CROSSING RIVER (B×B×B..) *COMPLETE*

Chapter 33- New World

After Zale’s return, the old world family were escorted to this border that separated them from New world. Despite Zale’s displeasure, River stayed with his family while they travelled.

River grew weary when he sensed other Creatures around them but the twins halted everyone, “Choose your ride, they will take us faster than ourselves. If they are any close to the Sacros from our world”, Zale ordered as pods of orcas swam towards them.

They have been traveling for few hours now and only Destan had been giving them time to stop and hunt. Zale kept sending bunch of fish, sea weeds and other foods to River through Brandon. He seemed to be the “I don’t care about you!”, guy who then would give you remaining of his food without eating himself.

River was not happy with Brandon being used like that and even when he expressed his point, it was ignored. Destan swam to River and nervously reached out his palm with pink Crystal necklace to the green eyed boy, “This is from your mother. She remembered you have pink scales and told us to give this to you. It will balance your energy and it also allows us to communicate. Like... phone?”, he softly explained.

River reached out and took the necklace and while doing so, his fingers caressed Destan’s palm which caused both of them to shiver. River’s eyes widened then it met with Destan’s crystal clear purple eyes, “What was that?”, he asked, scared by the emotions it stirred. Destan retracted his arm, “It’s nothing”, he whispered then return to the front.

“What happened?”, Riley asked as he felt River’s hands. River had been staring at the spot where Destan was, together with his brother. The green eyed boy shook his head, “It’s nothing”, then he looked at the necklace and at Riley, “Help me put it on?”, he smiled and the boy nodded.

As soon as it was clicked onto his neck, River felt at ease. Cool breeze ran down his body, relaxing every muscles and nerves. He felt really refreshed and full of energy. Wayde pulled the three of them to a orca and placed themselves on it’s back. Zale made a whistling sound and the big black and white animals started swimming forwards.

Erina and Olivia were sitting on one, other warriors were huddled in two while Zale, Destan and Brandon had one for each. Zale felt like his brother was getting closer with River and to have good impression he started treating Brandon more like one of his warriors than a slave.

To message their parents about their arrival, all crystals were needed to be used and he had informed them to charge the barrier with crystals on other side to keep it open for them. It will be opened only for an hour and half from the moment all their crystals lights up.

Sun rays couldn’t reach to where they were traveling but looking up at the surface every one could see the lights as the waves swayed front to back. It was very calming sight and the Creatures swimming all around them, looked like your everyday neighbours who did their own thing except these ones weren’t nosy or loud.

It took them one week to reach Antarctica and the water started getting cooler. River watched the surface which were covered with ice and shivered. It wasn’t cold inside but it was cool, not that he shivered from it, it was just the fear of what could be here beyond no man’s land that could be waiting for him and his family. He wanted to meet his mother but he wasn’t sure about others.

From what he had learned from Destan, this world was still a baby in comparison to where he was right now. He had given up on technology since he decided to start this journey but to be among people who lived in kingdoms? Who fought battles? A place where there was attack not just from within but from left, right, up and down? How could a bunch of modern age youths would survive there?

He felt a warm glow shining from his necklace and saw those who had bracelets were also staring at their wrists. “Ok! We have one and half hour until the barrier is closed. It can only be opened once a month according to new official rule, so we need to hurry”, Zale said out loud.

They all unmounted their rides and bid them goodbyes. Warriors circled around the old world family while Zale and Destan remained at the front with Brandon on the side. He seems to be itching to be close to River but he wasn’t allowed and River couldn’t tell him to come over because Zale had put black crystal bracelet on Brandon. Every time River made him reject Zale’s order, the guy gave a small zap to Brandon.

They swam deep under the blocks of ice, from left then right then through numbers of holes. Finally they fell down through the hole and into the reservoir. The icy cave walls were glowing all over with dim lights. However, this wasn’t the spot yet, the old world family were taken further deep into the water in the cave.

Destan had come close to River, “The one we came in through is the fastest route we discovered. It would have taken us long time had we used the original path. We will be there in few minutes now”, he explained and River gave him a nod of acknowledgement. He could tell the guy was trying hard to get in his good books and also the innocent love, fear, hope, frustration and anger, he had Felt just by a little skin contact earlier, River could sense what the guy was feeling towards him.

Riley and Wayde stayed closer to River because now they knew there would be trouble in paradise. They knew River would never leave them but these Creatures seems to be old fashioned and there’s the power they all had while the old world family only knew few tricks.

They all finally stopped and gawked at the magnificent looking wall of waterfall in the icy cave. The stream was going upwards and there was ripples as if the current was too fast. “Cross the river, River”, Zale made that joke again which earned him a slap on the head by his twin. The guy scowled at his brother then looked at River.

The green eyed boy ignored the guy with crystal clear deep blue eyes and swam to the wall. Erina, Olivia, Riley and Wayde followed behind him and he made eye contact with all of them. The fear and excitement prevalent in his eyes, they all gave him a nod and placed their hands on his shoulder, encouraging him to take the first step.

Zale and Destan both looked jealous from the bond River had with all this creatures. River stretched his arms out and placed it on the wall, his ears were ringing from fear and he closed his eyes. When he pushed his hands further, he was swallowed by the wall. River felt numb and tingles all over his body, white light attacked his sight and the ringing in his ears just amplified.

