WI #4 - LIKE WATER, YA Contemporary Sci-Fi

Title: LIKE WATER
Word Count: 75,000
Genre: YA LGBT Contemporary Sci-Fi

System(s) of Oppression: Homophobia, Family Privilege
Author's Identity: [removed], family estrangement/broken home

Query: 

Seventeen-year-old Micah Donaldson's no savior. All he wants is to keep his sexuality under the radar until graduation and get the hell out of town where he can escape the daily reminders of his twin's death.

But finding a half-drowned teen in the exact spot his brother was discovered dead breaks open barely healed wounds. Especially when the boy, who calls himself Jude, claims his brother was involved in psychic terrorism and he needs Micah's help to put a stop to it. If it's true, then his brother's drowning was no accident and there's something big going down at the Gilbert Academy.

Impersonating his twin, Micah sinks deeper into Jude's world, and finds himself racing the clock to find the missing piece of the Volumna Device, a giant psychic amplifier, before he's discovered a fraud. Or worse, the megalomaniacal leader of the group finds it and usurps the world's freewill.

There's just two problems: he's got zero psychic ability, and he's got a sinking suspicion the guy he's falling for is in on the whole thing.

First 250:

The first time a body washed up on the beach I wished for an asteroid the size of Texas to take the rest of us out. Because I wasn't strong enough to end it all myself. Because I knew he would be so mad at me if I even tried. But a random act of nature? I really couldn't be blamed for that, no matter how many gods I begged. And trust me, there was begging. And rash promises. Enough failed holy (and not so holy) summonings will leave a guy pretty numb.

Probably why, when the second body came to shore, I wasn't exactly surprised.

“Shit.” I took off across the beach. I hadn't moved that fast in weeks. Not mentally anyway. I'd gotten pretty good at faking the physical stuff. Which was a good thing because the sand was loose and uneven and my shoes weren't exactly helping keep me upright. I slid to a clumsy stop next to the guy lying face down in the sand as my brain struggled to kick start synapses I hadn't used in way too long. No shirt, no shoes, just a soaked pair of black shorts and a mess of dark, curling hair protected him from the chilly spring breeze.

“Oh, man.” My hands shook as my stomach heaved. There went all that blessed numbness. One second I was as Zen as I could be, the next it felt like if I didn't brace myself I'd shatter into a million pieces and they'd never be able to pick me out of the sand.