Chapter Twenty
One and a Half Years Later
I open my eyes to see that I'm on my back and staring at a blue sky. Groaning slightly, I sit up and look around to see seven other people sitting up as well. Sighing, I try to see if I can guess who's with me this time. Looking carefully, I see Erik and Victoria are rubbing their eyes a bit harder than the others are.
"Okay, who's actually here?" I ask, not wanting to try very hard to guess who's here with me today.
Erik and Victoria raise their hands, though none of the others do. Smiling at them, I push myself off the ground and walk over to them, giving them each a hand up. Looking at the other five, I see Brandon is rubbing his eyes again, making me wonder if he had just gotten here.
"Brandon?" I ask quietly.
"Yeah?" He mutters, obviously still disoriented. "Oh, yeah, it's me. I'm just getting adjusted to the sun. You know you're the only one of us that has no problems when you first get here. It's like you always have sun glasses on."
Snickering, I nod. "Well, when you're ready, you should try and get the others to join us in here."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're as bad as your sister; always bossing me around. It's easy to tell you two are related. I mean you two are so – Ow!" He stops as he rubs his side where I had just kicked him to make him shut up. "What did you do that for?"
"Brandon, you know why she kicked you," Erik says, walking up to him and offering him his hand. "You baited her on purpose, trying to see if she'd take the bait or not." Shaking his head after letting go of Brandon's hand, he sighs. "You should know better than to bait either of them. In fact, you should know not to bait any girl by now. You only live with two of them and have dreams with two others."
Brandon grumbles under his breath, obviously trying very hard not to be heard properly. "Fine…" He closes his eyes and faces the other four even though they aren't actually in the dreams. One by one, the other four start to rub their closed eyes, trying not to let any sunlight through their eyelids.
I smile as I watch Brandon using his power to drag the others into the dream. We had learned a while back that when Brandon's in a dream, he can drag in the other four, though not Erik or Victoria. Luckily, almost every time we have a dream, those two are both in it. It's probably because they're by me, the one whose world we use every single time.
Pretty soon we're all here and Kyle is making up stories about how he fought over fifty Erasers alone earlier that week. I know it's fake because Alexa is signing the real story to me from behind his back. All that had really happened was: he was put into a room with Erasers around the edges to make sure he actually did the tests. He never actually attacked them, just ignored them. I have to force myself not to laugh at it.
Everyone else talks about their testing this week and Erik tells the others about the different jokes he had told during the week. I roll my eyes at Victoria and Alexa while he does this. They both stifle laughs when they notice the movement from me.
Once we're all finally caught up on the week, Jen wants to go into the forest to climb trees while Victoria wants to swim and Shawn wants to fly. Groaning about the usual argument, I tell them that we'll all go to the lake by flying so that Shawn can fly, Victoria can swim, and Jen can climb the trees in the area surrounding the lake. This pleases all three of them, so we all take off, using the wind currents to have some fun flying.
Falling behind the group, I watch six of my friend enjoying the flight before looking down to see Erik running beneath us. He didn't want me to teleport him as he wants the chance to run for once. Sighing once again at his stubbornness, I watch Shawn using the air to do the more outrageous moves that would be impossible if it were for the fact that he's controlling the wind around him.
Finally getting to the lake, we all dive down and land along the shore of it, even though some of the others obviously want to dive right into it; we need to talk first. Jen starts to leave the group to go into the trees, but Shawn grabs her arm and shakes his head at her when she turns to glare at him. She's about to argue when the look on Shawn's face and the tightening of his wrist, though I'm the only one who noticed it, stop her argument in her throat.
"So what are we going to be doing while we're here?" Erik asks.
"I want to go climb in some trees!" Jen says, obviously anxious to get going.
"We know, Jen; we really do," I say, trying to calm her down while also telling her we're tired of this.
"Well I, for one, don't want to have a water fight with the four of you again! I'm tired of having to dodge more than water!" Erik states, obviously wanting to stop our normal game. He sees Victoria open her mouth and quickly acts. "Victoria, your water balls hurt. I'd rather be fighting normal waves of water, not spheres of it that you can control to follow us, even when we go under the water, when we duck, or when we turn. It's just not fair on the rest of us."
Looking at the four elemental users, I see that they understand, but they still resent what he's saying, no matter how true it is. This is the only way they get to use their powers together, so they don't want to give it up. They love using their powers, but for them, it isn't as much fun to work with them alone as it is to use them together, which is the only reason the rest of us have put up with unfair water fights.
"Why don't you four play your own game without the rest of us?" Brandon suddenly asks, looking around the group.
"Huh?" a confused Jen asks.
"I mean, why don't you four go down the river a bit and have a fight over there with elements." He pauses and thinks for a moment before adding a comment thoughtfully. "Well, as long as Erika doesn't mind." I shrug and he picks out my willingness from my head. "I guess that's an agreement."
