super speed and other exceptional abilities

[self_composed]

Wisconsin fast plants (so called because they are from Wisconsin, fast-growing, and plants) are the subject of Bella and Bridget's chosen bio experiment. It involves taking at least some measurements after sunset - Bella managed to find an exact specific experiment design that hasn't been done before, when she heard they were allowed to choose their own, and even though all it will determine is whether indoor plants without windows can "tell if it's night" even if you leave the light on all the time, she is slightly excited about this.

She meets Bridget there. They measure their plants in the lit room and the dark room, take pictures, and write down subjective evaluations of leaf droopiness. They leave.

They're about a third of the way to Bella's building when a man's voice behind them says, "Hello, girls."

Comments

[regularsized]

"Skipping most of the irrelevant details: I have been whisked away to a lab, it is not my favourite memory, and I have reason to believe it won't happen again."

[self_composed]

"Please, lay on the irrelevant details," says Bella, finding this explanation unsatisfactory.

[regularsized]

"Not my favourite memory," she repeats firmly.

[self_composed]

Bella is displeased. She files this away for later. "Fine. At least tell me how careful I have to be about telling other people."

[regularsized]

"I would appreciate it very much if you didn't mention my superpowers to anyone who doesn't already know."

[self_composed]

"Do I know anyone who already knows, at this time?"

Also, Alice totally already knows. Har har.

[regularsized]

"All our mutual acquaintances are your friends," Bridget points out, "and I haven't told any of them."

[self_composed]

"Didn't think so. Okay."

Bella looks at the ceiling. "Anyone else you may get around to telling eventually?"

[regularsized]

"That you know? Probably not."

[self_composed]

"Okay."

Bella takes out her phone and glances at the time. "And with that, I think I'm out of questions if I think of one more on the way out or not - I should head home. I'll see you in class."

[regularsized]

"See you," Bridget says agreeably.

[self_composed]

Bella lets herself out, hops on Tegu, and drives back to the dorm the way she came.

[So apparently I'm not the only person with a random power. I suppose this was more likely than me happening to have something that only happens to one in billions of people. The fact that I met one suggests that they're either pretty common - or there's a selection effect.]

Pause.

[Second possibility: slightly worrying.]

[edgeofyourseat]

[...What's a selection effect?]

[self_composed]

[Imagine you say that your club is open to everybody, and then you only advertise that it exists in yacht clubs. You are going to get people who have yachts. Anything that filters who you're looking at like that. I'm not sure I like the idea that someone or something is filtering who I look at so I get magic people. But it's only one - you weren't magic till after understood causes unrolled - so perhaps I'm only paranoid.]

[edgeofyourseat]

[Maybe you have a magic stalker,] he says whimsically.

[self_composed]

[Gah. That'd be bad.]

Bella thinks about it. [I don't think Bridget planned to get shot. I invited her on my own initiative to walk with me as far as my dorm - although it's possible she'd have invited herself along if I hadn't. I could have biked to and from - though it's possible that she just knows how I get around campus normally. We could have gone a different route - but I wouldn't necessarily notice if she were doing something subtle with her body language to steer me, and I didn't notice the guy until he was right behind us anyway so who knows how long he was tailing us. Hm.]

[edgeofyourseat]

[Maybe you've both got a magic stalker,] Alice hypothesizes. He doesn't know why he finds the vague notion of a mysterious individual arranging to have magical people meet each other so hilarious.

[self_composed]

[The stalker would still need a way to find out that we have magic. You and me and Charlie are the only ones who know about me. Unless they have some other way to find out than being told and used it before or around the protective wishes, or have been spying on me in great detail without already knowing about the magic and picked up on a suspicious discrepancy that way.]

Bella chews on her lip as she ascends the stairs to her room. She waves to Janine, if she's awake, and starts changing for bed; it's late.

[I suppose I'm not immune to non-mental spying. One moment while I design something to fix that.]

[edgeofyourseat]

[How do you make yourself immune to spying?] he wonders.

[self_composed]

[I am working on that. I think it'd cause more problems than it solves for people to mysteriously go blind if they look at me when I can't tell they're there - but mechanical bugs and magical divination, I think I can do. In the case of the bugs, I just happen to always be indistinct if that's plausible - image goes grainy, my voice is an indiscernible mumble - and the device outright malfunctions and quits bugging if that wouldn't make sense. Magical spying says I'm a null result, if they're looking for something specific I'm not that - if they're looking for me, I don't exist. This does have the drawback that someone who is already looking for me can tell that something unusual is going on. But we know that there exist natural superpowers - mine and Bridget's - and a reasonably competent magic stalker knows that too. Hmm.]

[edgeofyourseat]

[And I want my Bella-compass to still work,] Alice puts in. [I like my Bella-compass.]

[self_composed]

[I can add an exception for you and your Bella-compass,] she agrees, pondering.

[edgeofyourseat]

[Awesome.]

Alice ponders, too.

It occurs to him that anyone who doesn't know magic exists will find it incredibly suspicious that this one person just happens to be completely unrecordable. But maybe Bella doesn't care about that.

[self_composed]

[I don't think I'm being spied on a lot by random people. Nobody cares about security camera footage unless a crime is going on. But it can be suppressible like everything else. Maybe I should add a bug-sensing component so I can be more judicious about what I do and don't block.]

[edgeofyourseat]

[People spy on each other all the time, though, and if you just happen to get in the way enough times...]