Stranded in Thoughts

Chapter 19—The Young Bloods

My mother was teacher Mary.

So that was why I frequently dreamed about someone who I didn’t know but somehow knew that she was a person close to my heart. 

It was teacher Mary all along.

Fuzzy memories came rushing back: the faint “I love you…” from someone who had a blurred face: the tender, long arms; the curly hair that was swaying with the wind; and the sweet and encouraging “I love you” again when I was about to sleep. Everything was blurry, but then it all made sense now as to why I was having short episodes about the blurred woman every now and then.

Mom143.

Rico brought me back to my senses, “Hey, seems like your friend is about to say something important.”

“Everyone, I want you to listen properly. Yesterday, the day we got stranded, I managed to talk with my father using my thought, and he shared with me everything that’s happening here. True, it’s shocking, but I needed to keep my composure to not give a member of the Young Bloods who was in our group,” she gave Josh a look, “an idea that I’ve already found out. However, he somehow got suspicious, and we got to the point where I needed to link him earlier than planned to force him to help us from a dilemma we faced yesterday. There are so many Garcias in the world, but I actually can’t believe that he’s in the Garcia family.”

“Wait a minute, who exactly are you talking about?” I clarified.

“It’s Finlay.”

That was a bit predictable, but all the same shocked me.

She stood and moved the coffee table aside, making herself visible to us. She breathed a deep one through her nose and continued, “So, as what I’m telling you, Young Bloods are on our trail. We need to get ready because they will surely kill. Sure, they’ll leave Jelly because they’ll need her to initiate the transference rite to their leader, but they’ll kill her the moment it’s done.

“The Young Bloods, who I want you to consider as our enemies, are not invincible. They might be skilled thinkers, but they can be defeated. Their means of accomplishing their objectives and getting what they want are to kill and torture. However, in our case, we just want to disarm and render them unable to fight. And that’s the problem.”

“What’s the problem?” Rico asked.

“I don’t have an idea as to how to defeat them without actually hurting them.”

“Why don’t we just fight them? If they have the intent to kill, let’s return the favor. I don’t want to kill, but if our lives are in danger, of course, we should retaliate. Isn’t that the right thing to do than just wait with our asses to get killed?”

I gave him a look because of the way he spoke. He just shrugged and waited for Chevonne to reply.

“Well, I don’t really know. But the Young Bloods we’re going to deal with actually live up to their group name. They’re all young ones.”

“Wait, whut? We’re not going to subdue a group of men?” Josh reacted. The shock in it seemed not that apparent, but even so, he asked the same question I meant to ask her.

Who exactly were we dealing with?

“I know this might shock you the way it did to me when I first heard it, but I need you to be open and to accept the facts. We don’t really have much time to contradict each other when you’ll know who they are, especially us, teachers.”

“Go on. There’s nothing much more surprising than what we already know. Are they part of the crew of the barge at the beach?” Josh asked.

“No,” a voice answered upstairs.

The figure trudged down the carpeted steps and showed himself to us. He was wearing nothing but only a pair of crumpled, black pants that had some rips on it. His muscles and abs were full of gashes and bruises. The amputated shoulder had been bandaged fully, revealing none of the bloody mess.

“They’re all dead,” Dr. Shawn said.

The first one to shot on his feet was Rico. With clenched fists, he approached him and stopped just a meter in front of him.

He gritted his teeth and forced some words out of his mouth. “Te—tell me you’re lying.”

“It’s true. I was the only one who managed to escape. The Young Bloods murdered everyone on the shore. I luckily escaped, but with the cost of my arm.” He touched his bandaged shoulder and winced.

Chevonne’s expression changed. “Wait, wait. Like, everyone?”

“Everyone.”

“Even the teachers?”

“Not a single one was spared.”

“Even… teacher Mary?” I added. He just looked at me dead in the eye, conveying a strong affirmation.

