I decided to make this chapter a bit longer, just for the fun. Hope you
don't fall asleep or something like that. Anyway, in this chapter you will
find out what I'm talking about in the intro. Clive's nightmare is about to
begin...
Chapter 2: End of One Battle, Beginning of Another
"Blind attack? What the hell are they up to now?" Jet asked, squeezing the Airget Lamh harder in his hand. Clive adjusted his glasses, inspecting the smirking group of Drifters ahead of him. He tried to see what was coming next, calculate their next move, so he then could decide the best course of action.
"I do not know. But be careful" he warned. Virgninia cocked her ARMs and pointed them on Racen. He smirked even bigger. They were getting nervous, exactly how he wanted them.
"Get ready!" He shouted at the Maxwell Gang. Robert quickly pulled something out of his pocket and threw it at them. Clive noticed it was a small silverball, before it hit the ground before them, and exploded. Smoke came running out and the next thing they knew, they were engulfed by it, and entered a world of white nothingness. Virginia coughed as it poured down in her lungs like a river, giving her a suffocating feeling. She thought she heard someone cough next to her. Gallows, who had gotten farthest away from his comrades, fumbled around in the white world around him to locate them. Jet looked around him for enemies, with a hand over his mouth to protect himself from the cloud that threatened to suffocate him too and the other swinged his ARM wildly around to prevent an attempt of ambush from the Longwell team . Clive held out a golden medium in his hand. It bore the mark of Fengalon, the guardian beast of Wind. The wind from the beast could split the cloud around them, but he could hit one of his comrades by mistake and he didn't want to risk it.He tried to locate them, but the white world semmed endless, and only the coughing sound from his friends was heard, but he didn't know exactly where they were.
"Pretty clever, spreading out cloud to blind an opponent and make it impossible for them to attack. But it's not a very admirable thing to do." Clive thought.
"Cough Is everyone alright?" Virginia shouted and pulled away her ARMs, she didn't want to shoot her friends by mistake. She stumbled forward, reaching her hands forwards. Her fingertips touched soft, warm skin and she grabbed tight to the object, before it would disappear into the cloud. She knew it could be anyone, even one from Racen's team. But she only hoped that it was someone she knew.
"Hey! Let go of my arm!" It was Jet. She heard something snap in distance. Jet also heard it, his arm muscles became tense and his eyes flew wildly around, trying to find the source of the noise. Several bullets pierced her body and she did her best to protect herself , putting her hands over her head and bend down on her knees. She heard Gallows cry out in pain, letting her know that the same thing happened to her comrades as well. Something began to crawl down her skin, and she laid two fingers over it. It was wet and warm, and greasy. She held up her fingers before her eyes, shocked by the sight. It was blood. She had been shot. Jet hissed next to her. If it was by anger or pain, she didn't know. She heard another hissing sound, like from a lit bomb...
"Take cover! It's a bomb!" She yelled, dragging Jet down with her as she threw herself down on the roof. She felt a intense heat next to her and Jet, and before they knew it, they were being lifted into the air and thrown forward. She landed with a hard bump that made her loose her breath and the world seemed to spin around her. She slowly came up on her knees and breathed heavily. The smoke was being separated by the small breeze of wind, and gave her air to breathe in. When it vanished she looked up around her. Jet was a few feet from her, breathing hard, and held his hand over his chest, while blood forced its way between his fingers. It appeared that he had a serious shotwound that he tried to cover. Clive was crawling up on his knees with the help of his Gungnir, shaking his head, and holding the golden medium hard in his hand. Gallows still sat down, too tired to make an attempt to stand up. Their bodies was covered by fleeing blood, but they were still alive. The Longwell team came up to them.
"Not a bad attack is it? Gets our preys down on their knees every single time. Give up now, and we won't hurt you further. Do we understand each other?" Racen asked, holding out a hand to her to help her up.
"Don't you have any respect for human life!? There are other people except us on this train! You could have killed them with that bomb! And us too!" Virginia hissed, refusing the help from Racen.
"Oh please, spare me the lecture. I'm too good for that. I have made these bombs myself, they're designed to only hurt our preys a little bit" Lan said, throwing a bomb up and down his hand.
"Did you blew up your parents in the process or what, because nobody seems to have taught you any mannners" Gallows implied, pointing a finger on the enraged Lan.
"What did you say!?" He growled.
"That's enough. Well, how's it going to be?" Racen asked again, pulling back his hand. Virginia looked back on her comrades. Jet and Clive were up on their legs, Gallows was on his way up. She stood up slowly, then turned to the Longwell leader.
