Terror Chronicles 1: Chapter 3

Chapter 3

"Did physics ever make some sense to you?" Samantha whispered rather loudly next to me, attracting a few frowny faces and a curious Edward. "Like, you know what he says is right, but then again, you can patch human flesh with a simple touch. The Third Travellers can appear anywhere on a planet in an instant. Doesn't that defy some unknown law of physics?"

"I don't know, Samantha. And at this point, I'm too tired to care. Please, just let me listen to Mr. Shaw's rambling and leave it at that." I muttered, propping up my head with my hands, half squinting at the whiteboard. Samantha apparently did not get the message, and continued to pester me.

"If you think about it, none of the other sciences make sense too. We screwed biology by plucking genetic codes out from beasts and integrating them to our own. We murdered chemistry by discovering the ability to fully obliterate an object, which violates the whatdoyoucallit law, right?" She was now descending into hyper mode, and I knew if I didn't shut her down now, she won't be 'normal' for at least a day.

Luckily, Edward stepped in for me. "The law of conversion? Your people did that? But how? Doesn't the law of conversion state that the total mass of a material before a chemical equation-"

"Ok, never mind, I don't get any of that anyways." Samantha slumped back into her chair, tapping her fingers rapidly on the desk, seemingly devoid of any beat or tempo. Either that, or I couldn't hear it from my sheer exhaustion at getting literally no sleep last night.

Edward looked at her with curiosity in his eyes, and frowned at my dark eye rings. "You weren't able to sleep?"

"Yep."

"What did you do last night?"

I thought about telling him what I saw in my LSD-induced trip to my home world last night, then chuckled softly at the thought. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you anyways."

Edward frowned again. I forgot how firm his deep brown eyes could get whenever he wanted to know something. "You can tell me. What's more unbelievable than knowing that you can heal wounds, or that your people could reset your planet to perfect condition with a single push of a button?"

I sighed. It was a very cold and chilly walk back home, when Samantha and I were still young and loudly arguing which variant of Raixien were superior. I threw a stick at a stalking Edward, who happened to overhear the entire conversation, and later on decided to heal his head. That resulted in a two hour scolding by our Corors, and a very biased debate on whether Edward should get a stick to his head erasing his memories.

And also a fun team brawl where Samantha and I got utterly destroyed by Daniel and Rose when we tried to steal the memory stick.

"I flew through a space portal and ended up on my home planet as a ghost, then golden Spartans showed up with guns-"

"Ok, never mind. I don't think it's more important or interesting than physics. I will go back to doing classwork right now." He peered down at my empty booklet, with only a single equation written on it. "You should start right now. We have to hand this in by the end of the lesson. You too, Samantha."

"Nah." Samantha dropped her pen on the table loudly, making a big show of laying her head on the desk. Our teacher frowned, but barely looked up from the heaps of homework that he was correcting. Edward shook his head disapprovingly, but a smile curled at the corner of his lips. I watched this exchange go, of Edward's gaze lingering on Samantha, and Samantha's bored expression at physics.

I was pretty sure Edward had a crush on the next door alien, based on the amount of time he spent sneaking looks at her, even more so than his beloved science subjects. If there's anything I've learned about my best friend over the years, it's that virtually nothing means more than his sciences.

"I, on the other hand, will continue being a relatively good student and finish my physics classwork." I pointed down at my open booklet, and raised a confused eyebrow at the very first question. I turned to Edward with a frantic look, just realizing that I have not been able to catch up to class due to the sleep deprivation. "Although I do need desperate help on this subject."

Edward sighed again, scooting his chair over to mines and began to talk softly. None paid any attention to us, their heads dipped down in focus and concentration, except for Samantha, who is fidgeting with her pens aimlessly. I tried my very best to grasp the science words that were coming out of Edward's mouth, but to no avail. I have always been a little above average at science, but recently, it feels a lot harder now that I was in my first year of senior high.

Truth be told, I never understood why we had to go so in depth into these subjects. Why did I care what the specific heat capacity of water was, as long as I knew that heat would make water rise in temperature? Granted, without knowledge of this, Earth may not be what it is today, but still. It feels like an awful waste of time for myself to learn all this, since I already knew of the other different prospects that science can do.

You know, since the Raixien were a technology based race and were really, really good at what they did.

Before I knew it, the bell rang, and school was over today. Samantha was the first to get up, packed her bags, and left the room before the bell even finished. The rest of us shuffled out of the room quickly, all wishing nothing more than to lie on our beds and waste the rest of the day away.

