Alive

Ch. 15 Trying

The path to the castle didn't feel difficult, the traps and puzzles were deactivated, the people weren't acting as aggressive than before, and the assassins haven't caught up yet. We were in the forest with the red leafed trees and Susie blurted out "Can we stop for a sec? I want to eat something." Ralsei turned his attention to Susie and said "Didn't you eat breakfast?" Susie shook her head and said "Nope. I didn't eat anything for breakfast, I had some worms in a jar I could've eaten, but I had those yesterday." Ralsei shuddered in disgust and said "Lucky for you, I packed some brownies in my burlap sack." Ralsei had 6 total brownies, they were big enough to cover your whole palm and as thick as a sponge; there was 6 of us to get one each. We all sat down by a nearby tree and received our share of brownies. I noticed Noelle looked skeptical and I said "Don't worry, Noelle. They're fine." I took a bite to reassure Noelle, the brownie was a chocolate delight! I said "See? It's very good!" Noelle looked more calm and she also took a bite, Noelle reacted in a joyful way and said "Wow, Ralsei! These are really good! What's in them?" Ralsei was pleased to hear Noelle's compliment and said "Just the essentials... and a little bit of magic!" Kris looked curious at the brownie and said "Did you put real magic in this?" Ralsei nodded and said "Sure did. I found the recipe in a book called 'A warlock's guide to baked goods' it's an interesting read filled with all sorts of supernatural recipes." Kris looked interested at Ralsei and replied "I should get that book for my mom's birthday." I turned my attention to my sister. Judy was still unconscious, but still breathing. I nudged Judy awake, she woke up and mumbled to me "Brian...? What's going on? W-why don't I feel good?" I began to grow concerned and said "Can you remember?" Judy shook her head no and said "No, all I can remember is Dad carrying me to his car and Mom fighting some guy with a gun... I fell asleep to a loud sound." I thought that Judy meant a gunshot was the loud sound and I didn't want to frighten Judy, so I said "That wasn't Mom, Judy... just someone who looked like her..." I handed Judy her brownie and said "Here, you need to eat. Don't worry, they don't have peanuts." Just looked confused and said "I'm allergic to peanuts?" I figured that must be the memory loss of the disease kicking in, I felt bothered by my recognition of it. I felt as though one brownie wasn't going to be enough for Judy, so I gave Judy my brownie. Susie took notice at my act of charity and felt concerned for me. Susie broke her brownie in half and handed me her half piece, she said "Don't think this means anything." Susie winked at me with the eye that Noelle doesn't see from her perspective. Susie was clearly being romantic in her secret way.

We continued onto the trail, Judy was able to walk on her own, surprisingly. I was hoping that Rouxls will teleport to us and take us to Card Castle already, but I think he won't be coming. As we were about to enter the Great Board, we heard a feminine voice from behind us yell "Freeze, suckers!" We turned around and it was the black woman with dreads holding a crossbow pointed at us. The woman had on red leather armor, her skin changed to dark yellow and her hair color was brown. I felt the cold steel of a sai touch my neck and a different woman's voice said "Found you~." I assumed it was the woman with pink hair holding me hostage. The same woman pointed a crossbow at my sister and yelled "Natasha, I got our targets! Let's go somewhere more... private~." The woman moved one of her hands to my inner thigh. I wasn't feeling horny by the woman, I felt pissed! One of the people that I loathe was trying to make a move on me! Natasha yelled "Felicity! Quit flirting and get the targets over here! I'm getting tired of this shit!" I decided to beg to the assassins and said "Please! Not my sister! You can have me, just not her! She's sick!" I noticed that the assassins were thinking; as they were, I noticed Susie didn't say, instead mouthed to me "What the fuck?!" I mouthed back "I'm sorry!" Natasha said "Ok, we'll leave your sister alone, but you're coming with us!" The two female assassins now have me hostage and away from my group, they were leading me far away from my friends as possible. We were about 80 yards apart and Felicity said "Can't we just kill him now? We're far away enough to do it." Natasha sighed "We can't, Hanzo wants to fight Brian, you know how he is about that." Felicity took her sai off of my neck and said "That's dumb, I'm trying to get paid and I-" I bashed Felicity's nose with the back of my head, she stumbled backwards, and I summoned a sword and stabbed Felicity through the center of the rib cage. I used the other sword for a quick decapitation, I killed Felicity. I took my sword out of Felicity's chest and Natasha yelled "Aw fuck!" Natasha aimed her crossbow at my head and fired an arrow. I ended up splitting the arrow in half down the middle on accident, but I pretended to do it on purpose. Natasha tried to load another arrow, but she had difficulty doing so; it seemed that Natasha is not used to using a crossbow. I used this chance to launch my chained swords at Natasha, one sword pierced the left side of her collarbone and the other pierced the bottom left of her rib cage. I sensed that the swords had some sort of fire element made with it, I assumed it worked like my previous weapon. I cracked the chains like a whip, a fire traveled down the chain, and Natasha's upper half of her body exploded. I sighed with relief, I wasn't going to be killed by any assassin today, I only have 2 lives left. I had my weapons disappear and I began to run back to my friends, I figured they might be worried.

