Winter was creeping over and she'd just a month left to complete the year. She could have asked him for help, the thought had definitely passed through her more often than she wanted. but she couldn't bring herself to. She was still angry with him. She still couldn't believe she had thought of staying behind. Colt was the only person she could trust after all.

Zyca was getting paranoid, no hopes of getting the second half had surfaced. Sometimes, she'd found herself in the darkness of her room calling her sister's name to help her locate the crystal and every time, she was met with silence. Like now.

"Allet. Please tell me, I need your help. It's all for our sake," she begged rubbing her palms together in front of her chest.

At the dawn of Monday morning just after she cracked her eyes open, she'd fallen on her knees like she'd done so many times. And like always, Allet didn't reply.

Without a morning bath to take away the stench of the previous night, Zyca armed herself with the map and crept out the door so as not to wake up the others – she had no time to waste.

Before she could open the map, to identify her next destination, she felt herself losing control of her legs.

She almost screamed but her mouth was zipped tight by an unknown force.

Zyca struggled to gain control, shaking and jiggling but to no avail none of it worked. Zyca involuntarily moved out of her hallway, feet hurting from the fast-paced pull and from the set of stones she tumbled on until they stopped abruptly in front of a stairs.

"Is that you Allet?" She whispered gently when her mouth was finally free from the hold. A thumping sound came from up the stairs one at a time, ascending until it was no more. Zyca paused for ages, biting her lips, wondering if she should go down.

After a minute or two, she crept up the stairs. There was a door at the end, just like the rest of the doors in the house. She wondered what was behind it. She edged towards it and opened it slowly.

It was a large and empty room. Why was she led to an empty room? Griping the door frame, she paired inside roaming her eyes all over. No sight of anything.

Maybe she was sent on a wild goose chase, a fool's errand. Allet must have been wrong this time around or she was playing some sought of prank. As she was about to leave, she felt her body leave the ground and she was pitched headfirst into a whirl of color and shadow.

Zyca struggled to gain balance on the solid ground and stood alone, shaking as the blurred objects around her immediately came to focus.

She knew immediately what it was. Illusion. The once empty room was harnessed with library worthy shelves, tall ladders and a ball at the center which swirled with cloudy pictured. As she stumbled backwards, her foot hit something soft and slimy. She turned her head and saw a ball which resembled the message ball the thing had some out from.

"What's this place?" She asked herself.

What was a message ball doing in the human world?

Getting in deeper she opened the books, skimmed through them, touched the railings and moved to the center of the room. She stepped away when eyes blinked from the cloudy pictures.

Zyca gave one last look around promising to leave if she didn't find anything, she was starting to find it creepy. For a few seconds she saw nothing but then she noticed a rattling box near one of the walls.

'Zyca quick in here'

She moved carefully over to the chest which was about two meter's long and seventy meters wide. The wood was dark and fine. At the top had the genie crest.

She couldn't believe it. There was a genie in their midst. With a grunt she lifted the heavy lid and glanced inside. It was a cherry wood chest with a done lid and brass fitting. Lavender. The scent swiped through her nostrils. All her life she'd smelt that scent just once. She bathed in them, rubbed herself in them, rolled in them and slept in them. It was her mother's scent.

Zyca leaned into the chest, breathed long and deep. Deep within she knew she missed her mother. Pushing the lid all the way back, a white light shone on her face. Deepening her hands in, she made a grab for it.

"Who's there?" A harsh familiar voice boomed. At once, Zyca retreated her hands and rounded the chest and hid behind it, peering from the corners.

A transitory bright glare, shone from her. "No, not now." A semi dark gloom, right from her finger tips, released her original green skin. Colt was right, the wish didn't last forever.

Shuffling feet in heels was what she could see advancing towards where she was. "I know someone is here."

She gulped. Shifting back, she rested her back on the wood, tucked her legs to her chest and held them tight with her arms and tried as much as possible to hold her breath.

"I can see you don't want to come out."

To her right came a blazing fire like the size of a ball, thundering towards her. Zyca jumped out of the way before it could roast her.

