Devil's meadow

Chapter 17- Don't look

We ended up walking for miles, over vast hills and past abandoned buildings for a while, some of which Blaze didn't feel comfortable being around. As he started to speed up, I almost tripped over my own two feet. My exhausted accomplice had noticed that I had stumbled, and suggested to stop for a few minutes, before we continued on with our journey.
"I really think we should stop for a while."
"How come?"
"We've been walking for a while. What if we're not even going the right way?"
"Well, if we are going in the wrong direction, we can just circle back and go the way we came."
"That'll just take even longer."
"I guess we could stop for a while."
We settled down nearby some trees that were a very dark brown, and as Blaze sat against one, I placed myself onto the wilting grass. As he starting breathing normally, he looked over at me to see that I was staring at the trident again.
"Whatever it is your searching for, I don't think that it would be on the trident."
"Where would you say it's hiding then?"
"There's probably nothing else that's in that monstrosity of a weapon. Just remember that Crystal's dried blood has been on the prongs."
"I saw what happened, I don't need a reminder."
"Okay, I was just saying. What put you in a mood?"
"...."
"Hunter?"
"Nothing, B."
"I'm not convinced."
"Fine. You want to know so badly? I'm sick of being worthless all the god damn time, B. I've been stuck being told that I'm just a disappointment to my family my entire life. I regret things that I have control over, but I know I can't change it. I'm just not good enough for anyone...."
"You really think that way huh?"
"Did you want me to say it in a different way?"
"No."
"You mean a lot to me. Not just as a plain friend status. Your special to me."
"Hunter. You really don't need to keep yourself to well, yourself. I'm right here when you need me."
"I know that's why I-."
Before I could finish my sentence, someone came running past us both. They seemed disturbed and panicked, and as we both looked at each other confused, two more people flew past holding spears in their hands.
The f*ck?
As the grass was trampled over, me and Blaze both stood up, and chased after the three people who had raced by. The person at the very front was running in all directions as to try and loose the two behind them and as we were catching up, they stopped to face us, with their weapons pointing at our faces. The first person we saw had stopped in their tracks to observe  what was going on.
"What are you two doing here?"
"We should be asking you the same thing. Why are you chasing someone?"
"It's none of your business."
As they both looked directly at me, the gaze caught the sight of the trident strung over my shoulder. As they stated walking closer to me, Blaze stood in the way.
"Stay away from him."
"We're after the trident. We're not going to kill them."
"B."
"I know. Just be ready to run if things don't go the way we want them to."
As one of the deranged figures got close, the other came round the back of me, and grabbed my arms, and pulled them back so that I couldn't move. As his accomplice grabbed the bottom end of the trident and pulled it out its sheath, he noticed the prongs were slightly brown.
"Did you two steal this?"
"No. The king dropped it."
"You mean the king of-?"
"Yes. The reason why the prongs are that colour is because he killed someone with it."
"Wait- who did he kill?"
"Crystal. Leader of the ring alter. Now could you please let go of my arms. They're starting to hurt."
"State your name first."
"Hunter. Hunter Ortiz."
"What about you?"
"Uh. Blaze Ashbury."
They then put the trident back into the sheath, and
after Blaze finished his sentence, the two men let me go. But they were still awfully close. After a long moment of silence, one of them  whispered something into my ear.
"You may have gone away with it this time. But just know this...we will be back"
The other person was still watching us all, but as the two deranged men looked at them, they sprinted out of view.
As the other two chased after them, I turned around to meet Blaze looking concerned and confused.
"What did he tell you?"
"Something stupid."
"Which was-?"
"Something about getting away with something."
"We didn't even do anything."
"I know that's why I'm confused."
"Well whatever it is, let's just hope we don't come into contact with them again."
We decided to keep walking until we reached some type of destination. We both said nothing, but something, seems odd about it all, to the point where I felt queasy.
I wish Crystal was here..something seems...wrong.
We eventually came across a small town full of people frantically rushing around. They were dressed in cloaks, some of which reached the ground. The buildings looked fairly new, with smoke bellowing out from the chimneys. We stood still watching them all, and we were both confused.
"Where even are we?"
"Not a clue. I assume we went the right way."
"Well, it definitely looks like it."
As we both gazed upon the small village, someone came up from behind us. They seems just as confused as we were to see two new people.
"Who are you two?"
"We should be asking you that same question."