"Six months ago, I learned that there were no such thing as good or bad Drifters. What I did know, is when people's actions are right or wrong. That you hurt or kill people just to get famous and rich, is the wrong thing to do. I do not want to have any part of your schemes, and I will not let you cut off our wings, when we have fought so hard against people and demons to keep them!" She exclaimed and with her last ounch of strength, she performed a Seven gatling without bullets on the surprised Racen, and kicked him off the roof, before she fell down on her knees and hands, exhausted and weakened from the blood loss. Lan and Robert had been surprised and shocked by the Maxwell leader's sudden attack, but snapped out of it and rushed at them, with Robert's sword pointed up and Lan's Vanton40 ARM pointed forward. Virginia saw them coming but was too tired to get out of their way. Jet looked up and saw Virginia's predicament, and swore in his head at her to get out of the way. She didn't make a move. Regarding the injury on his chest, Jet ran to Virginia and pulled her away from them, Robert saw Clive stretch up his hand to the sky, and in a flash, the Maxwell team was gone. They heard a growl above them and looked up. A large animal came running down at them. The wind was getting stronger around them. It slashed with its paw and landed next to them before he jumped up and it vanished again. It left a tornado behind it that lifted the two Drifters from the roof and threw them off as well, leaving the train and its passengers intact.
"Clive, you rock!" Gallows applaud and healed his comrades with the Arcana spell Heal. Their wounds vanished in a instant moment, leaving no traces of the battle on them. Virginia stood up and walked over to the side where the Drifter team had vanished. She saw them laying on the ground, moaning. A sting of guilt was felt in her heart, but she tried her best to ignore it. They weren't dead, and they had attacked her and her comrades. They had to defend themselves. The two brothers helped their leader brother up on his legs. Racen stared up at Virginia. He held up a hand and waved once, which was his way to recognize her as a winner.
"Well done, Maxwell. We'll retreat for now. But don't think you have seen the last of us. We'll get stronger somehow, and claim that reward for you. You're best off to remember that" Racen said, turned around and whistled. Horses came running from the front of the train and stopped next to them. Clive, Gallows and Jet came up to Virginia and watched them mount their horses and set off in the direction of Jolly Roger. A fourth figure rode after them, but he was too far off for Virginia to see him clearly, but belived that was Barto, the friend Racen had talked about. Gallows put a hand on her shoulder.
"Another victory for the Maxwell team! This calls for a celebration!" He said cheerfully. Virginia didn't answer.
"Is something the matter?" Clive asked politely.
"I can't help it, but I'm feeling a little bit guilty" She replied, her head hung low.
"Are you telling us that we shoud have surrendered? Gimme a break..." Jet sighed and put a hand to his head.
"No, but..."
"I understand how you feel, Virginia. Fighting people is not the same thing as fighting monsters and demons. But as you said, they endangered the passengers in their attempts to catch us. They had to be stopped, or somebody else could have been hurt, or even killed" Clive implied. Virginia nodded, and she did feel a little bit better.
"Thank you, Clive" Virginia said. Clive smiled and scratched his head.
"With that said, I suggest that we jump off here and continue to the Ruins of Memory by horse as long as we can before dark, and continue tomorrow morning. It will take longer, but makes it more difficult for more possible pursuers to track us"
"You're right. But, wait, our belongings is left in the cabin!" She remembered.
"I get them. I'm faster than you three chatterboxes together anyway" Jet teased and ran to the ladder, while the rest jumped down on the ground. The train started to move when Jet threw out their belongings through the window, and after throwing out his own blanket, he jumped out from the before it picked to much speed. The team watched as the train vanished from their sight. Virginia pulled out a call whistle from her pouch and blew it. They didn't hear anything, but their horses did hear it. Four horses approached them from the south, dust covered their hooves as they galloped over the ground. The white horse neighed as it saw Virginia and picked up speed. It stopped next to her and neighed lowly. The black stallion came up to the Baskar, while a light brown stallion stopped next to Jet. Lastly, a dark brown stallion approached Clive slowly. It put its mule in his hand and Clive felt a small puff of warm air coming from the horse through the glove. He smiled and patted the horse on his head. They were already saddled, and the group mounted their horses. Clive was about to do the same thing when he stopped dead in his tracks, staring out into the barren wasteland.
A young woman was watching him. She stood a few meters away from him, with a smile covering her face, and her green eyes fixed on the green haired sniper. She had the same type of clothing as the prophets once had, and her ravenblack, long hair moved smoothly along the wind, like the wind was playing with it. She wore a white ribbon behind her head and she had purple hair covering the sides of her face. She was not an unfamiliar sight for him, because he had been seeing her more and more often during the last six months. But, this was the first time he had been able too see her clearly, and that she had been this close to him. Though she was smiling, her presence sent cold shivers down Clive's spine, and he slightly shivered. He had only seen her for six months and he didn't know who she was, yet he felt that he had known her longer than that. And the feeling that he got from her felt familiar too, the feeling that told him that something was not right with her, and warned him of danger...