"Wanna come over and do a couple of rounds? My sisters have after school activities today, so I won't have to wait for them to leave school." Edward asked as we walked towards the school exit door.

"No thanks. I think I'll go back home and do some combat training. See if I can finally beat Rose."

Edward eyed me up and down, then frowned. "You should go see a doctor if you really can't sleep. Maybe they can prescribe you some medicine. If it goes on like this, you won't be able to do anything efficiently, like everyone else can."

"I've already went, and the medicines they gave me doesn't work on me. Different biology, and all that. Besides, Daniel is the best doctor I've ever met, so if he can't think of anything to help, then I don't think anyone can."

"Still, you have to get this problem fixed soon. How long have you had this problem now?"

I tapped my chin. "For as long as I could remember. It used to affect me a lot, but it has become more manageable in the recent years. Must've adapted to it somehow."

"Problem's still a problem. I want my legendary gaming partner back." We grinned, and we waved each other goodbye as we turned the school corner, each heading our separate ways. I breathed a sigh of relief, relieved that school was finally over and I could go back home and get some sleep...

Ha. I wished.

"Go up and sleep."

"No."

"Go up and sleep." Rose repeated, lifting up a commanding finger at the spiralling staircase behind me. I tried to laugh, but ended up choking on the water in my mouth, to which Samantha laughed even harder. I glared at her with a half closed eye, yearning for something I have around here that I can throw at her with. Rose shook her head in defeat, retreating back up the stairs to the living room.

"Just so you know, sleep is still something we Raixiens require. Just because you can somewhat fight, doesn't mean you have already filled out your potential. You are an aggressive fighter, often overstepping your safety zone, and I think you might be able to out-aggressive Samantha if you just were a little bit faster and less drowsy." Rose commented absently, before disappearing from view.

"He'll never out-aggressive me! I'm the most aggressive there is! You know that, right?" Samantha called out to her Coror, and only a faint chuckle came drifting back to us. Samantha caught my tired smirk, and took it as a challenge.

"You. Me. Go. Now." She snapped, lunging at my face from afar away. I was still holding my cup of water, so her surprise was apparent when I took a quick step back and smashed my cup into her face. She howled in pain of the glass shards scraping her lean face, but continued pressing on, swinging her left fist at my sternum, hoping to knock the wind out of me.

I was tired, but I still know how to react. Even though I could've maybe gouged out an eye but smashing the cup, I emerged from that encounter victorious. I knew Samantha's fighting style, how she prefers to rapidly strike down her opponent than dragging out a fight.

A normal person would not be able to block her flashing fists. I could not block her fists. My hands were too slow to do so without risking harming myself.

I put another hand where I predicted her fist would land, and let out a roar of laughter as Samantha jumped back, frowning at her bleeding fist. "Hey, I actually got you with that. I thought you would've seen that."

"What kind of person holds two cups at the same time?" Samantha snarled, then began unleashing her fury onto my vulnerable body, since I was standing there with my hands by my sides, legs parallel to each other like an amateur. It took me less than a second to get my body in fighting mode, but it was already too late. My cheek exploded with pain, but I still swung my fists upward, hoping to catch her in the jaw.

Samantha jerked her head back at the last moment, and continued her onslaught as I attempted to block a single attack. None of my fists found their mark, and within seconds, I was already half-collapsing onto the floor, probably bleeding from most of my orifices, and very likely to just die right there and then. Samantha recognized this, and let me have a moment to use my Rengar.

I am a Raixien of the First.

Born under the blossom of Raqi, the Raino of the world.

To endure; to mend; to heal the world and I.

To serve as the foundation that holds the world.

A burst of air reached my lungs, and my eyes snapped open at the suddenness of my healing taking effect. I could feel my body shifting naturally, the cells rearranging themselves back to their perfect state, healing it. Blood stopped dripping onto the floor, and I felt as good as new. Samantha raised an eyebrow, obviously shocked that I had managed to heal myself so fast. It was new to me, too. It always took at least a minute for my healing to take effect, so a few seconds was extremely quick.

I saw an opportunity in her moment of confusion, and struck.

I leaped out and falcon punched her, before whipping my body around and swung my elbow where her head would be. When my elbow met nothing but air, I caught a glimpse of her in my periphal vision, putting in a punch to my thighs. I dropped to the floor like a sack of potato, clutching my thigh and groaning in pain. Samantha shook a few drops of blood free from her nose, then stalked towards my writhing body on the floor.

"I win. I am more aggressive than you-" I picked up a water bottle on the floor, then threw it up at her face, knocking her to the floor next to me. I let out one final laugh, and raised a fist into the air.

