As the Princess arrived at her bedroom, she walked in crying as she threw herself on her bed. Rika walked in to see her emotional as she was hugging her pillow for comfort.

"Your highness?" Rika quickly bowed to give her respect.

The Princess knew it was Rika but didn’t bother to raise her head up as she buried it in her pillow. She muffled something in her pillow that Rika couldn’t pick up.

"Can you repeat that again please Princess?" Rika asked as she walked up to her highness.

Princess Anya raised her head up from her pillow looking at Rika with tears in her eyes.

"I made a wish, before our mission asking for strength. It came true, but not what I expected." The Princess replied. "I know what I saw Rika, I didn’t imagine it."

Rika looked into the Princess’ eyes and saw how serious she was. She thought to herself that maybe she was telling the truth about their new visitor. Even though Rika saw for herself the seal that prevents Kevin from using his reiki powers, something or someone saved them; she sat next to the Princess.

"Something tells me you might be right your highness. I’m sure he didn’t mean what he said. He’s in our world, I can’t imagine how scared he must be. It might sound crazy, but as your second in command, I believe we should help him." Rika said. "Who knows, he might be helpful to our cause in return."

The Princess looked at Rika, surprised at first but as she saw Rika smile, it gave her the confirmation that she is willing to believe her. The Princess smiled as she sat up. Before she spoke, they hear a knock at the door.

"Your highness, are you there? It’s General De Grandis reporting in." General De Grandis spoke calmly.

Rika and the Princess stood up from the bed. Princess Anya wiped the rest of her tears away so she wouldn’t look like she was crying in front of the general.

You may enter General. She spoke calmly.

The General proceeded in opening the door. Both him and the soldier entered closing the door behind them. They didn’t approach the Princess; they didn’t even bow in respect. They stood in front of the door as though they were guarding it. Rika became suspicious of their odd action.

Welcome back general, I hope you and your men have settled in? The Princess asked.

Yes, your highness, but there isn’t much time. I came here to escort you for debriefing. We mustn’t be late. Replied the General.

"Yes of course." the Princess replied. As she walked towards the General, Rika grabbed the princess by the arm and stopped her in her place. Princess Anya looked back at her wondering what she was doing. Rika looked at her princess calmly but with concern in her eyes. Something about the General and the soldier crawled up Rika’s spine. Her senses told her something wasn’t right. They never bowed when they entered, and Rika has been in enough meetings with the Princess that she knew she was never escorted by military. She stepped in front of the Princess as to protect her showing the General and the soldier she wasn’t going to leave with them.

"I’m sorry General, but I couldn’t help but notice you both forgot to address her Highness when you came in." said Rika sternly.

The general and soldier quickly glanced at each other realizing that they messed up but still kept composed so not to blow their cover.

"Forgive us for the lack of formalities, but its urgent the Princess comes with us." Stated the General. "We need her statement on the incident that happened, and we don’t have much time."

The General stepped forward to approach the Princess, but Rika quickly brings out her weapons guarding the Princess. The General looked at Rika not amused with Rika not compiling.

"I’m sorry General, but the Princess has never been escorted by military personnel and you would know if you were the actual general." Announced Rika.

The General then stepped back sneering at Rika as she figured out they were not who they said they were. Rika smirked at them knowing that she got them and a little bit of pride as she was glad that trusting her instincts continued to pay off. The General stood back standing next to the soldier.

"I’m impressed you figured us out human." Stated the General as his voice altered and mixed with the Alpha Lurkers mechanical tone. "However, we can not allow you both to leave. Our orders are to capture the Princess for our master."

The two transformed their arms into sharp metallic blades and ran towards Rika and the Princess. The Princes brings out her dual swords in time as the battle began. The Lurkers were on the offense as they were charging at our heroines with force, Rika and the Princess however managed to handle them as they fought back dodging or blocking their attacks. The soldier was fighting Rika as they clashed and clanged with their weapons. They came up to each other’s faces with their weapons in front of them pushing for dominance. Seeing there was no way to push any further, the soldier opened his mouth stretching his bottom jaw out breaking it out of proportion as an energy ball was generating within its mouth and getting bigger. Sensing the strength of the energy ball, Rika knew at close range she wouldn’t be able to block or push back the energy ball. With quick lightening reflexes, she jumped away in time as the soldier released the energy ball as it became too big for his mouth to contain. The ball of energy grew to the size of a cannon ball as it flew past Rika and into the wall causing an explosion that blew a hole in the wall leading outside. The impact and sound of the explosion shook a part of the castle where Kevin, Caleb, and Vinnie resided. It got their attention especially Vinnie as his ears twitched to the sound and vibrations from the explosion.

