Chapter 10 - Opposites Attract, Yet Repel

Red was walking down the halls, taking in deep breaths, trying to calm herself down and not think about what it means for the Neverseen to already know about Sophie and Fitz's unborn child. Not thinking about what it means if she fails in the reason she came back.

"Can you tell me a story?" Red heard the non-tired child in the room she was passing by beg Sophie.

"Do you promise to go to sleep if I tell you one?" Sophie compromised. "You're supposed to be asleep right now, anyways."

"I promise," the little girl replies, "as long as the story you tell me is a very good one."

Red smiled, remembering how Amoria is only a child in this time, and how much she's grown. Red continued down the hall of Moonend to go to her room.

She walked into her guest bedroom, sighing and looking down, tired. When Red looked up, she groaned.

"You're not real, you're not here. You're not real, you're not here," she muttered to herself in attempt to making the elf dressed in all green standing in the middle of her room disappear.

"But, I am real and I am here," he told her as she walks by him to get to the balcony connected to her room for some fresh air to clear her head.

"It's all part of my imagination," Red mumbled, really bored with seeing Green almost everywhere now, leaning against the balcony railing and taking deep breaths.

"If I'm not real, then how come you can feel me?" he asks in response.

Red continues facing the beautiful scenery and away from him. "I ca-"

He snakes his hands around her waist, cutting Red off in surprise as she gasps.

"I'm really here, this time," he says softly in her ear.

Red freezes, unable to move. He is here. He is here. He is here.

"I won't let you go this time," Green continues. "I'm sorry. But you can not go through with this."

Red's breaths come out ragged as she closes her eyes slowly, and opens them again. She slowly turned around to look at him. Red had to hold back a gasp at how real he actually looked. Before, he was a hallucination, but now, since he's actually here, there's a lot more detail in his features. And she was about to add one more.

She brought her hand up and slapped him - hard - against his cheek, wanting to get him away from her.

He took a step back and rubbed the already-fading red hand-print she made against his pale complexion. "I guess I deserve that."

"You guess?" Red snapped, "You guess? What'd you think, you would come here and just expect me to give you a warm welcome after everything you've done to me, after everything you're about to do to me? How did you even get here?"

He just gives her one of his sad half-smirks that made her heart melt once upon a time. "Your sister."

Red's eyes darken. "She is not my sister."

"It was a mistake-" he tried to explain.

"A mistake that broke my heart, that made me go back to the isolated person I was before you showed me the world wasn't as cruel as I thought it was. A mistake that made me come back here, no matter how many times you tried to stop me." Red's voice was a little choked up, tears starting to form in her eyes. She tried to push that memory away, and it was working, until she met his sparkling emerald green eyes that used to make her laugh and smile when she would try so hard not to.

"I-I-" he stuttered. Then he gathered himself. "You can't do this. You can't go to the past and change it for your own personal vendetta. Especially not this event."

"If I wanted to go back and change things for my own personal use, I would have made sure you and her were never in the same room the night before our wedding," Red said, her voice hoarse, and that was when the first tear drop fell. But she was done crying for what happened. The past was in the future now, and if she went through with changing what's going to happen, she might not have to spend another second thinking about what he and her sister did . . . because she might not even exist.

He looked away and barely managed to whisper, "I really do love you."

"If you loved me, you would stay away from me." Red thought that was the truth.

He looked back at her, his eyes full of pain. "And if you don't love me anymore, then why do you still see me when I'm not really there?"

"Because you're a nightmare that's haunting me," Red retorted, but felt no pleasure in seeing his usual laughing, happy personality show no trace on the heart-broken elf she barely recognised now.

"You don't mean that."

"Yes, I do. Now leave me alone before I do something that I won't regret later."

He blinked slowly and a lonesome tear trailed down his cheek. "Just think about the future."

And with that, he disappeared in a whirlwind of green mist.

Red stood there for a moment, feeling her knees ready to collapse as she bent forward, a choked sob forming in her throat that she was trying to force down. But its force overcame her fading strength, and Red collapsed to the floor on her knees, putting her head in her hands, feeling the dam break in a crushing river of tears.

She hated it. She hated her existence. She hated her fate. She hated everything. Her ex-fiance's words played through her mind. Just think about the future.

A sarcastic chuckle sounded through her sob. That's all she's been doing. Thinking about the future.

Red tried to stop crying. Taking in deep breaths, and slowly exhaling. But thoughts began forming about why she really was here.

And she began seeing the flaws in her plan. And seeing how she came unprepared, not knowing what she was doing.

She had to bite down on her bottom lip - hard - to keep herself from crying even further.

This is all too much. Everything has always been too much.

