Where You Belong - Chapter 3

Chapter 3


Author's note: Although finished form first page to last, this story is still in the editing phase, so please bear with me. Many things are still liable to change. Which makes your input that much more important :) Enjoy!

No explanations were needed this time. Xan knew he conjured the lizard and Julia knew only too well what such a sign meant.

They sat there in silence for a while, confused by all the rapid changes in their lives when they were called by a guard to come immediately to the guest-room. They had no idea for what reason since they both never had any visitors, and why would they call them in together? Nobody except the members of the gang knew about their growing relationship.

A tall man dressed in completely black robes except for seven golden emblems on the back stood in the guest-room talking to the guards. He turned towards them immediately when they entered, then told the guard to leave them alone and not to record the conversation. There was authority in his voice and it carried a strong British accent.

‘This is a very important day for mankind. It has been more than a thousand years before the last ‘Prophecy’ occurred.’ He looked at the two, who were more than surprised. He growled.

‘It seems that you are unaware of the prophecy,’ he snorted, ‘your parents are a disgrace to the order. You should have been informed early in your childhood that you were ‘potentials’.’
Seeing the confused look on their faces he began to explain.

‘During times of great unrest in the world a great evil will be born. It will try to consume the world by praying upon its evils. The balance will be broken and the world left in ruin. But for every generation of this occurrence a group of ‘gifted’ children are born. Their destiny is to seek out the others and defeat the ‘evil’. You are two of them.’

At that both Xan and Julia opened their mouths to protest, but a raised hand by the man suddenly silenced them. Their mouths opened but no words came out.

‘You will remain silent until I finish talking!’ his thunderous voice echoed through the room and, with a threatening gesture, he continued, “I am sure you have seen the news, the increase in natural disasters around the world, and the mystery deaths engulfing our planet. These are not crimes committed by an organized group of mass murderers as the authorities say. They are signs. Signs that the ‘evil’ has come. Our council has worked twice as hard these days to keep the public or police from digging too deep. These are supernatural forces, and not something modern weapons can deal with. The realization of that would cause mass hysteria. The government can do nothing. It is up to you.’

Again the two tried to protest, but the man motioned with his hand again. Xan was flung across the room towards him, his shirt torn and the mark revealed. He remained suspended in the air. Suddenly Julia fell to her knees, trying to reach some spider- like creature boring into her body. She screamed in pain and Xan struggled with the telekinetic hold the man had over him. He closed his eyes and concentrated. A green light flashed and a cat appeared. It sunk its teeth into the man’s leg and his mental hold on Xan faltered. Xan ran to Julia, now lying on the floor, crying.

‘It’s inside me, I-It’s i-inside m-me…’ she moaned.

Xan pulled her shirt up and saw a scarred mark similar to his on her back. It was a moon crest with a staff running through the center. Xan comforted her until the crying was reduced to muffled sobs. He held her tightly, swiped her tears and kissed her on the temple.

‘You’ll be alright, I promise…’

‘Enough! You are the last hope of the world, not petty little weaklings. You,’ he pointed at Julia, ‘have the power to heal the most grave of injuries. And you,’ he looked at Xan, ‘you can call forth beings from planes unknown to mankind. Your little trick with the cat is nothing compared to the daemons you can summon when your power advances.’

This was all too fast, but Xan had Julia for comfort, and she had him.

‘It is your destiny. You cannot avoid it. It will follow you wherever you go. And if you fail… then all hope will fail with you. I cannot force you into fulfilling your destiny, and my colleagues and I can only point you in the right direction. Right now, you must find the others… Our Council has been searching for them for years unsuccessfully. But our sources tell us one ‘chosen’, the Paladin, has been sighted recently in England. It is there that you must go. Search out the Council there and find him.’

‘Even if we believe you, how are we supposed to get out of here? And if we do escape, won’t we have the police on our tails?’ Xan protested.

‘You are the chosen, you will find a way. It would be much too large a risk for exposure if we moderated your escape.’ The man concluded and disappeared.

The guard returned.

