Naihabi Ridge

Chapter Twenty-Five - The Gathering

I fingered at the feather Soha had made with my thumb as I sat on the makeshift bed Master Romia sent me to. We were all still in the southernmost hideout and not long after the first time I got lost in my thoughts, Master Romia caught on to my distractedness and immediately escorted me to the room I had left and banished me to there to rest. I couldn't exactly refuse her, either. It's not like I could overcome my dizziness and constant daymares anyway, so I sat there and I stayed there after she left.

Suddenly, the orange tip of the feather began glowing and I started, dropping it like a hot stone. It fluttered and landed peacefully on the ground, then, like a glorified dust cloud, plumes of metallic orange spurt out from the feather and Soha was suddenly present in the form of a stunning golden figure holding her own orange-tipped feather. I blinked several times, my mouth agape, and I searched for words that just wouldn't come to me.

"Why are you here?"
    
"A war is brewing and everyone here will perish if something is not done about it."

I furrowed my brows and I slowed to a befuddled pause, not quite processing what she just said.
    
"Your comrades will die. Do you understand?" She swept across the ground silently, fiddling with her own feather, "You must do something."

I opened my mouth to speak, but then I shut it again and glared at her. I already had Master Romia on my back about getting sleep and now I had Soha trying to get me up and out of bed before a single moment of rest. How was I ever supposed to heal if I went out and did...

"What would I even do?" I raised my voice unintentionally and glanced at my slung right arm, "I can't even write, much less—!"

Then Soha disappeared, her light snuffed out like a candle as the much duller light from the tunnel flooded into the room. Kit stood in the doorway, his hand still clutching the cloth hanging over the entrance and his eyebrows raised like he caught me doing something bad.

"Who were you talking to? Or screaming at, I should say."

I just stared at him incredulously. Could he ever just keep a thought inside his head?

"You're delusional, I've been trying to sleep." My flitted to the feather on the ground.

For a moment the room was quiet and his face became confused, then he muttered something to himself and sighed. "I was sent to tell you to meet in the main room. The plan has been decided."

+++

"There are four groups, each with five people including a captain," Master Romia spoke to everyone in the hideout including my cabin-mates and every other refugee we were taking with us. "Each group is represented by a color." She pointed to the enlarged map she had set up with a long wooden rod. Scattered around different parts of the map were four colored dots: yellow, blue, green, and black. Four colors easily distinguished.

"For the next two days, these colors will be your lifelines, your heart, and your spirit, so you'd do well to memorize them." She quickly lifted the rod from where she was pointing and smacked it back down with a loud snap. "Now, leaders, you know your groups and you know the plan. Take your groups, go through everything thoroughly, and prepare yourselves for your moment of truth."
    
A loud chaos erupted and we were quickly hustled along like cattle by a group of people who were clearly in charge and within ten minutes, everyone had been sectioned off into their group and the cacophony of noises settled to a more somber murmur.
    
Coincidentally, I ended up in the same group as Torin. I was also with two other rebels I had seen hanging around Master Romia: one of them a gnarly-looking brute named Broch and the other was Freire, a runty boy with bright blond hair and a deep scar on his left cheek. He looked like a nervous wreck. Almost as nervous as I was to see that Grengal as the leader.

My palms became sweaty when I saw Grengal's gaze linger on me. I was positive he had just recently learned my name wasn't actually Alphonse—Master Romia told him herself, much to my dismay. I chewed on my lip and averted my gaze, then Grengal turned around to the rest of the group and made me feel worse. His eyes were just like the last time I saw them: hard and cold as stone.

"The positions are as follows: Torin on defense; Broch is with me on offense; Avi is the lookout; Freire..." he paused in front of the short boy and watched him quiver for a second, "...you can be the runner. We will move as a group and if someone doesn't make it, we keep moving. This is a ruthless mission, men, and we have to be just as ruthless to survive."

"Yes, sir!" Freire yelped, alone.

"I'm not finished," Grengal said blankly, then he looked me dead in the eye and I pressed my mouth into a tight line. "Avi, under no circumstances are you to engage in combat. I can tell you now that every collector and soldier out there will be stronger than you. Don't die."

I nodded vigorously and he turned to Torin with a dry gaze. "You look determined enough, but will you be able to concentrate long enough to properly defend us?"
    
Torin cracked a convincing smile and Grengal huffed and turned to Freire, "You can run?"
    
He let out a small squeak and nodded, then Grengal turned to Broch and began a long, complicated speech that I couldn't quite pay attention to.

"Do you know Grengal?" Torin asked me quietly.

"Why?" I searched his face for an answer and I seemed to forget he was always smiling.

"Well do you know him or not, Grans?"

"Stop calling me that," I turned back to Grengal, running a hand through my embarrassing white hair, and paused when I realized neither of us had answered each other's questions. I opened my mouth to ask again, but Grengal had finished his speech by then and spared no time unfurling a map of his own, then he set it on the sandy ground and loudly cleared his throat.

"As you have been told, there are four groups. We are the blue. Tonight, we'll use red to represent the militia and collectors as sources have told us they've been working together in this operation." He dropped five colored pebbles on the map and set them in what appeared to be random spots around the buildings. The blue pebble was right in the middle of my former bunkhouse.
   
"The yellow group will be surrounding Romia's quarters—right outside the southern part of the summoning building—while the green group"—he slid the green pebble inside the summoning building—"infiltrates the summoning building and causes a commotion. As the militia try to calm the chaos the green group causes, the black group will be trying to get through the northern part of the summoning building on the other side of the Ridge. In the meantime, we will be waiting in the only empty bunkhouse until we see the black group's signal. After we see the signal, we will head toward the green group and aid in the escape, but don't forget that we are only aid; Romia designed this group as a backup in the battle and our main goal is to find the escape wagons and prepare them for the rest of the groups."
    
After saying all this and returning my headache to me, Grengal sighed and gave us all another stern look.
   
"Once we enter the summoning building, you'll see things that will most likely never leave your mind; you'll feel the truest form of fear you'll ever experience. But once you get out of there, it'll be over, all of it. You can start a new life in the town of Ethenbrook if you like, or just keep traveling if that's what your call is," his voice darkened and he shook his head slowly, "but just don't die out there."

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Hello, there. As it turns out, Naihabi Ridge is now a proud award winner! First place in the Action genre of The Golden Awards 2018. *sniffs to holds back happy tears*

And sorry this chapter took so long to finish. I had to finalize the escape plan on paper which meant making a map and agonizing over it for a long time.

Anyway, if you liked the content, vote for it. Comments, questions, suggestions, criticism (preferably constructive), you name it, all welcomed. Hit me up in the comments, peeps.

The picture is a photo manipulation made using ibisPaint X. Any ibisPaint users out there? Graphics, sketches, digital art in general?...