Waking(5)

Six hours passed since they had left.

I was back on the terrace with Spiel, Stark and Zen.

Holding Spiel on my chest, I stared right at the moon, the other two imitating me.

The moon did not hurt my eyes. I had no excuses. I put my free hand over my eyes. I could not hold back the tears. The least I could do was hide it from the others.

I would do anything for a little sunlight right now.

"Stryke..." 

I got up slowly, rubbed my eyes in an attempt to hide the tears and turned my head to face the owner of the voice.

James had made his way up to the terrace.

He knew where I would send most of my nights before sleep but both him and Gen decided not to interfere with my alone time.

Him coming upto the terrace was a surrprise. But it did not end right there. One by one more of the orphans walked into my vision.

Now my place definitely was not a secret.

I thought I would not mid it if the other kids found my place on the terrace,

I minded.

I did not want them up here. But I would not tell them to leave. As much as I wanted the place to myself, if being here made them happy, I would let them spend time here. That was my responsibility as the oldest.

It was what the previous older ones did for us and it was what I would continue to do as long as I remained in here with them.

The mood felt right, everyone was calmly just looking around or whispering to each other. I hand Spiel to James and told everyone to wait.

I returned to the terrace with the bag full of pendants and distributed it to everyone. In this place, where nothing was truly yours, this pendant would be something eveyone would treasure as theirs.

Everyone started playing and fiddling with it. I put one of the lightest ones on Spiel and carried him down. I put the other ones with a similar weight on the other two babies as well.

They would grow to like it I guess.

I made my way to my bed, I was excited to sleep now.

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I opened my eyes.

Everything was shrouded in darkness.

"No" I whimpered. "Not again."

I walked around in the darkness. With every passing second I did not hear the sound, I grew more relieved. I tried to get to the place from where the light usually began from.

There was a faint buzzing. Every step I took in that direction, the volume of the buzzing increased. The chittering sound was back. But it was not all around me. 

I should have walked back. I should have gone to sleep in the darkness itself.

But I was too curious. The sound was something I had handled for years, I could handle it a few more times if I could find out the reason behind my dreams.

Gritting my teeth, I ran toward the sound.

Suddenly, my foot hit something and I fell face first onto the ground. My arms, that I raised instinctively to protect my head had gotten hit from two different points.

I groaned and rubbed my hands.

Flailing on the ground I felt my hands pass over steps.

Stairs?

For the first time in six years, I encountered a structure in this dream.

I climb the stairs on all fours. 

One step at a time. One hand followed by the other. The sound increasing exponentially each step.

Climbing the stairs was not difficult at all but the pain from the sound was way too much, I couldn't hear myself think. I felt something drip down from my ears. Then down my nose. Then from my eyes. These were not tears. Now slowly losing the ability to feel, I push myself up. I try to touch my face only to not get any response from my fingers.

I could not feel anything.

I could not hear anything.

I could not see anything.

Make it stop.

I don't want this anymore.

I don't.

Please.

PLEASE.

BOOOOOOOOOOM

My eyes started working again.

No, I could barely make out a figure on its knees at the top of the stairs. From them a light had shot up straight into the darkness above. This was the light at the end of my dreams. I looked around me. There was nothing except empty space and the stairs in front of me..... There was a change though, the black around me was now white. 

My hands felt wet. I looked at them. They were completely covered in red liquid. I looked down at my body. My clothes were the same as what I had worn before sleep but now covered in blood.

The stairs... I could barely make them out now.

I tried moving my feet forward.

Just one step.

Closer to the person at the top.

My foot slid across the step. My vision pivoted to the now brightening sky. I started falling.

While falling, I looked toward the person on top, I saw them holding their stomach laughing. Laughing at me no doubt.

I wanted to have them answer my questions about this place, but now all I wanted was to land a punch on them.

I fell, waiting for my head to hit the previous steps.

Then in one swift motion I sat up. Awake.

It was morning, but James was still asleep. I had woken up really early.

I blinked a few times and sat there reorganizing my thoughts. My head hurt. I felt something near my ears. Touching it, I felt something hard. I scratched at it and I broke into tiny pieces. Pulling some of the broken pieces in front of me, I saw the dark red color. Dried blood. I didn't just bleed in my dream. I bled here. In real life.

