Chapter 6: Chapter 4 Allies?

“Stop where you are.” The voice said again warningly and I could see the back of Natalie and Fred as they came to a halt in front of whoever was speaking. It wasn’t long before I was behind them and stopped too.

Facing us was a crossbow, more correctly a tan-skinned girl holding a crossbow. She didn’t look that much older than us, maybe in her early twenties. Her eyes narrowed as she assessed us one by one.  Fred had pushed Natalie directly behind him, shielding her from sight; Evanna relaxed when she saw the girl, I took that as a good sign, however if Tom was arriving too it also meant our pursuers must be here soon.

“I am really sorry, but there are some people chasing us, can you possibly just let us pass? That’s all we want, I swear.” I said desperately, holding my hands up to show the girl that we meant no harm. The sound of cussing and threats from them can be heard now. The girl narrowed her eyes at us, then to the direction where the hostiles are approaching before lowering her bow slightly.

“Mariah! What is taking you so long?” An angry voice sounded and a brand new group appeared; a mix of race and gender, all in good shape and carrying huge bags. Contrary to what the other group wear- their attire was more medieval than they were modern. Leather boots, tunics and a light weight jacket in forest green and brown, but they blend into their surrounding just as effectively.

“Who are these people?” The man approaching asked and eyed us warily, as if he was tired of seeing strangers; he looked to be in his late thirties, towering over everyone at six feet five and surprisingly slender. “We are not a charity; we don’t take on other bounty hunters in the middle of a forest.”

“There you are! Decided that running was no use eh?” Just when I thought the situation couldn’t get more messed up our pursuers arrived; I could sense the tension between the two groups as soon as they laid eyes on each other.

“You!” the girl Mariah bellowed and straightened her arms again immediately and point the arrow at the leader from the other group, a look of dislike clear on her face. The same look was mirrored across the new group; a glimmer of hope bubbled inside me, maybe we have a chance to escape this.

The triumphant look had slipped from the obnoxious man and replaced by a mask of annoyance. “We have some unfinished business with this lot here. I would appreciate it if you will leave us to sort this out ourselves.”

“We have no business with you.” Tom said with gritted teeth, glaring at the man. I saw Mariah exchanged a look with her leader. It seemed the two groups had already crossed each other, though I can’t say I am surprised. Those men are beasts.

“Alistair. You group are already on the probation list of the Association for illegal activities.” The leader of the new group said. “Surely you don’t want to get banned from coming out now do you?”

The man Alistair stiffened and gave a venomous look to him. “Mind you own business Trevor. They have no proves that we did anything.”

“We have just witnessed you chased this group here all the way into our base.” Trevor said as he frowned at Alistair. “I am sure that’s evidence enough for attempted murder.”

“You are insane.” Alistair’s face had turned dark and crow-like. “We were just having a misunderstanding. We definitely did not plan on murdering these fine people.”

“Yeah, but you planned on capturing us then sell us to the highest bidder.” I said, then immediately covered up my mouth for the slip-up. Both Alistair and Trevor, along with everyone else turned to look at me in shock.  However in Alistair’s case it was shock at the fact that I knew what they were planning, and in Trevor’s there was an underlying horror.

“Even though I have always known you are one douchebag. I had never pinned you as the type that would kidnap and sell his own kind.” Trevor said, his face almost unreadable now. His groupmates, however was much easier to read. They all looked outraged and completely disgusted by the revelation.

“You are going to believe the words of these strangers? For all you know they could be the ones who are planning to kill us all.” Alistair argued, waving a hand at us as he spoke. Trevor didn’t even glance at us before replying.

“Yes, I am sure that’s why they were trying to run away from you and looked like they had been through hell.”

Hell? I looked at myself and realized that we were all covered from head to toe in dirt, stain patches; parts of our clothing were ripped from all the running through vegetation. In short, we looked like a bunch of wildlings.

“This can be their disguise!” Alistair exclaimed, “Look at them! They are definitely not from around here.”

His works stroke home and we all looked uncomfortably at each other.  Trevor seemed to realize this too and gave us a calculating glance. An awkward silence descended as the three group looked at each other, attempting to work out the motives of each.