"Clive, do you see something?" Virginia asked from the back of her horse. Clive turned his head to her and then back. The woman was gone.
"I believe I just saw a woman." He glanced over the area. She was nowhere in sight. "She is gone now, however. It could have been just a hallucination. Let us press on, the dark will be upon us soon" Clive climbed up on his horse. Virginia gave him a concerned look, but then turned her horse around and went into gallop. Her comrades followed her close behind, but Clive remained a little bit before he went after them too, in deep thoughts. He felt guilty that he didn't tell his comrades that he had seen her more times than just now, but he wanted to be sure what she was before he told them. They maybe would say that he had gone senile. Well, Gallows or Jet would say it, Virginia would proably think he had gotten ill. He had once tried to make them take notice of her, but they didn't see her, and she stood right in front of them! Why was Clive the only one who saw her, and what did she want? All these questions spinned around in his head and he couldn't make any sense out of the situation. Hasufel neighed as they were getting too far behind the rest, and Clive came out of his thoughts and picked up the speed.
They rode about half an hour when the sun gave up on them. The group was getting tired and weary. Virginia looked around for a good spot to camp at for the night. She saw a formation of rocks.
"That seems to be a good place to camp at. Let's stop there" she jumped of her horse and led it over there. The rest did the same thing. They unpacked their horses and put out their blankets at the ground. Gallows pulled out wood from his sack and piled it together. Jet used a fire spell to lit it up, and a fire started to burn brightly. They all sat down next to the fire and let it heat up their cold bodies. Virginia rationed the food she had in her sack with the others, and looked down in the bag. It was almost empty. She looked over to the horses, but they had found grass near the trunk of the tree and were eating on that.
"We need to restock our supplies. We're almost out of food" Virginia pointed out and showed the group her almost empty sack
"And for that we need money, which we don't have. Unless..." Jet tried again.
"Jet, for the last time, we ain't selling the Tear Drop!" Virginia scolded. Jet looked away, took another bite from his portion of meat, and pretended he didn't hear that. Virginia glared at him, and looked like she could hit Jet with her sack, her grip on it became tighter and it slowly left the ground against Jet's direction. Clive decided to that he needed to change the subject, before someone got hurt.
"Finding a mission to take on is not going to be easy, with the Order after us, and with that reward above our heads" Clive implied while he adjusted his glasses.
"And Jolly Roger is out of the question. That Longwell team went there, right? They would jump on us the second we walked into town, and other Drifters for that matter" Jet grumped, put away his food and laid down on his red blanket, with is hands behind his neck and stared up at the star sprinkled sky.
"Then why don't we head to Baskar Colony? I'm pretty sure Granny has a mission for us to take on. If not, then we have at least shelter for two days or more, while we search for leads. What do you say, leader?" Gallows implied.
"Sounds good to me! Let's head there after we have retuned the Tear Drop!" Virginia clapped her hands together in excitement. Clive came to think about wife and daughter, who was waiting for him back in Humphrey's Peak. He hadn't seen them in six months and it had been a while since he had written to them. If Roykman was there, Clive could send a letter with him to his family.
"Well, let's get to sleep, so we can get away early tomorrow. Who will take the watch?" Virginia asked.
"I can do that. I won't be able to go to sleep tonight anyway" Gallows offered.
"Okay, then it is decided. Good night everyone" Virginia said, yawned and laid down on her green blanket. She stared into the fire for a few seconds, before she closed her eyes and sighed loudly, and fell asleep seconds after that. Jet turned to his side, and faced the sleeping leader. He felt a warm feeling inside his heart. He closed his eyelids to get rid of the image that caused the feeling inside him.
"What would humans call this feeling? Love? Ridiculous. I'm an android, I can't fall in love. And with her? She's a tomboy, and a chatterbox. Although she is kinda cute when she gets mad... What am I thinking!? I must be going crazy or something!" Jet thought. He opened his eyeslids one more time. Virginia's face still faced his, and that warm feeling came up again. He felt a small smile creep upon his face, and for the first time in his life, he let it stay there. It felt good for him somehow.
"I AM going crazy" He thought and closed his eyes for the last time, keeping the image of the sleeping Virginia inside his head, before his subconscious drifted away in darkness. He fell asleep, still with the smile on his face.
Clive hesitated. He hadn't been able to get a good night sleep for six months, all because of this dream that keeps haunting him. He hadn't told the others about it, he didn't want them to worry. It was just a dream, nothing that could kill him. Yet he felt terrified just by going to sleep. And the pressure inside his head that increased every single time did not make it better. But the tiredness that crept away inside his body won the battle over the fear. Hoping that he would not see it again, he closed his eyes, and thought of Kaitlyn and Catherine, before he fell asleep too.
