Part 4 – Speak . . . (1/2)

The very moment that insufferable woman's grip loosened I pushed her away from me. To my surprise, she actually stumbled upon impact! Ha, maybe she wasn't so sturdy on her feet after all. Or, the ritual had actually worked and given me superhuman strength! Well . . . Superhuman in comparison to my earlier none existent strength. 'Hey, don't laugh at me! I'm a mage, not a brute!' As if she had heard my thoughts, which of course was nonsense, she looked at me with a cocked eyebrow.

“Not quite the frail little girl your father made you out to be, huh? Say, just where are you packing all that muscle in these soft noodle arms?” She forcefully pulled me to her and began groping my upper arm. Much to my horror I couldn't help but let out a soft meek moan. It was such a strange and odd sensation, it shouldn't feel like this really!

“Uh~! Stop that you damned pervert!” I jerked my arm from her grasp and walked off to where my clothes lay. Just before I started changing though, I turned to my chaperone and glared at her. “Do you fucking mind!?”

"Mind you changing in front of me? No, not in the slightest. I'm even open to helping you." The way she said it with such a deadpan voice made me even angrier!

“You are insufferable! Go die in a ditch already!!!”

I turned away and to the best of my abilities tried to think of her as another girl from the university. Yet before I was even finished with buttoning my blouse, a vibrating sound from my skirt pocket startled me. ‘A text? Now?’ Trying to be as inconspicuous as I could, I reached down and peeked at the screen of my smart pad. "I wait for you in the front! Try and lose your tail!"-T For just a split-second a smile stole its way onto my face, but that had already enough for the human bloodhound behind me.

“Ohh! What do we have there? Something nice?” She stepped around to my front quicker than she should have been able to. By now I was almost certain that she was augmented and heavily so too!

“Nothing! At least nothing of interest to a brute like you!” I was about to slide the Pad back into my pocket, only for her hand to quickly grab my wrist.

"Now the last time I checked, it was for me to decide what is of interest to me and whatnot . . . Oh, and looked here a phone!" She flipped my hand up and before I could react she had already snagged the Pad from me.

“Oh, is this message from your beloved Tanya? Well, I'll make sure you meet up with her! But before that . . .” Her smile cracked into an evil grin.

Loosening her grip she let the expensive and rather fragile devise slip out of her grasp. I went to reach for it but was already too late. With loud clattering, it impacted the ground. A large crack went from one edge of the screen to the other.

“Oops.”

“You Bit-” The heel of her armoured boot came crashing down right on the display. The composite-glass screen wasn't made for that kind of abuse. A loud crunch told me all I needed to know.

“Oops.”

‘I will kill that bitch! No . . . I will make her suffer and take everything from her! Her humanity, her sanity, her self-worth!

. . .

You hear me Sadiya? I'm coming for you, for you and your entire little troupe! You are NOT safe from me . . . Hahaha, Right! Back to the story, okay?’

. . .

A few minutes later the bitch in question had already dragged me through the entire compound. At least you could say the woman was efficient. Instead of stopping at the checkpoints, she just glared at the soldiers and rushed through. I was actually a little surprised that she didn't want to show off her little price. The way she held on to me like a dog with a bone, I sure felt as if I was just that to her. I guessed that she either didn't really understand her new job or she simply didn't care. Because on the way out she actually stopped by her living space and made me carry her stuff! Also, I was pretty sure there were several pornographic magazines in there. Something about tying people up. I guess it was nice? I obviously didn't look too closely at it! This was after all nothing I had any interest in!

One moment I was carrying weapon-grade amounts of perverted literature and in the next, we were already outside of the building. Damn, that woman was fast on her feet! Seriously, it almost seemed as if she was more eager to get out of here than I was. The guard at the exit only gave us a curious look, especially Sadiya that was. My guess was that he hadn't ever seen a fully armed and armoured mercenary storm out of the warehouse before, especially not one with her very own slave Mage! 'Why, the fuck, am I even carrying her stuff?!' I only refrained from actually asking that stuck up bitch, because I was certain she would try and torment me again.

All the while when walking towards where Tanya should be waiting I hadn't been able to decide what course of action I would be most comfortable with. On one hand, I was scared and angry about this entire development, I wanted her to come swooping in and save me from both my parents and my guard dog! On the other hand, I truly feared for what Sadiya, would do to my dear friend. First of all, I had no way of knowing if Tanya could even hold Sadiya off long enough for me to escape her reach. And even if she could then what? While I was certain now that my Future did not lay with Arcana Future Industries, my father was not one that easily gave up his investments. If things did went south Tanya could be shot and/or fatally wounded, or even worse I myself could be shot!

Thinking about all the horrible possibilities I didn't even register that we had already reached the meeting point. Therefore I was more than a little confused when suddenly Tanya’s voice called out to me.

“Valerie!? Thank goodness, you're okay!” While her smile remained unchanged her eyes narrowed as she looked over my new guard.

“And who the fuck is this?” Tanya’s voice was colder than I had ever heard before. She took a step towards me but instantly Sadiya’s hand went to her sidearm.

“Civilian!” She clicked off the weapons safety. “If you have nothing more to say, I’d advise you to not step closer to Miss Sherman. It would be a shame if I had to see you as a danger to her health . . .” The mercenary’s smile could only be described as positively evil.

