Grant stood with his arms crossed against his chest at the front of the room, blocking out the map on the TV screen. He had a sullen, angry look on his face as he waited for everyone to take their seats. Luna could see a vein running across the side of his forehead.
"This is a serious matter. Lloyd has gone missing, and we are under the impression that the White Sand has him. You all will go down there on a scouting mission. If you find Lloyd, bring him back."
"And don't get caught," Cleo added. "But that's a given."
"But why only him?" Luna asked in a shaking voice. "Why didn't they take me? I was right there."
"They're taunting us—you. They're trying to bait us into making a move. They know if we make any sort of military move against them they can start truly terrorizing us," Grant explained carefully.
"They are probably trying to gage your powers in action as well."
They all looked at each other, Luna's tearstained gaze stopping on her mirror image. Lily stared back, the same grief stricken look on her face, tears etching their way across her rosy cheeks. A look of hope filled her shattered eyes, but her expression remained unchanged. Luna nodded and smiled back reassuringly.
"We'll get him back," Luna said. "As soon as we can. This, this is war."
It was early morning, the sun just barely dancing above the horizon, not quite risen, but enough to engulf the little town in light. Luna and her friends flew above the clouds to the edge of town, careful not to be seen. No one spoke, just allowed the silence to speak for itself. Luna could already feel the side effects of missing one team member. It felt like an absence in her soul, like a piece of it had fallen and was no longer anywhere to be found. If she thought into it too deeply, she just wanted to curl up and—
She was pulled out of her thoughts when Harper called out to her. They had reached the Castle of The Eye.
They started creeping around the castle, looking for an inconspicuous way in. After some searching around the side of the building, they found a hidden door. It was metal, frosted over with grass. Colin broke it open, kicking it down after tearing away the hinges with his sword. They snuck inside, their feet not making a single sound.
There were two sets of stairs leading down. Metal and yellow stone. One that lead to the base, and one that lead to the castle. Luna turned to her right, starting down the stone.
Luna was leading the pack, her sword drawn but pointed down. Every few steps it would scrape against the wall. Colin was trailing behind, turning around every-so-often to scan the perimeter, clutching his sword with both hands, willing them to stop shaking. Sylvia held her gun ready. They were in a dark hallway, which led to a set of even darker stairs that descended into nothingness. They continued to follow the dark stairs, until finally reaching a dimly lit corridor. The technologically advanced section of the castle was beneath their feet, an entire secret base hidden beneath old eleventh century castle ruins. There was no way anyone could have found this before them. Without Sylvia, this place would still be a mystery.
There were dim fake torches posted on stone columns every few feet the further they got into the castle. There was one window at the end of the hall, only a tiny sliver cut into the rock, coming down only a few inches from the ceiling. On either side, there were iron bars instead of walls, with stone columns supporting the ceiling. The floor shook slightly, and some dirt and stone tumbled from the ceiling as the columns shifted. A cry came from one of the barred cells.
Luna's heart dropped. She could recognize that sound in her sleep. She could recognize that sound no matter what the conditions were. "Lloyd!" Luna called out to him in a hushed tone. Her voice reverberated through the hall, first amplifying and resounding, then dying back down to the nothingness it had come from.
"Luna!" he called back eagerly, his voice also bouncing off the walls.
She followed the source of the disturbance, eventually being led to a small secluded cell. Lloyd was huddled up in it, his yellow-blonde hair a disastrous mess filled with dirt and dust, his clothes ripped in random places and matted with blood. His face was covered in the same grey tinted stuff his hair was. A trail of the visible pinky flesh of his cheeks running down either side of his face was the only indication that he had been crying. He stood up, scuffling to the bars and clutched them with both hands. There was a bruise forming on his temple.
"Lloyd!" His name slipped from Lily's lips as she ran up to the bars. She cupped his face in her hands as he cracked a smile.
Luna tried slashing her sword across the bars, but it simply cluttered against the first one, not inflicting any damage.
"So we can't use force, let's just move on." Razaia sighed as she watched Luna prepare to strike the bars for a second time.
Luna let out a frustrated sigh of her own, sheathing her sword silently. Harper put her hands on her shoulders, moving her away from the bars. "It'll be okay, Luna. We found him." Luna nodded in response as she took deep breaths to calm her rage.
Razaia pulled out a paper clip she had stowed in a small pocket on her belt. She twisted the paperclip in her hands until she was satisfied with the new shape, turning towards the lock on the iron door. Sylvia held the lock in place as Razaia worked to unlock it. Colin was keeping guard at the end of the hallway, Lily was entertaining Lloyd, and Luna provided useless commentary while Harper hugged her shoulders.
"For such an advanced castle, don't you think there should be a more advanced security system down here? Maybe some sort of digital combination lock?" Luna's endless chatter began.
"I suppose you're right, but I believe this floor is a remnant from the ruins." Sylvia responded in a clipped tone. "Although it is strange for them to keep him here, especially with no guards."
"So in other words, it's like this for the aesthetic," Harper rolled her eyes.
Lloyd smiled, though it was obvious he wasn't happy, still on the wrong side of the bars.
Razaia managed to unlock it, and the door swung open. They all cheered in hushed tones, then started to find their way back out. Sylvia drew her sword and started to lead them back down the dark hallway, Colin close behind her with his gun drawn. The faint glow of the faux torch fires soon ceased as they carefully ascended the stairs. They kept Lloyd in the middle, the only one not in uniform. He was shaking, though persistently insisted he wasn't scared. He had Lily's gun gripped so tightly his knuckles were as colorless as Sylvia's hair.
Luna was at the back of the line as they made their way through the thin hallways, the only light there the glint of the swords.
"You guys start heading back to Base Camp, I want to see where the other tunnel leads," Luna said as they made it back to their exit.
"Be careful," Harper whispered. Luna nodded as she started down the hall.
आप पढ़ रहे हैं
Under the Shadow of the Moon
कल्पित विज्ञानLuna Vis woke up one morning, or rather one night, to the dim light of the moon. It was a day that started like any other, but turned out unlike any other, setting off the chain reaction that set her life ablaze for a second time. For six years she...