"I'm Misha. I'm not supposed to be out of the village's border but, I can't help myself."
"Uh huh.."
"If you don't mind me asking, where exactly are we?"
"Oh! ha ha, you're in Oxen."
"Oxen?"
"Yep. The small village is home to a lot of people actually."
"How many?"
"Hmm, I'd say around 200."
"That's not a lot."
"Depends on how you see it, not on what you know. I view it as lot more."
"Okay...?"
"So what are your names?"
"Uh. Hunter."
"Blaze."
"Ooh, sounds like you two are criminals."
"What, no! We're not criminals. Are we?"
"No."
"Well some people have been throwing rumours around saying that you two are bad and even set up wanted posters for you. I don't believe it until I see it. But, I wouldn't know who was a bad person until they dragged me into something bad."
"Alrighty then."
"All of sudden, I feel very uncomfortable."
"I do too."
"So. Should I give the grande tour?"
"Uhh. You said that were we wanted."
"Oh! I did. But I don't believe rumours."
"I don't really want people thinking that we're actually killers, by any chance do you have like a secret room or base or something?"
"No. But I do have a den."
"A den?"
"Yep. Follow me."
"If we get into trouble, don't yell at her. We've already lost too many people. I don't want her to go too."
"Okay."
As we followed the energetic child, she was extremely careful as not to get caught, and as she led us over to a tree with a door attached, she turned to face us.
"Oh! Before you go in, don't. Touch. Anything."
"Uh. Why?"
"Breakables."
"Oh. We won't lay a finger on anything."
"Thank you."
As she let us in, the trident on my back nearly touched the door frame. I didn't want her to know that we were a threat, so I took it out the sheath and precariously placed it against the wall, with Blaze following close behind.
"So...where'd you two come from? I know you're not from around here."
"We actually didn't know the name of the place where we came from."
"Katoka."
"What?"
"We originally came from Katoka."
"How do you know that?"
"I overheard someone say it."
"Oh."
"Ooh! It's sounds so fancy!"
"Uhm. It was far from from fancy."
"Yep."
"Oh. Were the people not nice?"
"No. I don't really want to say it in front of you, cuz you might be younger than 15."
"Oh ha ha! I'm not 15!"
"How old are you?!"
"I'm actually 17! I know I look and sound young, but I'm older than that."
"Your the same age as us..."
"I figured ha ha!"
As she smiled at us, something caught my eye. Some sort of disc with 4 colours going around it. Red, blue, green and yellow. The centre colour was shifting between two colours, purple and white.
"What's that?"
"Don't look at it! There's absolutely nothing there, that's a figment of your imagination!"
"Umm. I can clearly see it."
"Okay. Fine. It's an eradication disc."
"A what now?!"
"Eradication disc. You plan to use a destruction device. For what?"
"Uhhhh. I may or may not want to explode a part of the village. Ha."
"Why?"
"No reason in particular. Just wanted to get revenge on somebody."
"Who...?"
"Um. Okay, so I have a little bit of a dilemma with someone who ratted me out to the hunters because I was apparently breaking the law. I did nothing, I swear!"
"So let me get this straight. You want to explode part of your village as revenge because someone called you out?"
"Yes."
"Can we go? For a few minutes."
"Oh yea sure."
As Blaze was leaving, he grabbed me the shoulder. As I nearly fell, we had reached outside of the den.
"I don't want to be round her."
"Neither do I."
"Do we tell her we're leaving?"
"Uh. We might as we-Uhh, Blaze?"
"Yea?"
"I left the trident in there."
"You did what now?"
"I forgot to grab my trident. What do I do?"
"Go back in there."
"Whilst she's still in there? she's probably adding it to a collection of potential weapons she could use on other people. You saw what the power did to that tree. What if she uses it on us? It's game over."
"Okay here's what we do. We go back in there. We grab the trident, and we book it."
"And where would we run to? Where would we go?"
"We'll figure that out later. Let's just take the trident and go whilst we still can."
As we walked back into the den, Misha was sat in her chair looking at us with a stone cold expression on her face. The once energetic young adult was no longer smiling, but she was sat still with one of her legs crossed over the other, and she wasn't even blinking.
"I know where you're going. I heard it all."
"Uh. We're just going to get supplies and then we'll be back.
"That's not true. You lie, Blaze."
"The fact that you know my name is not that scary now that I think about it."
