Short Story 4

Warning: This is a long part.

“They’ve been asleep for ages. Why did you hit them so hard?” “I had to, otherwise it would have been a lot harder to get them here.” I groan and roll my head find that I am in a dark room, with the fire as the only source of light. Two men are standing near the fire. “Ah, well at least one of them is awake,” says the first man. The room is very large and mostly empty except for a table and chairs in the middle of the room. As I move towards the man that spoke, I’m yanked back. I look down and I see that chains are tied to my ankles and hands, connected to the wall. I walk back to the wall and I feel bumps where my nunchucks are safely stowed on my back. I grimace in pain as they push into my skin; whatever hit me, hit me hard. I hear clinking of chains from the other side of the room and as my eyes focus, I see Sparky chained like me to the opposite wall. She doesn’t say anything, just gives her death stare. “Good, hopefully they’ll all wake up now,” said the second man. “You son of a bitch,” said Max, and I realise that they didn’t take our mikes out. I smile to myself as the first man walks over to Max and slaps him in the face. Max grunts as a dark trickle runs down his cheek. “You’ll take that back son, or your time here will be most unpleasant,” the man growled. Max says nothing and just glares at him. Aine’s voice cuts the silence. “What do you want with us?” We all know that this is a stupid question but it gives them a reason to talk. The second man laughs and I noticed he had a very low voice, giving him a menacing tone. “Well, in case you didn’t notice, you broke into our house earlier,” “And nearly stole some of our belongings,” adds the first man. “Who are you?” asks Flame. “Oh no. That’s not how things work here, we ask the questions and you give the answers,” said Low-Voice. “But maybe later,” said man one. “Yes, we’ll give you some time to settle in.” They walk towards the door, which opens and then closes softly behind them.

“Does anyone have weapons?” comes Flame in my ear. “I’ve got my nunchucks,” I say. “They’ve done something to my cuffs,” says sparky, frustrated. “I can’t generate electricity.” “And I can’t make fire,” says Max. “I can’t run,” I say. “Ok, Alex. Get your nunchucks, make them swords and cut your chains. Then do Max’s,” orders Flame, speaking quickly. I get my nunchucks make them into diamond swords and I cut my chains. Immediately, feeling rushes into me and I feel whole again, like something was missing from me earlier and I didn’t notice. I race to Max and as I slash his chains to ribbons, his arms flare into flame and he breathes in deeply. I run to Flame and do the same, then Aine and then Sparky. As I cut her chains, her whole body crackles and sparks. We remove the remains of our cuffs as we hurry towards the doors. Sparky and I are on one side, Max and Flame on the other. Aine is in the middle of us at the handle. She slowly turns it and opens the door just a crack. She peers out as we all fear the worst. “All clear,” she breathes, so quiet I can barely hear her. We all creep out and Aine shuts the door behind us. “Everyone grab hold of me,” says Max. We shuffle around until we all have a firm grip on Max. I feel a small ripple that goes from my hand and flows down my body. The ripple make me shudder and I close my eyes, this happens every time. After a moment or two, Max says, “Ok, we’ve got 30 mins until it runs out.” I open my eyes and from my point of view it’s as if nothing’s changed.

We’re in a long corridor, and every little sound that we make echoes and bounces off the concrete. “This way,” says Flame. “I saw them turn towards the right.” We walk down the corridor, and we hear a door opening in the distance. None of us react, we just keep on walking. Three men are walking towards us, talking and in black clothes, they look like guards. We split and they walk between us, taking no notice that they just passed their prisoners. Max’s talents are very unique and I was surprised that they were able to catch him. As well as being able to light himself on fire, he also has invisibility powers, which he can pass on to others for a short amount of time. But passing his invisibility even to one person drains his energy. I look across to him, and I can see that he’s trying to look tough and that nothing is wrong, but I can tell that he’s really trying to keep up with us. As the guards pass out of sight, and the sound of their stomping boots fades away, Aine whispers, “They’re going to find that we’re gone so we’d better get moving.” We all start walking at a faster pace and Max struggles to keep up, his tiredness showing on his face. As we reach the door at the end of the corridor, we hear a shout and then a door open, and someone screams, “They’re gone!” “Ok, now we should run,” says Sparky. I open the door and we race out, Max closing it behind him.

Before us is a stair case made out of grand chocolate wood with a matching handrail. We race up it and wait at the door. The sound of footsteps is absent, even from behind us. Flame opens the door and indicates for us to follow. I shut the door behind us and turn to face the room in front of us. The room is huge, with every weapon imaginable, from swords to guns and bow and arrow to grenades. Torches burn from the walls which give the weapons a threatening look. Flame grins and runs to a pile of weapons which are lying in a corner. As the rest of us follow, we recognise all of our weapons except for mine, which are still on my back. Belts are strapped and swords are slid into their sheaths as the door on the opposite side of the room bursts open and five guards swarm in.