A New Beginning In A Mana Apocalypse

"Michael and Courtney?" I mentally asked Karen as we went up the stairs.

"Behaving, Kelly reamed them both a new a.s.shole. She never liked Courtney to start with and is p.i.s.sed that she wormed her way back into Michael"s life. Especially since she did like me." Karen replied a bit smugly.

I hadn"t thought about Kelly. Despite her being married to my father I had never really thought of her as family. I had a.s.sumed she would side with her son if we fought, I forgot that being with Megan made her my mother-in-law, whether I liked it or not she was family now. Despite that I still thought she would side with Michael but I seemed to be wrong on that matter. It was nice to know that she wouldn"t automatically side with Michael. Though I couldn"t believe she would always side with me.

As I raced up the stairs I realized I was missing the most important point. If the problem wasn"t Michael and Courtney, what was it? Jessarn? I hoped not, but if it wasn"t them either then what was it that spooked Karen so much.

I rushed through the roof door full of worries. I looked around only to see a group of people I recognized standing on west side of the building looking towards the southwest. Karen, Jessarn, Jamie, Jessica, Kelly, and Momma were all there along with some others I was familiar with. Shortly after I arrived Michael and Courtney followed me up. Michael nodded to me but Courtney just glared. I ignored them both.

"What is the...oh." I started to ask then stopped. Following the gaze of the others I immediately knew what had spooked them.

To the southwest of us floating high in the sky the pyramid from Phoenix could be seen making its way slowly to the north.

I had no idea why I had thought it would stay where it was, but I had never even thought about the possibility that the pyramid would move.

Seeing it from a distance I was once again impressed by the size of the structure and wondered what it was that kept the whole thing in the air.

"Trill?" I called out mentally when I noticed my pretty crane wasn"t present.

"Scouting." Trill replied immediately.

"Don"t get close, there is a flood dragon protecting that thing." I sent to her mentally.

She didn"t say anything but I felt like she cursed.

"What is it?" Courtney asked once she saw it.

"No idea." Michael replied to her.

"It showed up over Phoenix after the nuke hit that place." I responded. Not just for Courtney"s benefit. Though I looked over at Jessarn. I was hopeful he might know something about them.

I wasn"t disappointed.

"It"s the Lost Ones." Jessarn said then shivered. "We need to leave here, now!" he said then looked at me.

"Are you sure it is the Lost Ones?" Mary asked obviously frightened.

Jessarn nodded. "Yes, that is one of their mobile fortresses, they constructed them around three thousand years ago four worlds back. All of them disappeared with them. If one of them is here, they will be too." Jessarn replied. "And if they are here, we don"t want to be."

"Why? What makes them so horrible?" Michael asked.

"They feel that they are the superior race. They imprison, enslave, or kill anyone other than their own people." Jessarn replied. "Kind of funny given the fact that their race was created by a group of psychopaths that decided the greatest form of entertainment was to capture and enjoy twisted females." he added with a sneer.

Everyone stared at Jessarn in shock. "So they are…" Karen asked then hesitated.

"Half breeds between powerful awakened and twisted." Jessarn confirmed. "Very powerful awakened I might add. None of them left now, their kids murdered them once they were old enough to understand them."

I looked back to the inverted brown pyramid that was floating in the sky to the west. "Let me guess, they get the best of both races?" I asked.

Jessarn nodded, "Powerful abilities of the awakened and the incredible strength and durability of the twisted. Every one of them." Jessarn confirmed.

I shivered before I noticed that the "peak" of the pyramid was still open. "Trill?" I called out mentally. I could feel our bond and nothing seemed wrong but I was worrying about her.

"I have almost returned, you should be able to see me." Trill replied.

I scanned the sky and finally spotted a white dot high up in the sky.

"Master." Emy called to me mentally.

"What is it?" I asked.

"You all need to leave there, now! Jessarn is right, the Lost Ones are very dangerous, if you can see them, they know you are there." she told me.

I frowned then looked around. "Fine lets evacuate. Get everyone ready to go." I told them.

"Derek we are evacuating the hotel, that pyramid headed north." I sent the mental message to Derek.

"Come here, we can regroup then move to the haven once you have made it." Derek responded.

I frowned but didn"t argue with him. Of all the places I knew of, the distribution center was the only place I knew was relatively safe.

"Master, the twisted are coming." Nala sent a second later.

I cursed aloud.

"Problem?" Momma asked me.

I nodded as I started to move, "Get everyone to the lobby and through the s.p.a.ce tunnel as soon as you can. I don"t have time to wait for them." I yelled as I ran for the stairs. I took them quickly, I didn"t have time for this, I was still worried that we hadn"t seen the flood dragon yet and that worried me even more than the twisted advancing on Calidia, Nala, and Grace.