He almost wanted to cry out as he saw where he was. He was back in a village that looked like Humphrey's Peak, but the houses were twisted, all trees naked and lifeless, and the ground around him was grey, dead, and the sky had the mixture of orange and black. He looked up, even though he knew what he was going to see. He saw people bend over in pain, their screams reached his ears and etched into his mind. Their skins looked like they were bubbling, their internal organs moved around like snakes beneath the bubbles and skin, and many had gotten all sorts of different body part of demons. One developed horns, another had a hairy arm with sharp claws for fingers, and one had a face that resmebled a male pig, with two huge teeth sticking out from his lower jaw on both sides, and small red eyes that had replaced the human eyes. It roared in pain, as the rest of his body was transforming into a demon. Clive was crippled by the sight, he couldn't move, and a scream got stuck in his throat. Completely transformed demons approached him, stretching their arms after him. He wanted to get out of their way, but his body was paralyzed.
"Are you happy now, Clive Winslett? We are transforming into demons, all because of you" a demon dog hissed. Clive knew that voice. It was Datson, his friend from Humphrey's Peak.
"... Datson? Is that you?" The demon dog nodded and showed his teeth. They were bigger than on ordinary dogs, it was barely that they stayed inside the creature's mouth.They were bloody, he must have bitten somebody, Clive couldn't see any wounds on his body that indicated that he had bitten himself.
"What happened to you?"
"YOU are what happened, remember!? You are the cause that we are becoming demons. Have you come back here to finish what you started?" The demon threatened. Clive shook his head to the sides. His fault?
"I do not understand what you are talking about. I would never do this to you, I do not have the knowledge. Please believe me, Datson." Clive finally managed to get the words over his lips. The familiar pressure inside his head came back, worse than ever. He tightened his eyes from the pain.
"Don't lie to us. You are the one to blame. You and that woman. You even went after your own family, we saw you, and look at them now. It is indeed your fault!" The dog hissed again, and pointed a hairy finger on two demons a bit away from them. Clive looked into that direction. Two demons stared at them with red, glowing eyes. They looked like female demon birds, one smaller than the other, and they were holding each other hardly. The small one had blue ribbons on its head. Clive's heart beat faster, and his body became cold of fear and despair.
"No. Catherine... Kaitlyn... Not you too..." The two demons drew themselves away from him as they heard his voice, like it was poison to their shivering ears, and whimpered of fear for the sniper. The rest of the demons came closer to the sniper, and surrounded him. He couldn't see his family anymore. He fell on his knees, holding one hand on the ground for support, and the other on his aching head. It felt like it was going to explode. He tried to supress it, fight it back.
"Give in, Clive Winslett" A woman voice echoed. The same voice that he had always heard in this dream. It sounded like it was two voices in one, two that he was familiar with and yet not...
"Who are you? Why are you doing this?" Clive managed to whisper. The voice giggled. It sounded like it belonged to both a child and a grownup at the same time.
"I've been waiting for six months... waiting for a opportunity to get revenge on everyone for what they did to me, my friends... to create my own world...and you are going to help me. Let go..."
Clive's shadow seemed to move by itself, forming itself into a huge, black ring around Clive. That had never happened before... His hand became icecold and he pulled it from the ground and stood up. It was covered in a black fluid, shimmering as he held it up in the mysterious sunlight. He tried to shake it off, but to no avail. The pressure insid his head intensed, his vision was blurry from the pain. He looked down, seeing the black fluid crawl up his legs like snakes, and covered every spot of untouched clothing. The fluid on his hand also started to move forward, climbing down his arm. He lost the feeling in his arm and legs. The demons stood around him, offering no help to the green-haired sniper. Clive blinked several times, hoping that once he looked up again, he would be back in the camp, next to the fire and his comrades.The sight around him remained the same. He was stuck in the dream world.
"No... please do not do this..." He pleaded, trying to get out from the circle, but his legs were frozen, and the demons pushed him back in the circle. He swinged out his arm to get the fluid of him.
"Your mind belongs to me. I will have my revenge, with your help. Willingly or not. There is not point to fight me anymore, you'll only hurt yourself ..." The voice echoed again. The fluid moved up along his lower body part. He heard a pulsing sound inside his head, like from a pulsing heart. The fluid moved along with the sound. Clive realized that it was not a fluid, but a living body, a shadow that had found its way inside his head. Somebody was trying to separate his spirit from his body, melted its mind together with his. He was getting desperate, made one more attempt to wake up, but to no avail. The shadow pinned him down.
"No! Leave me alone!"
