CHAPTER XV – Countdown… (7…)

Maaz pulled Adam into the portal as Adam didn't even object or resist. Once in, he just gasped and looked at the portal. Adam was still looking straight ahead, as if he had lost all his senses.

Varun seemed to have some help as a metal ball struck Morpheus' leg and Varun got free. But before Varun could come towards the portal, it closed and just emptiness was ahead of them.

Adam snapped right out of his blank expression and shook his head.

"We need to know where we are," Maaz said. "Atmosphere feels survivable. But, we need to move fast."

"You… dragged me," Adam said.

"Yeah, it was exhausting but well, had to be done," Maaz said.

"Our friends are dying out there and we just abandoned them. What were you thinking?" Adam asked and got up, still looking forward, into the invisible portal.

"You think I didn't know that? You think I don't care about Varun… or Fara? I saved our lives!" Maaz said.

"By putting theirs in danger…?" Adam asked and turned to Maaz finally.

"You think if we had gone forward we could have saved them?" Maaz asked.

"We could have tried and not just let them die," Adam said.

"Look as cool as all our battles looked. We won, because our enemy had a disadvantage. Here he had armour and all we had was different looking swords. It worked against that Mesomorph, but here it was impossible," Maaz said.

"We… we left them. And now we are separated from all of them. Unknown to what will happen," Adam said.

"I know… we will find them. We must be more than kids for this. We at least need some armour to start with," Maaz said.

"Hopefully we are close to some Primevel warriors then. Hopefully somehow everyone survived," Adam said wiping his tear.

"I know I must have did something better. But… this is all I could do, I'm sorry. Fara… seems safe. As for Varun, someone came there, maybe Flint or Jay, as I saw everyone else leave. Or maybe sir," Maaz said.

"What is that?" Adam asked.

"I don't know what part of my sentence qualifies as that," Maaz said.

"Not that… that," Adam said pointing at something on the ground ahead.

It was some kind of stone-gem, broken into two halves; it looked similar to the one Varun had.

"Varun, teleported here…?" Maaz asked.

"Doesn't look like his one," Adam said. "But… a dragon gem surely."

The gem glowed yellow and rose up to their level.

"Whoa, what in the world…?" Adam asked.

The gem came right in between the two and glowed again, but this time completely blinding them. They both opened their eyes and couldn't believe what they were into.

"Are we…?" Maaz asked.

"Ooh yeah! More than kids now I suppose?" Adam asked.