"You told me your name. Both of you did. I can technically just turn you two in. That would buy me some time."
"Please don't. We've already been through too much."
"Not my problem. I should've thought you two were here to cause trouble."
"I'll just take my trident out of your house- or whatever this place is."
"IT'S A DEN! And I'll be taking your beauty of a weapon, ha. It'll come in handy when i destroy this decrepit world."
"Destroy the what what?"
"When I destroy this world. People will recognise me."
"They'll also come looking for you. Do you really think you can hide forever. No, you can't because I've tried it before. It's not going to be all sunshine and rainbows for you."
"If I can remove the people who get in the way, I can have all the power I wish."
"And she's not even listening. Grab your trident Hunter, we're leaving."
"I was going to the moment we stepped in here."
As I clutched my trident in my hand, Misha grabbed a nearby smoke bomb, and ignited the fuse. As it let out a hissing noise, she ran straight for me, but before I could move away, the bomb had exploded, filling the room with dusty white powder. As we were both coughing our lungs out, the sound of a door slamming shut followed by the sounds of a key twisting in a lock alarmed us, and we both knew that we had been completely trapped. After the smoke had cleared, we both gained back control of our own breath, but as we were scrambling around, I realised that I no longer had my trident in my hand.
"Uh. Blaze?"
"Yeah, what's up?"
"She took the trident. It's gone."
"You've got to be kidding me."
"We should've left when we had the chance."
"Well, we need to figure a way out. She obviously locked the door, I'd imagine you heard it as well as I did."
"Yep. I did."
"Okay so busting the door down won't do anything-what are you doing?!"
"It's...not too....late....yet..."
"That's not going to work."
"I'm just trying it."
"You're still hurt, just stop."
"Fine. We could try finding a flip or a lever. She probably had one."
"Where would we look?"
"Use your imagination, B."
As he stood there watching me, I was busy turning Misha's den upside down, turning over cushions, moving books, even sweeping through her belongings, but I couldn't find anything. I turned round to Blaze to see him staring at the eradication disc that was settled on the plinth.
"What if we use the disc on the door or the roof?"
"That could work, but there's the whole entire idea of it being explosive, we don't even know how it works."
"Well this is where we find out."
As Blaze got close, the centre piece of the device was changing from purple and white, to purple and black.
"Wait, Blaze stop!"
"What?"
"Look at the centre. It's not purple and white anymore."
"Oh. I didn't even notice. What do you think it means?"
"I think if you touch it, it will blow up."
"Maybe you need to grab it then."
"What it it blows up on me?!"
"You have multiple injuries. I think you could survive being slightly burnt."
"Okay. I'll try touching the danger of an explosive."
As I moved forward, the centre remained purple and white. I had no idea why, but after realising that it wasn't going to explode on me, I picked it up.
"Okay, now what?"
"Either throw it towards the door or throw it straight up."
"I'll try the ceiling."
As I threw it upward, the side of the disc hit the roof, creating a pinging noise, before it came crashing back down the the ground. It spun round on itself for a few moments before it stayed still, but something happened as it lay flat. The sound of a tiny button being pushed filled the den, and within a couple of seconds, the disc detonated, sending us both flying backwards outside onto the grass. As we landed hard on the ground, the sounds of fire crackling rung in our ears before it settled down.
"Ow. That hurt."
"Okay. I'm really starting to wish i threw that towards the door. Ow."
"Well, we're out. So now we can find Misha and get your trident back."
"Yep. Ow."
"We should probably move away from the den before she comes back though."
"Agreed."
As we both stood up and brushed ourselves off from the soot and smoke, Blaze started to head down to the venders.
"Wait Blaze."
"What?"
"Remember what Misha said. We're wanted. They've probably got bounty hunters everywhere."
"Oh good point. So how do we get through?"
"What if we cover our faces with soot? That way they'll just think we've just come back from like a mining trip or something."
"That's genius."
As we dusted our faces full of soot, we headed down to the streets of the small village. We did get some looks, but nobody seems to know who we truly were.
As we were walking down some paths, i saw glimpses of the trident manoeuvring through the crowds. I whispered to my friend, as we were striding through groups of people, I grabbed Blaze by the arm and started to run through the people who were in the way. They didn't seem to understand what was going on, but as the person with the trident found out they were being followed, they started sprinting through alleyways and somehow managed to get onto the roofs of some of the buildings.
"Jesus! She's quick!"
