The Shed Behind Felix's House

The shed was full of old bicycles and smelled of oil and damp wood and was, according to Felix, completely private because his parents never came out here.

"This is where you go to think?" Adaeze asked, looking around at the bicycles.

"This is where I go to be left alone," Felix said. "There is a difference."

He had found four upturned crates and arranged them in a square, which Priya thought was either very prepared or very telling about how often he sat in here with imaginary company. She sat on one. The others sat on the others.

"Okay," Felix said. He had his notebook out. He actually had a notebook. Priya looked at it and decided she liked him a little despite herself. "What do we know."

"Adaeze stopped a bridge," Ren said.

"Adaeze stopped a bridge," Felix confirmed, writing it down. "Ren went in the river and came out dry." He wrote that too. "Priya crossed a forty-metre bridge in approximately four seconds without appearing to try." He looked at her.

"I did not clock it," Priya muttered.

"I did," Felix said. "I have a very precise sense of time. It is one of the things about me." He paused. "Also I can feel exactly where everyone in a room is without looking at them. I have been able to do that since I was small and I always thought it was just very good spatial awareness but watching the three of you today I am starting to think it might be something else."

"Like a superpower," Adaeze said.

Felix winced slightly. "Like an ability," he said. "Superpower sounds like something from a comic book."

"We just survived a collapsing bridge because one of us has super-strength," Ren said mildly. "I think we can use the word."

Felix considered this. "Fine," he said. "Superpower."

Adaeze had been flexing her hands since they sat down, opening and closing them, pressing her palm against the wall of the shed. Now she pressed harder and Priya watched her fingers sink slightly into the wood the way you would push into clay.

"Stop doing that to his shed," Priya said.

"Sorry." Adaeze pulled her hand back. There were four small dents in the wood. "I need to understand what I can do."

"Safely," Ren said. "Understanding it safely. With walls that do not belong to Felix."

"Noted," Adaeze said.

"So," Priya said. "What do we do now? We all have powers. We are all strangers. The bridge we were just on is in the river."

They all looked at each other.

"There is a shopping centre two streets from here," Felix said slowly, "with a functioning lift that has been stuck between floors with three people inside for the past twenty minutes. I can hear them. They are not in danger yet but the emergency services response time today is going to be very slow because of the bridge."

Everybody stared at him.

"You can hear them from here?" Priya said.

"I told you," he said. "I can feel where things are. People especially. Once I tune into an area I can sense movement and heat and." He looked uncomfortable. "I know it sounds strange."

"Everything about today sounds strange," Adaeze said. She stood up. "Which shopping centre?"