The Reborn

Do you know how hard it is to paint a perfect circle? I’m telling ya that is so fucking hard. Me and Sparky spent almost one hour to paint a big almost perfect circle on this stupid wall. Blast wants me and Sparky to paint the new emblem of H.I.D.E. on the right wall of the main hall. After one hour of struggling we finally made the circle, but the rest of it will take us more than just one hour even if we’re 2.

“I think that we should draw the details with a pencil first and after that we should use paint because if we mess it up with the pencil, we can use an eraser, but if we mess it up with the paint.....” Sparky trailed off and I don’t want to even imagine how would it look like if we actually use paint and mess it up. But I know for sure that I’ll have a mental breakdown.

I smirked and pulled 2 pencils and 2 erasers from my jeans pockets. “I know and that’s exactly why I have these pencils with me.”

She smiled. “You’re a genius. I want the green one!!!!”

I chuckled and passed her the green pencil along with one eraser and I kept the grey one. I adore these pencils, products from Faber-Castell in general because the quality of their products never disappointed me.

After another 15 minutes of struggling to divide the circle in 3 equal parts without a ruler, we started with the more simple lions from left and right.

When I was painting carefully the main of the third lion and Sparky was painting the edge of the circle, the speakers came to life.

“Team Apocalypse, please come in my office as soon as you can. It’s an emergency and a possible code red. I repeat. Team Apocalypse is waited in my office.”

A code red? This means that someone is close to our current location, but that’s not possible. No one knows where H.I.D.E exactly is.

I shared a look with Sparky and we both dropped our brushes and ran to Blast’s office. I walked in without even bothering to knock since there’s no time for being polite. Shortly after me and Sparky arrived, the rest of the group walked in as well.

Blast clapped his hands. “Now that all of you are here.” he opened the holographic monitor and the map of the nearby region, which is basically the forest and the campus. Two red dots are moving around the forest, but by the way they are moving it looks like don’t have any idea of what are they looking for or where they are.

“This two were stopped rummaging around for the past 2 hours. Both of them are Darks and no older than 17 years old.” He continued as we looked at the red dots.

“They can be from D.A. They have the average age when Dark teenagers are sent on the field, but only in easy mission for adaptation.” Sharpedon said with his eyebrows furrowed in deep thought.

“So, they could be only scanning the territory?” River asked and I shook my head.

“It can’t be such a big coincidence. From all these places from Boltmountain, they are here, in this forest.” It’s impossible to be just a coincidence. How I already said, we are not that lucky.

“Shadow has a point, but then why are they here?” Blast said and looked at me expecting me to reveal my theory.

“Think about it. They’re new with no experience on the field and they have no idea about team work or any kind of military strategy.”

Sharpedon’s eyes widen. “If they die, they wouldn’t be such a loss. They aren’t part of any team so they won’t damage their army or whatever system they have.”

I nodded my head. “Exactly. I think that somehow they heard that our location may be here and they sent this 2 to see if it’s true.”

If the 2 persons won’t come back or won’t report anything, the Darks will figure out that they were killed by someone and they will come back to investigate with backups. We are not ready to fight with the whole Dark Army. At last not yet. We don’t have enough people and the ones we have are not prepared enough for such a crucial fight.

“And what do you think? What should we do?” Blast asked and I scratched the back of my neck.

“I don’t really know. The safest way is to let them wonder around while keeping an eye on them and if they get too close, we catch them and erase their memories.”

“But we don’t know how long they will stay here.” Sharpedon said and I clenched my jaw.

I turned to my left and glared at him. “Do you have a better idea, Gaze?” I growled his name because he is starting to get on my nerves. This is the safest plan, yet he isn’t content with it. And the other day he was telling me that I’m risking too much and I’m not thinking twice before acting.

Hypocrite much?

Very fucking much, not just much.

“Well should go, capture them, ask them some questions and we can let them go after we erase their memories.” Mr. Genius said and I wanted to punch him.

“I thought that you were for all the ‘better safe than sorry’ thing.” I snapped back with my arrogant tone.

He gave me a forced smile. “You know what they say. Take the risk or lose the chance.”

My jaw was about to hit the floor. Is he serious or is he doing this just to piss me off because it’s working. I clenched my teeth and fists.

“And you fucking dare to call me a hypocrite? You are worst than me.” I said trying my hardest to not yell at him.

He avoided my gaze and remaind silent as everyone else in the room was. No one dared to ask what I mean or comment something else on this subject.

Blast cleared his throat trying to ease the tension. “We will keep an eye on them for 2 hours and if they won’t leave, we are going after them.”

Of course Blast does what Sharpedon said. He is the leader after all. The golden boy.

You should calm down. You won’t resolve anything if you get angry and stressed out.

I can’t stay calm, Bolt. If they find our location we are screwed for life. We will die. Not even you can save us. With all the power we have, we can’t save them if the Darks are coming and I don’t want to lose people since we already don’t have enough.

What happened with the optimistic idiot I know?

Reality hit her in the face.

I raised from my seat with my arms crossed. “Do whatever you want. Go after them, but I’m not coming. Send whoever you want, except me. In this mission, I’m out.” I headed for the door when a voice stopped me.

“Since when you’re such a coward?”

“I’m not explaining myself in front of you, or in front of anyone else. Use the nut you have instead of a brain and think why I’m not doing this.” I hissed at Sharpedon and left the room.

