Burning Connections

Chapter Two

Bomi woke up in a unfamiliar forest with soft rays shining down on her face. She squinted a little, fighting hard against gravity to pull herself up. What is this place? Running away wasn't a feasible option, since she was unable to stand for some reason. She decided to just stay where she was and her eyes roamed all over the place.

The teenager was absolutely entranced by the ethereal beauty of the forest. The trees were all in mixed deep hues of turquoise, with the tips of every leaf ending with a translucent minty blue. The dead leaves didn't seem dead at all, for they shone a brilliant violet, a reflection of their former beauty. The ground was sturdy but soft at the same time. Nothing was decomposing, and everything was really clean for a forest, or so Bomi thought. A light mist floated through the treetops and covered the light blue sky.

Suddenly, the crunching of leaves could be heard. Bomi froze in fear. She held her breath and backed up against the closest tree when she saw a flash of white.

"Do not fear, young one," a deep and rich female voice was heard as a white tiger entered Bomi's sight. She did not know whether to feel freaked out or fascinated, for she had never seen a tiger up close, let alone a talking one.

She held her breath as it approached. Its jet-black stripes stood out against its pristine white fur and it shimmered ever so slightly under the sunlight. Strangely, there was a faded scent of lavender wisping around its body.

"I am Nidalee, one of the feline Guardians. You must be the one Ayalon chose." the tiger calmly spoke.

"A-Ayalon? Who's Ayalon? Where am I?" Bomi stuttered, eyes wide in confusion.

"You are in the Forest, one of the areas where the souls of animals spend the last of their days before they are reborn. Ayalon is the Guardian of deer kind, which means you as a Protector under his guidance, have the soul of a deer."

Bomi sat in silence, trying her best to process everything that was happening to her at the moment. She twirled her finger around her curls and looked at the tiger with a brow raised.

"What is this Protector... thing, you say?"

The tiger seemed to furrow her eyebrows as she recalled something.

"I do not have much time to speak, Bomi, but I will do my best to explain. A Protector, is a human with a great heart, and he or she, like you, has an animal soul together with their human energy in their bodies. They have a duty to protect animals from the evil of humans, but more importance is placed on the animals of the same kind as the animal within them. I need to go now, I shall explain in more detail when we meet again."

Nidalee then swiftly whipped her body around, preparing to leave but soon stopped short of taking a step.

"One more thing, if you experience pain at any time, do not let it get to you." she said before bowing her head slightly and bounding off into the distance.

Bomi was left stunned and confused. A talking tiger... Some so-called "duty" that comes out of nowhere... Wow. Good job Bomi. You have taken dreams to a whole new level.

A gust of wind came whooshing in and lifted the girl into the air. She was getting drowsier by the second, everything seemed to be closing in on her and she felt a numbing sensation all over.

The wind stopped blowing, but Bomi floated down tranquilly and drifted off to sleep...

...where she woke up to find being prodded and poked in her own room.

"You lazy pig! Wake up now, dinner's getting cold!" Bomi's mother yelled, landing a final smack on her daughter's arm before storming out the room. Bomi could hear her muttering angrily, and thoughts of the earlier happenings were quickly replaced by colourful phrases.

"Always lazing around, never helping out at home..."

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because all the good things I've done for the family are simply forgotten. It's not like I've never done housework before. I even got up early a couple of times to make breakfast for everyone! You're always focusing on the negative things. Tch.

Bomi resisted the urge to kick something or make a mess of things to release her frustration. Instead, she bored her eyes into her mother's back with passionate fury until she was out of sight. Putting on her best "I'm not angry" face, she strolled to the dining room.

Her anger was quickly dissipated though, for she spotted her favourite dish on the table - fried chicken. Oh, how had she been craving it for days, unable to go out to buy KFC. She slowly approached the table, grinning to herself just seconds before a second attack came raining down on her.

"Do you need a fancy invitation to help set the table? Do you think everyone needs to serve you, huh, princess?" her mother went on and on.

She pursed her lips, as she knew the mere sight of her scowling would send her mother on another wave of rants about how she was too sensitive about criticism, so on and so forth.

Come on, I just barely stepped in here and you start shouting at me. Really? Can't you just shut up for at least an hour? That would be great. I think even Dad would agree. -sighs- Too bad I don't have a sibling to back me up or at least complain together about Mom... and Dad sometimes.

She reluctantly took the spoons and chopsticks, setting them on the table and sat down quietly. Scoop after scoop of rice went down into her stomach until she was halfway through the bowl. She picked up a drumstick and sunk her teeth into the crispy chunk immediately.

At that instant, a sharp pain shot up her left leg, causing her to jump and curl up a little in her seat. The pain lasted for a few agonising seconds with Bomi furrowing her eyebrows and curling her toes, trying not to make any sound.

She went back to eating normally, quickly dismissing the pain. That was until she took another bite out of the chicken flesh, and her leg started hurting again.

Hmm... Weird.

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And I'm finally back with another chapter. This took a while, and I hope I'm not boring the heck out of any of you. I sincerely apologise for the long wait, but I promise I will update faster next time!

How do you like it so far? What do you think happened to Bomi? (Probably the most obvious question ever)

Stick around for the third chapter all right? Your support is greatly appreciated > w