Zyca didn't have time to turn around. There was a loud clacking noise and suddenly she felt herself hoisted up and jammed to one of the shelves with an invisible substance that reminded her of glue. Why do these this happen to her when she was alone? Guess it was her luck to get into dangers.

"You!"

"Sarah?" she called out.

****

They didn't know what to say, nor what to do. Sarah's eyes ran through her face, down to her wrist, - her eyes widened a fraction. "I..." Sarah started opening her mouth an inch wide, then shaking her head fanatically to the side. "Zyca?" She asked. "Baby?"

"You're a genie, aren't you," she asked paying no heed to Sarah's reaction.

Sarah cracked a sad smile. "I never knew the day would come, when I'll see my daughter again," she looked away. "When I first saw you, I never thought-"

"Can you please get me down from here?" she asked nastily. She felt irritated being in the presence of the woman who had abandoned her for the dead stand in her sight. Besides her arms were already feeling numb.

"Right. Right." Sarah rubs her palms on her fitted dress before twitching her fingers in two snaps, Zyca dropped to the ground with a thud but not enough to leave her cripple, landing on her feet and palms like a lion ready to pounce. "Sorry." Sarah apologized wincing.

With a crack of her back, Zyca twisted her wrist up and down, wiggling anti-clockwise to regain blood flow to her now numb fingers.

"You ran from us to live a luxurious life in the human world?" she took one final looks at the interior. "You got married... and a son," her mouth tasted bitter when her thoughts ventured to Daniel. What would she call themselves now, step-siblings? Do they know about this?" she huffed.

"No. Definitely not. I cared for you, both of you. You and Allet," Sarah defended with a hand on her chest. "You both mean so much to me."

"I can see that," said Zyca sarcastically. Walking a meter away, she turned with a slow spin, biting down on her lip tightly. "Why?" she asked the question that always ate her up, her heart, her soul, her whole being. "Why did you leave us? You knew how much Allet and I needed you."

"It wasn't my choice."

"THEN WHO WAS IT?" Zyca raised her voice. Sarah only but shook her head, balling a fist at her side as she looked away, catching her lips in between her teeth. "Tell me. What was so important you left?" Zyca prodded again hoping she could get the answers she wanted.

"I'm sorry..."

"A little too late, don't you think?"

It broke her, the flaming inferno in her melted away when her eyes caught a tiny tear drop run down Sarah's chin, followed by many, busting forth like a water from a dam. Zyca hated it, she hated feeling nothing but gloominess from her mother's tears. Was this the way children felt when their parent's cried? She once read, a Mother's tears were like a thousand thongs inserted into the brain, in fact it was far worse than the thongs, especially when the tears were caused by their children.

Her mother wasn't innocent, but she couldn't help but feel sorry. Zyca could taste the saltiness of her own tears as it dripped to the corners of her mouth.

Unable to bear it, she walked to her, gently taking her body into hers. "I'm so sorry," Sarah sobbed into her chest unceasingly, hands rubbing her back. Zyca held her in silence as they cried together, a bond she knew was starting to form.

A tiny time lapse let her pull away a little from Zyca's hold, blinking away the beads of water on her eyelashes before finally stepping away. "I wish I can tell you everything," said Sarah, a look of regret painting a form on her face.

"Then tell me something, anything to make me understand." Zyca sniffed tightening the veins in her neck a second long. "Please."

It took a minute or two or maybe three for Sarah to finally nod her head. "We should sit down," she gestured to a bench, she hadn't noticed before."

Zyca crossed her fingers on her lap in anticipation as she waited for her mother to take a sit on the other side of the awkward woody bench which raised itself when she sat.

"Where do I start from?" Sarah said taking a sit, rubbing her swollen face with her palm.

"The start."

Sarah sighed. Her hands vibrated from an emotion she could not tell. "I had to leave you both because I had to protect something that could destroy our world." Sarah released a breath, turning to face her and she said nothing else.

"Wait. Is that it?" Zyca quirked an eyebrow.

Sarah shrugged. "It's all I can tell you. All you can know."

Zyca scoffed, standing to her feet. "And here I was feeling sorry for you."

"I'm doing it for your own good. Both of you," Sarah replied.

"Well you did nothing but harm. We were trash Mother. Thrown into the dumper of rejected items with no grub nor water to drink."

