Emancipation

episode 17

Raen sat on a mat in the sleeping tent. Light streamed in through the open flap. A small bowl sat in front of her with a tennis ball sitting in it. Raen stared at the ball. According to Toni, as translated through Beaoul, Raen should be able to move things with her mind. She stared at and focused on the ball. Move! Damn it! In this place there was not so much as a breath of wind to stir the ball in the slightest and raise her hopes.

A heavy sigh escaped her lips and she moved her focus to her experiences. Raen let her consciousness just flow over and through her memories. As a child in a moment of disorientation, she just might have teleported herself and Fred out of danger. She had touched Beaoul's mind a few times. Her ability to heal a hellhound wound marked her as far from the average being. She had to accept she wasn't human. Only once she managed that would she even begin to release her potential.

Lives could depend on Raen's ability to release that potential. If she had some idea of what she was capable of back on Tradehub maybe a lot of her friends would still be alive, not to mention the rest of the population. The loss of so many lives made Raen sharply angry. The ball in front of her shifted in the bowl. Raen glared at the ball, how dare it move now? The ball shot from the bowl straight out of the tent.

Raen blinked at the empty bowl. Had she moved it?

"The answer to that would be yes Raen," Beaoul ducked into the tent carrying the tennis ball. "I get what dogs like about these things now! It flew past me and I just had to go after it. I grabbed it with my thoughts instead." Beaoul dropped the ball back in the bowl. Then she laid down on the tapestries covering the floor putting her head down on her paws. "So, you took the angry route. It just proved that you could do it. Now we need to teach you to do it without the adrenaline. Don't worry it shouldn't take you as long to figure out as it did me. I had to teach myself and it took me a little while to realize anger wasn't reliable."

Raen blinked at Beaoul who allowed her tongue to loll out the side of her mouth. This made Raen look her friend over critically. Beaoul wasn't as recognizable as a hellhound. Her filthy, short, dark, snarled-up fur was lighter, and they had both taken to washing and brushing it out regularly. They had also figured out a way to trim and grind her claws into attractive and even lengths. She was a lovely canine specimen.

"Beaoul, do you mind not LOOKing like a hellhound anymore?"

Beaoul sat up on her haunches in a defensive stance, "What do you mean I don't look like a hellhound?"

"You are a lovely dog! Your claws are manicured, your fur is clean, well-groomed, and several shades lighter more of a coppery tone now," Raen stated.

Beaoul huffed out a gruff chuckle, "We aren't discussing me. We need to get your mind moving things!"


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Beaoul