“This isn’t the point.” Trevor said courtly breaking the silence. Alistair pursed his lips and glared at us, as if warning us that this isn’t over before storming away with his crew.

“Thank you.” I said to Trevor after all trace of Alistair’s group had gone. He gave me a stiff nod whilst Mariah eyed us curiously.

“If you don’t mind, we will be leaving now.” Tom said mechanically, giving me a pointed look when I caught his eyes.

“Wait…” a guy behind Trevor suddenly said, stepping forward uncertainly, looking right at me. Everyone’s reaction was immediate; a hand grabbed me from behind pulling me backwards whilst Tom and Oscar had jumped forward to shield everyone behind them.

“Are you Abigail Beckett?” He asked, holding his hands up to show that he meant no harm. My eyes widened in shock, how the heck does this guy knows my name? His teammates looked at him and back to me with equally wide-eyes, as if they didn’t quite believe what is happening.

“How do you know my name?” I asked after a pause. If they wanted to capture us, kill us or hurt us they would have done so by now, and somehow I didn’t feel threatened by them. Maybe it’s because Mariah was already lowering her bow before Trevor arrived or the fact that he helped us get out of the sticky situation even though he didn’t have to. I have a feeling that these are good people.

“So you are Abigail Beckett?” This time it was Trevor who asked me. I saw recognition began to drawn in his eyes and I nodded. How are these people? Have I seen them before? Surely I will remember if I have met a group of POE who wore leathers and tunic.

“Thank god we found you!” Mariah exclaimed, and the group broke into a chorus of cheers and excited chatters. I looked at my friends who looked back at me with an equally puzzled face. Just what on Earth is going on here?

“Hi, my name is Trevor Holland.” Trevor said, stepping forward and shaking Tom’s hand, ignoring the less-than-friendly look on his face. “We are under the Ganesh family business.”

He then looked expectantly at me, as if it what he just said was enough to explain why they knew me and what was going on here. When he realized I had no idea what he was talking about, he frowned and exchanged a concerned look with the guy who recognized me.

“My name is Patrick.” The guy stepped forward and said, giving me a quick smile. “This really isn’t the best place for talking; we should head back to Yuanan City Base.”

Tom glanced at Fred as if expecting some sort of contribution from him, but the later kept his mouth shut and rested his hand protectively around Natalie’s waist, who looked at him quizzically. The idea of going into a Citybase was both comforting and worrying.  The thought of civilization after months of wilderness is very appealing; but on the other hand who knows what waits for us inside a Citybase? And those people who tried to capture us… would they be waiting for us to walk straight into their arms?

Patrick smiled at me and gestured for us to follow them into the forest, in the same general direction as Alistair group but a fair distant away. I looked back at my friends to see what they thought of this.

Evanna mouthed go to me and I gingerly followed the strangers in front of me. Tom took quick strides to the front overtaking me. I couldn’t help but smile; no matter how hard this guy tried to look cool and unaffected, there was no doubt that he cared a lot about us.

Seeing my smile Tom frowned at me whilst I flashed him a big smile, which caught him by surprise and his cheek turned into a colour suspiciously like red. Seeing that I seemed to notice he immediately turned around and stormed forward faster, making huffing noises under his breath. Blinking, I sub-consciously walked faster to catch up. Did Tom just blush because I smiled at him? Or was it just my imagination?

Before I had more time to think into it Holly and Owen quickly came to my side and started poking and pinching me (Okay, only Holly was poking and pinching), asking if I was alright. After assuring them repeatedly that I was okay, maybe it was just nerves, or power overuse, and they relent and stopped the poking.

We walked in almost silence after that. Patrick and Mariah, along with most of their teammates had all shot curious glances back at us, but made no attempt to talk. Trevor was all the way to the front leading the way, and kept glancing around the forest with a frown, as if he was looking out for something. We trek westward for about two hours, walking constantly and only pausing occasionally as Trevor scanned the landscape around us.

