The world of Nicolette Croga 4)

Time passed slowly when you were imprisoned. You would think the dark and fear would make it easy to fall asleep, and with the chains being attached to the floor and not the walls it should of been but every time your eyelids became a fraction of a gram heavier your body would just dish out another dose of adrenaline and Bam you were wide awake.

"Kallista?" I asked my voice was hoarse from the lack of water and the surprising amount of dust we were forced to inhale in such a small room but I managed to keep it emotion free. "Yes." She replied. The sound of shifting chains were heard and when I felt Kallista's foot nudge mine I knew that was the signal to continue.

We had been in here for what felt like an eternity and we soon realized it was only us in here, whether the others had gotten away or where simply in different cell we didn't know but seeming we were the two youngest it was an equal possibility.

"Do you think were being held hostage or do you think were all here?" I asked and she sighed shifting slightly closer. "No idea, but if we are being held hostage at least we know they'll come." The silence dragged out and just when I thought the talking for the hour was up Kallista spoke again.

"I'm sorry." She said sounding like she was holding back tears. This confused me but before I could voice why she continued. "I should of let you practise inside, maybe then you could of been able to defend yourself and you wouldn't be in this mess."

Whether she was crying or not I couldn't tell as I couldn't see. "Aw Kallista don't blame yourself, if I hadn't been able to defend myself you'd be all alone and that would be worse." I said softly trying to reach out to where she might be but finding nothing. Kallista didn't respond but I could still hear her breathing and a few sniffs now and then. I didn't know why Kallista would try and blame herself but then again if I was in her position ...

"What happened whilst I was gone?" I said before the thought had even crossed my mind, I was trying to change the subject, trying to get her talking. "When I saw you get pinned down I tried to move towards you, to help but the amount of vampires was making it hard. When you fought back I didn't push as hard and helped the others out a bit, Dragona and Sarthacus didn't need it, when there together nothing can stop them but Israel and Bridget needed help. Bridget was to quick for me to help so I teamed up with Israel. All of a sudden they began to leave we didn't know why but when we scanned the room we saw you were missing, I bolted out the door after you but I don't know what the others did, maybe they followed suit maybe they stayed."

So they were only looking for hostages, interesting. "Sounds like they only wanted a hostage, we must have something they want." I said. Kallista gave a sound of agreement as she shifted again. "what would they want from us though? We have gained nothing of importance or anything rare in the past few months we have been in this town." She said.

She wasn't really talking to me, more like voicing her thoughts out loud. "Rare." I repeated. Her wording made something click in my brain but I wasn't quite sure what, it was like you get the start of a great idea but it doesn't start to come into view until you have the whole thing mapped out. If Kallista was right they were looking for something rare that was important to them, something rare, I knew what it was but I just couldn't remember. Whilst I stiffened up in thought Kallista was squirming in her chains, looking for comfort that couldn't be achieved.

She let out a frustrated grunt as she did so. "Damn things wont break." She muttered "Powers are bound to, though being able to manipulate earth was rare, didn't think they'd be able to bound it."

"Rare." I whispered again and all of a sudden it clicked. They where looking for something rare and Kallista's power was rare, hell even my power was rare! Kallista stilled beside me and I knew she had caught on to what I was thinking "Rare, our powers our rare your blue energy mumbo jumbo and my elemental skills their rare!" She declared as if finally knowing what they were after somehow brought her strange relief.

"But we have had those powers for around a couple of years now why come after us now?" I asked confused. "Maybe they didn't know about us until we entered their local area, think about it we've never been to this city before, I merely rented an apartment to call home for the time being." Kallista said suddenly sitting up straight next to me.

It all made perfect sense. "Your right," I paused before adding "but please call it biotics not blue energy mumbo jumbo." I said trying to lighten the mood. Despite the situation she let out a laugh and then she said "Can you use your 'biotics'" She asked and I wondered why she though my situation would be any different to hers.

"Why would it make a difference?" I complained giving her an answer to the question she had asked and to my own.

"It's a fact that cuffs used to sustain elemental and mages are different as its a different type of magic, even though using earth is rare its still elemental magic, do you think they have cuffs ready for biotics yet? it took decades to develop the other types."

