Yes yes yes! I'm thinking that Zed will make a few friends, but be unable to tell them about his mission (by command of Aunt Hermione, obviously). Maybe they get pulled into helping out (feels a little cliche to me, but could be really fun to RP) or Zed abandons the mission (my personal preference)?

@Bakerloo I think that the THSYP is going to be evil so Zed could pull in a couple friends and try to stop it? It is your charrie though so do what you want to! I feel like Blake and Zed would have a love hate relationship! 

~Alec

I just got very uncomfortable. If this girl can see ghosts can she see my mom? I just became very self aware of how many people here can know about me just by looking at me. There has to be at least one mind reader in the group.  

I shiver.

~Blake

I kind of stand there in shock. Poppy can see dead people. So it's not just me and Wonderboy. I'm sure others have powers of some sort but Now there's three of us for sure. I still don't know why Alec is here but We'll figure it out. 

"How many people do you see now? Are they from olden times?" I ask.

"Blake." Alec says sternley.

Poppy is kind of in shock, "I don't think we should be here," She says softly.  

"Hey, listen," Alec looks right into her eyes, "We won't let anything bad happen to you,"

I give him a strange look. He gives me one that says "later". 

We look at Poppy to guage her reaction.  

Poppy~~~

I blink, trying hard to pay attention to Blake and Alec. Once the ghosts realized that I could see them they all started to talk, loudly, to me. 

"We won't let anything bad happen to you." Alec said, slightly surprising me.

I grin at him, how sweet!

"Thanks." I say. 

"There are a lot of ghosts here, too." I admit, then blink as one sticks his head through Alec.

"We're tying to talk to you!" the ghost says.

"Um... excuse me," I say akwardly. "But I'm going to have to excuse myself... the ghosts are wanting to talk." 

They blink at me in surprise and as I hurry away to a quiet area, to seemingly talk to myself. 

~~~~~~~ 

When are we going to get to the school? I feel like we should be moving on from the park soon...  

@Moonlight

Yes, I'm pretty sure that the THSYP is evil, but Aunt Hermione is also pretty morally gray and is a very "ends justify the means" kind of person (kidnapping a child so that the child can't be kidnapped by other people? yeah, not great). Zed might be torn between the friends and amenities at the THSYP and the "security" that Aunt Hermione offers.

~~~~~~

I've been sitting on the bench for a long while now - it's nearly 2:45. Other children have shown up, bringing along their hopes, dreams, and worries, which were now all streaming directly into my head. Someone - a girl? - was sad because no-one liked something she had done...someone was trying to remember where they had heard my name before...several people were slowly working out the fact that they had powers...that's it, Zed Doughtry, the guy who won the thing. Yep. That's me. I can see people glancing at me out of the corners of their eyes. They've all heard of me - everyone has. When I won, tons of letters came into the studio where they filmed "Best of the Best". The most creative name. Imagine the board meeting where they came up with that one! Aunt Hermione never let me see the letters, but she had told me what they said. A lot of people telling me they now believed in magic, a few deniers, saying I was a fraud, even fewer telling me about the strange powers they had, and how seeing me on television had let them know they weren't alone. Most people believed I just had really clever tricks, "smoke and mirrors" as Aunt Hermione had put it, but according to one boy, "I could just feel that it was all you".

What is a kid like Wonderboy doing here? He won a million dollars - he should be in LA.

...What did the letter say about superpowers? Just a place to look for extraordinary people, or some such...

I don't believe it. That's him.

I sink down in my seat and put a hand to my forehead. I cast my mind back to when Aunt Hermione had taught me about mind reading, trying to think of something - anything - to block out everybody. Generally speaking, there are two types of mind-readers - what must they all think of me? -active mind-readers and passive mind-readers. Active mind-readers must tap into other people's minds to tell - no, it's definitely him. It's been years, but it's him - what they're thinking; passive mind-readers can "hear" other people's thought processes effortlessly - how did she do that? - and can only block them out with practice. I get up off the bench, pick up my bag, and go to sit under a tree on the edge of the park. Hopefully some distance will help block everyone out; after years of training, I still can't manage to do it with my mind alone. I sit down and pick up the stopwatch. Holding it as still as possible, I take a picture of the group by pressing the button. There is a tiny click.

What is he doing here? I thought he disappeared.

I lower the stopwatch. A man has just stepped out of the bus. He's traded his grey suit and Homburg for a white button down shirt and khakis, and he's missing a lot of his hair, but it's definitely him. 

The guy from the school system.

Poppy~~~

The lady by the truck finally got tired of waiting for the rest of the people to arrive.

"Well... if they aren't coming then they aren't coming. I've been waiting for thirty minutes now! If they come late, oh well." she growled to herself.

"OK," she shouted. "Listen up, we're shoving off. Grab your bags and shove 'em in these here compartments. When you're done hop in the bus and we'll shove off." 

A rush of extitement filled the air, here we go! Finally going somewhere instead of akwardly looking at everyone. I quickly shoved my bag into the bus's storage and took a seat at the front, next to the window.

Someone sat next to me, so I looked over and said

"Hello!" 

~~~~~~

Just a heads up, I'm going to be really busy come Tuesday and beyond... so I probably won't be able to post as much, but I don't plan on dropping out of this! 

Top! Top! Top!

Saylor~

"Ok!" calls the lady leaning on the car behind her. "If they're not coming they're not coming! Grab your bags and shove 'em in this here compartment, and then we're shovin' off!"

I wipe a my tears away and grab my bag, walking to the trunk of the car. Then I hop inside and sit down. The interior of the car isn't half bad, the windows are tinted very dark, so dark you can barely see outside yourself! Get ahold of yourself now, I think, now that we're all in this car together there is probably going to be more conversation, so be friendly.  

The Woman call us to get in the bus so I grab my bags and hop in. I grab a seat all the way in the front, ready to meet somebody! (I just realized that-oops- this whole time I’ve been roleplaying and Skiies at nighttime, becuase of her personality and also that she was using her powers which she can’t in the daytime and afternoon owo) I wait impatiently for someone to sit neit to me, and when they do I happily, well, I may have shouted a touch, say “Hi! What’s your name and your powers?!”

Icy's POV
I sit next to the girl who spraypainted the bench then wiped it clean. I have no idea why. She turns to me and says, rather loudly, "Hi! What's your name and your powers?!" I cringe. "Volume, Vandal. Inside voices!" And that's when she recognizes me. She....deflates alittle, and I realize I shouldn't have called her Vandal. "Sorry," I say, and move over and back a bit to an empty seat. I stuff my duffel, which has too many things of importance (like notebooks, and pens, and regular books, etc.) to be left in the trunk, under the seat, and listen to the hubbub of voices. Two in particular pricks at me:
"More importantly, do you have powers?" That's Sophie. "We all figured that some of us have them. Do you?"

Then another I don't recognize. "Y-yes..."

"What are they?" Sophie again.

I sigh. Already heckling poor, innocent children.