CHANNELS

“There!”

“What…?”

Sighing in frustration, Raven firmly gripped Hix’s chin and turned his face toward the young man sitting alone in a dark corner of the bar. “There!” she repeated, punctuating it by jabbing a finger insistently toward the loner. “That’s what we need!”

Hix raised an eyebrow and stared at Raven. “A scrawny kid who drinks alone?”

“No,” Raven sighed with a roll of her eyes. “Look closer.”

Hix frowned at Raven, then turned to face the young man more directly, and he squinted his eyes to get a better look. “I give up. What am I supposed to be seeing?”

“Look at his eyes, Hix…”

Taking no care to be inconspicuous about staring at the young man, Hix took a deep breath as he leaned forward a bit, still squinting. “Ah…” he said finally after a full moment of open staring. “A Prod. Of course,” he said flatly.

“Not just any Prod,” Raven went on, “a ‘kin. And a drav powerful one, I’d wager.”

Hix chuffed. “What makes you say that?”

“Look at his eyes!”

“I did.”

“Look at the color. The shade! The way the light pulses even when he’s just sitting there…”

“How long have you been staring at this kid?” Hix muttered under his breath. Raven ignored him. “He’s exactly what we’ve been missing: A little brawn.” Hix took another sweeping glance toward the young man and chuckled, “I can’t imagine anyone looking at him and thinking: brawn.”

Raven’s eyes sparkled as she grinned at her companion. “Exactly. Makes him all the more perfect… I’m gonna go introduce myself.”

Without another word, Raven was off her stool and strutting across the expanse of the bar, her big black boots clunking loudly on the wood floor. Although the bar was fairly busy and she was an extremely striking woman, not a soul looked her way as she walked, her eyes pulsing with purple light. Anyone looking in her general direction as she walked by suddenly found themselves looking another way, though it never crossed their minds why.

The young man had been given a wide berth by the rest of the bar’s patrons. Hix may not have been impressed by his eyes, but they had clearly made an impression on the others. He sat alone in his corner, his back to the wall, a single tall glass filled to the brink with sparkling red classia stood on the small circular table before him, untouched.

“Mind if I join you?” said Raven. She didn’t wait for an invitation; she was already sitting in a chair across from him before she was even done speaking. The young man jumped the moment she spoke, his eyes wide. Although he didn’t touch it, the glass on the table suddenly slid forward an inklet, spilling some of its contents onto the table as it came to a stop.

“Easy,” Raven cooed soothingly, holding a hand up, palm-out, toward the young man. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I sometimes forget my ability often has its effect even when I’m not trying to use it.”

The young man’s eyes narrowed a bit as he stared across the table at her, and he slowly let out a tense breath. “Purple eyes… I’ve never seen a Prodigy with purple eyes.”

“Not many have.” Raven shrugged nonchalantly. “I don’t think there are many of us to begin with, but even if there are, we tend to… well, we tend to go unnoticed…”

The young man continued to stare at her for a moment. His mouth widened as if he was about to say something, but then, he abruptly snapped it shut, put his arms out on the table, his hands wrapping around his drink, and turned his eyes downward.

“What do you want?” he muttered.

Raven smirked. “To introduce myself. My name is Raven. You won’t have heard of me.”

She extended a hand across the table. The young man looked up at it from beneath furrowed eyebrows for just a moment before looking back down. Raven retracted the hand, but went on, unfazed, “And you are?”

“You mean you don’t know?” said the young man, finally looking her in the eye again, disbelief etched on his face. Raven looked at him curiously, her only reply a shrug. “Why else would you want to talk to me unless you knew who I was?”

Raven laughed openly, leaned back in her chair, and flicked a hand in the air. “I thought you looked like a good graff.”

The man choked. Raven just smiled. She reached out and gently pushed the glass of classia closer toward him. “Take a drink. It’ll help,” she said.

His eyes were red by the time he had gotten a hold of himself. He looked up and Raven nodded again toward the drink. He just looked at it for a moment as if he had no idea what it was or where it had come from, and then looked back up at her. “You really have no idea who I am?”

“I really don’t.”

“Well…” he said, and took a deep breath before continuing. “You’ll have heard of me. Or at least my father… I’m Maddock Traz-ak… Everyone calls me Dock.”

