The Swords of Memory: Second Chances

Chapter 4

                Zara was suddenly in the field again. She was standing in the exact spot she had been in before. The first thing she noticed was the sudden peace inside her head. Then she opened her eyes and saw the same metal stand, but the swirling mass of light that Aaron had called a portal was gone. Zara looked at the sky and saw that the moon was still there. It had moved some from where it had been before, but it was still there. Zara was hit with the realization that she didn't hurt at all. What had happened to the ambulance? Zara was confused but she had enough insight to realize that she needed to find Aaron and Garrett. They were the people that knew what was going on in this field and the ambulance was not important now. Her search didn't last long. She turned around at the sound of her name.

"Zara, there you are. I've been waiting for you for almost an hour." Aaron said. Zara turned to face him, seeing that nothing about him had changed. His hood was drawn and besides his voice, she realized she had no way to distinguish him.

"I'm not really sure what happened." She said.

"You disappeared and then, just now, you reappeared in the exact same spot." Zara took the information and started to think about it. She had left this place and then been in an ambulance. She remembered feeling faint from the pain, or possibly from something the paramedic was giving her, and then she appeared here again. Here she had a super power, there she was just as injured as you would expect someone who got in a car crash to be. Whenever she wasn't awake in that world, the real world, she was here. That meant this was all just a dream. "Zara, what happened?" She wasn't fully convinced this was a dream but saying it was to someone who was a part of it wouldn't get her anywhere.

"I just kind of time lapsed. I feel like I was just having that headache and then I heard you call me." She lied. If Zara was experienced in one thing, it was lying. "Where's Garrett?"

"He went ahead without us. While you were gone we found someone else like you. The things he didn't know matched up exactly with what you don't know. We were worried about being attacked by shades again so Garret went ahead with the boy."

"A boy? And he was just as confused as I was?" Zara was starting to doubt her earlier assumption. If there was someone else here that was in the same position as her, then this might not be a dream. She wasn't creative enough to create a story this complex, not even in her dreams. She always just dreamt of what happened to her the day before, if she dreamed at all.

"Yeah. We don't know where you came from but you need to be protected. It's dangerous for humans everywhere outside of the settlement. That's why the only people authorized to leave are the power core attendants. We are trained to protect ourselves in the outside world. Come on, the shades could come back at any second." Aaron did something with his hand and the portal appeared again. He took Zara's hand and smiled, guiding her towards the portal. He walked through and she was pulled after him. She expected to just come out on the other side and still be in the field but she was in a completely different environment. What had been a wide expanse of grass was now a wide expanse of one story stone buildings. She was standing on gravel next to Aaron.

He looked over at her and saw the amazement in his eyes. "I know exactly what you mean. Everyone knows what portals are, but only power core attendants ever get to use them. I felt the same way when I first went through one. You should put your hood up."

"Why? It's not cold."

"Remember what we said about how unrecognized people are not met with good will? The common people won't believe that you haven't been conspiring with one of the other races. You will have to pretend to be Daphne until I can get you to the king's palace." He put her hood up for her and pushed her black hair into the hood, hiding it from sight. Zara was going to protest but was pulled forward before she could utter a word. "I recommend keeping quite as well. Your voice could give you away just as easily as your looks." Startled by the command, Zara didn't ask for an explanation, she just followed Aaron's lead through the streets. There were many houses and between each was a plot of land with odd plants growing in them. Some people came out of the houses to watch Zara and Arron, some of them cheering. Aaron didn't respond to any of them so Zara followed suit. Hopefully these power core attendants didn't often respond to crowds.