Chronicles of the Unknowns: Intervention

Chapter 22

Dziko POV

Despite the entire hotel being empty, somehow the three of us ended up in the same rame. There wasn't much in the way of entertainment. All of the programs on TV were in Chinese. We had managed to figure out how to turn on subtitles, but there was a slight problem with that.

Over the past few years I had picked up speaking English pretty well, but as far as reading and writing, I wasn't as good as a native speaker. It took me a bit longer to put the words and phrases together when looking at them on a page. As for Daisy Lynn, she'd learned enough French from us to keep up a conversation, but the she had the same problem with literacy. The subtitles were useless because they went to fast. Ayana was the only one who was fine with both. When we were younger she'd taken more interest in learning English than I did.

Daisy Lynn sat at Ayanas feet, while she parted and began braiding her hair. I took my hair down from the tight bun I'd had it in and decided to hop in the shower. When I came out, I wrapped a black silk robe around myself that I'd found in the room. Ayana had put Daisy Lynn's hair into two french braids. They were chatting away, but I was disinterested. I was feeling a bit restless. I was annoyed with Ken about bothering me with his hurt feelings. Slowly becoming annoyed that Daisy Lynn and my sister weren't talking about anything that caught my attention. Irritated that I was restless. Everything was beginning to annoy me. It was like sensory overload.

I decided to get some fresh air to avoid getting snippy. I walked over to the window and pushed it up. Then I climbed out and jumped. When I landed, I hit the concrete roughly, but I used my powers to absorb the impact. As I looked around, I realized I was close to the pool, just on the other side of the gate. Something caught the corner of my eye and I looked around. It was like a flash of light. I heard a sizzling and crackling sound and decided to follow it.

A few moments later, I found the source of the flash I saw. Sakima was sitting on the ground with his shirtless back to me, but I could still see his arm was out. The fire he created was blue and I could feel the heat from where I stood, several feet back. He'd keep that up for a few seconds before it seemed like the fire burned itself out. Then he'd repeat.

"What are you up to?" I asked. I saw his back stiffen, and then relax.

"Trying to make my fire hotter. I know we'll come across Myra and Winston and Giovanna and the rest of her people again. There has to be a threshold for how much energy Myra can absorb from heat. I want to blast through her and burn Giovanna's skin right off her bones."

I walked over next to him. He glanced at me. I saw him look me up and down as I took a seat. I couldn't read the look on his face.

Sakima was not going to rest until Giovanna was dead. That much was clear. He wanted her to pay with her life for her actions. I didn't really have much to say. If someone snatched Ayana that way they did Salali, I would probably behave the same way.

He turned back to the scorched concrete in from of us. Then he started again. There was a hissing sound, kind of like when a teapot gets hot. A high pitched whistle that was quickly followed by burning hot blue fire. Sakima gritted his teeth. The muscles in his arms flexed and the veins became visible. He let out a grunt, and the flame began to grow brighter. It shifted away from blue and for a second it was a dazzling white that was so intense I had to look away. As quickly as it happened, I heard the sizzling and crackling sound from before and the light went out.

The ground that had been scorched before, looked like it had an indentation now. Like the fire had burned through a few layers of concrete. A breeze picked up and my hair went flying in the wind. I felt my robe try to come open and I quickly had to grab the collar and hold it closed. I hadn't put anything on underneath it. Before I'd been with the girls and I'd assumed I'd be alone when I came outside, so I figured there was no harm...but Sakima had definitely noticed.