Chapter 42 Chapter Forty Two - The Difference Between Water and Ice (1/2)

An expedition was planned and discussed and finally agreed upon. Some of members of the two former squads would leave the safety of the base to see about gathering grain as well as visiting a few places on the industrial outskirts of town that might hold supplies of seed, plants as well as other things that might be useful in the future and the remaining members would remain behind and protect the base.

As the one to propose the mission, Jonah wished to be in charge of it and where he went, his officers followed. Cole wished to go as well; although the base was spacious, there was still a wall of stone, brick and thick hedgerows about it. This, in his mind, was too close to remaining incarcerated and made him antsy. The children were naturally remaining behind, as was Nathan, who despite having the plant ability that would be very useful where mutant plants were sprouting upon every corner, could not be separated from his garden. The two cousins were to remain, Brooke as she was pregnant and Autumn as she was expected to look after Brooke. Harry, Winston and Paul felt that there were enough non-ability users leaving so opted to stay and Paul argued with Shaun until the latter gave him the silent treatment about him staying behind as well.

”Actually, I agree with Paul,” Jonah told him, ”you should remain behind this time.”

”But I have an ability,” Shaun insisted, ”I will be useful.”

”I'm not denying that,” Jonah replied. ”But we'll be in a field part of the time with weeds and uneven ground. Your chair won't cope well. Next time, maybe.”

”You should take Tyler,” Dexter advised him. Dexter was a powerful ability user and would have been good to have upon the team, but it wasn't good to have too many cooks in a kitchen or more than one leader on a team. Not that Dexter minded handing the reigns to someone like Jonah, but if some of his people were to go, they'd look to him first, so he was in charge of those staying behind. ”And maybe Patrick for some additional fire power.”

”Yay!” Patrick cheered, he knew he needed some more hands on experience to continue to develop control over his abilities, so he was okay with this.

Tyler was not so much. ”Is it really necessary for me to go?”

”With you there, they don't need to worry about supplies of water,” Dexter reminded him. ”You can just make it as you go.”

Brooke frowned as she heard these words. ”Make it? You can make water with your powers?” She'd not been able to do this. She could manipulate it somewhat, like make a bit jump from someone else's cup to her own and she could locate reasonable sized volumes of it (not like water vapour or dew on grass, that would just mean she'd become confused all of the time), but she'd never created it herself.

”Yeah,” Tyler agreed, before recalling that Jonah mentioned Brooke had some affinity to water. ”Not only me, but Nathan as well. Of course, I can make greater volumes than him having trained well.” Both Dexter and Patrick rolled their eyes heavenward due to this statement, but Tyler did not notice.

”Really,” The girl smiled and her eyes sparkled. She really was a pretty girl and would have been Tyler's type before the end. But he never went after women who were taken. ”Do you think I can learn how to do that?”

”I don't know,” Tyler replied, honestly. ”For that, you should ask our resident expert.”

”Yeah, where is Ren, anyway?” Dexter asked, noticing the oriental man was not around. He was not with Nathan either.

”Meditating on the roof,” Patrick told him.

”Meditating?” Jonah scoffed; he was sceptical about such things, though his old sister used to do Yoga and claimed it was good for the body, the mind and the soul. He'd just thought it was embarrassing doing all those weird poses. What 'downward facing dog' pose!?

Dexter tried to explain a bit, about how, as strange as it sounded, Ren had encouraged those with abilities to meditate, which actually improved those abilities and made them stronger. He'd also awakened abilities in Patrick, which is why the flaxen haired man had them now, though he was an ordinary person before the old base fell. Jonah accepted his statement, even if he still found it hard to believe. After all, zombies were getting stronger and gaining abilities, why not people?