I’d hoped more of them would stop shouting and screaming. The affected people and the people at the edge of the clearing were making so much noise that it nearly drowned me out as I shouted, “Get back!”

A number of people listened. The crowd in particular was inclined to take my order, getting away from the scene. Two of the seven who’d lagged behind the others turned to go too.

Five, however, looked at me and then continued to run toward the scene.

I clenched my fist.

Rationally, I knew that they likely saw this as the simplest thing in the world. The people over there had powers; all they had to do to get powers was to head over there. Some might well have no idea what triggers were, or they might have bought into one of the various other theories out there, some intentionally obscuring the truth. They didn’t know better.

Well, the screaming should have given them pause, but that might have been balanced out by the fact that they felt especially powerless at this time in particular. Because we were only two years after the most catastrophic and traumatic loss of human life in history. Because as much as we were recovering, we were far from being where we’d been. We weren’t okay. The dispute between the citizen workers and the construction administrations only brought that home.

Rationally, I knew that.

Less rationally, I had a weak point that extended well before the Gold Morning, well before the hospital stay, well before the Slaughterhouse Nine, before the bad days against Empire Eighty-Eight, before my trigger, even. I’d spent a fair portion of my time post-trigger and especially in the hospital, thinking about it.

I couldn’t fucking stand being ignored.

I flew to intercept.

I hadn’t practiced with this power enough. Even using it was a hard reminder, with a mental and emotional cost. I knew I needed to come to terms with it, and my time at the hospital had been an early foray into that.

That had been flight, and my flight was more or less untouched.

I flew low, approaching a car. As with the tree, all of my powers were up and active as I reached out in the car’s direction. Phantom hands dug into the metal of the car’s body, invisible fingers stabbing through. A mass of something pressed down on the hood, caving it in.

If I had any control over those limbs, it wasn’t something that lent itself to fine touches. It didn’t work well with the careful, methodical, warrior monk approach. In this, in the instinct and the moment of frustration, I could only hope that what I wanted and what my power wanted were mostly in agreement.