The Turn
Chapter Nine
~In the same
Boat~
Three Years
before the Turn
Zara
nervously stood on the street corner, waiting with a large bag over her
shoulder. The day had finally come and the whole Island was buzzed about the
event. It was the most important moment in a trainee’s life. It was the time
for them show off their powers to the Other representatives of the world. The
Coliseum was where it was all to be held. They would go up against one team and
hopefully they would win and impress the representatives. You didn’t
necessarily have to win your round, though it helped, because the
representatives usually go in knowing exactly what they want and if you’ve got
it you would find out a few days later if you were chosen.
Galaxy in his
reign, if you care to say, over the Tower had managed to spread its reach to
other countries. That way, if there was an immediate threat, the Agents
assigned there could act quickly. Of course the buildings didn’t look like the
Tower itself and they weren’t called the Tower II and so on but they were there
if you looked hard enough.
Today, if her
team did well enough, they would be chosen by one of the leaders to go to their
country. But if they weren’t chosen….Zara swallowed, her mouth suddenly became
dry. They already had a low score with her not doing the individual assessment
and Chaud failing miserably. Yes, the score mattered in the sense that it might
peak or dampen the interest people had in you. But then again, the score
represented you as an individual and not as a group.
Zara’s
breathing started coming in harsh breaths. She was thinking about the rest of
her life; what if she didn’t get chosen, what if the other team was too strong,
what if, what if, what if… She jumped when she felt a hand on her shoulder.
“Hey, what’s
up?” Chaud said with a smile.
“You have to
stop doing that!” Zara glared at him.
He looked at
her curiously, “Doing what?
Zara flailed
her arms in the air, “This! Sneaking up on people! You can give someone a heart
attack!”
Chaud stepped
back a pace, “Okay, someone is stressing out.”
“Of course
I’m stressing out!” Zara had practically snapped, “We’re talking about the rest
of our lives here! You might have a rich papa to run home to but I don’t! This
is everything I’ve got! If I fail, I’ve failed at life!”
Chaud stood
there a moment, “You need ice cream.”
Zara stared
at him in disbelief, “Ice cream? I’m talking about the end of my life as I know
it and all you can think about is ice cream?”
“Yeah,” Chaud
stated, “There’s a stand two blocks down. You’re two hours early. We’ve got
time.”
He started
walking away. Zara, open mouthed and shocked, followed after him. They found
the little ice cream stand and Chaud ordered them two cones. He passed one on
to Zara; it was vanilla with pink swirls in it. She looked at her ice cream for
a moment.
“What is
this?” she asked.
“It’s called
ice cream,” Chaud stated as he licked his vanilla cone, “We humans eat sugar to
drown out problems. Well, that and alcohol. Either way, it’s a bad habit
really.”
Zara liked it
and it tasted like strawberries. It didn’t taste bad. In confession, she hadn’t
had ice cream since she had come to the Island. It was good, surprisingly good.
“What are you
doing here?” Zara asked, “I know I was two hours early but why were you two
hours early.”
Chaud
shrugged, “You were here two hours early so I decided to keep you company.”
“Were you
watching me?” Zara glared a cautious eye at him.
“More like
staking the place out. You can’t be careful you know. We wouldn’t want
something bad to happen before the assessment,” he noticed Zara tense up, “I
mean before the ice cream cart rolls away. Yeah, that’s what I meant. I didn’t say
anything about an assessment…what assessment. In fact, why are we here again?”
After their
ice creams they walked back to the corner where they were all about to meet.
Naru and Hina came on off the bus and hour later. After that Vicky came thirty
minutes later while Deontay was pushing it with a minute to spare.
They all
walked toward the Coliseum together. The roads leading up to it were packed
with cars and news vans; only adding to Zara’s stress already. As they walked
on, they started running into other groups who too were making their way to the
Coliseum. They rounded a corner and the streets opened up to a large circular
building, similar to the Coliseum in Rome.
Windows replaced
the arches and the building was made of a white stone. The Island Coliseum was
slightly larger than the one in Rome, much newer as well. In the front entrance
there was a statue in the center of a fountain of Sage Tariq, the founder and
creator of the Tower. The Tower had seen two rulers before its current one.
Vicky ran up
to the fountain with something clasped tightly in her hands. She stood at the
rim of the fountain and stood there a moment. Then she reached in her pocket
and pulled out a folded piece of paper and quickly folded into a paper boat.
