She thrashes, finds the bottom and pushes off of it, and comes up spluttering. What the heck was that?!? She starts toward the shore, not swimming properly but half-walking through the neck-deep water, pulling herself along with her arms. Even so, the disorientation remains, and several times she loses her footing, dipping underwater for several alarming moments before finding her way to the air again.

She makes it to the shallows and stops, braced on all fours, coughing out saltwater. "Julie," she croaks, spits out sand, and looks around; this makes her surroundings spin even worse. She can't make out her sister among the kaleidoscope of people. "Julie!" she yells, loud so her voice will rise above the crowd -- and thankfully, her sister hears her.

"Mai? What happened?"
"Just -- I need to lie down. Help me there --" Clinging to her sister, she makes it over unsteady ground to their towel, where she collapses on her back with an arm over her eyes.
"Do you want water, or anything --"
"No!" She winces at her own tone. "Sorry. I just need to lie still for a bit." The world spins and spins.

Lying down doesn't help. If anything, the spinning gets worse. Why? She's never had any problems like this before; the biggest health issue she has is that she should probably get glasses soon! Something must have happened, but what could have possibly happened while she was swimming that affected her so quickly --

Oh. "Julie?" she says.

"Yeah?" says her sister at once, from where she's been hovering.

"We'd better -- we'd better go to the hospital." She swallows. "I think I might have been stung by a jellyfish."

Julie calls a car, and helps her into it. During the ride, Mai keeps her fingers clenched on the door handle and her head pressed back into the headrest, and manages, barely, not to throw up. They're met in front of the hospital by their mom, who Julie also called; the three of them make their way inside.

Mai tries to answer questions.

"No, I didn't notice it happening."

"No, there isn't any pain at all, I'm just -- really dizzy --"

"Yes, nausea, I think -- I think I'm going to --" But it's too late; she loses the battle against throwing up.

They won't let her lie on her back. She's placed on her side instead, while they run tests and talk back and forth over her head. Her mom squeezes her hand and she squeezes back with both hands at once, gripping as tightly as though her mom's hand is a lifeline, the only anchor she has to keep her from whirling away and disintegrating into pieces. It doesn't really help.

She lies as still as she possibly can, stiller than she had known she was capable of. She breathes in and out, in and out, in and out. The world reels relentlessly around her, carrying her along for the ride.

It doesn't stop.

Her mom tells her -- she manages, eventually, to pay enough attention to process it -- that they say she hasn't been stung by a jellyfish after all; the not knowing only makes it worse.

She hears the word "awakening" once or twice, in speculative tones, before it spins away with all the other words, out of her grasp.

They give her drugs. Things go hazier for a while, and she swirls in a muffled half-nightmare filled with carousels and out-of-control carnival rides.

She thinks she vomits again.

She must sleep, eventually, because eventually she wakes.

She's starting to forget what it was like for the world to ever hold still. Sometimes she pulls her awareness inward, clinging to the bedrail in front of her, trying to escape the ever-spinning by staying as small and still as possible. Other times she lets herself be swept along by the current, kicking out and even raising her head, trying to understand what she sees as the world whirls past her. Sometimes one or both strategies make her throw up. Nothing really helps.

Often, when she looks, her mom is there; often, her dad. Sometimes her sister, and even her brother Noah; he must have taken the train back from university. It's a little bit better when her family is there, when she can hear them around her and know that the world hasn't spun itself apart, that it's only her. She manages to tell them so.

Time passes. Her family starts looking at her eyes, every now and then. It's her mom who tells her: "Your eyes, they're getting purpler. We're sure of it, now. That means you're awakening! This will be over in a few more days, and then you're going to be an esper!"

Really? Her? An esper?

...An esper. That means what's happening right now is backlash; that means this is her hellweek; that means this isn't just a terrible malady that's afflicted her for no reason, that it's going to be worth something in the end.

"Good," Mai grits out. Stops, swallows, breathes in and out -- doesn't throw up. "I'd better -- I'd better get some really good powers to make up for this."

Her mother laughs, a little, as though it's a joke. It isn't.

Time passes. The world spins, and she spins with it. It doesn't stop.

It doesn't stop.

It doesn't stop why won't it stop why won't it STOP WHY WON'T IT STOP --

It stops.

It's a gradual thing. She starts to become more aware of how badly her fingers are cramping, from where they've been locked in place around the bedrail; she realizes her grip has loosened, and the endless spinning has slowed to a lazy whirl. It's evening. Something is beeping. Her throat is dry and scratchy, and her muscles ache.

"It's stopping," she mumbles. Her sister rushes to hug her; her dad calls someone in. The world slows, and slows, and slows,

and at last is still.

She goes home.

She feels strange and lightheaded for a while, wobbly on her feet, as though she's been at sea and needs to regain her land legs; but soon enough, that too fades. She can stand up straight again, and walk; and the world holds steady around her, and the ground does not move beneath her feet.

When she runs the faucet, she feels something new, something she could do with the moving water. She can't help flinching away. It's fine, though; she simply won't use her power, not till she has someone to guide away the backlash.

She wants to know what she can do, though! She quits her summer internship; they wanted a week's notice, but are willing to count the week she's already been out. She spends her time figuring out esper things, instead. She works out a power testing arrangement and shows up, eager to experiment --

And after all that, her power isn't even good for anything.

It turns out she can spin things. Water, air, other fluids -- ideally ones that are already moving. She can stir drinks; she can cool a stuffy room with a breeze. She could make a sizable whirlpool -- if she wanted to be knocked flat by backlash, too dizzy to move.

Yay her.

She gets her backlash guided off. She goes home. She curls up in her bed, for a while, and cries.

She gets up and slaps her face lightly, back and forth. So she's not a superhero after all, so what! She sure hadn't expected to be, this time last month! She still got lucky. She'll never have to worry about money; she's very fit, which she honestly really enjoys; she won't have to get glasses after all, which might be worth it just on its own. And she's so pretty, now, that's nothing to be thrown away either.

Her hair is coming in a lovely new color. She shaves her head.

And she gets ready to go to mixers. She may not be a superhero, but she's totally an esper; she can guide the superheroes (or the construction workers, or the weather stabilizers, or whoever does whatever important things with their power). She could get a job as an esper-tester; she could learn to run some sort of finicky uninterruptible machinery. Heck, maybe she can be a model.

Maybe she'll even figure out something to do with her own power, someday.

There are all sorts of things to learn, and all sorts of things to do.