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June 2015

The smell of food woke me again. But this time I was the last to get up and eat. I was sore and felt horrible. And he was there, staring again. I shuddered and focused on eating.

The big man who carried me out of the tunnels was also watching me, but with a different expression. I couldn't tell what he was thinking and decided to stay clear of him.

Before long we were walking again. I saw both men watching me and fell back to the back of the group. Neither followed, thankfully.

"He's just worried about you, you know?" the green haired girl suddenly said, startling me.

Where she'd come from I couldn't say, but her words confused me. She pointed ahead but all I saw was the man with the grin. "He isn't worried about me!" I said with a shudder.

She frowned and followed my gaze. Her expression turned dark. He must have noticed because he suddenly moved away. "Not him, though now I think I understand why he's worried. I'm talking about Corey." she said.

"Corey? Who is that?" I asked.

"The big guy who knew Lisa. The ogre?" she said.

"Lisa said that, too. Why do you call them ogres?" I said.

She shrugged, "I guess they look rather like ogres are supposed to look and they have the strength. Lisa seemed to like the idea, though Corey is less enthusiastic."

I said nothing, hoping she'd forgotten what she was saying before. No such luck. "Please talk to Corey." she said. "He can help. And if that other guy gives you any trouble, let me know."

Her tone frightened me. All of these Wyld seemed dangerous. Maybe what they said about us was true? I certainly looked less than human now. And he looked vicious with those sharp teeth.

I fell farther behind and thought about going off on my own. I knew I wouldn't last long, or I would have. Even knowing that I almost did. But then he was there beside me, Corey.

"You'll never make it on your own." he said.

I shrugged, "What makes you think I would try?"

He tapped the side of his head, "I can feel it. Just like I can feel that someone hurt you."

I shrugged, "That was before. They can't hurt me anymore." I was glad of that, though I felt guilty about being happy about never seeing my family again.

He shook his head, "No, not them. Him." He didn't point or otherwise indicate direction, but I knew who he was referring to. How he knew, I couldn't say.

He growled when I stayed silent, "Don't try to pretend with me. I can feel it. It hurts me almost as much as it does you. Let me help you?" He pleaded with me with his eyes and his voice. It was strange to see such a fearsome looking guy speak like that to me.

"There's nothing you can do." I whispered.

Another growl, "Yes there is! Please, tell me what's going on?!"

"It's my place; my duty. It's okay." I said, trying to sound like I meant it.

"WHO told you THAT!?!" he roared, his face mere inches from mine. I shrank away and started running. He yelled for me to stop, so I ran faster. But suddenly the ground under my feet lurched upwards and I found myself standing precariously on a twenty foot tower of rock.

"Sorry about that." the green haired girl said, somehow standing on the rock beside me. "He gets a little worked up sometimes and forgets how frightening he can be."

"How did you get up here?!" I squeaked, barely managing not to fall off of the tower.

She grinned, "The same way I made the ground rise up like this. I'm an earth elemental. It's pretty cool."

"Are you people all crazy?!" I muttered.

"Maybe." she said, shrugging it off. "But you certainly are."

"What?!" I growled.

Her grin never wavered, "Good, you still have some spine left. I was starting to worry about that."

I growled again, a much deeper sound than I would have expected, "Just let me down, okay?"

"Not just yet. We need to talk. Since you won't listen to Corey, you get me. Name's Paige, by the way." she said, holding her hand out.

I just stared at her like she was nuts, which I thought she was, until she dropped the hand with a sigh. "You're going to be difficult, aren't you? Sorry, dumb question. Anyway, from what I've gathered so far, the creepy guy with the sharp teeth did or said something to you he shouldn't have, right? Dish!" she said it like she was waiting for juicy gossip.

"It's nothing; it doesn't matter!" I growled, cringing at the sounds I was making. I really was an animal!

