Dari Cross (On Hold)

Part Twenty One

This is deticated to my buddy mkay77 who is completely awesome!

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“Yes,” The graying man agrees.

I look up again, into his eyes. How can I trust him? The last man in charge…dead, most likely. Yes that’s right, I killed him. When I was working for N.O.V.A. I killed him. He was the leader of the band of rebels against the institute. “So how’s life been for the past two years,” I say with a wide smirk.

The man before me seems to lose all of his calm for a few seconds before returning to normal. “Fine, actually. We have gained more and more of our kind over the past years,”

“So you are like me? What can you do?”

My smile grew wider. Oh how I love making it difficult for this guy. I already hypothesized that this man was attempting to get me to join his buddies of mutants for a pay back to N.O.V.A. after they stole some of the Evolutionist’s own and used them as experiments. He would need to do a whole lot better job than that. Before he could speak a word, a woman appeared to his rescue. She eyed me very closely with her deep sea blue eyes. She approached me with caution, her dark hair waving around her shoulders. The woman seemed extraordinarily off, her gaze never wavering, never blinking. She finally stopped inches before me, her breath cold upon my face. “Men just never learn,” She says in a deep French accent.

Her crystal, ocean eyes suddenly turned into a horrible night like shade. Darkness clouded my own vision, pain erupting in every corner of my soul. This pain was worse than Cole’s “death,” it felt as if my soul was being ripped from my body. I felt myself dyeing inside.

Dari’s P.O.V.

A horrific pain etches itself across my brain. The dry tears plastered to my face begin to fall once more. I hear distant yelling and crying, not knowing if this was me or not. I wish for it to end, for myself to be put out of this agony. And it does almost as my wishes plead for. I slowly re-open my eyes. I lay on my side in a ball of what was once petrifying pain. Miles, Cole, Skylar, Autumn, and the rest of the gang peer down at me. “What just happened?” Jenna asked.

I ignore this, before turning to the rest of the eight. “Did you guys feel that?”

They all nod, except Sky and Jenna. “But not as much as you seemed to have experienced,” Miles says.

“It was more like an awful twinge, or migraine,” Cole puts in.

I gingerly move to a sitting position, my mind feeling like a punching bag. “It’s Logan, they’ve done this to him,” I murmur.

“Who has?” Kenleigh asks softly.

I shake my head, “I’m not sure, they just took him and none of them were N.O.V.A.s, no badge or anything,”

I think back to a week earlier where my file was empty except for a note. You are next. Maybe that’s what it meant, but why take Logan instead? When he cringed…it was for him wasn’t it? It was a warning to him from his past. “Um can someone explain to me what the heck just happened?” Jenna nags once more.

I blink tiredly, looking back up at her. “We are all connected by this symbol on our arms,” I role up my sleeve and glance down at my mark.

Something was wrong, one of the dots were glowing. I look up at the rest of the eight, they get my silent message and look at their own marks. Nods come from all of them, so it wasn’t just me. I stare back down at the glowing dot, thinking. Each dot must represent each one of us, is this one Logan’s? What does it mean? Is he…is he gone? I gulp as Jenna continues to look at me for an answer. Autumn comes to my rescue as she begins to explain. “So as Dari said the eight of us are all connected. Well what she means,” she says, moving her hands, “is that when one of us is hurt or dying we can also feel their pain. This happened once before when Cole was stabbed or something and he “died” but since he has healing, yeah, he came back to life,”

Jenna looks slightly shocked by this before speaking up again, “So you all are one of the eight?”

“No,” Skylar says stiffly.

Jenna turns to her, “No mark?”

Sky shakes her head. “So where’s is the missing one?”

We all stiffen; Miles and I cringe more than the others. Jenna takes steps back, an expression of knowing her mistake on her face. “Number Three, Grace Kinsley, is currently not exactly on our side,” I say quickly.

“Not on our side?” Miles huffs, “She betrayed us, and she betrayed Logan,”

He stands angrily and stalks off, disappearing back inside the ware house. “Um, I’ll go check on him,” Skylar mumbles, her brown eyes worried.

I look down at my mark, the glowing dot no longer glows, but it seemed as if a piece of it had disappeared. I rubbed my thumb over it gently as tingles ran through all of the present eight around me. “I’m so sorry,” Autumn says, sitting beside me.

 I shake my head, tears at the verge of pouring onto my cheeks.  I feel the rest of them back off slowly, heading back inside. Now in the cold with Autumn by my side, I let small tears fall on to my cheeks. Autumn stretched her arm around me, trying extremely hard to comfort me. “I’m such a loser,” I murmur through sobs.

“No you are not! Don’t ever say that about yourself! You are a freaking super hero for Christ’s sake!”

This makes me smile. “And you are my best friend,” She adds.

“Why is this happening to me?”

Autumn shakes her head slowly. “I don’t know, maybe you could ask that Gray guy, isn’t he a time traveler….gosh that sounds so weird,”    

“Hmm,” I reply, standing.

Before I can go and ask him, the boy appears. “You called?” He asked with his knowing eyes.

“No, well not exactly, but I was going to come and ask you something,”

He nods, seeming to know what I wanted to say. “Well I want to know where Logan is,”

He furrows his eyebrows, thinking. “You saw the future, didn’t you?” I ask, almost pleading for him to help me find Logan.

He turns back to me, staring with those piercing dark eyes of his. “I have, friend, but if you find out where he is now then it will create the butterfly affect,”

“The butterfly wha?” Autumn blurts in.

“The butterfly affect is where for example you go back in time to stop one thing, but in the process well let’s say you cause a butterfly to move off course, which causes a hawk to fly down, and in this distraction the hawk hits a car who kills the man who possibly cured cancer,”

Autumn makes a 0 shape with her mouth, her eyes wide. Turning back to Gray I ask, “Will I ever find him?”

He pauses, “Yes, but you need to wait for the right inside man to help you,”

Before any further questions he turns heal and leaves, disappearing back inside the ware house. “What was that all about?” Autumn asks.

I glance over at my friend before murmuring, “Gray has his ways,” 

Like the strange boy before me, I open the roof door and walk slowly down the creaking stairs as Autumn trails closely behind me. I unfasten the second door and ignore the five others who stand by lanterns and flash lights, before setting myself down and closing my eyes. I’m going to find you Logan, no matter how long it takes. Just promise me to stay alive until then.

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Thanks so much for reading! Much is appreciated. So until next time folks! And an early Merry Christmas to you!