One week down underground had Jan in a strange mood. She wasn't really used to being told what to do. She could go some places and was forbidden from going other places. She only saw doctors, instructors, and trainers. Her room was small, and more importantly the bed was small. Jan could almost stretch out in it, but only almost. The food was decent, but she had to eat in the room. The trainer, Yvonne Fordis, was tough. Jan was invincible, but after three hours with Yvonne it took all Jan's strength to eat and study the books they made her read. She still had to take English, French, Calculus, History, and Physics. Jan thought she had been in good shape, but not good enough. She wondered what time it was. It was black in her underground bedroom. They didn't let them have watches. Jan was so tired she didn't even want to roll over and go to sleep. She finally did. She guessed that she would need her strength the next day.

"So what do you think about our new trainees?", Byron Livingston asked.

Martha Worthington rubbed her forehead before answering. "I think Sara Hewitt may be one in a billion. Jan Caufield, on the other hand, is strange. She's tough and she's good. She picks up things quickly, but observing her is like watching something impressive even though the show hasn't really started yet."

Byron laughed. "I do understand what you're saying. I observe her, but it almost seems as if there is more to come, but nothing happens."

"We might have to step up the pressure on her. Perhaps we can get her to show us that next gear she has."

Jan had to wear the ugly prison looking gray jumpsuit uniform almost everywhere. She had no idea how they managed to keep her from seeing anyone except who they wanted her to see, but they did a damn good job. She was starting to feel lonely. She missed Alisha and she missed Sara. She missed being around someone who knew who and what she was. She felt dumb to have given that up just to be back in a situation where she had to keep herself secret again. It was depressing in a way. Jan let the thoughts drop. She had to get ready for a workout session with Yvonne.

Jan walked into her cubbyhole of a bedroom and threw her jumpsuit on her bed. She put on her light blue tube top and the black lycra tights she had been issued. They had at least let her keep her cross training shoes. They were already broken in. Jan took a deep breath and opened the door to leave.

Sara's workout was just ending. Sara had been small as a child and small as a teenager, but Ms. Fordis was trying to change that. Sara still couldn't run a mile without walking, but she was getting better. Sara's blond hair was pulled back into a pony tail. She looked at herself in a mirror and for the first time in a long time and really liked what she saw. She was doing pushups and crunches everyday even after Ms. Fordis' grueling workouts. Sara stood in the mirror as Ms. Fordis walked up behind her.

"Good job, Ms. Hewitt. I think you're safe to go hit the showers." Yvonne patted the smaller girl on the shoulder. "I read your file. You aren't putting any suggestions in my head are you? I think I've let you off a little easy the past two days."

Sara laughed. "No, ma'am", she drawled in her aristocratic Mississippi accent. "I wouldn't do that even if I could."

"Well, good. Can you?"

Sara laughed. "I don't really know. I mean I didn't even know I could run half a mile until you made me, Miss Fordis."

Yvonne laughed partly at what Sara had said and partly at how she had said it. Yvonne was from Flatbush, Brooklyn and had only heard an accent like Sara's on TV. She didn't know, but Sara was thinking the same thing in reverse.

Yvonne opened her mouth to speak, but stopped when she felt a rumble. The ground swayed and jumped. "Did you feel that?"

Sara looked around and nodded.

"Maybe we should move out of this room. This way!"

The ground shook and rumbled stronger. Weights fell off the racks and some off the machines fell over. Alarms started going off. Yvonne and Sara were running towards the back door of the weight room. Yvonne pressed her card against the door and slammed it open. The explosion roared from deep in the ground. The steel walls of the complex blasted inward sending shards of hot metal out in all directions. The shockwave sent Sara and Yvonne flying against the back wall. Flames from the depths shot out and filled the room. The flames flashed to the ceiling blowing away anything in its path. Yvonne pushed Sara back to the ground as the flames came up. Large sections of the wall slammed into Yvonne's back and shoulders. She fell forward onto Sara hitting the small girl in the nose causing a flow of blood to start. Sara pulled Yvonne off of her carefully.

