Melissa's Quest

by Blair Drake

  She raced to the front doors and peered through the glass panels beside them. The darkness was right there, slammed up against the building. She pushed the door open slightly with her shoulder and stood there, between the door and the doorframe, keeping the door ajar so she could look at the darkness closely. And, instead of seeing the grounds all the way around the building, all she could see was the swirling black cloud.

  At the top of her lungs she screamed, “Go away. Just leave me alone.”

  Instead of giving her a response, the air around her had a deceiving wobbliness to it, indicating the disruption the dark cloud brought. As if an answer was given, only one she couldn’t hear. Which just went along with the nightmare of her 2-D world right now. She closed her eyes and said, “Hey, you guys in my head, is it true every time I lose a light in my talisman the darkness comes closer?”

  “Yes, that’s true from our observation,” replied the male voice.

  She reached up a hand and rubbed her temple. “What happens when the darkness reaches me?” Her voice was faint, but she knew they would’ve heard it. It didn’t matter to them if she spoke out loud or not.

  “We don’t know,” said the voice. “Nobody has ever come back who was caught up in the darkness.”

  “Is that what happened to Trace?”

  A startled gasp sounded in her head. And then—in a low, barely audible voice—came the answer. “Yes.”

  “He’s not there in the darkness so much as just not here. I’ve seen his face, his hand…I’ve tried to talk to him, but I don’t think he hears me, and I can’t hear him.”

  The second shocked gasp was twice as loud and twice as long.

  “Can you give us any details?” asked the more feminine voice urgently. “Where is here? How could we try to talk to him? Do you know if he’s alive? How do you know you couldn’t hear him? Did he say something to you?”

  “Sometimes I can see his face, out of the corner of my eye. But it’s always here in the 2-D school. I saw his lips moving. He’s alive, or he is what stands for being alive in whatever dimension he’s in.”

  “Are you sure it’s him? How would you know his face?”

  “From Hettie’s keepsake box,” Melissa said bluntly. “She has a picture of him in there. I keep trying to talk to him, and maybe he’s talking to me, but neither one of us appeared to be on the same wavelength.”

  That male voice jumped in, almost identifiable but not quite, and said, “Keep trying. If he’s there, if it is not just an echo of his image, you might be able to talk to him.”

  Echo? Echo of his image? She shook her head at the concept. She figured the male voice thought he was making sense, but nothing made sense to her. Still she needed their help. “I’m not getting anywhere. I keep learning more and more, but nothing is helping me get back home.”

  “You are home,” said the female voice, softer, gentler this time.

  Melissa groaned. “You know what I mean. I’m in this flat 2-D world. I want to get back to my regular 3-D world.”

  “Then just cross,” the female voice said in exasperation. “You are the one who makes portals, after all.”

  Melissa frowned as the female voice disappeared. “That doesn’t make any sense,” she cried out. “I’ve been making portals steadily. All it does is drain my talisman and keep me in this training world.”

  The male voice urgently whispered, “So graduate past that world—and fast.”

  And then he too was gone. Every time she heard his voice, she thought she recognized it. But his name drifted away before she could capture it. She thought of all the schoolkids she knew. As she identified each one, she dismissed them as being the male voice in her head. If it wasn’t the headmaster, she had no clue who it was. “It would be nice if you guys would just do something helpful, like give me step-by-step instructions. That would be great,” she called out.

  With a last look at the darkness sitting just out of her reach, she carried Gideon back inside, turned, and locked the door. She had no idea why she needed to lock the door, but it appeared to be important. She put Gideon down in the hallway and watched as he walked aimlessly forward. “Gideon, take me to where I need to be to build a portal home.”

  As if understanding her, he turned, gave her a long look, and then headed toward the headmaster’s office. In a way that would make total sense, as the blackness came in that way originally. On the other hand, the roof made just as much sense too. That’s where she left from. And then again, so did the ice field, as that’s where she arrived first. Like a tunnel, those were entrances and exits. It’s just one was 3-D, and another was 2-D. But what was she supposed to do with that information? Every time she attempted to leave, it took her to another place within the 2-D world. Was she not using the portal correctly?

  “Or was the portal not where I thought it was?” she muttered out loud, reaching the headmaster’s office, but Gideon continued on to Hettie’s office. She joined Gideon there.

  She sifted through the info from the books she’d supercharged into her brain. Mesmerized, she watched pages turning as she searched for information. It was pretty cool actually, but it was also frustrating because she wanted the information to be right there. And that wasn’t happening.

  She was tempted to take a portal right then to the ice field, but she needed to figure this out first otherwise she’d burn through her energy trying to stay warm. That’s the only explanation she’d been able to come up for being less cold the last time she’d been in the arctic world. The next time was no guarantee she’d have the same results. And she couldn’t afford to waste time or energy and definitely not the lights on the talisman. No, what she needed to do was plan this out here and now, and she had to save just enough energy on the talisman lights to complete the jumps so she ended up in her 3-D world before she ran out of time and energy.

  That was the trick.