She had a point, biotics wasn't a element and it wasn't random magic it was using your mind to control the energy around you... maybe.

A blue light emerged in the palms of my hands and for the first time in hours I saw Kallista's face. A smile slowly spread across her lips as the blue light illuminated the middle parts of her face and hair and I couldn't help but smile back. It didn't illuminate the whole room but it hit some walls showing us the room was smaller then expected.

Just when I allowed myself to hope a clapping noise filled my ears, I looked at kallista's hands as she looked at mine and when we realized the other wasn't clapping our faces fell. I poured more energy into the small ball and it doubled inside illuminating the corners of the room. Kallista nearly screamed as a fist came round and hit me in the face. I fell to the floor sideways moaning. Whoever was here with us was a heavy hitter.

"Thanks for confirming our suspicions you two." came the voice of a male, it sounded like an old voice but when the face came into view it looked startlingly young.

Vampire. He lifted his hand to hit Kallista and I panicked, I quickly thrust back the energy and I could feel my eyes flash white again as I threw the vampire against the wall. We heard something snap, but the worst part of it was the disturbing noise the vampires bone made as it healed almost instantly.

"You bitch." The man spat and with the light now gone I had no idea where he was. I closed my eyes and concentrated, I remembered mine and Kallista's positions in the room and created at faint barrier around us. All I could do was hope Kallista hadn't moved.

A hand struck against my barrier but didn't go threw, instead the strength of the blast rippled across the barrier revealing it slightly, the force of the punch rippled across the barrier and onto the chains, causing them to snap. If that fist had hit me then my head would of turned into part of the decor, not a nice thought.

Out of my chains I rolled and tried to find Kallista but the vampire could see and I couldn't and he had me by the throat before I could even stand. He dragged me along, my toes just scraping the floor as he headed towards something. Light flooded the room. He had opened the door. The light immediately brought my advantage back and I sent a shock wave using all the energy I had left towards kallista chains. I didn't think the force would be enough to break them but I was proved wrong as the chains split and almost immediately a pillar of rock struck straight the vampire.

I thought the pillar would just knock him over but it didn't, the rock pierced straight threw his chest and blood poured from the wound. His grip lost its power and I wriggled free desperately trying to breath threw the shock. We had killed tonnes of vampires before but it had never before been so gory. The vampire went limp but because of the rock threw his chest he didn't fall.

I glanced at Kallista her hands were trembling as she looked right at me and then she took a calming breath and said. "Come on, hes bound to have friends." I shook my head stepping around the dead body and then following Kallista after she walked out.

The room in front of us looked like it cost a lot, the walls were replaced entirely with glass that showed a breathtaking sight of mountains in the early morning, a casual drift of snowflakes drifted across the window and every time one landed on the glass is suddenly melted away without a mark. Self cleaning glass. Despite the snow outside the room itself was really warm. Plush sofas lined the middle of the plastered walls and a lush white carpet coated the floor, as soon as I stepped onto it my feet sagged down at least an inch and I couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief at the comfort. It was such a contrast to that cold stone room. However there was still no entertainment, I guess this high up in the mountains you wouldn't be able to get satellite TV.

At the moment nobody was around  but if the vampire had planned on taking us out then he had most likely alerted someone else, we weren't attacked by just one vampire after all. "There doesn't appear to be any doors any ideas on how we get out?" Kallista said pacing around the apartment looking for secret exits. I didn't answer instead I just walked closer to the glass. We were pretty high up in the mountain range and it would be cold outside, then again vampires didn't really need warmth, or sun, they just needed privacy and this seemed like a perfect location.

Glancing down I saw piles of snow and jagged parts of new forming mountain. If we broke the glass I could slow the fall and kallista could shape the rock into a smooth surface for us to land on. The only concern was warmth, we would be out there until we could get signal on one of our mobiles.

Kallista saw me glancing out of the window and raised an eyebrow, catching on to my idea. "Normally I would call you crazy but to be honest its the perfect option." She said walking next to me and placing a hand on her hip. "But there is no warm clothing in here, vampires don't need it, we'll just have to move fast." She said glancing at me and I smiled as I lifted one hand.

