Sinking Slow

Strength and power

We laid our heads there until he woke up. He jumped up fast to where it jerked all our heads up. He was backing away from us at first like we were the danger. He was sweaty and very scared. At least, I imagine so, trapped inside of a body you can't control. I slowly approached him but he got scared as I did. "Sh sh," I told him approaching him calmly almost like he was a child. I came and rubbed his shoulder. He started to snap back out of it. "Gracin, you need to tell us what happened, now." He gulped and looked at all of us. "Well,.." he started to say sitting up. He wiped the sweat from his head licked his lips and took a couple breaths. "Well, when I first arrived in the maze, I was walking..I was really angry and, I just kept thinking how..my parents were ripped to shreds. I kept thinking how they were gone, and I was never going to see them again. I could feel my anger,....almost like it was taking over...completely. I could see in the distance a creature coming after me, a zombie, I wasn't scared though, I was angry. Without even thinking, because I realized I didn't even control my body any more. What ever it was, it made me run after the zombie and..bite it. I bit it, right in the neck, I could feel something..coming from my teeth like..venom. It fell to the ground and twitched, my anger let loose and I stumbled back in horror of what I just did. I watched the zombie..and what was happening to it. It's body and flesh started to glow purple and it twitched like crazy until..it blew up. It blew up and purple guts flew everywhere. I fell down, questioning over and over, what had I done? And what was wrong with me? I lasted fifteen days in the maze. Even though I hated it, when the creatures came after me, I had no choice, but any of them that came after me, I bit them. I walked away quick though, I didn't want to see what happened to them. None of the creatures wanted to mess with me. I thought maybe a couple were more tough than me, but no. When Rina and her brothers found me, and I became the brains, I was able to use technology again. I pricked my skin to take some blood and see the DNA. That's when I found out, I'm part bashe." "Bashe?" Rina interrupted in horror, I didn't know so, I waited for him to continue. Gracin looked at me. "From all the creatures recorded, Bashe is the most powerful in the maze. Out of the one hundred and eight different species." I gulped, now having a slight realization of why Rina was so scared. "Bashe is a giant snake creature, that's why making me angry, is dangerous. I could've killed you all right there if it wanted to." "Wait, so does that mean, after all this time of killing these creatures, after all this work we went through, you could've just bit them?" Rina started to get a little irritated. "Yeah, but I didn't want you guys trying to kill me." "We wouldn't, you'd kill us." Exactly, I didn't want to kill you guys." Rina sat in silence for a second. "I mean, we might have just, understood if you just told us." "You mean like Morgan did? Right." He got up and walked to the back room. Rina and I followed him and the boys stood at the door. I sat down beside him. "Gracin, I'm sorry." I knew sorry wasn't good enough to explain what I thought, but there was no need to, I remembered Gracin could read my thoughts. "How can you read my thoughts?" "That's another advantage of mine, but not of the Bashe. The Bashe's power for that is a little different than mine. It can't read your thoughts..but it can read your feelings. It can understand what you feel, it can feel threatened by them too." "Have you ever encountered one?" I asked "no," he said. "And I'm afraid to. I may be more powerful than the other creatures, but against my own kind, they probably could kill me pretty fast." Not really, your half of what it is, I doubt it will kill you that fast. It may kill you, but you would put up a pretty good fight." He just smiled. "Gracin," I told him, he looked up at me. "I barely know you, I don't know a lot about you, but," he waited for a response out loud, even though he could already see what I was trying to say. "Your different, not just the fact that you're half creature but, I've seen everyone's real personality. I haven't really seen a lot about you." "Oh you will." He gave another gorgeous smile. "Have you ever been in a relationship?" I asked with a sneaky smile. By that time Rina had gone out of there and the boys too. "Well," Gracin said "no" "oh" I said. but really I knew he had. Who wouldn't want to be in a relationship with him? Yet he seemed so perfect, were there no flaws at all? Gracin and I sat there in silence, he sort of looked all at me again, and I shyly looked down at his face again. I don't know if it was just me, but he started to get just a little closer. Then the door swung open. "Morgan!" She yelled. It made me jump because of such silence that I was just in. I looked back at her. "You don't think your gonna be with us in this group as a puny thing do you?" I got up and followed her. I passed her and she stood in the door way. She stared at Gracin sort of with puppy eyes, or disappointment in her eyes. I don't know why. "Rina!" I hollered at her. "You okay?" "Yeah I'm fine doll," she said and closed the door of Gracin's room. "Okay Morgan," she told me. Let's start with something simple. Lift these twenty pounds." She could tell I never lifted weights before. I put my hands on the