Paige sighed, dropping the chipper act, "Look, whatever your name is, listen." She moved up so close I could feel her breath on my face, staring intently into my eyes, "Whatever bullshit you've been fed is just that; bullshit! Whatever creepy guy did or said was wrong, end of story. How do I know? Because it hurt you and, through you, Corey. Frankly, I'm having a hard time caring about you right now, but Corey is my friend. So you're going to tell me what happened so I can make it right even if you're too screwed up to do it yourself."

She didn't say anything more, just stood there staring into my eyes. I looked down, ashamed. "It's my fault, not his. It shouldn't bother me. It's what we're for." I said.

"We're for?! What the hell is that supposed to mean?!" Paige demanded.

"Dad told me. After Mom died. He needed me to take her place. He didn't have time to take care of the house or cook the meals. And he has... needs. It was my job as the woman of the house." I said weakly.

She just stared at me in shock for a minute. Finally, she shook herself and said, "Wait, let me get this straight! You're dad filled your head with this 'woman's place' bullshit so you just opened your legs for that guy?!"

"It hurts more if you fight it." I said softly, remembering...

"Shit!" Paige muttered. She paced around the tiny tower and then stopped and screamed incoherently. I couldn't look at her, but when I looked away I found everyone was stopped staring at us. And they were getting closer.

"I'll take care of this shit right now!" Paige declared, confidently stepping off the shrinking tower. Steps pushed themselves out to catch her feet. She strode directly towards him. He tried to hide behind the others but she never lost sight of him for a moment. She stopped only when she was within inches of him.

"What do you want?" he asked hesitantly.

"I want to know what your damage is, asshole!" she said angrily.

"What?!" he exclaimed, glancing furtively towards me.

"Aw, fuck this!" she growled. She stepped back and the ground rose up around him, forming a cage of stone.

"Let me out of here!" he demanded, grabbing the bars and pulling on them to no effect.

"What are you doing Paige?!" Corey demanded, pushing his way through the crowd.

By then the tower was gone and I was on solid ground again. Everyone was looking back and forth between Paige, him, and me. I wanted to crawl in a hole somewhere and wished I had Paige's powers.

"I'm trying to decide if I should leave him here or just squash him!" she replied, barely glancing at the larger Wyld.

"What?!" he exclaimed.

This was followed by a whispered conversation involving Paige, Corey and him. Whenever someone tried to get close enough to hear Corey would growl at them until they backed off. It didn't take long; he's scary when he wants to be.

When they were done Paige began to dissolve the cage. He looked smug, until Corey grabbed his canteen and sleeping back and pulled them out so Paige could close it back up again.

"Hey, let me out of here!" he screamed.

"Not happening asshole!" Paige said smugly. "You get to stay right here until we're out of range. When that happens the cage will dissolve. It'll be up to you how you survive after that. Personally, I hope you don't!"

There were a lot of grumbles at that, but Paige and Corey refused to listen to them. The other guides came up for an explanation, but they seemed satisfied and started leading everyone off. They all looked at me as they did; having obviously picked up on my connection to all of this. I hung my head and followed slowly behind the rest.

"Where do you think you're going, bitch?! Get back here, you belong to me!" he screamed after me.

I slowed to a stop, not sure what to do. I wanted to go; I really did. But... Before I could make up my mind Paige grabbed one arm and Corey the other. They led me away from him; practically carrying me whenever I paused when he demanded I come back.

"You don't belong to him. You don't belong to anybody but yourself." Corey said with feeling.

"Yeah, girl, listen to the ogre. He's got his head on straight. Usually." Paige said, grinning at Corey when he glanced her way.

He rolled his eyes back at her and continued tugging me along. Eventually I couldn't hear his cries anymore and it became easier to ignore him.

"When we get settled tonight," Paige said after several minutes of silent walking, "you and I are going to have a long chat about 'our place'. It's too bad your father isn't here so I could deal with him, too."

"You want to cage him, too?" Corey asked.

She shook her head, "Nah, I'd just squish him. He's not worth the trouble of torturing. I only let the other guy live 'cause I didn't want to have a riot. He deserves to die."

