Author's Note: Another chapter! And due to the overall positive response about the multiple POV, I decided to stick with it. Thank you for all the reviews and I hope you enjoy this chapter!

Chapter 5: Surprise Attack

Logan POV

I woke up feeling like something was lying on my chest, Carlos decided to use me as his personal pillow. This presented a problem, I needed to get out of bed but then I would have to wake Carlos up, I just couldn't wake him up. He looked so peaceful as he slept, like we were back in LA, and none of this had ever happened.

"Morning Logan, when did you get up?" Carlos said and from the tone in his voice I knew he had been awake the entire time. He wasn't sleeping, just pretending to.

"You were awake but decided to use me as a pillow?" I wasn't mad, who could ever be mad at those big brown eyes, nobody could resist them.

"But you're so warm! And comfortable, I just couldn't help myself. By the way, did you know you talk in your sleep? You said some pretty interesting words." My face grew a shade of red that made Carlos burst out laughing. He said my face looked like a bottle of ketchup.

"Come on, we need to get moving. Kendall and James are probably waiting for us." He groaned before getting off of me and the bed. As we headed for the exit of the inn, he suddenly pulled me into him and kissed me.

"Don't forget about me." He ran off and turned the corner leaving me in a daze. I walked out the door with a huge grin on my face; I couldn't forget that or him even if I tried.

When we entered Nanaki's shop Kendall and James were arguing over where to head next, apparently there were three cities nearby. The port of Timney, the mechanized city of Saint Luca, and the magical town of Selije were all within a day's walk from here, except there were a few issues. Based on the map we either had to navigate through a desert, forest or spend much more time walking.

"Luca!"

"Timney!"

They kept arguing back and forth before the noticed me and Carlos staring at them. They resumed arguing when I had the brilliant idea of asking Nanaki which would be better.

"I think the Selije town would be the greatest aid to you guys. Logan's kind reign there and only a Selije student could find it." Me, a Selije student? I guessed it was possible, how else do you explain a floating book?

"Then it's settled! We are headed to the town of Selije!" Carlos announced leaving the shop. Kendall and James followed but I stayed behind.

"Thank you Nanaki, we owe you so much." He smiled before handing me a bag full of items. I stood there holding the bag open and stared at the contents. A three charms, a bunch of colored bottles and a few glowing red feathers.

"Are you sure? I couldn't possibly accept this." He insisted and pushed the bag closer to me, he smile grew wider.

"The charms decided, I couldn't sell them anyway, they 'attached' themselves to your friends. Do you really want to leave? After all I could teach you so much more than he could." His grin turned into an evil smirk before he grabbed me by my shirt and pulled me into him.

"No…. please don't!" I tried to pull away but he was much stronger than I was. He started to lean in before I heard another voice.

"Don't you even think about doing it! Move one more inch and I won't feel sorry for killing you." Carlos growled, his normally bright face looked darker, more evil. He held a giant shuriken at Nanaki, who released me. So I grabbed the bag and booked it out of the store. Carlos ran behind me and when I felt safe enough to stop running he gave me an 'I told you so,' kind of look.

"Are you okay? Did he do anything?" I shook my head 'no' because I wasn't okay and he didn't do anything.

"Logan, he can't ever hurt you again. I will always protect you. Oh, James you can detonate it now." He turned me toward the shop just in time to see it explode. Nanaki made it out, alive. I kinda wished that he died in that explosion even though he helped me greatly.

Kendall POV

That guy, Nanaki, tried to chase us but Carlos threw his 'star' at him. The guy ducked it but he stopped chasing us after that. I had to remind myself not to mess with either Carlos or Logan if I had any value of my life. But since the incident was over we headed toward the north, where the Selije town waited for us. The only way to the north was to cross the forest where Carlos' 'friend' came from.

"Be careful guys, we don't know what could be hiding in here." I said taking the leader role, it wasn't asked of me, or expected but being the man in charge just felt natural to me. Even in LA I would be the one to make some ridiculous plan or rally the guys after a plan failed.

Carlos had said this was a short forest but he also admitted that he jumped from branch to branch, so I didn't think he knew how big it was when you were walking.

After about three hours worth or walking I grew suspicious because we haven't heard nor seen a beast. I guess I spoke too soon, as a screech from somewhere above us caused the four of us to look around. More and more screeches rang through the forest and Logan ordered us to stop moving.

"Keep your eyes open, we don't know what's out there." Logan said while flipping his book open to a page.

"There!" James pointed toward the tree tops where a dozen flying creatures waited for us. They dived at us and I heard Logan call out a spell.

"Barrier!" And a dome of, I'm going to call it energy, surrounded us.