Raven landed easily on her feet, smoothly turning into a roll toward the wall, where she sprang back up onto her feet, and was holding herself safely to the side as Dock came crashing down exactly where she had initially landed. But Dock didn’t crash down. Raven watched, mildly impressed, as Dock tried to catch himself with his own power, slowing his fall, providing a cushion of air that bounced him back up slightly before he had even hit the ground, and then allowing him to hit the ground less painfully.

When Dock was on the ground, Raven stepped over to him and extended her hand, helping him to his feet. Both unhurt by the short fall, they looked back up at the hole Dock had created a moment earlier just as a girl who looked all of about twelve revs of age, out of breath and panting heavily, appeared in the roughly-hewn rectangle of light. The girl was dressed in a plain, but frilly, pale pink dress, and her brown hair was done up in pig-tails. Even as she caught her breath, her face was full of rage as she looked down on them.

“I see you!” the girl shrieked at them, pointing an accusatory finger. “How dare you defile the tomb of the ancient one?! Come out now, and we’ll show mercy: We will give you quick deaths!”

Dock slowly turned his gaze back down to Raven, and Raven moved her head to match until they were looking at each other. Soft moonlight from above highlighted his features. His eyes glimmered with dull light and his lips were twitching as if trying to smile. “Is it still wrong to hit a little girl if you’re not actually using your fist to do it?”

Rather than respond, Raven just turned around and started looking around the cavern. Or rather, she started sensing her surroundings. She couldn’t actually see very deep into the cave as the only light was shining down from the hole above. The light failed to extend very far. However, among the advantages her power provided was a sense of her surroundings, even in perfect darkness. Raven could move around in the shadows of any location as easily as if she were moving around her own home at night.

Behind her, Raven heard a light but distinct puff of air she knew to associate with Dock using his telekinetic ability. The sound was immediately followed by a ferocious roar like that of a wild animal, and Raven spun back around just in time to see Dock scurry toward her into the darkness. Raven leaned back into the light to look up again, but only saw the young girl still staring angrily down, now accompanied by the large Taijian from up the street.

“Did you see that?!” said Dock. He was now standing too deep in the shadows to see his face, but she could still see his eyes illuminated with the light of his power. It might have been her imagination, but they looked scared. “I hit her… not very hard, just to knock her back a bit… and she… she turned… into something… just for a second. It was… I don’t know…”

Raven was only paying him half her attention. She was still primarily focused on getting a sense of the cave around her. She couldn’t see the walls, but she knew they were there, each within an arm’s length on either side. There seemed to be only one way to go, so she grabbed Dock’s hand and started guiding him forward. He moved with some reluctance, still obviously focused on whatever had happened back at the entrance.

“Are you surprised?” Raven muttered absently. “It’s Albatraz. There’re all manner of people… creatures… in the different clans…”

“Yeah, but they look like Tighs…”

“Lots of clans look like Tighs,” said Raven, still distracted as her focus was on leading them down the pitch black cavern. “Looks can be deceiving… You must’ve noticed what part of the Yulkeur Forest we’re in. Surrounded by Keurs and Mercy knows what else on all sides, and they don’t even have walls out there? There would be no surviving in this area without something up your sleeve…”

“Yeah, but…”

Raven interjected before Dock could finish the thought. “You know this would be easier if you were using your power to feel out your own way too.”

“It would be even easier if we used lights.”

“That’s not a good idea. We don’t want to be seen.”

“I thought you said they wouldn’t follow us down here.”

Raven bit her lip, and tried to keep her focus.

Dock was persistent. “Raven,” he said pointedly. “I thought you said they wouldn’t follow us down here.”

Raven sighed heavily. “They won’t. This is a sacred place to them. All are forbidden from entering.”

“Then who are we afraid will see us?”

“Hopefully, there won’t be anyone to see us. But I prefer to ere on the side of caution. Just try to help me out here, okay?”

Dock was silent for a moment before he said quietly, “You know my power’s no good for that.”

“Drael, Dock. I’ve seen all kinds of ‘kins feel out their surroundings. Like feeling the walls with your hands, only you use your power.”

“Not me, you haven’t.”

“It just takes prac—Hm…”

“What?”

“Uh… The cavern’s opening up… I think… Watch your ste—Aaugh!”