Sarah's eyes widen.

"What! That's impossible." She stood.

"It's true. It was then Allet got sick," Zyca shifted her sleeves upwards, revealing a long scratch close to her elbow. "She gave me this scratch during one of her many sessions."

"But..."

"He threw us out and if it wasn't for Master Kane...," she darted a glance over to her. "I don't know what I would have done."

A shadow loomed over them with unspoken words, unsolved mysteries and many apologies. "I..."

"I think I'm tired of hearing I'm sorry," Zyca leaned on the railing.

"Everything started with the crystals... and unfortunately, your father." Sarah exhaled going up to Zyca. Zyca couldn't help but perk her ears, slowly leaning in to hear what she had to say. "The crystals, we're our protection, shielding us from dangers. It kept us safe..."

"Until father took it."

She nodded. "Yes. He wanted power, he wanted to rule."

"But why?"

"No one knows. Greed I suppose," she closed her eyes, the sides crinkling. She opened them again. "His attitude caused us so much trouble, so much pain. Genie's lost their lives in the process of protecting the crystals."

"Crystal protectors," Zyca swapped her hands in front of her face, when a wee sound flew across.

"You know about them?"

"My best friend told me."

Sarah nodded. "Good. So, it wouldn't be a surprise if I tell you I'm one of them. I'm a crystal protector." Zyca's hand slipped from the railing, making her lose balance, staggering forward. Sarah laughed.

"You're what!"

"That was my mission Zyca, to protect the crystal from bad hands. That's why I came to the human world to protect it. I'm also partly to blame for Daniel's dreams and yours too. It came as a surprise when I got to know he's books were based on you; my daughter and it had caused him so much pain and sadness." Sarah walked to the other side peering down to the ground floor. "Despite this I still can't go back until the next protectors are chosen. Trust me I've tried." She added sadly.

"But you can."

Sarah inclined her head to look at her. "What do you mean?"

"When Father escaped into the human world, I was blamed and in the process of escaping Allet was taken into Laddendebt," Zyca saw her mother rise with fear in her eyes. "Don't worry she's safe... for now. - I was sent to bring father and the crystal back so I can prove my innocence and protect Allet and ...."

"Wait, hold on a minute," Sarah cut her off. "What do you mean Allet is in Laddendebt and your father escaped?"

"Yes. And you killed him, and broke the crystal into two for protection. I know."

Sarah drew back. "I never met your father and I never broke the crystal into two. In fact, the crystal being in the human world is top secret. No one is meant to know."

"Are you sure?"

"Very sure."

Zyca didn't understand what her mother sprouted from her mouth and a sudden fear busted inside her at the thought of all she had knew was far from the truth.

"It's all news to me."

Zyca searched her eyes for an answer, anything that could give away her lies. Sarah was a liar, she'd lied before and it wouldn't hurt for her to lie again.

"You're lying. I was there, white wash rang, and Allet was taken away to Laddendebt ... my father escaped..." her voice flattened immediately, leaving her words hanging without strings in the air.

"Did you see him escape? Do you have proof?"

She hadn't really seen her father escape, she was told but the other's she had seen. No... something didn't sit right with her. "I..."

"Who told you all this."

Her hands quivered so much she had to clasp it in place, tightly on her torso. "They lied to you Zyca. Tell me. Who told you," Sarah asked again panicked.

Zyca stepped back. She took in a copious amount of air, her heart felt constricted, and her body tense. "Proof," she managed to spit out. "Show me proof it's all a lie."

She could hear the wheels in her mother head chiming, like a percussion instrument to lie perhaps. It was a possibility her thinking was wrong. "Fine, come with me."

Sarah led her to back down to the ground floor, then to the now closed chest she invaded an hour ago. With a flick of her hand, the chest opened, its cover slamming on the cream-colored wall. "You use magic," Zyca started at the sight.

"I work for the higher ups, so I don't have cuffs." Sarah replied.

Zyca waited in expectancy, as her mother dipped her hands into the chest searching for something she could not tell.

