What Will I Do Without You?

Chapter 4

After climbing for around 5 minutes, Sophie hit hard ground.

"I hit some floor." She whisper-shouted to the boys.

Tam jumped off the ladder before hitting the last rungs, and smelled the air. It smells like... sulfur."

Dex felt the ground and stepped off the ladder. "So do I. And that's never a good thing."

"I can't even see down here, it's too dark." Sophie whispered.

Tam grunted. "I can see fine, so I guess I'm leading now."

Apparently they were at the end of a long hallway, and according to Tam, there were doors on each side of the passage.

"They're all closed but I can see light seeping down under the bottoms of the doors." He said.

Sophie put her hand on his shoulder, making him flinch, and Dex put his hand on Sophie's shoulder. "That way we can all stay together and not get separated." She said.

Tam huffed and continued walking until he reached the first door. "Should we go in?" He asked carefully.

Sophie had a mental debate then agreed. Dex hoped nothing bad was in that room.

Tam opened the door, letting some light into the hallway. It was a large room from what Dex could tell, but what surprised him the most was not all of the plant life in there, but the sunlight that seeped through a hole in the ceiling.

"What do you think this is?" Dex asked.

Sophie shrugged. "It seems like a nursery to me."

"I don't see any babies."

"No," Sophie laughed. "A plant nursery. Humans use them to keep plants alive." She walked up to one peculiar flower, and lightly touched its petals. Suddenly the flower sprang up, which triggered all the other flowers, and they began giving off a gas.

"Sophie!" Dex cried, trying not to breathe in the gas. Who knew how harmful it might be?

"Dex-" She coughed. "We have to get-" cough "- out of here!"

Suddenly Tam collapsed from breathing in the fog. He groaned and tried crawling towards Sophie.

"You gotta-" cough "-leap us out of here." Tam managed to get out, while clutching his stomach in pain.

Dex, who had surprisingly held his breath for this long, ran over to the two, and pulled out his crystal to leap to Elwin's office. Thankfully because of the sunlight seeping into the room, he was able to make a weak beam, then held on to Sophie who grabbed Tam's arm, and leapt out.

///

Linh paced the living room of Havenfield. It had been long past the time when Dex should have returned, and she was worried out of her mind.

"Linh, I'm sure that Tam is fine." Biana said, putting her hand on the other girl's shoulder in a comforting gesture.

Linh shrugged it off, holding her arms around herself. "I'm nervous for them. They should have returned by now-"

Alden's imparter began ringing, and he quickly answered. Elwin's face appeared, and he looked extremely worried.

"Elwin? What's wrong-"

"You guys need to come quick. Dex leaped to me with Tam and Sophie and they're both unconscious. I'm at the Foxfire office, come quick."

Alden flipped his imparter off as Linh began fumbling for her pathfinder. "We need to hurry!"

Keefe stood up quickly. "Just take the Leapmaster." He ran outside and shouted "Foxfire!"

Everyone else ran out and formed a large circle. Grady then stepped into the light and they all leapt to the school.