Guardian: Protectors of Light (48 page)

“
Jason?”
Sabrina raised an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t you prefer if I left,
then?”

She noticed her master
closed his eyes again. “No. I need you to be here for our
discussion, as it regards you as well. I bet Mr Morgan wouldn’t
mind.”

“
As you wish,” Sabrina said, while making a bow, and went to
get Jason.
Jason was slightly offended due to the fact
that 
he
 hadn’t been
allowed inside while Sabrina was bringing her news to the Master,
while she actually 
was
 permitted to
stay while Jason reported his latest observations to his master.
Yet, he put himself over his feelings and knelt down in front of
the throne his master was sitting on.

“
Jason
Morgan,” the Master spoke. “What news do you have on the Bond of
Light’s whereabouts?”
Jason smiled, yet spoke without looking up, as if he was actually
trying to treat someone with respect for once in his life. “It’s
going better than expected, My Lord,” he said. “Imagination’s
powers are stronger than they were in previous Generations, but
that makes them only glitch out even more. An easy target, if I
daresay...”

“
Hm...” Jason
could hear his master think out loud. “What about the Keepers? What
do you know about them?”

“
Only one of
them is currently with them,” Jason spoke. “Sabrina was able to
kill the youngest in battle.”

With that being said, the
Master’s eyes and attention instantly shifted from Jason to
Sabrina. “Is this true, young one?” he said.

Sabrina nodded. “Yes. I
don’t know how he knows it-” she decided to take advantage of the
situation by throwing Jason an angry glare, “-but it’s true. Jason
is right. Right now, they are with three left, but one of the
fixies has joined them on their crusade, which makes four... Three
of them, including the fixie, are on their way here; the fourth one
is with the Bond.”
The Master moved in his seat, probably to be able to rest his chin
on his hand while thinking. “A fairy. What a powerful ally to
choose... I must say, they made a wise choice. I’ve underestimated
their skill and intelligence.”

Jason stood up, looking
the Master straight in the eye; he wanted to make sure he came
across as determined. “Do you want us to stop them,
Master?”

It was quite hard to see,
yet Jason was able to see that his master was shaking his head.
“No.

Sabrina’s done her job
well; I’ve got them exactly where I want them. Killing one of the
Protectors was the small push they needed; it has angered them,
increasing their recklessness and lowering their common sense. We
need not to seek them out, because over time, they will come to us.
As for the Guardians...”
What happened next, was what both Sabrina and Jason could’ve sworn
they’d never seen their master do ever before. The Master got up
from his throne and stepped out of the darkness into the light,
revealing his face.
Despite the fact he was millions of years old, there was no way to
notice he was; the fact that he was still a half-spirit kept his
aging process at a zero, leaving him to look like a man in his
mid-forties. However, his skin did look extremely damaged; a black
mark resembling which seemed to be a strange combination of bird
and bat wings covered the skin surrounding his left eye, which
seemed to cause black veins to spread all across his face and neck,
starting from where the mark was located. Jason had the same mark
and veins on his face; Sabrina, however, only had the
veins.

One of his eyes seemed
fairly normal; the right eye still had a glowing red iris, which
was surrounded by dark veins and had a black, cat-like
pupil.

The other eye could’ve
been considered a blind eye; it looked more like an empty eye
socked with a creepy, bright orange glow inside of it rather than a
fully functional eye. His hair was black with some signs of
greying; the same grey streaks appeared here and there in his
beard.
His clothes looked simple; all what was seen of his clothes
underneath the dark blue robe which covered his body was a dark
purple turtle neck with golden details. The robe was sleeveless,
and had golden details on both shoulders.

The Master looked
intimidating; even when he was completely serene as he was now. In
fact, his serenity made him seem even more dangerous.

Both his servants
appeared completely awestruck by the fact that their master had
shown his face to them for the first time in- nine hundred or so
years? As good as never had he cared enough for any of the
Generations to take care of them himself, with a few exceptions
here and there.
This certainly had to be different.
Either the Master didn’t notice or just simply didn’t care for the
reactions his servants gave him; he just looked at them, and said,
“Yes. I still have a vast form. Surprised?”

Sabrina blinked. “N...no,
of course not,” she stammered. “Master-”

The Master rolled with
his eyes and let out a loud sigh of exasperation. With a wave of
his hand, he waved away whatever Sabrina was meaning to say.
“Please, Sabrina,” he said. “The three of us have known each other
for nearly a thousand years now. Please just call me Asura.”
He then focused on one of the burning torches across the room. Or
just on nothing. “I assume you’re both aware of the plans I’d
prepared for this day,” he said. “It’s about time we executed
them.

Prepare the troops and
all that is necessary. We leave as soon as night falls; we’ve got
no time to lose. 

This is going to be an
interesting Generation to fight.”

*

James was sitting by the fire. He didn’t know whether it
was still night or already day, nor did he actually care. He didn’t
care about anything; all he wanted was to go home.
He used his Magic to play around with the fire, as Timothy had
advised him to use a bit of his Magic to “retrain” it; he made it
burn brighter and softer, making funny shapes appear within the
flames. One of these shapes resembled his mother, smiling at
him.
James sighed. “I miss you,” he whispered to the head in the flames.
“So much. Even though sometimes I was a pain in the butt to you.”
He sighed and smiled at the thought. “...But you always meant well.
You never helped us out at inventing because you were afraid that
one of us would get hurt, or you would mess up, and I regret
yelling at you so often those times that
you 
did
 help us.
But... Now, I just can’t help but regret the fact that Samira and I
might haven’t done enough to involve you into our projects. The
situation we’re in now makes me wish I would’ve done
so.”

