Catching the Catchers

Chapter Twenty-Eight - The Return

           

"Wait, we're not—oof!"

            I cut Sophia off and pushed her behind a bush when I began hearing some chattering voices.

            "Shut up," I barked, focusing my energy on changing our outward appearances to resemble that of Catchers. This didn't work too well last time, but I was kind of winging it by this point.

            Her eyes widened when she finally figured out what I did. "You are so unbelievably dumb, Taylor! I can't believe you brought us here!"

            "Well, I was only planning on it being myself so you just hang out here while I do my thing."

            "Oh, no. You're not doing anything. We're going back right now!"

            I raised an eyebrow at her. "Oh yeah? How do you supposed we do that? You don't know how to teleport."

            "Taylor..." she warned, gritting her teeth.

            I ignored her tone and made sure I was now looking like a Catcher before standing up. For once, I had the power in the situation and I was not going down without a fight. "I'm not leaving until I find Cole and get him out of here," I told the Catcher-looking Sophia who was still hutched down behind the bush. "So decide if you're coming or staying."

            She contemplated it for a few seconds before giving in a standing up. "If I die during this, I'm going kill you."

            "How could you kill me if you're dead?"

            She was quiet for a moment before saying, "Shut up."

            I reached into my brain, trying hard to somehow find Cole with my powers. I didn't know if finding him would be a good or bad thing and I didn't know what I wanted. If I didn't find him, he might have been able to escape. If I did, I might be able to get him out.

            Finally, I found a slight hint of his location using my powers. My heart began beating faster now as I began walking forward into Katherine's fray.

            Because there was only two of us, my hold on our disguises was stronger than it was when I was here with the Big Six. While I might be physically damaged and weak, the determination I had was really propelling me forward. I was taking such large steps that Sophia was actually having to jog a bit to keep up.

            "This is kind of weird..." she whispered to me as we continued forward. "Nobody is looking at us any differently."

            "Because they have no suspicions of us coming here," I answered. And it was true. Last time, Katherine had to have known that we were going to come for her soon enough, but I'm sure she thinks she won or we're recovering or something else. We would be dumb to even try her again so soon.

            And yes, I am calling myself dumb for doing this, but I needed to know where he was. I had to know or else I'd go crazy just sitting around doing nothing when he's done so much for myself and everyone else.

            We continued walking forward, hearing the excited chattering of the Catchers around us. It was like nothing had happened a few.... Days? Hours? However long it has been since our fight. We walked past the area it had happened and it was like nothing occurred. No destruction, no huge hole, nothing.

            Maybe I had imagined the whole thing.

            "Yeah, you should have seen it," I heard a female Catcher say to another. "Master Katherine was unstoppable! She let them all go except for the Fire boy."