Hell's War

Chapter Eleven

'Ummm, what?' I ask faintly.

'We need to break this stalemate, and that can only be done by fighting them. I need to shock them into battle. And with you on my side, Tanya, we can't lose. Of course, I don't want to simply capture them, we must meet them in battle.' Athena explains, 'When I have my army ready, you will flatten a large area into a field, then transport everyone in the enemy camp to it. But for now, you may go.' She dismisses us.

We walk back to our room in silence, each of us thinking about what Athena said.

'Hey Tanya, we're going to the training room. We want to practice. Are you coming?' Roshni asks.

'No, I think I'll come later. Right now I gotta practice.' I say sadly. I do want to practice, but I also want to hang out with my friends.

'Ok, see you later.' They walk off. Once they're gone, I obediently start to focus on making the room bigger, smaller and weirdly shaped. After about five minutes, I get bored of that and start to focus on other parts of Athena's camp. Suddenly I start to sense slight pressures on the floors of the rooms I'm focusing on. After a while of doing this, I realize that these things are people. I focus on Athena's office and find out that she is sitting down in her chair. I can't actually tell who it is, but who else would it be? I sense someone walking weirdly, kind of limping, down in the dungeons. So I decide to go and explore down there.

I quickly scan the layout of the camp, then walk through the tunnels that will lead me to the entrance. Once I'm there, I climb down the roughly hewn ladder into a long tunnel with caves all along both sides. And limping along this tunnel is a horribly disfigured person! He turns towards me and starts limping forwards.

I scream and trap him in the rock. I slowly walk towards him, my heart pounding. As I get closer, I see that he isn't disfigured, but he isn't a normal human being either. If I had to guess, I'd say that he's a Neanderthal or something like that.

'What are you? I ask quietly, half expecting it not to answer.

'I am Selden the Halfman.' It answer in a scratchy voice. I am shocked. I don't know what he is, but he is clearly a half-wit. Why is he down here guarding the prisoners?

This thought shocks me out of my reverie. I quickly glance around, making sure that none of the prisoners have escaped. Good, none of them have so much as poked their heads out. I hastily block all of the doorways up, leaving only a peephole the size of my hand where each door had been. I look at Selden again.

'Ok Selden, can you tell me some answers?' I ask quietly, careful not to let anyone in the rooms above know that I'm here.

'Ok.' Selden agrees.

'Why are you guarding the prisoners instead of someone better qualified?'

'Because they're scared of me,' he says sadly, 'and because I'll know if they try to get out.'

'How will you know?' I ask. He looks confused, as if the question didn't make sense.

'I just know.' he finally says. I sigh. Clearly I am getting nowhere.

'Ok, why don't you just kill the prisoners?'

'Cant kill dead people. They just heal.' He says this like I am the idiot.

'Ok, you are absolutely no help at all. I'm going.' And with that I stand up and walk over to the ladder. When I'm halfway up it, I get rid of all the changes I made to the corridor. Then I walk back to my room.