The Candles

1

Logan Bloom sat with his legs dangling over the edge of a cliff, the ground seventy feet below. He examined his hands, wincing at the sight of open blisters. A bit of chalk still coated his hands.

The sixteen year old had wide shoulders and a tall lean body. His pale blue eyes scanned the Canadian treetops, down a thirty meter long cable that spanned over the forest and crossed over a large air inflated mattress hidden by branches. Just after that was a small swamp filled with rotting plants and smelly manure for fertilizer.

A breeze swept over the small ledge Logan was sitting on. It was just big enough to hold him and the second teen that had placed a chalky hand on the ledge.

Jet Lin heaved himself on top of the ledge, slightly out of breath.

"You've gotten better since I left," he said. Jet Lin put his hands on top of his hands to fight off a cramp. He was an Asian teenager, also sixteen, with a slim body build and tan skin. Logan and Jet were some of the best climbers on campus. Neither of them wore a harness. The seventy foot drop didn't bother them at all.

"How long did you leave again?" asked Logan. Jet shrugged.

"Two months," he reminded him. "How often did you come up here?"

"Every morning." Logan's mind went back to when he'd first seen the seventy foot climbing wall. He'd been wearing a harness back then and when he'd finally set foot on the ledge, every fiber in his body had been shaking uncontrollably. He bent over and open a chest set into the cliff wall and pulled out two zip line trolleys with handles.

Logan attached his trolley to the cable and made sure it rolled smoothly. He handed the other one to Jet.

"I'll see you down there," Logan said before stepping off the ledge and letting himself fall forward. He let out a thrilled shout.

"Wait!" Jet shouted behind him. Logan glanced back, his blonde hair whipping his face, the trolley accelerating. He saw Jet pointing at the bottom of the zip line. Logan spun around so fast his neck cramped up.

"Shit!" The zip line lowered until he found himself amongst the thick forest of Canada. He'd forgotten to check if someone was on the mattress before leaving.

As Logan emerged from the trees, he spotted a ten year old girl clutching her ankle in pain. She was laying in the middle of mattress, right where one would land. The mattress was surrounded by a group of anxious-looking ten-year olds. A woman dressed in a blue shirt was hurrying towards the injured girl. The young agents pointed up at Logan, surprised.

Logan scanned the area. He couldn't jump aside to land on the edge of the mattress. The landing area was small, maybe two by two meters because it was meant as a challenge and it was easy to miss if you weren't used to it. Logan had a high chance of missing the mattress completely and even if he did manage to land on the edge, he would either slide off or send the girl flying in the air.

Logan didn't want to take the chance. The woman was climbing on the mattress and stumbling across the uneven surface towards the girl, carrying a red first-aid kit case.

Logan flew right over them as the woman glanced up at him, a disappointed and angry expression on her face. Logan let go of the handle bars when he was over the stinky swamp, held his breath, and plunged into the depth of the filthy water.

Fortunately, this swamp was deeper than the average swamp, maybe three meters of dirty water filled with algae, weird bugs and lots of manure.Logan didn't shatter his legs from the three meters drop. He kicked his way back to the surface and took in a big gulp of air.

He wiped his eyes and hair out of the way and looked around. The smell of manure hit his nostrils like a punch. He coughed and swam to the shore and crawled out of the dirty water.