Lost in the Crossroads

One - Strange Event and Places (Marco & Abelone)

Fear of the unknown. It doesn't only apply to humans.

It was spring in the Land of Moon, and Marco was looking for his kindred.

He flew high above the sky. The great wind of the sky was slowly icing his fiery wings with its deadly winds. Not enough to stop his movements but it does unease him.

He had not meant to come this high or this far. Below him, through the deep blanket of darkness, lay the endless Ocean. He had been hunting over the Naga's territory, flying in great circles, illuminating the night sky with his fiery brilliance and calling with his mind.

He was uncertain as to why he keeps looking when no one seems to answer his call.

It was painful, listening to silence.

Then the silence was suddenly broken by a great, battering wind. For a brief, unaccustomed moment, he had been afraid as the great wind lifted him like a dry leaf and flung through the darkness and dropped him.

Composing himself, Marco spread his fiery wings and rose upon the winds. He hovered above the clouds that seemed to gain a curtain of bright lights.

What just happened? He wondered. What is going on?

This was a first in the thousand years of his life. The wind never tossed him before like a rag doll. Even more so, the strange curtain of lights above the sky that encompasses the sea and land was never seen before.

Something had happened.

Something was in the air.

Magic. But it was always in the air.

It was in the nature of their lands.

Yet the sudden surge of magic in the air unsettled him. Never had he felt something like that before.

The wind caught him again, the rising magic in the air howled against his skin. This time he slipped in its grip, diving beneath the clouds and began to soar back to his home with powerful beats of his wings.

The winds came from somewhere in the East, the Land of the Rising Sun. It doesn't felt like the wretched Witch but one cannot be so sure.

A trill of rage escaped his beak. No more witches!

Witches were the cause of the fall of the East. They wanted to control over everything, humans, elves and Mythos alike. Witches drove the Dragon kin to extinction with their greed of power. An Ancient House of Mythos fell into ruins because of human females drunk in their destructive magical power.

It was most insulting.

Clearly, humans were not meant for Magic with their greed and ambition. Just look at the terrible wars they wage against their own race. War over war, fighting with the whole length of their short-lived existence like there will no be tomorrow.

It was a wonder why Gaia still kept them. Perhaps, she found entertainment with their foolishness.

He mentally snorted at the thought of that. The goddess finding too much entertainment over humanity, she granted Mythos' the gift to morphed into a human being. Marco, after the extinction of Dragons he held so dear in his heart, refused to fully used that gift. He doesn't want to be like them. Why would he?

It taken a good hour but he can finally see the rooftops of Mythos' settlements around the towering Castle of the Land of the Moon. He dove lower in preparation to land on the Castle's garden.

It seems like he wasn't the only one who felt the surge of magic in the air as the White Tiger-lord waited for his arrival. The Black Turtle must have gone to wake their adoptive father, The Lord of the West, for the orders to what action was to be taken with the sudden anomaly from the East. Normally, it was his duty to decide as the strongest Mythos but this problem origins from the East.

The East doesn't bode him well.

“Brother.”He greeted as he morphed into his half-form, talons scratching the well-trimmed grass of the garden. He tried to hide his uneasiness from the tiger despite knowing it was futile.

“And here I thought, you're going to bring something back.”Sebastian grinned teasingly, white tail flicking back and forth behind him.

“I was distracted." He admitted, gliding through the garden with a flurry of passionate red and flashing gold of his robes.

Sharp golden eyes bore into his blue ones as he approached him. The tiger's tail stopped twitching. “Of course, you are. But I assure you brother, it is no witch.”

“I know." He sighed, stopping for a moment to feel his brother's comforting clawed hand on his shoulder. Praise the Tiger-lord for knowing to remind him that witches no longer exist in any land.

Yet he cannot shake this feeling of something was not right.

“Hopefully, it was just Gaia messing around.” The Tiger-Lord commented, hoping to lighten the situation. It was in his nature after all.

“Hopefully.” Marco smiled for his brother's effort.

Abelone waited for Dawn as they huddled together with combined towels over their form on the bulky and unknown tree's tentacle-like roots.

She stared blankly at the slowly dying embers of their camp fire, listening to the silent snores of her friends around her. Alex was leaning on her left shoulder, an uncomfortable weight but she doesn't have the heart to move her.

They were all tired from their wild experience.

Massive Earthquake. Endless screaming around them.

Road crumbling before them.

Trying to avoid from melting and finding out that they somehow escaped death. Death must have been pissed at them for knocking and running away.

Landing on top of a cliff with a big ass tree behind them.

Encountering a fiery ball of lights. And then finally, light shows.

They didn't even hit a twenty-four-hour mark. Abel felt a massive headache coming.

Once the light shows ended with another dramatic gust of wind, her friends started demanding and screaming questions.

Are they truly Aurora Borealis, just like Blake said? I don't know, she answered. Abel doesn't encounter Auroras in their country. After all, it was a tropical archipelago. She wasn't sure what they look like in close inspection.

Aren't those supposed to appear somewhere in Northern Countries? Yes. They do sound like exists in cold areas. Like North Pole.

Where on Earth are they? That's what we are going to find out once morning arrive. She placated the hysterical Drishti who was close to snapping at the equally hysterical Kara.

Maybe we were really in Heaven? No, we don't. She sighed, a little exasperated. I don't see any angels. I need angels before I believed I'm in heaven.

Not that I'll go to heaven when I die, anyway. She thought.