"She must know this place like the back of their hand!"
"I don't think I can get up there."
As I tried to corner them off, the hood of the cloak fell off, revealing her identity.
"Is that?"
"Misha!"
As she glanced over her shoulder, her footing slipped, and she nearly fell off a slated roof. I was hoping she didn't accidentally hit the prongs on anything, she knew nothing about the powers of the trident, but as I tried the grab the end of it, she jumped down into another building that was completely blocked off.
"Dang it!"
"How do we get it back now?"
"There has to be another way. I won't accept defeat."
"Unless we go through another building?"
"Breaking and entering?!"
"If you want the trident back, then go through the building."
"Alright."
As we looked for a building we could get on top of, some of the bounty hunters came rushing over. They must've heard us shouting and realised where we were. In a state of panic, I grabbed Blaze by the shoulder and ran into an empty house, and sprinted up the first few stairs.
"What are you-?"
"Shhh!! There's hunters right outside."
"Uh oh."
"Just don't be too loud."
"Okay."
As we remained in silence, some of the hunters were talking amongst themselves. They knew that we couldn't have gotten far, but they couldn't pin-point our exact location. Whilst we were on the stairs, Blaze noticed a flat surface just in front of us, but it wasn't the flooring that caught his attention. It was a trident leant against the wall. This one was completely different to the one that I had, the patterns were the same, but the colour of it, was dark blue. Everything about this trident was the same as the one Misha stole, but it wasn't red. Even the prongs were the same shape.
"Is that?"
"Yes. Yes it is."
"But why is this here?
"I have no idea."
"Do I-?"
"Don't. For now. We can circle back for this one once we get the other one."
"Okay."
A few minutes had passed, and we heard nothing else about from a few footsteps going passed. We both assumed it was safe to come out, and eventually managed to get onto the roof. But we were facing a problem, a 6 feet long gap in between where we were stood and the building Misha jumped into.
"You've got to be kidding me!"
"Oh this is just great. Now what?"
"Well, we jump across."
"Absolutely not. Absolutely not."
"Are you scared of heights, B?"
"No. It's just jumping across a 6 foot long gap, that I'm afraid of. She made it look easy."
"I thought you weren't scared of anything?"
"I have limits!"
"Shhh! Lower your voice!!"
"Okay! Are you going first or am I?"
"Do you want to go first?"
"Not really."
"Okay, so I'll jump across first and then you follow after."
"What if you slip? Then what?"
"I can hoist my self up."
"You only have one hand."
"Fine. Then you go first. If you make it you can just catch me."
"Okay."
As Blaze took a few steps back, he focused his eyes on the tiles on the next roof over. As he jumped across, he slammed into the upper wall and clung on before he eventually hoisted himself up and pulled himself together.
"Ow."
"You okay!?"
"Uh, yea I'm fine."
As he stood up, he looked at me with focus in his eyes before eventually leaning over the ledge with his hand stretched fully out. As I leaped across, he grabbed me by the collar of my shirt and as I nearly slipped he yoinked my arm and pulled me up onto the roof.
"You okay?"
"Yes."
"Okay."
As we both stood up, we looked into the building Misha went into. But she was no longer there.
"How!? That's impossible."
"Uh, Hunter?"
"What?"
"Look closely."
As I narrowed my eyes, the ground starting warbling. I rubbed my eyes to see if I was seeing things, but it wasn't my imagination.
"What is that?"
"I think it might be a reflection pool."
"A what now?"
"A reflection pool. It's a building full of water that looks like the ground it's on top of."
"How deep are they usually?"
"Depends on location. Here, I don't think it would be dramatically deep, but if you're not careful it could potentially kill you."
"Did Misha jump in here then?"
"No idea. I'm guessing she either juked us out, or she actually jumped in here."
"Should we find out?"
"You're really dedicated to get your trident back."
"She doesn't know how much power is in it. I don't want her hurting others."
"If you're willing to possibly get yourself killed, then I'll go with you. Personally I have no idea what is on the other side of a reflection pool, but I can imagine whatever is on the other side."
"You can?"
"Yeah. It's something about the trident actually and there's someone with you."
"Who?"
"Uh....oh. That's not a good sign."
"What?"
"Oh no.."
"What?"
"..."
"Blaze?!"
"Hm? Oh! You-uh....get....killed....."
"I WHAT!?"
