Vitality

by Marleina Murray

  “I already told you, I don’t know!!” I yelled back. I had to admit, that was the most fun I had had since I had gotten to that dump. He snatched the locket from my neck. “Say goodbye to this!” he said, walking out of the room. From down the hallway, I heard him scream. The necklace floated back into the room and reattached itself to my neck. Abysmal stormed back into the room. “What did you do?!” he yelled. His hand was red, and there was a brand on his grey skin from the locket. He had gotten burnt. He pointed the gun at my head, and pulled the trigger.

  I shrieked, froze, and closed my eyes. My legs gave out and I collapsed. Was I dead? I opened my eyes, and the bullet was on the floor in front of me. He pulled the trigger again, and the bullet fell to the ground. I sighed a sigh of relief. I didn’t want to die. Just to be sure, he aimed at the window and pulled the trigger. The glass shattered. As long as I wore the locket, I couldn’t be destroyed.

  Abysmal untied my hands and I rubbed my wrists. “Take your best shot” he said, glaring at me. Was he serious?? I glared back. “Come on!!” he yelled. He was serious. I figured, things couldn’t get any worst, so I balled up my fists, and plunged one into his nose. I then plunged another in his eye. I hit him as hard as I could, and it felt good. “Good shot” he said, smirking, then punched me back. I got dizzy and fell. I laid there for a few seconds, got back up, and kicked him twice in his side. He then knocked me out with the butt of his gun.

  Chapter Nine

  I woke up on the floor in total darkness. I ached all over. Was I back in my room? I pulled the locket from under my shirt to see. The room now had a little light, like a soft candlelight glow. It was my room. I crawled slowly over to the heap bed, and felt underneath for the diary. I also went for the liquid, which was full again and cold! I drank it fast and launched the empty bottle. It rattled off of the wall, and finally gave in to gravity. Suddenly, all of my aching had begun to go away. What was I drinking? I’d worry about that later. I pulled out the diary, and examined it once more to make sure that it was okay. I pressed the locket piece to the diary where it fit.

  The diary turned gold and lit up the room. I tried to pull the locket away before the light got me busted, but the locket seeped into the diary. The diary began to shake and I dropped it on the floor, not sure of what would happen next. I looked up to the door to see if anyone was there. My heart was pounding, without the locket, I could die. If I was busted, I would have been killed. The diary stopped shaking, and popped open. I stepped back and watched.

  Symbols that I couldn’t understand began to pour out of the pages and onto the floor, like a fountain. They gathered into a gold, glowing puddle. Up from the puddle came a person. The person was wearing a long black, hooded robe. I backed further away, and waited. The person removed the hood, and it was my mother.

  I burst into tears and ran to hug her, but my arms went right through her. She wasn’t really there. She just stared straight ahead, like I wasn’t there. She began to speak. “If you are hearing this message, that means that I am gone. Don’t worry sweetie, we will meet again. The locket that I gave to you is a portal piece, and it will only work when the locket is whole. I don’t know how to guide you through, but I know that you have it in you. The locket will keep you alive, but I’m sorry to say, not from all harm. This locket is a blessing and a burden at the same time, so please be careful. If you can’t handle it, the locket will make a mind of its own, overpower you, and destroy you. Get everyone except Absolutes to the other side safely. Do not let any Absolutes through, or they will take over where you go. I can’t tell you how to do this, or if everything will turn out okay. All I ask is that you try your hardest, and you’ll know what to do when the time comes. Fight until death, because I know that the Absolutes will. I love you, and you are stronger than you think.” She finished, bowed to me, and dropped back into the puddle.

  The diary shattered into a million pieces, but the fragments disappeared before they hit the ground. The puddle began to boil and the locket was spewed out, landing on the floor, next to the puddle. The locket shined twice as bright as it did before. I picked up the locket and placed it around my neck. A huge gust of wind came out of nowhere. I shielded myself as I examined the room, thinking they had discovered what I was up to. I looked up at the door. Nothing. I began to stumble as the wind got stronger. Then, I looked at the locket, where the wind was coming from.

