Daniel

10:45 AM

After locating Kenta’s position with his second sight, Daniel had to ask, “What, exactly, just happened?”

:Took you long enough.: Kenta didn’t seem to have heard him, :I can’t help but notice we were waiting on Rana.:

Lea came through next, :As I said, bothering them while they are working is not productive—it will slow them further. The way things stand, we can expect a prompt rescue from our prisons with ample room to escape from this facility.:

:The sooner I’m freed, the sooner escape becomes trivial. That’s all I have to say.:

“The first wave of soldiers will be within firing range in twenty seconds,” Cassandra announced, pointing with her ears to indicate the incoming direction. They didn’t have time for distractions.

Daniel blew open a hole in the appropriate wall and the four of them walked through the tunnel into the next corridor. In his animate-object form, Paul was freer to explain than the rest of them, :Rana and I connected our minds so she could use my abilities. As for Cassie, she says her kind doesn’t produce enough natural energy to stay healthy regardless of diet. Her vitality needs regular supplements and fresh blood is the best source we know.:

He found himself interested in what Paul said and considered the implications for his nature—his mind returning to the question of their origin, What did he mean, ‘her kind?’

:Rana was right about you not remembering everything, huh?: Paul sent, :We’ll have to talk later.:

Daniel startled. Rana had told Paul but not everyone. Can he read my mind, or did I just communicate telepathically on accident?

:I see it’s also the first time you’ve sent anything in a while. Congrats on remembering how. We can maintain this private channel as long as we’re in sight of each other. Any farther and you’ll need a Rosetta Stone.:

He decided to keep a better leash on his thoughts in the future but, if they had privacy and a second to ‘talk,’ something bothered Daniel he wanted to get out, :If Cassie knew Rana was on her way and could help, why did she panic when we got there?:

Paul paused before replying, :You should ask Rana. She explains it better. The way I see it, when she uses her Camouflage, people tend to forget her.:

A thought occurred to Daniel, When I met Paul, I should’ve asked whether Rana had succeeded in her mission. It hadn’t occurred to him to ask—like it wasn’t important—despite it being critical.

:And we remember everything when she stops it. You know how magic is.:

Magic? There were no esoteric words or scrolls or potions involved. It couldn’t be magic.

:Please don’t spin me that way, Rana, I get dizzy—: Rana twirled the candlestick through the fingers of her left hand like a baton, the Paul flame spinning in a circle, :—I think I’m going to be sick.: She pointed the business end of the candlestick at the opening behind them. Liquid wax pooled on the ground, gathered, grew, and formed a barrier that solidified as it cooled. With a few seconds of effort, Rana made a wax wall.

Cassie continued her predictions from over Rana’s shoulder, “Ten seconds until the second wave of soldiers come through this hall.”

Right, Daniel thought as he turned to make another tunnel. They’re depending on me for a way through or we’ll have to fight who knows how many soldiers. As he disintegrated feet of concrete into clouds of dust, Rana shot a line of slick slime towards the corner the soldiers would come around. Then she sealed the new tunnel’s entrance behind them with wax like the cap on a honeycomb. Random bursts of automatic rifle fire percussed from the hall they’d left as the unlucky soldiers found the slippery trap. Daniel looked over his shoulder and found Rana’s eyes.

She shrugged and said, “They should have kept their guns on safety…”

Daniel chuckled and broke through into the next hallway. The lights went out.

He’d never been in a cave, or he couldn’t remember if he had, but the sudden darkness felt like the bowels of a mountain miles beneath the sun-soaked grass. A cold wind from ventilation made him shiver and pull his robes tight. He saw the others’ auras with his second sight, but he’d smack his nose into the next wall if his eyes didn’t adjust. The effect disoriented his next woozy steps.

:At least they can’t see us either: Paul sent to the group.

Cassandra told them, “No, they have night-vision goggles—we’re in trouble.” Although, it was shortly to be not so much trouble.

With a sweep of Paul the candlestick, Rana grew a row of candles on the ground that lit themselves as they sprouted and bathed the group in warm waves of light. Back on track, the four crossed the hall and Daniel continued tunneling. Wax cracked beneath brutal blows behind them.

Rana turned and spewed sticky slime from her hand. She slathered the wax wall to bind the fissures. As they made their way into a new tunnel she slick-slimed the floor and raised another wall, keeping a constant trail of lit candles ahead.

