A Long Ways From Home

Chapter Two: The First Garde

Her name is Emily and she is sixteen, but that is merely an alias, a way of hiding her true identity. In reality, she is Number One. The first of nine children that fled to Earth after their planet was destroyed by Mogadorians, a hostile alien species skilled in the art of war. Her Cêpan, Adelina, is her protector; she died a few years back. The Mogadorians got the drop on them in South Carolina. Neither of them even saw them coming. They followed Emily and Adelina through Georgia all the way to the motel that they stayed in and stabbed Adelina through the back. From that day, Emily ran.

She ran and she never stopped.

Emily developed her first legacy, telekinesis, three years ago, soon after Adelina was killed. It's a power that allows her to levitate any object with her mind; said to be more deadly than anything her pursuers are capable of. Over the years, she has made good practice with it, and she seeks to use it to track down the others and get her revenge.

Her second legacy soon followed. On a trip to a motel pool. She was swimming laps when no one was around. She nearly ran out of air. It was unexpected, but it saved her life.

Her third legacy came much later; when she was being followed by a group of Mogadorians in the small town of Gillot, near the edges of Tennessee. Luckily, she noticed them in time. It was when she led them to a deserted street that she felt a chill run up her spine and at first, she didn't realize the fog of breath leaving her mouth when she breathed. Nor did she notice it on the Mogadorians that followed her. It was when they attacked that the coldness brewed and she couldn't control it. The air around them all got colder and they froze, then dropped. She checked their pulse and they were dead; their heart stopped. Soon after, they turned to dust and ash.

It was the most pacifistic death she had ever seen or imagined. She didn't even touch them; she didn't even need to get close! They were dead within minutes and that was when she knew another legacy had shown.

The ability to manipulate the temperature at will. Raise it in heat or cool the air until frozen. Her body is immune to extreme temperatures, to the extra warm and extra cold. While she still feels the chill and warmness travel up her spine and through her blood, the legacy doesn't affect her like it does others.

Now, she travels through the state of Arkansas. Across hot and dry plains to find a boy in Oklahoma that survived a fall from a fourth-story window with no bruises or broken bones. Someone that is almost certainly like her. She's had her suspicions but doesn't know what else to believe. She's been alone for the past three years, travelling from state to state, running from the Mogadorians that want her dead. Searching for the others so they can win this war, avenge the people they have lost, and maybe even go home.

Adelina meant everything to her. She protected her, like she was her real child. She mentored her, taught her about their people and culture. If she had developed her legacies with Adelina, she has no doubt that her Cêpan would've trained her to be as great a warrior as their people were on the day of Lorien's fall. Adelina died brutally and Emily will never forget the way she looked at her as the Mogadorian's blade pierced her back. She intends to end them like they have ended her. She intends to make her proud.

There is a roar. A loud terrifying roar being emitted through the field behind her. She whips around and standing some hundred feet away, is a large beast on four legs that must be at least 30 feet tall. It has red glowering eyes and its body is dead gray.

And while the creature rushes her and she turns to run, dozens of those same Mogadorians from South Carolina surround her on all sides.

There is nowhere to run; no escaping them this time.

She sucks in a breath and breathes out an icy mist around her. The fog encompasses the extremely pale men in dark cloaks and in a matter of a few short minutes, those that are in her frozen air are soon frozen to the touch. They freeze, their weapons fall from the lack of warmth in their hands, and their bodies fall. Lifeless to the ground.

But the beast still charges her.

She breathes out again, twirls her hand in a circling motion at her side, tries anything and everything she can to slow the beast down, to surround it with the same icy cold temperatures as she did the soldiers.

But the beast does not slow in the slightest. It continues its sprint. Closing the distance between them. 80 feet, 50, 30. She fears she isn't strong enough to stop it. She fears it will be over.

She shuts her eyes when it comes within 20 feet. And in doing so, a rush of air hits her in the side. Her feet lose contact with the ground and the wind whips through her sleek brunette hair.

What is going on? Someone is holding her. Someone is carrying her. A boy, she realizes when she again opens her eyes. He is flying! They are flying! Hovering over the giant, red-eyed beast and soaring above the clouds.

The boy flies them southeast, in the direction of Alabama, the wind ineffective against his short-cropped brown hair. He stops there; lowers and sets her down outside of a ranch, where a bunch of others are waiting with yipping animals at their sides.

As soon as the girl's feet touch ground again, she questions the boy that brought her to this strange place, "Who are you? Where am I?"

"My name is Cody," the boy answers quietly. "Also known as Number Five. This is our base, Yellowhammer Ranch; you're safe here. And these are the others."