by Daise, Sonny
“My grandmother was a powerful woman,” he began, and paused for a long while. “She was the beginning of all this in 1886. She found a necklace; it was buried deep in the sand at a beach. She put it in her pocket and went home. When she got home, she admired it for a bit, and then put it on, instantly, she felt different. She woke up in the morning, not as a woman, but a tiger.” He paused for a long time, which left me thinking about the story Elizabeth told. This was the same story; the only difference was that the mysterious woman in Elizabeth’s story, was revealed to be her great-grandmother. Why didn’t she tell me before? “She became a total recluse, afraid that she would be punished. A couple of years later, she met my grandfather. She gave him powers; they always knew what each other were thinking. They fell in love and not too long after, my mother was born, and my aunt.”
“Grandpa, what does this story have to do with anything?” Cooper asked.
“It has a lot to do with everything.” He looked over at me. “Once she came out of hiding, my grandmother was regarded as royalty. She was the most powerful anyone of our kind had ever seen. As the years went on, she gained more power, without ever touching another necklace. Anyway, it wasn’t too long after she found the necklace, that more people started finding them all over. To this day, no one knows where they came from. The Alliance was formed by the time my grandmother and grandfather met, and she was destined to stop them. Or so everyone thought.”
“I still don’t see what this has to do with anything,” Cooper interrupted.
“Pictures were drawn on the walls of the first Alliance community. The one that still stands in Sunny Bay and is regarded as the headquarters today. One was thought to be of your grandmother, her siblings and a few good friends that she had. I recreated that drawing; I was always trying to figure out what it meant, and how it came to be. If this picture was supposed to have come true, then what was to come?” He paused and looked around the room, lingering on each of us, especially Dante and I.
“You know we love your stories, but we need to know the Alliance’s secrets,” Cooper said.
“I have a question, too,” I blurted. “Why were you in the Alliance?”
“To do exactly what I’ve done. Find their secrets and document them. Back to the story, I don’t need to wonder anymore—about the picture, I mean. I know what it means now; I figured it out only moments ago.”
He brought out a crumpled, brown piece of paper and unrolled it. Standing in that picture was me, Dante, Rose, Cooper, Lily, Grace, Annabelle, Jackson, and Rachel.
“Why didn’t you tell me I was in a picture before Grandpa?” Lily asked.
“You look exactly like your great-great-grandmother’s sister and Cooper like her brother. She had a cousin that she was close to, they looked almost like twins, see here, this was my grandmother.”
She was an almost exact replica of me, and her cousin, with her short, red waves looked like Rose.
“So you’re telling me there was a group of people before who looked exactly like us?” Lily asked.
“Yes, you are the ones who are meant to take down the Alliance, more specifically you.” He pointed at me. “My grandmother told me that one day, there would be someone more powerful than her, one of the powers she got over the years was to see into the future, she could go a hundred years, or more. She couldn’t see every detail, more like an example. She saw you. She knew you would look exactly like her, and she knew that you would be the one to take down the Alliance, but she never told anyone.”
“There’s nothing special about me, I don’t understand why everyone thinks there is. Yes, I have powers. I have a few powers, but I don’t see how any of them make me more powerful than anyone else.”
“That’s for you to find out. It could take you a lifetime, but I am not wrong about this, and neither are any of the other people who have told this to you. I don’t know how they got their information, but they did, and now they’re after you. You need to fight back. Some of you could die,” he turned his gaze to the floor and almost looked as if he was going to cry. “But that might be what was always meant for you; you will go down in history,” he sighed.
“So you expect us to go into this expecting that we will die?” Cooper demanded.
“You should have known there was a chance of that already, Coop,” he turned away from him and looked at everyone. “When you are done come back here.”
“Come here, give me a hug before you go,” the man said to Lily and Cooper.
When we went to leave, he asked to have a minute alone with me and Rose. He led us into a room in the back, and pulled out a photo album.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“I know who you are, and I know that you know as well,” he declared. Though the thought hadn’t really crossed my mind, I knew I was his granddaughter and so was Rose. “I told your mother not to do it, that it would be the biggest mistake of her life… that it would ruin everything. I knew that one of you would be the one my grandmother was referring to.”
“Wait, you knew Ann?” I asked.
“You mean your adoptive mother? I didn’t know her, but she knew what I knew as well, and I always had a feeling that she had bad intentions.”
“Adoptive?” I said, shocked. “No she stole us; she took us away.”
“Your mother didn’t think she could take care of you. She was young, but more than that it is hard to think of taking care of yourself and a child—two children—in a world like this.”
“She gave us up,” I whimpered. “Where is she now? We need to go see her.”
“You need to deal with this first. Come back, and I’ll tell you,” he smiled. “Good luck, I hope everything goes alright. I’m glad you’ve made your way back, both of you.”
“Thank you,” I said. He came closer to whisper in my ear.
“You will need to go in alone; no one else can do it but you.”