Fires burned all around. The smoke choked off the air and burned Sara's eyes. Sara cradled Yvonne's unconscious body in her soot covered arms. Sara yelled, but could barely hear herself over the roar of the flames and the steady clanging of the alarm. She looked down at Yvonne and saw that she was breathing, but it was very shallow. Sara started to cry. She looked around for a way out. There was a gap in the flames, but Sara knew she couldn't move Yvonne and keep them from being burned. The flames licked closer to Yvonne's back. Sara pulled her closer and turned her own body around to shield her teacher. She felt the heat. She stopped crying and looked around. The gap was closed. The fire burned along the ceiling and roared from the hole in the floor. The ground begun to shake again. Sara's face didn't have time to change as she watched a wall of flame roar up from the depths towards she and Yvonne.

Jan nearly hit her head on the ceiling jumping at the sound of the explosion. People were running in all directions. The lights flickered. The red lights of the alarm cast strange shadows on the walls. Jan walked slowly among the people. She had no idea where to go. She could smell the acidic smoke coming from the fire. Jan leaned over to get beneath the level of smoke.

"What's going on!", someone yelled.

"Gas explosion in the old mine beneath this place!"

Jan looked around as the smoke started to clear. Powerful fans kicked in and started venting the air. Jan took a deep breath. She started to relax. Then her head began to swim.

"Jan! Help us!" It was Sara. Jan could feel her more than hear her. She sounded so scared.

"Where are you?" Jan thought as strongly as she could.

"Exercise room!"

Jan took off at full speed. She darted past people already moving quickly. She knocked some people over. Her long legs covered ground quickly. She only had one focus. She had to get to her friend. The crowd thickened as Jan got closer. Men with water hoses sprayed roaring flames, but moved no closer than the end of the hall that lead to the weightroom. Jan tried to run past them, but she was held.

"Let me go! Sara is over there! My friend is in there!"

"If she's in there, then's she's gone! The sprinkler line was broken in that area, and there's a cave-in on the other side of those flames. We can't even get past!"

"I can!", Jan yelled and pulled herself free. She jumped in front of the hoses and spun around in the water jet. People yelled at her to come back, but she turned and ran into the flames. She closed her eyes as she went through. Flames licked at her. The heat was so intense she couldn't even open her eyes. She kept moving until she came to a small space out of the flames. The air was so dark and so heavy she could only breathe in short gasps. She reached out and felt rocks blocking the hall. Ten feet of the ceiling had caved in blocking the hall. Tons of rocks had fallen down on top of that. Jan pushed against the rocks. The fire had heated them. Jan's hands sizzled as she pushed against the rocks. She pushed against the rocks harder than she had ever pushed anything. Her quads flexed bracing her as her back and shoulders pushed against the rocks. She closed her eyes and pushed harder. The rocks shifted. She could feel them start to slide. She reared back and shoved. The rocks crashed out on the other side giving Jan enough space to crawl over the rest of the blockage. Her hands throbbed, but she continued.

The flames licked at Jan's legs as she ran down the smoke filled hall towards the double door to the exercise room. The entire wall had been shifted and the floor raised. The thick steel door frame was twisted. The door was cracked perhaps six inches.

"Sara!", Jan yelled.

"Jan!"

"Are you ok!?! Are you burned!?!"

"Not yet! Miss Fordis is hurt! I can't carry her! Hurry!"

"I'm coming!"

Jan put her hands on the door and began to pull the doors apart. Metal scraped against metal as Jan's back muscles flexed and writhed. Jan's face was a mask of pain and concentration. Jan's delts fired as the doors spread slowly. The doors stopped. The bent door frame stopped progress. Jan grit her teeth and coiled her powerful back. She leaned against the left door and with a rush us power pushed. The steel door slid out of the track and burst through the wall. Jan wanted to take a deep breath, but the smoke choked her.

Fire filled the room. "Sara where are you!"

"Here!"

