New: Worlds

New: Worlds (Chapter 12)

Chapter 12: Ellie (Clay's POV)

It hurt to hear my sister cry. I had no experience with loved ones before I came here, so I never knew how strong a connection was between two people could be. It was like we were one person now. It was unfortunate that Conner still wasn't back. He had the best leadership skills, and he cared about my sister. If something happened to me, and he wasn't there, Allison would be all alone. I trusted him, which says a lot, because I don't trust a lot of people, but it seemed to me that he didn't trust me back. I trusted the people I was surrounded by for different reasons. I trusted Allison because she was proven to be my sister, and she was the friendliest to me. I trusted Ellie because even if she was on the bad side, she wouldn't be able to defend herself from us. Other than the fact that she was weak I couldn't trust her. I didn't see her as a threat, but I never saw how she could be of any help to us. She was only there because she looked like my sister, so supposedly. She was a petal too. I never understood why I trusted Bri. She hardly ever spoke to me, but she was a good person, and she had that certain quality of trustworthiness. To be honest, I was hoping that the air petal would be a guy. How come the majority of the petals were all girls that looked like Allison, or rather she looked like them. Maybe I was a mistake. There are only four elements, so why are there five petals? I looked almost nothing like Allison, mostly because I was the opposite gender but still. What if I wasn't a mistake petal-wise, but what if I was supposed to be a girl. I shuddered at the thought of having boobs. How can women stand up straight with those things?

I looked behind me to check on the girls. Allison was sniffling and shaking a bit, Bri was asleep, and Ellie was facing the opposite direction. Now that I thought about it, Ally had no reason to cry. She still had me, and she still had Bri and Ellie and parents for God's sake. She was focusing too much on whom she lost that she was forgetting what she had. I never grew up with parents, just people telling me to do chores and insulting me for not doing things the way they wanted it to be done. The thought of her crying over it angered me a little, but I couldn't say that to her, so I took out my anger on my speed. I tightened my grip on the poles that were attached to the main part of the wooden carriage. The only light in the tunnel was the fire coming out of my boots, which unbelievably did not catch on fire. I willed the fire to grow, so that I would "fly" a bit faster, but not too fast. I made random turns in the tunnels. Left. Right. Middle. Right. Middle. Left. Left. Right. Right. I slowed down a little after a while until I stopped at a crossroads to rest and restore a bit of my energy. I gently laid down the poles of the wagon, extinguished my fire and plopped down against the cave wall. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I listened to the quiet dripping of water onto the cave floors. I timed it out of boredom. Every drop was separated by 3 seconds of silence. I constant beat of drums sounded inside my head. And then the drums stopped. The water had stopped dripping. But it had been dripping for so long now, how could it have just stopped, unless... I froze, realizing what that meant. From where I was, the leak was to the right of me. But the carriage was on the left, so it wasn't coming from the girls. I hadn't heard any movement coming from the carriage, only occasional sniffles and a couple quiet snores. So something else was blocking the leak. It wasn't a bug, because it would've moved out of the way by now, so it was something moderately big at least. The thought that someone was watching me crossed my mind. "Ellie," I said as calmly and as quietly as I could. "Yeah?" she whispered back. At least I knew she was alive. "Very silently, wake up Bri and Ally, and it's very important that they don't make a sound."

"Why not?"

"Just do it."

Indistinct whispers came from the direction of the carriage. "They're awake now," I heard Ellie say. "Ally, on the count of three, I need you to light up your fist, and only your fist, okay? I think someone is watching us." The cave became deadly quiet. "One," I said shakily. "Two." My heart was pounding and throbbing in my chest. "Three." Both of our fists ignited to reveal the appearance of the space around us. Just as I had predicted, we weren't alone anymore. A hideous creature was standing arm's length from me. It was breathtaking, in a negative way of course. I honestly had no idea what it was. It was some sort of lizard person. It was slightly more human than lizard but not by much. It had the figure of a human, and jet black hair on its head, but there were giant tears of green scales that interrupted its human skin. The scales covered majority of his limbs and his neck, and there was a slim scar that ran over his eye. When the eyes blinked, it was slow, hiding the piercing yellow eyes underneath for a slow second. My eyes scanned the cave for any other of the lizard-men. There were three next to the carriage, eyeing the three girls very intently. They averted back on my opponent, repeating to myself that they would be okay, since there were three of them. The longer I seemed to stare into its eyes, the slower they seemed to blink. Wow, I was suddenly really tired. I felt myself sink back against the wall, but I never made contact with it. Instead, I was forced into a flashback.