Arnold pulled us into a strange world. From the ever green trees to the large tree houses, I'm guessing this is the Elven galaxy.
Arnold was beside me but he looked a lot more like a ghost. On that topic... hmm...
I raised my arms and just as I guessed, they were glowing, but unlike Arnold's golden glow, mine was pure black.
He raised his arms and the view changed. We were moved into one of the Tree houses that suspiciously looked like a castle and we both phased into a large golden room.
Oh the blinding of my eyes! Why is everything gold? The golden table? The combination of white and golden stripe patterns on the walls together with the brown wood floor taped in gold? Gold, gold, gold in general, except the furniture, being high class as it could possibly be though.
In one of the coaches sat a male and female whom I'm assuming were Arnold's parents. I see where he got his brown eyes from, his father, but other than that, he is a perfect image of his mother. Both parents were smiling as they watched their children playing a fine game of tag. Arnold looked a lot younger, barely five maybe, as he chased whom I'm assuming is his younger sister around.
"This is where it all began," ghost Arnold whispered. From there, I became even more attentive to the story.
Both parents waited until their kids were out of an earshot (at least they hoped so. Little Arnold was hiding behind the door) then both their smiles faded.
"How long do we have?" Arnold's mother asked worriedly.
"Not long, dear," His father answered as he took out his phone. He punched in a code and a hologram appeared. A dark armored Knight was shown and judging from the badge, I'm guessing he's one of the demon's generals.
"Have you made you choice then?" he asked monotonously.
"Yes. I'm not giving you my children so that you can manipulate them as you please. I refuse," Arnold's father answered with conviction. The Knight smiled and shook his head.
"I knew that would be your answer. That's why I came prepared!" he replied then an explosion shook the entire castle.
"NOOO!" both parents screamed and the vision shifted from there.
"That's the day my sister was taken from me," Arnold spoke in a stained voice.
"Arnold, I'm really sorry," I started as I tried to comfort him, but then my hand slipped right through him.
"You haven't seen the worst part of it,"
He snapped his fingers and the scenery changed. It was now him and his parents alone, and they were all running away from something. They were in a dark part of a forest with explosions echoing everywhere. Arnold looked about eight years old and quite frankly, seemed to have lived through hell together with his parents.
They turned to the left but were met with a full army of dark elfs. One came up to the front, a tall buffy dark elf who probably had muscles for brains and was clearly the leader. Arnold's father looked at the dark elf in shock that quickly turned to anger while the mother shielded Arnold.
"How's life been treating you, Neal," the elf asked with an evil grin.
"I should have guessed it was you, Jack. You always wanted to rule the Elven kingdom. But I never would have anticipated you'd side with the demons,"
"You should know by now, I would do anything for power," the dark elf answered. "Capture them alive. The demons want the boy. Mary, my love, why don't you leave this cocky bastard and join me at my side as my wife?"
"I will never leave Neal, you Dumb bastard!" Arnold's mother answered as a declaration.
"Don't worry. I'll make you love me," Jack said and they began marching towards them.
"Mary, NOW!" Neal shouted and a beam struck them. All of them suddenly vanished from the area. The Dark elf roared with vengeance in his eyes and charged at his subordinate who had no idea why he transported the family to an unknown location.
I was thrown back to the darkness then just as first, suddenly saw the familiar ceiling of our room. I turned towards Arnold and saw him bury his face in his thighs. I could hear him crying in silence.I struggled to rise from my bed which took a lot more effort than I anticipated. Then, limped towards Arnold's bed and climbed on.
I rubbed his back and waited for him to calm down, no doubt these memories weren't those someone would like to remember. Losing his sister as well as his home isn't something a little kid should get to experience. I didn't have to wait long for him to finish with his story at least.
"Ever since that day, we've been on the run but were lucky enough to meet one of my fathers' friends. We managed to survive till I was able to enroll in camp and thankfully, that friend held a backup account of ours. Once I entered camp, my parents could now fully refocus on searching for my sister," he ended his story.
I leaned back on his bed and began mine, trying to take his mind off his story, "I don't know if I had siblings. I don't even remember my parents faces,"
Arnold wanted to say something but I stopped him before I continued.
"I lost my memories when I was five. The only thing I can remember from that point on is my time with Flintheart, my class teacher, and even those are hazy. But in the end, even he too left me to fend off for myself," I continued but my voice broke.
"You don't have to talk if you don't want to," Arnold tried to stop me but I shook my head.
"From there, it's been the worst five years of my life. I was enrolled in a public school where I was treated like absolute trash due to my race. Only the bare minimum were nice to me and that's because they had to just for show or pity."
"So I created this persona to hide my true feelings and always acted nice towards people but deep down in my mind I always knew no one was to be trusted. Just recently, when I entered the blackhole, my deepest thoughts were projected out towards me effectively releasing all my emotions. That's why I am as I am."
I was not going to elaborate on what I had to do in those five years. I'd rather wish to forget those horrid memories. Unconsciously, I started remembering them and all the emotions that accompanied them.
"So that's why. Jeez, I'm sorry about all that talk about my parents when you don't even have an idea what they even look like. Worse is that almost everyone you knew practically left you to fend for your... self... wait...hold on" he stopped talking and turned to me.
I had no idea what was happening because I was a little bit occupied with locking down those memories again, but that's why I couldn't sense the punch that was thrown right on my head. It knocked me off Arnold's bed and I immediately crushed to the floor in pain.
