The Innates (Book #1)

Chapter 25

With Ace wailing, I could barely concentrate on being happy for once in a while. His tight grab on my prosthetic hand actually bent my fingers. He moves like he's a flailing fish on a dry ground. His fingers bundle upy forearm, then my shoulder and my neck.
"Ace!" I called. "It's just a few seconds! Calm down at least!" I scraped off his hands from my shivering neck and kicked him on his side.
"Ow!" He yells louder. "What was that?!"
"A distraction from fear." I said, still smiling.
"This is impossible!"
"No it's not! Remember what you guys showed me? You controlled my fear by showing me how fun life is. How can you possibly teach me something you don't know?"
"Okay... I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna conquer my fear." He sighed and stretched his entire self out. "I didn't know you had it in you, please come back to training!" He's visible again.
"Alright! I'll do it, I promise..."
"Better keep that vow until you land. That'd be a good record."
"Not that weak, bro." I felt that tingly sensation on my thighs and my shins, that feeling when your tendons are weakening and you know they're getting stronger when your getting closer to the ground.
"Here we go!" We both yelled. The landing wasn't so bad, everything was just fluffy snow, except for where landed. We somersaulted our way down the hill until we stopped. My buttocks hurt from landing on the hard that was the most difficult part because you have to be precise on how you land painlessly. Basically, every bone on my body is in pain right now, the teleportation, the rolling down the hill, and the free-falling. I feel so sore. But at least we're in snow. Speaking of "we", where are the rest of us? In a matter of seconds, we finally slowed down and stopped.
"Hey, they jumped too!" Ace said.
I see the four of them flying through the mist of clouds. The two tallest ones' legs were waving and kicking for us to watch out. We moved over to the side and two girls' screams were heard as they landed first.
"Why'd you guys jump?" Sarra asked.
"Because Ace here was afraid, so I decided to scare him." Ace smacked my arm and I laughed.
"Robert here!" Robert bounces off the slope and landed on his chest next to the furious Alice.
"Robert, get off!" She shook him off her back. His red right glove that matched his maroon jacket flies off into the wild and vicious air without his knowledge.
"Watch out!" Zach's roaring tone of his voice echoes across the vast slope. He lands on a topsy-turvy manner with his hands slapping his slightly middle-aged-but-still-young face every which way. He stops yelling in pain until he landed.
"Is his face red?" Sarra asked, helping him stand up and trying not to fall off the small flat surface we only have that could barely hold eight people. If somebody ever tries to jump off again, they'd fall to their death. I crawled near the surface and peeked through the edge of the block of ice we're all sitting on. It's a long way down there. It's a straight slope that led down to elsewhere. Something mysterious and obscured, something... unpredictable.
"Guys..." I said.
"What is it?"
"We're stuck here." I said.
"What?" Robert looks down and pressed his head on Zach after what he saw.
"We're trapped here." He whispered.
"No blames, no games, no pain." Ace said.
"He's right, I still have the--" He reaches for his pocket. "Oh my!" He shouted. "I lost my last marble."
"It's gotta be somewhere on that hill." Sarra said.
"If we fall, who am I gonna catch?"
"What kind of a question is that?!" Alice yelled.
"I can only carry three people in the air." He said.
"You better save me or I swear I'll make both of us fall."
"Hey, hey, hey, guys! No arguing, I'm sure all of us will make it, as long as I find that marble."
"Better make it quick. I heard a small crack." Robert said.
"It's all in your head." I sat back next to Alice and Sarra. They were nervous too.
"We're gonna die because of our own stupidity." Alice said.
"Alice, no, we're not going to die. Not a single one of us."
"I can't die, we didn't even find that person who switched the guns."
"How was your job doing?"
"Great, I guess." Zach said.
"We're all smart, so let's find a way to get out of this mess."
"Can't think with all this pressure." Ace said.
"You're scared?" Sarra said.
"Yeah... normally." He held back a few tears.
"Guys, I want to tell you something." Alice said.
"What? Tell us."
"I'm scared too, what if the person who switched the guns is actually someone we trust? What if, that person killed all of our loved ones and we didn't know? I'm really, really scared."
"It's okay... to be afraid. That's what normalizes us. Even if we try to be normal, we're not. No matter how hard we try to be. Nothing's normal. This isn't heaven, it's still out world."
"You're right." Robert said.
"But one more thing..." I said. "I actually learned a valuable lesson from you guys that you should always, always follow... no filter. No more hiding."
"No more hiding." Zach repeated.
"He's right." Ace said.
"I love you, guys. This isn't the end but, at least I get to say it now. Friends forever." Robert said.
"You know that one thing we missed?" Zach said.
"What?"
"Jackson. He-he would have been proud of us right now, for sticking up for each other."
"Ace?" I said.
"Yeah?"
"You've always been like a real brother to me, you and Jackson."
"Sarra and Alice, you're really annoying, just like a perfect sister I could ever imagine."
"You three... Robert, Zach, you guys have are the two nicest guys in the whole world. You acted like my dads and never got tired of it. Thank you."
I reached for Sarra's shoulder and Ace grabbed my back. The seven of us were an inseparable chain. I love these guys so much.