I arrived at the lobby in a minute then had a s.p.a.ce tunnel open a moment later. Megan kept on my heels then created her own s.p.a.ce tunnel beside mine. Dena rushed past me and through the s.p.a.ce tunnel before I could reach it but I didn"t wait for her to give me an all clear.

Back in the distribution center I kept the s.p.a.ce tunnel open so the others could follow us as soon as they reached the lobby. I prayed all of my girls hurried. I wasn"t proud of the thought but they were the only ones I really cared about. Them and Momma. The rest, well I would be a bit sad if anything happened to them, but not for long.

"Dena watch the tunnels and keep an eye out for any trouble on the other side. Let me know if you see or hear anything." I told her.

"Yes." she replied aloud, it was a bit odd to hear an elephant speak but I didn"t let myself dwell on that for long, we didn"t have time. I cast my search out to see where the twisted were only to find that they had halted just outside of the building. Derek, his men, and Nala were waiting for them to come in but they had stopped just before entering the building.

I frowned not understanding what was going on, before leaving they seemed to be afraid of our presence, was Nala"s lone aura not enough by herself? Was the combined aura"s of Nala, Dena, Megan, and Mine what we needed to scare them? I had no idea but I headed towards the door that Derek and the others were at, I did need to catch some twisted, now was as good a time as any.

"What took you so long?" Derek asked when I reached them.

"Jessarn had some interesting things to say about the owners of the pyramid." I replied.

Derek frowned, "Bad?" he asked.

I nodded. "Really bad." I confirmed.

"Believe him?" Derek asked.

I nodded. "No reason not too. Better to be safe than sorry and all that." I replied. "Besides that place was always meant to be temporary."

Derek nodded. "Alright, but what about the twisted?" he asked.

"They seemed to hesitate as soon as we arrived here." I replied.

"Maybe not we, probably you." Megan spoke up from my side.

"Huh?" Derek and I asked.

"We, and when I say we, I mean you, got overconfident about our golden cores. The twisted fight everything almost mindlessly, why would they care about our auras." Megan pointed out.

I glared at her but didn"t retort.

"The only thing they don"t are other twisted." Megan added giving me a pointed look.

Oh! s.h.i.t! d.a.m.n it!

I readied a s.p.a.ce pocket then pushed the door open to reveal the group of twisted just outside of it. There were fifty or so of them, mostly red and green with four blue and a single purple present. They stared at me stupidly for a moment and I took advantage of that to open a s.p.a.ce tunnel to the s.p.a.ce pocket I had created for them and swept them all up into it.

"Well that was anticlimactic." Derek commented as he put his rifle down.

"Probably for the best, they outnumbered us." Megan pointed out.

Derek shrugged, "Yeah but they could only come through the door one at a time." Derek replied.

"Are you sure? No chance that they would have used their strength to come through the wall?" Megan asked.

Derek stopped then looked at Megan for a moment with a frown on his face, "I never considered the possibility, the walls here are thick, but you are right, they are strong enough to go through the walls." he admitted a worried look appearing on his face as he looked at the wall.

"We need to change the way we think." I told him.

"We?" Derek asked.

"Yes we." I replied but I didn"t elaborate. I had left three of my girls here, only because I was sure the twisted wouldn"t mess with a gold. I had been wrong, and while nothing happened, I couldn"t make the same mistake again. I might not get so lucky a second time.

"Lets go we need to get everyone away from that pyramid." I said then headed back to the s.p.a.ce tunnels.

Grace and Calidia had come down from the room the survivors were in and created two more s.p.a.ce tunnels. Already people were starting to come through the s.p.a.ce tunnels and they were coming through fast. A quick glance confirmed that my wives and family were already through the s.p.a.ce tunnels. I was immediately rea.s.sured to see them. That is until I noticed that Tracy wasn"t here, none of Jessarn"s people were.

"Jessarn?" I asked looking to Karen.

Karen shrugged, "He went to gather his family but they haven"t come through yet." she replied.

As there were still people coming through I tried not to worry.

I used my friendship level bond to feel for Tracy only to find that she wasn"t back at the hotel, instead she was far away, really far away, she felt distant, almost like there was a barrier between us.

I frowned and searched my other bonds but only one felt like Tracy"s and that was the one to Emy in her haven.

"Tracy?" I thought to her wondering what was going on as I started to worry.

"I"m fine, grandpa took us all somewhere else, he"s really scared of those Lost Ones." she mentally replied. "He"s really riled up, I am kind of worried."

I frowned, I could guess that he was worried, but was there a reason to separate from us, and when did they have a haven?