"Try to make me..." The voice whispered back.
Anyone have a clue on who it is? Please R&R!
Chapter 2: End of One Battle, Beginning of Another
"Blind attack? What the hell are they up to now?" Jet asked, squeezing the Airget Lamh harder in his hand. Clive adjusted his glasses, inspecting the smirking group of Drifters ahead of him. He tried to see what was coming next, calculate their next move, so he then could decide the best course of action.
"I do not know. But be careful" he warned. Virgninia cocked her ARMs and pointed them on Racen. He smirked even bigger. They were getting nervous, exactly how he wanted them.
"Get ready!" He shouted at the Maxwell Gang. Robert quickly pulled something out of his pocket and threw it at them. Clive noticed it was a small silverball, before it hit the ground before them, and exploded. Smoke came running out and the next thing they knew, they were engulfed by it, and entered a world of white nothingness. Virginia coughed as it poured down in her lungs like a river, giving her a suffocating feeling. She thought she heard someone cough next to her. Gallows, who had gotten farthest away from his comrades, fumbled around in the white world around him to locate them. Jet looked around him for enemies, with a hand over his mouth to protect himself from the cloud that threatened to suffocate him too and the other swinged his ARM wildly around to prevent an attempt of ambush from the Longwell team . Clive held out a golden medium in his hand. It bore the mark of Fengalon, the guardian beast of Wind. The wind from the beast could split the cloud around them, but he could hit one of his comrades by mistake and he didn't want to risk it.He tried to locate them, but the white world semmed endless, and only the coughing sound from his friends was heard, but he didn't know exactly where they were.
"Pretty clever, spreading out cloud to blind an opponent and make it impossible for them to attack. But it's not a very admirable thing to do." Clive thought.
"Cough Is everyone alright?" Virginia shouted and pulled away her ARMs, she didn't want to shoot her friends by mistake. She stumbled forward, reaching her hands forwards. Her fingertips touched soft, warm skin and she grabbed tight to the object, before it would disappear into the cloud. She knew it could be anyone, even one from Racen's team. But she only hoped that it was someone she knew.
"Hey! Let go of my arm!" It was Jet. She heard something snap in distance. Jet also heard it, his arm muscles became tense and his eyes flew wildly around, trying to find the source of the noise. Several bullets pierced her body and she did her best to protect herself , putting her hands over her head and bend down on her knees. She heard Gallows cry out in pain, letting her know that the same thing happened to her comrades as well. Something began to crawl down her skin, and she laid two fingers over it. It was wet and warm, and greasy. She held up her fingers before her eyes, shocked by the sight. It was blood. She had been shot. Jet hissed next to her. If it was by anger or pain, she didn't know. She heard another hissing sound, like from a lit bomb...
"Take cover! It's a bomb!" She yelled, dragging Jet down with her as she threw herself down on the roof. She felt a intense heat next to her and Jet, and before they knew it, they were being lifted into the air and thrown forward. She landed with a hard bump that made her loose her breath and the world seemed to spin around her. She slowly came up on her knees and breathed heavily. The smoke was being separated by the small breeze of wind, and gave her air to breathe in. When it vanished she looked up around her. Jet was a few feet from her, breathing hard, and held his hand over his chest, while blood forced its way between his fingers. It appeared that he had a serious shotwound that he tried to cover. Clive was crawling up on his knees with the help of his Gungnir, shaking his head, and holding the golden medium hard in his hand. Gallows still sat down, too tired to make an attempt to stand up. Their bodies was covered by fleeing blood, but they were still alive. The Longwell team came up to them.
"Not a bad attack is it? Gets our preys down on their knees every single time. Give up now, and we won't hurt you further. Do we understand each other?" Racen asked, holding out a hand to her to help her up.
"Don't you have any respect for human life!? There are other people except us on this train! You could have killed them with that bomb! And us too!" Virginia hissed, refusing the help from Racen.
"Oh please, spare me the lecture. I'm too good for that. I have made these bombs myself, they're designed to only hurt our preys a little bit" Lan said, throwing a bomb up and down his hand.
"Did you blew up your parents in the process or what, because nobody seems to have taught you any mannners" Gallows implied, pointing a finger on the enraged Lan.
"What did you say!?" He growled.
"That's enough. Well, how's it going to be?" Racen asked again, pulling back his hand. Virginia looked back on her comrades. Jet and Clive were up on their legs, Gallows was on his way up. She stood up slowly, then turned to the Longwell leader.