Jan watched as the fire began to retreat. She looked around. She didn't feel any wind, but the fire moved back like it was being pushed by an invisible wall. She ran forward into the space. Jan saw Sara sat against the wall with Ms Fordis lying across her lap. Sara's eyes were pressed shut and her body shook just a bit. Jan ran up to her.

"Sara!"

The girl opened her eyes slowly. The fire behind Jan roared back across the doorway. "Jan", Sara gasped wearily.

"Let's get out of here!"

"There are other people down here", Sara said with more strength to in her voice.

"What?"

"There are six other people down here. They're trapped that way." Sara pointed over her shoulder.

Jan sighed. "Ok." Jan took Ms Fordis around her waist and lifted her up and onto her shoulder. Sara rose to her feet and ran towards the other trapped people. Jan followed. Sara ran towards the back dodging the flames. She stopped in front of another cave-in.

"It's blocked! They're right on the other side."

"Are you sure they're alive? I mean you can't even hear on the other side of the rocks."

Sara looked up at her friend. "I'm sure. There are six people on the side of those rocks. I can help you move the rocks."

Jan looked at her tiny friend and almost smiled. "Here take care of Miss Fordis." She gently laid her trainer on the uneven floor. Jan went to the pile of rocks. Some of the fallen stones were small, no bigger than an apple, but most were large. Jan grabbed one twice the size of a watermelon and tossed it to the side. She grabbed another and another. Sara watched as her friend tossed 500 pound rocks like some people tossed loaves of bread. Jan's body glistened with sweat as her muscles worked to clear the stones. Jan wanted to push the rocks over, but she feared for the people on the other side. The rocks in the middle of the pile were bigger. Jan's powerful biceps flexed hard as she pulled the rocks free. She could hear the people now. She could hear them coughing and yelling over the roar of the flames. Just then the ground began to shake again.

"Oh my God!", someone on the other side of the rocks yelled. The explosion wasn't as bad, but the yells from the other side of the rocks grew louder and more panicked.

Jan took a few steps back and took as deep a breath as she could manage. She put her head down and ran. She saw the rocks in front of her, but they weren't going to stop her. Jan's legs flexed with coiled power as she burst into the rocks with all the power her super body could produce. Her shoulder shattered the rocks it met all the way through. Rocks collapsed in a pile behind her, but Jan was through.

Six sets of eyes stared at Jan as she stood up after coming through the rocks. "Are any of you hurt?" No one spoke. "Can all of you walk!", Jan yelled with more anger than she intended.

"Yes, we can all walk, we can damn well run too!", someone yelled. The flames came closer. "We need to hurry. The wall back there is collapsing."

"Ok. Just stand back here. Those rocks aren't that dense. I'm going to make a hole."

Jan ran again. This time she leaned in with her left shoulder. Rocks exploded as she powered through them. The rocks above began falling as Jan she came through. She stopped midway through and braced herself as the rocks fell. She threw up her arms and braced as the weight fell onto her arms. Jan's arms shook under the strain. Muscles knotted and flexed as Jan held the rock above her. Her triceps flared and her back and legs flexed to the max.

"Move!", Jan yelled.

The six people behind her didn't need any urging. They followed.

"What the hell!"

Jan looked up. "Ms. Fordis, you're awake!"

"Did you just go through those rocks and hold up..." Her speech wasn't quite normal, but she seemed alert enough.

"Long story, ma'am. If we make it through this, I'll explain."

Sara looked up. "I think we should leave soon."

Jan lead the group back the way she had come. Everyone stayed close. Ms. Fordis couldn't move as quickly as she normally would, but she kept up. Jan hoped to run back into the corridor that she had come from originally, but the doors were closed. Jan pushed the button next to the door but nothing happened. She looked for an emergency knob, but couldn't find one. She tried to work her fingers into the crack of the door. Jan finally reared back and punched the seam as hard as she could. The noise echoed in the small space. The door had a dent the size of Jan's fist. She coiled her powerful arm back again and let loose a punch harder than the first. The steel was hard, but it was yielding to Jan's muscles. Jan worked her fingers into the breach she had made. These doors were undamaged and locked. She had to work harder, but her body was up to it. Her forearms bulged with corded muscle as Jan worked her fingers into the hole.