Red heard a knock on the door and didn't move, keeping her head in her hands. She didn't hear anyone or any footsteps, but she still felt arms wrap around her, pushing her into their owner's chest.

Red was a mess on the floor, and she didn't want anyone seeing her in that state. But she didn't refuse the warmth and comfort of the elf with her.

"Let it all out," Fitz gently said, stroking her hair. "It's okay to cry."

And she did. She wrapped her arms around Fitz and buried her head into his shoulder, letting herself let it all out.

Is this what it feels like to have a caring father figure? Red wondered as her cries began to calm down to sniffles. It's nice.

They stayed in silence for a few minutes longer. Red still sniffled and Fitz still stroked her hair, trying his best to comfort her.

"Thank you," Red finally says after a while. "I don't understand why you would help me, especially since I've been incredibly rude to you, but I really needed someone to comfort me right now. So, thank you."

"Honestly, when I came in, I wanted to help you in some way," Fitz said, making no effort to move and get away from Red, which Red was grateful for.

"Must be your fatherly instincts kicking in."

Fitz smiled. "Maybe. Am I a good dad?"

Red gets confused for a moment before Fitz clarifies, "I mean, in the future? Am I a good dad in the future?"

Red hesitates for a fraction of a second before shrugging. "I don't know. But right now, it seems like you . . . you'd make a great father."

"Honestly, I feel like when the baby is born, I'm going to have no idea what to do and Sophie would just have to take care of me as well," Fitz said, earning a short chuckle from Red.

Red smiled softly when she realized what Fitz was doing. He was trying to distract her from her thoughts so that she doesn't start crying again. "I'm sure you'll do better than you think."

Red decides to slide off of Fitz's lap and stand up, Fitz joins her shortly.

"Does this mean you'll take it easier on me from now on?" Fitz joked, though deeeeeeeeeeeeeeep down, he secretly wished Red would go a tad bit easier on him during training.

Red laughed. "If anything, I'll make train for a week straight - no sleep, food, or water - if you ever tell anyone anything about this."

Fitz laughed, too, though knowing she probably wasn't joking. But his expression turned a little more serious. "You know it's okay to cry every once in a while. And I'm always here if you ever need a shoulder to cry on."

Red raised an eyebrow. "Crying makes me seem like a normal teenager."

"You are a normal teenager."

"With a lot of exceptions."

"You sound like Sophie."

I guess I'm more like her than I realized, I think to myself.

Red starts thinking about what happened after the Neverseen found out Sophie was with child the moment Fitz left her room to go check up on his wife.

She felt tired and her eyes were red (bloodshot and her skin was a reddish color around her eyes - not her iris which was always red in her disguise) and puffy, but she wanted to think about something else besides her heartbreak.

Once she was able to concentrate and remember what happened, she started down the hallway and towards the room where she last saw Sophie - Amoria's room.

Red mentally cringed when she heard Fitz ask Sophie, "So I asked how our little baby is doing, how is mommy?"

To which Sophie replied with, "Mommy is doing good."

Fitz kissed Sophie before saying, "I still think it's going to be a girl."

At this point, Red wanted to cut in, getting embarrassed watching the two older elves acting cheesy. "Wanna make a bet?"

Sophie smiled and raised her eyebrow challengingly at Fitz. "You see, now I think it's a boy even more if Red wants to bet against you."

Red shortly chuckled. "Or maybe I want to bet against you, Sophie."

Fitz cleared his throat. "Are you okay, Red?"

Her smile fades, and she nods. "I'm fine."

"Why wouldn't she be fine?" Sophie wondered out loud.

Instead of answering her question, Red said, "I'm actually here to talk."

"Okay," Sophie replied, resting her head against Fitz.

Red sighed, suddenly wishing she didn't have to talk with them. "About the Neverseen."

* * *

Chapter 11 - Drowning in Dresses

"I just feel like something bad will happen if you do go out," Fitz quietly told Sophie as he hugged her.

Amoria rolled her eyes. "Adults are always paranoid."

Biana and Sophie both tried to stifle a laugh at Amoria's attitude and Fitz's confused reaction.

"I'm sorry. I just want you all to be safe," Fitz told the young child. "Especially with everything going on."

"Who would want to harm a pregnant lady?" Amoria asked in a matter-of-factly tone with her arms crossed. "Besides, Sophie has, like, a million abilities. People would be idiots if they try anything."

Fitz was stumped, trying to figure out how to argue with a child without sounding too harsh and still be reasonable. "Okay, yeah true but . . . there are still really bad guys out there."

"As much as I agree with Fitz, here," Red said, joining in on the conversation, seeming to appear from nowhere, "Amoria's right. You should go out and have fun."