"Six months ago, I learned that there were no such thing as good or bad Drifters. What I did know, is when people's actions are right or wrong. That you hurt or kill people just to get famous and rich, is the wrong thing to do. I do not want to have any part of your schemes, and I will not let you cut off our wings, when we have fought so hard against people and demons to keep them!" She exclaimed and with her last ounch of strength, she performed a Seven gatling without bullets on the surprised Racen, and kicked him off the roof, before she fell down on her knees and hands, exhausted and weakened from the blood loss. Lan and Robert had been surprised and shocked by the Maxwell leader's sudden attack, but snapped out of it and rushed at them, with Robert's sword pointed up and Lan's Vanton40 ARM pointed forward. Virginia saw them coming but was too tired to get out of their way. Jet looked up and saw Virginia's predicament, and swore in his head at her to get out of the way. She didn't make a move. Regarding the injury on his chest, Jet ran to Virginia and pulled her away from them, Robert saw Clive stretch up his hand to the sky, and in a flash, the Maxwell team was gone. They heard a growl above them and looked up. A large animal came running down at them. The wind was getting stronger around them. It slashed with its paw and landed next to them before he jumped up and it vanished again. It left a tornado behind it that lifted the two Drifters from the roof and threw them off as well, leaving the train and its passengers intact.
"Clive, you rock!" Gallows applaud and healed his comrades with the Arcana spell Heal. Their wounds vanished in a instant moment, leaving no traces of the battle on them. Virginia stood up and walked over to the side where the Drifter team had vanished. She saw them laying on the ground, moaning. A sting of guilt was felt in her heart, but she tried her best to ignore it. They weren't dead, and they had attacked her and her comrades. They had to defend themselves. The two brothers helped their leader brother up on his legs. Racen stared up at Virginia. He held up a hand and waved once, which was his way to recognize her as a winner.
"Well done, Maxwell. We'll retreat for now. But don't think you have seen the last of us. We'll get stronger somehow, and claim that reward for you. You're best off to remember that" Racen said, turned around and whistled. Horses came running from the front of the train and stopped next to them. Clive, Gallows and Jet came up to Virginia and watched them mount their horses and set off in the direction of Jolly Roger. A fourth figure rode after them, but he was too far off for Virginia to see him clearly, but belived that was Barto, the friend Racen had talked about. Gallows put a hand on her shoulder.
"Another victory for the Maxwell team! This calls for a celebration!" He said cheerfully. Virginia didn't answer.
"Is something the matter?" Clive asked politely.
"I can't help it, but I'm feeling a little bit guilty" She replied, her head hung low.
"Are you telling us that we shoud have surrendered? Gimme a break..." Jet sighed and put a hand to his head.
"No, but..."
"I understand how you feel, Virginia. Fighting people is not the same thing as fighting monsters and demons. But as you said, they endangered the passengers in their attempts to catch us. They had to be stopped, or somebody else could have been hurt, or even killed" Clive implied. Virginia nodded, and she did feel a little bit better.
"Thank you, Clive" Virginia said. Clive smiled and scratched his head.
"With that said, I suggest that we jump off here and continue to the Ruins of Memory by horse as long as we can before dark, and continue tomorrow morning. It will take longer, but makes it more difficult for more possible pursuers to track us"
"You're right. But, wait, our belongings is left in the cabin!" She remembered.
"I get them. I'm faster than you three chatterboxes together anyway" Jet teased and ran to the ladder, while the rest jumped down on the ground. The train started to move when Jet threw out their belongings through the window, and after throwing out his own blanket, he jumped out from the before it picked to much speed. The team watched as the train vanished from their sight. Virginia pulled out a call whistle from her pouch and blew it. They didn't hear anything, but their horses did hear it. Four horses approached them from the south, dust covered their hooves as they galloped over the ground. The white horse neighed as it saw Virginia and picked up speed. It stopped next to her and neighed lowly. The black stallion came up to the Baskar, while a light brown stallion stopped next to Jet. Lastly, a dark brown stallion approached Clive slowly. It put its mule in his hand and Clive felt a small puff of warm air coming from the horse through the glove. He smiled and patted the horse on his head. They were already saddled, and the group mounted their horses. Clive was about to do the same thing when he stopped dead in his tracks, staring out into the barren wasteland.
A young woman was watching him. She stood a few meters away from him, with a smile covering her face, and her green eyes fixed on the green haired sniper. She had the same type of clothing as the prophets once had, and her ravenblack, long hair moved smoothly along the wind, like the wind was playing with it. She wore a white ribbon behind her head and she had purple hair covering the sides of her face. She was not an unfamiliar sight for him, because he had been seeing her more and more often during the last six months. But, this was the first time he had been able too see her clearly, and that she had been this close to him. Though she was smiling, her presence sent cold shivers down Clive's spine, and he slightly shivered. He had only seen her for six months and he didn't know who she was, yet he felt that he had known her longer than that. And the feeling that he got from her felt familiar too, the feeling that told him that something was not right with her, and warned him of danger...
