"It's nearing night time," I noted to Dylan, staring at the sky that was painted with violet blues and varnished blacks, beginning to tint with miniature dots of stars. By now, we were long down the route, the night sky up and free.
"Yeah, I guess," he told me, sounding tired. We kept walking on through the road that would lead us to Minuka City, where Dylan lived and had to get all of his possessions ready to continue with the quest. I hoped that another Minor wouldn't be revealed while I was waiting for him. That would be quite troublesome.
As we walked side by side, I tried to figure out why the Botanical Half picked his personality specifically to embed itself into. I faced my glare in his direction, in other words to my left, and began with the physical details. I slowly began comparing him to Kakori, the Botany Council. He didn't seem to notice my glare stuck on him, he just kept walking, pacing slowly into the forest we would soon be surrounded in.
First, I thought of Kakori's physical features. Kakori had a kind of pony-tailed hair. It wasn't long, it's just that his pony tail was extremely short and spiked up like triangles sticking out of the back of his head. Tied with a rubber band, his dark, ivy green hair was almost consumed with black. It was just outlined with a few dark greens, that's all. He had eyes that showed the state of the innocent. Just like a child's eyes. Just like Dylan's eyes. All wide and green shaded for Dylan, white shaded for Kakori.
Kakori's eyes would crinkle into small lines painted on his face when he smiled a wide smile, just like Dylan's did when he ordered his twentieth bowl of ramen. They both usually got excited over things, like a new idea for a technique or lunch time. They both seemed pretty nice, like they couldn't harm a fly. But I knew that wasn't true. I've seen both of them in a serious state. And Kakori would go on a rage if he had to. I wondered if Dylan was the same.
"What's going on?" Dylan said in his own, kid-like voice. He stared at me with upward crinkled eyebrows, his eyes steering off to the bottom right towards me.
"Nothing," I said, keeping my thoughts to myself. I stood up straight and felt the wind brush us gently with its gentle hands as we followed the dirt walk into the lively, green forest. Dylan didn't seem to believe my words and turned his eyes back to the walk, his eyebrows still crinkled in wonder.
"Do you think we should stop for the night? It's getting a little dark, and I don't think we should walk too much in the dark," Dylan insisted in a voice that seemed like he was trying to protect me. Well, newsflash. I don't need to be protected. But I didn't want to be rude.
"Okay," I said, looking around to see flocks of trees surrounding us. "But where would we sleep?" gently feeling the bark of a young tree, touching the crags and pricks of the wood.
"I think there's a hill all the way to the east side of this road. Let's head for that. We don't really have anything to keep us warm, but it'll help us conserve energy. We can start early in the morning," he told me, directing his arm to the east side of the forest that led to a bunch of trees.
I stared down the way we were supposed to go, where my sight was lost within the branching trees in the way. I was pretty nervous about staying the night on a hill, unlike in a bedroom like I usually did with the Council, but I guess it'll have to do.
As we changed our direction and headed for the large hill to rest ourselves for the next few hours, I began to wonder if I should contact the Council, telling them that I all ready had a Minor on my side. They would be proud to hear so. It had only been the first day, and I had found one and gotten him on our side. But a part of me went against it, and I don't know why. I couldn't see any reason why I shouldn't tell them. Maybe I was just too tired. I'll contact them in the morning, I decided. We finally reached the large hill, which was about ten feet high in the air and seven feet wide.
I sat myself down on the base of the hill, staring up into the night sky, watching the starry wonders blink in the sky. The violets and blues were fading amongst the horizon now, and the dark purple was taking over. "Hey," Dylan called to me. His voice seemed to come from above me.
I turned my head quickly to see where he was. I looked around the hill, but couldn't find him. Then I finally looked up to the top of the hill. There he was, nestled on top of the tall hill with his legs sticking out, his back straight up. "I'll be up here," he told me. "Will you be okay down there?" he asked me with a grin and cheery eyes, looking up at the night sky as well.
"Yeah, I'll be fine," plopping down back to the base of the hill where I had been before. I wasn't the least bit surprised he could climb up the hill and find his seat on the top. Frankly, I didn't really care. I began to stare at the sky again, the twinkling dots in the sky smiling upon me. The scene in the sky painted the forest darker, making the light green regular greens, the browns and whites darker.
For some reason, the stars reminded me of the past. The past I wanted to forget. But also a past to cherish forever. I thought of how I was five years ago before I met the Council, lost in some desert I had no idea where it was. As I continued to glare at the shiny marks in the sky wide-mouthed, I was taken back slowly into my memories…
It was a ho day that seemed like summer. The desert sand provided no solid ground for my bare feet and no water for my dry lips. I didn't know who I was or what I was doing there. All I knew, was that I had to make it through the desert. Or else I would die. Why? I don't know.