  She pulled out her talisman to see she had six lights left, only six lights. She needed one to get back to the ice field and probably one to get home. That left her with four lights and gave her just a few hours as far she could tell. With that in mind, she sat down cross-legged in the floor of Hettie’s office, wrapped her arms around her knees, and ordered herself to think.

  You’re not stupid. You know you have to go back to the ice field for a final jump through the portal. You know you have to take the ice field jump to return to the rooftop. So why is it you just can’t do that?

  Because she couldn’t. She tried the portal at the ice field twice, but it wouldn’t let her go home. So what was it she had to learn to do first? Failure was not an option.

  Gideon ran over to her, jumped up on his back legs, and touched her face. She smiled, reached down, and stroked him. “I have you. Therefore, I’m not alone. What is it I need to learn so I’m not feeling so alone? I need to connect to others, but who do I need to connect with?”

  She thought about it and realized she really felt close to Hettie, especially when seated here in her office. Melissa closed her eyes and, in her mind, reached out her arms and wrapped them around an imaginary Hettie. “Hettie, I miss you. You always were a bright spot in my life and always there with a smile and word of encouragement. Even when times were really tough, and I wasn’t so sure what was going on, it never stopped you. You were always kind and compassionate. I’ve always felt very connected to you.”

  She could feel something in her mind warming up as though Hettie was responding. Wouldn’t it be nice to think Melissa could connect with Hettie in her 3-D world, even though Melissa was here in the 2-D world? Maybe that’s what she needed to do. She quickly went through all the girls and guys she could remember from school. Maybe this was less about her needing to connect as it was about them needing the connection, needing Melissa to give them all encouragement.

  Some she had almost no connection with, even though she tried hard, as if they weren’t there. She was on the second student when she realized two people she knew, Alice and Jason, weren’t part of
the group caught on the roof. Maybe that’s why she had no sense of connection to them—at least not as strong as to those who were on the rooftop. She went back to work on more of the students and her friends who were with her in the rooftop circle fighting off the dark cloud.

  She could feel something when she reached out to a couple more. She wasn’t sure what, but so far, everything seemed almost indescribable.

  She sent out welcoming hugs of friendship, words of reassurance, encouraging and caring energy, trying to connect with each of them who were on the rooftop. As Melissa sat here, finally done and pulled out her talisman, she realized that, instead of draining her energy, it appeared one more light was now trying to flicker back on again.

  She viewed it cautiously and closed her eyes, thinking about Annalise. “Take it easy. You’ll be just fine. This is new to all of us. Our experiences will be different. I doubt we’ll all need to learn to open portals, but as soon as I can figure out how to open a portal to where you are, you can be sure I’m coming for you. So, do what you can and otherwise wait with hope. One of us will be there soon.”

  She opened her eyes and stared at the talisman, and sure enough, the one light that was flickering now shone brightly. She studied it for a long moment and smiled. “Positive, loving energy connects me with others and restores my well-being. Being alone drains it.”

  She laughed. “Okay, I got it.”

  A dark voice in her head grumbled, “About time.”

  “Hey, that’s not fair. I’ve been working this out on my own here. Without an instruction manual, thank you very much. I’ve come this far in strange places and dangerous situations with an undisclosed time limit to add to my stress. And that’s not how I did my best learning at school. Jeez, give a girl a break here.”

  “And you’re getting somewhere. That’s one of the main elements of the talisman.”

  She stared at the ring of bright lights on her school pin. “What happens if I lose my talisman?”

  “While in training, it will be a death sentence,” said the grumbling voice. “Once you have succeeded in this quest, then you won’t need it. But it could add so much to your future, depending on your abilities.”

  “So, the more people I connect with, the less alone I am, the more I can charge my talisman. And, with it charged, the more power I have to do more things?”

  “Correct.”

  She nodded. In the back of her head she wanted to try something but figured it was a waste of her abilities if she couldn’t pull it off. She just didn’t have enough of these lights left to get her to all the places she wanted to go. Of course, there was one in particular. Getting home was most important. Then she could figure out how to recharge the talisman and go anywhere. “Do I need the talisman to travel through dimensions after this?”

  “Not necessarily. As soon as you get to the point where you master this, it could become more of a curiosity. Or you’ll learn to use it in different ways.”

  She nodded but couldn’t let go of how this might apply to contacting friends and relatives. While traveling around the world with animals… Would Gideon come with her? Could he come with her? That brought up another horrifying thought. She stared at Gideon for a long moment. “Am I allowed to take Gideon with me?”

  “Animals are of the natural order of things. Gideon has crossed many boundaries on his own.”

  Melissa stared at the ginger cat in her arm. “So he can do what I’m just learning to do?”

  “Of course. How do you think he got here in the first place?”

  “I called, and he came?” she asked, puzzled. “You’re saying because I called, he crossed the dimensions to get to me?”

  Silence. But it wasn’t a disagreeable silence.

  It was more like there was no need to answer because Melissa finally understood. She looked down at Gideon and cuddled him in her arms. “I’m so glad you came.”

  His engine kicked in, letting her know he understood and appreciated her thanks. She chuckled and buried her face against his, feeling the warm pulse of his heart against her hands. “How is it I can feel your heat, and yet I can’t feel anything else in this place?”

