(A/N: Who's ready for a new chapter? I know I am! It might be stressful at times, but it's all worth it when I know that I'm making someone's day.
Just so you know, yes, I am receiving and reading your reviews (which can be a little overwhelming sometimes, but who am I to complain). The most thing I've been getting lately is Layla's mother or giving her a mother figure. Her mother will come much, much later, but there will be a mother figure for her at some point, I can't say when that'll be though.
I also see quite a few reviews about the Tennysons, which I believe I've addressed before. She will be reunited with them sooner than later.
That's it for the future plans, time to get back to the present. I hope I can give all of you an amazing chapter!)
V-U-*o-I-0-I-o*-U-V
When Patelliday told Layla that Ceto had a day for their private training, she was ecstatic. The days seemed to fly like an eagle when she had an exact date for it. Once it arrived, it was as though she was given the time one moment and it was there the next.
After she finished getting ready, he took her to the same room it was held the last time. He was in an unusual hurry to be at work, he was typically very busy every day, but he barely stayed for a moment before he left her there with Ceto.
He had her on the treadmill-like exercise machine again, having her run instead of walking. She could stop whenever she wanted, he was using a timer to count how long she ran.
"I can tell you have been practicing a lot," he commented.
She slowed down momentarily, but didn't stop running, "Really? How long have I been on this?"
"Five minutes," he responded, jokingly. He showed her the timer to prove it.
"Keep it going, I'm not stopping yet," she smiled, increasing her pace.
He smiled back, "Perfect."
He was proud of how much she was progressing in their short time together. He honestly thought it would take a while before they started to do slightly tougher exercises, but she might be ready to advance to them.
After a few more minutes, she decided she had done enough running and stopped. She used the remote that controlled the speed to turn it down to the slowest setting, stepping off of it.
He gave her a metal container that resembled a combination of a canteen and a hydro flask. "A little over ten minutes, great job."
"It could be better," she uttered, opening the container and drinking the water held inside of it.
"You are trying, though," he patted her shoulder. "That is better than not."
She drank a little more water before closing it, "I guess."
"Come on, let me show you something," he told her.
He used his gauntlet to activate something, a small gap appearing on the floor almost immediately. Rising from it were two posts that could have fooled her to be telephone poles, connected by a thin metal rod.
He walked under it and leapt up, grabbing onto it with a firm grip. "Watch me, alright?"
She nodded, "Okay."
He pulled himself up until the rod was touching the middle of his chest. He allowed himself to drop, but only until the top of his head was under it. He pulled up and dropped again, continuing to do it a couple more times as an additional demonstration.
Finally, he let go and his feet touched the floor, "Do you think you can do that?"
"I… I'm not sure," she replied, feeling nervous.
"Well, just try to do one. If it is too difficult for you now, we can do something else. Is that alright?" he asked.
"Um, I guess I can try," she responded.
She stood under the rod, just as he did, but she struggled to jump high enough to reach it, she was too short. He held up his gauntlet again and lowered it a few inches for her.
"There, you should be able to reach it now," he informed her.
She jumped again and finally managed to grab hold of it. It was harder for her to keep her grip on the smooth metal than she thought, she could have fallen to the floor in a second.
Nevertheless, she held onto it as firmly as she could and bent her elbows as she tried to lift herself up. She could feel the little muscle she had in her arms strain, barely managing to raise her head above the boundary of the rod before she lost her grip and fell to the floor, hard.
Ceto offered his hand to her and she took it, although she was quite embarrassed, "I'm sorry, I failed."
"No, you didn't," he reassured her, patting her head. "Pull-ups are really hard to do the first time, but at least you are trying. If you try harder, you will eventually be able to do ten of them, maybe twenty or thirty at once."
She laughed, "Yeah, maybe one day I will."
"And I have a feeling it will be much sooner than later," he playfully poked her shoulder, causing her to laugh more.
"Really?" she grinned, barely able to speak without laughing.
He nodded, "Look how far you have come in only a couple of weeks. Without my direct guidance. I think you were born to be independent, you are succeeding on your own."
"I did have help," she pointed out.
"And there is nothing wrong with that," he told her. "Everyone needs a little bit of assistance to achieve their goals."
"So, what should we do now?" she asked.
"You have been practicing your push-ups and sit-ups, right? Why not show me how many of them you can do?" he suggested.
"Okay, I can do that. Can you help me hold my feet down?" she requested meekly, slightly embarrassed. "It's a little hard for me to keep them flat."
He nodded with a reassuring smile, "Of course."
She laid down on the floor and bent her knees, he crouched and gently pressed her feet flat to prevent her from moving them. Her hands slid forward and back as she sat up and her back touched the smooth surface, trying hard not to use her elbows.
She continued to do them until she started to feel a slight pain in her tailbone, although it wasn't as bad as she had experienced before. He helped her off the floor and she rubbed the spot where she felt sore.
"Are you alright?" he asked.
"Yeah, I will be," she answered.
"You really should stop when you have done enough," he advised, "do not pressure yourself. Be careful."
She was about to say something when, all of a sudden, she heard the words "be careful" echoing in her mind. Her head felt like it was spinning, a tidal wave of fatigue came crashing onto her.
Everything became black, like she was swimming in a sea of darkness. Suddenly, streams of light swirled like a whirlpool as blurry images began to form, although details were impossible to decipher. Gradually, they cleared ever so slightly, but most of the features were seemingly clouded by mud.
She started to hear voices, but the words were little more than whispers and murmurs. Just like the visuals, they too cleared and she could hear a bit of dialogue, enough to know what was being said.
