El Comienzo Trágico (The Tragic Start) | [Still on Going]

Chapter 12

   In the forest, Percy and the others were bored and had nothing to do, "Men, what should we do now?" Kedrick said, lying on the ground.
        "The sorceress gave us something, right? Why don't we study those things?" Luke suggested. "Lynn, have you read the book the sorceress gave to you?"
        "No... Hope was there reading it."
        "Why don't you two start to learn some brewing? While we're waiting here, you two find some of the ingredients..." said Luke.
        "Are you—" Lynn's words got cut off when Hope clapped her hand on her shoulder.
        "Yeah, Lynn! Come on let's find some of those inside the woods... Come on don't be lazy..." Hope grabbed Lynn's arm pulling her to move, and come with her.
        "Okay, okay stop,"
        Meanwhile, Percy and Jake were sitting in a log and observing the Rednilyc. While looking at it, Jake discovered something from it.
        "What can these buttons do? They have different colors," Jake presses the blue button. Suddenly, he flinched when the arrow changed direction. "What?" he said, he then pressed the green button and saw that the arrow changed direction again.
        "Woah, so these buttons can tell the direction of each object we need to find... I think I need to list this down, in case something happens, or I'll accidentally lose this, right Pers?" stated Jake, suddenly he noticed that Percy was silent the whole time, and when he looked at him, Percy was staring at the ground, and not a single blink from his eyes.
        "Pers?" Jake then taps him on the shoulder and Percy snaps back to his senses. "Are you Alright?"
        "Oh, sorry, I was— thinking something..." said Percy.
        "What's bothering your mind?..."
        "Nothing... I'm Okay," forcing his smile at Jake.
        "I know you you Pers, so come'n you can tell me," said Jake, tapping his hand on Percy's shoulder.
        "I miss him..." He takes a deep breath, thinking something. "I miss having a family... Do you think I'm des—" he stopped his words, thinking if he could open up to Jake.
        "Think What? Pers what?" Jake knows that he might be thinking that he's not deserving of something. "Percy don't you there think that you're not deserving of Love, you deserved better you know that."
        "What can I do Jake? I mean— they're all gone, and my grandfather kicked us out after my mother died. I'm not deserving of love... I hope I still have a family..."
         His eyes have a gloomy glint, almost a tear dropped. Jake puts his arm across Percy's shoulder to comfort him.
        "No, that's not true Pers, You deserved love... you know why? Because I'm still here... I'm still here for you, as your best friend... As long I'm here, I will make sure you're okay and feel loved."
"Thank you," his wet blue eyes were glistening when the light reflected, and his tears started to crawl one by one to his cheeks.

Inside the forest, Lynn is following Hope wandering around looking for some ingredients she reads. Lynn asked Hope what potion she wanted to brew so they could find those first. "I think the poison one sounds a lot easier," said Hope. "Tell me, what is the difference between the poison that humans use and the poison that is magical brew?"
         "The magical brew can affect if you just throw it near to your target, it also releases smoke-like poison, while the poison that humans use only affects if you drink it or mix it on food," explained Lynn.
         While walking, Hope saw something in the distance, bright yellow-colored petals and their green fresh leaves covered the ground. She ran toward it and kneeled on the field, Hope then reached out her hand and snapped one of the flowers to examine it. A Dandelion flower and its roots are one of the ingredients for some potion. Hope turns around to show Lynn, however, she is out of sight. Hope wandered her eyes all over the place, her eyes widened and her hands started to shake a little, Her mind started to play some thoughts about what could happen to her so she started to call her name.
         "What's wrong?" Suddenly Lynn arrived from her back, holding something both of her hands.
         "Where have you been!?... I'm so worried," worried Hope.
         "You so paranoid," laughed Lynn. "I just took some moss and spider and Oregano leaves somewhere there... You have nothing to worry about,"
         "Spider?" Hope took the book, lifting all the pages to search if there was a spider in the ingredients, and there, she saw 6 spider eyes needed.
         "How'd you know about that? I never seen you reading this..." asked Hope.
         "I saw it when you're reading it..." Lynn said. "So... What's next?"
         "It says here... berries of Atro-pa Bel-la-donna?" pronounced Hope. "What's that?"
         "It's a deadly, poisonous flower," said Lynn. "I think it's commonly growing in the forest, that's not really rare."
         "Is it?... Okay, and the next is Apple seeds and Akimello... I know this plant! It buds explodes a fog-like with pollen that can cause skin allergies."
         After a while, they finally found what they needed, a bell-shaped, purple flower hanging from its stems, suddenly, Hope reached out her hand to pick the flowers. "STOP!!" Lynn ran toward her and pushed her hand away from the plant before she could touch it.
         "What?" wondered Hope.
         "It's poisonous!! It can cause some bad effects on your skin. You're not allowed to touch and ingest Belladonna! It can take a life... And what we need is its berries," worried Lynn.
         "I'm sorry... So how can we take some of this?"
         "We need a stick," Lynn grabbed two dead stalks from a tree to use as a tool to pick the berries. "Hope, get a separate bag for this."
         Lynn carefully holds each berry between the sticks to transfer it inside the pouch. After careful transfer, they managed to take some berries they needed and continued to find the remaining ingredients.
        "You know what... I am so annoyed with Jake," Hope laughed in mockery.
        "You're not the only one," Lynn answered smiling.
        "He's like... Everything for him is a joke, you know... Every time I saw him he never got serious or... Taking this plan seriously... He's always smiling, laughing— he's acting so childish," Hope says.
        "Aside from Jake... what do you feel about the others?" asked Lynn. Hope thinks for a moment about what she feels.
        "I— Don't trust any of them actually," said Hope. "I don't trust men. It started when I was a kid... Because of my father."
      