‘What are you doing in here? No guests have been announced for today, and definitely not for the two of you!’ he growled and pushed them out.

Xan would have thought it was all a dream if he hadn’t seen the look on Julia’s face. It was real.

The telekinesis, the silence spell, the disappearance and the guard: none could be explained in the real world. At first Xan and Julia tried to forget everything he told them. Tried to forget he ever even visited them, but they couldn’t. Somehow everything he said made sense. As unbelievable as what he had said was, they both felt like they had always known.

Watching the news whenever allowed, they saw the situation change for the worse day by day. The authorities, of course, always had logical reasons for all of the occurrences, but the two knew better. They began to believe the prophecy, began to believe that it had to be done.

Although still skeptical of their own abilities they decided they had to get out. Find the answers.

But before they could even start thinking up a plan their problem of escaping prison solved itself. It was that night, a week after the mystery man appeared, that the whole world changed.

Watching the news that night the whole prison stared in shock at the footage from Japan. All electronic devices inexplicably went haywire, until they all burnt their circuits. Gradually all the cameras went dead and footage from other countries followed. Xan and Julia sat frozen in their seats. Everything the man said was true.
And while the anchor said something about electromagnetic pulse outburst, he was suddenly silenced as the lights went out. Guards tried emphatically to stop the chaos that had begun. Without lights, technology, electronics or any communication systems the guards were hopeless. Amidst the crowd Xan and Julia escaped into the Jungle that had once been San Francisco.

All order had been decimated. Much like in the prison, all around the world, the authorities were helpless. Word spread that the American government fired electromagnetic missiles to cripple the command ability of its opponents, but the plan was an absolute failure.

Xan and Julia both knew otherwise. It was the doing of this ‘evil’ that the man described.
They were out of prison and it was highly unlikely that anybody would even be interested in looking for them at a time like this.

There was no time to pack, so getting supplies was the most urgent task at hand. Two days ago, they may have had to run from the police and try to hide from their pursuers, but today they could walk freely in the streets of San Francisco. Clearly, people were far too busy with their own problems to pay them any attention. They stopped and sat down in a dark alleyway. After spending most of the last few occurrences in silence, Xan began to speak.

‘We’re out,’ still hardly able to believe what was happening, ‘today nobody cares that we just escaped from prison, but who knows what will happen tomorrow. I think we better grab some new clothes or something…’

He looked at Julia who was staring at him confused. It never occurred to Xan that he was just asking her to steal something and that was something she had never done before.

‘Um, I-I c-can’t…’ Julia stuttered.

‘Why?’ he asked, still confused, ‘we can’t be walking around in these clothes, eventually order will be restored and they’ll start looking for us.’

‘C-Can’t w-we just ask s-s-s-someone?’
Immediately, Xan realized what the problem was.

‘Look, I’m not a thief or anything and I’m definitely not doing this for fun. I just lived on the street for a couple of years and I know that we have to do this. It’s the only way, I wouldn’t ask you to do such thing if it wasn’t.’
Julia succumbed to his pleading and hesitantly rose to her feet.

‘A-And a-after that?’ she asked.

Xan would have wanted nothing more than to just forget everything and run. Run away with Julia and forget everything, but the new evidence was undeniable. If they really were the ‘chosen’ then they really had no other choice.

‘Somehow we have to get to England. I doubt the regular transport will be running in the next few days. But first things first: the clothes and supplies.’

‘I hope she understands how much I hate to do this, but we can’t run around just waiting to get caught or simply starve.’

Xan got up and smiled encouragingly at Julia.

‘I’ll go get something for us to wear. It’ll be safer if you stay here, in case they do make a search.’ Xan stopped when he saw the fear in those blue pools he came to love more than anything else. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll be back in no time.’

‘P-Please, don’t go…’ Julia mumbled and pulled on his arm like a little girl.

‘She’s really been through a lot and being alone in an alley like this is probably a nightmare for her. I can’t leave her like this’

‘Ok,’ Xan said and linked his hand in hers, ‘lets go!’