James tore his eyes away
from the fire and closed them, while sighing deeply. “I’m sorry if
I don’t make it home, Mum. I’m sorry if I never see you
again.”
After he’d finished talking, or actually confessing, as if he was
hoping his mother would hear him somehow, James wanted to put out
the fire, but as he heard footsteps behind him, he refrained from
doing so. 

He instinctively got on
all fours and pulled out his sword, ready to attack, but then
noticed who’d actually approached him.
It was Samira.
“Hey, James...” she said carefully. “What are you
doing?”

James lowered his sword,
but however kept holding it, and smiled at her. “Hey, Sammy,” he
said. 

“
I... Came
here to check and see if you’re okay,” Samira said. “I wanted to
make sure you were okay before Thomas woke up... Are you all
right?”

James nodded at her,
attempting to broaden his smile. “Yes, I am, Samira.”

“
You don’t
look
fine to me.”
“Rgh...” James didn’t want to lie to her, but he didn’t want to
worry her, either. He decided it was for the better if he just
changed the subject. “You know,” he said, “this night reminds me of
our first night in Lunaria. Oh well – our
first 
real
 night. The
one in the cabin in the Twilight Forest.”

Samira smiled. “You were
thinking about home again, weren’t you?”

James shrugged. Denying
he was wasn’t going to neither help nor harm him, so why do
so?

Samira walked closer to
him and took the sword out of his hand, shoving it back into the
scabbard it belonged inside of. “What you need,” she said, “is new
Hope.” Samira took both James’ hands and pulled him along, moving
as if she wanted to dance with him. “I remember that one night,
while I was lying awake, I heard you were whispering to yourself
that we were almost home. You were trying to comfort yourself
enough to fall asleep... I kind of took it as if you were also
speaking to me. To all of us.
And yes, James, I know it’s been a hard month and a week... but
we’re getting there.”

She pulled him close,
looking him in the eye. “We’re going to make it home, I promise.
They’re waiting for us.”

Before James could
respond, Samira threw both her arms around his neck and hugged him.
Something they hadn’t really done in a long time; despite always
being there for each other, James had always had the feeling that
he and his sister had been growing apart for a long
time.

“
Come on,”
Samira said. “You need to rest.”

It took her a few
moments, but eventually, she’d convinced her brother to lie down
and go to sleep, while she kept watch.

Samira could see James’
body slowly starting to relax and relieve all the tension as he
drifted off. It was good to see the innocence return in him; the
happiness he always showed at home was the same happiness he showed
when he was asleep.

She hoped fiercely he
wouldn’t get any bad dreams; a good night’s rest was well-deserved
after all he’d been through.

For all of
them.

If she had to be
completely honest, getting to where they were now, getting to the
Land of Void, was further than she’d ever dreamed they’d be able to
get. And she knew the others were thinking the same.

They were almost there.
Al they had to do now, was believe they could make it through to
the Spirit Castle, and then they would. Without their faith and
hope, they would be nowhere. If they couldn’t count on each other,
they would be lost.
Samira looked at James again, who now was fast asleep, seemingly
peaceful. Her eyes wandered off to the fire, which had now started
to die out, where James had made their relatives appear earlier.
Samira could understand how he felt. She felt the same about her
own family, and she was highly convinced the others were thinking
the exact same about their own families. 

But they would only be in
the Land of Void for just a few more days, perhaps a week or two,
and then they’d be there. All they had to do was stay out of the
Master’s clutches.

That wasn’t going to be
an easy task, but if they played the game right, they had a chance
at winning it. Right?

And she had better hold
on to that thought as she looked into the distance and let out a
startling yell to wake everyone up.
“AMBUSH!”

You are Your
Own Enemy

Samira’s yelling had
awoken everyone within an instant.

Sleep drowsiness didn’t
seem to affect them at all; within a heartbeat, everyone was
standing up with their weapons ready, all ready to
fight.

Except for Thomas,
perhaps; as he’d just woken up from his sleep, he wasn’t wearing
his armour. He’d wanted to keep it on while sleeping, but took it
off anyway when James kept nagging him he had to do so.

They stood in attack
position before even knowing what they were supposed to
attack.

The teenagers were soon
to find out; the mysterious, dark figures moved swiftly through the
night.

The figures appeared to
be human; or at least their appearance was suggesting they
were.

As soon as they’d
appeared, they had the Bond of Light surrounded. And then, as he
looked straight at one of the five figures, he figured out who he
was looking at.

He was looking at
himself.

“
Uh- guys? I
think we might have a problem!” James yelled out.

“
Are you guys
seeing what I’m seeing?” Antonio replied. “They’re us!”

“
They’re
not,” Timothy breathed. “They’re Reverse Guardians. The Master
believes that you are your own worst enemy, and that fighting
yourself would be impossible. Don’t let them trick you!”

“
Won’t be a
problem,” Antonio said. “Have you even seen their eyes? They’re the
same as all that other Nightmare scum!”

“
Why aren’t
they attacking us?” Samira questioned. “They’re supposed to take us
out! So why don’t they?”

Timothy tore his eyes off
the Reverse Guardians surrounding them to answer her question.
“They’re scanning you. As soon as you make a move, they’ll be able
to mimic you. That’s why you can’t let them trick you, or else
they’ll become invincible!”

“
Well, it’s
not as if just standing here like this is going to solve the
problem,” Thomas said. “We’ve got to fight them!”

“
Thomas,
wait!” James shouted, but Thomas had already lashed out toward his
doppelganger, who quickly moved away from Thomas by dissolving into
the usual black smoke and reforming behind him.