The witch's mountain

Chapter 5: The Black Chip

"Lights out at ten Lillian." My dad tells me. I hear him walk over to my desk and peek over my shoulder. "You really outdid yourself with this hammer." He says scanning my blueprints. "Thanks dad." I reply, feeling proud of myself. He pats my head and walks away, leaving me to finish my work. This hammer was everything I could wish for and more. I can't wait to finish building it.

My adorable robot friend, Timothy flies over to land on my shoulder. "I really think you should've built a sword." He says in his tiny robot voice. "What can you do with a hammer?" I chuckle. "A lot," I replied. "I always knew my way around a hammer anyway. You know that." As one of the daughters of the mayor of Circuit City, hammers, screwdrivers and machinery in general is all that I know. Ever since I was a child, I have always had a hammer in my hand. The very thought of building something with my own hands always excites me. And I have my dad to thank for that. My dad is a genius vampire. And one of the most powerful ones. During war, my dad saved most of the community by disobeying the vampire king. He did what he had to do to save the people. And for that, the vampire queen rewarded him by giving him a city of his own. And so Circuit City was created.

Made by people who were saved by my father and others who loved to build things and technology, Circuit City is one of the largest cities east of the royal castle of Magica.

I started to craft the hammer, paying attention to every detail, from the sharpness of the head to the strength of the handle. When I was done, I knew I had made something special. I smiled, knowing that this hammer was going to be powerful and useful.

Then suddenly, I heard a few sharp knocks on my office door. A beautiful curvaceous woman with golden tan skin with long blonde hair like mine and silver eyes walks through the door. Her plump and glossy lips pout as she stares at my cluttered office mess. She had an air of authority about her, and she immediately commanded my attention. I watched her cross the room, her hips swaying with each step. "Lillian my love, you really need to clean up this office," she tells me. "Of course mother," I say. She smiles and kisses my forehead, before looking down at my hammer. "What's this lily flower?" She asked picking up my blueprints. "It's my new hammer." I say proudly. She grins and hands me the blueprints. "This looks like an excellent project. I'm sure you'll do great work, just like always." She says, giving me an affectionate squeeze before looking around my office again.

I noticed her unsettling aura and instinctively grabbed her hand. "Are you alright mama?" I asked. I also noticed she wore her yellow training leotard. My mom is both an enchantress and a fighter. She and grandpa Nick train our city folk for an attack. Our city is mostly robots. And people who love robots. Or any type of machinery. And to most that might seem weak. So my mom decided that to not seem weak to enemies, we needed to use our skills to fight as well as buidling things we love.

My mom looks at me and smiles. "I'm fine sweetie." She says softly. Her voice almost sounded like a whisper. Tim leaned close to my ear. "She's lying," He whispers. "I know." I whispered back. Her face looks around my office again. I think she was searching for something. For what, I don't know. I grabbed my hammer and looked around myself. Something made her uneasy. And I wanted to be prepared.

Suddenly, we both saw this weird shape on the ceiling. I'm up on my feet. My mom pulled me to her side. As if oozed, the oddly-shaped liquid began to drip on the wooden floor. My mother and I stood ready. Tim's evil aura alarm went off.

"What the hell is it?" Tim cried. Then the ooze struck! We dodged it instantly. Mom tried to counter but missed. The ooze once again attacks and this time the damn ooze separated itself into 3 parts. An opponent for each of us. We all attacked, but the ooze was too fast and slippery! "s**t!" My mama cursed. My office was too small. We needed room to fight. My mom and Tim were both trapped in a small corner of my office. They tried as hard as they could to fight off the ooze.

"Out the window!" I cried. My mama grabs Tim and jumps up and over the ooze. Using my newly crafted hammer, I pour my magic and create a shield to stop the ooze from attacking. It gave my mom enough time to crash out of the window. I followed immediately after the ooze broke through my shield. We flew into the air. If the ooze was toxic, we didn't want it to hit the ground and hurt citizens.

