“So, do you think you’ll really be able to trace Lara’s core?” Alexis asked.

Parker shrugged his shoulders slightly. “I mean, I think so. I’m just afraid of holding it for too long and accidentally teleporting to her. After it happening last time I feel like she’s either gonna be ready for it to be happening again, or trying to find a way to do it herself. From the sounds of it when I was there for that brief moment, she doesn’t know how to trace my core anymore.”

“Doesn’t that mean we’re safe from her?”

“Wait a minute,” Caleb interjected. “Didn’t she already find us once?”

“Caleb’s right,” Master Sora said. “She was able to already find us, so I wouldn’t count on her not being able to sense our cores.”

Parker sighed. “Well, if she can, she can’t do it well. I know that.”

The others looked back and forth at each other, not sure if they should completely believe Parker. He didn’t care though, he knew he was right, they didn’t see her face.

“So what now?” Alexis asked.

Master Sora stood up from where he was sitting. “Now, we figure out how to use this in order to track down Lara’s location. It’s to the four of us to stop her.”

The three of them stared at the master confused. “Four of us?” Caleb asked. “What about everyone else we’ve traveled with? They’d be great help!”

“I can’t do it...” Master Sora said, dropping his head. “I can’t put anyone else at risk...”

“But it’s okay for us to be at risk?” Caleb asked, frustrated.

“You’ve proven yourselves time and time again. The others haven’t had to deal with what you have.”

“We’ve mostly succeeded because of luck though!” Alexis shouted.

“Luck is when something happens once.” Everyone stared at the master knowing he was right, but the nerves and anxiety of the situation forced them to doubt themselves.

-----

Before leaving the castle, Alexis and Caleb grabbed a variety of items that were Hailee’s that might help in tracking Lara down, but they didn’t risk Parker touching anymore of them.

When they arrived at the base of the mountain, Parker leaned against the “Caution: Falling Rocks” sign. Caleb laughed, remembering their first trip down and how they didn’t know how true that sign was. Now, there was nothing remotely in sight.

“I can’t believe Lara even got rid of all the animals and creatures,” Parker said.

“We don’t know what happened yet,” Master Sora corrected. “And she didn’t get rid of all of them. It just seems like she’s gotten rid of most of the bigger creatures. But we’ve come across normal animals like cats, dogs, and remember that bear we saw in the first few months of our travel?”

“I suppose so, but I’m still putting my money on the fact we’re still on Earth 1 and that Earth 2 doesn’t even exist. I can feel it in my gut.” Parker said.

“Let’s keep moving,” Master Sora suggested.

“But we don’t even know where to go,” Caleb complained. “So how are we supposed to move in the right direction? If we go east, but she’s west then we’d have to completely backtrack. Parker needs to touch the necklace again and see if he can sense her.”

Everyone went quiet and looked at Parker. His heart started to race, pressure growing in his chest. “What?” he asked.

“I don’t like it,” the master stated. “It’s too risky.”

“Then how do we know where to go?” Alexis asked.

“One hundred percent sure? We can’t know. But my gut tells me she’s somewhere east of here. Heck, probability says she has to be somewhere east of here considering there’s really not a whole lot to the west of the school.”

“I can do it,” Parker said confidently. “Let me see the necklace.”

“Parker... I don’t think you should...” the master warned.

Alexis held out the necklace in her palm. The locket sat in the center and the chain dangled over the edge of her hand. “You’re sure you’ll be okay?”

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Parker nodded and slowly reached his hand forward. His chest was pounding and his mind raced. He grabbed the necklace and held it for a moment. Immediately he could sense Lara’s core. It was crystal clear, just like it had been before. Why he had to be holding this for it to work, he didn’t know but at least he felt like himself again.

“Anything?” Alexis asked. “Can you sense her?”

Parker nodded again, this time with a grin. “I can feel it perfe—”

-----

He stood in the same room he’d been in before, staring at Lara once more. It seemed like the same people were sitting around her again. This time though, Parker set the locket down on the desk in front of him hoping he wouldn’t teleport right back this time. He had questions that he was going to get answers to.

“Parker, how are you doing this?”

Parker looked at her confused. “You mean, you don’t know how to sense me anymore?”