Corey chuckled weakly, "Sometimes I worry about you, Neon."

She growled, "Don't call me that, ogre!"

They went back and forth with silly name calling and jokes. It was obvious they'd been friends for a while. I wasn't sure what to think about either of them. Corey could be scary, but was usually very caring. Paige was nice when she wanted to be, but vicious. Would I ever meet a Wyld that was... normal?

Things settled down after that; though most of the others stayed away from me. I guess they were afraid of making Paige or Corey mad. For their part, at least one of them was with me pretty much all the time. I got used to them, but never felt entirely comfortable.

When we crossed the border into Mexico I couldn't say. Especially since the actual border was always shifting. One of these days Mexico would get itself organized and push back at Texas but it hadn't happened yet. Eventually it did become obvious we were in Mexico. You didn't see too many burned out buildings full of corpses in Texas. At least, not ones that had obviously been like that for a while.

"What happened here?" someone asked.

The guy who had ridden on the dragon's back answered, "Warlords. They are always fighting down here. We should stay away from civilization as much as possible while we're here. They won't react to Wyld the same way they do back home, but it's dangerous for anybody."

We passed the buildings in silence; all of us gazing around warily for any sign of movement. There were none and soon it passed out of sight. Several days of grueling walking followed. The heat was oppressive and we had trouble finding good water. A couple of times Paige had to open a deep crevice in the ground to get any.

Thankfully, we came to the ocean without any trouble beyond the water and food issues. We were rationing the food we'd brought and all of us were getting weaker. There had been another food stash along the way but it had already been looted. We were all getting irritable by the time the ocean came into sight.

"So, now what?" a young woman asked.

One of the guides I had not heard speaking before answered, "There's supposed to be a boat waiting for us. I'll scout around and see what the hold up is." With that she ran towards the ocean and jumped; wings of flame blossoming on her back and bearing her up into the sky.

"Wow!" several people breathed.

Paige grunted, "Fire elementals; always getting all the attention!"

"She's a phoenix, not a fire elemental." Corey chided.

She waved that off, "That's what she says! Hmph! She's just a weak fire elemental trying to put on airs if you ask me."

Corey rolled his eyes in response. I couldn't help but giggle at their antics. I couldn't remember laughing so much as I had around them since Mom was alive...

A few minutes later the phoenix returned with a somber expression. "Sorry guys, no boat." she said after she landed.

"What could have held it up?" the dragon riding guy wondered.

"Uh, sorry, that's not what I meant. I found the boat. It's just not going to do us any good. It's been destroyed." she replied.

"Shit!" Paige yelled. "Now what?!"

"I don't suppose there is a water elemental among you?" Corey asked, addressing all of us. We all looked at each other doubtfully. "I guess not. Anybody have any powers that might help us get across the ocean without a proper boat?"

Two people raised their hands. One looked like a human-sized fairy, translucent wings and all. The other looked normal.

"Good! What can you two do?" Corey asked eagerly.

"Uh, I'm kind of a merman?" the normal looking guy said. "My legs turn into a tail and I can breath underwater. If we can get some kind of raft or something, I can push it."

Corey nodded thoughtfully, "We might be able to arrange something. What about you?"

The fairy girl shrugged, "I can pull the raft or whatever."

"Those wings don't look that strong." Paige noted.

She shrugged again, "They're not, right now. But in my little form I'm a lot stronger."

"Little form?" Corey asked.

She nodded and began to shrink right before our eyes! In moments she was only about a foot tall. She flew into the air, zipping around us like a hummingbird. Then she grabbed onto Corey's shirt and lifted him into the air!

"Whoa!" Corey exclaimed. She laughed musically before putting him down.

Paige clapped her hands together, "Okay, we can work with this. Anyone else? No, okay. I'll make the boat, you guys will push and pull it. I'll also make some oars, but Corey here might be the only one strong enough to use them."