As I screamed, hunters started to rush over to the roof we were stood on. They had spears in their hands, some of which were thrown our way, and as we both glanced at them all, Blaze grabbed my arm.
"Okay, time to go!"
"Wait, Blaze-!"
As Blaze jumped off the roof, and into the reflection pool, muffled shouts and screams were audible, but the sound of the water filtered it all at. We appeared to be falling deeper into the water, and whilst he still had a hold of my wrist, I had already opened my eyes. It felt weird, it didn't sting, but as the air bubbles flew passed us, visible strings of blue light were everywhere I looked. It was so mesmerising to look at and actually calmed me down. As we eventually reached the either side of the pool, B carefully placed himself on the ground, followed by me soon after. As he saw that I was still holding my breath, he chuckled.
"You don't need to do that."
"What-woah!"
"This is amazing."
"Where even are we?"
"Look up."
As I glanced up, the other end of the pool was visible, we weren't that far down, but my depth perception told me something different.
"Whoah!"
"I've never been on the opposite side of a reflection pool before, this is incredible."
"Now where's Misha?"
"No idea."
"So. You two decided to follow me.."
"There you are. You have 30 seconds to return my trident."
"I'm afraid I can't do that."
"Why the f*ck not?"
"Unfortunately, I've had fun experimenting."
"You don't know how much power it has."
"Oh really? Turn around."
As we both glanced over our shoulders, a massive spruce tree had a black substance dripping of the branches. The trunk's colour was a very dark grey, and there was no sign of life.
"No..."
"You see, when one has the opportunity to do damage, one does just that. And I've enjoyed creating mayhem and destruction. This'll come in handy when I destroy so many things."
"You want to destroy the home that you grew up in. Imagine how many families could loose their lives and homes. No one will be able to recover from this. Misha, if you really cared about the people around you, you wouldn't do any of this."
"..."
"He's right. We've seen so many people suffer. Just look at Hunter, he has no hand. We watched somebody die before we came here. The king used that trident to kill somebody that we knew, it happened right in front of me, Hunter saw it too. The roses on the meadow, will wilt because of you. If you chose to do this....people will remember who you were, and not in a good way. They'll call you names. Call you a monster. Is that really what you want?"
"..."
"Is it?"
"...no.."
"That trident can do so much more than just kill trees. Don't make a mistake that you can't come back from."
"I...you made me see the potential damage I could've caused. I owe you two an apology. I was so focused on causing damage to other people, I didn't realise that I was causing damage to myself."
"Can I have the trident back?"
"Sure. You deserve it more than I do."
"Although. There was another one."
"Oh yeah. I almost forgot about that."
"What?"
"Before we came here, we saw another trident that was dark blue."
"Huh."
"We can show if you you want."
"Uh. I'm not too sure you want to see me with it. But i think this belongs to you."
As she gave me back my weapon, she smiled enthusiastically. She knew that I didn't know the trident's power, but she gave it back to me anyway.
"So, shall we leave?"
"Hang on a second. They are still after us. If we want to get the other trident, we'll have to sneak into the building to grab and then carefully sneak out of the village."
"Oh. I forgot they were still after us."
"How do we even leave here though?"
"Just jump."
"Er, okay?"
As we all jumped into the air, gravity started to take us back up towards the other side of the reflection pool. As the blue strings of light appeared again, we all repositioned ourselves to get a gentle landing. When we reached the surface, Blaze and Misha both clung onto a railing, and after they saw me came up, they pulled me onto the concrete floor.
"Alright. Remain quiet until we get out of the borders."
"Ok."
We had to carefully manoeuvre past a few villagers and hunters without drawing attention to ourselves, and once we were in the clear, we all went up the stairs that me and Blaze hid on. The navy blue trident was where it was when we left it, and as Misha carefully clutched it in her hand, it's staring to glow slightly.
"Oh. It never did that when I picked it up."
"Maybe you don't have a proper connection to it."
"Maybe."
Whilst I was staring at the weapon in her hand, a very loud ringing noise rang in my ears, followed by the sounds of voices overlapping each other. I tried to block it out, but the decibel of the ringing was overwhelming. As I shut my eyes tightly and covered my ear, Blaze glanced over and said something, but I couldn't hear a single thing.
"Hunter? Are you okay?"
"Hunter?"
In the middle of my small episode, a familiar voice was audible, a woman in her late 20s was whispering something in my ear.