  The wind lifted me up off of the ground, I kicked around, trying to take the locket off. “Stop it!” I yelled at the locket, as I was lifted higher. I used my hands to push away from the ceiling. “Stop it!” I yelled again. The wind suddenly stopped, and I hit the floor. I had underestimated the power of this tiny locket. With it, I was invincible, and it would literally save our whole world! I couldn’t wait until the next morning to tear the prison apart. But how? I fell asleep thinking of all the things that my mother had just said. 6,957 of us lived on planet Abysmal. Not including the Absolutes. How would I get them all through the portal without the Absolutes knowing? I had to do something, but first, we had to go through Victor’s plan, whatever that may be, the next day.

  Chapter Ten

  I was woken up with a bucket of ice water the next day. I sat up and screamed. It was shockingly cold, I couldn’t think. I coughed and spat the water out of my mouth. I tried to catch my breath and shivered as I processed what had just happened. “Out of bed, savage. I added the ice just because you’re so special.” Goblin said. He threw his head back in an uncontrollable bout of laughter. He looked at the candy wrappers and the bottle on the floor. I had forgotten to put them under the heap bed. “What’s this?!” he yelled. “I don’t know; I was hoping you could tell me.” I lied. He squinted his eyes and pointed the stick at me. “There’s something sneaky going on, and I’ll find out what it is you little brat!” he spat. I shivered worst as the cold water really started to sink in. “Cold are you? I hope you freeze to death. Let’s go, your brother waits for his shot.” He said, merrily. He grabbed my arm pulling me. I didn’t want to do this, I had to buy time.

  “Not until I get a shower and some clothes” I said, yanking my arm back. “Should I have the royal dressers come to dress you also, your highness?” he laughed. He laughed so hard that he fell over. He stood up and whacked me on the back with his stick, and it changed my clothes. Ragged black pajamas, at least I was dry. “Let’s go now! I’ve had it up to here with you!” he yelled. He grabbed me, and I pulled away. “I can get there without you touching me!” I snapped. He glared at me. “When this is all over, I’ll have your head!!” he snapped back. “Take me to him” I said, walking to the wall.

  This time, we went towards the right. The walls shifted as Goblin tapped on them. I silently wondered if his stick would work for me. About three minutes later, the wall opened. I heard a bunch of people talking. We walked out into a giant arena. Victor sat in the middle of the arena, strapped into a chair. Hundreds of people were sitting on benches against the walls, stacked like bunk beds. There were four other people strapped into chairs next to Victor. All of the people grew silent as I walked over to Victor. I tensed, I had never been in a room with this many people at once, let alone anyone watching my every move. Everyone was forced into this room, only to watch someone murder a family member. It wasn’t justice, it was more like a sadistic game.

  “Is that her?” I heard a woman whisper. “Of course it is, she looks just like her mother.” an old man whispered back. I looked up to get a look at the people who had known my mother. “I think she can hear us” the woman said. They both smiled at me. The old man quickly opened his hand, and closed it. He had the ring hidden in his hand. People around the arena began to talk again. There was a giant door on the left side of the arena. It busted opened, and in walked Abysmal. “Settle down or you’re all next!” he growled. Everyone stopped talking. Abysmal was pushing a metal cart with five small needles on it. Behind him, two Absolutes escorted a prisoner to the closest bench to us. I waited for them to step back so that
I could get a better look. It was my father.

  He wore the same thing as all of us, black, raggedy pajamas. His afro was so long that it fell to the sides. He still looked strong. He looked up at me. The look in his eyes told me that he never lost hope. Goblin sat down next to my dad as Abysmal walked up with the metal cart. “Don’t let the size fool you, gets the job done every time.” He gloated. Victor’s mouth was tapped, Abysmal ripped the tape off. “Scared boy?” Abysmal asked. Victor didn’t say anything. He just stared at Abysmal. “Pick up the needle, and stick him.” Abysmal said to me. I picked the needle up, and my hand was shaking vigorously. I stood there with the needle in my hand, shaking. “Do it or die!!!” he snapped, grabbing me by the back of my neck, pushing me closer to Victor. Out of the corner of my eye, I looked for my dad. Him and Goblin were gone.