He had the feeling of falling and his breath hitched, slowly his sight recovered and he gawked at the scene in front of him. It was day time and all he saw was water, deep blue water. The atmosphere was light and tickling to the skin.

He finally looked down and yelled as he face planted on the river which was long, wide and deep. He was plunged inside and he quickly steadied himself, the water was soothing to the pain on his face. His body felt like it was singing all kinds of happy song. He was being carried by the current as he heard more splashes from behind him.

All his family along with the twins and his best friend entered and he smiled at their reactions. Zale and Destan were quick to reach him on either side and he saw them looking at him with some kind of expectations. He didn’t know what to say, so he just gave them his extremely surprised and astonished smile. They looked like puppies who loved getting attention from their owner.

However, their expression turned dire when dark shadows glided over them. River felt chills go down his spine when he saw a huge shadow out of the water. It flew right towards the water fall and he turned back to see the few of warriors who were falling down into the river were caught in mid air and wholly swallowed by the beast.

He felt the twins tug on his hand and he was pulled to the front. Their pace increased and he looked back at his family in total fear. They all had held hands and were right behind his tail. He sighed and looked at front. Erina, Olivia and Riley soon took the front with their speed that they inherited from River, they pulled Wayde and Brandon with them. River also pulled the twins with him and dashed after them.

Their expression changed when they figured out there was another fall in front of them. “Slow down and stay inside the water!”, Erina yelled and everyone followed. This time they didn’t fall out of the water but dropped down from inside. A large mouth closed right in front of their eyes as the red scaly beast flew past the spot they would have been in, if they hadn’t slowed down.

Their heart nearly stopped beating. It was waiting for them to fall again or was it another one? Then they saw four of such winged colourful creatures glide over the vast ocean and close to the waterfall. “Dragons! Fuck! They are dragons!”, Olivia yelled and they all plunged right into the sea.

No one waited to recover as they quickly dove down and good thing, they did. Last remaining warriors were grabbed by scaly claws as the dragons used the technique sea eagles used when fishing.

Only when they were very deep into the sea, did they heaved and looked around them. There was some sort of structure built stretched in a long way. About fifteen Beluga looking Sirens with crystallized spears where all around them. All of their eyes were focused on River and the twins at first but they soon looked towards extra company.

“Da, Ma! We found him! This is Rhael!”, Zale greeted two old looking Sirens who were dripping with purple and blue crystal jewels. They had their eyes covered with black lids as they looked at River. Then they looked behind the three of them, “They are the family he created using sci.... Magic”, Destan quickly explained to their parents.

They looked shock and then pleased when they heard the word magic. “Very well, bring Rhael and his family back to the palace to rest. Her majesty from Tridia will be arriving soon to greet him”, their father spoke in deep and thick accent. River remembered that they weren’t talking in human language but he was listening them speak the language he understands.

There palace was basically under water caves being connected and decorated with crystals. On their way, the talkative of the twin explained them the infrastructures of the place. Interconnected cave routes were used to travel into the palace where only few guards were present. Many spears were erected all over the kingdom.

Those who weren’t royals stayed out of the palace in huge igloo like houses but the Old world family didn’t see much Meras on their way. Even Zale and Destan looked surprised and worried. They took River to extraordinary looking cave which screamed twin’s room from miles away while others were taken to “Guest” caves.

The twins were putting their human knowledge to use and giving names to many things for him to understand, even their parents looked oddly at their sons using alien names when describing things.

River could sense some sort of tension within the kingdom as the leaders took their sons away to have private conversation while they treated him as god and sweetly asked him to rest in the room. River felt very nervous when he learned that his mother was on her way to meet him.

He didn’t know what to feel, happy, sad, excitement, nervousness, anxiety, fear, he was overwhelmed. He slowly peeked outside the cave to see if there were any guards and he saw Wayde and Riley doing the same on the other side. He smiled at them and quickly rushed towards them.

They hugged him tightly and both of them nibbled on his neck, causing him to shiver and giggle, he never giggled! Embarrassed from giggling, he shoved them aside and reached towards Erina and Olivia. The ladies looked very surprised from being hugged so tightly but soon hugged him back. River then tightly embraced Brandon who did the same in return.

Much to Riley and Wayde’s displeasure, the best friends hugged longer than they did. Finally River let go of Brandon but the boy wasn’t ready, he chuckled and patted the boy on the back. River turned around and looked at his family.

“I was so stressed out when I saw those things! This place is a complete fantasy land! Only far too gore with Jurassic Park vibe. It could have been anyone of us in place of those poor souls! Our adventure would have stopped before even starting.. I can’t believe I am saying this but I don’t want to stay here, in this world. There numbers seems to be dwindling which means there is more threat in water as it is out there”, he spat out everything he wanted to say and finally sat down.

Everyone had same thoughts as him and they all sat down in circles. “Even if we want to leave, didn’t the twins say that the barrier opens only once a month? Can we even survive a month?”, Olivia asked and shivered. This adventure wasn’t exactly what she had in mind.

She had thought, they would bicker with everyday normal Sirens in the ocean, fight sharks and other cute creatures, hunt and build home. She would get to study deep water life style. There would have been life threatening incidents but they could have been dealt with, unlike here where the first thing that greeted them was huge flying dragons!

“Rhael!? Where is he?”, came a loud female voice from outside the cave into the hall of the cave palace. River nearly chocked on water as he started to cough.