I went back to the main hall and started to paint again to calm down. Painting and drawing always calmed me. It’s like I’m under a spell and a I can think about is how I’ll make the next important detail or where I should draw another shadow or where I should light up the drawing. As I paint the mane of the last lion I’m once again in my happy trance. I paint his main carefully to not mix the colors or trace any lop-sided line.

I smiled as I stepped back to admire my work. Mine and Sparky’s. My eyes can’t believe what are they seeing and I can’t believe that it looks so good. The eyes of the lion looks so real that I feel like they’re staring back at me.

“You were always the artist in our family.”

I turned around to see a smiling Lincoln. “Thanks.”

“You don’t have to thank me. You did a wonderful job here. If someone will break in at night, will more than sure get scared of the lion’s face.” he started to laugh and I punched his shoulder with a smile.

“Shut up. He’s handsome and won’t scare a fly.”

He rubbed the place where I hit him. “Whatever makes you feel good. Does he has a name?” Lincoln asked jokingly, but I answered him truthfully.

“His name is Grey Sollemniter.”

“What? You actually named him?”

“Yup. This isn’t just an emblem. It’s our emblem. It’s our signature and with this one we’ll make peace. And this lion, is our mascot. Grey because grey is our color symbolising equality between Elementars and Darks, and Sollemniter because in Latin means solemnity. If you ask me, this is one of our main traits.”

Lincoln smiled from ear to ear. “That was so fucking beautiful. Since when are you so philosophical?”

I shrugged with a smile. “I don’t know. It just happened. And I have a lot of free time. Anyway, how did you know that I was here?”

“When you exited the room in a very dramatic way, I asked Sparky where were you painting before we meet in the office and BAM. Here I am to see if my favorite sister is fine.”

I rolled my eyes. “Lincoln, you have only one sister. Sky may be little, shy and cute, but he’s a boy.”

Now is his turn to roll his eyes. “I was trying to say that you are my favorite from all the brothers. I prefer you from all those idiots.”

“Awww.” I pulled him in a hug. “That was so cute. And you are also my favorite.”

“Of corse I am. I’m perfect and everyone loves me.”

“We both know that that was a lie. Lincoln, it’s not healthy to lie to yourself.”

He pulled back and glared at me while I gave him an innocent smile. “But I still love you.”

Lincoln shook his head with a smile. “You are impossible.”

“But you still love meeee.” I said hugging him while he didn’t move a single muscles to hug me back.

“Shadow is not good to lie to yourself. It’s not healthy.” I could hear the smirk in his voice.

“You mouth says something, but your eyes are saying something else.” I said dramatically and I realised that I’m spending way too much time with the Earthquake brothers.

He rolled his eyes. “Whatever, Shadow. By the way, I wanted to tell you that I’ll be send in this mission.”

My smiled suddenly vanished and irritation appeared. “With who?”

“Sharpedon, Aiden and Hazel. Just in case they are dangerous, which I doubt, but who knows.”

I nodded my head. “At least he’s not risking that much. All of you are strong so this mission shouldn’t be a problem, but please be careful.”

“I’m always careful twiny. I’ll be fine. Don’t worry. And I’ll save their asses if something bad happens, but let’s hope that it won’t.” he smiled and ruffled my head.

I forced a smile and hope for the best, trying to ignore the knot in my stomach.

Two hours passed and the two Darks are still there. The boys are getting ready to leave while the rest of us are heading to the computers room, much to Sky’s dislike. He doesn’t like having people in ‘his room’ because we are distracting him and messing with his digital things. After I promised on my mark that I won’t touch anything, he finally let us in.

“Sit down and-”

“Don’t touch anything. I heard you from the first freaking time, Sky!” I snapped at him and he glared at me.

Our little shy flower is starting to blow. I’m so happy!!!

“Fine, but if you touch something, I’ll kick you out.”

I waved my hand at him. “Yeah, yeah. I’ve heard that before. Now, do your thing and let us see them.”

“Fine.” he typed for 2 minutes until the monitor came to life and the map was on display.

The red dots are in the same spot we saw them the last time and this made me frown. I don’t think that they are so stupid that they can’t find their way back or they can’t move closer to the main building. It doesn’t make sense.

“Am I the only one who thinks that it’s a little weird that those 2 are in the same spot as 2 hours ago?” Leaf asked as he pointed at the map.

So I’m not the only one who saw it. But I guess that it’s normal since we are trained to see this kind of things.

“Let’s hope that they only took a 2 hours break.” Windy said anxious and I bit my lip.

Four grey dots appeared at the other side of the forest where H.I.D.E is and they started to get closer and closer to the 2 red dots. Our grey dots finally arrived at the red ones and I could hear my heart drumming inside my chest. For a moment nothing happened and the dots freeze in their spots.

All of us were gathered in front of the monitor waiting for something to happen. Each one of us was a wreck of nerves and to be honest, I was about to jump from my seat and go to see what’s going on with my own eyes.

When two of our grey dots collided with the two red dots, meaning that they are fighting, we relaxed for a second until we jumped from our seats and ran for the exit.

Another 10 red dots appeared out of nowhere and circled our grey dots.

“I want you all to try to circle the already made circle and kill them on the spot. I don’t want any kind of information, as soon as you see an opening kill them. Our goal is to save our team mates.” I yelled as we ran out of the main building.

Bolt as soon as we see them, you are free to do your thing. Show no mercy.

As you wish, my dear Shadow. Let the game begin.

Let the game begin and let us win the game with no bad injuries. Let them all be alright ’cause I don’t know what I will do if I’ll lose one of them.