The Hundred First Generation: The Ancient Power Returns

Chapter Twenty Two

We somehow managed to pull everybody together in a decent amount of time. Celina and I ushered everybody into the living room before we went out to get food. It was likely going to take a while if we were going as a group of twelve as we were then, so it would be best if I went on and told them what had happened the night before at a point of time before we walked out the door.

"Is everybody here?" I asked, glancing around the room. I did a quick head count, but I only counted eleven. "Oh no. We're missing someone."

"Did you count yourself?" asked Braylee with a raise of her eyebrow.

After realizing that I hadn't, I let a sheepish smile appear on my face. "Oops," I said simply. Braylee rolled her eyes, something that I had come to realize was normal for her.

"Something happened last night," I said after I had shaken off Braylee's eye roll. "I'm sure that you'll want to hear about it."

"Then what was it? We're not going to get anything done if you keep talking in circles, you know," Braylee said, her tone barbed. Man, she sure did have an attitude...

"Well... It was kind of late last night. I woke up because I felt something was wrong. When I realized what it was, I was shocked, to say the least," I told her.

"You're avoiding telling us like detectives on TV. Cliché, Renee," said Celina. "Can you tell us? We want to help you."

I let out a small sigh. "Well... It was Finley. He was in our room."

"What?" asked Celina, her eyes having gone wide. "I thought that we had made sure he was imprisoned. How could he have possible escaped?"

"I don't get how it happened either, but he was there. I could tell it was him by the voice," I told her. "He leaned over and he kissed me on the cheek, which is creepy, if you ask me. After that, I heard him walk out, so I quietly snuck out of bed to follow him."

"Wait... He kissed you?!" Corinne asked. "Why would he do that?! You barely know him! Only weirdos do that stuff, and they do it on dates!"

"I didn't get it either, until I heard him whisper something before leaving. He opened a rift and went through, but not before calling me his sister," I explained quickly.

The room was covered in silence for quite some time. I couldn't hear anybody doing anything, not even breathing. I had to admit that it freaked me out a little bit. I had never heard the group be so quiet before, so I wasn't exactly a fan of It.

"Wow. Plot twist," Braylee eventually said. Out of all the people I had expected to speak up and fill the void of quiet, I didn't expect her at all. "Do you know if he was telling the truth or not?"

"I don't think so," I said. "I never had any sort of other family members at all. It was always just me and my mom. Her parents died back when I was still a baby and my father left shortly after I was born. Since she didn't have any siblings, we were the only ones in our family."

"For all you know, your father took Finley off when he left," said Arianna. "I know that it's not probable, but it's a possibility. Besides, I doubt that he would call you his sister as a joke or lie. I feel like he's on the honest side, even for a Trelosa soldier, at least from what I've heard of him."

"Trelosa soldiers can't be honest," Celina said with a frown. "But I understand why everybody here would be suspicious. After all, there is a chance that he was right. For now, we should leave that investigation for later on. I don't know about you all, but I think that we should be focusing on finding the keys that will ultimately help us stop Hakate."

"That should take my mind off of this mess, so I have no objections," I told her. "You said that we were splitting up by power tiers, right?"

"Exactly," Celina said. "We can go over who's with who again after we head out and get some food. I don't know about you all, but I personally am getting incredibly hungry."

"Me too," Melody agreed. "After we get some food, let's come back here and head our separate ways. I believe that we'll get more done after we get some energy inside of us."

"You're sounding like every single woman on a health care video right now," Braylee told her. Melody merely shook her head and looked away, not in the mood to deal with Braylee and her over the top attitude.

"Even if it's a tad bit overused, she has a point," Viveca said. "Come on, everyone. We have food to eat and people to meet. Today's going to be a long day."

"If we happen to run into any trouble, and I sincerely hope we don't, we'll have to see what Renee's powers have in store for us," Corinne declared. "I don't think anybody's seen anything of them yet."

"Nope," I replied with a shake of my head. "I didn't really know that I could have powers until a few days ago, anyways, so I haven't gotten the chance to practice or do anything else magic related."

"Then I guess we'll just have to see how things go down," shrugged Celina. "For now, let's go and get some food. We have no time to lose. Things are going to get intense rather quickly today. Call it a hunch. The sooner we get the jump on whatever's to come, the better."

"Then let's stop babbling on and get some food already," Braylee said, which prompted us all to stand up and go for the door.

I was near the back of the crowd. I couldn't help but think about Finley... Something about him was oddly familiar, but I couldn't put a finger on it. 

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I mentioned this before but I had a power outage last night so I couldn't type anything up 

I was just about to post this when my power went out so no updates from yesterday :/

-Digital