by Patrick Hatt
“Notice that did you?” Trinny grinned and then scoffed at Mr. Lions. “I will inform Oxom that we have two more guests and that you are behind it. Sir Dreadvent will also be found and disposed of.”
“We said he was dead. Didn’t you hear that?” Lester asked.
“Like I’d believe a leprechaun.” Trinny marched from the room and slammed the door closed.
Mr. Lions waited until she left and then pushed himself up to his knees.
“I have never seen anyone on Momentus so volatile. Something is truly wrong. Maybe Dina was right. Could somehow your fate have been altered?” Mr. Lions stared at the pair, who had trouble telling if he was from the many forms he kept taking.
“Could you make sense soon?” Lester asked.
“The sooner we figure it out, the sooner we can get out of here. Hopefully Bazooka is getting us help now.”
“I’m not sure what I can tell you will make sense, but I can try. After all, you two have seen much in your short lives.”
“You can say that again. And just when we thought it couldn’t get any weirder.” Lester snickered.
“Unlike Atlantis or other realms your father blocked out and unlike Shangri-La and other realms whose portal got destroyed, long ago we detached Momentus from the realms ourselves.”
“I’m sure you aren’t the first who destroyed their gate willingly,” Max replied.
“No. We got rid of it entirely.” Mr. Lions saw their confusion and quickly thought up the best example he could. “Think of the realms like balls attached to a ring. The ring touches each one and creates a handle on each side, connecting every single realm in one place and in one time. Now when it comes to Momentus, we pushed our ball below the ring and the two ends holding us just connected, making it as if we were never a part of it.”
“So you are like the Observer Realm?” Lester asked.
“No. Even the Observer Realm has no idea we are here. That is the realm in the center of this circle, connecting to all others. We are outside of it, having our own circle, inclusive of only itself.”
“But why would you do that?” Max questioned.
“I don’t know the specifics, but I know it had to do with us being all and all being us. I think Oxom is the only one that truly knows.”
“Could he get us out of here?” Lester asked.
“I’m sure if anyone knows anyway out, it is him.”
“Then I guess we have to find him and get out of this mess,” Max stated, staring at the bars. “She said nothing works in here, right?”
“I’m afraid she spoke the truth. Nothing works. Your friend is lucky.”
“I’m not sure I’d consider dying lucky,” Lester added.
“Not Bazooka, Trudesile.” Mr. Lions could see the confusion and intrigue in their eyes. “The one that isn’t all vampire as your friend said.”
“You mean Light Trudesile? She’s alive? All this time she’s been here?” Max blurted out.
“I’m afraid she hasn’t been here as long as you may think, but yes, she has been here. She is alive. That is if the guards haven’t gotten to her yet.”
“By me pot of gold.” Lester stood stunned and then stepped back as Max pushed him aside.
“Lester, we’re getting out of here.” Max winked at Lester. “Just like Eden. Nothing brings forth nothing. I hope.”
Max concentrated and brought forth his blue cloak from within. It grew larger than Lester had ever seen it and then expanded around the bars, dissolving them upon touching it.
“Max! How did you do that?” Lester questioned while lying flat on the floor to avoid the cloak.
“Just because I don’t use my imagination power much anymore, doesn’t mean I haven’t been practicing other things.” Max pointed to the open bars. “Go, Lester. It won’t hurt you.”
Lester sprang to his feet and hopped through the hole. He jumped up and clicked his heels together. He stood in awe as Max concentrated yet stepped through himself, never wavering.
“If that elf could see you now, he’d crap his pants.” Lester snickered.
“He, Eve, Vlad and the others are all going to be doing more than that when we get back.” Max turned to Mr. Lions. “Can you take us to Trudesile?”
“I can try. But in order to home in on her we have to get to the courtyard. It is central. I’d have a better chance there. She drained my power with those hits. It is our only chance. But we must hurry. The guards must be on them.”