With that she got to work. She knelt on the ground and closed her eyes in concentration. A moment passed without anything happening, but then the ground shook as something pushed itself out of the ground. A large stone the size of a horse rose slowly until it could roll onto the ground. Then another, and another. Before long there was half a dozen large boulders lying around her. Then they began to flow into each other!

We all gasped, except for the guides. Slowly a boat's hull formed. It was a large longboat, just big enough for all of us. There was a little stone left which she used to form oars. I could see why she said Corey might be the only one who could use it. I could lift one, but that's about it.

"How are we going to get that into the water?!" someone asked.

Paige stood, brushing herself off. "Easy. Just start walking, it will keep up." With that Paige started walking towards the ocean. The other guides urged us to follow but we all stopped and stared for a minute when the boat started sliding along on a bed of sand without anyone touching it.

"Man, it must be cool to have powers like that!" a werewolf-looking guy breathed. I could only nod in agreement.

Soon the boat was half in the water and half on the beech. We all climbed in except for the merman, fairy and phoenix. She insisted on flying as much as possible to keep the weight down.

The fairy shrank down to her smallest size and perched on the front of the boat. Paige formed a handhold for her to use to pull the boat along. Once the boat was in the water she formed another on the bottom for the merman. The fairy towed us out, the pace quickening rapidly when the merman added his strength to hers. And picked up again when Corey put the oars to work.

We moved along at a fair clip with Paige navigating. She said that she could feel the direction of north like a compass and guided us unerringly.

Eventually Corey got tired. Several people tried to take up the oars but only two of us could handle them at all. Oddly enough, I was one of them. Paige had formed rings for the oars to go through so all I had to do was lift a portion of their weight and pull against the water. They didn't seem that heavy that way but I was obviously stronger than before.

Eventually our pace slowed. The merman stuck his head out of the water and said he needed a break. We hauled him in. The phoenix joined soon after, extinguishing her flame wings a few feet above us and dropping into Corey's waiting arms. She didn't seem very comfortable with that and he quickly set her down. The fairy actually lasted the longest before she had to rest. She quickly reverted to her human size when she did.

The wolfman, Corey and I took turns at the oars, though Corey always lasted the longest. Eventually we were all too tired and drifted in silence until we fell asleep.

---

Something tugging my hair woke me. Brushing at my hair groggily my hand came in contact with... feathers? That woke me up! I sat upright and startled several seagulls away from the boat. Corey was already awake, pulling away at the oars.

"Annoying, aren't they?" he said breathlessly.

"How long have you been up?" I asked.

He shrugged, "A while."

"Why don't I take a turn? You look tired." I suggested. He agreed and we switched places. The movement startled a few others awake, including the phoenix. She decided to lighten our load and started flying again.

Before long everyone was awake and we were moving at a good clip again with our merman and fairy help. The phoenix came back down long enough to heat up our last cans of food. It was interesting to watch. She just held them in her hands and they burst into flame! But she wasn't harmed.

Shared around the entire group there wasn't much. Especially when those of us providing the muscle moving the boat got the lion's share. I protested that, but still got fed half a can. The merman and fairy got a whole can each. Nobody begrudged them that, though. Their contributions were obvious and impressive.

But after two days of travel we were all getting weaker again. Especially those responsible for keeping the boat moving. Corey and the fairy were handling it the best. The wolfman was no longer strong enough to pull the oars at all and I couldn't last more than half an hour at a time. The merman was struggling, too.

Even the phoenix was exhausted, having to spend most of her time on the boat. We were nearly out of water, too. It didn't look good for us.

On the fourth day out someone spotted a boat behind us. We all tensed at this news and redoubled our efforts. For a time we left the boat behind. But fatigue caught up and they closed the distance.

"Who are they?" the phoenix asked worriedly.

"Probably the same ones that destroyed our boat." Paige said darkly.

"Maybe, maybe not. But let's get to Hawaii as soon as we can just to be on the safe side." Corey said.

