Ascendance

8

We unloaded our things and headed to the cabin. It was rather small, with the living room being most of the home, the kitchen was in the back and the rooms were to the side. I wonder if we would all have to share a bathroom. I hope there's some Lysol around.

"This place hasn't changed a bit." Kyra set her suitcase down by the door. Karenina went to the kitchen to check the fridge.

"Well, it's stocked up on food for the time being." Karenina closes the fridge door. She looks through the pantry as well. Brendan goes to the room in the middle.

"I guess you can pick a room. Karenina and I will share." Kyra moves her suitcase. I choose the one closer to the kitchen. I felt like I was on vacation but not really.

Kyra cooks some fancy pasta for us. It had tomatoes, capers, olives and feta cheese. I hate most of the ingredients but I eat it to not be rude. There's a few movies, mostly ones I've never watched before and a few familiar ones. There's some books, mostly classics and Harry Potter. There's some board games too. Scrabble, Monopoly (which was banned from my house from how competitive Lydia and Dad are) and Connect Four were the ones I saw.

"Does she have any cards in there?" Brendan asked, peeking out of the threshold of the other room.

"No, she doesn't." I get up from my knees. I was growing used to being without my phone. My parents would probably think that was a good thing. God, I miss them. Brendan gets out of the room with a deck of cards in hand.

"Anyone want to play against me?" He raised his brow.

"No, thanks. You always beat me." Kyra was putting away the leftovers.

"I will." Karenina smiled. "You're the only one who's at my expertise level."

"I'll be better than you soon." Brendan spoke playfully. They sat down on the table. I decided to watch them play. They both seemed extremely concentrated on their decks. Brendan and Karenina seem to only focus on their decks. Finally, Karenina smiled and pulled card after card from her deck.

"I won!" She cheered, smiling.

"Booo.." Brendan chuckled. "You wanna try, Erika?"

"I guess. I don't know how to play through." I sat next to him.

"You don't know how to play cards?" Brendan asked, looking surprised.

"My parents never really taught us." I sighed. My parents didn't really play any table games besides the one time we tried Monopoly, dominos and the occasional loteria game. I was pretty good at the latter, to the point I earned one hundred and sixty dollars off the family in one night. I had spent it on makeup and getting my nails done.

"Well, we'll teach you today." Brendan spoke, smiling at me. I spent the next hour or so learning how to play cards with both Brendan and Karenina guiding me through it.

"I won!" I shout with joy as I finish lining up my cards.

"Not bad." Karenina put her deck up. "I'm going to go shower and set up for a meeting with the Agency."

Brendan and I put the rest of the cards up.

"That was fun." I remarked as Brendan closed the card book up.

"Yeah." He spoke. Suddenly, I heard a clash outside and a screech. We all booked it at the back door. It was Kyra fighting an octopus. She was trying to pull it off her face.

Kyra cast a burn spell and the creature fell off of her face, writhing in agony. Karenina shot it in the head, causing bits of blood and flesh to hit us.

"You alright?" Karenina asked Kyra. Kyra sighed and nodded.

"There's been worse things in my face." She looked annoyed. We went back inside where Karenina cleaned out Kyra's cuts with peroxide.

"They found us, didn't they?" I ask, feeling upset.

"Yep. Brendan, go check on the car. Seeing you can find a tracker." Karenina says, dabbling cotton balls on Kyra.

"Brings back memories, doesn't it?" Kyra asked Karenina.

"Oh, yeah." Karenina smiles.

"What happened, Kyra?" I asked her.

"Now or...?"

"Now."

She sighs. "I was taking out the trash when a cephalopod attacked me. It was trying to install itself on my neck. That's when we started fighting."

"Yikes." The cuts on her face look bad.

"Looks like you'll need stitches, Ky." Karenina shakes her head.

"Oh. Joy." Kyra groans. Brendan returns with a chip.

"It was inside of a seat. They've been tracking us." Brendan sighed. "We should get out of here."

"Agreed." Karenina spoke. "And to urgent care or something."

Kyra sighed. "Okay." We didn't even get the chance to unpack. That's annoying. After shoving a few snacks into our packs, Brendan throws the chip at the lake and we drive off to an urgent care.

"So do the bad guys normally go for your face?" I ask her, trying to joke.

"Yeah, I guess." Kyra sighed. "Want to know how Karenina and I met? She murdered the man who was trafficking me as part of an undercover mission. We escaped him together. One of his favorite punishments for the girls who crossed him was cutting their face with a razor blade."

Jesus Christ, I can't imagine how painful it must have been for her to go through all of that.

"Yeah, that's why he ended up with them in his throat." Karenina lights a cigarette. Well, good riddance to that bastard. I hope he choked on them.

"How did you end up in the Agency?" I asked, slightly trying to move the conversation to a different topic.

"She freed me and the other girls from him. I chose to go with her and Alberto hired me as a Agent as a favor to Karenina." Kyra sighed. We finally reached urgent care. I hope that they don't ask too many questions. I don't think I could explain what's happening.