She opened her hand to expose six pennies. She lined her boat with pennies,
three on each side, and placed the boat in the water. It floated off around the
circular fountain. She ran back to the others and smiled.
“Hope Sage
brings us some luck,” she said as she pushed her glasses up her nose.
“Don’t know
how a bronze—ow!” Chaud jumped after Zara stepped on his foot.
“We could use
all the luck we can get,” she said through gritted teeth.
“But its
bronze,” Chaud muttered quietly.
Vicky smiled
and ran after Naru and Hina who had gone ahead. Deontay shook his head and
sighed.
Chaud looked
at him with mock shock, “Bronze doesn’t grant wishes!”
Zara rolled
her eyes and headed for the main entrance.
“Okay,” the
woman at one of the front desks said, “are you here to participate or watch?”
“Participate,”
Zara responded.
“Please go
down that hall to the right, a gentle man there will help you.”
“Thanks.”
They did as
they were told and walked though scores of people to get to the mouth of the
hallway. The hallway was blocked off with a gate and a man sat at a computer
typing away at the keyboard. A stronger looking man stood a little further down
the table. He looked up as their group approached. With a smile he delved into
the matter at hand.
“Leader,
name,” he stated,
“Zara Uzek,”
the response came.
The man typed
the name into his computer, “Weapon.”
“Katana.”
“Power.”
“Fire.”
“Anything
else we should know about you?”
“No.”
“Alright then
Miss Uzek please continue down the line where your bag with be searched.
Second.”
“Chaud
Galaxy.”
Zara placed
her bag on the table. The man opened it up and dug around inside. He then came
around the table and gave her a quick pat down. This event was notoriously
known for people bringing in illegal weapons. If you were caught bringing
things in, you were kicked off the Island but that enough didn’t stop people
from wanting an edge over the competition.
“Please stand
over there Miss,” the man muttered, “you can take your bag.”
“Anything
else we should know about you?”
“I have
wings,” Chaud stated casually.
“Thank you,
you can continue down the line.”
Chaud set his
weapons on the table the man looked at them and nodded, “You will need to use
the bullets we provide for you. Did you already make a note, Frank?”
“Yes, I did,”
sighed the man at the computer.
The guard
looked at Chaud again, “The boxes will be sent to the room.”
After that
exchange, Chaud underwent the same pat down before being allowed to stand near
the door next to Zara. Hina pushed ahead of her brother who didn’t put up much
of a fight. Deontay, being a gentleman, allowed Vicky to go ahead of him.
Naru’s things took the longest to process considering he had so many individual
parts: two sai, two dozen or so shuriken, and about a million needles. It was
safe to say though that the teams in line behind them stared wide eyed in fear
as Naru had to explain what each weapon was used for. Some of them rubbed their
muscles as he explained what would happen when a needle hit a curtain area.
“Fine,” the
guard said, unfazed, “room 52. Once in your room, the doors will lock and you
won’t be able to exit until it is time for your battle. Everything you need
should be in the room. If you need something not provided to you knock on the
door.”
A buzz
sounded as the door opened. Zara walked though first leading the others to find
their room. She turned back to make sure everyone was following when she saw
something in the crowd. Zara hurried back to the gate just as it closed.
Puppetmaster looked at her with his purple eyes. He smiled and raised a hand in
a motionless wave. Shuppet was secured underneath his other arm. The small doll
even risked a wave itself. Zara waved back.
“Are you
coming or what?” Chaud called impatiently.
Zara turned,
“Hold on a minute!”
She turned to
look for the familiar face only to see people she didn’t know. Her eyes scanned
the crowd a while longer. With a sigh, she pulled herself from the gate and
walked after the others.
Kaiba stood
far enough not to be seen by his younger sibling though he was almost certain
that Chaud knew he was there. He saw Zara reaction and made a mental note to
write it down when he had the time. A man in a flowing coat and an interesting
hat walked past him, brushing his shoulder. Kaiba looked over his shoulder for
a moment. The clock in the inner entrance read five minutes to ten. He pulled
out his tablet and quickly wrote something and placed it back into his pocket.
Kaiba turned
in place and started walking toward the arena entrance. He turned suddenly and
walked up some stairs. Many like himself, seconds to their representatives,
walked up and down the stairs. He paid them no notice for he had already
accomplished what he had been sent out to do.
He reached an
upper level guarded by two strong men. They did nothing as Kaiba walked past.