  Gideon didn’t answer, and neither did the voices. But she figured she found the answer all on her own. “It’s because you’re from the 3-D world, isn’t it?”

  Gideon just stared at her and blinked.

  She laughed. “I know. As far as you’re concerned, I should just walk right back over—the same as you did.” She thought about that and said, “I found you here in Hettie’s office, right? Maybe that’s what I need to do.”

  She held him securely, hopped to her feet, and turned around. She stepped to where she saw Gideon the first time and slowly, carefully, searched the energy around her. Just because she used a gate in the icy world didn’t mean it was the only gate. The voices told her that too. In fact, they said, All portals will lead home. And, as that truth slammed into her, she realized she didn’t have to go back through the ice field at all. She studied the area more, searching for the portal Gideon used. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t see it. Finally, she realized she was looking for a people-size door. She dropped to her knees and crawled around Hettie’s office, looking for one that might be Gideon-size.

  Again she found nothing. She turned to look at Gideon and said, “Can you just show me?”

  Gideon walked to the far side where Hettie’s bookshelves were.

  And disappeared.

  Chapter 16

  She bolted after Gideon. On her hands and knees, she approached the same spot from the same direction, but nothing happened. She searched all around, even removing books and shelves to see if she could make it through the same place. She tried to stick her hand through, hoping maybe her hand would disappear and come out on the other side, but nothing. “Gideon? Gideon, come back here.”

  Gideon didn’t return.

  And she realized that, once again, she was all alone. She immediately rejected that idea.

  “No,” she said out loud. “I’m not alone. I have friends. I have connections. I just have to reach out and touch them to know that I have them, even here.”

  As if to prove it, she closed her eyes, imagined Hettie in front of her, then placed a hand on her shoulder. A look of complete surprise and wonder crossed Hettie’s face as Melissa stared at the headmistress. The longer Melissa held the image, the more solid Hettie appeared.

  “You can see me, can’t you?” Melissa whispered in awe.

  Hettie slowly nodded. “I can. You’re doing fantastic. I’m so proud of you.”

  “Don’t be. I’m not exactly sure where I am,” Melissa said with a laugh. “My body is caught in the 2-D world. I just wanted to connect.”

  Hettie reached up, covered Melissa’s hand with her own, and said, “Even to do that much is wonderful. Now is it just your hand you wanted to come all the way across?”

  “I’ve been trying to get my whole body across,” she said. “But I can’t seem to make that happen.”

  Hettie chuckled. “Not yet. You’ll figure it out soon, but don’t take too long. The darkness is always waiting for you.”

  “What is that darkness?” she asked. “Why is it after us?”

  “It’s looking for energy, and it feeds on fear. It’s been there since forever but always in the background. A year ago it changed. Now it’s a constant presence we have to be aware of.”

  “It feels like it’s following me, watching me, waiting for me to fail.”

  “It’s not, not in the way you are thinking, but life is about balance. As the black cloud grows, it wants more balance too. Thus, let go of your fear, so it’s not attracted to you. It will start to recede,” Hettie said. “At least you know to reach out and connect. Do more of that, particularly those you are disconnected from. You should be able to get home then.”

  Hettie glanced around guiltily, as if she’d said something she wasn’t allowed to. From a far distance, Melissa could hear the headmaster callin
g out sternly, “Hettie, stop!”

  Just like that, the room started to spin, and Hettie disappeared.

  As much as Melissa didn’t like watching Hettie disappear in front of her, it was hard to consider the experience as anything other than a success. Melissa grinned. She’d just managed to communicate with those in the real world.

  Melissa sat in the same place, considering Hettie’s words. Her father was the first person who came to mind. Should she try to connect with him? They didn’t have much of a loving relationship, but she had always believed he loved her in his own way. It was just distant, his version of what love was, very much the opposite of hers. She closed her eyes, took several deep breaths, and reached out to him mentally. “Dad, where are you?”

  It took a moment of repeated questioning, with her sending warm energy toward him. She wasn’t sure what she even meant by energy, but she created a rainbow in her mind from her heart to his heart, and she poured waves and waves of warm color toward him.

  When there was no response, she wondered if her father was not magical, or maybe she needed to open herself up more. She tried to understand why her father was so absent in her life.

  She still didn’t know what happened to her mom because he never talked about her. He’d yell it was simply the way it was. “Just accept she’s gone now. You won’t see her again, so forget about it.”

  Like that would happen.

  She tried to infuse more love into the roadway she’d imagined, but it was hard because he was almost a stranger. If somebody asked her if she loved her father, her instinctive answer would be yes. She wasn’t sure she liked him, but she did love him.

  It was a blood bond nobody could take away from them.

  Absent any two-sided magical connection, maybe the only way she could touch him was to remind him of that blood bond. So, she imagined her palm opening slightly, a stream of blood flowing over her hands, off into space like a thin river floating directly toward his hand. She envisioned a small hole in his hand, where the end of the river entered his system. She didn’t know if that was creepy or not, but all she could think about was to reinforce the blood bond.