"What the hell Bro?!" I screamed at him as I held my head in pain. "Why would yo-"
"SHUT UP!" he screamed right back. I angrily took a look at him and was caught in suprise. His fist was still raised, but his face was bright red. He still had tears in his eyes but he looked absolutely livid with me.
"I KNEW YOU WERE DUMB, BUT NOT THAT DUMB!"
"Hey! Where did that come from?!"
"DUMMBO!"
"Wait, what?!"
"KING OF DUMBDUMBS!"
"Ok, I see. Let it all out,"
He still had that angry look on his face. He was ready to punch me again so I slowly and painfully backed away.
"That's the reason you're acting so cold towards us, your friends?! You think we'll betray you?! Grow up!" he flew from his bed and pinned me to the floor. He raised his right hand ready to add another blow but when it landed, it carried no power so it grazed harmlessly passed my face.
"Why? WHY?!" he muttered as fresh tears fell from his eyes.
"You have no idea what I've been through!"
"Does it look like I care?! We're your friends, Max! You should put a lot more faith in us. Don't forget, most of us have always suffered due to the demons. So stop your BULLSHIT!" he shouted then head butted me.
"OW! Fine Arnold, calm down! It's just tha-"
"That what?" he gave me a look that said the next words out of my mouth might be my last. I inhaled deeply and relaxed myself.
"That nothing. I sorry for being such a jerk. I know I'm in the wrong. Now can you get off me?"
He slowly calmed down and nodded to my answer, but still sat on me.
"I can't,"
"What do you mean you, 'You can't?"
He looked embarrassed for some reason. With all the strength I'd used up, I wasn't going anywhere anytime soon, so all that was left was for him.
"Um..." he turned his head and began whistling.
"Arnold..." I warned.
" Ok, ok. I may have been pretending to be strong so no one would see me as a weakling. But in my defense, it's your fault. Guess I stretched my strength a little too far," he said then smiled. He started laughing and I joined him and we both laughed at our situation we were in. I had no idea how and why, but it felt right.
"What's all that noise about?" a calm voice asked. We slowly turned towards the voice at our door. The principal was standing there, carefully watching us.
When did she get there? I didn't hear the door open.
Mrs Kelly's eyes shined with feighted shock, "Oh, I see. Now I understand where all that screaming was coming from. Sorry for disturbing you boys. Carry on"
"Hold up, what do you mean by that?"
We both looked at the position we were stuck in and just realized now it would give the wrong message to any spectator. Arnold's face turned beetroot red and I could feel the heat rise from my cheecks too from the embarrassment.
"It's not like that!" We both said at the same time.
***
*Five minutes later*
***
After a lot of explaining and apologizing, Mrs Kelly helped the two of us to our beds. But before she left, I had to ask...
"I know no one can enter our room without the key, so..."
"Mandrax, please. I'm the principal. This is literally my school, so no door can hold me back," she replied.
"So um... how did you hear us? Did we reach all the way to your office?"
"Fortunately, no. I was just patrolling down the halls as all and I happened to stumble upon this one. Now get some rest, boys."
"But what about..."
Drowsiness washed over me and that was the last I saw of her.
***
"What happened last night?" I asked Arnold while yawning, as we walked down to the dining hall, the morning arriving much faster than anticicipated.
"Beats me. Hey, there are Blade and Kira. Lets join them."
We barely settled in our seats before Miss Kelly made her appearance to the podium. There were two generals present at the podium table and all class teachers. The other two generals must have gone to help the schools that were to be attacked.
Kelly raised her hand for silence and began the usual announcements.
Two more camps were taken down. And unlike ours, they weren't so lucky. The were no survivors from camp Uranus and Mercury and from what they investigated, Venus was next. I could see the anxiety everyone had but truth be told, there was nothing we could do but just hope for the best. But the school was ordered to continue with their normal activities. Now I'm not sure whether I helped too late or not.
"....Which brings me to my next announcement. All classes from the first form participated in the inter galactical excavation and I will now be announcing the class with the most beast essence gathered."
"But first, let me rate the second years. For first place, Two North take the lead with about one hundred thousand beast essence followed closely by two west at around fifty thousand. Third is East with thirty thousand and finally South with twenty thousand. Would the class representative of North please come up,"
A tall composed half-orc walked over and was handed a trophy which can later be exchanged for inter class points. From what I've heard, I guess this is a normal occurrence for North. I hope our class did a lot more better cause from what I remember, my group didn't even collect one.
"Time for the first years. Lets start with the first class. We may have a tie between class North and West with a large amount of fifty thousand points!" she declared. I had whispers from all around and I caught quite a few.
"I thought this would be an easy win for South seeing as they had an Adamantium warrior with them. Maybe Miss Ivory was right. He must have stolen the glory from one of the Northerns,"
"I knew this would be the outcome. Once a trash class, always a trash class,"
"You said it, Bro. I bet they didn't even collect one hundred essence."
Many of my classmates looked absolutely devastated and I couldn't blame them. They had such high hopes for me, and I failed to deliver. Before the principal could continue with the ranking though, Flintheart stoop up and went to Miss Kelly. After a brief word, he handed her a ring and returned to his seat.
Miss Kelly looked looked shocked after examining the ring for some time at first, but quickly returned her poker face.
"Sorry, everyone, for the interruption. Back to the ranks with a bit of change. The first position will be going to class South with an astonishing amount of One hundred and thirty thousand points!"
"WHAT?!" The whole hall erupted.