Taint, Time and Tangents✔️

≑ Chapter Twenty-Two

Cover on the Multimedia made by: Shine Hope (dreamer37)

∞ 22 ∞

SEVEN

"One more minute. One more."

"Oh please. It doesn't fit her at all."

"Ugh, he stinks. I'm outta here."

"Will she get angry if I tell her what I did with George?"

"I hope Gramp's home."

Myriad voices crawled to my ears, incessant, overwhelming each other- battling for attention. The moment I switched on my ability, it was like a dam abruptly opened, water rushing down through every gates into the wide stream ahead until they eventually drowned my own thoughts.

Closing my eyes firmly for a couple of seconds, I breathed in- drawing all the positive energy around me, absorbing them. Then like a tiny bubble welling up from my heart, as I let soothing air slowly slither out from my nostrils, an invisible shield wrapped around my body, following its every curves and contours.

I opened my eyes the same instant those deafening voices dissolved. The scene before me was still the same- a busy street packed with hastening humans- but this time, their voices were not knocking on my ears anymore.  

Having the ability to read and hear everyone's thoughts was, at first, intriguing and addictive. It granted me the chance to listen to the thousand phrases a mute could say, to the several wise words an idiot could think of and to all the emotions that a heart in denial could whisper.

But after seeing humans continuously fool each other, I'd learned enough not to meddle anymore in their childish plays especially after discovering how a simple human could be so hypocrite- how he could be wonderful outside but rotten from the inside.

Roaming my eyes around, I breathed out a relieved sigh as I realized that there were no more tasks left to do in this particular place. It was great that I only had white-feathered jobs around this area and they were relatively just less-than-a-minute works. Now that we were only five Amaranths actually performing our jobs, workload had become very heavy. But looking at it closely, with Eight suddenly deciding to turn into human and Five busy being cryptic about his plans, I guess only three of us were left standing.

Although we were so against about Eight leaving us for a couple of days at first, we owed it to him that our jobs recently were so much easier. We bullied- er, asked him to finishour golden feathers- all fifty of them. Perhaps he was too desperate or it was just innate on him to be very kind, because, surprisingly, he agreed to it immediately. He got delayed but otherwise, he managed to finish them all just right after Four created the potion.

What is he doing right now? Did he already meet Nine?

He was so relaxed while we watched him transform, trying to let him remember all our messages to Nine. Four did not breathe at all until the last minute as she enumerated all the reminders Eight should relay to Nine.

As much as we wanted Nine to see us, Five did something to her potion so that he would be the only one visible to her. Just like the primary protocol on our missions, we should be humans as well before she could see us.  

This should not be the case because if it was Four's potion, an Amaranth could retain all his abilities and strength even if he/she transformed into another being.  However, Five seemed to have made Nine so human- so weak and vulnerable- we were afraid that a day would come that she'd eventually forget that she was an angel.