Rob, his wife and daughter.
I rushed over to them dropping to my knees. It would be a miracle if they were alive at all, the amount of blood on them and pooling under them made me fear the worst.
I reached over placing my fingers against Becca’s neck, jerking away as she groaned and moved slightly.
My heart was pounding; I shifted toward Rob and Trish reaching out to Trish first finding a faint pulse. I touched Rob, he was cold… I jumped back so fast I slammed myself into the wall behind me. Tears silently rolled down my face, tearing a dimensional rip next to Trish and Becca, I pulled them through the portal, along with Rob’s lifeless body, not willing to let leave him behind even if he was dead.
I held onto them all as tightly as I could, straining my muscles to hold them as went through the rabbit hole of my creation, dumping us unceremoniously into the dirt. I looked around as people began to scream, tears silently crawling from my eyes.
Some people began running away, some toward us, most people were trying to hush those who had begun to scream scared the Militia would hear us even though we were maybe a hundred miles away by now, which didn’t mean anything if my sister guessed our general area right. She could transport an entire battalion in one shot.
“Help me please,” I begged the people standing around me. “They’re dying, please,” I cried becoming hysterical.
They just stood there as I tried to assess where the bleeding was coming from. “Help me! Why are you just standing there?” I screamed at them.
“They can’t help if you don’t release them.” I looked at the woman who spoke; she was a tall tropical looking blonde who stood next to tall tan woman with chestnut hair.
I looked over at the six people who stood around me seeing their faces now as if for the first time since I dumped us out of the portal, I could see them struggling, trying to break free.
I didn’t know I could do this…and wondered what else I could do. I calmed myself, taking deep breaths, searching within myself for the proverbial on/off switch.
Six people, who stood around me, fell to their knees and those who could back away did so as if I were a mutant monster ready and willing to drink their blood.
I turned my head away not wanting to look at the horror on their faces. The blonde and the brunette walked over to us, dropping to their knees they began ripping clothes searching for wounds.
“They were shot…with guns.” The blonde said.
“Does anyone here have magnetism, or healing?” The brunette yelled.
Everyone started asking each other, but no one came forward.
“Freak girl,” the brunette said. I looked around wondering who she was talking to before realizing she was talking to me. Of course she was talking to me, who else here would or could be a freak like me, but still I had my pride.
“My name is McKenna,” I said, mustering all the courage I could.
“Okay—McKenna--How did you do that thing, with the people are you a shield?” The Brunette asked.
“No…I’m a psiconicsis; I can create things, rip portals and apparently freeze people, probably more too,” I said shrugging my shoulders.
The blonde made a sound that sounded like laughter. “Listen to me, and listen good…Focus.” The blonde grabbed my hand, placing it over the bullet wound on Becca.
Her breathing was ragged, coming slower and slower. Her heart beat was shallow, almost non-existent. “Focus, picture the wound, picture the bullet, hold both of these images in your mind, grab the bullet and slide it out slowly,” the blonde coached.
“I…I don’t think I can.” Tears rolled down my cheeks again, was she serious? I hadn’t used my gift this way before what if I made a mistake?
“You can do this McKenna…McKenna look at me…You can do this,” the blonde said.”
“Imagine a little cup forming under the bullet pulling it out. Pull it out slowly. You can do this,” she said again.
I had to do something. I didn’t want them die they were all that was left of Rob’s family. I nodded pushing out a ragged breath, closing my eyes trying to concentrate. Pressing my hands down on Trish and Becca’s wounds, I had no idea what the inside of a body looked like so I thought of a well with a bucket in the bottom, turning the crank to bring up the bucket full of water.
I cranked slowly until I felt the bucket (bullet) pressing against the palm of my hands. I opened my eyes moving my hands from Trish and Becca. I could see the bullets poking out of their wounds.
I reached down and pinched the bullet sticking out of Becca’s abdomen, pulling the bullet the rest of the way out just as a girl rushed up, slamming into me, sending me skidding across the forest floor.
I pulled myself up against a tree pulling my knees to my chest and watched as the healer worked on Becca, then moved on to Trish.
“Her eyes are opening.” The blonde said.
“Where am I?” Becca asked, looking around at everyone, completely oblivious to what had happened to her until she caught sight of her mom and dad, blood stained and bleeding. She began to scream.
CHAPTER 41
We watched the scene unfold in front of us, people gathering, popping out of thin air, until a girl came carrying three wounded.
Those people…they looked so familiar but I couldn’t place from where. We observed the girl being coached, removing the bullets from within the women lying on the ground. Once the bullets were removed the healer slammed into the girl who knelt over the two women and began to heal them both. The girl awoke and looked as if she had been rescued from the brink of death by the amount of blood that covered her.
The girl sat up and began to scream. I ran, knocking people out of my way. I had to get to her, how could she be here? They had to be the escapee’s if not I have surely doomed myself and possibly Garrett who remained invisible, while I on the other hand didn’t possess that gift.