Max extended his cloak through the bars and Lester waited for Mr. Lions to turn into a being that weighed very little. He yanked him through and Mr. Lions once again took his usual human form.
“You two sure aren’t bound by any fate. How can this be?” Mr. Lions tried to come up with a scenario as the pair picked him up and inched him to the door.
“We make our own fate,” Max stated.
“If only that were true,” Mr. Lions mumbled, fearing what sinister force might truly be at play.
“Allow me.” Lester eyed the lock and made a key appear from his imagination. He used it and pushed the door open.
Max peeked through and scanned the small hallway veering off to the right. He found it clear of threats and then grabbed Mr. Lions.
“Hold on.” Mr. Lions took the form of another being they had never seen before and seconds later he stood tall, like he had never been whipped.
“What was that?” Lester asked.
“A Priolotop. They are long extinct. Hunted to extinction due to their unique ability to heal any wounds. We must go before we are discovered and made extinct as well. My power could be whole again by the time we reach the courtyard.”
Mr. Lions waved for them to follow and the trio crept down the hall. The pair refused to fully trust Mr. Lions, each fearing what might be around the next corner, but they were prepared to face anything if it meant finding Trudesile alive and well.
Chapter 4
Running Smoothly
Trudesile and Dina scurried behind a barrel after falling through her portal. They peeked around the side, finding guards whipping many different beings with beams from their heads. Trudesile fought back her tears after she spotted two human children younger than her being forced to work. She wanted to jump out, but restrained herself until she had more information. God and Bandaid had never told her about this and the place was too vast to take in from their hiding spot.
“What is this?” Trudesile asked.
“I don’t know. This wasn’t taught to us. This is horrible.” Dina wiped tears from her eyes as she slunk down behind the barrel. “Why would we do this? Who are they? Who are we really?”
“I’m sorry, Dina. I don’t have all the answers. But these beings are slaves. We have to find Max and Lester and then we can stop this.”
“How? There are too many of them.” Dina’s mind filled with fear as she began to question everything she had ever been taught.
“We’ll figure it out. But first we have to find Max and see what happened. It could have been Sir Dreadvent. If he’s here, we have to stop him or everyone is dead.”
Dina grabbed Trudesile’s hand and got to her feet. She wiped a tear from her eye and nodded to Trudesile. Dina took a deep breath and then tried to open a doorway, failing to do so. She tried time and time again, her strain making blood vessels rise from her forehead.
“I can’t. We’re trapped. Something is blocking me.”
“Let’s see.” Trudesile attempted to change her hand into a cat paw.
“What does it mean?”
“It means we are stuck here.” Trudesile peered across the area, attempting to find what could be blocking their abilities, but she failed to find anything that would give her a clue.
Dina’s fear and sadness became hate as she took in what her kind were doing. She watched the food being boxed and processed, never really knowing how it had gotten to them until now, she saw some beings working on sparks that resembled what she had seen in her mother’s sanctuary, and she cringed further as she stared at
a hospital area with beings being born.
“Trudesile, are they really breeding slaves?” Dina clenched her fist, searching for some way to end it.
“Dad was so wrong on how horrible this place could be,” Trudesile mumbled.
“I want to know what you know,” Dina demanded.
“Dina, my father and Bandaid said that I must be here to protect you. You would be the one to help us fix what may be done. I don’t know how they knew fates would change, but they were right. It must have to do with Sir Dreadvent.”
“But how did you get here? How did they know about us? No being outside of us is supposed to be here. Ever.”
“Dad said since I was out of sync when Bandaid split my dark side from me, I was out of sync like your realm. Bandaid could sense it from his time as crazy Bandaid in the Observer Realm and sent me here. He said I was the only one that could gain your trust.”
“But how did he know of me?”
“Dina, those are answers for him. We didn’t have much time. Our door to get me here was closing. We’ll get answers later. Right now we have to move.”
Trudesile spotted a familiar energy reforming a few feet away from them. Dina’s eyes widened as Bazooka took form and fell on one of the guards.