Where are the aftershocks? Probably got lost, too. She replied blandly, earning a smack on the head from Alex. Obviously not coming. She amended. And for the last time Kara, there wasn't going to be a Tsunami.

Speaking of Tsunami, now that the purring engine of her Trooper stopped she could hear the tell-tale sound of waves crashing against rocks. And the scent that the winds bring are fresh, salty and slightly fishy.

Great, they were in a Coastal Area.

How did that happen again?

Ugh. Headache.

“What is going to happen to us?” Alex murmured once the others have fallen asleep.

“I'm not sure.” She answered thoughtfully. “But we'll have to live and find out.”

“Will we be able to come back?”

“I don't know. Do you want to go back?”

“Don't you?”

“I don't know.”

“Hmm.”

Alex fell asleep after that. Abel remained awake as their watch. She couldn't really sleep after what happened. Her body was like a high strung wire from all the life-threatening situation. She felt that if she just blink something bad is going to happen again which she just couldn't allow.

While she lost men in the battlefield before, being a Captain of a squad and all, Abel wouldn't be able to accept if they die on her watch. God. That damn earthquake almost did that. At the very least, she was with them but still the damage had been done.

Unlike terrorists, robbers, kidnappers, rapist etc,.. She could not fight and win against Mother Nature in order for them to live. Not even with her drifting skills.

It was most terrifying than being slashed on the throat by your late Commanding Officer.

Abel unconsciously covered the visible scar on her throat with her free hand.

If her Commanding Officer had never done that, she must have died back then. He faked her death with a shallow cut on her throat, just so she could survive knowing they wouldn't that day. She could still feel the warmth of her own blood from the bleeding cut in her hands. The pain of not being able to breathe properly. Inhaling in and out the scent of blood, dirt, grime, gunpowder and explosion in the air while blood gushed out of the wound with every movement. The fear of dying.

She released a shaky breath from the trip in the memory-lane.

As much as she was grateful, they were still alive and breathing. She felt suspicious of their sudden arrival in this unknown land. She really doesn't want to delve deep into it but she couldn't help it. Her instinct is thrumming with suspicion that something is at work here.

She rarely doubted her instinct since it saved her a lot of times in the front-lines. Used it to dodge bullets actually, not that it works every time.

God, this place doesn't bode her well.

It also got weird-ass trees. She thought, tilting her head up. It is a tree with a majestic size with a long trunk and broad tree-top. Knotted branches rose ever upwards. She supposed whatever was swaying along with the winds from the branches were just vines, not some tentacles or something.

Her gaze turned to the slowly lighting horizon, catching a minute-movement in the sea waters and clearly heard some loud splashing.

Dawn is near.

And there is something long in the water. Something—what the hell was that?

There was again a movement, a shadow in the dark waters of the sea.

A snake on the sea?

Oh a sea-snake.

Probably?

Abel pursed her lips, wanting to investigate but couldn't move from her spot with her friend leaning on her shoulder. Sighing, she carefully laid down Alex on Dein's outstretched legs and escaped the warmth of combined towels.

“Abel?" Alex murmured sleepily, probably jostled awake even with her careful movements.

Abel shushed her, extinguishing the camp fire as the sky has softened to blue and the clouds blushed with the brush of the rising Sun's light. The air is delicate and cool with moisture, kissing softly the blades of leaves, grasses and mosses.

She stood at the edge of the cliff, careful not to slip on the slippery moist roots with her sneakers.

The rather large sea-snake she saw disappeared beneath the soft waves of the sea. Abel hoped she was just seeing things.

She really did but the overgrown worm's shadow reared its ugly head again, leaping in the air and diving back into the water. It looks long since its body seems to coil between the air and water creating a loop.

She heard someone slipped not far from behind her, a thump and a shriek. She peered over her shoulders, finding Alex sprawled over the cradle of roots and mosses with a shock and mortified look on her face. Her hands haphazardly thrown over her head and on the legs of the newly awaken Dein who woke up Hailey with a finger shove on her nose and made her shriek. Thankfully, Blake slapped a hand over her mouth before the sound could actually create a permanent damage in anyone's ear.

“What is that?”Alex demanded, hazel brown eyes squinting at the horizon.

Abel pinched the bridged of her nose as she slowly and carefully twisted her body side-ways. She could feign ignorance but Alex, even half-awake could tell she knows something was up.

Well, there is really no need to lie. They could take it. It was just an overgrown worm splashing happily in the sea.

“What is it?” Dein grumbled, rubbing her eyes and have the temper to glared at the both of them. Kara, using Dein's stomach as pillow, stirred awake. Geneva and Drishti was already sitting up.

“Is something wrong?”Fenella muttered under Tabithas arm pit as she slowly rise. Why the hell she was there Abel didn't know.

“There is a snake in the sea.” She answered, glancing back at the slowly lighting up horizon.

Any minute now, the sun would rise.

“There is?” Fenella inquired.

The damn snake timed it well, shooting in a straight line in the air as the sun peeks out from the horizon, granting the whole world its beaming light and giving them full view of how immensely large and long the sea-snake was compare to normal ones they encountered in their country. It's not really a snake but a sea monster.

Somebody choked, Abel wasn't sure who.

“Do not scream. It's too early for this madness.” Abel warned.

Too late, they have already started. Their shrill screams echoing in the new light of Dawn brought her headache with vengeance. It was quite surprising the damn monster didn't deem them annoying enough for the noise and gobbled them up. Instead it dove beneath the waters and never shown itself again.

Damn, this place is weird.