My eyes began to turn whiter at the use of the power but didn't flash white this time as the glass cracked in the centre and then spread out. With a final push my eyes went completely white as the glass smashed and fell onto the mountains.

Suddenly the temperature of the room turned sub zero and a cold sting traveled along my arms and legs. I stepped back slightly from the full force of the cold harsh winds and shivered deeply. We wouldn't be able to stand out there long.
"That eye thing is going to take some getting used to." Kallista said as she linked her arm in mine, I didn't understand how it could be warmer then mine. "On the count of three?" She asked turning to me and I looked at her before giving a mischievous grin, "Na." and with that I jumped forcing Kallista to come with me.

The freezing air wiped past us and I began to concentrate on slowing the fall, blue shimmered around us and suddenly the decent slowed considerable and we were going at around twice the speed of a feather. This left Kallista a lot of time to reshape the rocks and after a minute of falling we hit the smooth ground gently.

My teeth stared to clatter and I saw goose bumps spread across Kallista's arms as we began to walk forward. First we would find signal then we would wait to be picked up.

~~~

"We can't just keep sitting around to wait anymore Bridget they have Kallista!" Dragona argued as he paced around the room. "Nicolette as well." Israel pointed out as he strolled into the room shooting Dragona a not so friendly look. Dragona lowered his head away from Israel's gaze and looked back to Bridget who was sitting calmly on top of a unit. As if she felt his gaze she lifted her head away from her fingernails and said.

"You think I don't know that? We are still high profile, we go out there now we get taken in by the police and then were in the same position as them, they may be the youngest but they can look after themselves." She said and even though it wasn't said harshly it was like a punch in the gut. "God sake!" Dragona shouted as he left the room clearly not liking how Bridget was dealing with the situation, what he disliked the most was how he knew she was right.

With Dragona out of the room Bridget slipped of the unit and jumped straight onto the sofa in one bound, rocking it forward as she landed. Israel pushed off from against the wall and cast a glance at Bridget from behind. "Bridget, I know what your saying to them is right but you don't actually seem like you care about what will happen to them."

"That's because I don't" Bridget bit back, venom in her voice. "I'm a vampire for Christ sake, I kill people because I need to, I kill people because I want to, during my life I had friends but in the end it ends up with them being killed, so to be honest I stopped caring about friends long ago."

Israel's breath hitched in his throat at her words, sure he knew her life had been difficult but still how could she say such a thing. "Bridget, you have to have at least an ounce of care in there, you couldn't of lost your hum-" Before he could finish she was across the room in a blink of an eye suddenly up in his face, many people would of flinched but Israel had seen her getting angry as a likely possibility.

"Humanity?" she fumed "You honestly think I have humanity? I don't know when you last checked but I'm a vampire not a human I have instinct, tactics, logic, not emotion, not humanity!" Her eyes were pure red as she took a step back allowing Israel to breath. As she eyes faded back to their normal colour she lowered her head in a defeated way and whispered so silently it couldn't of been heard by anyone other then Israel. "not anymore." She said as she turned back to the sofa.

Israel allowed himself to relax, not really sure when his muscles had tensed whilst Bridget let off steam. Human or not he knew Bridget still felt things, he knew she still had humanity even if it couldn't be called that anymore.

As soon as Bridget let her emotions show they were gone again, back under her the layer of a cold tactical commander that she put on. "You guys can go but I'll stay here, if you get caught you'll need someone to get you out of prison." That wasn't exactly what Israel had expected to hear, to be honest when he looked into the future a few brief seconds ago he saw them waiting around doing nothing, but something in Bridget must of changed her mind right then as now he say them leaving.

"Dragona, Sarthacus! were going!" Israel shouted as he headed out of the room smiling to himself. Even though they didn't know where they were yet he would know soon, They could get into Dragona's car and leave whilst he searched the future, he didn't know how long it would of normally taken them to find them but he did know that his power would get them there a lot faster then usual, all they needed was a location.