Lost in Technicolor

Drizzle

Drake stood, swiping a hand across his mouth nonchalantly, "Well, now what? I don't think she's in this world. My best bet would be on End World."

"Yes, that would be where she originally traveled too," Jordan said in a very manner of fact way, "but she could easily have rode a train to another world. Besides, neither you nor your . . . Damien seem to have any idea which year her ring was set too. Just that she is with Damien. Am I wrong?"

"No," Drake sighed, "so then what is your plan exactly?"

"Well," Jordan smiled the tattoo's swirled onto his face moved with his skin. "We are going on a journey through Damien's life. Starting from the day he met Lyra, come on."

Drake frowned, "This will take more than three days then."

Jordan smiled at him, making Drake raise his eyebrows. It had been a long time since he had been around someone who wore a smile when they were happy and a frown when they were sad. No games. "Oh, definitely in our time it will. Three weeks would be much more accurate of an assumption. Here." He tossed Drake a ring identical to his and said, "Wear it so that you don't travel back in thirty minutes."

Slipping on the cold ring, Drake wondered with a sigh where this guy had been when he and Jade had been scratching in the dirt for any clues on how time traveling worked.

"And now?" Drake yawned.

"Well," Jordan gave him an empathetic look, "we could find a hotel and rest for a bit since it is getting dark."

Drake nodded and they began to walk down the lonely street, "May I ask how old is the Damien we are visiting here?"

"Er," Jordan paused and glanced up as if he could see the calculations he was making in his head there, "um, twelve I suppose and Lyra would be um nine. Wait," his eyes fell straight into Drake's, "you do know that Lyra and Damien are both paired, right?"

"I figured as much," Drake replied, stepping over an empty bottle sitting on the street in front of him. "Why?"

"Well," he sighed, "it's a pretty big deal to all of the worlds and especially the king. I'm sure that you've never been exposed to how big of a deal it is because Damien hid you and this girl we're looking for from the worlds, but look on the inside of your right wrist."

Flipping over his arm and glancing at the inside of his wrist, Drake saw the familiar triangular birth mark.

"Only one of the graces has it and whomever presiding over the grace with that mark is basically given the duty to take him or her to the king for evaluation and then to travel the thirty-two worlds for the match. Where we have traveled to is a time when Damien first meets Lyra. I hope at least. I'm kind of guessing here," he said with a laugh as he placed his hand on the back of his neck casually.

Drake smiled at him, charmed to be in the company with someone who hadn't know him his entire life and wasn't constantly comparing and contrasting him with Damien. This boy had already judged him from what he had said earlier and believed that Drake was Damien that there simply was no difference between the two other than age and its obvious results. "What do you think of me?" Drake asked smoothly.

Jordan moved his head to look Drake in the eye. He squinted and tilted his head this way and that as if trying to find something before replying, "I think that you're tormented by something terrible. I just don't know what. And you of me?"

Taken aback by the question, Drake found himself unable to recall a time when anyone had asked him what he thought of them. He seemed to usually be the center of any conversation, well him and Damien. He smiled though, amused more than ever, "I think that you can see straight through people easily, but you're wrong in thinking that Damien and I are alike in any way."