Knight of the Black Rose

by Nissa Gordon

"It might do, but you're still helping us with this," Hunter told her. "And in fact you have already given us a name,"

  "Didn't you already question him?" Lucy asked.

  Hunter looked over in the direction where Nathan's friend Harry was sat, he actually looked really nervous, more so than anyone else, as the others just seemed bored and annoyed.

  "Stuart trusts you and your judgement...he didn't tell me why...just that he does," Hunter told her. "Is he the only one who's appeared to be acting overly suspicion about all of this?"

  Lucy didn't like to point fingers like this, but none of her friends had asked anything strange of her, yes they wanted to know things, but they haven't been pushy about it or close minded about what they had heard.

  "I guess yes...he was the only one..." Lucy said reluctantly. "But wouldn't Nathan be able to tell you better, they're friends and roommates..."

  Hunter turned and walked back to the group with Lucy and Loring behind him, Lucy trying to avoid everyone staring at her, but they could tell that something was going on.

  "Harry Miller of Clarus," Hunter called, but he didn't stand. "Mister Miller we need to talk with you,"

  Whispers broke out as they moved away from, Domnus and Validus moved forward in case trouble broke out.

  "Mister Miller, if you please," Hunter said again, but this time with more command behind it.

  "No...I'm not going anywhere with you!" Harry shouted as he climbed backwards over the bench; he pointed at Lucy. "You're going to listen to that freak! She isn't even human...who knows what she looks like...and that isn't even her real voice!"

  "It is her real voice, and I don't give a damn what she really looks like," Hunter told him angrily. "You'll come with us, while we ask you some questions,"

  "No!" Harry shouted as he backed away. "I don't have to go anywhere with you people!"

  "We'll have your parents brought in as well," Hunter continued.

  "The rest of you may leave, but I'm afraid I'll have to ask Clarus to stay a little longer, we have a few more questions to ask," Validus told them. "We just want to make sure that he hasn't revealed anything about any of you and your families,"

  The students got up and began walking off giving Harry a wide birth as though they didn't want to get too close to him in case he might do something to them, those who stayed moved closer together and away from where Harry stood.

  "Hey! I'm not the freak here! She...what about her...she's some sort of banshee...and is probably butt hag ugly in her proper form!" Harry shouted at them.

  "You're such a fool," Loring told him as he walked off with Lucy still at his side. "Her kind, are consider among the most beautiful in the galaxy,"

  "Loring, that's enough," Hunter said sternly.

  Loring waved dismissively as he led Lucy straight through the crowd, not allowing her to stop and talk to any of them as they crossed to the only doors that weren't blocked off by the benches.

  Lucy didn't like to be called ugly, but it hadn't been that much of a surprise considering that he had no idea what she was; the bigger surprise was actually Loring who considered her race to be among the most beautiful in the galaxy. It kind of made her wonder if he had seen one of her kind before, but of course she couldn't really ask him about it here in front of everyone, and she kind of felt a little out of place talking to him about it altogether to begin with.

  There was so much going on, that when Lucy finally sat down in front of a computer in the library with Loring hovering close by; she really had to focus on what she was doing. She flicked through her stack of papers trying to find what she really needed, not wanting to sound stupid now that she was actually allowed to do this; she actually felt kind of nervous thinking that she could tell these people something when they were among the best in the galaxy and she was just a little girl. Lucy still decided that she would do it, she had asked Loring and Hunter for this and they had actually believed in her, so she might as well give it a go.

  To who is in-charge of the...project of restoring the people who had their energy drained.

  I'm Luna, I was just writing to inform you of something else that I discovered over here that might be connected to what is going on. We still don't know what it is, but it is being controlled by someone and then being summoned to people. The first couple might have just been for practice to make sure that it was working properly, but this last attack I believe was targeted considering the person in question had actually had several contacts with it.

  The being wasn't able to do its thing, to drain him...he's basically just sleeping at the moment. A high impulse shriek might scare it off, or stop whatever it is doing.

  I'm also sending in an attached file, the work I've started on an object that has been found at several attacks here, that I believe could be connected considering that it's make-up says that it's part of a summoning spell. If you can figure out how it's being summoned, then we might be able to contain it and stop it.

  Thank you for taking to time to look at my work, and I hope that it will be of use to you.

  Luna

  Lucy sent the message and really did hope that she was sending them something useful and that she wasn't just wasting their time, she believed herself that she had found out something important, but that didn't mean that it would be important to them as they could have already discovered it.