"I need you to act more like your age. For a 17 year old, you act like a toddler."
Other voices overlapped on top of hers and as I opened my eyes, Blaze was right in front of my face.
"Hunter. I need you to breathe. Take a deep breath in and out."
"...."
"Look at me. Breathe."
"I..."
"It's just your mind playing tricks on you. There is nothing there."
"She-not....proud of me..."
"Never mind was she thinks, she's not even here. But we are."
"...B?"
"Yea?"
"Who am I?"
"You're my friend. Don't let anyone else tell you different."
"...thanks."
As I removed my hand from my ear and looked over at Misha, she smiled. When I smiled back, Blaze glanced over my shoulder to see a hunter's spear poking out from around the corner.
"Move!"
"Eh?"
"Hunters."
"Oh sh*t."
"Don't say anything.."
During the moments of us hiding, the hunter Blaze saw moved into the doorway and was trying to listen for us. Misha silently nudged Blaze, and as they quietly moved away, I remained frozen in my spot.
Whilst I was frozen with fear, Blaze gestured for me to move. But I didn't want to reveal our location.
"Hunter, come here."
"I'm not risking getting caught."
"Is he always this stubborn?"
"No he's not."
I was in a really weird position, but couldn't move as I was afraid of making the step creak and revealing where we were. The trident in the sheath almost scratched the upper wall, and as I flinched away, the hunter had stepped fully into the doorway.
"Hunter!"
"Don't..."
"Why?"
"The hunter's literally inside the doorway."
"Don't move."
"I wasn't going to anyway."
A long pause of silence echoed through the hallway, no one said a word, in fact the only sounds we heard were villagers and other hunters rushing around in the streets. After nearly 5 excruciating minutes, the deranged man holding his spear, decided that it was time to go. As he left the house and trudged down the street, the sounds of his chain amour was audible, but it was fading away. After a moment of pure shock had passed, I went up the remainder of the stairs and knelt next to Misha.
"Why didn't you come to us?"
"He would've seen me. I'm not risking getting us all caught."
"Well, now that that's over, I say we figure out a way to get out of here."
"How do we dot that though?"
"By blending in."
"I don't think that'll work, B."
"Do you have any other ideas?"
"I-well....no."
"Okay, good."
"There should be extra cloaks nearby. I could try find some."
"Good thinking."
"B"
"Don't say it. I know."
"You do?"
"Yes..."
"Okay. So I found two which is perfect! I already have one, so there's one for both of you."
"Thanks Misha."
After we put the cloaks on, we looked like ordinary people living in the village. We decided to move out of the house and start walking to the nearest hill. As other villagers, stopped and stared, we felt like the centre of attention. But our luck soon ran out, because as we were moving through the crowds, we bumped into a hunter.
"Now where are you three heading?"
"Uh. Getting firewood."
"Mhm..."
"We have permission."
"Fine. But, before you go..."
"Yes?"
"You lot haven't seen two young lads around here have you?"
"No. Although we did hear and see a brawl going on between two lads in the centre of the village."
"What did they look like?"
"Uh. Blue shirts, cream coloured jeans. Both of their hair was a tar -like black colour."
"Oh. Thank you."
"Just doing my best."
"Uh huh. Go on get out of here."
"Yes sir."
After the hunter had left, we all looked at each other with astonishment.
"Did that just happen!?"
"Yes. Yes it did."
"I can't believe that worked."
"Agreed."
"We should probably go, before they come back and realise it was a lie."
"Oh for sure."
Moving out of the village was a breeze, no one suspected a thing, but as we reached to top of the hill, Misha told us something about the trident she had in her hand.
"There's something in here."
"What?"
"In the head."
"What do you mean there's something in the head?"
"It means there's something in the head of it."
"Well then, take the head off."
"Okay!"
Soon after she took the head off, a clunking sound came from inside. She took one glance at the bottom of the base of the neck, and looked back at us.
"What was that?"
"Uh. There's some sort of paper slip in here."
"Take it out."
"I don't know if I can."
"Pass it to me."
After Misha gave me the head, a small electrical stupor made connection with my hand. It hurt to the point where I dropped the trident on the ground.
"Ow! The f*ck?!"
"Did it just-?"
"Yes!"
"Okay I definitely think I'm meant to open it."
Once she picked it back up, one of the prongs twisted open and revealed the other side to the paper. As Misha grabbed a hold of it and carefully took it out, she looked at me for a few seconds.