"Tim, do we know what this is yet?" My mom asked the tiny robot. Tim's delicate yellow eyes analyzed the ooze that was slowly floating through the air. His silver body glows white and a sheet of paper appears in front of him. "It's some kind of ooze created with dead demon hearts." He answers. Dead demon hearts? I thought. Who in hell would use dead demon hearts? And for what? Had no time to think. I had to act. As the ooze separated again, there were more than three separate oozes this time. "Goddamn it!" Mom cried angrily. "Don't fret," Tim said. "When it separates, the demonic energy decreases."

I felt relieved, but I was still worried. I had no idea what the ooze could do. Nor where it came from. And why was it here? I had to stay on guard if something unexpected happened. I studied the ooze carefully. To end this fight as quickly as possible, I looked for a weakness. This ooze was made of demon hearts. Dead demon hearts. I'm part vampire, I can sense the dead. Concentrating hard, I should be able to sense the heart that controls it.

"Tim. Mom." I said looking at them. "I'm gonna try and find the heart." They nodded and my mom made clones of herself to attack. Tim also jumped into the battle while I focused on finding the main demon heart. I closed my eyes. Using my vampire ability, I listened intensely to a heart beat.

In my mind's eyes, I saw several tiny golden lights. They were dull. Which means they're fake. Or rather just the small pieces of a few demon hearts. They were use as a distraction of course to keep us away from the main heart. But I wasn't going to give up. That heart had to be somewhere among these clones of ooze. I looked to the left and then to the right. I kept seeing the dull golden fake hearts. But just then, I heard it. The heart beat!

My eyes shot open!

I pressed the button on my hammer to increase its size. I twisted it to make sure it locked and charged it up with some of my power. I watched as the hammer expanded and the handle lengthened. With a satisfied smile, I knew I was ready to find the core of the demonic ooze. I entered the fight, my hammer firmly in my grip. With my senses guiding me, I was getting close. Just to the left, I found what controlled the ooze. With one stroke of my hammer, I crushed a medium-sized shard that was hiding within the glass of my office window.

"Gotcha," I cried. The shard shattered into tiny pieces. The ooze clones shrieked in pain and evaporated like water in the hot sun. Then suddenly, I felt a pain in the back of my neck as something came out of it. It felt like metal. And the energy around it was dark. Very dark. And when it came out, she conjured a shield around it. "At long last," Mom whispered. I gave her a questionable look. "What is it?" I asked. "The one thing I've been searching for all these years." She replied.

We heard my dad calling out to us and we flew down to the sidewalk where he and others were standing crowded around. My dad pulled us into his arms and looks us over. Are you all ok?" he asked, worried. "Are you injured in any way?" I shook my head. "We're fine daddy." He sighed in relief. "Let's head home," he said, taking us both by the hand. As we walked home, I couldn't help but wonder what my mom had found.

"Mom," I called her.

"Don't worry sweetie," she says. "I'll explain when we get home."

We got to the castle in no time flat. We walked to our lab where my mother called in a specialist to examine the delicate metal thing that came out of my neck. The specialist told us it was a chip put there when I was a baby. He said it had tracked my every move since then. My dad and I were shocked. My mother, however, didn't seem at all surprised. "Mom, did you know about this?" I asked abruptly. She nodded. "Yes, I knew about it," she said. "It was put there to control you." "But why?" I asked. She took a deep breath before answering. "I don't know Lily. But it might have something to do with the time we found you in front of a portal near the beach a long time ago."

"What happened?" I asked.

"One night, when you were 4 years old, you and several other children were found in front of a dark cave near the shadow woods after you went through the portal near the beach." Dad explained. I couldn't remember a thing. I asked Dad why I was there, but he shook his head and said he didn't know. He said all he could remember was seeing me there with the other children. "Did you get a chance to look inside the cave?" I asked. "There must have been something in there that lured us there." Mom shook her head. "We didn't try," she replied. "All the parents sensed some very dark magic coming from it and we decided to leave and seal it before anything came out of it." "We all agreed never to speak of the cave again and to never return to it. We all quickly left and never looked back."

