JACKIE:

“What a nightmare.”

The wind picked up embers from Beatrice’s fire portal and carried them to the village. Two houses were set ablaze, at least a dozen people injured, and one dead. Firestorm was right. His people were constantly under a new threat from Life Rite.

When Firestorm and I touched down in the center of their village, the villagers screamed. The sight of Firestorm spooked them. Those that could, ran. The injured were too exhausted to fight another battle. I dismounted his back and tried to explain that it was okay, but no one understood me.

Tinga ran toward us, swinging a mallet. I got a chill when I saw him, now leading the villagers as an elder. I saw a glimpse of his story and knew what happened to his son, but he didn’t know me.

“Jackie, duck!”

I dodged the mallet, but only just.

“Stop! We’re here to help!” I cried.

Tinga pulled his weapon back, ready to strike.

“What is this?” he shouted, waving at Firestorm.

“It’s Firestorm, I mean, Zayne. He’s here to help,” I explained.

Tinga looked into Firestorm’s eyes and turned pale. He dropped the mallet and examined the giant phoenix in front of him, searching for a glimmer of recognition.

“Zayne?” Tinga asked.

Firestorm nodded.

“We’re here to help,” I repeated.

Firestorm flapped his wings and flew over to the nearby burning houses. He wrapped his wings around one building and absorbed the flames into his body. The fire covered him and then quickly extinguished. His already scaly skin charred over. He moved to the next house and absorbed those flames, too. Everyone stared in disbelief as the majestic phoenix put out the fire before it spread.

Firestorm flew back to me and Tinga with smoke trailing from him. Tinga dropped to his knees, touched Firestorm’s talons, bowed his head, and prayed.

The other villagers bowed in prayer, too. After their moment of silence, they looked up with tired faces, many with bandages and burns. Even the children looked exhausted. A Bennu-skin blanket covered a dead body. The devastation was clear, even though the fire portal was half a mile away, near the complex.

“Why do you stay if you’re constantly beat down by Life Rite and my… my family?”

That felt weird to admit. It pained me to think of all the suffering inflicted on them by people related to me. I differed from my family, though. I wanted to heal instead of hurt. Ironically, that is what Life Rite products do. If only they weren’t made from the blood and tears of this village.

“The island is burning.” I restated the obvious.

Tinga looked at the smoke plume in the distance. He waved it off as if it was nothing.

“We don’t go to the complex. Evil lives there,” he replied.

“I know, but if we don’t stop the flames, they’ll spread. Your entire village could burn to the ground.”

Firestorm nodded in agreement.

Jappa, Zayne’s childhood friend who was now an adult, stepped forward. He hugged Firestorm, then spoke to Tinga in their native language.

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Jappa looked at me and said, “We protect the eggs.”

“Nothing will be safe if we don’t stop her,” I said with a shrug.

Tinga and Jappa nodded and barked instructions to the villagers. They broke into groups and grabbed as many pots as possible. They took a colossal amount of Bennu eggs and crushed them, then mixed in a salt-like compound. The villagers beat the ingredients together into a paste. I grabbed a pot and joined them.

We worked together silently, making a large quantity of the greenish-grey substance. I smiled at the children, who looked at me with curiosity. Although I was new there, I felt welcomed and safe. Unlike Grace, I felt like I belonged.

“Enough.” Once Tinga was satisfied with the amount of paste made, I followed the villagers to the gate. We spread the paste on the ground, creating a circle of protection around their community. Others left with pots to protect the various nests of Bennu eggs around the island.

It was an incredibly tedious task, back-breaking work, and I wanted to give up pretty quickly. My gunshot wound nagged at me, but I saw how hardworking the villagers were. They dedicated themselves to protecting the Bennu eggs, and they’d do anything to fulfill that duty. It was remarkably inspiring to see them work together harmoniously, and despite my fatigue, I kept at it for hours. It was the least I could do after divulging the information about the fire portals.

“They don’t deserve this, Firestorm.” I vowed to do anything in my power to protect the tribe and repair some of the damage they endured over the years; the kidnapping and mutation of their children, the massacre when they stormed the complex, and now the burning of their sacred lands.

When we finally finished our section of the protection circle, we rejoined Tinga and Jappa in the village, no doubt discussing the continued threat of fire portals on Bennu Island.

Jappa pointed at the blood on my shirt and asked, “I fix?”

I nodded and lifted my shirt. My gunshot wound was bleeding again from all the manual labor. Jappa wiped a salve on the wound, presumably made from Bennu eggs as well. I felt instant relief.

Next, he grabbed some bandages and patched me up gently. I looked at the light wrinkles around his eyes as he worked on me, wondering what Zayne would have looked like now if he hadn’t turned into Firestorm.

Firestorm turned to me and said, “Heal yourself, Jackie. Trust in your ability.”

“I’m not special.”

“Come. Pay respects to Nannu.”

Firestorm and I visited a tree. A beautiful necklace of a Merkaba symbol made from Bennu teeth hung from a branch. The one Nannu wore around her neck.

“Our ancestors show us the way. It’s time for Beatrice to pay for her sins.”

“I’m ready to avenge our people.”

Revenge felt like enough of a plan, and without much discussion, Firestorm and I went to go make things right. I wasn’t sure what that meant yet, but thinking ahead isn’t exactly my strong suit.

As the sun set, Firestorm and I flew over the scorched lands of Bennu Island to confront Beatrice. We sailed over the volcano and landed on the balcony overlooking it. The same balcony where Grace and Zayne stood up to Beatrice and Mark all those years ago.

My mother was much more confident than me. After seeing the mutation photographs and meeting the villagers in-person, I had the conviction to confront Beatrice, but did I have the same courage Grace did? It was time to find out.

“Beatrice, you’ve gone too far!”

She didn’t respond, in a trance on the balcony overlooking the fiery lands she set ablaze. Her eyes rolled back into her head, and her eyelids danced between open and closed.

“Firestorm, how deep is she in the slipstream? What does she do in there?”

“What probabilities has she explored and what is she searching for? We can’t know unless we ride her streams.”

“Okay…”

Beatrice elegantly opened her eyes after I jumped off Firestorm’s back clumsily. She could clearly control going in and out of the slipstream better than me. She made a formidable enemy, to say the least.

“Welcome to Bennu Island.” Beatrice smiled. “I’m glad you’re here in the flesh, Jackie.”

I sighed. “Look what you’ve done to this place.”

“Isn’t it glorious? Have you seen the castle my love erected in my honor?”

Beatrice pointed at the tower, now complete.

“He brought over the bricks from our wedding chapel from Scottland and painstakingly reconstructed it.”

The tower looked important, but I refused to give her any satisfaction. “Don’t you mean the villagers painstakingly reconstructed it?”

Beatrice crossed her arms. “Under Mark’s watchful eye, yes.”

I shrugged. “Eh, I’ve seen better. Be careful. If you keep starting fires, it might burn down.”

“My slipstream vision has never been stronger. How can I repay you for such valuable information about fire portals?” Beatrice asked genuinely.

I wanted to name a price and walk away from all this with a huge payday. Forget all that happened and go live like a princess instead of a janitor.

As if reading my mind, Beatrice doubled down. “Join me, Jackie. Help me run the family business. Take your place as rightful heir.”

Her offer shocked me. Connected to both the Claudi family and the villagers, could I make more of an impact if I joined forces with the dark side?