She continued screaming, tears streaked through dirt and blood alike on her face. “Becca!” I screamed, shouldering through people coming to stand before her as she laid beating on her father’s chest, on Rob’s chest.
I dropped to my knees at their side, only to get knocked down by a 140 pound panther.
“We’re not the enemy.” Garrett yelled at the murderous lot. “We’ve come to take you to a safe place, to help you, we’re not the enemy!” He said as he unchained his weapon from his gauntlet dropping it to the ground putting up his hands and dropping to his knees trying to make himself look smaller and less dangerous than he really is.
“Please get your pet off my woman,” he barked at no one in particular.
“Yes, please get off me,” I gasped, trying hard to breathe. Becca screamed again, as she began to glow, arcing yellow and white light passed from head to toe back and forth, as she unleashed massive amounts of pent up dormant energy.
She had come into her gift, in her desperate time of need. Becca shoved her hands onto her father’s chest releasing energy, attempting to start his heart again.
No one could stop her; no one could get close enough even if they wanted to. I called out to her, screaming her name trying to get her attention, but her full attention was on her too long dead father.
“He’s gone,” the healer said as she finished healing Trish who still lay on the ground where her blood had pooled and began to coagulate.
“Why isn’t she waking up?” The brunette asked the healer.
“While her injuries may not have been as grave physically, the mental injuries are the ones I cannot see, nor heal. She’ll come to when she’s ready.”
The brunette stood, walking over to sit closer to Becca. “Sweetie, you have to stop. Your Momma needs you now. Your Daddy’s gone to a better place, they can’t hurt him anymore girl.”
McKenna walked over to Becca, creating netting, covering herself she reached out touching Becca’s shoulder, locking her jaw against the arcing energy coursing over and through her entire being.
The pain that she felt in that moment w
as beyond anything she had ever experienced, causing her hair to stand on end.
She couldn’t completely protect herself but luckily for McKenna Becca ceased her amazing display of power as she noticed the pain clearly crossing her new friends face.
“Listen people. We gotta move, you have a Militia force trailing you. You’ve been here over an hour; do you think they can’t find you? It’s only a matter of time now,” Garrett called out obviously frustrated with the situation, but making a great attempt to stay compassionate.
The panther moved off of my chest, I rolled to my side gasping and choking on the air I so desperately needed and had been semi-deprived of. I tried to pull myself closer to Becca as the panther stalked over to Garrett, nose to nose, shifting back into the slim Blonde woman with yellow eyes who sat cross legged right in front of him stark naked.
“Ma’am I think you lost your clothes,” Garrett said dropping his jacket over her as quickly as he could, making her laugh hysterically at his discomfort.
She stood leaving his jacket where it had pooled at her feet, walking over to her clothes slipping them back on slowly.
“Who are you?” The brunette asked.
“Garrett, this is my girlfriend…”
“Reighlyn?” Becca interrupted noticing me now for the first time.
“Sweetie we’ve come to get you all out of here, we found a safe place. Blaine’s there too,” I said taking her in my arms squeezing her in my best attempt to comfort her.
“It’s about three hundred miles from here,” I told everyone.
Groans erupted from the already exhausted crowd. “We can show you the way,” I said again holding Becca who had collapsed against my chest sobbing.
“How do we know this isn’t a trick?” the Brunette asked.
“Do you have another choice?” I shot back at her.
“It’s us or take your chances in the wilderness…or with the Militia again, but seeing as you were captured once… It’s only a matter of time,” I snapped at her, more pissed she was eye screwing my man than anything.
She could stay behind and I could care less. “What’s your name?” Garrett asked the brunette. “Jessa,” she hissed. “And this.” She pointed to the blonde who had given Garrett a full frontal.
“This is Josilyn.”
“Good to know, let’s get out of here it’s a long walk,” Garrett said trying to defuse the situation and get everyone on the move.
“We don’t have to walk…that is if you have a map.” A small pale blonde girl said.
I put Becca on the ground, pulling out my flails, and stalked toward her.
“Stop, she’s with us! She’s not with her.” Becca cried out, stopping me in my tracks.
“Who are you?” I asked.
“My name is McKenna Shade,” she said in a whisper.
“Who are you?” I asked her again.
“I’m her sister!” She yelled defiantly.
I turned to Garrett. It seemed I was the only surprised one here; the look on Garrett’s face was one of pity and delight.
“Lilly was right, Ben’s going to love this,” I said to Garrett, who winked at me in response.
“We have a map,” Garrett said.
“She’s ok; she’s not like her sister,” Becca said to me.
“She’s right,” Garrett said.
“How do you know? Do you know her?” I asked him.
“No, I don’t know her personally, but I heard Cora talk about her a lot. She used to tell Avril how disappointed she was in her sister how she was weak and couldn’t stomach the torturing and killing. That she refused to do it, so Cora used to punish her by making her watch her torture and kill people slowly. She’s found her way out…and took around a hundred people with her,” he said as he pulled a map out of his pack circling an area on the map right outside of where we trained at the caves.
