"JOHN! NO!" I scream out as his hand slips past mine before I can grab him in time. He goes flying through the air, my sword sticking out of him, like a fish on a line, being pulled out of the water.
"B! They just took John! They stabbed him with MY sword and TOOK HIM!" I shout through my com, paying attention to the air to see if they start throwing him around like they did me. If I can spot him, I can snap him back to me, hopefully.
'I just need to breathe and stay calm, don't panic. Don't panic.'
I'm repeating this over and over in my head, scanning for any sign of John.
"SIN! DO YOU HEAR ME?!" B's voice cuts through my thoughts and I snap to.
"No, Repeat."
"DO NOT GO AFTER HIM YET. THIS... IS..... A ....TRAP. " He stresses to me.
I'm pacing still watching the sky, my thoughts begin to make my anxiety sky rocket.
"B! They could be torturing him! They could Kill him! I know they're not going to be putting him up in a Suite with a pool and a view!"
"Sin, listen to me. They will not kill him, because he's leverage. They kill him and they lose that leverage. Now, place someone in charge and get back here."
I'm approached by some of the soldiers, one of which is a Lt. Colonel.
"Lt. Colonel Blackwood, I'm leaving you in command of these soldiers here." I inform him.
"Are you going after him, Sir?" He inquires.
"Not yet, No heroics from you guys here either. You hold the line, if you need some help we will do what we can. I repeat no heroics and no team will be going after him either, until I say so."
They salute and I snap away to B's workshop where his men are running around, his mother is sleeping on a lounge and Viekar is shouting at someone.
"What did I miss?" I ask Bavarthos who's working on the potion of warding for the suits we will need that are being made out of Vartonix' skin that will completely cover us from head to toe.
"Well... he just poured the wrong thing into the mix. We have to start over from square one on that batch of translucence."
My heart drops, "That took two days! That's two more days that they'll have John!"
I start to turn to vent my frustration and spot Queen Lirael, stirring in her sleep. I snap to Viekar and stop him, motioning towards the lounge where she slept. He instantly stops and drags the guy out of the workroom.
We all had to be careful with the Queen. I've come to know her personalities very well this last week. She was cursed by the Erlking to change into three distinct characters of her personality at random times, like some one with multiple split personality disorder. Her appearance changed with those personalities too.
The young, arrogant, tactless Queen who was savagely brutal but honest. The middle aged, kind, loving, patient and forgiving Queen, who everyone adored and referred to as the 'real queen'. Then the wise, cunning, old crone, who was mercurial in her methods and actions that some would say were chaotic neutral. When I heard that the immediate thought that ran cross my mind was, 'GREAT... That explains my 'gift'.'
She merely turned over on the lounge and continued sleeping as people ran around trying to start a new batch of the translucence. To keep myself busy and not stress myself over John, I tried to help make the new batch but Bavarthos was quick to pull me away.
"Help me with the warding potion. I need this constantly stirred as I add this Graphene into it."
Stirring, my thoughts keep wondering back to John and I notice my hand shaking.
"Talk to me Bav, I need to focus on something else."
Bavarthos starts at my words, but keeps adding the graphene as he asks me.
"What did you just call me?"
"Bav? Sorry, do you prefer B?" He seems surprised I would call him that.
"Uh yeah, call me B. Only one person calls me that and it's intimate in nature to me."
"Oh .. Your girlfriend." I state.
He finishes pouring the graphene and let's me continue stirring .
" No. Not my girlfriend, My Wife." He informs me.
I stop for a second, but quickly keep stirring.
"I didn't take you as the married type." I mention quickly, surprised at this new bit of news.
"Yes, well.. We were married a few days before I had to come here. I didn't get to enjoy as much of it as I wished." His voice trembled at the end, making me glance up at his face. His eyes were misty but he quickly acted like nothing was wrong.
"What?" He barks at me.
Taken aback, I just stir and collect my thoughts for a moment. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry you had to come here to help us, but thank you, none the less."
He gives me a roll of his eyes as he breathes in deeply. "You're welcome. Apologies for snapping at you. It's not anyone's fault. Besides, Rakara would disown me if I had not come back to help."
"She really must be one heck of a woman." I grin at him when we are both startled by a voice behind us.
"Rakara is an amazing woman, I believe you and her would get along well."
We turn and see Queen Lirael behind us, smiling.
"Feel better, mother?" Bavarthos gives her a sad smile that he tries to make convincing but looks strained in doing so.
"I do, son." She pats his back, quietly showing her love and concern.
I look at the dynamic between them and see her heart hurting for her son's pain. You can also spot the guilt that makes her brows twitch up, over her being the cause of some of that pain.
Quickly changing the subject feeling the heaviness that sits in the air making me start to worry over John again, I bring her up to date.
"They have John. They used my sword to catch him like a fish hook and pulled him into their midst."
She frowns, her lips pursing in irritation. "Well then, we need to hurry and finish these suits up." She places a hand on my shoulder, "Don't worry dear, we will get him back alive."
I just nod not able to voice a optimistic response to her right now.
We immediately get to work finishing up any of the potions we can until we get another message from the front lines that they are in need of more troops. Bavarthos eyes narrow off in the distance and turn to his men in the room.
"I need five squads to join the front lines, any volunteers?" His gaze falls on the eight that step forward and he nods to five of the individuals and tells the other three that they are still needed here, while the others go to ready their squads.
Queen Lirael is looking around frantically. "Where's the translucent potion?"
"There was an accident and it was ruined. We had to restart the process." Bav informs her.
Lirael grabs her forehead, in annoyance and sighs. "Then what is boiling in this beaker?" She turns to Bav, pointing at the murky green filled beaker. "It's supposed to be clear during the entire process."
Bav looks to the guy who had been working on it. He throws his hands up and says quickly, "I followed the directions and ingredients as it's written down!"
He was doing it wrong this entire time?
Lirael takes the beaker in her tongs and sets it in the sink before grabbing a new beaker and starting the potion all over again. I notice she's not even looking at the directions but say nothing as the entire time her solution remains clear. She's muttering under her breath and within an hour she has gone through her personalities again and is back to Bav's mother.
Thank goodness, too. Her younger self nearly made the last technician that had screwed up the previous potion, soil himself, she had him shaking in fear so badly. Once she disappeared, the guy took off in the direction of the bathrooms where we all were feeling bad for him. He received an apology once he had returned from her, but he still kept his distance from her.
It's now been three hours since they took John and I'm getting antsy. I can't stand still and my mind keeps wandering, unable to focus on reading one of the strange books Bavarthos handed to me to study the ways of using my magic to accomplish certain defensive and offensive attacks. I was too distracted to help with the potions and those had to be complete as soon as possible.
What are they doing to John? Are they torturing him for information? How much longer till he can no longer endure? Will he end up broken just like I was?
I place the book down and walk out of the work room before anyone can see tears stream down my face.
I just take off in any direction that I can go, going through random doors at random directions, allowing myself to get lost, knowing that Viekar or anyone of Bavarthos's men can find me quickly.
They've prevented me from going to the front lines to fight, knowing I'd go after John alone and possibly end up as another pawn for leverage. I kick the box in front of me, only to fall on my ass in pain, gripping my foot cursing at the unscathed box that hasn't moved an inch.
"Dear me, are you alright ma'am?" I hear a sweet melodic voice ask from the other side of the room, startling me quickly to my feet.