"What was that?" Kevin asked.

Vinnie closed his eyes trying to figure out what it was and where it came from.

"Some sort of explosion but I can’t pinpoint its location." Vinnie replied.

Kevin looked at the two as they didn’t react to the fact that there was an explosion. He raised an eyebrow confused to what was not happening.

"Uh guys. Shouldn’t you go and find out where it came from?" Kevin asked puzzled.

Caleb and Vinnie looked at each other as they knew it would be the right thing to do. But they knew if they leave, who will guard Kevin. Kevin noticed they were really thinking about this and figured he could use that to his advantage to escape. The thought crossed his mind to stay and try to apologize to the Princess, but he remembered Rika and what she would do to him if he tried to approach her. At this point he could care less where he would go just as long as he could leave.

"Look guys, I can see it in your faces, you want to check it out." Kevin stated. "For all we know the girls could be in danger and you’re standing here guarding a weak and pathetic Earthling. I would be an idiot to leave, so go and check it out."

Kevin reassured them by sitting on the bed and waited for them to make a move. Caleb and Vinnie knew he was right, the Princess and their comrade could be in danger.

"What do you think?" Vinnie asked Caleb.

"If I find you out of this room, you’re dead." Caleb warned Kevin.

The two quickly left the room trying to find out where the explosion occurred. Kevin quickly jumped out of bed, rushed to the door and peeked out to see them turn a corner as they were out of sight. Kevin made his move as he quietly stepped out of the room trying to find a way out. He ended up in the main hallway with the four statues of the Knights of Auran. He looked at each of the proud warriors, on display. He stopped at the last Statue, a tall man in his late 50s dressed in armor with shoulder length hair, and a chiseled face covered with a finely trimmed beard. As he looked at the granite marker under the statue it read “Here lies Sir Tristam”. Closely looking at the statute, he realized he looked familiar. With that, Kevin suddenly remembered when he was in space, the stone in front of him was flying him towards Zonia. From out of the stone, he remembered seeing this Knight, come out from the stone.

“It’s you.” Kevin spoke to himself as he leaned closer to observe the face.

As he leaned forward his hand touched the granite marker which reacted to his touch. The marker slid open revealing a pristine broadsword in its scabbard still intact under the statue. Marveled at his discovery, he couldn’t help but pick it up as something about it drew him to it. Just holding it, he could feel energy coming from it making him almost feel empowered for holding it. He pulled the sword out, it had a platinum and gold decorated hilt with a tribal pattern cross guard that shaped like a bird with its wings spread out. Suddenly Kevin heard Rika yell in pain from a distance followed by a mechanical shrill. He looked at the direction from where he heard the sound came from and realized that he was right, the girls are in danger and the other knights are nowhere in sight. He looked back at the sword seeing his reflection and realized he couldn’t leave. He would be a jerk if he left without helping, he knew he wasn’t the kind of person that wouldn’t help someone even if he didn’t know them, but he also knew this wasn’t a normal fight. He let out a big sigh knowing what he had to do; with sword in hand he ran towards the battle. Rika, exhausted, had her hand over the wound from the soldier that wounded her. The soldier’s body was bruised with several injuries in which a normal person would have bled out, but it was only the body of the soldier that was injured not the lurker within. The Lurker emerged from the Soldier’s back chuckling as he knew it wasn’t long till it could defeat Rika.

“You seem tired human.” Replied the Lurker soldier. “Shall I end this now?”

Ignoring the Lurker’s taunt, she prepares to fight once again. Before they continued, Kevin bursts through the door with sword in hand ready to swing.

“Let them go!” Kevin shouted trying to sound deep and intimidating hoping he would get whoever is trying to hurt them to be afraid.