        10 years ago…
It was a quiet evening, and a mother was reading an old storybook to her daughter. The girl was so happy to listen to her mother reading, even though it was read to her many times. While reading her mother heard something outside.
         "Hope, go to your room now, okay? we-we'll continue it tomorrow," said the mother who was scared for something, her eyes were teary and her hands were shaking.
         "Mother, come on I love the story,"
         "You should sleep now Hope, now go to room, okay?"
         "Fine..."
         Hope gets into her room and jumps to her bed to sleep.
         Her mother quickly prepared the table, and herself, and as she was preparing, she was coughing and coughing. She grabbed a glass of water to drink, and suddenly their front door opened forcibly.
         "LADY!" shouts her drunk husband.
         "Oh hun, you- you're back,"
         "You did not pay?... YOU DID NOT PAY THE DEBT!"
         "What?"
         "That man... embarrassed me in front of people, because YOU DID NOT PAY HIM YET!"
         "It- it was your debt, I- I don't have enough money—"
         "My debt? Ha! Yes, and you said you're going to pay him right?! THEN WHY?!"
         "You know what!" Shouts the mother, "screw you! I can't handle this anymore, I don't want to be with you anymore—" Her husband slaps her and says.
         "But you have to pay him first! 'coz if you don't! I will take our daughter to him—" Her wife slapped him, the first time she did that to him.
         "Don't you dare put my daughter to your problem idiot! And she's not your daughter!"
         Her husband pushed her forcefully, causing her to fall on the ground with her head first. He noticed that she did not respond, so he checked her forcibly, "Get up woman!" And there he saw, dark red blood running down the floor from her head.
         "Mother?" Hope said in the distance, who had just arrived. Their house was dark, so she did not see what happened to her.
         He saw Hope and approached her.
         "What happened?"
         "Don't mind your mother she's just asleep... Why don't you come with me, I'll take you to the market,"
         "But—"
         "Just trust me, okay?"
         Hope goes with her father without any problem, knowing she can trust him. When they reached the market, her father did not stop, they went to a big building and she saw some man outside, dressed in all black with a tophat.
         "She's gone, She can't pay you... So I give you my daughter!"
         "What!?" Hope's eyes were wide open, scared of what she heard."Father?" he then pushed her to the man.
         "Come on little girl," said the man, he grabbed her arms and pulled her with him.
         "No no no Please don't! Father no! Help me!" shouted Hope. However, her father did care and just walked away.
         Hope was frightened, thinking about how her father sold her to the man. Suddenly, she faces the man's arm and bites it as hard as she can. The man was in pain with his bleeding arm. Hope ran away trying to get out of this place. As she was running, tears running down her face, and there she saw a large wagon with a donkey, full of crops and goods. She did not hesitate to climb and hide under a fabric that was covering the stuff.
         Minutes later a 69-year-old woman came and lifted the fabric. "Little girl, why are you hiding in there?" Suddenly some guys in the distance were yelling, "Find that girl!" shouted the man dressed in all black. The old woman recognized the man, so she covered Hope with the fabric.
         When the man got away, she lifted the fabric again and asked Hope.
         "What happened?"
         "My father sold me to him," sniffled Hope. "Please take me with you, I have nowhere to go, my mother died I heard it from my father... That's why she was lying on the ground lately when my father asked me to come with him," cried Hope. The old woman agreed, and she said, she was living in the nearby town.
   
