Distant Lands

I fall to my knees, gasping for air. Coming back through the doorway from the silver world seemed harder than going in. Ivan inputs something on his watch, and the doorway closes.

Emerald looks at me with her usual angry face. “What were you thinking? Getting involved! Her breathing gets heavier with every word and she gets in my face, “You are lucky the king didn’t impale you with his sword!” She pokes my chest with her finger.

Taking a step back I harden my stare and defend my decision, “I couldn’t let him do that to that guy. He was going to chop his hand off.”

She shakes her head, “The thief was already getting punished. If you hadn’t said anything, it wouldn’t have angered the king.”

Ivan walks toward us staring at his watch, “This king is known for being cruel. Emerald is right; sometimes you need to stay out of other world’s problems.”

There is no use in arguing any further. Yes, yes, I guess I could have gotten punished for interfering. But luckily I didn’t. I just hope I don’t suffer any repercussions from the council.

“So, none of this… is going to be mentioned to the council, right?” I ask Emerald. Emerald huffs and begins to walk up the dirt road, then Ivan follows. I stay put, and look out into the forest. I don’t regret getting involved. I can’t bear looking at other people getting tortured. The king was making a show out of him, trying to show his authority, and I was getting a live show, so I couldn’t just stand by and watch. I had to do something.

Suddenly I hear branches cracking in the forest. Through the trees, I see a man dressed all in black, from head to toe. This is eerie, why is he just standing there? Starring at me? He looks like a shadow. “Hey!” I walk towards it and he turns and runs away. “Hey! Wait!” I run towards him. I run past some trees and reach the area where he was standing, I scan the forest and up at the trees, but there’s no one there.

“Who are You? What the hell?” How could he run away without making a sound? How can he have just disappeared? I feel like someone is watching me, but I see no one.

“Hello, who is there?” I stand still, just listening; all I hear are the birds and woodland animals in the forest. No footsteps, not a human sound. Did I imagine it? Was it a figment of my imagination? Or-

“Elizabeth! Get over here!” Emerald shouts. I turn and walk back towards the dirt road. What a strange day, It’s throwing me off coming from a world where it was nighttime, and here in Azure, it’s still daytime, it feels like it’s a new day, but in reality, it is late in the afternoon the same day. I know, it’s confusing. I walk back on the dirt road, and everything looks the same here; now, this place seems familiar to me. It almost seems like I came back home. I look at the orchard trees, and I see one that has a weird-looking red fruit on it. I walk towards it and look up. “This is new.”

Its oval shape reminds me of a mango. I jump up to grab one and rub it against my shirt. I smell it. It has no scent. I take a bite of the fruit and spit it out in disgust, and gag—the fruit oozed with deep red liquid.

“What the hell is this? It tastes like, like, blood?” I feel a raindrop fall on my forehead. I wipe my forehead and have more of this red liquid smeared on my hand. I look up at the tree, and drops are leaking from the branch where I had ripped the fruit out.

“Ugh, Disgusting.” I spit out, trying to get the iron taste off my tongue. I take the fruit with me and head to the Plant lab. My instructor Evie is in the lab. She sees me, and her eyes brighten up. “Oh, hi Elizabeth, congratulations on graduating, and I heard you stopped a thief.” She looks so proud of me, it makes me smile. She sees my blood-smeared forehead and the strange fruit in my hand.

“Oh, I see you found our blood fruit. We have been trying to find the right blood to inject into it. The tree quickly replicates the blood cells and makes it into fruit.”

“That’s strange, so is this fruit meant for Lamia?” I ask.

“Yes, months ago, we finally received a perfect blood sample for the tree,” she says. She walks over to a fridge, and I follow her. We have a team that brings blood samples from different types of animals. This sample was here, and we used it on the tree, and it was perfect. The tree accepted the sample.”

“What are these?” I point at small metal mosquitoes.

“Oh, we use them to draw animal blood.”

“Wow, wouldn’t want to be stung by one of those.” I look at the blood sample and read the label. “What does LHE mean?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out. I tried calling the team, but I haven’t heard from them.”

“I took a bite out of this fruit,” I say concerned.

“You’ll be fine. It was probably just a very unpleasant taste.”

“Yes, it tastes horrible.”