“Darn. I overshot that by a bit. I guess I’m not as in tune as I thought. Must work on that. A little help, chaps.” Bazooka eyed the barrel they used for cover.
“Trudesile, we can’t. They’ll destroy us.”
“No they won’t.” Trudesile eyed the guard that Bazooka had landed on, spotting a rainbow-colored collar around his neck.
“What? How?”
“Stop asking and do. Learning can only get you so far, Dina. Sometimes you have to act.”
Bazooka put up his arm as the rainbow whips came at him. He moved it aside after they all swung around at the sound of Trudesile’s voice.
“Bazooka! Break their collars.” Trudesile grabbed a tiny shovel from the nearby human kid, who had been gardening, and jabbed it into the nearest guard’s collar.
“Don’t have to tell me twice.” Bazooka smirked as the guard’s collar broke and his abilities failed. He reached down to see if he could break the one beneath him with his paw, feeling a groove in the collar. “Or maybe there is a better way.”
The guards surrounded Trudesile while more hordes sprinted from other areas of the factory. Trudesile tried to whack another but one grabbed her from behind. Her appendages soon became wrapped in rainbow beams. The one wrapping around her stomach squeezed tighter, leaving her gasping for breath.
“Take this.” Dina snatched up the shovel and whacked the guard’s collar who had a beam wrapped around Trudesile’s waist, causing his abilities to fail.
“Get her! She betrayed her own kind,” a guard ordered.
“Not today, chaps. Down!” Bazooka shouted.
Dina dove to the factory floor and Trudesile ducked her head the best she could. Bazooka shot lightning strikes from his toes and the bolts fried the collars of all the guards around them.
“So glad I learned to use this imagination stuff a bit better.” Bazooka smiled at Trudesile, showing her the collar he now wore. He took it off and tossed it to her. “But mine is nowhere near as good as yours. Go get em, chap.”
Trudesile slapped the collar on and turned into a dinosaur. She towered over every being, using parts from different dinosaurs to create her own. Her head scraped the ceiling as she roared at the guards nearing them. She began fighting off the guards, using her claws to slash many collars. She soon found herself covered with beams and turned into an ant to free herself. She then went to a bear and began her attack again, this time getting restrained faster than before.
“People of the many realms. You don’t have to do this. Help us and we’ll free you all. This isn’t your fate. Together we can take them down.” Dina stabbed another with the tiny shovel, breaking his collar, and then jumped back as Bazooka punched him in the face.
“The rainbow one who seems to be on our side is right. We can beat them, chaps. There are more of us than them.”
The beings all stopped what they were doing and looked to one another. Seconds later they began attacking the guards with any weapons that they could find. They followed Bazooka’s lead and smashed the collars before knocking out the guards.
“Go and warn Oxom. We’ll squash this uprising before it begins,” a guard yelled.
Dina ran after a guard who opened a portal and jumped on his back, knocking him to the floor. She ripped off his collar and the portal disappeared. She slapped it around her neck and then caused multiple rainbow whips to spring forth from her head. She sent them in every direction, bashing the collars of any guard she could spot.
“I’ll take that, chap.” Bazooka took another collar and snapped it on. He then zapped the guards around him.
The many beings shoved the hordes of guards to the ground, knocking them out and chasing down the few that tried to get away. Soon cheers filled the factory as all but one of the guards had been beaten.
“This isn’t over,” a guard yelled. He quickly opened a portal and jumped through.
“Trudesile, he’ll be back with more. We have to go,” Dina insisted.
“Not without them. We have to free them first.”
“I thought we needed to stop Sir Dreadvent?” Dina questioned.
“We’re no better than him if we leave them here.” Trudesile smiled as a mother walked out of the hospital area with a baby in her arms. “Send them to Olympus’s realm. They’ll be safe there.”
“Why not Heaven?”
“Lucifer is still there. I don’t trust him,” Trudesile stated.