"Actually, not just him, like, all men around me, since then... I never met a nice guy in my whole life. They just wanted to be treated like royalty by women like us, make us servants... We can't do anything to fight back... They're all the same." Lynn was speechless after all Hope had said. "All I can trust in this group is you..." Hope says, and Lynn looks at her and smiles, She puts her arms around Hope to make her feel that she cares for her and that she's not alone in a situation.
        Later, they finally found the Akimello plant with some huge buds. They are planning how can they get those buds without triggering the buds to explode their fog-like pollen. "You have a knife?" Lynn asked. Hope grabbed a knife and handed it to Lynn. Lynn instantly ties it to a long branch of a tree, They step back a couple of feet away from the plant, and from there, Lynn gives a strong grip on the stick, aiming the bud, and swings the stick with a knife directly at the bottom of the huge bud.
        She cut the bud from its plant successfully, the bud started to let out some fog-like pollens when it fell on the ground.
        "Good cut Lynn!" complimented Hope to Lynn.
        "We need 5 more to cut... It might take a while," said Lynn. "After this, we have to head to the market to buy some apples."

Back at the camp, Luke and Kendrick were looking for the next town or city on a map the sorceress gave to them. When Luke sees the name of their town on the map, he remembers the small peaceful, and contented life they have back there. "I think if we didn't meet these people, I think we still got our peaceful life back in our town."
        "Men, You said you want to seek excitement right? And good thing that we met them and we're in this plan... Because, aside from wanting to stop the wickedness around the country, Edna's sister said our mother was enslaved by the queen. The queen enslaves many people from a different town and our mother is one of them, this is the only way we can get our mother out of that place Luke." stated Kendrick.
        4:30 afternoon, while Kendrick and Ben are preparing for early dinner, Hope and Lynn are waiting for their brewing Potion of poison, Hope is resting her back on the log and sitting on the ground, while Lynn is sitting and her face is resting on her hand with her sleepy eyes. Suddenly, Hope saw someone's silhouette getting closer from the woods, She loaded her bow with an arrow for protection. However, when the person stepped out from the darkness, they saw that it was Sanya.
        After a couple of minutes, Sanya finally told her decision, and that is to come with them and help them with their plans. However, she can't leave this time, she needs to get back to Harrison's house and wait till midnight to come back here, where everyone in that house is sleeping.

It was 12:40 at midnight when Sanya came back, they decided to get back to their rented house to take some of their stuff, including the very special pickaxe of Ben that his father gave to him, and while the others were waiting in the woods.
         When they got out of the house, they saw Mr. Harrison outside standing like his waiting for them. "Mr. Harrison?" Sanya says, her eyes were wide open, her body started shaking, and her heart was beating fast. She can't help her mind to think about Mr. Harrison being so angry, and the possible punishment he could do to them. However, he doesn't look mad at all, his eyes look sad, but he is trying to make a smile on his face.
         "Oh... I apologize, I was drinking water when I saw you sneak out so I decided to follow you," explained Mr. Harrison. "Hey Ben," greeted him happily.
         "You're living?" He says, still smiling at Sanya. Sanya, on the other hand, was struggling to mouth her words, her eyes started to have some tears. "When will you come back?" Asked Mr. Harrison, with his melancholy voice, his eyes started to have tears on them, shining by the light from Ben's lamp.
         "When everything is settled," Sanya said.
         "I'm sorry Sir...we have to go... Ben?"
They started to leave and walked past Mr. Harrison saying, "Take care..."
         Sanya just nodded at him, and a single tear crawled down her cheek.
       
When they reached the camp, they prepared to leave the town of Logtuma.

•Belladonna

•Akimello