"Be careful, grandpa. Those are very sharp."
Knives or elongated claws cupped the head of a baby in a bundle. One of them lightly brushed against the infant's face, barely touching it.
"I've held one or two in my time."
"Are you sure it is safe for him to hold our newborn?"
"I trust him."
"I don't. He rules with an iron fist, he doesn't hesitate to strike those who oppose him, and-"
"And he cares for his family. I'm not in denial that he is ruthless, but I know he has a heart."
"If you say so."
Layla opened her eyes after the vision she had faded, she was in the infirmary. Next to her were machines that she assumed were for analyzing her vitals. There were suction cups with cords attached to her chest and one of her arms, which were presumably feeding the information about her health to the machines.
Shortly after she woke up, she was visited by a doctor. It was Dr. Uril, who examined her when she first arrived at the Plumber base.
She smiled softly, "How are you feeling?"
"What happened?" she asked, slightly sluggish.
"You collapsed during your training," she told her. "Officer Ceto brought you here."
"What?" She sat up in the bed, confused and worried. "Why? Is there something wrong with me?"
"No, no, you're fine," she assured her. "However, I want to keep you here in the infirmary for the next twenty-four hours. Don't worry, I already informed Magister Patelliday."
She went to the side of her bed and sat down in a chair. She started tapping her fingers on the tablet she held, which looked like the same one she had the first time they met.
"Can you tell me what you can remember?" she questioned.
"Um, I just finished doing some sit-ups and I was talking to Ceto when I started hearing something in my head," she reported.
"Really?" Her nonexistent eyebrows raised. "What was it? Do you know?"
"I kept hearing 'be careful', 'be careful' over and over again," she responded.
She hummed, typing on her tablet, "Interesting. What else?"
"I had this… dream, I guess, and I remember people talking," she answered.
"And what were they saying? Do you remember?" she inquired.
"I think there was one person talking about how they don't trust someone to hold their baby," she replied. "Uh, I think that's it."
She patted the bed reassuringly, "It's okay, you've done a lot."
She continued to type what she was saying on her tablet. When she was finished with it, she turned it off and stood up.
"Don't worry, you will be out of here before you know it," she smiled gently.
She left her alone and went to her office, where she transferred the information from her tablet onto a different device, which was slightly similar to computers on Earth. As she read through everything she had written, she quickly realized that it didn't make sense medically.
She thought the most likely scenario was that it was a repressed or forgotten memory that her subconscious resurfaced. But that would not explain why she collapsed, nothing could. Unless, for an unexplained reason, her mind and body needed to be in a relaxed state in order for her to receive as much as she did.
There was the possibility that it was nothing more than a dream, but that would put her sudden loss of consciousness under more questions. Such a thought called for more doubts than questions, neither of which she could rationally explain; not from a medical perspective.
In other words, it was something that - for that moment - was unexplainable. She was a woman of science, and for there to be a mystery that had no explanation almost made her anxious enough to start pounding her head against her desk or wall. It was especially stressful when she had no idea if it was a fatal condition, she could die under her watch because there were no answers she could give.
She heard someone knocking in her doorway and looked up from her desk to see who it was. It was Patelliday, but his presence was not reassuring for her, it put more pressure on her because she was treating his adopted daughter.
"What's the diagnosis?" he questioned. "Is it serious?"
Instead of answering him, she stood up from her desk and closed the door. She would be embarrassed if any of her colleagues heard what she was about to say to him.
"I- I don't know," she admitted.
He was perplexed, "What do you mean?"
She didn't know how to answer, "All I can say is that she collapsed and she… saw or heard something in a dream, or vision, or memory."
"Really?" He raised a scaly eyebrow. "That's very strange."
"I know!" she raised her voice, which was full of stress. "And I'm going insane trying to find a medical or scientific reason behind it."
"Maybe it's neither of them," he put forward.
"I know that magic exists, but I don't believe it can cause what happened to her," she affirmed.
"I never said that I thought it was magic," he replied. "I don't know how I would explain it either. Maybe it is magic, maybe it isn't."
She tried to think of something she could suggest or recommend, but if there was no diagnosis, she could not legally, lest she risked losing her medical license. She had never had a case such as this and, frankly, she didn't know how to handle it.
Then, she remembered that he was friends with Max Tennyson, who had seen many strange things during his time as a Plumber, especially for a human. He was also once married to an Anodite and had experience with Ectonurites, there was a chance he might have an idea of what caused Layla's condition.
"I know you and Magister Tennyson are still in contact," she mentioned, "perhaps he might be able to say what happened to her. I really don't know what else I can tell you, that is the honest truth."
"He would probably know more than either of us," he agreed. "I'll give him a call."
V-U-*o-I-0-I-o*-U-V
(A/N: I know, it's another short chapter and it's not the best, but at least I put in the effort. Don't worry, Layla is fine, it's not a serious or fatal condition, it's actually a good thing.
Dr. Uril referencing the existence of magic is something that I based on an assumption. I assumed that since Addwaitya is a mutated alien who used his magic to take over Ledgerdomain, he (and therefore the realm) would be known by the Plumbers. For obvious reasons, I think it would be seldom discussed, which is why it's rarely mentioned.
Yes, Max is going to be involved in the next chapter. Will he, Ben, and Gwen be making a physical appearance? Do you expect me to tell you? If I did, what would be the point of reading the story? So don't ask me for any spoilers, I won't give them. But if you want to see what's going to happen, maybe you should stick around for it.)