I got off the bed and ran into the bathroom to check myself in the mirrors. Or that was what should have happened.

I got off the bed and had ran right into the wall.

Reaching out to the door handle to my right, I tried to pull myself up.

CRACKKK

I fell back down, with the handle in my hands.

How? I had not activated my ability yet. I also know my own strength. So how did I break off the handle?

I stood back up and carefully took a couple of steps.

It seemed that my strength had increased yet again. Why? Normal Physicals did not have multiple increments of strength in a span of a few days? Maybe mine was different. A newer form of Physicals?

"What.... are you doing?"

I looked backward to see James, now fully awake, staring at me.

"Is that blood?"

He noticed very quickly.

"I don't know let me check." I said as I walked toward the bathroom slowly.

My body was completely fine, perfect even. Except for the dried blood near my ears and under my nose. My eyesight had also improved. And I had to be extra careful controlling my newfound strength.

Then came the harder part, explaining the previous situation to James. I managedto somehow convince him that I had gone through a strenght increment in my sleep and the blood was probably a result of that.

Training and practice was of order. I had to improve my control now.

And so I trained.

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Sweat ran down my face as I sat under a tree, watching the others train.

For the past few weeks I had researched about dreams. There had to be some kind of record of someone going through a similar situation to me. Or at least any kind of situation involving dreams affecting real life.

I had no such luck however. Not a single one of the leads I followed culminated in a proper result. Everything talked about spiritual travel and demon possession. That made no sense. Spirits and demons did not exist and that is a factual statement. 

After the Cosmic Radiance and its effects, people did everything to see if they could talk to ghosts, summon demons, contact gods. Nothing bore fruit. That did not stop believers though. Barda was a prime example. Everyone from there were believers of some great being that caused the world to change with the Cosmic Radiance.

I did not believe in any gods. If they were real, why did they not help us or any of those suffering for that matter.

I was going to become something of my own hard work, that was my only option. No outside intervention would change that.

Despite all my research and the pain from the dream, I never found a solution. Everyday, for the past few weeks, I faced the same dream.

But with the dreams came progress. I reached the stairs faster each time. I climbed futher each time.

The sound and pain did not decrease in any manner. My body got stronger every time I climbed a new stair and that in turn let me climb one more.

I climbed an average of two to three steps a week and there were visible improvements to my body.

I could now make out more features of the laughing person. It was a man. His body structure implied so. But other than his torn and tattered clothes, every part of his body remained shrouded in the darkness.

Hiding it from everyone was a little difficult and I managed to convince them by saying that the first increment had pushed my body to a new level and "I was just figuring things out and taking it slow".

I had gotten used to lying to them all now. I did not want them to know something I had now control over.

Speaking about lying, Mama Kemp had spotted the logo on the pendants when she was taking care of the babies. 

What was I thinking putting it on them in the first place?

I should have waited till they were older to give it.

Anyway, I told her the same things I told the workers at Reach's. And James lied about having spotted the logo when he entered her office as she was looking through the files.

Safe to say, we had to face the sun for more than a few hours and she almost confiscated the little things. But she could not win out against twenty crying children could she? So she eventually relented but made us all promise to hide it under our clothes or show the blank side outward, which he happily agreed to. Anything that did not involve losing our new treasure was a good compromise.

Another thing was troubling me..... Gen and Jeana. They had not contacted us once. We tried to talk to them through Mama Kemp, but the only time she could talk to them was to check up on them after half a year. Apparently, laws were in place to prevent constant contact between orphanages and adopted children due to the children being used to gather information about the families they had joined. So, even the call we would have would be heavily monitored, which I did not care about. There was nothing to be afraid of if we weren't doing anything wrong.

Despite the reasons, it still felt off about how they did noteven try to contact us. Gen would have managed to find a way. I knew him enough to guarantee that he would contact us. The only two options were, I did not know him enough or there was something stopping him. 

The latter seemed more likely.

"Oi. How much longer do you plan on sitting there? No break is supposed to last that long?" James yell broke my line of thought.

I looked at him. Them.

Everyone had their eyes on me.

I got up, stretched a bit, and walked back to them.

The training would not be stopping anytime soon.

Not until that little rat who laughed at me answered my questions and took a couple punches.