My friends and I met up halfway, they were going to come back for me. I saw that Kris was holding Judy, I assumed Judy passed out again. I was surprised by Susie because she hugged me; I assumed she missed me a lot, considering I was taken by the assassins. Susie said "Holy crap, Brian! I'm so happy you're ok! I don't know what I would've done if-!" I coughed to snap Susie out of her episode and get her to realize what she was doing in front of Noelle. Susie began to blush and sweat, she said "I mean, uhh... if you did die because uhm... you still owe me half of a brownie...?" Noelle wasn't convinced by Susie's lie, she said "Susie...? Do you like Brian?" Susie rubbed the back of her head and began mumbling. I nudged Susie and signaled that she needs to take a deep breath. Susie deeply inhaled then exhaled and said "Yes and so does Brian. We've been dating in secret for a couple days." Noelle looked mildly disappointed at Susie's statement, she turned to Kris and Ralsei and said "Is this true?" They both nodded and Kris said "We both knew for a while. It's not much of a secret, it was more like a fact that they didn't want to admit." I felt minor surprise in Kris' statement and I said "Is it that obvious?" Kris nodded and said "It's pretty obvious. Monster Kid told me about you and Susie and Catti wrote on her social media about your date." Susie rubbed her arm and blushed, she said "Things were getting pretty heated in that diner." Noelle returned her attention to me and Susie, she said to Susie "Does Brian help you be nicer? Does he help you be happy?" Susie thought for a moment and said  "He helps a lot, yeah." Noelle sighed in disappointment, but smiled shortly after and said "If he makes you happy, then I'm happy." There was a small pause and Ralsei said "Well, I'm glad we could clear this up! Kris, do want me to hold Judy? You look kind of tired." Kris did an obvious flirt and said "I thought you like seeing me looking heroic and manly~." Kris did a heroic pose while holding my sister, but the mood was killed when my sister coughed. Ralsei went from blushing to serious as he grew concerned for my sister. Ralsei inspected Judy while she was still in Kris' arms. Ralsei turned his attention to me and said "Brian, your sister's pulse is fading and she feels cold!" I began to feel scared and I went to inspect Judy, I said "No no no no! What can we do?!" Ralsei adjusted his scarf and said "I can treat the disease, but I don't know how long she'll have left. Using my magic will just extend her life, but shorten the length of how much time she has every time I use it on her. If we can't get to the archives in time, it'll never work." Ralsei activates the best healing spell he has and Judy looked somewhat healthier. I said "We'll make it work." I took Judy out of Kris' hands and I walked. I heard Susie say "Damn, that is a man right there." As I was walking, I mumbled "Don't cry. Don't cry. Don't cry. Everything will be ok. There's just one more assassin." I deeply inhaled then exhaled and said "I'm fucking nervous as fuck...!" I'm scared to the core, but I didn't show it; if I showed I was scared, the others may think I can't handle this situation and I wanted to feel brave for them. I'll stop at nothing to save my sister, even if I'm not alive.