Raven sensed the floor dropping out just before her foot slipped. She would have tumbled into blackness had it not been for Dock. As she started slipping, he turned his wrist in her grasp and grabbed hold of her arm. At the same time, she felt a heavy whoosh of air from the opposite side, pushing her none too gently back into Dock. They collapsed backward, but at least it was onto solid ground.

“If you wanted to graff, you could’ve just said so,” said Raven mockingly as she pushed herself up from Dock and rose to her feet, again giving Dock a hand in getting back up.

Raven could see the roll of Dock’s glowing eyes, though it was all she could see, and she could just imagine the look on his face as he replied, “I think we both know that you’re the one—”

“In case you’ve forgotten, comms are open…” Hix’s voice, accompanied by a vague metallic ring and a lot of static, emitted over their earpieces. Dock coughed and stopped talking. Raven cleared her throat as well, silently took Dock’s hand back in hers, and returned her focus to their surroundings. No longer distracted, Raven could sense the foot-bridge that led over the gap ahead of her.

“Stick very close to me,” Raven stressed. Dock immediately stepped so close behind her that she could feel his breath on the back of her neck. She was surprised to feel a pleasurable tremble dance down her spine, and she had to consciously suppress it before refocusing and moving forward. She was about to take her first step onto the bridge she could only feel, but not see, when she paused and added, “And be ready to catch us if you have to…”

The breath on her neck halted for a moment. The silence in the wide cavern around them suddenly seemed to exert itself, and Raven felt like she could drown in it. Then, finally, Dock’s breathing resumed, and he whispered, “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

Raven took a deliberately slow step forward, in the middle of which, she suddenly started panicking that her foot would come back down on nothing at all, and they would both simply fall forward into nothingness. She hesitated as she took quick, shallow breaths, little more than panting, and she could feel the sweat trickling down her forehead. But then her boot touched down on something solid, and her weight followed. She breathed in relief, and took another step forward, this time more confidently, trusting in her ability to sense the bridge. Dock followed close behind, obviously equally nervous if the death-grip he had on her hand was any indication.

After a dozen more steps, Raven sensed the ground widening again, and she knew they were past the gap. However, she immediately sensed a new problem at hand. “Hix, you there?”

“As ever I am,” was Hix’s tinny reply over the earpiece.

“You’re tracking us on the scanner?”

“Of course,” said Hix. “You flicker in and out from time to time, but by and large, you’re good. You haven’t come to an impasse already, have you?”

“No. The opposite, actually. I sense several caves branching out from the big one we’re in. I need you to point me.”

“Oh, is that all?” There were a few tics of silence from Hix’s end, and then, “Okay, if I’m reading this right, you wanna head north-northeast from your current position. Got your bearings?”

“I think so. Let me know if we veer off course.”

“Not a problem.”

Raven pointed herself toward the cave opening that seemed most in line with their desired course, took an extra moment to assure herself there were no more gaps in the floor between there and here, and then strode semi-confidently forward. Dock trailed behind her, still holding her hand, but no longer keeping on her heels. The moved on in solemn silence, the dangers of the cavern having grown coldly real to them both. At a few points, the cave split into two paths, and Raven consulted with Hix each time to make sure they stayed on the right path. Once their chosen path took a sharp turn off-course over a hundred cartras along, and they had to double back to find another route.

After having already spent well over a nuor traversing the pitch black caves, Raven felt the cave around her begin to widen again, and she stopped cold. This time, not because she feared more gaps. She knew that although the walls were wider ahead, they weren’t a great deal wider, and she could feel the cave floor for many cartras ahead of them. No, she stopped because she had heard something.

“Wha—?”

“Shhh!” Raven pinched Dock’s wrist painfully, and then pulled him forward. She whispered so quietly into his ear, she could barely even hear her own words. “Do you hear that?”

They both held their breath as they listened. From somewhere ahead of them, there came a scratching noise, faint at first, but getting stronger with every passing moment. It sounded like something heavy was dragging across the stone surface of the cave floor. And then, as the scratching grew steadily louder, closer, another sound joined it, also faint at first, only to grow louder… It was breathing. Long, rattling breaths, heavy and guttural. Whatever it was, Raven was sure it was big.

“We have to go back!” Raven hissed, already turning to hurry back up the passageway. But Dock caught her wrist, and held her there. She stared at him questioningly, though she knew he couldn’t see her except for her eyes, so she whispered, “What are you doing?!”

