Opposites: The Staff of Light [Book One]

4. Timber

Alice

"You did a good job, Annabeth", I muttered to myself as I laid myself down on my room's floor, staring blankly at the ceiling. "Oh, you didn't do a good job, you did a great job! Now, we're both going down like timber. How do we get out of this? It's all your fault we're dead. Everytime you do something stupid, I get into the problem! Like, right now! Great job!"

Annabeth, from her room, cleared her voice. "I can hear you, Alice", she moaned. "Stop trying to mutter! Because you can't even tell yourself to shut up!"

"If I want to mutter, then I'll mutter!"

"Fine! Don't stop, okay? But you call that a mutter? I call that a shrieking yell!"

I wish I was Elsa right now. With Annabeth around, I feel like I am already Elsa but she gets into the character. The unknown character. Elsa's long lost twin who lives inside a volcano with lava everywhere. 

"You want a shrieking yell?" I asked her in response. 

She started to crack up in evil. "Try to mutter, that's a shrieking yell, Alice". 

"Oh, whatever. I'll be blaming you when Dad gets home". 

"Of course you'll be blaming me. Dad always liked you best. And, obviously, you won't frame yourself, you idiot. Now, that, would be a hundred percent ridiculous". 

"You already said so yourself". 

"What? You mean the part that I called you an idiot? Yeah, I am right. I said so myself and you agreed!"

"Not that..."

"What? You said so yourself". 

Now, she's just using my words against me. She is such an annoying rebel. 

After that, we stood silent. My guess she started to get a book and read. Me? I got up from the floor, and suddenly had the guts to shout on my pillow, for some reason, but I didn't exactly. I grabbed my phone and played some Minecraft, one of my favorite games of all time. Presenting, Minecraft Pocket Edition. I made Annabeth play these before but she said that these games could whack my brain apart. I think that was a little too overexaggerated. This game is not a brainwhacker, and it's really, really, cool, amazing, cool and awesome! And it's not gonna whack my brain, like she says. I'm not playing like every second of the day. But she finds me like that. 

I've always wondered why, though. Maybe she hates getting killed by Creepers, Zombies, Spiders and the Mini-Zombies. Or even maybe the funny not dangerous pet squickens! There's nothing to be afraid of really. They're just games. 

Hours came by. I've been playing with my phone for hours already and I had to recharge it. Currently, I was playing some Flappy Bird even the phone was charging up. I was about to hit a new highscore and beat Donna's when suddenly... 

"Alice! Annabeth!" our little brother, Alex, called from outside, banging on my door. Startled, I almost dropped my phone on the icy floor, but lucky, my gloved hands caught it. 

"Dang it, Alex!" I snapped, opening my door. "Hold your horses! What's wrong?"

Annabeth opened her door and like always, had her black cape on with her hood slung at the back of her neck and a metal bracelet on her right hand. "Not good". 

"What's not good, now?"

She faced away. "Ask Alex". 

I faced Alex and raised a brow. 

"Mom and Dad's in the kitchen waiting for the both of you... well, us. They sound furious. We better hurry now", Alex explained and without a doubt, we head to the kitchen and saw Mom and Dad standing there as if they practiced stuff or something. 

"Alex, you may be excused", Mom crossed her arms, calmly and then made us step forwards. "Now, I've warned you, Alice, to not use your powers. Our windows were open. What do you think would the neighbors think if they saw you summoning some sort of sorcery?"

I felt a shot of guilt rush inside of me and faced the floor for respect. "Yeah... I'm a moron..."

Dad faced Annabeth, his facial expressions were getting calmer. "And, Annabeth Candum, I expected more from you, young lady". 

Annabeth looked rather ashamed for what she did to me. I felt the same, too, for using my powers. With the windows open. 

"Now", Mom continues, still having her arms crossed. "I don't now whom will be grounded". 

"I say, not because I love one of you more, Annabeth, you started the fight, you have to be punished", Dad decided. "One week of no research". 

"What?" Annabeth protested. She loves researching as much as she loved books. "Dad, Mom, you can't do this to me!"

Dad hesitated. "I'm sorry, Annabeth, but it's for your own good. You started the fight, therefore you get to be punished". 

"But..."

"No but's. Now, go to your room", Mom said as Annabeth walked sadly and tearing away. "For you, Alice, you may also be excused". 

I ran off to Alex's room because I clearly had no more things to do for the rest off the day. It suddenly bummed me out. Especially the fact that I almost beat Donna's high score and got the title of the Best Flapper in our gang. Great job, me. Great job. My work was made pretty darn, well. 

I knocked on the door. "Alex?"

He then opened it as quick as lightning. "Yo, what up? Come on in. We can talk more". 

"Okay..." I entered his room and there we were, sitting at the edge of his bed. 

"So what happened to Annabeth?" he questioned, breaking the awkward silence. "Did she get grounded or something?"

I sighed heavily. "She did get... grounded. And got banned from researching the entire week". 

"What? You have to be kidding me!"

"No. I'm telling the truth. I just couldn't believe that researching was everything to her..."

Alex jumped in surprise, his eyes opened wide. "Let's just thank that books weren't banned! Imagine if Mom and Dad banded her without books for an entire week... My condolences". 

"What do you mean condolences?" I cried. "Stop acting dumb... like me... Alex! As if upsetting her would bring up Doomsday or something". 

"It would, you know". 

"Impossible". 

"Trust me, Alice, you don't have a single idea how powerful Annabeth is. I made her mad once and she like, bursted into flames, which kinda freaked me out..."

"Say, what?" I exclaimed in response. "You mean to tell me, a guy as innocent as you", except when he overuses his lightning power, "could make Annabeth, our short-tempered bookworm sister, explode like a bomb or a volcano or something?"

"Uh, that time was part your fault, not mine? She kinda blamed it on me because of you..."

"Well, how was I supposed to know the carton was hers? It wasn't my fault! Did it have a name written on it? Did it have a name tag?"

"Well, you don't have... It's probably not nece..."

"No!"