "I felt the same way when you teleported us here."
"Weird." Abigail said and got out one of the bags of candy corn. "When I teleport, it's like the world moves around me. But when you do it... you move." She looked over at Riley, who was stacking the cans of food on the countertop. "Shouldn't you write this down?"
"I'm gonna." She stopped unpacking and sat down next to Abby on the couch. "Different kinds of teleportation." Riley muttered, reaching for her log. She flipped to a fresh page, dated it, and started sketching out two diagrams side by side. "Like... you bend space around you, and I bend myself through space."
"That's one way to put it." Abby was already halfway through the bag of candy corn. "But wouldn't that mean you're actually moving through... whatever's between here and there?"
Riley paused her sketching. "What do you mean?"
"Like..." Abby grabbed another handful of candy. "If you're moving through space, aren't you technically passing through walls and stuff? But I'm just... making here and there the same place for a second."
"But... there's no functional difference to that, right? We're still teleporting."
"Sure, sure, but that might mean that you can apply that to other things" Abby explained with a full mouth. "Here, try that." She tossed her a can of Bush's beans.
"Try what?"
"Try to teleport, but don't teleport yourself, just teleport the can."
"That's ridiculous. It's not how it works."
"Just try it."
Riley sighed, focused on the can, the weight in her hand, then on the space on the coffee table. What it would feel like to be there, on the table, in the shape of a... can.
Nothing happened. Of course nothing happened. She wasn't a can of beans, and she knew her power didn't work like that. "I told you. That's just not how it works."
"I think there's still something to it." Abby said, still munching on the sugary treats. "Try again? But this time, you... I dunno, picture pushing the can maybe?"
Riley sighed. "It doesn't work, all right? I can teleport myself, I can teleport things or people I touch, but I can't teleport something somewhere else." She put the can down on the coffee table. "And it doesn't matter if I picture pushing it, or throwing it, or-"
A flash of light blinded her momentarily, and when she could see again, the can was standing on the other side.
"See?" Abby said, triumphantly. "You can do it!"
Riley blinked. "I..."
"Get it? Can?"
"Yeah, yeah, very funny." She went over to the other side of the table and picked up the can. It was real. She had teleported that can of beans, without moving herself, just by thinking about it. "Can you?"
Abby shook her head. "Nope. Tried a million times." The bag of candy corn was almost empty. "But you're a year older than me. Might be 'cause of that."
"Probably." Riley said, but barely even processed what Abby was saying. She grabbed her log, flipped to her own page and started scribbling in the powers section. "We gotta test the limits of this. Go back to the store, pick up more things. Heavier things."
"Like... two cans of beans?"
"Maybe a gallon of milk. Something like that."
"Are you gonna make me a grocery list?" Abby joked.
"You go, I'll keep practicing." She put on her coat again. "Nobody can see us out back, right?"
"Should just be the lake," Abigail answered. "You can sort of see the Tacoma shore from here, but at this time of year nobody's there."
"Good." Riley stepped out the back door and onto the porch. Abigail followed. "I'm going to try moving some of these rocks."
"Well be careful. Don't overexert yourself" Abigail said, but Riley just waved her hand and nodded, dismissing her concerns. She pulled her jacket closer and wanted to leave for the convenience store, but Riley motioned her to hold on.
"Wait. I should try to teleport you there."
"Are you sure that's such a good idea?" Abigail said and looked at Riley. "I mean, you just found out you can do this, and you don't nearly have as much practice at me, and-"
Riley's eyes were sparkling with excitement. "Look, if I have superpowers I'm going to use them."
"I still think that's a little much for the beginning," Abigail assuaged her. "Let's learn to walk before we run, okay?" Abigail sounded like her mother. It made Riley a little mad. Who was she to claim to know what's best for her?
"Fine." Riley said and lowered her hand again. "But be quick." Abigail nodded, closed her eyes and was whisked away, of course accompanied by the iconic flash of light that always accompanied their teleports.
From the backyard behind the cabin Riley could look out all the way over Lake Tahoe. The water's surface was still, serene. Now that Abigail was gone, it felt like she was alone in the world, the only person for thousands of miles.
Of course, that wasn't true, and Riley conceded to herself that it was really only a brief respite. Sooner or later, someone would find them. Maybe it would be the police, maybe it would be her father, Maybe they'd even return to San Francisco on their own, even though that possibility seemed like it was getting less likely by the minute.
Riley stepped closer to the lake's shore, with small, calculated steps so she wouldn't slip and fall head first into the frigid water. Not a pleasant way to die, she imagined, and it would also be impossible to concentrate enough to teleport with her body gasping for air trying not to sink.
She picked up a rock, comparable in size to the can of beans, and tried to recreate their experiment from earlier. She imagined the rock simply being over there, over the surface of the water, and have it fall in. She closed her eyes, let her body consider the weight of the stone in her hands, and let go of it in her mind.
She could see the flash of light as a flaring up of red behind her closed eyelids, and the weight of the stone was gone from her hands. She opened her eyes, and across the lake, at the spot she'd been looking at, ripples radiated outward from where the rock had fallen into the lake. Riley smiled, took her log out of her bag and started scribbling down the results. Experiment reproduced. Teleportation extends to held objects and can be moved without moving the subject.
The next experiment was to teleport she wasn't holding in her hands. She focused on another rock, one with a peculiar shape and jagged edges that would stand out against all the other rocks on the shore. She pictured it missing from the spot where it was and reappearing in her hands. This time, she didn't look away - she focused up, willed her mind and body to cooperate, to magically swap the empty space in her hand and the rock on the ground - another bright flash, and she had done it. The stone's corners dug into her skin, but that sensation just meant that what she was feeling was real. It had happened.