“What if this is the way?”

“We’ll find another!”

“What if there isn’t one?”

“There will be! Come on! It’s getting close!” She could almost feel it with her senses. Not quite, but she was sure she would in another moment. It was strangely similar to that feeling one gets when they’re trying to remember something, but they just can’t seem to grasp it.

“There…” Dock paused, and Raven could feel Dock’s hesitation as he searched for the words. “There’s something else…”

“What do you mean? Dock, we don’t have time…”

She tried to pull him with her, but he wouldn’t budge. Now, she really could sense the approaching creature. She had been right. It was huge. It was a lucky thing they were in a wider part of the cave. She didn’t think the creature was big enough to occupy the whole space, but the more space between them and it, the better.

“I heard…” Again, Dock paused. He seemed to be having trouble putting it into words. Raven didn’t care to wait for him to find them.

“Dock, I refuse to let myself get eaten. Let’s go!”

She tugged again at his arm, pulling with all her strength. Then, suddenly a strong wind came up behind her and pushed her hard into Dock’s chest. His arms folded around her in an instant, and together, they pressed up against the wall. She could still feel the wind that had pushed her pressing up against them, pinning them to the wall. And then the creature was there.

It stank, like something rotten and decaying. She had been right about it being big. Even though she and Dock were pressed up against the wall, she could sense it mere quartras from where they were. It probably wouldn’t even fit through many of the caves they had come through. In her head, she was cursing Dock’s stubbornness. They might have been safe if they had pulled back when they had a chance. She couldn’t understand what had gotten into Dock. She was usually the one eager to press on no matter how dangerous a job became. It was typical for Dock to be suggesting they cut their losses and run.

The huge creature stopped directly in front of them, sniffing at the stale air of the pitch black cave. She couldn’t see the creature, but her sense gave her a vague mental image. It was very tall, and very wide, taking up a bulk of the cavern surrounding it. Its legs were short and stubby, but its arms were very long, reaching so far down that the fingers grazed the floor as it walked.

“It would help if you focused your power on hiding us,” Dock breathed directly into her ear. She hadn’t even noticed their cheeks touching as he held her tight. It took Raven a moment to process Dock’s words through her panic, but after a moment, her eyes widened, her body relaxed slightly, and she nearly laughed out loud at her own foolishness. She threw the mental shroud over them as if it was a coat, and immediately the creature stopped sniffing. Within a few ticuits, it was moving down the cavern they had just been coming from.

They didn’t move for a long moment, Raven keeping up her mental mask, while Dock continued to use his power to press them tight against the wall. Finally, when she felt the creature must be a safe distance away, Raven issued a subtle cough, and Dock said, “Oh!” and released them. Raven took a few steps away, still trying to regain her calm.

“Holding us against a wall while a giant… who-knows-what?!... is lurking mere inklets away?!” Raven said in an excited, but hushed, voice. “I would have thought you’re inability at delicacy would have forbidden you from accomplishing that without the beast sensing it.”

“I would have thought that you wouldn’t have needed to be told to hide us,” countered Dock.

“Yes, well… Maintaining such a detailed sense of the world around me is an outward expression of my power and tends to negate the masking factor… It’s easy to forget that I’m not already hidden when my power usually works so well without even trying.”

“And you were too panicked to think of it…”

Raven frowned playfully at him before remembering that he couldn’t see it. “I still say your use of your own power says a lot more about your abilities than you give yourself credit for.”

“Yeah… Maybe…” Dock muttered wonderingly. Turning her senses back outward, she could feel him wandering slowly down the cave. She thought he must be trying to feel his way out, and was proud that he had gained some new confidence.

“Don’t get too far without me,” Raven called, softly, still mindful of the creature and anything else that might be living in the caves. “And don’t go walking off a cliff!” She turned her attention to her comms, and spoke out to Hix, “Now, Hix. I thought I asked you to keep an eye on any other potential life-forms in the caves. You could have warned us about that long before we got so close to it!”

She waited for a reply, but there was only silence.

“Hix?” she tried again. “You better still be there… Hix?”

Nothing.

She took a few steps down the passage, about to speak to Dock, when she realized she could no longer sense him. A fresh wave of anxiety instantly crashed over her senses, and she started moving down the passage faster, trying to sense as far ahead of her as she could.