  Now all Lucy was worried about was facing everyone else in her year group considering that she had pointed her finger at Harry, she was just glad that it had been him and she hadn't gotten someone in trouble, she just couldn't believe his reaction towards them as it didn't make sense to her. If he didn't like all of this to begin with, then why would he even bother coming here in the first place, it couldn't have all been about money.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  It had been a whole week since the attack and Will still hadn't woken up yet, as Glen paced in front of his bed in the hospital ward his jacket thrown over the back of the chair next to Will's bed; he had spent most of the last week here beside of his son, only leaving to go into the office to find out if they had anymore leads on the attacks. He wanted to get the people who had done this to his son, he was angry before this attack considering what they were doing to people, but it was just something else to actually attack a school full of innocent children. If it was him that they wanted, then they should have come for him straight on instead of going after his son, because harming him had just raised the stakes, meaning that they weren't going to come out of this.

  Glen was startled out of his thoughts when he heard shouting outside of the doors, he turned around in their direction but couldn't make out who was actually shouting, not that he cared, only that they were disrupting his sons peace.

  "How dare you go over my head in these matters!"

  "It had nothing to do with you!"

  "Of course it does, I'm the head of the damn department!"

  "Perhaps if you were actually here more, then you would have been kept in the loop!"

  Glen marched down the length of the ward and then pulled the doors opened, surprised to find Jevidah and Loring arguing; Jevidah turned briefly in his direction and then dismissed him as though he wasn't important.

  "I've been busy with work," Jevidah told him. "But that still doesn't give you the right to contact The Department of Inter-Galactic Science and Research, without consulting me first,"

  Loring just waved him off dismissively as he turned to Glen and handed him a bottle. "They sent this, saying that it's helping somewhat with the others. But considering that Will wasn't as affected, it should work quicker on him,"

  "They found a cure?" Glen asked surprised taking the bottle.

  Loring shook his head. "Not at the moment, but people are responding more, thanks to this,”

  Glen nodded as he looked back over his shoulder at his son; he was willing to try anything.

  "I wouldn't mind running a few tests on it first," Jevidah told him as he stopped Glen from going back to his son. "We don't know
what's in it,"

  "I don't understand, it's helped the others, then it'll help him," Glen told him pulling himself free. "You should have asked for another sample so you could test it,"

  "I would have, if someone would have bothered telling me what was going on," Jevidah told him, his anger rolling off of him in waves.

  Glen walked back over to his son. "I don't care about your damn pride, get over yourself,"

  "How dare you!" Jevidah roared marching after him, but Loring grabbed him and pulled him away. "Let go of me! He has no right to talk to me like that!"

  "Calm down already..." Loring told him as he struggled with him, the doors swinging close behind them.

  Glen ignored them as he went back to his son, he didn't care who had come up with this as long as it worked. He sat down on the edge of the bed and carefully lifted Will up into his arms, then opened his mouth slightly so that he could pour some of it in his mouth. He waited a few moments for a reaction, but there was none, so he gave him some more, annoyed with himself anew because he hadn't asked how much he should give him and how long it would take for a reaction, he had just been so glad that they had something finally.

  After feeding him the whole bottle, Glen gently lay Will back down on the bed and settled back in his own chair to wait for some sort of reaction from him, still berating himself for not asking the right questions, when he always did; but he knew this was different because it was it son who was in danger.

  The lights were off as Lucy went over to her bed, she couldn't wait to get in as she was so tried with the amount of homework they had done over the weekend, telling them that it would help them with their exams which were still several months away. Lucy didn't want to think about them, they just scared her, and what her dad would say if she didn't get the grades that he expected of her.

  She threw back the covers and was just about to crawl in when her computer beeped, startling her, she looked over her shoulder sure that she had turned it off, but apparently hadn't. She turned back around and went over to her desk, turning the screen on, the light making her blink several times until her eyes adjusted and then she squinted at the screen; she had a message waiting. She quickly clicked it open, thinking that it was from home and that something must have happened for them to be contacting her so late at night like this.

  From: - The Department of Inter-Galactic Science and Research

  Dear Luna,

  I want to thank you personally for all of the help that you have given us, your research was in fact very helpful. We haven't completed a cure yet, but we are very close, those who were infected have been responding very well to the first treatment. We're very hopeful that we'll have a full treatment ready to go in a matter of days, but I'm afraid that you were right. Even if this Being is killed, there is no way to transfer the power that was already taken from these people back to their own bodies.

  We're looking into them hopefully in time being able to get back to full strength, but in that respect we're not very hopeful. They'll be alive, but without their powers and abilities. I hope that the solution we sent you works on your student, we're hopeful that it will, and that he'll be one of the lucky ones considering that you said his powers weren't taken. If you could send us your test results on his progress, that would be most helpful to us here.