"I vote for a tie."

"No fair. Three of your four attacks were with a weapon, whereas I only used what I had on my body. Which is my fist. I win."

"This is a fight, meaning there are no rules to whether or not I can use a weapon. We were both standing, now we were both lying on the floor. I vote for a tie."

"I agree. That fight was a tie." The both of us swivelled out heads to the right, looking at a smiling Daniel leaning against the smooth metal wall. His hair was cut short, and he wore a new brown leather jacket that highlighted his muscular frames well. "What do you think? This jacket seems to fit me perfectly, yeah?"

Samantha and I got up in a puff, and she scowled at Daniel. "Of course you say it was tie. You're his Coror, his guardian, not mine. If Rose was here, I'm sure she would say it was clear victory for me." She complained loudly.

"No, I also think it's a tie." Rose yelled somewhere from upstairs, and her voice was muffled. Cooking, I presume.

Daniel and I locked eyes, and his eyes glinted with approval. My heart leapt with joy, and I savoured every word that came out of his mouth right then. "Rivin used what was available to him at the moment, and survived rather well against you. Granted, his defence could use some work, but it was a tie."

Samantha scowled ever harder, and began to stomp away from the both of us. I called out after her. "Hey, you had enhanced reflexes, and I still lived! You know what that means!" She muttered something incoherent as she made her way upstairs, her footsteps echoing loudly throughout our house. Daniel gave me a resigned smile, and we both followed after her to the dining room.

The spiral staircases were a nice touch to the house. Whereas others might have a comfy and warm household, our 'base' was a resilient fortress that could not be broken or damaged in any human way possible. We tested this, when Samantha and I were strong enough to wield a sledgehammer and go at it ourselves. We've tried grenades as well, but that mostly messed up the furniture than the infrastructure of the house.

As we walked the clean pine floor, I thought of this house and its history. This house has been here before we were even born, but the underground training facilities were definitely new. Had our guardians made it for us, or was it already here before?

They knew that the survival of our race depended on us, the last generation of Raixiens to ever wander this universe. The only way our people would ever live on, is if we returned to our war-ridden home planet and performed the Great Reset.

I don't know much about the Great Reset other than the snippets of information I caught on from our guardians, but it was supposedly a button or a switch that can reset the world back to its prime state, and that includes the living beings on it. If we pressed that button, we can essentially create a new generation of Raixien, albeit an undeveloped one. Still, it was better than extinction, as Daniel had often said.

So, that was the purpose of our training. To one day be able to return to our home world and reclaim it as our own. To take vengeance on the Aerilosac, the golden race that destroyed nearly all the Raixiens.

The doorbell rang. I frowned, wondering who it could be at this time of day. It was eight at night, and nobody ever knocked on our door. We always knew who were coming, and had expected them. Daniel apparently thought the same, and we both approached the front door with cautious steps and stance, ready to demolish the visitor if necessary.

Though it probably was just a lost person in this small town, it never hurt to be prepared.

Daniel peeked through the peephole, and turned back to me, shaking his head reservedly at bewilderment. There was nobody outside. Daniel whipped out a tablet from his jacket pocket, and began rapid clicking on different cameras, flicking from the first to the very last, only to spot nothing but the faint light of the lamp posts.

I obviously looked rather distressed, because Daniel stopped what he was doing and peered at me. "No need to worry. Sometimes human machines have errors. Probably just a faulty doorbell." He reassured me, but I could tell he felt the same way, rubbing his neck as he frowned, clicking through the cameras again to confirm that there really was no one there.

"Daniel! Rivin! Food is ready!" Rose called out from the dining room, and I heard dishes being set up on our dining table. We didn't respond, still examining every nook and cranny of the cameras for abnormalities.

"You need not be uneasy. We are one and the same." A gravelly and low voice said, from behind us. We both turned and pulled out our Raixien made weapons, Daniel's purple tinged blade, and my pistol.

What I saw made me gasp in disbelief.

A boy stood in front of us, the same height as me. He had short, dark hair atop the same coloured eyes, and he twirled a metal pipe in his left hand. He had an average build, not too muscular or thin, but the aura he gave off was one of anger. His face is locked in a permanent snarl, one that I did not think looked good on him, and he scrutinized the both of us impatiently.

Still, I did not blink. This boy looked exactly like me, feature by feature. One would think that we were...

"Twins. Others. Whatever you want to call it. I am you, and you are me. However, it would seem that you are the original version, and I am nothing more than a..." His lips curled in detest. "A fake. An image of your mind."

I blinked. What the hell was going on?