“Hey.” Patrick said, slowing down and joining me from the front as Trevor paused once again. Tom gave him a once over before deciding that he meant no harm and relaxed. Either he was being polite or just didn’t notice, Patrick continued to smile at everyone.

“Just a few pointers; we are now about to head back into the Citybase.” He said, nodding to the front where nothing was visible yet behind the thick vegetation. “All you need to do is to follow closely behind us; don’t talk to anyone, and try not to make eye contacts with them.”

We all nodded at his instructions “I promise we will explain things once we are inside the Citybase, but this is not the place to talk.” He said, shooting an apologetic smile to me. I return his smile, but inside I was wondering why he kept singling me out; Tom was the decision maker in the group, he was the one that had kept us alive and safe for this long. Although Fred would deny this if it was ever spoken out loud, but I am sure deep inside he knew that it was the truth.

“Remember, act like you do this every day.” Patrick added before walking back to the front. Trevor turned and gave us a nod signaling the end of our little rest period. I took a deep breath in attempt to calm my racing heart. Why does it always overreact whenever I have to do something dangerous?

In. Out. I chant to myself, breath slowly. Just as my heart began to decelerate back to normal, the vegetation thinned and I could see a giant wall rising up in front of me. It took me a lot of restrain to stop myself from gasping. I had imagined before what a Citybase would look like from the outside, but I had never anticipated that it would be like this. A giant man-made structure rising several tens of meters into the sky, towering over even the tallest trees. I swallowed hard as I took in the grand scale of it, and appreciation welled up inside me to our ancestors who had built a safe haven for us from scratch.

We walked closer and closer to the wall, excitement bubbled up inside me; I couldn’t wait to see how we enter the Citybase from outside. I could sense the others’ excitement as well; after all we were taught that there was no way to exit the wall of a Citybase.

As we got closer the wall looming above us grew more imposing and nervousness had started to replace my excitement. What if they recognized us in the gate? What if this was really a trap and we were playing straight into their hands? What if there was really no way in; and they had just lured us here to slaughter us? Wait the last one didn’t make any sense. Argh. Stop it brain!

By the time I calmed down enough we were standing right at the foot of the wall. Up close you could see every single details of the wall clearly. To my surprise the wall was made of blocks of metals and not brick and stone as I originally imagined. I looked around and saw nothing but a smooth wall, no signs of an entrance at all. What are they playing at?

Trevor stepped forward from the group and started to run his hands on the wall, touching every surface as if he was looking for something. I shared a bewildered look with Natalie and continued to watch his strange behavior. What was he trying to do?

“Got it.” Trevor said triumphantly, stopping his hands over a random spot and pressed on it hard. A crisp, low click sounded and the group around us suddenly started to sink a little. My mouth felled open in surprise as the metal blocks started to shift away from each other forming a gate with unbelievable speed and within a minute a full sized opening had been created out of nowhere.

“Close your mouth.” Mariah whispered beside me, amusement lining her voice. I obeyed absent mindedly, my mind blown into pieces by what just happened in front of me. There was still a gate behind the opening, about mid-width and two men were approaching from the other side. Behind them I could just make out a dark room with a door and a window. A window that showed a street, crowded with people outside.

A/N

Yay :D I managed to finish this before Sunday ends! Sorry for the poor gramma etc, I had little time to edit this.

Once again thank you for everyone's comments! I noticed a lot of Tom girls out there ;) high five!

Another thing is I HAVE REACH 1000 FOLLOWERS! Thank you you guys so much!

I want to give you guys something in return, I have come up with 2 ideas -

1) Q&A - post a comment, a question. Any questions and I will answer you. But nothing that will reveal the plot ahead. I will answer everyone's question in a separate story.

2) Allow you guys to decide on which story I will progress to after POE chronicles end. Here's a list of ideas that I have started but yet to begin properly.

i) A fantasy novel, about magic, other dimensions and worlds.

ii) A paranormal story about a boy who died, but found himself with a chance of seeing his family again

iii) A harry potter fan fic in Albus Potter's generation

iv) Romance novel - there is 2 I am working on, one is sequel to Forgetting us, the other is a brand new one

so let me know what you want! x