  I would like to thank you again for your help, and I look forward to working with you again in the future on this and many more projects.

  Dr S.Wray

  Lucy read the letter several times before it finally sank in what the doctor had told her, she could actually feel her cheeks burning and was kind of embarrassed but didn't know why. She had hoped that she could help them, but she had never expected to be of this much help, and that one of them would actually write to her personally. She smiled to herself at the last line, he or she actually would want to work with her again, which she was pleased with but also a little confused about.

  Lucy suddenly remembered Loring explaining what he had done, yes he had sent her work off to the labs with her middle name, but he hadn't told them that she was a student; which meant what, that they thought she was a teacher here or something?

  Lucy shook her head, that was just stupid, they couldn't possibly think that, her work wasn't good enough to compare with that of a teachers; but she had helped them. She didn't understand, and it didn't really matter at the moment, only that it had helped them and she would be able to see Will tomorrow hopefully awake and well if everything this guy had said was right.

  Lucy had gotten up bright and early the next morning, also getting everyone else up, she wanted to check in on Will before they had to go to school, which they hadn't minded that much after she had told them about the message she had received last night; she had saved it as well.

  Lucy had pushed Troy and Alex up front so that they could check through the ward door to see who was there before they went in, there was a small shuffle and then they both looked in at the same time with Lucy looking over their shoulder; Eddie and Methos behind her on tip toes trying to get a look as well while Selena, Jess and Libby waited to be told the coast was clear.

  "Come on guys, I can't see anything," Eddie complained.

  "Just go in already," Methos told them as he gave them a little nudge making Troy and Alex almost fall through the doors with Lucy right behind them. "Sorry..."

  "Maybe you should have pushed them harder," Selena said as she pushed past the lot of them and went inside first with Libby and Jess following closely behind her.

  "It was an accident," Methos told her.

  Glen looked over in their direction and stood slowly waving them over, they went over to join him as he stepped out and they got their first look at Will sat up in bed, he smiled at them and they all rushed over to him.

  "I'll let you lot have a couple of minutes, before you have to go onto classes," Glen told them before he left the ward.

  "Oh my god!" Libby said at the end of the bed.

  "You're the first one to wake up," Troy told him.

  Will hadn't known that. "Other people at the school were attacked?"

  "What? No...he means the others before you," Lucy told him hitting Troy on the arm. "They're slowly responding to the same treatment, but as you know they were completely drained,"

  "I'm still not sure why I weren't," Will said confused.

  "Well, what do you remember?" Alex asked.

  Will looked at them all, he had already gone over this story like half a dozen times already, but he knew that he had to tell them. "I...err...I felt something...and then blackness started to creep up around me. The grass and the trees..."

  "Yeah they're still black," Methos told him.

  "It's so creepy to have to walk that way," Libby shuddered.

  "I felt like it was surrounding me, or at least trying to," Will told them. "It was so weird...I knew it was there, but I couldn't make it out. I heard something, a scream or some sort of weird shriek," They all pointed at Lucy, who blushed deeply; this confused Will even more. "You screamed...I've never heard you scream before?"

  "Probably a good thing, we couldn't hear for days," Selena told him, smirking at Lucy, because she knew it annoyed her.

  "It was a warning shriek, not a scream...and...err...it worked," Lucy said as off handily as she could, but she knew that her face was still bright red because she could feel herself burning up.

  "Oh, if you're interested they also found out who's been selling their story to the papers," Eddie told him. "It was Harry...err...was his last name Miller...anyway, it was him. He completely freaked out when they confronted him about it,"

  "Nathan's still quite angry about it; he had actually thought they were friends...but the things that he said..." Lucy said annoyed shaking her head.

  "He got kicked out, and him and his family had their memories altered," Methos told him.

  "So, I've been wondering...would they do that to anyone else?" Libby asked nervously, making them all look at her.

  "I gue
ss that would depend upon what you did, but the safety of the people come first," Lucy told her.

  "I'm not going to do anything, I was just wondering..." Libby told them quickly. "I like it here...and all of you. I don't like the attacks of course, but everything else is great."

  "Okay then," Selena said; and then they all turned back around to Will.

  "I wonder why it came after you like that?" Methos said thoughtfully.

  "The book," Will told them as though this was obvious, but they all just looked at him as though they had no idea what he was talking about. "The Black Knight...I told you about the book, and what happened when I found it,"

  "You didn't tell me," Lucy said annoyed that he would leave her out of something like this.