“This is where we need to go,” he told her as she looked at the map, running her fingers over the area he marked, closing her eyes.
“I don’t know how many people I can put through a portal at a time,” McKenna said to us.
“Ok people, women and children first, if you are wounded find a partner and line up,” Garrett called out to the crowd.
As everyone shuffled to line up and help others who had been hurt Garrett grabbed me, pulling me to him. “Thank you for trusting in me,” he whispered in my ear.
“I would walk off the side of a mountain with no power to stay up what so ever if you told me there was an invisible walk way,” I smiled at him, as I went to help Becca move her Dad’s body closer to McKenna.
Jessa and Josilyn would help Becca take back her mom and dad.
McKenna opened the gate; we stood back and watched as people began to shuffle through.
“How do you know the kid with the dead dad and wounded mom?” Garrett asked.
“It’s Blaine’s family,” I whispered back.
“Crap,” he said drawing a questioning stare form me.
“We can’t go on like this. Just sitting around wondering when something is going to happen,” I said.
“After this Reigh, I don’t think we’re going to have to wait long for something to happen,” Garrett said as we stepped up behind the last escapee’s next to McKenna liking arms walking through a dimensional tear back to our new home.
CHAPTER 42
We exited the portal to chaos, but not like we had found in the hills.
Some families had been reunited, while others were still missing. Some people were screaming for their loved ones while others searched, which is exactly what I did.
I searched for Blaine, my heart breaking for his loss. He and I had been best friends for as long as I could remember. We practically grew up at each other’s houses, we were family.
I looked over to Garrett who stood on the opposite side of McKenna. Our eyes met and I could see he was going through the same emotions I just had.
“We should take McKenna to see my Dad, and Lilly first,” Garrett said.
“Good idea,” I said, turning to McKenna. “McKenna Don’t worry I promise you no one here will harm you. What I can’t promise is that they may or may not have a closed mind. Just seeing you may bring forth feelings of rage with in them, they may not be able to help themselves or their nasty attitudes, but no physical harm will come to you. You have already made many friends in those you’ve freed; keep positive and everyone will come around. I promise.”
McKenna smiled at me, knowing what I said to be true. “Off to see the wizard,” I called out as we walked into the caves, linked arm in arm.
CHAPTER 43
Every person who entered the caves spent the majority of the next two weeks with Ulric, Lilly and Ben Except for those who were too wounded to.
They went over what they remembered, while Lilly followed them through their memories.
McKenna and Jessa spent their day with Ben and Lilly. They had been with Cora the longest out the entire group, and they bared the mark of the Seven.
We were now a complete unit. McKenna was still young and she knew so much more than she had realized coming to understand that her sister must have thought her a simpleton and really believed that McKenna would never go against her.
She was wrong, so very wrong.
Ben had even showed he trusted her by allowing her to train with us; she would be a part of something that wasn’t perverse like her sister and the Militia cause.
She was excited, and she worked hard. Josilyn worked with McKenna daily teaching her how to concentrate, for a shape shifter she was an amazing coach.
Josilyn was a special person. She was a hard nut to crack. Always on the defensive but once you spent time with her she was caring, and kind so much so, most people would believe it was a fault.
The Seven were brought together through fate and Chance; their wills had been tested in one way or another. Now the time to stand together would show the true character of each and every one of them, individually, as well a
s a group.
CHAPTER 44
Ben stood in front of the commons room addressing all of those who resided there.
We were nearly 500 strong now.
Every available space had been taken up in the cave system. Even having to double up where we could.
“Ladies and Gentlemen,” he addressed the compound as a whole. “The prophecy of the Seven has begun. The Seven have been brought together as had been foretold. Reighlyn, Jasper, Garrett, Blaine, Luke, Jessa, and McKenna.”
Ben paused looking around to the faces before him, the weight of his seriousness sinking into the crowd. “This is far from over…We’ve been working diligently to gather the correct information for the Seven. I am ecstatic to announce we now have what we need--we have a location--but more importantly we are currently putting together a plan.” Ben called to the crowd as I stepped up beside him front and center.
“None of us asked for this, but each of us is willing to lay down our lives...not just for those that we love but for everyone, for our freedom as a whole. These past few months have changed me…they have changed us all, I hope for the better. As we continue forward in the coming month’s things will get harder before they get better, but I have faith in the prophecy…I have faith in us all.”
I nodded to the crowd and stepped back in line with the others as they cheered us all. Garrett grabbed my hand squeezing it, giving me his approval.
CHAPTER 45
I stood at the head of the long table while the others sat at a long table that had been set up in my rooms. Staring at the blueprints or shuffling through piles of papers.
McKenna had given them a lot of useful information. Between McKenna, Jessa and Josilyn they had confirmation of who the major players were.
A self-proclaimed King-- Rolland Deutermont-- and his court of misfits.
The Genesis Project Prophecy of the Seven Page 14