On the morning of our fifth day the boat was close enough to get a good look at. And it wasn't a small boat, but a large warship! "A battleship?! I didn't think anybody used those anymore!" Corey exclaimed.

"Shit! This isn't good. I heard a few weeks ago that Texas recommissioned a couple of them." Paige said.

Corey's eyes widened in what I could only think was fear, "That's not good. We need to move faster!"

He put his words to action and took his turn at the oars again. We lurched forward, his urgency lending strength to the fairy and merman. But it was clear we weren't going to get away. The battleship was just too fast and we were running out of steam. Even Corey.

And suddenly she was there. Standing among us like she'd been there the whole time. "Hey guys, need some help?" she said.

Everything stopped as we gawked at this stunning blonde woman in shock. Even in the baggy sweatpants and tank top with her hair cut short she was beautiful. I felt an intense stab of envy. Going Wyld made me into a monster and she became beautiful! Unless she was like that before, but still!

"What can you do?" Corey asked, being the first to recover as usual.

"Fly. Fast." she said simply.

"Can you push or pull us?" Paige asked hopefully.

She stroked her chin in thought kind of like a guy with a beard or something. It was odd, to say the least. "I think if I pushed from behind I'd capsize you. And I think I'm going to need to be in contact with as much of the boat as possible for this to work. This thing looks like the work of an earth elemental. Think whoever made it can make some kind of harness like thing in the middle?" she asked finally.

Paige shrugged, "I'll try anything once. Get in whatever position you want and I'll shape the boat around you."

She laid down in the center of the boat and Paige caused the stone to flow up around her, leaving handholds and footholds for her to dig into. "Cool, this should work." she said. "But everybody better get in and lay low. This is likely to be bumpy."

Corey splashed the water three times, the signal he'd worked out for the merman to come up. The fairy stopped pulling and climbed down into the bottom of the boat, keeping her smaller form. Everyone got as low as we could and Paige added protrusions to hold onto. She had to use the oars for material but we weren't going to row our way out of this anyway.

Once we all said we were ready she said, "Hang on!" Suddenly the boat lurched forward, water spraying up on all sides. I was instantly soaked. Paige had to add holes for the water to get out or we would have drowned or sunk. But when I dared to look up I could see that we were moving at an unbelievable pace.

There was a booming sound and we suddenly stopped. Something hit the water ahead of us and a wall of water shot up, soaking us all over again. "They're shooting!" someone screamed.

Everyone began panicking, but the flying girl just smiled, "Don't worry. We got this covered. Watch." With that she pointed back towards the battleship, which was much further away now. The guns fired, flattening the water around the ship. A moment later the booming sound came again. I thought we were going to be hit, but she suddenly pulled us forward far enough to dodge it.

When the spray cleared nobody was hurt. The blonde was still smiling so I looked back at the ship. Just as I did a beam of red light struck it just above the waterline. Water vaporized and the struck spot blackened. A moment later another beam shot out and struck the turret that fired at us. This beam lasted longer and caused the turret to glow red where it struck. The turret didn't move or fire after that.

"What's going on?" Corey asked.

"A friend of mine is covering us. Now that the guns are silenced I'll get us the rest of the way there." the blonde girl said. We all ducked down just in time for us to lurch forward again. The speed she was managing was astonishing! We were like a speed boat; cutting through the water and leaving a tall wake of water falling behind us.

We traveled like that for what seemed an eternity but was probably only an hour or two. When we stopped Hawaii was in sight and the battleship was turning away. I was surprised at that, since it hadn't taken that much damage by the looks of it. But then I saw the two Japanese gunships half out of the harbor and understood.

"We're safe!" someone yelled, followed by just about everybody else. The fairy towed us the last ways to a long pier. Paige freed the flyer from her stone harness and she flew off so fast it almost seemed she teleported. But she reappeared a moment later on the pier, waiting to tie off the boat. Once that was done we all gladly climbed out.

Once we were all out of the boat Paige broke it up, letting the pieces sink out of sight.

"So, what now?" someone asked.

---

To Be Continued...