To Lyger 0: So many more skills you need than just hitting things!
To yellow 14: That one was a lot of fun to write!
John let out a breath, panting in exertion from the morning's hike through the woods. Birds chirped in the trees around him, the buzzing of insects flitting about providing a faint hum of white noise for his walk and threatening to put him to sleep. But he couldn't afford to show weakness – today of all days. He had lived at the Temple for as long as he could remember; this was the only life he had ever known. The mountain forest surrounding the Temple was as familiar to him as the back of his hand. He had dreamed of this day, of finally becoming a full Acolyte, since before he could walk. And now that goal was within sight. Last night, he had kept vigil in the forest, the final part of his promotion from Novice to Acolyte. The only thing left to do was to take the path back to the Temple and report to the Novice-Master of his success. That would be the culmination of the vigil.
Then he could have some coffee. Or a nap.
He heard rustling from the woods beside him, and in his sleep-addled mind he could almost imagine the winged miraculous holder swooping down from above to drag him off. His grip on his staff tightened, his free hand finding the chi-putty stored in the sleeve of his robe. The bushes parted, and he automatically flung a piece of chi-putty at the person who emerged, his foot dropping back in a defensive stance as he raised his staff protectively.
"Whoa!" Jake held up his hands in front of his face and spat irritably, blinking furiously to work the chi-putty out of his eyes. "Chill out, man. It's just me!"
John's staff dropped to his side. "Oh… sorry, bro." He grimaced sheepishly. "I guess I'm just a little on edge."
Jake shrugged, rubbing the chi-putty off of his hands and flicking it to the ground. "It's probably my bad. Honestly, I probably would have attacked you if I'd heard you first!"
John yawned involuntarily and immediately covered his mouth, looking around nervously. Acolytes were supposed to be in the woods to watch over them during their vigil; if any of them saw his moment of weakness… But as the silence around them dragged on he allowed himself to relax. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jake watching him carefully. "Don't tell the Circuitor," he warned.
Jake grinned. "Of course not… as long as you don't tell him that I yawned right after you!"
"Deal."
"So what's got you so nervous?" Jake asked as they emerged from the woods and followed the cliff toward the start of their path back to the Temple. "After all, last night was the hard part!"
"Just thinking back to last year, the first time we were supposed to sit our vigil," explained John, grimacing. "The Eagle Miraculous user flying above the Temple almost all the time."
Jake shuddered. "Yeah, that was pretty hairy for a while," he agreed, nodding. "I'm not sorry to see that he's gone."
"As long as he really is gone…" John muttered, surreptitiously glancing up at the sky.
"Didn't the Prior report seeing him in Paris a handful of times?" asked Jake. "If he's there, he can't exactly be here." John gave him a confused look. Jake smirked mischievously. "There's a reason I volunteered for cleaning duty. The meeting room isn't nearly as soundproof as they think it is."
"Well, if that's the case," John began dubiously, his voice trailing off as he stared off over the cliff side at the small clearing below and the forest beyond.
Jake grinned. "You can't deny that this is an exciting time to be an Acolyte!" he pointed out. "Nothing for hundreds and thousands of years, and suddenly miraculous are just coming out of the woodwork. Maybe that means we'll get a chance to fight a few miraculous users!"
John raised an eyebrow. "Maybe…"
Jake frowned, pursing his lips. "Of course, it doesn't exactly sound like any of the deployed brothers have had much success," he noted. "I heard them reading reports from all over. The Prior hasn't managed to do much of anything in the last year. The Vicar somehow managed to get bogged down in England. The Heirodeacon hasn't found anything yet, despite all the reports of miraculous users in the area. The Sub-Prioress has yet to find a suitable location for the new monastery…"
"You're just full of good news, aren't you?" John commented wryly, stifling another yawn. He paused alongside the cliff opposite the trailhead for the main path to their Temple. Although he couldn't see it, the old Pueblo village that had served as an outpost of their Order for centuries was carved into the cliff face below them. The rising sun at their back cast the valley below into dark shadows. "Where do you think they'll send us now?"
Jake shrugged. "It's up to them, isn't it? But wherever it is, I wouldn't mind somewhere warm. Maybe Africa?"
John hummed. "Too bad Matty couldn't do the vigil with us last night."
Jake shrugged. "Hopefully next time he won't feel so sick."
John nodded, looking around himself curiously, scanning the clearing in either direction for signs of movement. The brothers were supposed to meet them here to escort them back to the Temple, but where were they? The bluff was clear and quiet aside from the two of them, and even the birds had stopped chirping. He was about to turn back toward the forest when the ground beneath his feet rumbled, shaking the bluff. His eyes widened and he stared at his twin in shock, his jaw falling open.
Jake gave him a bewildered look. "What's going on!?"
John gasped in realization as the ground below them shifted again. "Get away from the edge!" he shouted, sprinting for the forest. Only a moment later, Jake took off after him, running pell-mell for the forest cover, minimal though it might be against an earthquake. Around them the ground shook again, harder. And then–
BOOM!
The cliff behind them shattered and crumbled, the stones churned to powder and exploding outward from the cliff, dust caught in the breeze. Something lowed behind them, a deep, rumbling sound that threatened to stop John's heart. The shattered cliff began to slide downhill as the mountain destabilized. Without slowing down, John sprinted another couple steps and dove forward just as the ground beneath him began to collapse, grabbing onto the protruding roots of a tree on the edge of the forest. Next to him Jake had managed to squeeze his arm into the root system of a different tree. Their legs dangled over the empty space where once there had been a bluff, and John scrambled to find purchase on the jagged cliff face with his boots. Glancing below them out of the corner of his eye, John got only a quick glimpse of a dark brown monster on four legs that had emerged from the cliff, standing two-thirds as tall as the trees at its shoulders, as it put its head down and charged into the forest with a deafening bellow. John blinked dumbly, staring after it.
"What the hell was that?" Jake demanded, mouth hanging wide open.
John shook his head mutely and tugged at the roots and trying to pull himself up. His toes finally stuck into a facet of the stone, pushing away more of the loose earth, and he crawled up, hand over hand, onto the cliff edge. Beside him, Jake let out a grunt and reached up with one hand. John grabbed his wrist and hauled him up until they were both lying sprawled on the edge of the cliff, just inside the tree line. "I don't know, but we need to tell someone about it." His stomach clenched in a tight knot. "We need to talk to the Archimandrite."
AN: And on that note, tomorrow will be the beginning of "Quest for Claire"… which takes place more or less on the other side of the planet.