When we left, I sat in the car in silence. Everyone chattered around me, but my thoughts drowned them out. This would be deadly, and I couldn’t turn away the fact that he said I really was special, and basically that this was up to me. What would happen when we got to the Alliance? We still had no plans. We needed a plan, a strategy; we needed something concrete to give us hope. I wondered why he said no one could do it but me, did this mean I would be totally alone? I doubted that, I could use all the help I could get.
We all decided that tomorrow, we would strike. Everyone would be staying at Grace’s tonight. She still hadn’t heard from her mother. We needed to figure out where everyone would sleep. Lily and Rachel would get the guest room. Grace, Rose, and Allison had gotten close, so they would share her bedroom. There was a chair that was suitable in the living room, and Cooper decided to sleep there, when Jackson called the couch first. The only two with nowhere to sleep, was me and Dante.
“You can crash in my room, too,” Grace offered. “There’s more than enough room on the floor.”
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” Dante asked before I could answer Grace. He led me out into Grace’s garage, and then started looking around for something. “Aha,” he said.
“What did you want to talk about?” I asked, paying no attention to what he was doing.
“Oh, nothing serious… right now anyway, but I was wondering…” he mumbled as he looked down to the ground. It was almost as if he was ignoring the fact that I was there altogether. “I found a tent; I don’t mind sleeping in it alone, but… I just thought… I don’t know what tomorrow will bring…”
“I won’t let something happen to you, not again,” I swore. He pursed his lips, shook his head and looked down.
“I’m sure Grace’s room will be kind of crowded, if you want, you can come out to the tent, okay?”
“Alright,” I said.
I went back in the house. I wasn’t sure if he wanted me to stay or was just trying to be polite.
I went into the basement to see if I could find any blankets or pillows to bring out with me. I
knew by the end of the night, no matter what, I would be out in that tent with the boy that I loved. I was so tired of pretending we were just getting to know each other; he had the dreams, and he knew what went on between us. I knew it was only an excuse, but I didn’t mind that much. I wanted to be his friend if there was no hope for anything else.
“Hey, what are you doing down here?” Grace asked as she walked down the stairs.
“Oh, Dante found a tent outside, and I was looking for some blankets and pillows.”
“So you’re sleeping outside?” she asked.
“I think I probably will, if that’s alright.”
“Yes, of course that’s alright,” she said as she went to walk upstairs.
“Hey Grace?”
“Yeah?”
“After all this is over, I really hope we are good friends.”
“Me, too,” she smiled. “There are a couple of sleeping bags over there.” She pointed to the corner.
“Thanks.”
“I know things have been a bit crazy lately, and we haven’t talked much, but I’ve been having these dreams,” she shuddered. “I feel like I know you better than I know anyone, and I know now just how hard you tried to save me.”
“You—you’ve been having dreams?” I sat down on the stool next to me; she pulled over another and sat by me.
“Yes, I think you coming back into the past has changed a lot for the better. I don’t think I was in as much trouble now as I was before. And do you know why? Because you came to look for me, the Alliance needed me the last time as bait.”
“So do you know what happened the night that you…died?”
“Yes. Should I start from the beginning?” I nodded. “I was at your house. We sat in your living room for a few hours and just talked about everything, and at the same time nothing. I was your best friend, and I said nothing.” She looked down. “I kept seeing the person who was following me, outside the window. I saw them; I knew that it was them, but until later that night, I had no idea who they were—what they were.”
“Grace, I am so sorry you had to go through this.”
“We went to sleep. Well, you went to sleep, and I laid awake staring out the window. My eyelids got heavy; I hadn’t seen any sign of them in a while. I closed my eyes and when I opened them, someone was in the hallway, right outside your room. I couldn’t be certain that this was the person that had been following me; in fact, they looked rather… harmless. She wore a white dress; she had long brown hair, and she told me that if I followed her, everything would be okay.” White dress, brown hair, she looked harmless—it was the woman who was sent to kill me.
“So she’s the one who killed you?”
“No,” she said simply. “I followed her down the street, and into the woods. I couldn’t help it; it was as if I had no choice in the matter. Anyway, someone else was waiting—it was the nurse, the one from Meadowbrook. They tied me up to a tree; I couldn’t move. The girl in the dress pulled out a knife, and the nurse slapped her across the face. She was screaming about how they couldn’t kill me that way. She said there could be no wounds. The nurse grabbed the knife and stabbed the girl over and over. Then she untied me and took me to a small river that wasn’t too far away…”
“So you were drowned?”
“Yes, and the girl in the white dress took over my body.”
“I miss you,” I whispered, as a single tear streamed down my cheek.
“We are going to be best friends, that is one thing that won’t change,” she smiled. “Good night,” she said as she walked up the stairs.
I grabbed the sleeping bags, a couple of blankets, and two pillows. I heard footsteps coming down the stairs. It was Allison.
“Oh, do you know where Grace is?” she asked.