He entered another hallway with many rooms spaced fairly apart. A flag hung
from each door. He turned left and continued down the curved hallway until he
found what he was looking for.
Kaiba entered
a room it was well furnished with brown carpeting and white furnisher. A large
glass window looked out onto the stadium below. The stands were filling up
quickly for the first battle to be fought at eleven-o-clock. Sirius and the
Mrs. stood at the widow, his arm around her waist and her head on his shoulder.
On a chair beside the couch, Lynx sat with Kia in his lap.
Sirius looked
over his shoulder and saw Kaiba. He smiled, “So how is he?”
Kaiba looked
blankly at his father, “It depends if you want a family decision or a
professional one.”
“Let’s go
with both this morning,” Mrs. Galaxy said as she walked back to the couch.
“He’ll be
fine,” Kaiba stated.
“And
professionally?” Sirius probed.
Kaiba pulled
out his tablet, “Where do I start?”
Sirius could
see line after line though the clear screen, “I get the point, Kaiba.”
“He’s all
over the place,” Kaiba placed the tablet away.
“We’ll just
have to hope for the best,” Mrs. Galaxy smiled as Kia ran toward her.
“That we
will,” Sirius confirmed, “but for now we only have an hour to greet our guests,
dear.”
Mrs. Galaxy
sighed, “Do we have to? I think Mrs. Russia has it out for me.”
“If it makes
you feel better, I’ll do all the talking,” Sirius helped his wife to her feet,
“All you’ll have to do is smile and act pretty.”
She laughed “Don’t
I always?”
“Exactly, so
it won’t be that hard now, will it?” he kissed her lightly on the lips.
“I suppose,”
she smiled, “Kaiba, darling, you’re in charge while mommy and daddy are gone.
Behave.”
Kaiba’s
shoulders sunk at the word ‘darling’, “Yes, mother.”
In the
hallway, Sirius leaned into his wife, “He hates it when you talk to him like
that, you know.”
A sly smile
crept across her face, “I know. Now that he’s annoyed, it’s guaranteed that he
won’t allow any funny business.”
Sirius
chuckled, “That’s true.”
Zara opened
the door and gasped. The ‘room’ that they were provided looked like a high end
ritzy apartment. From the door, there were stairs that led down into a kind of
living space. There was a large television and many comfortable chairs. On the
second floor, where they were now, to the left there was a small series of
steps, a landing and more stairs that led up to the third floor.
On the third
floor it looked like there were changing rooms, one for the boys and another for
the girls. There was also a beautiful bathroom and two other rooms with beds in
them, again one for the boys and the other for the girls, both with TV’s in
them as well. On the first floor, off of the living space, was a kitchen with a
stovetop oven, a refrigerator and all the likes. Most of the floors had a white
carpet covering the floor or black tile for contrast. Across the living space
was a door with no handle.
To their
right there was also a sequence of stairs and landings that led to a small gym both
an area for working out and a flat area for practicing battle techniques. The
others started walking around to explore their living quarters for the rest of
the day. Deontay suggested that he and Vicky practice some of the boxing that
he had been teaching her and Vicky readily agreed. Naru went upstairs to put
his things in a room. Hina went down into the kitchen to find something to eat.
Zara walked over to the television and turned it on.
The
television was preset to view the stadium.
“Today is a big day for most of these kids, Ralph!
This is the day they show the world what they are made of!”
“Thanks, Steve! We’ll tune in to Rachel at the front
entrance. Rachel, are you there?”
“Yes, Ralph. I’m here at the Coliseum statue of Sage
Tariq. As you see here, many teens have come by here to throw pennies into the
fountain for luck on their way into the Coliseum. If you take a closer look
here, there seems to me a small paper boat full of pennies making its rounds
around the fountain. As you see, all six pieces of its copper cargo are still
inside even as the paper boat gets wet. Hopefully, for the team that set this little
boat to sea, this means that they will pull through whatever pours down on
them. Back to you, Steve.”
“Thank you, Rachel.”
Zara looked behind her, sensing that Chaud had
snuck up yet again. Sure enough, he was there, at her right side. He saw her
glance at him and raised a cautious eye brow.
“Okay, is
pretty cool that the little boat is happy and floating around, but I maintain
that a copper statue of a guy had nothing to do with that fact.”
“What about
the pennies?” Zara smiled.
Chaud walked
away in a huff, “I doubt that there is any copper in a penny anymore.”
Zara
shrugged, “Whatever. Makes a good story though.”