Shawn hits his forehead with his palm and keeps it there, his eyes closed. "Why didn't we think of that before now? We've been doing this for a year already!"
"Yes, we have, but we haven't really tried to think of an alternative for you four," Alexa says matter-of-factly.
"I guess you're right," Shawn says slowly. "So how-"
"Erika!" Erik says suddenly, interrupting Shawn without even giving him a apologetic look, which means something is up.
"Yeah?"
"Is the sky changing color already?" I raise an eyebrow in his direction before looking up at the blue sky whose shade hasn't changed in the slightest since we got here.
"Nope." Erik looks down at his shifting feet quickly, not willing to say anything in response to my reply. "Not again, Erik!" I groan as I realize why he's asking about the shading of the sky.
"Sorry," Erik mutters quietly, still looking down at his feet.
"It's fine, Erik," I sigh, looking around at the others. Alexa, Brandon, and Victoria know what's going on, but the others have no idea as Erik's never woken up in the middle of dreams shared with them. Jen, Shawn, and Kyle's faces show their confusion while the other's have looks of sympathy and sorrow, though no anger is shown at all.
Erik's going to wake up in a minute; he needs to use the bathroom, Brandon says into my mind, obviously trying to tell everyone at once and not caring who hears. That or he's trying to make sure all of us are on the same page. I'm going with the latter as Erik's face is up a little, telling me he was startled by something.
It's a bad thing because he'll wake Erika up when he moves, stopping the dream, Brandon replies to an unspoken question.
She still falls asleep with her head on his chest as a pillow. It's nothing new. We've seen the memories of it from Victoria over and over. It's mostly just an inconvenience as once Erika's awake, we can't get back into a shared dream until the next time it happens. Brandon pauses for a moment to hear a reply before his face gets an annoyed look on it and his mental voice mirrors his look.
Kyle! It's not their fault that this is happening! If you don't get those thoughts out of your head, I'll let certain people in this group know what you're thinking. I hope you're ready for over a week with the wounds you'll get.
Looking around, I see Victoria and Erik are as amazed by Brandon's tone as I am. Oh, yeah, we've seen him angry before, but even while angry, he's always calm enough to talk – well, think in this case – normally. The fact that he's basically yelling through our minds as well as threatening Kyle is an amazing thing to hear.
Just as I'm about to say something, I notice my paradise getting darker quite suddenly. A quick glance around the group tells me that I'm the only one to notice it, forcing my head to look above me. The sky's shading is a deep purple, quickly going towards black, having skipped the colors in-between completely.
Sighing, I speak up, stopping the mental argument that obviously got personal, "Guys, Erik's almost awake. He's going to be out of here in a moment or two and then I'll be forced to follow him."
Alexa hugs me without saying anything verbally. Instead, she puts her right index finger, right middle finger, and right ring finger together with the other two tucked in, and presses them against my heart. A small smile gracing my lips, I copy her sign. I love you. It's a sign we came up with here in my paradise for only the two of us, none of the others ever even realizing we use it.
When we pull apart, I notice that not only is the sky black, but Erik's body is gone. With a final sigh and a wave for the others, I allow myself to be pulled out of my dream to the motion of Erik underneath me, trying to stop himself from squirming in his need to relieve himself.
I slowly lift my head from his chest, trying to do it in such a way that I can wake up and stop the chances of dizziness overcoming me. Erik, being used to this habit from every morning, finally stops moving long enough for me to get out of range of his body before he quickly sits up and moves over into the corner. I turn away from him and look over at Victoria's sleeping form, trying not to wish that I was in her position right now.
While she may have just been kicked out of the shared dream, she's still asleep, still dreaming. All of us may have nightmares here and there, me more than the others with my past and all, but we all have dreams before the nightmares. Victoria at least gets to enjoy her normal dreams for a while. It takes me a while to get back to sleep after Erik wakes me up like he just did.
I sigh quietly, causing Erik to turn around now that he's done and look at me with emotions flowing through his eyes: sorrow, sympathy, and apology. I smile lightly at him, letting him know that I don't blame him for this, that I understand that it isn't his fault. Relief joins the other emotions in his eyes, though the other emotions don't leave very much.
Sighing slightly at his worry, I motion him over to me again with my hand before patting the ground next to me on the exact place he had been laying just minutes before. Gratitude floods his entire body as he relaxes slightly and rejoins me in our section of the cage, lying back down on the metal floor in his normal position, his chest straight up and ready for me to use as a pillow.
Smiling down at him, I lay on my right side, my head on the center of his chest with my right ear listening to his heart beating at it's normal pace, slowing down as his body relaxes and begins to fall asleep. The movement of his chest slows as his breathing deepens, my own breath and heart doing the same. Closing my eyes lightly, I enjoy the sounds and feelings this brings to me, bringing a small smile to my face as I fall asleep.