Sara and the other survivors huddled thirty feet behind Jan as she worked against the door. Some people prayed while others looked at Jan in disbelief as she dismantled a steel door with her bare hands. Sara looked up went she heard cracking. It almost sounded like rifle shots. She started to stand up, but it was too late. A fifteen foot section of ceiling broke loose right above her and the rest of the group. People looked up, but had time to do nothing other than yell.

Jan turned. The slab was already on the way down. She lunged, but knew she wasn't going to make it. She wanted to yell or do something, but there was nothing she could do. She watched in slow motion as tons of concrete and steel fell towards her friend and all the people that were so close to being safe. The slab fell frame by fame in Jan's mind as she ran closer. Then the slab stopped. It hovered motionless not three feet above the heads of the screaming people beneath it.

"What in the hell?", Jan stammered. Everyone had had their hands and arms over their heads and were just now poking their heads out. They all rushed from under the slab, some getting close to the flames to get out from under the thick slab. Only Sara remained. Her eyes were squeezed tight and her small hands were balled into tight fists. Her thin body vibrated and sweat streamed down her forehead.

"Sara?", Jan asked quietly almost reverently.

"Get the door open", Sara ordered through clenched teeth without opening her eyes.

Jan hurried back to the door and started pealing back metal with more urgency. Sara opened one eye a little. Her head tilted up slowly like it took all of her strength. She took small steps towards the edge of the slab. She moved woodenly and slowly. Finally she made her way from under the slab. She exhaled and the slab sank slowly to the ground. Sara fell to one knee wanting to take a deep breath, but couldn't.

Jan finally had a good grip. She gritted her teeth and leaned her chest against the cold steel before pulling her arms apart. The door lock broke with an explosive crack. Jan grunted and slowly pried the doors apart. She could feel water spray on her face and chest as the doors ground against the frame. Jan yelled as she shoved the doors one last time. She stepped through the door. The rest of the survivors stepped through after her. Sara fell to one knee. Jan wrapped her arms around her friend's shoulders.

"We made it."

Sara looked up. "Yeah."

Medical people swooped down on the survivors and in moments Jan, Sara, and the rest of the survivors were taken to the infirmary and worked over by doctors nurses and people who seemed to have no purpose. Jan tried to tell the people that she was fine, but in the rush no one was listening.

After more than three hours the people were gone and Jan had a bed next to Sara. They were hooked up to monitoring devices, but they both felt fine. Jan sat up and swung her legs over to the floor, and pulled back the curtain.

"How do you feel?", Jan asked.

Sara swung out of bed. She and Jan were hooked up to IV tubes and monitors so they couldn't really get all the way out of the bed. "You know, I always tried to stay away from smokers. I think I breathed in enough smoke to last me a lifetime, but I feel fine."

"Good." Jan took a sip of water. "I had no idea you were..."

"Psychic and telekinetic?"

"Yeah, that."

Sara took a sip of water too. "No one goes around advertising the fact that they're weird. Besides, I hadn't used any of my abilities since I came to Livingston a year and a half ago."

"I'm glad you remembered how."

Sara laughed. "Yeah, me too! I would have been crushed! Wouldn't have been a problem for you."

"Maybe not, but it would have hurt like hell."

"Speaking of not advertising, I didn't know you were supergirl, breaking through those rocks and ripping steel apart like that."

Jan smiled. "Supergirl can fly, I can't. I'll have to tell you that story one day."

"Still, you've got to have the most perfect body in the world."

"Aww, your power is so much cooler than mine. When I heard you in my mind, were you reading my thoughts?"

"No, not at all. Reading thoughts is not easy. People's minds aren't like filing cabinets. Besides, my parents taught me not to do things like that. To me its worse than stealing someone's mail. No, talking to people thought to thought is not reading thoughts. It is kinda like whispering in someone's ear. I mean everybody's mind feels different. I knew you were down here the day you came. I could feel you. When I called to you, I could find you right away. Its as easy to find your mind as it is for me to see you sitting in front of me."

