Chapter 12

Waking up in a dark, red-tinted room was never a pleasant experience. It reminded me of how people described hell. Couple that with the silence as everyone else slept, and it was enough to make me tremble in fear, on the verge of a panic attack. I had never been used to that kind of silence, even growing up. On my father’s ship, there was always the sound of the crew working or even my father’s snores if I woke before him. Living with Jim, I could hear him and feel him nearby when I woke up in the morning. I never felt alone. Now, as a prisoner on Pathos’ ship, I felt more isolated than I’d even been in my life. It didn’t matter that my brother was just across the room from me, or that six other people were within speaking distance from my cell. All was utterly silent and my fear of being alone attacked me, making my heart clench.

 

It was Pathos who had done this to me, making me fear isolation as much as I did. I was only a small child, barely five years old, and our ship had landed on a planet of which I forget the name. My father had told me to stay on the ship, with Mr. Scroop and the rest of the crew. Of course, being as stubborn as I had always been, I disobeyed and snuck off the ship. Trying to follow my dad, I got lost in a crowd. I ran out as fast as I could, losing myself in a back alleyway. I was alone, scared and vulnerable. That’s when Pathos first appeared in my life. He came out of the shadows, a twisted grin on his face, He said something about the first in his ‘collection’ and reached out for me. I feared for my life in the presence of the lupine, knowing from the feelings I got from him that he intended to harm me. I ran away from him as fast as I could, my heart pounding in my chest, and screamed for help. That was when my dad found me, crying and screaming. He searched around for the cause of my fear, but couldn’t find Pathos. From that moment on, I feared the feeling of being completely isolated.

 

“Ember,” Gale said, causing me to jump in surprise.

 

“Yeah,” I said, though my voice wavered slightly. This didn’t go unnoticed by my brother and his brow furrowed.

 

“What’s with you?”

 

“It’s nothing to worry about.”

 

Gale cast me an unconvinced glanced, but didn’t press the matter any further. It was quiet between us, with only a few shared words between us. I didn’t feel alone as long as someone was conscious along with me, though. A couple hours later, everyone was awake and we were talking among ourselves. Of course, Tobias and Willow were quiet as usual, but I understood that was how they were.

 

“Oh no,” Willow suddenly whispered, gaining all of our attention in an instant.

 

“What’s wrong, Willow?” Ari asked. I could hear the concern in his voice.

 

“It’s from Ember’s ship.” My heart clenched and I stopped breathing for a moment. No one moved.

 

“W-What happened?” I asked shakily.

 

“Someone is attacking ahead of schedule. He’s disobeying Jim’s orders.”

 

“Who?!” I was enraged. Who in my crew would dare disobey Jim when I put him in charge of them?

 

“I believe his name is… Meltdown. He thinks this is taking too long. H-He’s at the laser cannon right now!”

 

“What?! Are you serious?!” I heard Willow whimper in pain and Tobias moved in the cell.

 

“I think he just fired,” he said.

 

“We have a few seconds at best! Everyone, get down and hold onto something sturdy!” Gale ordered.

 

The seconds ticked by slowly. Then, the laser ball hit, rocking the ship like and earthquake. The ominous red light flickered out, leaving us in complete darkness. From the movement of the ship’s floorboards beneath me, I could tell we were on a crash-landing to the planet Ementia. As the ship plummeted, I could only hope my dad was still alright.

 

“Meltdown is dead when I get my hands on him!” I yelled over the noise as the ship fell.

 

Hitting the planet rattled me more than anything I’d ever experienced before in my life. I was thrown across the room, landing on Gale and sending us into the door of our cell. I heard crashes and screams from the cells around me. All of the ‘projectiles’ Ari had saved in his and Nyssa’s cell clattered around, banging into everything as far as I could tell. Gale grunted in pain behind me as we were flung to another part of the room. With one final jolt, the ship stopped moving and we were all thrown around once more.

 

“How’s everyone?” Ari asked, doing a status check.

 

“Fine,” I answered, rubbing my sore back.

 

“Headache, but otherwise good,” Gale said.

 

“I’m okay,” Willow answered quietly.

 

“Same,” Tobias agreed.

 

“I’ll live,” Ebony called.

 

“My leg hurts like a b***h, but I’ll walk it off,” Griffon answered.

 

“And Nyssa and I are okay,” Ari finished. “We’re all accounted for.

 

‘Not all,’ I thought, my mind drifting to my dad.

 

I slowly stood up, gripping the bars to the door to help support myself. At that moment, I realized something. There wasn’t a faint glow in the cell, nothing pulling me back to the other side of the cell. With the blown power in the ship, the laser-tethers were disabled. I felt my wrists and the metal cuffs were gone, as was the feature in the event of an outage. Then another thought struck me. No power meant no locks on the cell doors. I pulled on the bars of the door and it gave a little.

 

“Gale, come here. Help me get the door,” I ordered. My brother stumbled in the darkness, stopping beside me with his hands on the metal bars.

 

“On three,” he said. “One, two, three.” We both pulled as hard as we could and the door creaked open.

 

“We are out of here!” I exclaimed.