Fractured | The Portal Series book 1

Chapter 2 - Jessica

6:27 a.m. SET (Sylvan Eastern Time) – 7/13/341 U.M.

6:27 p.m. BTS – 7/12/341 U.M.

The Darkness and the Light. Two conflicting forces. Unlike yin and yang, they don't want to be in balance. Whether or not the Darkness and the Light collided at the beginning of time and created the Universe, like most Pangeans believe, I don't know. It feels like the Big Bang Theory all over again, but in a different time, on a new world.

But I know that the Darkness and the Light are there. I can sense both. Mostly the Darkness. It is always watching, waiting for the moment you crack.

I lick my lips, shoving away the disturbing mental image of giving in to the Darkness.

"Hold it still this time," I say shortly. I adjust the height of the kicking shield Wendell is holding, and when I am finished, he visibly braces himself.

"I always do," he replies with a grimace.

I scoff, getting into a fighting stance and eyeing the shield. A few other students my age watch from a meter away, instead of practicing. I am fifteen, and am therefore stuck with other fifteen-year-olds. But, even after eight years, I feel no loyalty to them, as I am sure that they feel no loyalty to me.

For a brief moment, I close my eyes, taking in a deep breath. I can almost feel the energy flowing through me, sizzling and crackling to the beat of my heart.

Summoning adrenaline with well-practiced techniques, I reopen my eyes. Even without looking at the mirror on the far wall, I can tell that my "game face" is on, as the other students call it.

Deep breath in.

Deep breath out.

In.

Out.

My eye catches Wendell's. He looks almost scared. The corner of my lip quirks up slightly before I suppress the amusement.

When I was younger, I yelled whenever I kicked or punched. But as the years passed, that instinct dissipated, replaced by the need to be patient, and to attack quickly and silently.

I glare at the shield for one, two, three seconds. Then I strike. With oiled precision, I twist my balancing leg to the left, and draw my right leg up to my chest so that the bottom of my foot faces Wendell. I don't allow even half a second to pass before snapping out my foot to slam into the kicking shield. Then, I move in to get in a back fist and a mid-level punch before retreating to my original stance.

Wendell, despite his big words, moved.

A few students clap. Not for me, though. Never for me. The applause is for the person who managed to stay upright while holding a kicking shield for Jessica Lewis, the Floating Isle's prodigy.

After a few more kicking combinations, I take a short break. Retreating to the corner of the room where all the water bottles are lined up, I grab one and down it in four gulps. Crumpling the plastic, I toss it into the recycling chute, and check my reflection in the mirrored wall. Some of my dark brown hair has come loose from its ponytail, but otherwise I look fine.

While redoing my hair, my gaze automatically flicks past my reflection to the glass floor of the training room. My heart pumps quickly for three beats, but then subsides to its normal routine. Six hundred meters—approximately one thousand, eight hundred and sixty-eight feet—of air sits between me and the shuttle runways at the base of the cliff. There is a reason for the Floating Isle's name.