"How far out can your mind search?", Jan asked.

"I don't know, but I do know that when they told my grandmother had died that I reached out and felt her mind and she was at home.

"So you knew they were lying and went anyway?", Jan asked.

Sara smiled. "What was I going to do?"

"I don't know, twirl them in the air and make e' puke all over themselves before telling to get lost."

Sara laughed. "I've never done that. I always worried about dropping someone and hurting them. I could try you though."

"I'll pass." Jan took another sip of water then looked up at Sara again. "I used to have a really bad temper and I scared the hell out of my parents. That's why they sent me to Livingston, but Sara you are shy, gentle, and caring. Why did you ever go there?"

Sara looked down for a instant before looking up and speaking. "I wondered when you were ask me that. Well, my birth mother died when I was a little baby, and my father remarried when I was four. By then I was already moving around small things with my mind and talking to people in their heads. She accepted me, and taught me manners with it. She used to tell me not to try to read thoughts and other things. I grew up knowing that I was different, but not thinking anything of it. Most kids get scared on their first day of school, well not me. I could talk to my Father, Mother, my Nanna, or anyone whenever I wanted to. As I got older my powers got stronger, but I still couldn't lift anything heavy maybe a couple hundred pounds." She looked at Jan who smirked. Sara smiled herself and continued.

"Ok, so I couldn't have lifted 200 pounds any other way, but one day I was holding a cup of tea and saw how much of my hand touched the cup. I learned how to use my mind to lift an object using dozens of contact points. It worked. The whole family would get in the car and I would wait until we were about to pull off I would raise the tires off the ground just enough so the car wouldn't move. Mom would always hit the gas trying to make the car move no matter how many times I did the same prank.

"Anyway, 2 years ago this coming February, Mom was coming home from a charity event and a drunk driver hit her head on. She died on the roadway." Sara paused and took a deep breath.

"I had never hated before in my life, Jan. The Bible says to hate no one, but I sat up in my room either crying or figuring out the most painful way I could kill that man. So the trial started. I was going to kill him in the courtroom. It wouldn't even have been a strain. I could have killed that man with a thought. He was there with his wife and three kids. His wife had cancer and he had just been diagnosed with MS. He plead guilty and apologized so much that I couldn't take it. I ran out of the courtroom. Anyway to make a long story short, I told my father that I needed a change of scenery. We found a brochure from Livingston. We didn't know that it was a reform school until I had been there nearly a month." Sara laughed. "Once I got here, I promised myself that I wouldn't use my abilities."

"I guess neither one of us has to worry about secrets as much anymore."

"Matthew 10:26"

"Huh?"

Sara smiled. "'There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known.'" Sara frowned. "Let me see try something." Sara closed her eyes. "My dad's at our house, in his study. He's reading a book on World War II." Sara giggled. "He knows I'm there. I told him hello. He says that I haven't done this for a long time."

Jan watched her friend have a conversation with her father who was in a house over a thousand miles away in Mississippi. Sara seemed only dimmly aware of her surroundings.

"I told him that I'm with a friend. I told him that you saved my life and that you know about my abilities. He wants me to say hello to my little brother."

Sara opened her eyes again and looked at Jan.

"That was the coolest thing I've ever seen. So I guess it doesn't matter how far away the person is."

"Guess not, but it helps to know the mind. I mean there are millions of minds between here and there, but its just like faces in a crowd unless I know the mind." Sara paused and took a drink of water. Her throat was still dry from the smoke. "Alisha's down here."

Jan's face brightened. "Really!?!"

"She's sleep."

"This is so cool."

"Yeah, I think I'm getting sleepy. I'm going to say goodnight to my brother and turn in."

"Well, goodnight, Sara. I'll see you in the morning."

"Goodnight, Jan."

to be continued...

Be on the lookout for more....

comments welcome: dem2@hotmail.com