"Clive, do you see something?" Virginia asked from the back of her horse. Clive turned his head to her and then back. The woman was gone.
"I believe I just saw a woman." He glanced over the area. She was nowhere in sight. "She is gone now, however. It could have been just a hallucination. Let us press on, the dark will be upon us soon" Clive climbed up on his horse. Virginia gave him a concerned look, but then turned her horse around and went into gallop. Her comrades followed her close behind, but Clive remained a little bit before he went after them too, in deep thoughts. He felt guilty that he didn't tell his comrades that he had seen her more times than just now, but he wanted to be sure what she was before he told them. They maybe would say that he had gone senile. Well, Gallows or Jet would say it, Virginia would proably think he had gotten ill. He had once tried to make them take notice of her, but they didn't see her, and she stood right in front of them! Why was Clive the only one who saw her, and what did she want? All these questions spinned around in his head and he couldn't make any sense out of the situation. Hasufel neighed as they were getting too far behind the rest, and Clive came out of his thoughts and picked up the speed.
They rode about half an hour when the sun gave up on them. The group was getting tired and weary. Virginia looked around for a good spot to camp at for the night. She saw a formation of rocks.
"That seems to be a good place to camp at. Let's stop there" she jumped of her horse and led it over there. The rest did the same thing. They unpacked their horses and put out their blankets at the ground. Gallows pulled out wood from his sack and piled it together. Jet used a fire spell to lit it up, and a fire started to burn brightly. They all sat down next to the fire and let it heat up their cold bodies. Virginia rationed the food she had in her sack with the others, and looked down in the bag. It was almost empty. She looked over to the horses, but they had found grass near the trunk of the tree and were eating on that.
"We need to restock our supplies. We're almost out of food" Virginia pointed out and showed the group her almost empty sack
"And for that we need money, which we don't have. Unless..." Jet tried again.
"Jet, for the last time, we ain't selling the Tear Drop!" Virginia scolded. Jet looked away, took another bite from his portion of meat, and pretended he didn't hear that. Virginia glared at him, and looked like she could hit Jet with her sack, her grip on it became tighter and it slowly left the ground against Jet's direction. Clive decided to that he needed to change the subject, before someone got hurt.
"Finding a mission to take on is not going to be easy, with the Order after us, and with that reward above our heads" Clive implied while he adjusted his glasses.
"And Jolly Roger is out of the question. That Longwell team went there, right? They would jump on us the second we walked into town, and other Drifters for that matter" Jet grumped, put away his food and laid down on his red blanket, with is hands behind his neck and stared up at the star sprinkled sky.
"Then why don't we head to Baskar Colony? I'm pretty sure Granny has a mission for us to take on. If not, then we have at least shelter for two days or more, while we search for leads. What do you say, leader?" Gallows implied.
"Sounds good to me! Let's head there after we have retuned the Tear Drop!" Virginia clapped her hands together in excitement. Clive came to think about wife and daughter, who was waiting for him back in Humphrey's Peak. He hadn't seen them in six months and it had been a while since he had written to them. If Roykman was there, Clive could send a letter with him to his family.
"Well, let's get to sleep, so we can get away early tomorrow. Who will take the watch?" Virginia asked.
"I can do that. I won't be able to go to sleep tonight anyway" Gallows offered.
"Okay, then it is decided. Good night everyone" Virginia said, yawned and laid down on her green blanket. She stared into the fire for a few seconds, before she closed her eyes and sighed loudly, and fell asleep seconds after that. Jet turned to his side, and faced the sleeping leader. He felt a warm feeling inside his heart. He closed his eyelids to get rid of the image that caused the feeling inside him.
"What would humans call this feeling? Love? Ridiculous. I'm an android, I can't fall in love. And with her? She's a tomboy, and a chatterbox. Although she is kinda cute when she gets mad... What am I thinking!? I must be going crazy or something!" Jet thought. He opened his eyeslids one more time. Virginia's face still faced his, and that warm feeling came up again. He felt a small smile creep upon his face, and for the first time in his life, he let it stay there. It felt good for him somehow.
"I AM going crazy" He thought and closed his eyes for the last time, keeping the image of the sleeping Virginia inside his head, before his subconscious drifted away in darkness. He fell asleep, still with the smile on his face.
Clive hesitated. He hadn't been able to get a good night sleep for six months, all because of this dream that keeps haunting him. He hadn't told the others about it, he didn't want them to worry. It was just a dream, nothing that could kill him. Yet he felt terrified just by going to sleep. And the pressure inside his head that increased every single time did not make it better. But the tiredness that crept away inside his body won the battle over the fear. Hoping that he would not see it again, he closed his eyes, and thought of Kaitlyn and Catherine, before he fell asleep too.