  A fight broke out between a few of the prisoners, and grew, until everyone was involved. Someone had staged a riot. Abysmal and his soldiers ran to stop the fight. “Hold on to me!” Victor yelled. I grabbed him and then we were falling into the darkness. We fell into Victor’s room. Goblin tapped Victor’s chair and it disappeared. My dad and grandma helped Victor up. “Don’t let him fool you, he works for them!!” I said, trying to pull the stick away from Goblin. My grandma laughed. “Gilbert has been my most trusted friend since the very beginning.” She said. “Gilbert?! Your most trusted friend has been trying to kill me the whole time!!” I shrieked. I didn’t care who he was, he had tortured me since the second we met. “Very sorry, it’s a terrible world when you have to play the enemy” Goblin… I mean, Gilbert said to me. I walked over to my grandmother. “You’re Hannah?” I said, squeezing her. “In the flesh! It’s good to see you, kid. I’ve waited sixteen years for this moment.” she laughed, embracing me. “I believe there’s someone here you need to see.” My grandmother said, pointing to my father as if I didn’t see him standing there. My father opened his arms as I ran to him. “Everything will be okay” he said, squeezing me.

  The ceiling opened and in fell the old man and woman who recognized me in the arena. My dad and Gilbert helped them up. The old man placed the ring in my hand. “I believe this belongs to you.” He said, closing my hand and pat it a few times. “This isn’t mines; I took it from the Absolute that Victor killed. I don’t even know how to use it.” I said, as I studied the ring. “It was a gift from grandma when you were born” Victor said. Why didn’t I know anything!! “Very sorry” Goblin said as he bumped into me. I dropped ring, and the needle that I forgot I was holding in my other hand. We stared at it in silence.

  Victor picked them up and handed them back to me. “Keep it, kill one of those things” he said to me, looking disgusted. I knew just the one that I wanted to kill. Commander Abysmal. “We’ll have to split up if we have any chance of getting out of this place” my grandmother said. “Goblin, you go with Victor, Arok, and Sunny (the old man). Patience (the young woman) and Adeptia will come with me” she instructed. A rush of despair came over me. “What?! I don’t want to split up, we all just got back together.” I sighed. “We have to honey, it’s the only way” she said, rubbing my face.

  My dad walked over to me, removed the other half of the locket from his neck, and placed it around mines. He then connected the two pieces together. A strong gust of wind suddenly began to blow. “Open it” he said. I hesitated for a few seconds, took a deep breath, and opened it. Inside, I saw a star shining in the night sky. Next to the star was an amethyst glowing planet. “That’s it” he told me. I gazed in wonder as I brought it closer to my face. I could smell the cool, crisp air derived from the night sky.

  “We better hurry up, there are a lot of people in need of a new home” I said, closing the locket back. Gilbert tapped on the left side of the wall and it shifted, yielding a doorway. We watched them go into the wall and disappear into the dark. “Let me see the ring” my grandmother instructed. I handed it over, curious of why. She placed it on her finger, and placed her hand on the wall opposite the one they had just entered. The wall shifted and opened.

  “How did that Absolute get my ring” I asked as we went through the wall. “The General had taken it from your mother months after you were born. He had no clue how to use it, only The Commander did” my grandmother explained. So that’s why the commander had wanted it so bad. “Once The General saw how bad that The Commander wanted this ring, he knew that it had to be useful! The Commander secretly hated The General, but kept him close by to watch over the ring.” She finished. “Why didn’t he just kill him and take it??” I wondered aloud. “The Commander wasn’t sure just how powerful it was yet, not until they captured your father. By this time, The Commander figured it would be better to keep The General alive so he’d have a lap dog” she said, shrugging.