Everyone sitting around the table looked as confused as Parker had been when his parents dropped him off at the abandoned subway station all those years ago. “Sensing you isn’t the problem child. Teleporting to you is.”

“So, you can sense my core?”

“Did I not just say that?” Lara spat out. “Did I stutter? Your core isn’t the problem. Others are a different story.” She noticed the locket on the desk. “Where did you get that?” She flew across the room and snatched the locket up. “Where did you get it?!”

“I... Alexis gave it to me...”

“Where did she get it?! It’s not hers!”

“You gave that to Hailee, didn’t you?”

“I...” Lara trailed off.

“Ma’am are you okay?” one of the men sitting at the table asked.

“I’m fine...”

The room fell silent for several moments as Lara stared at the locket. Parker didn’t know what to say and he’d lost the locket. He had absolutely no clue how he was going to teleport back to the others.

“How are you doing it Parker? The teleporting. How?” Lara asked him the questions without taking her eyes off the locket.

Parker stared at her wide-eyed. “I don’t really know...” He didn’t like saying the answer, but it was the truth. “I just picked up the locket and could sense your core. Then, the next moment, I’m right here. I didn’t actually try to teleport.”

Lara glared at him for a minute. “You confuse me child.”

“I confuse you?! You said you can’t teleport, yet somehow you still invaded the camp I was at and released hostages we had.” Saying it out loud, he realized quickly how bad that made them sound. The guy had been a bad guy, but still, having “hostages” didn’t sound very good on their part.

Lara sneered at Parker with a look that said Parker had to have been getting dumber as the years went on. He didn’t understand why he was receiving the look from her, but it made his heart race nonetheless.

“It took me days to catch up to my men. Honestly, I didn’t even know that you were there until I returned here with my men. They told me about some kid that questioned them and then described you.”

“You didn’t know I was there?! How not?! You said you could sense my core!”

“Just because I said I could sense your core doesn’t mean I’m searching for it twenty-four seven. I have other things to worry about now. A kid who can’t even teleport on purpose is the least of my worries.”

Parker felt a little hurt, he wasn’t sure why, but the feeling was still there. However, the look on her face said that he wasn’t the least of her worries, no matter how much she wanted him to think that.

“What are you trying to actually do?”

Lara laughed. “Trying to do? There’s no trying child.”

“Fine. What are you doing then?”

“I’m leading one of the largest, if not the largest, group of Imperials left in the world. My people are everywhere that matters and keeping control of everything that happens there.”

“I mean, you can’t be that large. We’ve been traveling for what now, almost three years? We didn’t run into any of your people until recently.” Parker was doing what he could to not start laughing. He didn’t know why, but he wasn’t afraid of being a smartass to Lara. Even though it sounded like she was becoming a new-age dictator.

“What did I say? My people are everywhere that matters. As we grow larger, we will consume the places that are insignificant and either station people there or simply burn it to the ground so there’s no reason to ever go there.”

“What’s your deal?” Parker spat out.

“My deal?!” Lara exploded. “My deal?! My deal is you little shits got my daughter killed!”

The tension in the room shot through the roof. Everyone around the table was dead silent. Apparently, any mention of Hailee was taboo from the looks on their faces.

“We didn’t get her killed! You know it wasn’t us! We did everything we could to protect her!” Parker could feel himself getting so worked up that he almost started crying. He’d grieved a little after everything had happened. But with the new world thing and trying to help keep others calm, he didn’t have the proper time or environment to grieve properly.

“You let Warwick get to her. We made a deal! If I hadn’t listened to you, Warwick would be dead, not Hailee!”

Parker was standing with his hands pressed against the table and was leaning forward at this point. “You couldn’t kill him if you wanted to. You never could. That’s why you forced us into all that crap. You couldn’t handle him, so you brought kids in do to your dirty work.”

It was obvious now that the people sitting around the table were starting to wonder if everything, he was saying was true. Was their leader really unable to defeat someone and then asked children for help?

“And, at least I didn’t bring the one person I hated the most here.”

Lara’s eyes shot open wide. “What do you mean?”

Parker blinked several times. “You mean, you don’t know?”

“You—”

“Warwick Terra is here. On Earth 2 with the rest of us.”