Tanya in turn only scoffed, took a step towards the other woman and spit out in front of her. “Try me, cunt. We’ll see who wins . . .” Her left hand reached around to her back.

There they stood, right in front of me looking as if they were about to have a shoot-out! 'What the heck is this? Some kind of old-timey Western!?' Agitated I looked from one of them back to the other and as I did so a tiny voice in the back of my head began whispering to me. ‘Let it escalate . . . choose the stronger one . . .’ I blinked in confusion, just what had I been thinking right now? ‘Why would I want them to fight? Shouldn’t I try and stop them? No . . .' A smile spread on my face. There were people right here willing to fight for me. To fight each other to the death . . . Just why would I want to break this up? I would simply make the winner my champion. After all, if Tanya couldn't protect me . . . then why should she be worthy of my grace?

When after several moments nothing more happened than the two staring at each other my smile cracked. ‘How boring . . . Wait wasn't that actually a good thing?’ Something weird was going on with my mind, of that I was sure. These thoughts . . . they had felt at the same time like mine and not like mine. A cold shiver ran down when I realized that I had no idea on how to stop this, whatever it was! Not the voice inside my head or the two women before me would listen to me. I had to do something! But what?

I took a step towards them, I need to stop them! Another step my vision blacked out. I fell forwards. The next thing I know, I found myself in a world incredibly alien and disturbingly familiar. All-Encompassing darkness seemed to almost wrap around my lithe frame. And from the darkness, from the deepest most terrifying and most welcoming blackness a voice called to me.

“Child. Speak . . . And the world will listen . . .”

The voice, it was so hard to focus on it but from the little I had heard, I was certain. It was female and it had called me a child.

“I am no longer a child! What do you even mean by that?”

The voice was silent for a moment but then she said it again.

“Speak . . . And the world will listen . . .”

Just why did this being, this entity . . . whatever it was! Why did it have to be so cryptic!

“Explain yourself, Gods damn it!”

“No God . . . Speak . . .”

I blinked once and all of a sudden I was back in the street like before. Neither Tanya nor Sadiya had moved in all the time I had been gone. Had they not seen me fall? I looked down and to my surprise, I was still on my feet! I took another step towards the two in the hopes of interfering and stopping them from doing anything stupid. Yet the very moment I moved it was as if the both of them were released from stasis. Quicker than I realized weapons were drawn and fingers went on triggers. I gasped in shock and panic. 'Not like this! I will not lose Tanya! Speak . . .’ And as if something I had done from birth, really more out of instinct than any logical thought I Spoke.

“Stop!” My voice was nothing human anymore. Producing the sound alone felt like swallowing shards of glass. Even hearing my own words brought me pain.

Two people stood before me. Both of them locked into their action. Sadiya had levelled her gun at my friend's chest and Tanya's weapon was point-blank between the mercenary's eyes. Yet both of them didn't move a muscle. Their fingers didn't twitch and their chests didn't rise. I looked at the scene for what felt like an eternity, not understanding what had just happened. Only when I saw the trickle of blood flowing out of Tanya's nose I truly realised what I had done!

I had hurt Tanya . . . I had hurt my only friend, the one person that had protected and cared for me for years. I searched for the magic within me, to frantically try and stop whatever I was doing but quickly found that nothing was left! There was literally no amount of magic in my body! ‘Oh, Go- ugh! What have I done! What is going on with me? How do I stop this!?’ Trough my coming tears a saw how Tanya's eyes twitched and she looked over to me. If anything, what I saw in them was her pain, pure and simple. What I had done was still hurting her!

Once more I tried to grasp at whatever was forming this control over her. I closed my eyes and send my mind racing through every fibre of my body. And this time I noticed something. While there was indeed no mana flowing trough me anymore, there was a faint pulsing from within me. I called to me beckoned me. If sirens existed, this had to be their song, I was certain of it. Slowly but surely I reached out to it. My mind probed it, felt for it. It was powerful, magnificent, it drowned out even the beating of my own heart. And then I embraced it. Hot and cold shivers ran down my body. My skin seemed to almost physically ripple. And as if my heart went into a symphony with the pulsing, the oh so faint beating tuned in on the same rhythm the same frequency, losing itself completely in the pulsing.

I opened my eyes again, I was attuned! Finally, I could see what had been hiden from me before. Not I had hexed Tanya and Sadiya. Something else had, or rather Someone. While the energy and compulsion were channelled through my body, it did not originate from it. Like a tether through a hole, a connection was made through my core into another dimension. This spell was her way of teaching me. Like a parent showing her child how to drive a bike. Still, I didn't want this. I reached out for the tether and gently clenched it. It pushed against me for a second but then relented.

And the very moment the connection collapsed, I did too. I felt similar to a mage overusing their powers and burning out, only instead of my mind and body being tired, I was left with the weirdest case of vertigo I had ever experienced. Almost sure of my composure, I took a few steps forward, only to immediately collapsing on my jelly legs. Curiously enough I felt almost instantly a pair of arms around me. I looked up expecting the Tanya smiling down on me only to be met with the curious stare of my new bodyguard.