For the first time since we started these shared dreams, I enter my paradise on my back and Erik's there to help me up. We're the only two in my paradise this time, sharing the dream alone. Smiling at each other, we go and spend the rest of the night at the lake, lying in the same positions here as we are in our cage in Itex, only moving to get slightly more comfortable or to talk almost silently. I never even notice when the sky gets darker and we begin to wake up, my eyes having closed in my own paradise as Erik and I are identical between Itex and the lake, both forms asleep in the same position.
"Erika, Erik," a voice calls, slowly dragging me out of my slumber. "It's time to get up." I don't want to open my eyes as I realize who it is trying to get us up. "You guys, it's time to get up!" Victoria calls again, confirming the thought in my mind that we aren't in my paradise anymore. "I know you two got up in the middle of the night for Erik's use of the bathroom, but this is pathetic!"
I feel Victoria grab my side, making me instinctively kick out with my leg left, the one on top and closest to her, to make her get away. Trying to burrow my head closer to Erik, while studiously ignoring Victoria and her muttered swears, I feel Erik silently laughing at the situation just as his left arm comes up to wrap around my waist. I stiffen slightly at the touch that he only uses once and a while, and usually while we're asleep so that I wake up to it, before I relax into the touch and feel myself begin to calm down from Victoria's wake-up.
"Victoria," Erik says while obviously trying to hold in a laugh, "next time you should make sure you're away from us when trying to wake us up. You know how badly Erika here takes to being woken up by surprise, especially after a shared night."
"I normally do keep away," she says, her voice obviously coming from the other side of the cage, "but last night wasn't one of the normal shared nights; it was ended in the middle of it."
"Actually, it was a normal shared night," I say, finally pulling my head away from Erik's chest and turning in his loose hold of my waist so that I can see Victoria on the other side of the cage, her hand over her right side where I kicked her. "It just wasn't shared with everyone. There was also a break in the middle."
"What are you talking about?" Victoria asks curiously.
"What she means is that after we fell back to sleep, the two of us shared a dream with only the two of us, last night," Erik says.
"You WHAT?!"
"Shared a second dream," I say matter-of-factly, knowing that she's just trying to get the idea through her brain.
"I can't believe it," she mutters under her breath while shaking her head slowly. "Actually," she says to the two of us for sure, her voice louder and her head looking at us, "I can believe it. If it had to happen to any of us with you, Erika, I'd have bet on either Erik or Alexa. I'm pretty sure it would have been a tie if we each had two votes; otherwise, it would have been very hard to choose."
"Stop joking around, Victoria," Erik says, his cheeks slightly pink when I turn to look at his face.
"I'm not! I'd seriously choose either you or Alexa to be the one to do something like that! Heck, it wouldn't surprise me if she is the next one to have a dream alone with her. I'm pretty sure it won't be the second dream in a night, though." Victoria smirks as she says that final part, looking at Erik pointedly.
Using some of the sign language, Erik tells Victoria to Shut up with some very… colorful language mixed into it, making her laugh and me shake my head and hit Erik upside the head. He doesn't even bother to ask why I did it, knowing he earned it but also thinking it was worth a very hard hit from me.
Shaking my head, I smile a half-smile at the antics of my two best friends, never wanting to let these moments go. These are the moments that make our family a family. These are the moments that make my favorite people in the whole world my favorite people. The antics make everyone who they are. None of us eight like to be separated, but we're all relieved by the fact that at least we're in two groups and have each other.
I sit up and move to lean against a bar of the cage as Erik tries to sit up. Still with a half-smile on my face, I try my best to relax as I enjoy yet another round of this amazing and funny show that makes up much of the entertainment here in Itex these days for us, trying not to let the idea of how bad the idea of being separated sounds take over my mind.
Go ahead, kill me. Just remember, I can't write if I'm maimed, unconcious, or dead. Besides, I'm only a week late! Oh, wait... Sorry, the fact that I'm a week late IS a bad thing... Hm... How can I make it up to you all? Will two updates this weekend be enough for you all? :-P That's right. I spent over three hours today working on chapter 21! I worked an extra hour last night (staying up until midnight, I might add) to finish this chapter for you all! I had a REALLY busy weekend last week and a very busy week followed it! I'm sorry, so I hope a double update helps, even if chapter 21 is a very... emotional one...
Now, I hope you all enjoyed this fun chapter. I wanted to have some fun with them as well as show how they've been doing the past year and a half or so. Now, the next chapter is another time jump of a year, so... I'm sorry, but I'm trying to get up to a certain point...
Please, even if I am posting a second chapter in a few minutes (once the AN is written), review for this chapter! It'll make me want to write chapter 22 this weekend instead of reading FF all the time.
Posted: 3/6/10