Even with her confidence and mature demeanor, Chevonne dropped to the floor and cried. She was the only one who knew the particulars of everything, and the responsibility and expectation must have weighed her down. Now that she couldn’t—we couldn’t—save anyone, the harsh truth set in. I crawled next to her on the floor and threw in some comforting words that were not effective in lifting her spirits and couldn’t change the fact that everyone was dead. I was trying my best not to break down anymore, but I just couldn’t. The harsh truth crawled in my skin. The truth that any one of us could be next. That I could be next.

And the truth that teacher Mary was dead—that my mother was dead. We didn’t even have a proper introduction as a mother and daughter yet.

We were in a real dangerous deal.

Josh lurched straight to Dr. Shawn and pinned him to the floor. Dr. Shawn winced with the pain and shouted, “Who the—”

“Don’t be cocky! Don’t you dare say that everyone’s dead with a straight face!” Josh’s holler overpowered Dr. Shawn’s. He punched the floor. He punched it again. He repeated the process until he couldn’t keep his bravado anymore and wailed with bleeding knuckles. Dr. Shawn must have seen the pain that settled in on his face up close and couldn’t help himself to be affected by it. He pushed Josh aside and sat on the cold floor, sobbing softly.

Now, almost everyone was crying.

I heard a creaking noise and caught the old man rummaging in the cupboard. He pulled a pistol and placed it on the coffee table.

“Use is this.”

We all looked at him, then at the pistol resting on the table. I didn’t know what kind of gun it was, but it looked like those that pirates would use. It had a long barrel and some intricate carvings on the hand rest.

Chevonne squinted and wiped her tears away. “Wh—what are we going to do with this? You want us to shoot them dead?”

“No, that’s not a working gun.” Dr. Shawn stood and grabbed the pistol from the table. He examined it and aimed at the windows. With satisfaction, he put it back. “It’s a cursed item.”

“What? Where did you get this? Cursed items are very rare, especially if the maledicter is not active in his or her thought initiation. The fact that it is still here means that the maledicter of this item is still alive.”

“I know where you got this. It’s from that woman that cursed you, right?” Rico guessed.

The old man just went back to his chair and rubbed the under-chin of the beast.

So, that was a yes.

“What are we supposed to do with this? How will this help us?” Chevonne egged on.

The old man looked at the ceiling and sighed. “You know what is the silencer can do? It do the same.”

“Oh, sweet. A portable Finlay.”

Chevonne explained what a silencer was, and that Finlay was one. Josh picked the pistol and weighed it down by his palms alternatingly, then asked, “So, who are we specifically dealing with? I hope you can provide names.”

“I believe you already have an idea,” Chevonne replied.

Josh put the pistol back. His countenance changed to something really serious. He looked up and boldly guessed, “Was it the student council of our school?”

Chevonne didn’t answer. She just gazed at the floor.

Their chemistry was something that I couldn’t explain well. It was like they knew each other way longer than how it was. I didn’t find it shocking anymore that our enemies were from the student council of our school—or, to say, that I didn’t care that much anymore. I somehow knew that it was going to be something worthy of a revelation, anyway.

“Their leader is Samuel Cuer. One of our teachers.”

Now, this one I didn’t bypass.

“What? But he was a very good person! He helps our students a lot, so there’s no way that he’ll be the bad guy!”

“Jelly, think things through. It’s just a disguise; a facade. We all know now who teacher Mary really is, and how important she is for them. One of their objectives is to secretly follow her wherever she goes until she’ll trigger the curse, which will mean that they’ve found the next creator already. But they won’t know who specifically because, as what Maximus said, the maledicter is not that skillful and talented to make the curse well-refined. 

“Anyway, I believed that after the cruse was triggered, they set their plan in motion. Teacher Samuel applied to the school and did his best to be the student council adviser. He then let the Young Bloods be in the council and planned a retreat here. And that’s where we are now.”

She had a point, but I couldn’t piece them out yet. Or I just didn’t want to accept the idea at all.

