Override (Glitch)

I’d been afraid my power was too much for a human body, but now that I’d managed control, all I could do was revel in it. My focus was sharp as I imagined molding myself and the rock together into one entity.
    I am that .
    I lifted the half-ton weight with ease, dropped it down, then lifted it again three times.
    When I put it down the last time and opened my eyes, I felt Rand’s and Taylor’s stares.
    “Whoa,” Rand said.
    Relief and anxiety both reared up in my chest. I’d passed the test and I felt ready, but at the same time, I’d never been truly tested in a mission before. Taylor led us back toward the elevator. I hurried after her, but when we got to the elevator, Adrien stepped out.
    “Adrien,” I said in surprise. “What are you doing here?” We’d both been so busy with our separate training schedules that I’d barely seen him the past couple weeks.
    He smiled. “I hoped I’d catch you. I thought since you were in your suit already maybe I could show you something.”
    He looked at the General standing beside me and the edges of his smile drooped a little. “General,” he said with a slight nod.
    She stiffened, but nodded back before stepping into the elevator.
    I stared a moment, watching the General frown as the doors closed behind her. “Sometimes I don’t think the General likes glitchers.”
    “She might not like us,” Adrien said, “but she knows she needs us.”
    He looked down at the clock on his arm panel. “Come on, we’ve gotta go or we’re going to miss it.”
    The grin was back on his face as he tugged on my arm and led me toward the bright Surface opening. As we got closer, the sunlight almost hurt my eyes, it was so intense. A small wave of anxiety swept over me. I knew I could trust my suit to protect me, but the Surface still filled me with an instinctual fear.
    The light cut a sharp line at the end of the tunnel, like a dividing edge between underground and the Surface. I paused at the shadow’s edge.
    Adrien had walked straight into the light. He held out a hand to me, and finally I reached for it. We stood there, arms stretched out between us for a long moment, one in sunlight, the other shadow, until he tugged me forward.
    “Good,” he murmured, looking out. “We got here right at sunset.”
    My eyes widened when I realized we were at the edge of a cliffside. Brush and tree branches extended overhead and around us to the side, but there was still a clear view of the valley and mountains in the distance.
    “Amazing, isn’t it?” Adrien whispered. “I thought you might like to remember what beauty looks like. That, out there, that’s freedom. Beauty. Life. Everything we’re fighting for.”
    Mountain ranges spilled over each other, cascading down as if they’d been planted there just for the purpose of looking pretty. Peaks one after another, each giving dramatic backdrop to the last. And then there was the sky, full of colors like I’d never seen before. Purples, blues, pinks, and other hues everywhere in between.
    I’d never thought of the Surface as beautiful. It was always a scary place, but the scene in front of me made my breath catch in my chest.
    “It’s incredible,” I admitted with surprise. I turned to look at Adrien. The setting sun lit up his blue-green eyes, making them brilliantly translucent against the black of his pupils. He seemed so much lighter than he had been the last time we’d been alone together. Less weighed down. Even the shadows under his eyes didn’t seem as deep.
    “There was a place like this where Mom and I lived for six months, in a cave up in the mountains. Every morning I’d walk down to this little stream that was half a mile from the cave. Everything was so green. Mom was always tense and on the lookout for flyovers. But I just looked.”
    His eyes were bright as he talked. “I’d sit for hours underneath one of the thick trees near the cave. All kinds of animals would come up to me after awhile, if I sat still long enough. Squirrels would run right over my legs like I was just part of the tree roots, and I’d get this amazing sense of connection to everything around me. Life calling to life.”
    He looked down, his smile dimming slightly. “I forgot about it for a while when I was training so hard to become a Rez operative. But you brought it back to me. It’s how I felt when I met you too, you know.”
    “Like what?”
    “First when I had visions of you, and then after I met you in person, I