Riley threw the rock into the lake and teleported another one into her hand - a smoother one, flatter, one that could better jump across the water. She kneeled down a little, aligning her hand with the lake's surface and flicked it. It jumped three times before finally sinking into the icy depths of Lake Tahoe.
From the backyard, she heard the distinct whoosh of Abigail teleporting, so she went back up to where she'd climbed down to the lake from. "What took you so long?" Riley quipped, but Abigail just handed her the bag of items. It was heavy, like she had asked for. A gallon of milk, laundry detergent, and a five pound bag of rice. She turned around to face her, and Riley could see that Abigail had been crying.
"Whoa, whoa, wait, I didn't mean to offend you when I told you to go to the-"
"They found us," she said, sniffling. "At the... the store, there was a TV, and they showed the newscast, and, and- we were on there, and then the clerk looked at it, and- I think he recognised me, and I just paid, and I ran, I teleported here, I..."
"What?!" Riley called out in surprise. "You mean-"
"He's called the police" Abigail sniffled. "They'll be here. Riley. We... we-"
"We stay here." She said, quickly taking back control. Abigail was a sniffling mess, but that shouldn't compromise them if Riley just kept her head calm and made rational decisions. "We stay here tonight. Set up watch. You sleep while I'm awake and vice versa. We keep our head down, no lights, stay quiet, and if the cops come we can still run."
"Run? From the police?" She coughed as she choked on her own fear. "That's your idea?"
"We didn't do anything wrong! We didn't break the law, we didn't hurt anyone, we can just run away!"
"But where? The cabin was our only place!"
"We'll figure it out" she said, hoping to not have to make that decision anytime soon. "For now, we go inside, and we wait."
Riley had taken the second watch, although she could hardly sleep in the first anyway. Abby couldn't sleep either, instead cowering next to Riley, rolled up in blankets. Their bags were packed, and stood ready next to the couch if the feds were going to break down the door.
"I'm not going to let anything happen to us" Riley said. "Trust me. They won't catch us."
"I hope you're right."
A cone of light wandered through the room, probably a passing car. There had been at least a hundred that night, and every time it made both girls hold their breath. This one passed too.
"Did you figure out a new place where we can go?"
"No" Riley lied. She'd teleport to New York City if it came to that, but Abigail would never agree to that. Too dangerous to teleport across the entire USA, New York wasn't safe, a million other perfectly valid reasons not to go there, but she didn't care. She knew her plan would work. They'd hide in the biggest city, surviving off of stolen groceries and hiding out in abandoned buildings.
"I don't like this" Abby said. "We should have never left home. Mom would have helped us, mom would have-"
"Mom would have ratted me out to the cops the second they threatened her license to practice medicine. Not an option. I know you miss her, but we're here now, and we gotta deal with it."
Another light cone wandered through the room.
"We didn't even do anything to them. Why do they want to put us in jail?"
"We're powerful" Riley sighed. "Whether you like it or not, our powers are unique, and I bet you that someone would pay top dollar for our abilities. The government catches us, they'll never let us leave in one piece. Cut out whatever part makes us unique, stick it into some corporate fat cat."
"You really think that?"
"Or worse" Riley said, letting her imagination take the reigns of catastrophising for a bit. "What about the army? Teleporting in an entire platoon worth of soldiers, that wins you wars. And if they need to cut us open to figure out how it works, they're gonna do that."
"My parents would never let them do that."
"Your parents are probably already in jail" Riley continued. "How long have you had your powers? Four years?"
"Three" she whispered.
"That's how long they've been illegally harbouring an empowered individual. Or whatever justification they want to find."
Another light cone danced across the windows, but this one stopped. Abby held her breath.
"This is the place," an adult man's voice said outside the cabin. "Where they said they'd be. Family cabin."
"Some cabin. Are they loaded?" Another voice asked.
"Must be." There was a click, and a searchlight burst through the window in the front door, casting harsh shadows on everything inside. Riley ducked away. "No signs o' movement."
"Yeah, they're probably asleep."
"Hey, watch it, wiseass. I'm still your superior officer."
"I didn't-"
"Just watch your tone, detective."
"All right, all right, I'm sorry. Should we knock?"
The banging at the door ripped through the cabin's still air like gunshots. Abby darted awake from being half-asleep, a product of teleporting all day with Riley.
"Tacoma PD!" The older of the two men called against the door. Riley and Abby held their breath. "Open up!"
A few seconds passed, then the other voice spoke. "Abigail Louden and Riley Truman, open the door, this is the police!"
The girls didn't dare move an inch.
"See, I told you. They're not here. How would they even get here in the first place? They don't have a car, they don't-"
"Or they're hiding. Guy at the Seven Eleven said-"
"Yeah, yeah, I know. Family sent me the spare key."
Oh, no.
"We have to move" Riley whispered. "Now."
"Are you sure-" The key rattled in the lock.
"Abby, they're going to get inside any second now."
"I just-"
"Abigail and Riley, we can hear you. Come out with your hands over your heads!" The older voice called out as he fumbled with the door keys. "Damn thing is stuck."
"Do you trust me?"
"What?"
"Abby. Do you trust me?"
Abby thought for a moment, more than they really could spare, and nodded. "Yes. I trust you."
"Good." Riley grabbed her bag, Abby grabbed her backpack and held out her hand for Riley to take. "Everything is going to be fine, I promise."
The door unlocked, and two police offers stumbled inside the cabin, looking directly at them, standing in front of the couch. "There you are! You can't just run away from home! Dr. Truman was-"
She closed her eyes, pictured New York. The endless skyscrapers, the smell of urine and burnt pizza, how there was always somehow at least one siren sounding, the cold air, the unwelcoming streets - and how it was an entire continent away.
"Hey, put your hands up!" The police officer said.
Then there was a bright flash of light.