“Being the leader of the Young Bloods, he’s the hardest to deal with. He might be in the orange margin, but a warper is a warper. No matter how good you are, you can’t outrun one. They just poof from one place to the other in a fraction of a second.”

“What are the thoughts of the student council members?” Josh asked rather impatiently.

“First is Priscilla, a controller. She’s the first on the list that’s in the red margin. Be extra careful when approaching her because the moment you go inside her thought, consider yourself dead meat. Although controllers have a normal to small thought diameter, they’re still dangerous.”

“Wait,” Rico butted in, “remember teacher Norkie, Jelly?”

“Yes, what’s with him?”

“He actually moved pretty robotically, have you noticed? What were the chances he’s been controlled or manipulated?”

“You’re right! Ritchelle must have been, too, with how she just died on the spot without anyone hurting her.”

“How about the rest?” Josh pressed on. He looked serious, like anticipating something to happen.

“Next is the vice president, Joseph. He’s the second on the list that’s in the red margin. He’s a slasher, and he can generate slashes by swinging his hands. He had a small thought diameter, but still dangerous. Some thinkers say that the best way to defeat a slasher is to cut their arms. Well, in our case, we can’t really do that.”

“Next,” Josh egged on. He looked worried now, and he started sweating.

Chevonne noticed his expression and glanced at me. “Well, the third is the trea—”

“—it’s Rex,” Josh bolted up and charged to the windows, smashing them with his bleeding fists.

Rico and Dr. Shawn went after him while Chevonne and I cowered in surprise and fear in the corner. His face was turning red, and his veins were bulging from his neck. He let out some shrieks of agony and continued punching the windows, making his knuckles bleed more.

Right there and then, Rico threw a gutter punch. It hit Josh’s jaw and he dropped motionless on the floor.

“I can’t think of anything much better,” he huffed, puffing some visible mist with the freezing night.

“You couldn’t have handled it much better,” Dr. Shawn said.

“What’s with him?” Chevonne unclutched from our tight hug and approached Josh’s limp body on the floor. “Wait, is he okay?”

Rico picked Josh and Dr. Shawn slid to the other side.

“He’s okay, he was just unconscious,” Rico replied.

They brought him up and when their footsteps grew fainter, I finally exhaled. It was intense.

“If I recall, Rex is Josh’s nephew,” I told Chevonne.

Chevonne went to the bar and apologized to the old man. “I’m sorry about that, we’ll clean up the shards an—”

“Don’t is the bother. Leave it.”

“Chevonne, can you tell me the rest?” I interjected.

She returned and held my hands tight. “Alright, alright. As I was to tell everyone, Rex is a burster. He’s the third and last red margin thinker in the council. He had a ‘compacted thought’, which means that his thought expands to coat over his whole body only. He can only burst the part that he’s touching. However, with enough mental practices and boosting, he can extend his thought inside the victim’s body.

“Then the twins. The ones who are always absent because of an illness. Father told me it’s just an excuse; they were actually training and have just recently classified. Momo is a summoner while Mimi a sizer. They are both in the orange margin.” She explained briefly what their powers could do. “Actually, we somehow encountered them indirectly.”

The old man gasped and fell from his chair. Chevonne rushed to him and called out the boys to help. Rico and Dr. Shawn rushed down and carried him to the couch. They undid his tuxedo and cerulean long sleeves, revealing a white undershirt. His face was full of sweat and he was gasping for more air. Dr. Shawn examined him and, for some reason, stood and turned my way.

“Stick your hands. He’s going to quicken it.”

Chevonne sobbed and held my hands. “Jelly, let him finish it.”

I didn’t understand but complied, nonetheless. The old man held my hands tightly; he was shivering.

Then I convulsed. My head hurt so much, and a greenish light expanded from my temple. We were all swimming in a green mist, like the one that happened on the barge. I looked at the broken windows and saw my reflection; my eyes were shining in a light shade of green. It disappeared afterward and everything returned to normal.