"See, she has common sense," Amoria said, proud Red agreed with her.

Red smiled at Amoria before noticing the confused looks on the adults. In English, so that Amoria didn't understand, she said with an accent, "I'll be there, hiding, the whole time. You'll be fine."

The three adults still gave her confused looks, wondering what got into Red. Red has been pushing them hard and drilling into their brains the fact that the Neverseen will stop at nothing to get what they want, and that they need to be prepared and stay safe. Red not being against letting them go out is very strange.

Amoria raised an eyebrow, looking up at Red. "What did you just say?" she asked, seeming both curious and concerned.

Red smiled and crouched to be eye-level with the young elf. "Just boring adult stuff. Trust me, you don't want to know about it."

Amoria's slight frown curved upwards as she exclaimed, "Okay! Can we go now?"

* * * *

"So have things between you and Keefe gotten better?" Sophie asked Biana as they exited a clothing store, bags full of their new wardrobe hanging from their hands. Amoria was hopping happily between them, her amber hair flowing in the light breeze.

Biana smiled as she nodded proudly. "Yeah. I actually asked him about it a couple days ago. You were right, he was just really busy with emissary work."

"That's good!" Sophie exclaimed. "I told you everything was alright."

Biana giggled. "And this time, it didn't involve someone almost dying."

Sophie laughed. "Very true."

"Ooh! Can we go in there?" Amoria begged, pointing at a store they were walking by.

Sophie could see why Amoria would want to go in it; it was a toy store, filled with all kinds of objects elves Around Amoria's age and older would enjoy.

"We should," Biana agreed. "Maybe we can also find a few things for Baby Vacker to play with once she's born."

Sophie rolled her eyes with a smile as she followed her sister and sister-in-law into the store. "You and Fitz are so sure it's a girl."

"Yeah. It's just a sense, you could call it," Biana responded, another giggle escaping her lips. "Have you and Fitz thought of names, yet?"

"No, not yet," Sophie said, keeping an eye on Amoria as the little girl went browsing along the long shelves. "We've just been busy, with Red and all."

"Right. Has Red seemed strange to you, lately?" Biana questioned, picking something random off the shelf they were next to and examining it.

Sophie shrugged. "A little bit. It was also strange how she knew I was pregnant only a couple days after I found out I was."

"Yeah . . . ," Biana mumbled, then gasped, her eyes widening. "Do you think Red knows Baby Vacker?"

"It's possible. I mean, everyone knows the Vackers and me. It'd make sense if they knew about our baby."

"True."

A moment passed by before Sophie realized she couldn't see or hear Amoria anymore.

"Amoria?" she called out.

No response.

"Amoria!" Biana shouted a bit louder.

Still no response. The girls were getting worried and searched frantically through the store. It was then they realized the store was completely vacant of people, not even a cashier.

"Amoria!" Sophie screamed, feeling a panic attack arising.

"Sophie, calm down," Biana demanded, putting a reassuring hand on her shoulder, though she barely seemed calm herself. "We'll find her."

Just then, a hollow voice sounded from the other side of the aisle they were standing in. "But how will you get her back?"

Both Biana and Sophie froze, knowing that the man speaking was part of the Neverseen.

Sure enough, as they slowly walked to the edge of the aisle and peered onto the other side, she saw Amoria's sleeping body in the hands of someone wearing a black cloak.

Sophie barely resisted the urge to shriek, hoping that Amoria was really just sleeping.

"Give her to us," Biana demanded, a hardly noticeable quiver in her commanding tone.

He just laughed and slowly walked backwards. "And why should I?"

"Because you shouldn't have her in the first place!" Sophie exclaimed, feeling nauseous.

"Now, when has that ever stopped us?" he asked, and Sophie knew he was wearing a disgusting grin even with his hood on.

"Stopped you from what, exactly?" another voice sounded behind the cloaked figure.

Before he could even react, Red put him into a headlock, kicked his calf with a lot more force than technically necessary, and grabbed Amoria from him as he kneeled on the ground, groaning in pain. But, before she turned around to go back to Sophie and Biana and return the unconscious little figure in her arms to her worried sister, she kneed him in the stomach, earning another painful moan.

Red rushed back to the girls, and within an instant, they were all lying down in the grass at Moonend. Sophie leaned over and vomited, her nausea finally winning her over. Biana sat on the ground, taking in deep breaths of the cool air, calming herself from their most recent encounter with the enemy. Red subconsciously held Amoria tight in her hands, making sure she was safe and sound.

They were safe from the Neverseen.

For now.