  “How will we get everyone together without The Absolutes knowing?” I asked, thinking hard of a plan. “That’s impossible” Patience said. I had almost forgotten that she was there. “No it’s not, we need we need to just come up with something that they wouldn’t expect” I said, rubbing the locket. “Something like what?” Patience asked. “The only thing I know so far, is that we will have to fight them off” I said.

  Patience stopped and looked at me. Her face was faint in the light of the locket, but I could see the disappointment on her face. “Everyone in the prison thinks that you will fail. I don’t because your mother saved my father’s life once from being attacked by a herd of Absolutes. She told us all to have hope and that we would see better times. Everyone thought that she was crazy, but here you are.” She said excited and giving me a quick hug. My grandmother shifted through the last wall, and we were smacked in the face with light.

  The Sun hurt my eyes, so I put my hand up as a shield. It felt amazing as the warm heat caressed my skin, nurturing me back to life a little. From everything that had happened in that short amount of time, I felt dead inside. In that instant, the sunlight was a breath of life, and for that I was thankful. I took in a deep breath of the life swarming around me. A moment of pure bliss in a chaotic storm.

  “Stay close to the wall.” My grandmother whispered to us. We leaned against the wall and slid carefully behind her. “Hey!” a guard shouted as he spotted us, coming in our direction fast. We froze. “Were unarmed, please don’t hurt us.” My grandmother begged. He smirked and slowed down “We’ll see if we can work something out” he said, slyly. When he got close enough, my grandmother knocked him down with a quick sweep, and disarmed him. She took his gun and handed it to me. “You know what to do” she said. Did I? I had plotted murdering every single last one of the Absolutes in my head, but I had never killed anyone. “Do it!” she yelled. I pointed the gun at him, my hands were shaky. He stared back at me with horrified eyes “Please, don’t do this!” he pleaded. I stood there in position, ready to strike, and did nothing. My grandmother took the gun from me as he still begged and shot him in the head twice.

  “Show no mercy girls, or that could mean it’s the last breath that you’ll ever breathe. Check him for weapons” she instructed. “Shouldn’t we be leaving?” Patience asked. “We must wait for the others” my grandmother told her. We searched for more weapons. Surprisingly, nothing. Was this guard simply the bait in a mousetrap?? The wall busted opened, first an avalanche of rocks, then Goblin and the rest of them. Sunny had a dead Absolute over his shoulder. A large mass of men and women came pouring out of the wall. Everyone inside were now free. A few of the men and women drug and carried dead Absolutes. I looked to see if any of them were Abysmal.

  No, my luck wasn’t that good. They laid all of the dead Absolutes in a pile. Blue blood was everywhere. A sloppy mess, the result of of rage and desperation, now lay lifeless on the ground. Some of the men and women were laughing, slapping each other on the back. Finally, the last man came out of the wall carrying an Absolute’s head. Everyone grew silent. “The Commander’s wife” I heard a few people murmur. The man walked up to me and placed the head at my feet. “I do believe a war has just been decl
ared!!!” he yelled for all to hear. The massive crowd erupted in cheers. They were crazy! I stared, horrified. The cheers continued. I put my face in my hands. I listened blindly to the roar of glee. These people were happy, hopeful, and ready to do whatever it took to complete this journey. They were feeling what I was supposed to be feeling, but I wasn’t. I cried, until I realized, I didn’t have to cry anymore. I wasn’t doing this alone. They were all here to aid in the mission. I smiled, and burst out into uncontrollable laughter. I grabbed my brother’s arm and we skipped around in circles, cheering.

  Chapter Eleven

  “So this was your plan?” I asked Victor, still laughing, shocked that he had come up with all of this. “Part of it, we have to meet everyone in the field behind the house” He said. “Let’s get going before the Absolutes see what we’ve done” he continued. “We’ve got about two and a half miles to go people, please try to stay alive!” my dad yelled so everyone could hear him. “When we get into the woods, don’t wander off, it’s for your own safety!” he finished. We had to go back the way that we came through the woods when we ran from our home. That meant that we could be stuck in the woods for hours!