They Called Me FIVE

LANCE

"Please hurry." She said urgently. 

"Where are you?" A mob of skully warriors with rifles and clanking armors meet us at the center of the dark tunnel. I looked behind me. Found twice their number staggering to trap us in the area.

"So eager to die, I see." I said. My fingers flexing. My shadows dancing from my palm to my arms. 

"Are you still there? Alpha Beast? Hello?" Magnus is furiously tapping his temples. Still nothing from fake Seven. I can only hear high pitch ringing sound. The skully warriors pointed their rifles at us. What a timing. 

Static came in and her muffled voice went through. "Magnus?"

"Yeah, I'm here." He said. Skully warriors chose that time to mow us with bullets. I stretch my shadows to form a shield wall around us. Preventing their ammos to get through. Each bullet suspended in dead black air. 

"What the –" Magnus stared, mouth agape.

"What did Alpha Beast say? Where is she?"

The rifles blazing stops. I twist my hands. Controlling the shadows to flip the bullets caught and point at the skully warriors. The effort strains my arm. Almost ripping my veins to three different sizes. I stifled a cry of pain. My fingers are screaming for release. Shadows are like wolves I put on leash. The more I rely on them to do my bidding, the more they get stronger and beg for freedom. 

I grunt and let the bullets loose. They shot like rocheting bombs with deadly speed. The skully warriors didn't notice I backfired their shots. Each gave me a dead stare that says, 'Did something happen?' 

The bullets ran past through their skulls. Drilling holes so big I could see the wall on the other side. Expressions clueless, they touch their foreheads. Before crashing down the floor with a loud thud.

"Wow." Magnus said. I looked at him. I'm breathless, and clearly half drained. Damn, that wasn't part of the plan. 

"Where's fake Seven?" He shakes his head. 

"No longer here. She said she woke up inside of a coffin. And they're transporting her to another location. The box was airtight. She's losing air on the way." 

"What!"  I marched with my fists clench towards him.

"Wait, let me finish." He put a hand on my chest. Stopping me in the spot.

"She'll be alright. She can escape whenever she wants from the coffin. She said she can turn into anything right? She'll probably be an ant or cockroach and escape. So, it's okay, we don't need to worry about her. There's more important matters we need to attend to." Magnus directed me into the moss covered tunnel and turned left. 

There's a deep chasm that leads right into below ground level. Overlooking at this metal railings, I can see green figures drifting here and there. I look for familiar faces. But they all look the same to me. He climbed into the railings.

"What are you doing?" He pulled me to his side. I stumbled on the metal pipe, I'm leaning right down to the dark pavement below. It's probably hundred feet. 

"Alpha Beast said she finally made contact with Seven." 

My face lit up. "Really? Where is she?" He nudge his chin below, down to the corner hidden by the flight of stairs, I caught sight of something silver and gleaming. At first I thought it's a diamond, but the thing is ten times our size so that's impossible. 

"Sealed in a sphere." He suddenly grab me by the collar and we plummeted down. I screamed. 

Terribly reminded when I fell in third storey window and was caught like a falling princess. I'm prepared to be crushed like shattered wine glass, hitting the bottom. I'm prepared for broken bones possibly splitting my limbs lengthwise. 

What I didn't expect…is to bounce like a flying ball and hit my butt on the most ugliest stoutest dwarf I've ever seen the face will probably hunt me down for the rest of my life. 

"Oof!" I stumbled in clear hearing. Magnus landed like a frog on all fours. He helped me up.

"What the hell was that?!" I demanded. He shrugged. "We got us a safe landing. Come on." He jerked his head towards the gleaming room I caught sight from above.

"Haaarrk!" 

"Ouch!" The dwarf I hit on is lying flat on the ground. His teeth sank on my feet. He tried to bite me again but I kick his mud freaking ugly cheek instead. My worn out leather shoes drilled deeper into his mouth and take out all his teeth. He coughed it all off. Gave me one last glare before his eyeball roll at the top of his eyelids and he passed out.

I ran to catch up with Magnus. 

"What's a dwarf doing here?" I asked him. Barely keeping up to his long strides. 

"He'll kill you if he heard you called him dwarf." We climbed the ledge and hopped on from sets of stairs before we took one last big acrobatic leap to avoid the flimsy rusted bridge. 

Glass room greeted us. Inside is a big sphere like transparent window church glasses. Except there's no painting of apostles or Mary, a girl was inside. Short cropped up hair, translucent pale skin, black overcoat and pants, black boots too. 

My eyes dilated. It's Seven.

Magnus kicked off the glass walls. It crash under his feet. 

"Seven?" I pound my fist on the sphere. She's standing completely still inside. Deep asleep. I exert all my strength and tried to break through. It didn't work. No cracks on the surface. Beside me, Magnus also tried but failed.

"She won't wake up."  Someone behind us said. We both turned around. Meira is standing with her chin up high. High heels clanking on the floor, and she's wearing a cheerleader costume. Her auburn hair on ponytail. My blood smeared right into my eyes when I see her rotting face.

She's brimming with youth. Even more than before. She flip her auburn ponytailed hair and gave us a brilliant smile. My fingers literally digs right into my skin and scratch deeper until blood comes out.

I would literally give anything to rip those white teeth off one by one.