"Well it looks like we might have to go back to that cave," I said. My mother shook her head. "You're not going anywhere until we know who attacked you and grandpa William." My eyes widen. "Someone attacked Grandpa William?" My mother nodded gravely. "He's in the hospital now," she said. "You're not going anywhere until we know who did this and why."

"But I just can't sit here and do nothing mom. I can help figure this out." I replied. Someone made an extreme effort to attack me. Let alone Grandpa William. And it would kill me to sit here and do nothing. I had so many questions. Who was behind this attack? What was their motive? How did they pull it off? And not only that, there were several others at that cave. I need to find them so this won't happen to them either.

My dad searched my eyes. He saw the determination in my eyes and I wasn't backing down. He nodded and said, "Alright sweetie." Mom was about to interject but dad raised his hand to stop her. "She's not planning to back down dear," He said. He walks over to mom and kisses her cheek. "She takes after you remember." Mom reluctantly gives in but tells me to wait until she and the other parents find out what happened to Grandpa William.

Shortly after, mom and dad returned back to my office to see if they could find anymore clues. Tim and I stayed in the lab to brainstorm a bit. "There are many old enemies that your parents have on their lists," Tim stated. "It could be anyone." We looked into every possible suspect. We compiled a list of names and started researching to see if there was any connection between them and the attack. But there was nothing. As a wise man in the magical realm, Grandpa William is highly respected. Moreover, I am a daughter of a vampire and an enchatress.

Maybe these attacks were intended to draw the attention of the magical realm's king and queen. I thought. But then there was still the fact that this black chip had been inside me since I was a baby. Along with several others. So many dots. But one thing is clear, something sinister is happening and we need to stop it before it becomes a major problem than it already is.

And just as I was about to leave the lab, a portal opened and a girl I recognized fell out of it. I rushed over to her quickly. Her cinnamon brown skin was covered in cuts and she had a huge gash on her forehead. Her flaming red hair was a mess and she wore a torn blue cape. She held on to her triton and when she fluttered her eyes open, she looked at me and smiles faintly. "Made it," she whispered. "Octavia, what happened to you?" I asked franticly. But before she could answer she fainted.

There was no time to take her to the hospital, not even teleporting. She lost too much blood. So I cleared off one of the lab desks, and gently placed her on it. And as her blood poured out, something slipped out of her neck. "Look!" Tim cried. It was another black chip. This mystery has now become even stranger. But at least I found another one with a black chip on her neck. I quickly grabbed it and placed it in a test tube. I then grabbed some bandages and tried to stop the bleeding. And called some doctors to come to our castle to help Octavia. And then I thought, if we locate all the children who were in the cave that night we might be able to find whoever is attacking us.

Once the doctors fixed up Octavia, I ordered them to put her in a guest room. I knew it would be awhile before she woke up to question her so I sat beside her. I took her hand in mine and prayed that she would make it through this. I was relieved when I saw her chest rising and falling. I knew she was going to be alright. "Don't worry," I whispered softly. I sat beside her for a few more minutes until I felt my eyes heavy and fell asleep. When I awoke, I felt someone put a blanket over me. I looked up to see Octavia smiling down at me. She squeezed my hand and whispered, "Thank you." I smiled back and nodded, happy she was alive and well. "What happened?" I asked.

She let out a frustrated sigh. "This damn water demon attacked me when I was about to go to my parents' castle." "Same here." I said. "I was attacked by some ooze a couple of hours ago. I had my mom and Tim with me." She raised an eyebrow. "What do you think is happening?" she asked. I shook my head. "I'm not sure. But I learned from my parents that a long time ago, myself and a couple of other children were found near a cave not too far from the shadow woods."

"And?" she asked.

"You were one of them," I replied.

"How do you know?"

"There was a black chip from your neck. The same chip that came out of mine."

Ocatvia's jaw dropped. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. She put her fingers to her neck and felt the empty spot where the chip had been. She was stunned and speechless. "I think we should find others who also have a black chip." I said to her. "How?" she asked. "By using ours."