He almost wanted to cry out as he saw where he was. He was back in a village that looked like Humphrey's Peak, but the houses were twisted, all trees naked and lifeless, and the ground around him was grey, dead, and the sky had the mixture of orange and black. He looked up, even though he knew what he was going to see. He saw people bend over in pain, their screams reached his ears and etched into his mind. Their skins looked like they were bubbling, their internal organs moved around like snakes beneath the bubbles and skin, and many had gotten all sorts of different body part of demons. One developed horns, another had a hairy arm with sharp claws for fingers, and one had a face that resmebled a male pig, with two huge teeth sticking out from his lower jaw on both sides, and small red eyes that had replaced the human eyes. It roared in pain, as the rest of his body was transforming into a demon. Clive was crippled by the sight, he couldn't move, and a scream got stuck in his throat. Completely transformed demons approached him, stretching their arms after him. He wanted to get out of their way, but his body was paralyzed.
"Are you happy now, Clive Winslett? We are transforming into demons, all because of you" a demon dog hissed. Clive knew that voice. It was Datson, his friend from Humphrey's Peak.
"... Datson? Is that you?" The demon dog nodded and showed his teeth. They were bigger than on ordinary dogs, it was barely that they stayed inside the creature's mouth.They were bloody, he must have bitten somebody, Clive couldn't see any wounds on his body that indicated that he had bitten himself.
"What happened to you?"
"YOU are what happened, remember!? You are the cause that we are becoming demons. Have you come back here to finish what you started?" The demon threatened. Clive shook his head to the sides. His fault?
"I do not understand what you are talking about. I would never do this to you, I do not have the knowledge. Please believe me, Datson." Clive finally managed to get the words over his lips. The familiar pressure inside his head came back, worse than ever. He tightened his eyes from the pain.
"Don't lie to us. You are the one to blame. You and that woman. You even went after your own family, we saw you, and look at them now. It is indeed your fault!" The dog hissed again, and pointed a hairy finger on two demons a bit away from them. Clive looked into that direction. Two demons stared at them with red, glowing eyes. They looked like female demon birds, one smaller than the other, and they were holding each other hardly. The small one had blue ribbons on its head. Clive's heart beat faster, and his body became cold of fear and despair.
"No. Catherine... Kaitlyn... Not you too..." The two demons drew themselves away from him as they heard his voice, like it was poison to their shivering ears, and whimpered of fear for the sniper. The rest of the demons came closer to the sniper, and surrounded him. He couldn't see his family anymore. He fell on his knees, holding one hand on the ground for support, and the other on his aching head. It felt like it was going to explode. He tried to supress it, fight it back.
"Give in, Clive Winslett" A woman voice echoed. The same voice that he had always heard in this dream. It sounded like it was two voices in one, two that he was familiar with and yet not...
"Who are you? Why are you doing this?" Clive managed to whisper. The voice giggled. It sounded like it belonged to both a child and a grownup at the same time.
"I've been waiting for six months... waiting for a opportunity to get revenge on everyone for what they did to me, my friends... to create my own world...and you are going to help me. Let go..."
Clive's shadow seemed to move by itself, forming itself into a huge, black ring around Clive. That had never happened before... His hand became icecold and he pulled it from the ground and stood up. It was covered in a black fluid, shimmering as he held it up in the mysterious sunlight. He tried to shake it off, but to no avail. The pressure insid his head intensed, his vision was blurry from the pain. He looked down, seeing the black fluid crawl up his legs like snakes, and covered every spot of untouched clothing. The fluid on his hand also started to move forward, climbing down his arm. He lost the feeling in his arm and legs. The demons stood around him, offering no help to the green-haired sniper. Clive blinked several times, hoping that once he looked up again, he would be back in the camp, next to the fire and his comrades.The sight around him remained the same. He was stuck in the dream world.
"No... please do not do this..." He pleaded, trying to get out from the circle, but his legs were frozen, and the demons pushed him back in the circle. He swinged out his arm to get the fluid of him.
"Your mind belongs to me. I will have my revenge, with your help. Willingly or not. There is not point to fight me anymore, you'll only hurt yourself ..." The voice echoed again. The fluid moved up along his lower body part. He heard a pulsing sound inside his head, like from a pulsing heart. The fluid moved along with the sound. Clive realized that it was not a fluid, but a living body, a shadow that had found its way inside his head. Somebody was trying to separate his spirit from his body, melted its mind together with his. He was getting desperate, made one more attempt to wake up, but to no avail. The shadow pinned him down.
"No! Leave me alone!"
"Try to make me..." The voice whispered back.
Anyone have a clue on who it is? Please R&R!