The Cosmic Princess

Just in Time

Realizing that her words of wisdom were finished, I began pulling against the chains again. My feet were barely touching the floor, my tippy toes just skimming the murky damp surface. Unfortunately because of us being held up by chains, my struggling ultimately caused my chains to began swinging back and forward.

I groaned lowly, letting out a whimper of dismay, feeling my arms cry in protest with each forward and backward movement.

"Great job." Kaiya sarcastically pipped from beside me. "How's the pain in your arms going?"

"Shut up!" I hissed at her patronizing tone while clenching my teeth trying to conceal my cries of pain. Swinging back and forward, I dropped my head trying to get control of my emotions. The pain was so agonizing that I wanted to cry, but I held the tears at bay. I had to be strong if I wanted to get out of this...and smart.

An idea suddenly sprung to mind. "Hey, Mist how are these chains hung up?" Voice was quiet, barely restraining from yelling out. I was trying to not focus on the pain, but my arms were still be swung out of my control.

"By the stones, they're embedded in the stones why?" She asked. Her eyes were filled with concern seeing me in clear pain,

"You'll see." Taking a deep breath, trying to focus on the wall in front of me I began to try to block out everything else. During my training, Ike had taught me how to block out pain and emotions during combat. He said the better your blocked it out the more you were able to focus. Unfortunately, the only time I seemed to be able to block out pain was when I wasn't putting my full focus on that instead of using my powers. I had slowly began getting better and better at it too. Of course, I wasn't skilled enough to block the pain out a hundred percent, but I could block it out to be just enough.

If I could just block out everything like he taught me then the throbbing pain in my arms would just become just a dull buzz.

The harder I stared, the more the wall in front of me began to become detailed. I could now see small plants that had slowly crawled across the groves of the black stones and found their homes in the tight cracks. I could also see the dampness of the bricks and the way the stones dully glowed, the glowing was nearly invisible if you didn't look at it closely. All to soon, Mist's and Kaiya's questioning voices faded into the distance.

I swung my weight forward only to feel the dull pain sprout in my arms when the shackles moved forward and swung me. I then swung my weight backward feeling the shackles moving with me. To Kaiya and Mist, I probably looked like some idiotic wannabe gymnast trying to swing from the shackles.

The swinging went on for a few moments, me trying to bring myself enough momentum to keep myself swinging without having to use my body. Once I reached this point, I closed my eyes mustering up some of my energy.

I knew I could move things anywhere I wanted, so if I focused that energy on pulling the chains I could hopefully create enough weight to break the chains. I searched for the energy to come to me, I practically called for it. But I could hardly gain any of my energy. I now understood the dire truth of how much I had overexerted myself yesterday. I could barely draw any energy and my already weakened state was doing nothing to help that. But still I pushed forward to find it. Just as I was beginning to lose my momentum, I felt a small surge of energy flow through me from some distant reservoir.

Reaching out to it, I pushed harder to gain control of it. And finally I was able to barely grasp it and used it or my benefit. As my energy pushed downward weight onto the chains, I felt the chains cracking. The pain in my arms were beginning to take over again, my focus wavering, but I kept my attention on the chains.

With my swinging and the downward momentum the chains would surely break.

"Or you plan was completely stupid and you would have caused yourself unnecessary pain and energy depletion."  My voice pessimistically droned in, and I scowled.