At the next wall, Cassie said, “Hold on, Daniel, soldiers ahead. Rana, you take right.” On their signal, Daniel blew open a path and Rana tumbled forward without dislodging either Cassie or Paul. Through the roll, Rana pumped her arm to rapid-blast the men on the right with sticky-slime from her palm. Meanwhile, Cassie inhaled deeply and gathered energy within herself, charging it until her aura shone brighter. At the end of the roll, Cassie released the charge as an animalistic burst of sound and power expelled in a silvery ring of aura from her mouth to fill the hallway.

Daniel entered the hall and saw a half dozen immobilized men on his right. To his left, another half dozen scrambled on the floor unable to find their feet. What kind of ability is that? The soldiers seem confused, not hurt. They pressed on before either set of guards recovered.

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Their group emerged into a corridor, Rana trapping and walling their rear, leading straight to the next containment unit. With Daniel’s reserves dwindling and his migraine returning, the finish line couldn’t come too soon.

“Stop! On the ground ahead,” Cassie gestured with a leg-hand and Rana illuminated the area with candles. A line of metal rails embedded in the concrete ran perpendicular to the corridor around the walls, floor, and ceiling. “Lightning in the walls,” she repeated the odd prediction she’d made in her chamber.

“A shock trap,” Daniel said as he considered rusting them away. He worried whether destroying something which wasn’t a strictly physical barrier would ‘count’ for his recharge. The others sensed his reluctance.

:Save your strength, Daniel.: Rana approached the obstacle, “We’ll fry if we touch them. Best go over.” Together, she and Paul raised a bridge of wax from a pale pool. It had to span twenty feet of the corridor without touching the ground and be thick enough to walk on without collapsing. Rana grew the other side to meet the two in the middle, but Paul’s power weakened with distance and the opposite side took longer to construct.

“They’re breaking through the walls behind us…” Cassie reported. Rana waved Paul the candlestick at the brittle bridge, patching cracks with new wax. “…Thirty seconds.” The finished bridge looked fragile as the icing arches on a wedding cake.

“You go first,” Rana told him.

Daniel briefly considered objecting before he turned to see her building another wall behind them. He stepped onto the bridge and realized how badly his feet cracked and aged the wax beneath them.

“Trust me,” she said as he hesitated.

“…Twenty-five,” came Cassie’s voice from behind him.

What happens if I fall?

He threw a tiny bit of power at the first electrified rail, rusting it to pieces. Nothing. The first rail could be a part of the whole barrier, his ability might have decided not to ‘count’ the electric rail as a barrier, or the fact he stood on a perfectly good bridge might disqualify the railings’ ‘barrier’ status. He looked at the rest of the twenty feet in dismay, mind incrementally hazier after wasting his energy.

It looked like he’d have to trust Paul’s ability and Rana’s craftsmanship. Daniel marched, sweating as his steps dissolved behind him and his weight sent spiderwebs of micro-cracks throughout the structure. Moving faster put more force on each step and shook the bridge but moving slower let his steps eat through the wax and promised to plummet him onto the rails.

Cassie again, “They’ve broken through the other wax walls. They’ll be here in ten seconds.”

Daniel reached the top of the arch and, as he began his descent, the bridge fractured. His heart stopped.

He ran, puffing hard, and jumped the last few feet as the bridge shattered. Daniel landed rough, falling at the foot of the bridge’s far side. Looking up, his three friends eyed the twenty feet of electrified wires and broken wax separating them.

“They’re here!”

“No!” Daniel shouted. He swallowed dismay and regret, “What have I done?”

With a single step to build speed, Rana leaped with Cassie on her back and Paul in hand. Though Cassie shut her wings tight to not touch the walls, they billowed against Rana as the three of them soared between the electrified floor and ceiling.

“Wow,” Daniel gaped as Rana landed on her feet and slid to a gradual halt beside him. She’d cleared the trap with practically no effort. She’d made the bridge for the person she couldn’t carry across. Him.

Cassie shrieked, “Get down!” an instant before it happened. Rana spun, shielding Cassie with her body as the bat girl dropped off her back and the wax wall exploded in a blizzard of shrapnel. Splinters of wax brushed Daniel but poofed into dust on contact—although some chunks hit him like dizzying slaps.

