Chapter Two: Trapped

Timmy had limped to where the gateway had been just a few short hours before. Now all that was left was fallen ashes and sparkles of magic. they gleamed and twinkled before dimming as they fell over the white snow. A few small fires encompassed the rocks.

He began to panic, and then realized this is what he wanted. This was his wish to spend his life with Tecna. "Not like this!" He yelled, taking a rock and throwing it against the gateways old frame. Suddenly, his thoughts rushed to him again. Had he made it out of here, how would his life had ended up? Full of never ending sadness at the loss of the only woman he'd ever loved? At least here he could die in a place close to her.

He resolved to being trapped here forever. In fact, he smiled.

A moment of silence marked the true realization that he was stuck here. In Omega. Forever. Those thoughts seemed threatening enough on their own without the fact that this was a frozen prison. Dozens of criminals resided here, each encompassed in a six inch thick sheet of ice. However, what would become of him if one of them got loose? Timmy fumbled around his pockets and his knapsack for any sort of weapon to arm himself.

As he shifted through his pocket, his hands entangled around the only picture of Tecna he dared to keep with him, just in case it fell out or got ruined in battle. This picture was taken on the last day of school last year. He remembered the feeling of putting his arms around her and just holding her watching the others having fun with their games. She was so beautiful on that day to him, more than usual. Her laughter lit him with electricity that day. Her teal eyes glistened... He shook his head to clear his mind and stuffed the picture deep into his pocket. He decided to search his knapsack next and to his surprise, he managed to find a stun gun, a laser gun, and (his favorite) a yellow rapier. He fastened the weapons to his belt and went through what other provisions he had. Two dozen packs of dried food, a week's supply of water packets, water purifiers, gloves, heat pads, and a blanket.

In other words, enough supplies to last a week camping on earth. Not enough supplies to survive a week in Omega.

Timmy set an eternal clock: one week to find his love. He would go from there with deciding a plan of escape with her. His stomach filled with a feeling of warmness; he was going to find her, feel her skin, and kiss her lips. He wasn't going down without a fight.

Setting the pack upon his shoulders, he took the blanket from the pack and wrapped it around his ankle for a makeshift stint. Surely, it wasn't broken, just sprained. He took careful baby steps towards the ledge of the trench. Timmy flashed the light from the flashlight down to skim the lower ledges once more. He wanted to find out who - or what - the earlier screams had belonged to.

"Err...H-hello? Anybody down there?" He called down. His breath was white as it hit the frozen air around him. Almost as white as his face when a response came floating upwards to his ears.

"Y-yes...Down...I-i have..." the voice dissipated into a chorus of coughs.

He couldn't make out the voice, if it belonged to a man or female and his heart hoped it belonged to his beloved. "Listen...can you tell me your name?"

Minutes passed.

No response.

"Please. Please, just respond. I need you to answer." Timmy began to shiver with anticipation. "I need to know if you are Tecna." He added beneath his breath.

"I-I d-d-on't know..." the voice suddenly sobbed.

Timmy cried out. "I'm coming for you!"

He shakily made his way to the very edge of the ledge and began his decent down. His fingers stuck like glue to the ledge whilst his feet shifted gracefully from foothold to foothold. The air was getting colder, the light was quickly falling towards darkness. A slip of his hands had Timmy almost free falling for a moment, until he regained control. After that slip, his heart continuously was beating in his chest and all he heard was the sound of blood rushing in his ears. The only thing that kept him moving was the thought of Tecna in his arms once again.

Magenta hair...teal eyes...he would do anything for.

Finally, his feet landed on what seemed like a flat ledge. He pulled the flashlight out and scanned the area. Nothing more than ice and a few discarded rocks at the bottom of the trench. His glance upwards served only to measure how much he had traveled, probably a good thirty feet in ten minutes. He only had those once pesky robe-climbing exercises at Red Fountain to thank.

"So...I'm here. Call out!"

"P-please...come..."

Timmy followed the sound quickly, scanning the flashlight around to find the person. He eyes seemed to deceive him when they fell upon...

A man.

A limp, dying man wrapped in fetal position. His straggly hair laid across his forehead, his beard was grown out (an unfitting feature, Timmy felt he should add), and scars lined across his cheeks in almost a showoff way. His only clothing was the black and white striped prison suit every criminal was required to wear when they are frozen...

Criminal?!

Timmy jumped back, dropping the flashlight so that only a strip of light shone across the criminals' belly. He retrieved his laser gun and pointed it in the man's direction. "D-don't do a-anything s-s-stupid! I'm warning you!"

The man chuckled slightly, the laugh changing quickly into a fit of coughing. "Damn cough!" He exclaimed, pushing himself into a sitting position. He held his hand out to Timmy. "Look, son, don't worry yourself! I'm harmless! There's something here that yo-"

Timmy scoffed, "please, you're a freaking criminal in the Omega! I'm not going to believe for a second that you are harmless!"

The man's eyes suddenly shifted behind Timmy. "Kid, I'm telling ya, I'm harmless. But here's some food for thought: that ice worm behind you is quite the opposite!"

Timmy turned around in a flash, surprised to see a giant, twenty foot worm towering over him and the man. The flashlight shined just enough to showcase the blue, bumpy and yet oily skin of the worm. It leaned forward and let out a guttural screech.

Both Timmy and the man followed suit.