bar with my fingers facing me at the bottom. "No, look." She took my hands off and put them the other way were my fingers at the top. I lifted it with pretty much no struggle. I held it up for a minute or two then let it go. She walked over to the 50 pound one, and I tried to lift it. There was a struggle this time, I was able to lift it but only hold it for 30 second until my face nearly turned blue. "Okay, I see what's going on here now. I want you to lift the twenty pounds, add ten seconds every day, until you reach two minutes. Then lift the fifty for as long as you can, add 10 seconds for every day until you reach a minute and thirty seconds. Do that every day and see me once you've got that far." "Okay," I just quietly said. "And I mean it, push yourself to add ten seconds every day. Unless you seriously can't." "Okay" I nodded. I listened to her words too, for the past week I lifted and lifted, we went out and killed creatures again and again. Never as big as the rat, but big ones. We did the same thing for the past couple weeks. Nothing changed, everything was the same. Just talking more and more to Gracin, I found out more and more stuff about him. I seemed to form something with him, I think it was that connection I was longing for, but I didn't really know. I definitely got to see his personality more. Rina and I sort of worked together pretty well. I might not have got off with a great start with her, but things were forming very well. The boys were more brutal yet flirty as ever. They were more kind than they would appear. They were very helpful, but I don't think Rina appreciated them that much. I felt like I should tell her something, because Gracin and I knew that we lost our family. We would give everything to go back and have just one more chance to say goodbye, and that we loved them. I don't think Rina really understood that, but I didn't want to get in an argument with her like I did before. The weeks seemed to go by like days did up on earth. It's just, that everything seemed so unreal. I don't think that they wondered about it as much as I did. I wondered why we were chose, I wondered why I entered the way I did. I wondered all the time. After a month, I was just about as tuff as Rina. I could lift eighty pounds for fifty seconds. Ninety pounds for thirty. I was way more tuff then when I first started out. I also got used to the kind of stuff Rina wore too. My sword never did anything special either. Not after what happened. In fact, I didn't even remember the secret room till after a month. It clicked in my head, and it was a day we weren't really doing anything. So I ran to Gracin's room. "Gracin! The room! The room! Let's go come on!" He laughed and followed behind me. We all got up and got ready. "Alright! Something to do around here!" I laughed at Rina's enthusiasm. We all ran out with our weapons, and ran to the room. Gracin walked in first, and he walked in slow. It was a very small room. With a green light in the corner, like a black light. I went over there ahead of Gracin to check it out. Once Rina saw me by the light she ran after me and hollered. "Morgan! Don't touch it!" "I wasn't going to." I told her. "Morgan when I touched that glowing magic it burned my skin invisible!" "I know Rina, but this is a different color." "So?" She asked me like I was stupid. I looked back at it. She told me it was a glowing blue light, this one was green. I saw a small bag of it, and a note beside it. "Rina..come look at this." She came and slouched by me. We were both in shock. "I told you guys, there's a human here." I picked up the note and read. "Magic is something that Rina wouldn't touch, but magic is a wonderful thing in such. You felt in your gut that is how you are surviving now, is something that can be cured some how. Your thinking about leaving, I see it in your eyes. Speak your opinion, there is no reason to hide. Tell them how you feel, deep down inside you have a plan to escape. Let them know that you know the right way. and your welcome for the help. Maybe if you find me, we can work together, to escape from this hell." My mouth remained open the whole time of reading it. Even that I finished, I still held the note up. "Morgan?" Rina blocked her head in the view of the note, but my eyes remained in the same place. I was in complete confusion. Rina snatched the note from me and the other three came over there to read it too. They all looked at me when they finished. Then after a moment of them staring at me, I looked at them. Rina looked in my eyes and said something that I never thought I would ever hear her say. "So What do we do Morgan?" I grabbed the bag of magic and touched it. Nothing happened, at first. Just a glow of it got on my finger. Then it turned grey it showed purple cracks that flowed and it went back to grey. I touched my finger..it was stone. I slammed my finger at the ground, and i didn't feel a thing. When I brought my finger back up the grey on my finger faded away, and it was normal again. I smiled and moved my finger. Smiles slides across their faces too. I put the bag in my pocket and I looked at them. "We're going to find who wrote this note, and use magic along the way. From now on we'll follow me. We're gonna work together to get through this maze. We will search every nook and cranny that we haven't found yet. I've got a plan." They all nodded their heads at me in agreement, even Rina. And we went back to the room.