When their attack let up Carlos and James went to work. Carlos jumped from tree to tree slashing the birds with his star. James threw bomb after bomb at the flying creatures, they stuck to them and caused them to become parlayed, giving Carlos a perfect opportunity to strike. I couldn't do much because I can't jump around in this clumsy armor nor could I aim a bomb for my life. So I decided to protect Logan while he remained on the ground, casting spells like crazy. I heard a roar from behind Logan, a half lion half lizard beast charged at him. Logan jumped out of the way and I drew my sword, blocking the attack. The beast attacked again but I didn't have time to block it, thankfully Logan threw a Barrier before he could do any damage. I swung my blade across its back and dug into the leathery and scaly flesh. When it stopped moving I ran back over to Logan, and kept my eyes open for any more of those creatures.

Carlos yelled and slashed the last beast in half, that's when I noticed the strangest thing. Instead of falling toward the ground, the dead beast simply vanished. Poof. Gone.

James POV

"What the hell Logan! How does something like that just vanish!" Carlos asked, slightly pissed. I would be too; we spent nearly half an hour dealing with those flying beasts.

"I think it has to do with the mutations. Weaker beasts disappear when killed and stronger beasts don't. I think that because of their genes being altered, it caused them to vanish like that." He looked more interested in his little charm than answering my question. So I grabbed it from him.

"What is that?" Kendall asked grabbing it from me. A blue light radiated from the charm. When the light faded I noticed a floating beast, but it didn't move. I recognized the animal, a falcon, from class at the Palmwoods.

"That's what they do!" Logan said before pulling three more of those little charms. A small UFO, a glowing green orb and a red egg, were in his hands. I grabbed the UFO shaped charm while Carlos picked up the egg. Three more shades of light, red, yellow, and green were emitted from our respective charms. Kendall's falcon, my Frisbee sized UFO, Carlos' miniature dragon and Logan's….

"Logan what is that?" asked Carlos, pointing at the weird looking creature. It looked like an eel, but it had a glowing green light around it. The fact I could see through it made me think of a ghost, but I knew that they didn't exist here.

"It's a Mana Wyrm." He said like it was no big deal. He then petted the new 'pet' before it floated on the other side of Logan's book.

Carlos POV

"What do they do?" I asked while staring at my incredibly cute dragon. I wanted to hug it but decided against it, usually dragons breathe fire.

"They assist us in battle, at least that's what I think they do. I wouldn't know for sure until I observed them during a fight." Logan explained giving me a small smile.

"I know one thing; I don't want to stay here in this forest any longer. We need to get out of here before we come under attack again." Kendall said walking in the opposite direction. He was headed back to the town of Quartly, not to the north.

"Kendall, it's the other way." James said pointing in the opposite direction of Kendall.

"No it's this way!"

"You're wrong! It's in this direction!"

"Guys! North is this way!" Logan said with a calculated smile. We stared at him in disbelief because we couldn't believe that Logan would know where we were originally headed.

"How do you know? Did you read it?" Kendall asked with a snigger. Logan threw his hand up and a holographic version of the map appeared in the middle of us. A red dotted line showed where we had been and a giant red arrow pointed in the direction we needed to go. Logan was right, as usual.

"Do you get that fed into your brain?" James asked laughing, but stopped when Logan nodded. He apologized, saying that it was a joke, that he didn't know.

"It's not all bad. It's like having a television in your mind." He joked dryly. After a few minutes of walking we saw the light, signaling that we had made it out of the forest. Dusk had approached and we knew that staying outside at night would spell disaster.

"Logan where is this town?" Cue Logan's glowing green eyes. He pointed to empty space, there wasn't any town or even a sign. I looked at him and he nodded.

"We need to get closer; I can't quite get the range of my spell in check." We ran in the direction Logan pointed before he called another spell.

"Reveal." And wouldn't you know it, something appeared, but it wasn't a town. But a glowing purple ring on the ground.

"It's a teleport, the real city of Selije is far in the north, in the arctic." Logan explained before taking a step into the purple ring. We followed him into the ring and within a blink of my eye the wasteland turned into a snowy city.

Around the teleport was two feet of snowy terrain, but after that nothing. I walked toward the empty space before Logan spoke up.

"If you fall of the edge you return to the teleport. The city of Selije is surrounded by a magical sphere that protects the citizens from the extreme cold and monsters. The darkness is the edge of the barrier, so please don't fall off." I laughed before running back away from the edge. I didn't want to fall, even if I would return here.

A/N: Anyway, I felt like after 2k words that I should stop. Since someone asked me in a review, yes I got Nanaki from FF7's Red XIII. But instead of being a….idk what it is so I'm calling it a red dog, he's a human. Also if you played FFX or Wild Arms 2 then a few future references will be blatantly obvious. Reviews would be greatly appreciated and have a nice, cool day. (In Cali it's over 110 everyday this past week.)~RAY~