* * *

Chapter 12 - Slipping Off the Canyon

After everyone was calm, they settled into the living area. No one spoke for a moment. Biana had put Amoria to bed in her room before settling on the couch, leaning against her husband. Sophie practically depended on Fitz to keep her up straight, rather than lying down.

Red had finished explaining everything, and the two boys were focused on every detail, wanting to know exactly what had happened.

"Wait," Keefe eventually said. "How'd you get them back here so quickly?"

Red hesitated, wondering if she should tell the truth or not. She knew it would be best to tell them after what had happened earlier, but she wasn't sure if it was the right choice.

Half a moment and one decision later, she reached into her shirt and pulled out a necklace she was wearing, hidden beneath her clothes. It was a thin silver chain with a ring dangling at the bottom. The green crystal on the silver band was encased within smaller diamonds connecting it to the ring itself. The emerald crystal had a sparkle to it. "I used this."

"Is that a light leaping crystal?" Sophie questioned, staring at the beautiful piece of jewelry.

Red nodded, looking warily at the item she was holding.

"It doesn't have an facets to changing where you'll lightleap to," Keefe observed. "So it would only lead to one place; here."

Red glared at him for a second as Fitz asked with furrowed brows, "Why would you have a light leaping crystal that only leads to Moonend?"

"I - um , , , ," Red stuttered for a moment, glancing at Sophie's small baby bump. "A friend gave it to me, in case I ever needed help."

It was Linh who made the connection first. "Oh! You and the baby are friends in the future?"

Red rolled her eyes, her leg fidgeting, looking like she really didn't want to be in this situation. "Yeah," she coughed, "something like that."

Sophie raised an eyebrow out of surprise. "You and our baby are . . . close in the future?"

Red let the barest of smiles show on her face, knowing what Sophie was implying. "More than you could know."

A moment of silence passed over the group as they all thought the same thing.

Red and the baby . . .

Red sighed, turned around, and walked out of the living room, heading down the hall to go to her own room.

Once she got into her room, she closed the door, and leaned against it with her back to it. She slowly slid down to the floor, her palms pressed to her face like she was tired and sad.

A lonely tear slipped down her cheeks, and Red let it splash to the ground. Another tear came and went. And another. And another. Quickly, she took in a deep breath and wiped them away.

Realising that the necklace was still in her hand, she took one look at the jewel and tossed it in the direction of her bed with more force than necessary.

"Darn it!" she whisper-yelled, her voice hoarse, not wanting to let the others know she was crying.

The other elf from the future faded into her room and noticed Red on the floor against the door. Then, he noticed the chain of the necklace hanging off the bed, on the verge of falling down. He walked over to pick it up, and smiled when he spotted the gem.

As he walked over to Red, he said, "I remember when I gave this to you."

Red roller her eyes and brushed her hair back from falling into her eyes. "Go away."

He squatted down, wanting to be eye-to-eye with Red. His green eyes glaring into her red ones. He held out the necklace to give it back to her, waiting for her to take it. "You were crying then."

Red let her head rest against the door, creating a fraction of an inch of more space between them. "I trusted you then. Guess some things are different now."

His mouth opened a slight bit, like he wanted to say something, but thought better of it, and he redirected his gaze to the floor. "What is it going take for you to believe me? It was just a stupid kiss, it didn't mean anything."

Red let out a short chuckle with no humour. "To you, it may have meant nothing. To her, it meant everything. Doesn't matter if it was a drunken mistake on the eve of our wedding, or in a ditch in the middle of nowhere where you and her belong."

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, looking back at her, but Red already turned her head to the side and closed her eyes, not wanting to see him.

He kneeled down to have better support as he leaned over closer to Red. Red tilted her head down further, noticing his close proximity. He gently wrapped the long necklace around her neck, surprised to see that Red didn't stop him. It took him a second to secure the chain, but as soon as he did, he moved his hand so that his knuckles barely grazed her cheek.

She shivered at his touch over her scar, and opened her eyes, but still didn't turn to look at him. "Please go," she whispered.

Red didn't know if she really wanted him gone, but he left at her request anyways.

She let out a breath she didn't know she was holding, tucked the necklace back underneath her clothes so that it wouldn't be noticeable once again, and stood up.

She walked to the mirror in her room to fix her ponytail and freshen up a bit - she didn't want the others knowing she was crying. When she was done, she looked at herself in the mirror, staring into her fake red eyes, wishing to see them their real blue color.

She took in a deep inhale, and let out a deep exhale, calming herself. "She won't exist if I do this," she mumbled to herself, still staring into her reflection. Then she smiled. "And the traitor won't be able to run this time." 

~*~

Thanks, lovelies
Nuela