Krystal
When I woke up, I thought I was dreaming, or still in the portal. I couldn’t see anything, but I could smell some sort of grain. Like flour or something. I realized that a flour sack covered my head. And of course my hands and feet were tied.
As far as I could tell, I was sitting still. I was on a soft surface that definitely wasn’t grass. It felt sort of like those special mattresses that mold to your body.
Inevitably, I had started to panic. I calmed myself and tried to remember what Madara had told me to do if I was ever captured. Apparently, I had been captured.
I was supposed to appear as if I was unconscious, which wasn’t very hard, seeing as I didn’t think I could move if I wanted to. My body felt so heavy, like I weighed 200 lbs instead of 103 (point 6).
There was a funny taste in my mouth. It reminded me of the smell in doctors’ offices back on Earth. I started panicking again. Oh, my gosh what happened? Where am I? Who’s here? Where’s everyone else?
That’s not exactly how I thought it. It was sort of all at the same time. I half-expected to feel Kyle’s arm around my shoulders. He was always there for me when things got heavy.
Suddenly, I rolled off of whatever I was sitting on and hit what I believed to be the ground. Hard. That’s gonna leave a mark, I commented dryly to myself.
Large hands grabbed me roughly. And I mean “large” hands. Whoever it was could cover my whole arm with his hand. I got lifted at least 10 feet in the air, my feet dangling over nowhere. I stiffened up, and practically heard Madara yelling at me.
The bag was ripped off of my head, taking chunks of my hair with it. Too bad Lorik never actually got around to teaching me that hair trick, I griped, irritated.
To my surprise, I wasn’t blinded by light. Wherever I was, the sun wasn’t very strong. Or it was evening. I was in a small-looking, dirty village populated with huge, cone-shaped huts.
Right away I saw Wynn, similarly bound, and with a sack still over his head. I reached out to his mind. For a brief second I smirked to myself. It’s prohibited to access another’s mind uninvited unless you have a constant connection with them. Oh well. Hopefully the Board would make an exception.
WYNN!
No need to shout, he responded. His “voice” was a little slurred, like he’d been on morphine for the past 24 hours.
Sorry, I said in a softer voice. Of course, I just had to think of Kelta as I said it to him. I’m not all that good at controlling thoughts that other people see while mind speaking with me.
Kelta…is she okay? Wynn asked.
Uh, sorry dude but we’re kind of…you know…in trouble.
You weren’t supposed to hear that, he retorted.
I was going to apologize again, but I was distracted by blood running into my eyes. Do you know how much that hurts? Try mixing cornstarch and water, and then add about a gallon of salt and rub it into your eyes. Make sure the mixture is steaming hot.
The giant squeezed my abdomen so hard that I couldn’t breathe. Yes, it was a giant. At first I thought it was a Cyclops because of the one large brown eye in the center of its head, but then I noticed two smaller eyes on either side of it. So, it was a Three-clops. And there was another one behind us. I could sense its brain. Barely; these creatures weren’t all that bright.
It spoke to its companion in a garbled, mangled language that I couldn’t have understood if I had wanted to.
I still couldn’t breathe. I sent a jolt of energy through the man-beast, electrocuting him. Apparently I gave him too much, because his body shook with spasms violent enough to knock down a brick wall.
As soon as he let me go, he nearly trampled me to death under his huge feet. He had also dropped Wynn from his other hand, though I couldn’t see him anywhere. Where could he possibly be? The giant almost stomped on me again. Kôrspt yalra! I swore, using a expletive I had heard Lorik use often. As far as Kyle would tell me, it meant something like “May your bowels be slowly eaten away by bugs”. Apparently it’s a huge insult in Lorik’s world.
The Three-clops didn’t like that. He shakily stood to his feet and roared, beating his chest with dirty, oversized hands.
Men.
Wynn appeared next to me, and then disappeared again. I sought him out with my mind, connected, and then exploded. NICE! REAL NICE, WYNN! JUST GO AHEAD AND LEAVE WHENEVER YOU FEEL LIKE IT!
You should talk. You nearly killed me with your little stunt back there, he answered emotionlessly as we ran back down a winding road.
I had forgotten that Wynn’s body wasn’t electricity-proof like mine. I didn’t bother apologizing; I had saved our lives, hadn’t I?
Behind us, we heard primitive grunts and roars. I chanced a look behind us; they were close. More Three-clopses had joined them, some carrying wicked-looking spiked clubs. The spikes on those things were huge.
I whipped my head back around to Wynn, but he wasn’t there. WYNN! I shouted at him, wherever he was.
I’m right here. He appeared on my other side.
Quit doing that!
Quit doing what?
I didn’t bother responding with coherent thoughts; keeping up a connection with someone who can’t read Energy output is physically exhausting.
The Three-clopses were gaining on us. We were panting hard, and my sides were starting to hurt. Through what little remained of our connection, I could feel my Teammate grabbing for my attention. I distractedly acknowledged him.
Suddenly I went cross-eyed. Wynn was sending me a mental image, but the waves were all wrong. It only took a fraction of a second for me to sort it out. There was a hill off a few dozen meters to our right. It was covered with tall plants that resembled trees, and a few large boulders. I didn’t know what the heck he wanted to do, but I did know I was supposed to follow him.
I just did it. The way we were going, we’d die anyway. What did we have to lose?
We had almost reached the hill when Wynn drew a dagger, flipped his wrist, and made a cut on his wrist. He repeated the operation on my arm before I had time to protest.
As soon as the blade touched his skin, everything around us went blurry like it had in my Earth high school when Kyle and Lorik had first brought me to the Inborn Powers Training School.
…
I must have passed out, because the next thing I remember was waking up in Wynn’s arms. Well, this is awkward, I noted, carefully concealing my thoughts about Kelta. Now didn’t seem like the time to go “Hey, do you like Kelta?”
Once he saw that I was fully awake, Wynn moved away and waited for me to get up. I sat up, swayed, and found myself kissing the ground. In an attempt to roll over, I somehow managed to get my arms and legs confused.
A little help here? I prompted the tall Shadow Classman.
You looked like you had it under control, he responded, his mind tainted with mirth. I got the feeling that he was teasing me.
I growled and collected myself without his help.
“We’ve got to go back fro the others,” I slurred aloud. It took me a minute to remember how to rearrange my mind waves like Lorik had told me.
Wynn raised an eyebrow, as if to say “Really?”
I made a “duh” face back at him, and turned to go back towards the Three-clops village, but Wynn held me back.