“Dock?” she said, hoping he would pick her up over the comms, though she wasn’t sure they were even working anymore. “Dock, answer if you hear me!... Dock?!”

Soon, she was practically running down the cave as it descended deeper and deeper into the earth. Even though she was doing her best to keep her senses attuned to what was ahead of her, she felt sure that she would end up running herself right off a cliff. But she didn’t slow down. Despite the fact that the cave was gradually getting wider around her again, she was suddenly feeling very claustrophobic, without Hix on the comms or Dock at hand; she felt like the caves were closing on her.

She felt Dock only ticuits before crashing into him, nearly sending them both toppling over yet again. He had stopped, and Raven immediately sensed why. They were in another clearing in the passageway with several different caves opening out from here. Raven groaned in frustration, beginning to question why she ever took this job to begin with.

“Hix isn’t answering on the comms. I have a vague idea which way we’re going, but—”

“It’s this way,” said Dock, and he continued forward down one of the caves, seemingly at random. He walked quickly, and Raven had to hurry to keep up.

“What do you mean ‘it’s this way’? How do you know?”

“Don’t you hear that?”

Raven strained her ears, trying to hear ahead of them, afraid they were going to hear another creature moving in the darkness. “No. There’s nothing!”

Raven caught a flash of glowing blue as Dock glanced back at her. “There’s something, all right… It’s beautiful…”

“What?! What’s beautiful?” Raven asked frantically. “What’s wrong with you?!”

But Dock was apparently done talking. Instead of replying, he just sped up, and Raven had to start running again to keep up. Several hundred cartras further down, the cave widened again into a much smaller opening than before, but she again sensed the ground giving out to a gap. She tried to stop Dock, but nothing could deter him. She called out after him, but he wasn’t listening.

Without even stopping, Dock stepped out onto the narrow foot-bridge that led across the short gap, and quickly darted across to the other side. Raven took the bridge a bit more carefully, though she was still trying to move fast so as not to lose Dock. When the cave split into three different paths, Dock didn’t even pause this time. He just shot straight down the passage to the far right, and Raven struggled to follow.

“Dock, are you sure…?”

“So loud now… I know you can hear it now!”

Raven was so puzzled, she didn’t respond. All she could hear were the skittering rocks as they were kicked aside by their hurrying feet. And then… Dock came to a stop. Raven reached out with her senses, trying to confirm what she had already felt. All she could feel was solid wall before them. They were at a dead end.

“This is it,” Dock breathed. “Come on.”

Dock took a step forward, and Raven reached out after him, grabbing his arm to pull him back, but he easily slipped his arm out of her grasp, continuing forward. Raven winced as she could sense his face colliding with the solid wall, and she stepped forward to support him as he came bouncing backward…

Except that he didn’t come bouncing backward.

He continued moving forward, impossibly, through the wall she could feel so surely with her senses. She heard a faint buzzing sound as he moved into it, which cut off the moment he had disappeared through it. And he did disappear. Again she reached out with her senses, trying to assure herself of what she was feeling. She could sense Dock nowhere. All she could feel was the wall, seeming to her mind as solid as anything she had ever felt.

Raven sighed. “I think it’s time I risk a little light…”

Reaching into a side pocket on the small pack strapped to her back, Raven pulled out an electric torchlight. She flicked it on and pointed it directly at the wall before her, letting out a low whistle as she stared at it. Her eyes confirmed what her senses had told her. There was only a wall in front of her. Blank and flat, it stood there, perfectly dull, seemingly impenetrable. And yet…

Raven took a deep breath, and lifted her left hand before her as if she was about to take an oath. Holding the torchlight with her other hand and keeping it trained on the wall directly before her, she stared at her left hand and slowly pushed it forward. She breathed in sharply as the hand touched the wall, and a light stinging sensation exploded across her palm and spread as she pushed the hand through what appeared to be solid wall. In ticuits, her entire hand had disappeared through the wall, and she stood there looking at her arm which for all the world appeared to be stuck in a solid rock wall.

She pulled her hand back out and looked it over for a moment, front and back. After dropping her hand back to her side, Raven closed her eyes, took another deep breath, and took a single step forward, stepping straight through the wall.

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