“What was that?” I gasped.

The old man writhed in pain and the same shade of light retracted back to his temple.

And then he was dead.

Dr. Shawn touched the old man lightly and his body disintegrated on the floor. Then the ashes glittered in light green and floated in the air, whirling around us—then vanished.

“Thank you, Maximus,” Dr. Shawn said.

† † †

We were all inside a room on the second floor where the boys brought Josh. Just an hour ago, Dr. Shawn opened up to us and he revealed his identity.

Apparently, he was also a thinker, and he was sent by his family here to protect Maximus. He was an esper and he could control and move any non-living things inside his thought. He sampled the broken windows earlier and brought the shards back to their original place. However, the moment he canceled his thought, the shards fell to the floor and broke to tinier pieces.

He shared, with the help of Chevonne, that thinkers nowadays were getting more dangerous and society wouldn’t accept them at all: they were considered abominations. Some wealthy families took the initiative to find poor families of thinkers and let them live under their names. They were trained on how to optimize their thoughts and use them to their advantage for the betterment of the world—or the opposite. The wealthy families were called the “head family” while those under their names were called the “subfamily”. The Lorena subfamily was under the Ladra head family. I was a bit lost when they had started sharing about the four realms, but I still understood the gist of it. They said there was a realm that was considered as a new world for some families and that it was governed by some laws created by the creator.

This governed realm that was considered a world for thinkers was called Dimension One, and for them, it was a sacred place. Maximus Ladra, the old man, was once a friend of the previous creator of Dimension One and that they could just go in and out of each other’s realm. However, when Dimension One had been transferred to the next heir, who greatly loathed Maximus, he was banished from entering the borders—for eternity.

The Ladra family had been subjected to prejudice since then. They all left the realm and lived their lives normally in the normal society. But the Ladra family was not the only family who left. Some also didn’t like the ways of the new creator and left for good. Among them were the Garcia and Amamapaw families. Since then, the creator locked the realm from the outside world, and no one knew how it had been to date.

Each family had its ways and set of principles of living—be it for good or bad. The Lorena family swore an oath to their head family to protect Maximus and his succeeding creators. Dr. Shawn’s father had been protecting Maximus until his death, and Dr. Shawn just recently took over his father’s role. That was why he was sent here.

And now, he had sworn an oath in front of me to protect me at all costs. He even kneeled and took my hand, which made me blush.

I hated myself for doubting him at first.

After Dr. Shawn swore an oath, Rico pulled me aside and whispered something about how I could just easily trust him with his words. I told him I didn’t. I just didn’t know what to do. Then we all went up to check on Josh.

Chevonne looked deadly concerned about Josh’s state. She held his left hand and prayed. Dr. Shawn positioned himself by the windows, securing the vicinity outside. Rico was standing beside me, giving Dr. Shawn some weird glances.

I remembered something that I forgot to ask. “Chevonne, didn’t you say that your mother knows the old man?”

She looked at me with dreadful eyes. “He was a friend of our family. He once saved my mother from an accident and helped her marry my father later in her life. Ever since then, he’s been part of my mother’s late-night stories.”

Josh’s hand twitched and Chevonne tightened her hold. His eyes opened to the sight of Chevonne’s hands on his. He pulled his hand out and blushed under the blanket.

What was with the girlish reaction? I didn’t know that he was a softy.

Josh peeked over the hem of the blanket and said in a low and mumbled voice, “I’m sorry for what I’ve done. It’s just that, Rex is a relative.”

He apologized a couple more times, and Rico apologized for what he did as well. It made the atmosphere of the room warm for a moment. Chevonne shared with them the rest of the council members’ thoughts and we strategized a plan.

Then we heard a creaking noise. 

The roof collapsed onto us straight to the floor, and we found ourselves hurtling down the seemingly dark abyss.

All went black.