Sarah raised something to her shoulder immediately she turned, about five centimeter long and a centimeter wide. Its bright color was blinding making her shield her eyes with a squint. "Light off," she heard her mother command with an authoritative voice. At once the blinding light was gone in a flash, leaving a translucent object in between her fingers.

It was the crystal, she knew at sight but the problem was, the object was not chipped or harmed nor damaged, it looked as good as new.

"Impossible."

Quickly Zyca remove the chipped crystal from her shoe. "What is this then?"

"It's fake baby."

Then her mother commanded again. "Show me Laddendebt."

Zyca followed Sarah like a lost duck, to the creepy ball at the center in which a mist surrounded like a cloudy day on a hot afternoon. The eyes that once blinked at her, evaporated higher and higher up the ball, decimating when she mistakenly touched it with when she passed by, she thought she was the cause. "I didn't..."

"Shuu," her mother placed a finger to her lip. "Look." she pointed above them.

It was Laddendebt, the sign was a dead giveaway and the looming feeling of death and sorrows and the painful screams did nothing to calm her weakened heart. Everything that surrounded them melted away, the walls of the eerie prison replaced them cocooning both of them.

"This is the present day Laddendebt," Sarah said.

"Why did you bring me here?"

"Just a matter of time, you will see."

A shrunken, fail looking blue man, a hazel mop of hair on his head, was reading a book with a candlelight. Zyca waited for recognition to come but it never did. She'd never seen him before.

"Excuse me," Zyca said. "I'm sorry we didn't mean to -" Sarah's laugh caused her to pause in her speech.

"He can't hear you," she said and true enough, the man didn't look up nor acknowledge he had heard something. The man continued to read, frowning slightly when he turned the book to another page.

"Lovers. Too cliché," the man spat. Like he literally spat straight to the floor, rubbing his shoe on his saliva leaving a long liquid stain.

Disgusting.

The man closed the book with a sweep, stood up, walked passed them without sparing a glance, and drew the curtains at his window. The sky outside was just like she remembered, it was still dark and gloomy, with no sun to heat the ground.

Zyca looked around his office. No decoration- just plain Grey bulwarks.

There was a knock on the office door.

"Come in," the man said in a cheeky voice.

A man of like physique, with a bald head entered, limping. A golden badge which read 'Guard' was glinting on his left breast pocket."

"A visitor, Chief" the man said with a low bow. It was then she noticed someone, a boy in fact tugging behind the man in steady steps. What was this? The aura from the boy was somewhat familiar yet scary. He emitted strength, authority and power and evil, four things which could send her running for the sun – if they had one. She could not see his face mainly because of the dim lit room and the pointy cap he wore which covered almost half of his face.

"Ah, sir?" The chief said then turned and looked to his left and gave a short nod at the usher to which she thought was a signal to leave, and she was correct because he left at once through the door he came.

"Sit down," the Chief told the boy who stood still in his spot. "What a pleasant surprise."

"Thank you," the boy moved to the sit directly in front of the desk and sat in a way his back was to her.

"Tea?" Asked the Chief kindly.

"I'll rather not have anything in this dump," the boy said calmly.

The Chief quickly retreated his hands from the tea cup he was about picking from the waste bin. "I make a mean tea you know," he laughed. "So, to what do I owe this pleasure of having you in Laddendebt?"

"I want to go to the prisons," the stranger said at once.

"But your parents are not in today," the man said curiosity. "It's their off day. Didn't they tell you?"

"I know," the boy replied. "It's just that, the last time I visited which was yesterday, I forgot my glasses in one of the prisons when my parents were doing their rounds."

"I didn't know you wore glasses?"

The boy clucked his tongue. "I only wear them in school," he said placing his hands on the handle of his chair and spun around with his heels on the ground, his face illuminated in the light the burning candle was giving. "And I don't see why any of it is your business."

Zyca couldn't help but release an audible gasp. It was Colt.

"Do you know the boy?" Sarah asked

Zyca nodded. "It's my best friend." Although the boy looked like Colt, his eyes and the way he spoke was not the Colt she knew. It was the opposite. She'd know Colt to be playful and a joker but the one who faced her was nothing like the boy she knew, this one was wired differently. Something was different and she didn't like it.

"I just wanted to make sure..."