My pace was soft and steady, the hot desert heat shaking the air at the bottom. The surroundings were barren and sweaty, and the sky above me was cloudless and sun-fried. I gasped for cold air violently, wondering what I was doing in such a hot place like this. Wondering where I had come from. I was almost completely dehydrate, I realized as I continued walking on the unsteady sands. Bits and grains of it were sticking to my feet and the short sleeved shirt and shorts I was wearing were torn up and ripped.
There was no one to be seen around the area, only my shadow and I. I believed that that was all I needed in my life. Just myself, and my shadow to live on. There was no way to believe anything else, after all. No one was around me. No one came around and cared for me. No one gave a rat's butt as to where I was. I was just lonely, and I didn't know where I had come from; where I was born. I didn't know anyone in this world. Anyone. Everyone was a stranger.
As my hateful thoughts reined my mind, I collapsed due to dehydration. I needed water. But no one would give it to me. I needed a helping hand. But no one was there to help me up. I was alone, and I knew I was about to be dead.
I breathed in the brown sand heavily as I tried to somehow reach cold air by breathing over and over again as hard as I could. The sun continued to fry my back as the hot, unstable sand cooked me from my chest. My legs felt weak and heavy, like they were broken by the sun's crucial rays.
But just as I felt like blacking out, a figure appeared over my head. The strange shadowy figure gave way to shade upon myself, blocking the sun from any further punishment on my useless life. I tried to focus my tired eyes and turned my body over. I was still breathing hard as I noticed the face on the figure. It was a face of sincerity, of support. But who was this person? What was he or she doing here?
"Hey," her voice called out to me. It was a girl. At this point I was wondering if I was seeing a mirage. Was this a mirage? Am I really imagining all of this that's happening right now? "Looks like you could use a hand to help you up," she said, reaching her hand out to me among the hot desert sands.
A hand to help me up? That was exactly what I needed. But how did she know? I gave her my hand slowly, my arms weak and tired from being in the sun all day, the moisture in them practically dried out.
She slowly helped me get up and brushed the sand out of clothes without touching me. I was totally amazed. How was the sand escaping into the air from my clothes without any contact or touch? Was she causing this? Grains of sand got caught in my eye as I tried to see the figure of this taller woman. I was but five years old, and this girl seemed like she was in her thirties or twenties. What was she doing here? I asked myself one more time.
"I'm here to help you," she replied, flashing a smile smothered with the shadow she made with the back of her head, her whole face seeming as cool as a piece of ice, not at all bothered by the sun. Was she reading my mind? Did she know what I was thinking? Just who is this girl?
"In a way, you could say I was reading your mind. But what I was really reading was something else. Something so much stronger," she began to talk. "My name's Minoa. I'm part of the Council."
"The Council? What's that?" I asked her, still hot and tired from walking such a far distance.
"The Council, is a twelve man group that teamed up together to… basically, help the world from its current state," she told me. I was glad to hear that there were people like that in our world. Was there hope for me after all? The woman gave me a happy smirk beneath her white streaks of hair blocking the right side of her face. "You've been through a lot, haven't you? I can sense your pain, and I want to help. You haven't had a proper education either, have you? You don't even know why you know the words you know, or why you understand the things you understand."
"Y-Yeah," I told her. So she did understand. She did have powers. Would she be the savior of my life? We got to talking, and she said that she'd raise me under her supervision as a Council Trainee. I'd asked her why she chose me to be a part of her life all of a sudden after just meeting me, but all she replied was, "You have great power, and I know you don't know you have them. So I want you to become our Trainee so you could discover and learn how to use them. Understand?" I had nodded to her and said yes. I wasn't sure I understood anything I heard, but I was so light-headed and confused, she opened some kind of portal in the middle of the desert and pulled me in. She took me to the Council's dimension, where I had stayed for the last five years. They named me Jeremy, after something I don't remember. But my name from now on was Jeremy, and I had learned so much from them ever since.
From then on, I felt loved. I felt protected. I felt like someone wanted me for a reason and treated me like anyone else. I was given a whole new chance in life, and I respected that. From that point on, I knew that I would be lonely no more. From that point on, I knew I was safe.
Now I was here, sitting in front of a hill, staring up into the sky, remembering the past. "Hey Jeremy," Dylan called me from above. I looked up to where he was to see his face staring down at me with one of his handsome grins again. Those things were seriously getting annoying.
"Yeah?" I asked him, remaining in place on the front of the hill.
"You okay down there? You hadn't said or done anything for the past ten minutes," he stated, worried. The darkness of the night had taken over by now, and the violets were gone, covered by the dark blackness of the night sky.
"Yeah, I think I'll be fine," I told him, turning away and looking back up into the illuminated but yet, still dark night sky. I felt like each and every star, each and every glinting phenomenon in the sky represented one memory from my forgotten past. One memory that I had chosen to treasure and keep some idea of within my heart for the rest of my life. And as I began to count the stars and label them each with their own forgotten memory, I slowly drifted into a peaceful, dreamful sleep…