Rika and the Princess looked back to see who it was that came into the room. The General did the same by turning his head one-eighty which would normally break a person’s neck. The general scanned Kevin identifying him as the one his master commanded to capture as well.

“That’s him, get him!” commanded the General.

The general turned his head back to face the Princess and continued fighting. The other soldier looked back at Rika and snuffed her as he turned to face Kevin and obey his Alpha’s orders. Rika goes to attack the soldier but even though the soldier’s back was facing Rika, the Lurker used the soldier’s arms to bend backwards and block Rika’s attack with his arm blades. While still controlling the soldier, the Lurker converted the tip of his tentacle like hair as spears stretching them towards Kevin. He ducked in time as the spears crashed into the wall getting stuck. Using this opportunity, Kevin cuts the tentacles in half; the Lurker shrilling in pain as he retracks his severed hair. The Lurker quickly healed its wounds regenerating its hair back to normal. Seeing that the creature could regenerate limbs made Kevin nervous trying to figure out what else he could do; he was frozen in fear. As Rika was fighting the soldier half of the Lurker, she noticed Kevin was unsure what to do as he’s never fought anything like this before; she needed to help him. The Lurker noticed Kevin was unfocused and changed its hair into dual blades and aimed to attack him.

"Hey Newbie!" Rika yelled. "Focus!"

Kevin heard Rika and woke up from his frozen mental state in time to block the Lurker’s attack with his sword.

“Break his mask, its how to defeat them.” Rika alerted.

The Lurker overheard Rika revealing its weakness and shrills at her. He charged a larger energy ball using its tentacle hair and threw it at Rika. The energy ball was bigger than the last one making it difficult to dodge in time. With last minute thinking, she charged up her reiki and with her weapon she deflected the energy ball back at the Lurker in hopes of it getting hit by its own energy. Seeing the energy ball coming back, the Lurker also dodged in time leaving the energy ball heading towards Kevin.

"Look out!" Rika warned Kevin.

Kevin froze, as he’s never seen an energy ball before. Kevin couldn’t avoid it he wouldn’t make it on time. The Princess heard Rika yelling “look out” and looked over to see Kevin in danger as an energy ball was heading his way. Using her reiki, she transported herself in front of Kevin. She built her reiki up, her red aura building around her. As the energy ball arrived, she held the energy in place though it was slowly pushing her back, she was using her reiki to force it back. Kevin watched amazed at her strength to prevent the energy ball from blasting them. She then builds more of her energy causing friction between the two forces causing the energy ball to be pushed back. She launched the ball back towards the Lurker before it could react. The Lurker was blasted by its own energy ball and both it and the body of the soldier it inhabited were disintegrated. When the smoke and dust cleared, it revealed Rika and the Princess used a barrier from their reiki powers to protect them from the explosion. They released their barriers seeing that the threat was gone. The Princess looked back to see Kevin still impressed by what The Princess did for him.

"Are you ok?" The Princess asked.

"That was amazing." Kevin replied still in awe.

"Jut returning the favor." She said smiling.

Kevin smiled back but then his smile quickly disappeared as he saw something behind the Princess.

"Anya, behind you!" Warned Kevin.

At first she was confused as to why he was afraid but then she remembered the general and that he may have survived the blast. She turned around to see what was left of the General. Like wearing broken armor, parts of the General’s body were gone revealing the Alpha Lurker underneath. The General’s face with his skin peeled off revealing torn muscles and half a skull glared at the Princess. Rika attempted to attack but the Alpha grabbed Rika by the throat as it stretched its claw out chocking her. Then the Alpha quickly removed the rest of the General’s body like a lizard shedding skin as it expanded its body till it hovered over the Princess. Soon the Alpha covered the Princess in its body trapping her inside. He was about to go for Kevin till Rika, despite being chocked by the Lurker, shoots the Lurker with a fist sides energy ball which hits the Lurker at the back side of his head. The Lurker looked at Rika hissing at her and was going to kill her till Caleb and Vinnie arrived.

"It’s one of those things." Said Vinnie. "And it’s got Rika."

Surrounded, the Alpha Lurker released Rika and makes a break to escape through the hole in the wall. Before it was out of sight, Vinnie quickly takes out a small tracking device and shoots it into the Alpha's body concealing it.