“She just went upstairs,” I answered. She went to turn around and go back up, but I stopped her, “hey Allison?”
“Yeah?”
“Can I talk to you for a minute?”
“Sure,” she said, sounding uncertain.
“Have you seen anything lately, anything that might have something to do with the Alliance or—“
“Sometimes it’s hard to tell where my visions take place. Sometimes I even see from another person’s perspective…”
“So you haven’t seen anything that might have to do with the Alliance?”
“It’s like my power stopped working,” she sighed. “The past few days, whenever I close my eyes, I can’t breathe, and sometimes when I close my eyes all I see is water, it’s like I’m underwater….”
“Just try and get a good night’s sleep,” I smiled.
“Alright, thanks Scarlett.”
I picked up the blankets, pillows and sleeping bags, and went outside to see Dante. It was dark out already, but his fire lit up the backyard with an eerie, orange glow.
He was sitting in a fold up chair, and he had another lying on the ground. He didn’t see me coming; he looked miserable. I set everything in the tent that he had already assembled. Then I picked up the chair and sat next to him.
“Hey, were you expecting someone?” I joked.
“Yeah, you.”
“Well, here I am. I’m sorry it took so long I—”
“What are we going to do?”
“I—I don’t know… I guess I’m going to go in alone, see what’s going on, and find out where they all are. Then you guys come in.”
“Why are you going in alone?” he asked.
“Because I can go invisible,” I laughed. “I think that’s what Cooper and Lily’s—well, my—grandpa meant. He said I would have to go in alone. I don’t know how he knew, but—“
“No, I know, but… I could go with you.” He held his hand out.
“Yeah, I guess you could, but you’d have to be careful,” I said as I grabbed his hand. We both disappeared and with the fire glowing next to us, Dante had an amazing orange outline. I went to let go of his hand, but he held on tighter.
“We should do something amazing tonight, something we’ve never done before.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I’ve just been thinking about tomorrow, and I think I’m having an adrenaline rush,” he laughed.
“Well, I have no idea what you want to do, so when you know, get back to me.”
We sat there, staring into the fire; occasionally looking up to the sky. The stars twinkled above our heads.
“I know,” he blurted.
“Okay, let’s hear it.”
He shook his head and grabbed my hand, and the familiar green and blue swirls surrounded us. When I opened my eyes, we were standing on the highest rock on a lake, we were about thirty or more feet above the water.
“What, do you expect me to jump?”
“No. I used to come up here all the time; I’ve never brought anyone up here though. It’s just a nice place to think… or talk, if you’re not alone.”
“So what do you want to talk about?” I wondered.
“Us,” he mumbled. “I know you don’t want me to worry about tomorrow, but I do. I don’t want anything to happen without you knowing that I care.”
I hugged him. “I care, too,” I said.
“I’ve had so many dreams, and you were the main thing about these dreams that made them, well, amazing. When you weren’t with me in my dreams, the sky seemed like it was always grey, but when you were…. I could feel the slightest breeze; the sky was always blue. Even if it was only a dream, even if it was at night, they were the best days I’ve had.”
“They weren’t only dreams; they were memories that a different part of you has lived through. That part is a part of you now, I believe that. I’m just happy that I—we have another chance,” I smiled up at him; he didn’t smile back.
“When Cooper’s grandpa said that some of us will die… he was looking at me. It seemed almost like he was warning me, like he was talking just to me,” he admitted.
“I’m sorry, but I can’t believe that,” I whispe
red.
“No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be talking about things like that. I’m sure I was imagining it.” He said it to make me feel better, but I could tell by his tone of voice, that he didn’t believe a word he said.
“Everything is going to be fine. We are going to be the ones to take down the Alliance and then after that, we’re going back to being normal teenagers,” I reassured him.
“That sounds great, being a normal teenager. Awkward conversations, even a feeling or memory that can come rushing back by something as small as a familiar smell. I know it hasn’t been long, but nothing has felt normal these past few days.” He closed his eyes. A gust of wind blew in our direction.
“You used to wear that cologne every day,” I sighed at the memory it brought back, and he put his hand over mine.
“That was a good dream; I never got to finish it though.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
“For some reason, I just thought about the night… you said something about my cologne.”
Why didn’t I think of it before? “So you never saw what happened, not later that night or in the morning?”
“No, it was blurry; things got clear when we were standing on the edge of the cliff,” he said as he stared out into the lake. Then suddenly, he got up.
“Where are you going?”
“I was thinking about it, and I kind of do want to jump. There aren’t any rocks down there; we just have to jump far enough out.”
“Dante,” I whined.
“Come on,” he held his hand out. “We’ll do it together; I promise you won’t get hurt.”
I stepped to the edge of the rock. A memory came rushing back. It wasn’t the one where I was standing on the edge of the cliff with the Alliance staring me down, though this felt vaguely similar. It wasn’t because of the cliff. It was because of what surrounded me.
Chapter 10: Life or Death