He pushed himself to his feet in the aftermath. Rana and Paul made another wall behind them while she tended to herself. She’d been hit by a dagger-sized piece of jagged wax and bled from a dozen lesser wounds. Her eye twitched when she yanked the large fragment from her arm, small cuts closing automatically as her body’s healing ejected tiny slivers. Daniel noted with interest her torn clothes self-repaired.

Paul the candlestick watched the others with concern, himself unharmed. Unlike him, Cassie’s delicate skin had been lacerated with shrapnel. Worse, her wings bled from tiny pinholes. Unlike Rana, she didn’t regenerate.

“Help, please,” Cassie sucked her teeth and panted with watery eyes, “I can’t fly like this. I need the coin.” Rana nodded and regurgitated a small metallic coin, then wiped off the slime.

The frog girl knelt holding the coin as it emanated tendrils of pulsing aura. :Raphael’s Token,: Paul explained, :Speeds up natural healing but doesn’t increase vitality or refresh your mind. In fact, it takes a lot of effort to use.: Daniel felt what Paul meant. His muscles and bruises were less sore after seconds of exposure, but the Token didn’t touch his headache.

Healing the bat girl threw a wet blanket of weariness over Rana’s sagging shoulders no stolid expression could hide. How much magic does she have left? After swallowing the coin, Rana helped Cassie climb onto her back.

Though hardly safe, none of them were eager to continue. Anxiety crept into Cassie’s face. Her eyes and ears twisted about as if expecting the Facility to collapse on them any second. Paul’s candle flame dimmed, face grim.

Something else concerned Daniel. His recharges had diminishing returns. Since The Ruin left him, refreshing his power didn’t reset Daniel to 100%… and lower each time. Daniel couldn’t keep doing this forever. On the other hand, the insights from his Possession and the life-or-death pressure gradually improved his technique and efficiency. Yet skill alone couldn’t compensate for mounting bone-deep weariness. His eyelids drooped at every second’s pause, and he wanted to lie down and sleep for a week.

“We’re almost there!” he said for his benefit as much, if not more, than theirs as they ran for Kenta’s containment unit.

It seemed Cassie’s voice always came with bad news, “Faster, Daniel! Run faster or the soldiers get there first!” They approached a ‘T’ at the end of the hall with enemies headed for the intersection as well. Daniel and Rana put on another burst of speed, him trailing behind as fast as his bony legs could carry him.

The four of them arrived first and Daniel set to rusting the big metal door. The teeth-grinding squeal of scraping metal came from inside the chamber. :Finally! Get me out of here!: Kenta sent.

:I’m so tired.: Paul sent, :I don’t think I can do two more walls.: The trail of candles had dwindled to nothing; their dim source of light came from the waning flame of Paul’s face.

Rana simply stood there without barricading their position. Her arm prepared to shoot a glob of sticky slime at the first soldier who rounded the corner, but she didn’t have spare slime to slick the ground.

“I can Noise Blast the west side,” Cassie said.

“I’ll hold off the east,” Rana replied.

“They’re coming up behind us with shock-resistant boots over the electrified railing. Eight seconds,” Cassie counted.

They were telling him to hurry the heck up like his life depended on it in the nicest way possible. Given the circumstances, he could use a little congeniality.

:Let me out and I’ll take them all on!:

“Seven…”

Daniel resorted to scraping with his temporarily strengthened fingers. This metal door was especially thick.

:Five…: Cassie switched to telepathy and charged her Noise Blast.

No time to make a proper opening, but maybe he didn’t have to. If Daniel broke through, even a pinhole, it might ‘count’ enough for a recharge.

:Four… Three…:

After this, everything depended on Kenta.

:Two… One…:

Daniel suppressed his anticipation of pain and thrust his index finger at the weakest point in the metal with all his strength and remaining power. Instead of snapping the delicate bones like dry twigs, his finger jab penetrated steel. Pain from overextending his ability stabbed his head like an icepick to the temple instead of his hand. He staggered back, inadvertently withdrawing his finger from the door.

He glimpsed the glint of candlelight on gun barrels turning the corner as dust spilled from the hole.

Delicious relief trickled in slow, leaking from the hole in the door. Daniel turned to face the threat with what little energy he’d gathered.

:Yes!: