You can be normal again

"Crime? What do you mean?" Exclaimed Gabe, staring at her, mouth slightly agape.

"Just answer the question Mr Walters. Have you ever used your powers for crime?" She questioned, glaring hard into his eyes.

"No! Why would I do that? What makes you think I would do something like that?" Gabe asked, a confused look on his face.

"We have significant evidence to link you to several recent robberies in this area. Over the last month, there have been five items of considerable value stolen from museums and art galleries around this area. Two paintings, one rare jewel and one ancient vase. Together they have a total net worth of over $150 million. All of the places they are kept have incredibly high security, but in all cases there was no sign of a break in. It's as if someone just waltzed in and took them." She told him, shaking her head in disbelief.

"And...and what does this have to do with me? I have loads of money! Why would I need to steal?" Gabe stuttered.

"We believe that the only way that someone would be able to take these things is if they had some kind of special abilities. And for your information, you do not have 'loads of money.' In fact, as of one month ago your family was declared officially bankrupt." There was something slightly vindictive about the way that she said that, even though there was still no emotion in her voice. It was as if she enjoyed being proved right, regardless of the people that were hurt along the way.

"What do you mean bankrupt? How could that happen?"

"Your father is away a lot, is he not?"

"Yes...he goes on business trips a lot. He works for a large company." Gabe replied.

"Well, when he was on these 'business trips' he managed to rack up a debt of millions of dollars through illegal gambling. In fact, he owes a lot of money to some very shady people. We think that gives you plenty of motive for theft, correct?" Gabe just continued to stare at her, unable to process the information he was being given.

"You are a straight A student. You clearly have the mental capacity to devise a plan to get into these locations. You have the speed of the quarterback; you can get in and out quickly. And, most importantly, you have your 'special abilities'. We have nobody else on record with abilities like yours in this area, and nobody from another area has come near here in the last month."

"So you think...you think I did it?" Stuttered Gabe.

"Well, you and Mr Matthews. There is significant evidence to point to your guilt. Which means that certain measures will have to be taken to prevent this from happening again."

"And what are these...measures?" Quent whispered, "You're not going to kill us, right?"

"No. We couldn't do that, even the government has it's limits. But we can...reverse the effects of your powers." She told him, some of the impassiveness in her voice dropping away, and continuing sounding almost sympathetic. Almost, but not quite.

" Having these powers... It will only cause you trouble in the long run. You can never tell anyone about them, and it is likely that you won't ever meet anyone like you. People with these abilities are rare, un organised and scattered across the globe. It's better this way." She finished, folding her hands together on her lap.

"So what you're saying, is you're going to...to TAKE OUR POWERS AWAY? Is that even possible?"

"Oh, I assure you it is entirely possible and perfectly safe. All we have to do is break the connection between you. Your powers only work because of the connection you have. Break that, and your powers will be useless."

Gabe stared at her in horror, while Quent just gasped inside his head.

"But if you break our connection, what will happen to our feelings for each other? If that is broken, will we still be in love with each other?"

How had this happened so fast? Gabe asked himself. How had things gone from being so perfect to so terrible in such a short amount of time? Suddenly he was a dangerous criminal, and his family had no money and they were going take Quent away from him. Or at least, they were going to take Quent's feelings for him away which was practically the same thing. He couldn't deal with that. He could lose his money, his freedom, his powers- they could take that all away. But the one thing that he would not lose is Quent.

"Well, we aren't totally sure of the answer to that question," she said, bringing him out of his thoughts. "But if the connection is broken, then it is definitely possible, maybe even probable. However, that might not necessarily be a bad thing. In this world, you two in the relationship you have will face a lot of prejudice, a lot of judgement, a lot of pain. People might not accept you just because of the way you feel about each other. Do you really want that? Isn't it better this way, we can make all those problems go away. You can be NORMAL again."

She sounded like she really believed in what she was saying, like a parent telling their child to clean their teeth. She honestly thought that it would be better for them to not be in their relationship anymore. Gabe stomped to his feet, pushing the chair he was stirring on onto the floor with a crash.

"I don't want to be normal!" He yelled. "The only thing I want is Quent. I love him more than anything else in the world, I love the way he talks, the way he laughs, the way he smiles, I love his hair, his eyes, his face, his nose, his eyebrows, I love everything about him. I love the way that he organised the best birthday ever for me, before you all came along and ruined it. And I wouldn't give up these feelings for anything because I love the way he makes me feel alive."

"I'm very sorry," the woman said, immediately going from being caring back to emotionless again. "I tried to go the easy way, but it seems that isn't an option..."

"Gabe! Gabe, you need to listen to me." Quent shouted frantically inside his head, distracting him from that ominous last sentence."I know you're angry. I am too. But you have to concentrate. You need to freeze her. Now. Or we'll never get out of here."

"We're in a GOVERNMENT FACILITY. How are we supposed to get out of here anyway? Whichever way you look at it, this place must have crazy security and we're just high schoolers." Gabe replied despondently.

"I'm not so sure. I don't think this place is an actual government base. I think it's just a holding facility, a place to temporarily store people. So with our powers we might just be able to get out of here."

"How do you know that?" Gabe asked, slightly hopefully.

"That woman said something about the pink your room was painted, Baker-miller pink. She said it calms people down. Well, that's true, but it only calms people for a short amount of time. After that, they become even more aggressive. So what is the only reason you would paint a cell a colour that will eventually make the people in it more violent?"

"If you were only keeping them there for a short amount of time. Quent, you're amazing! But how did you know all that stuff?" Gabe exclaimed.

"Oh, I just know everything. Also I googled it because I thought it was bloody hilarious that your room was pink. But that doesn't matter. Right now you need to freeze her so we can get out of this place!"

For some reason, I really don't like this chapter. I'll probably edit it at some point, but I'm just not that happy with it. I edited it a lot already, but still. I just don't think it's quite...right. Can someone tell me what they think? I'd really appreciate that.

Well, next chapter should be better, some of the action is finally starting. It took longer than I expected. But I'm still not sure about all the action-y parts anyway. Ah well.

The next chapter should be out soon. Hopefully. Maybe? I don't know. As the author I probably should.

As always:

IF YOU SEE ANY SPELLING/GRAMMAR MISTAKES PLEASE TELL ME!