Amber stared bleakly at the coffin. She had cried and cried over the past couple of days, and now had no tears left.
Her family had moved from half a country away to Tulsa to being with her grandparents when they learned that her grandfather was in hospital. Her father had moved away from home when he went to college, and then ended up staying away after he had met her mother. Although they only really got to see each other at Christmas, and the occasional summer holidays, Amber felt close to her grandparents, and the death of her grandfather came as a shock to them all.
Amber's family was going to move in with her grandmother. Both to look after her and to take over the family business. Her family was the only one out of her aunts and uncles who was able to make the transition, and it seemed to happen by default more than anything else.
Amber knew they were going to move, but it hadn't really clicked yet. All she could think about was how much she missed her grandfather.
The music began to play again, as her father, uncles, and a couple of ours, lifted the coffin and started walking down the asile to put it in the car for the progression down to the cemetary.
**********
Later, at the wake, Amber had found a seat alone in a corner when one of her cousins spotted her.
"Long time, no see."
Amber looked up and smiled.
"It has been a few years, huh? How have you been."
"Oh, good, good. One more year of school, and then I'm gonna go tour Europe for three months," she giggled, "I keep making plans, and then changing them because I've discovered something new I can do over there."
She rubbed her hands together eagerly.
"Got a summer job so I can save up."
"Cool," Amber replied.
"What about you?"
"Oh nothing exciting, really. Well, we're going to be moving in with Grandma, anyway."
"Oh, yeah, that's right. I remember hearing Dad saying something about that," her cousin mused. "Say... you ever figure out what your power was?"
Amber shook her head. Every Dathrian had a speciality power - every Dathrian except her, apparently. At first, no one was concerned, after all, when you're a kids, your power, just like your body, needs a chance to develop - even those who's powers are evident from the womb. But the years passed, and Amber was never able to do anything power like, beyond atom manipulation. This lack had grown to be a rather sore spot. She felt like she had been born deformed or something. And it wasn't like she was half human - having atom manipulation but no speciality power wasn't uncommon in the hybrids.
Amber had even been to see some power specialists over the years. She had endured a great number of tests and scans, and even the proffessionals were perplexed. There was no evidence of any mental or physical enhancements, and no signs of any empathic or spiritual powers could be found. She had even worked with a couple of therapists, but nothing came of it. Her brothers enjoyed teasing her about it, although not very often after a few demonstrations explaining that she didn't need powers to get revenge got through to them.
"That sucks," her cousin commented.
"I'm kinda used to it now," Amber lied.
Amber really didn't think there was anything she wanted more than to have a power. Her parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, alien and mutant friends all had powers and demonstrations of them tended to make her envious and sometimes a little depressed. On the flip side, however, Amber had become much more proficient with her atom manipulation than most of them, and the occasional show off (and reactions to said show off), seemed to compensate.