She chuckles and continues with her work. I throw the fruit away and walk to my room. Emerald said we were staying here tonight. She didn’t feel like traveling after returning from the silver world. Feeling drained from the events of the day I walk into my room and dive onto my bed. I stare up at the skylight, still thinking about that weird tree. How can a tree replicate blood cells? I wonder what animal LHE is? Does that mean that poor animal is being cloned into fruit? Strange. LHE?

My blood runs cold. “No, it can’t be.” I sit up in bed as if I woke up from one of my nightmares and call Damon on my watch.

“Oh, what a nice surprise. I heard you were honored by royalty?” he asks.

“Yes, it was great. Damon, can you come over to the Ranch? I want to tell you something in person.”

“Did something happen?” he sounds concerned.

“No, I just want to tell you something in private.” There’s an awkward silence. I’m sure he is trying to figure out why my voice is a bit shaky.

“Sure, I’ll come over.” He responds and the communication cuts off. I wash my face and grab my backpack. I walk outside to wait for Damon and sit on a bench. My eyes water and I hope to god I am wrong about this. I’m so angry and disgusted, I feel so violated.

Footsteps sound from behind me. Ivan comes and sits next to me. “Even though you angered the king, you did a good job. After that scene, he just wanted to be left alone, so in a way, it all worked out in our favor,” he smiles.

I blink back my tears, “I’m glad it did. I felt awful seeing the young man ridiculed in public. Nobody stood up for him.”

“It did feel awful, but we need to know how to choose our battles. Sometimes we need to learn to put up a wall and not get involved.”

I nod and look down at the ground. I know that that is something I can’t do. If I see someone getting hurt, I need to try and help.

“Ivan, when am I going home?” I look at him.

His eyes look sad, and his lips tighten, “I’m working on it. Please have patience.”

“I will try,” I get up, and so does he.

“Well, see you tomorrow,” he nods and walks back inside. When Ivan disappears from view, I walk down the road and see Damon coming up the dirt road. I keep walking to meet him halfway. Wearing his motorcycle gear, he walks up to me, smiling.

“Hello, little human, what did you want to tell me that you couldn’t tell me by call?” he asks.

“Damon, I wanted to show you something.” I walk forward into the orchard, and he follows. When I see the blood tree my heart begins to race.

“What did you want to show me?” he looks curious. He looks up and sees the blood tree up ahead, and he smiles. He walks faster towards it, looks up, and reaches for a blood fruit. He brings it up to his face and smells it, and it looks like he enjoys the smell; he takes a bite out of it and gushes with red liquid.

“Hmm,” he says, smiling, red liquid runs down the corner of his mouth and catches it with his tongue. He keeps eating it like he’s eating a juicy peach.

I feel disgusted. I take off my backpack, take out my baton, and hide it behind my back. “Damon, I went to the lab to ask about this tree. The blood sample given to them said LHE. Is it my blood sample?”

He looks up at me and smiles, revealing his fangs and his eyes smiling. His face told me my answer. How?

My heart pounds and I quickly point my baton at him. Before Damon could react, the metal rope wraps around him and the tree. He looks down at the metal rope holding him to the tree and looks wide-eyed at me. I didn’t plan to tie him to a tree, but I’m glad It did.

“Is it still funny?” I ask, giving him a pist-off smile.

He gives me a wicked smile, braces his feet on the ground, and tries to yank himself out, making the tree move violently. I hear it crack and fear he will unroot it. But the roots hold him in place. I get closer to him, so angry, so hurt that I can barely speak, and my eyes brim with tears.

“YOU-USED-MY-BLOOD to inject into this blood tree? Do you know how messed up that is? This tree is like.... a clone of me! Now this tree is me! and I am this tree!” I point to the tree and then to my chest.

My words make Damon laugh, and it pisses me off even more. He’s laughing? How is this funny? Through his laughing, he looks at me, “It’s not just this tree; there’s like twenty of them. We can name them after you.”

My heart might just implode, and I can’t speak. I just hold my baton, and I press a button that gives Damon a shock of electricity. He yells in pain and looks at me, shocked, angry, and breathing hard. I place the baton on the floor and walk away.

“Liz!”

I turn back and see the anger in his eyes. I smile and walk away.

“You’re going to regret this,” he warns.

I scoff at his warning.

“Liz! Release me!”

I ignore him and just continue walking. How dare he use my blood for the damn blood tree?