The Arena - The Moon Trilogy - Book #2

Chapter forty-one:

It was Eric Lance. His face was cast in a blueish light, giving it a ghoulish look. His blank eye stared out at nothing, sending a short shiver down her spine.

He looked up at the sound of the door opening, and his calm expression was momentarily cracked by a burst of surprise before reverting to the expressionless mask he probably worked so hard to maintain.

His hand hovered over a radio set, frozen in his surprise. He sat at a large, wooden desk, situated in the middle of the room. August was sprawled on the floor, only his top half visible, as the rest of him was hidden behind the desk.

It only took a minute for Eric to take action. He slammed his hand down on a red button on the little box radio and it started emitting a high-pitch squeal that almost caused her to cover her ears. After that, he grabbed a small cylindrical thing from the desk that she first mistook for a pen, and pressed a button on the top.

"I look forward to the time when I can see you again, Clarity." He said. A smug, infuriatingly victorious smile creased his lips just a second before he vanished.

Clarity was blinded by a rush of emotions; anger, disbelief, disappointment in herself for not acting sooner.

But she could hardly do anything about it now, so she shook herself back to the world of the living. August needed her help.

She knelt next to him, checking quickly for a pulse. The faintest blip of a heartbeat could be felt beneath her fingertips.

He was barely breathing, but at least he was alive.

She let out a sigh. At least one thing went right.

Now that Eric was gone, she allowed herself to examine the room in more depth. She didn't know what to compare it to, but she eventually decided that it looked similar to the inside of the top of a lighthouse, only with a desk instead of a big spinning light.

A wide band of glass provided a three-sixty view, only sliced by the occasional beam of supporting metal. The only thing she could see through these monstrous windows, however, was water, in every direction. The sea was clear and blue, allowing her to see rather far.

She looked up and out to find out to check if she could see the surface from the little bulb of glass, but she still couldn't. She once again marveled at the impossibility of the structure. How had they managed to construct such a large building so far down?

All at once, she remembered their predicament and mentally kicked herself for allowing her mind to get so off-track. They had to get out, and she was the only person who could really accomplish that at the moment.

She stepped up to the nearest window when a thought popped into her head, only to be shot down a second later when she saw that the glass was far too thick to break.

Then she got a sudden burst of genius. She placed a hand firmly on the glass, and she teleported to a spot a few feet away. To her satisfaction, her plan worked perfectly. A hand-shaped chunk of glass fell at her feet, water gushing through the hole it had left.

She had no time to celebrate her brilliance, however. She ran to August and she put a hand on his arm. His skin was strangely cold, and she shivered as she teleported both of them back to the ground floor.

She looked down the hallway. It was immediately apparent that no one had yet returned from their search. She was dismayed to find that the water was already up to her shins. She pulled August upright so he wouldn't choke. She knew that more water was now streaming down the staircase behind her, as well. They were definitely racing against time, now.

She teleported to their temporary headquarters, running the last few feet to the unconscious tiro. It was hard, trying to get in contact with all three of them at once, but she finally managed, and she teleported them all to the head of the hallway.

A group of people came running towards her, sending relief flooding through her once more.

"Clarity, did you find him?" Alex asked, at the head of the group and therefore the first to reach her position. She nodded towards the unconscious lump of a telepath in answer.

"I also found Eric, but he got away before I could do anything." She added after a minute, realizing much later than she should have that she should have clarified.

There were only two people to find, now: Sam and Rachel, and then they could leave for real this time.

"Have you seen Rachel?" Benjamin asked as he stopped just behind Alex.

"No, but I can find her, and Sam too." Clarity said.

"You guys take care of Scarlett, Johnny, and August while I look for them," she added, unloading her burden on Alex and Benjamin.

She teleported to the other hallway, the one with the generator room. There was a noticeable and potentially dangerous current here, and she didn't see anyone, so she teleported away.

She checked the coliseum and a bunch of cells without any luck. They had to be back where she had started. She'd been stupid not to check there, first.

But just as she was about to teleport back to where she'd left the other group, she heard two pairs of sloshing footsteps.

She turned and saw Rachel running towards her, followed closely by Sam.

"Clarity! There you are. Are we ready to leave yet?" Rachel asked, splashing laboriously through the now-thigh-deep water as she ran.

"Yeah, we can leave now." Clarity nodded quickly, taking Rachel's hand when she got close enough. Rachel, in turn, took hold of Sam's hand, and in the blink of an eye, they were standing back at the head of the second hallway. They came dangerously close to landing on top of Alex, but all was quickly forgiven in the haste to escape.

They all joined hands, and Clarity concentrated hard. She'd never teleported so many people before, and she wasn't sure if she could do it all in one trip.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, releasing it slowly as she allowed her mind to see things for her now. The tiniest specks of matter, obviously too small to ever see with her naked eye, suddenly became larger. She could feel them brushing against her, flowing through her, past her, around her. She latched onto them, spreading the web of their reach beyond her hand, and slowly down the line.

Her lungs expanded in one last breath of air before her concentration snapped in half, and not a moment too soon. They had arrived at Alex's house. The feeling of water flowing around her waist disappeared, only to be replaced by the brush of a gentle breeze.

She opened her eyes, and she saw that they were all standing in front of the house, as intended. She was glad to feel the warmth of setting sunshine mingling with the cool wind. It felt like years since she'd last seen proper sunlight.

The car was still parked like the sleeping hulk of a beast resting in the driveway, and the house looked the same as when they'd left it. The only thing that had changed was them. A member lost; two gained back, and plenty of new wounds. In fact, the only person that had come out of the ordeal unscathed was Alex, and even he had simply cheated the system by becoming unscathed.

A dagger of pain flashed through her skull,  soon accompanied by a faint dizziness.

Her legs went rubbery beneath her, and she crashed into an ungraceful sitting position.

A breathy laugh bubbled out of her mouth as she splayed back onto the grass. They were safe, and none of the survivors seemed to be seriously hurt.

Though she was now in the safe position of flat on her back, she felt the dizzy sensation magnify until she felt like she was floating it a gentle whirlpool of nausea. A pounding headache started at the base of her skull and traveled to the rest of her head. The darkening sky blurred before her.

She felt someone picking her up as she lost her grip on consciousness.