Imperium: Volume 3

I was heading to mission control when someone came running up to me.

"Raeve!" I looked over, and it was one of the younger recruits.

He looked out of breath, and took him a second to catch it before he was able to talk. "The phone.......the phone is ringing."

I felt my heart skip a beat, and I quickly blipped over to the phone booth at the side of the mall. It had stopped ringing, so I waited on the off chance that it would ring again. I was pacing back and forth until I heard the sound of the call. I quickly picked it up.

"Bowdie!?" I said hastily.

"Raeve." I felt a sudden sense of dissapointment when I heard Sarah's voice on the other end.

"Sarah......Is everything alright?" I asked in a exhausted tone.

"Raeve, we need your help." She said. "But there is something I need to tell you first, so please stay calm."

Those were not the words I wanted to hear. I felt a knot form in my throat. "Is.......is it....Bowdie?" I held on so tight to the phone, I was afraid I would break it.

"Raeve, she's here with me and the others."

I fell to my knees with phone in hand. and I held it to the side, while I calmed myself down. My hand was shaking while I tried to bring the phone back up to my ear. I could hear Sarah trying to yell for my attention.

"Hello? Raeve you there?" She asked.

"Y...yes, I'm here. Sarah.....is she okay?" I asked her.

"Raeve, can you come to this location and I'll fill you in?" She asked.

"Is everything alright!? Is she in trouble?" I pressed.

"I'm going to give you our location, then hang up. Go look on a map and get over here." She said.

We hung up, and I blipped over to mission control. I accidently startled Jay in the process but took to a map of the area they were in.

"Is everything alright?" Jay asked.

"It's Bowdie." I kept looking for the right map. "I'm going. Sarah and Rowen are with her and the others. I'm not sure when I will be back." I looked to him while grabbing my go back that I always left in the control room.

"Give us a call, if you need anything." He said.

Now that I had the location, I blipped from his vision, and saw Sarah shortly after standing in front of me. She was standing there waiting for me, and I couldn't help but look at her worried. I immediatley saw the bandage wrapped around her arm, and knew that they had found themselves in a bind.

"What happened? Where's Bowdie?" I said sternly.

"She's okay Raeve. She's banged up pretty good but she's going to be okay. Rowen's taken real good care of her. Just when you go to see her, don't give her a hard time. She's been through alot. More than you know." She advised.

I looked at her with furrowed brows and looked to the trailor to my left. The door was open and I saw a tall figure standing near the doorway. I started walking over, and saw Rowen sitting with Oaken, and Anja peered around from the back of the camper. It surprised me, as I hadn't received a call from her yet in regards to Ana. And of course the thought of how these guys found eachother baffled me. As I got closer to the camper Oaken didn't even dare to look at me. She knew quite well how pissed I was that they left, but not as pissed as I was about to be once I saw Bowdie. I started to make my way in, when the tall figure made his way out. I didn't quite recognise him, but he had a grin on his face, and seemed completley unbothered by me being here.

I peered in and heard movement in the bathroom.

"Is he coming here yet?" Bowdie said.

She was freaking out, that's for sure. That's how she always sounded when she knew she was in big fucking trouble.

"Bowdie?" I said softly. I tried to remain calm just like Sarah told me. What was I to expect?

"Raeve?" She answered.

I sighed. "Bowdie come out here please."

"No." She said.

Her response immediatley had my hand pinch the bridge of my nose. "Bowdie, I'm going to give you 3 seconds to get your ass out of there, and if you don't I'm going to beat your ass."

"Ya, well......someone already beat you to the punch." She said as she slowly walked out.

I got brought back and took a step back. I found my hands at the back of my head as I looked her over. The knot that had subsided had found it's way back in my throat, and I was trying real hard to push back the tears. She couldn't even look at me. The whole one side of her face was bruised and her one eye completley blood shot. Her lips was black and blue, aswell as whatever flesh that poked through her clothes were covered in bruises as well. Her arm was slung across her chest, and I could see the tension wrap around her ribs. I heard her breathing was hitched as she walked out which tells me, she has broken ribs or something to that liking.

I stepped towards her, and she took a small one back. I could see tears forming in her eyes as I inched myself closer.

"Bowdie.....stop moving." I told her, and I now found myself infront of her.

I wiped the tears from her eyes as gentle as I could before wrapping my arms around her. I could feel the tension leave her shoulder's as soon as I hugged her, and finally took a breath of relief.

"I'm sorry brother." She said.

"Me too." I leaned back. I brushed underneath her eye with my thumb and looked over the rest of her. "I thought I lost you for good. Do you know how scared I was?"

"I'm sorry, I....I just couldn't let Oaken go on her own. And...."