"What?"
"I wonder why this was in there."
"Open it."
Carefully unfolding the slip, she took a glance at what was on the plain piece of paper and almost dropped it in shock.
"I don't know who this is meant for, but i don't think I was meant to have it."
"Huh?"
"Read it and find out."
As I took the slip out her hand and gave it a read, I almost stumbled back in fear.
"B.."
"What?"
"You might want to take this one...."
Once I let go of the page, Blaze glanced at it and dropped it on the ground.
"No."
"I..."
"That explains the episode you had earlier."
"But why would they..?"
"Hunter. I'm so sorry."
"I'm the only one left."
"I.."
"What do you mean, the only one left?"
"Conor. Father. Mother. They're all dead. I'm the last of my family."
"You're not the only one."
"You too?"
"Unfortunately. I died from cancer. The rest of my family were all killed when I was 2. I've been at foster homes for the majority of my life, all of which told me I would never find a forever home."
"So at what age did you die?"
"..."
"Don't be afraid to tell the truth."
"I died at 14 years of age."
"That young?"
"Mhm."
"If it makes you feel any better, I'm slightly a dummy."
She giggled at my weird remark, Blaze did too, but I still felt mass amounts of guilt. Not only had I just lost my mother, but Misha's whole life had been taken away from her. Both of our second lives were changed probably forever. Just as we were stood there, hunters rushed onto the other side of the valley, and saw us all without wood. Whilst they rushed forward, spears drawn, I grabbed my trident out its sheath and clutched it by the base, with my stance as tense as it would ever be. Blaze and Misha stood behind me whilst I was panning my eye sight back and forth, and just as I was about to make my mark, Misha had perfectly aligned with my body, with the blue trident in her possession. Blaze couldn't do much except clutch both his hands very tightly.
"You're not doing anything. You three were meant to grab wood. What are your intentions?"
"To find our purpose in our second lives."
"Not an answer."
"Hunter. I'll take this one."
"Are you-?"
"Yes."
"Oh. Okay."
"I'm trying to prove my innocence. I did absolutely nothing, I shouldn't be convicted."
"We were told otherwise."
"That 'otherwise' was a fib. You've just been lied to. And we all know lying is forbidden."
"That's a good answer. Now you two, what are your intentions?"
"Hunter?"
"Really?"
"Just answer the f*cking question! Don't be naïve.."
"Alright jeez... my intentions are to make it out in this world alive."
"Go on..."
"I haven't been converted. That's why I'm here. To pass on properly. Did you all seriously think that would hurt you all because I'm here?"
"You seem like it!"
"I'm trying to protect myself, okay? I don't know why my soul wasn't converted, why I'm being personally attacked, but it has nothing to do with hurting anybody here! I have no hand, I'm slightly depressed, I have f*cking PTSD, anxiety, trust issues, and to top that off, I've just lost my mother! Give me a f*cking break!"
"That's enough."
"F*cking Jesus Christ..."
"Anyway, you...why are you here?"
"To protect the ones I care about, and if you can't see that, then you're just as big as a fool as I am when I first met my friend. I think the question on all our minds now, is why are YOU here?..."
"....to protect the people I once failed to protect."
"Then leave us alone... we have nothing to do with any of you anymore."
"Unfortunately, we can't do that. We still have to take you three in for questioning."
"We answered your questions. Now let us go..."
"No..."
"Okay...then we'll just have to....SCATTER!"
When we all ran, the hunters tried to catch us and as we thought that we were safe, they pulled out tranquilliser guns, and actually managed to strike Misha in the arm and Blaze in the neck.
When I turned round, they were being dragged back to the village, and after I managed to juke out the bounty Hunter that was after me, I booked it to the nearest forest to hide, and panicked silently in my head.
Sh*t! I promise I will get you two back....I just need to make it out of here first....

Thank you for reading this chapter! This means so much to me that people enjoy reading this story. After this story is fully completed, I am going to be making another book, so keep an eye out for that! Also some other things to clear up, I am considering making the complete lore book for this story, as well as making another one for the bloopers, outtakes and incorrect quotes, which for the quotes, that will complete depend on what you guess send in! I'm looking forward to creating more memories within this app, and I'm looking forward to seeing your inputs and suggestions for the incorrect quotes! Many thanks and wonders, H.

Total word count: 6357