Dina concentrated and opened a portal. Trudesile assured them that they would be safe while receiving thanks from the many beings. Bazooka quickly waved for the beings to start going through after spotting Olympus on the other side.
“Bazooka, how did you get here?”
“That leprechaun dropped a pot on me.” Bazooka smirked. “Then I kind of fried myself in our jail cell.”
“They are in a cell?”
“Last I saw them.”
“What?” Trudesile asked, noticing Bazooka’s smile toward her.
“It’s just good to see you alive. I knew I sensed you when I went to reform. You are so much better on the eyes and the head than that vampire version of you. But how in the heck are you still as old as you were when we last saw you, chap?”
“Why wouldn’t I be? I’ve only been gone a few months.”
“Trudesile, you’ve been gone almost five years.”
“What?” Trudesile stood stunned. Her stomach turned in knots and she nearly fell to her knees before Bazooka caught her. “Max, he thought I was dead all this time?”
“We all did.”
“Trudesile, that’s all of them. We have to go.”
“Where’s the cellblock area, Dina?” Trudesile asked.
“I never knew we had one. But if I were to guess, I’d say it was in the Hall of Momentus. Has to be in there somewhere.”
“That’s where we are going. Open a portal.” Trudesile stood up, regaining her composure. She hated knowing that she had caused her friends such pain for so long, but she was determined to save them and see her mission through.
Dina opened a portal and the three quickly jumped through, leaving the many guards unconscious in the now silent factory.
******************************
Mr. Lions waved his hand and Max and Lester clung to the side of the wall. The pair bent down behind him and each peeked around the hallway corner, spotting Oxom, Madar, the other graduates, and a few council members.
“This is so a King Yenny vibe,” Lester whispered, taking in the statues.
“It would seem that way, but each statue holds a purpose. Just watch,” Mr. Lions replied.
“Max, aren’t you at all freaked out by the fact that this guy knows everything about us?” Lester tried to keep his voice low, but he could see by
the smile on Mr. Lions’ face that he had heard him.
“He hasn’t tried to kill us yet, so we’ve got that going for us,” Max replied.
“I assure you, guys, I mean you no harm. I’ve taught your fates so many years I know everything you will do and everything you have done.”
“So you’re psychic?” Max asked.
“Just what we need,” Lester mumbled.
“No. A bit more than that. Now watch and keep quiet. We can’t get through until they are gone anyway.”
The pair remained quiet while Oxom escorted each of the graduates to one of the many statues of himself.
“Today is the day you’ve all worked so hard for. Today you will take your plot and be as one with your fates. Should you find a partner at your plot, that is who you will be paired with for life. Should you not find one then the next class of graduates will surely find one coming your way. Enjoy your new plots and remain diligent on your fates.”
“I’m getting a serious Earth pre-imagination vibe here,” Max whispered.
“This place is nuts. What are you people?” Lester questioned, not satisfied with what little information he had been given.
“Just touch the statue and you will be sent to your designated plot.” Oxom smiled and many touched one willingly. A few others hesitated and then touched it, leaving only Madar remaining.
“This is what you’ve been working for. Take the final step and one day you may be a member of the council.” Oxom placed his hand on Madar’s shoulder and then went to shove him toward the statue, but failed to move him. “What is the meaning of this?”
“We wouldn’t want to deny our guests the sight of my victory, now would we?” Madar said, glaring directly at where the trio were hiding. “After all, if it weren’t for Max, none of this would be possible.”
“Do we know that guy?” Lester whispered.
“He’s seen you in class studies,” Mr. Lions stated.
“Why are you studying us again?” Lester sighed.
Max remained silent as Madar’s glare turned to a grin. His stomach squirmed upon sensing the dormant Sevestie part of himself shivering inside his body.
“Get out of that boy’s body, Sir Dreadvent.” Max jumped out from behind the wall, ready to use whatever imagination power he had to stop him.