"Dammit Bowdie, you could have been fucking killed!" I couldn't help but be fustrated with her. First mom, then June. What were you thinking? "Your human for god sake, who know's how this could have ended. Your lucky this was all that happened to you!"

"I know....but you have to understand. She left me too!" She yelled. I could tell she was hurting as she yelled at me, because her hand came up to her side.

I dialed it down a knotch. She was right, June left all of us not just me, and I had to remember that. We stayed silent for a moment as we both let our anger get the best of us. I wanted her safe, but she wanted her freedom. At some point I would have to acknowledge that, but during war? That was a big fuck no!

I turned back to the door as Sarah popped in.

"How about you two come out here. I'll explain what happened and what's going on." She said.

I turned back to Bowdie, who was already making her way passed me. I took in a breath to calm my nerves and I followed her out to where the others were sitting around a fire. I watched as the boy helped my sister to a seat and I took the one next to her. He sat on the other side of her and just stared me down.

What was this punks deal?

"Okay! Raeve, aside from calling you here to see Bowdie, we called you for another reason." Sarah said.

I looked to her. "Okay. Let's start from the beginning. But first things first. Who's the punk staring at me?" I said without taking my eyes off Sarah.

"That's Gunner." They all said in unison.

He just grinned.

"So he's got a stupid name to go with that stupid look on his face." I said confidently.

He stood up and took a step towards me.

"Gunner, sit down!" Yelled Sarah.

I watched as he looked at Sarah than to Bowdie. He did the smart thing by retreating and sat back down. Now I had the grin on my face.

"Okay...I said...start from the beginning."

........................

I just sat there, as they relayed the past days events to me. They all had been through alot in such a short amount of time, but it told me one thing. That they were able to take care of themselves.

"Okay, so let me get this straight. You lot...I was pointing to Gunner, Bowdie and Oaken....found out that there is a team of mercinaries, that are hunting Anja as well as looking for June, and you happened to stroll into Jaxynville and found out they were holding a parade. Then Sarah caught wind of you guys and found you at the hotel, and within a day, you got caught, ran into Anja, got trampled on, then fought soldiers in an ambulance, then got chased by the mercinary team, who happens to have a fire wielder. And to top if all off, you can phase through solid objects. I....I mean Anja.....do you have an ability we should all know about?" I asked sarcastically.

"I'm psychotic." She bluntly said.

I swear you could hear the crickets, if there was any. I through my hands in the air. "Is there anything else I need to know?"

Actually.....Said Bowdie.

I turned to her. "Jesus dont tell me your dating this guy!" I said surprised pointing to Gunner.

"What? No, that's not it." She replied. "This is something I need to tell everybody." She got up from her seat and stood before us.

"Back in the machine room, when I got shot..."

"You fucking got shot!?" I stood up. "You forgot to mention that small detail Bowd's!" I snapped at her.

"Clearly I wasn't shot, now sit down and listen. I was shot at yes...... but I told Oaken and Gunner that it was a graze, but it wasn't necessarily. Something happened."

"Ya...you were fucking shot." I said under my breath.

"I swear to god Raeve, if you don't shut your mouth I'm going to shut it for you." She said.

I just held my hands in surrender and I let her talk.

"From what I understand, my body reacted in a way that....... allowed me to see things differently. How do I say this?"

I just looked at her totally and utterly confused.

"Ugh, Sarah can you help me out on this one." She said defeated.

"I'll do it the best I can. Essentially she is an Imperium like the rest of us....except Anja......no offence."

"None taken." Anja said.

"Well how hard was that?" The Gunner kid said.

"Your what?" I had to have them repeat? "An Imperium?"

Bowdie smiled. "Yes."

"I like how you said it earlier Bowdie." Sarah said. "She has a cheat code. Is that right?" She asked her. Bowdie nodded. "There were two times, Bowdie was face to face with a gun, and both times she was able to dodge the bullet because her ability allowed her reaction time to move 100 x faster than the bullet."

What....the....fuck....

"That's not all. Her ability changes depending on the situation." She stated.

"How do you mean?" I asked.

"Meaning, her ability allows her to cheat death. So however death presents itself, her ability kicks into action differently. What we don't know is, how her body will react under such situations." Sarah finally concluded.

I looked to Bowdie. She seemed happy but also scared of the notion. How many times was she going to brush with death? Hopefully the right answer to that was never again, but this is war and nothing is predictable. Clearly she could still get injured, so this thing only kicks in when death is at her door. There was a small sense of relief to that thought, but what might not physically scar her may mentally.

"Well....that's certainly........alot of fucking information to take in. Your ability doesn't allow you to heal quickly by chance does it?"

She just nodded no. I nodded in return.

"Okay, so is that the gist of it or no?" I asked.

"No." Said Anja. "I need your help."