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him, grabbing a branch to safety. In
contrast, Jason had nothing to hold on to.
    Looking
up from my burning amulet, I reached for Jason’s jacket. I had it in my hand
for a second, but the downpour loosened my grip. Jason slipped from my grasp.
    Travis
and I watched in horror, kneeling over the edge, as our best friend fell down
the side of the cliff. Jason’s last act of his life—his blood-curdling
scream—struck terror into our hearts, creating an indelible memory of sheer horror.
The sound of a lifeless body smacked the water, and all that remained was the
rain pattering the stone of the cliffs. Aided by a flash of lightning, Travis
and I see Jason’s body as he floated lifeless with the river’s current.
    “Then,
the rumble of the thunder came, and all was engulfed by blackness and eerie
calm. Jason’s life was taken by the rocky sides of the cliff and the murky
waters below it.”
    I
glance around at the equally foreboding gloominess of my prison cell. While
shedding a tear at Jason’s memory, I figure I cannot afford to waste a drop
more, because I am at point of severe dehydration. Mustering my courage, I wipe
away the tear. My body sinks slowly to the mat on the hard floor as I am
overcome with exhaustion.
    Time
goes by, as I drift in and out of consciousness.
    “Roll
him over,” one of the guards says. “You forgot to restrain him, you idiot. Fire
up the cannon and keep it locked on eight-six-seven-five’s signature. Do you
have any idea who this is?”
    “He’s
asleep, boss,” the rookie says.
    Between
blinks, I see the veteran guard does not look like he wants to be here today.
He says to his colleague, “I will put you to sleep, if you screw up
again, rookie. Grab him up under the armpits there. I will slip the
temporalysis over his head.” As the device is placed behind my head, its bands
magically wrap around my skull, and its nodes press hard at my temples. I stir
somewhat.
    “Hey,
that temporalysis thing really works. He was as limp as a dead fish, now look
at him! Who is he?”
    “He
is Theodore Crane.”
    “No
way! I should’ve known!”
    “It’s
okay, rookie. It’s your first day. Come, I will tell you a secret. He isn’t the
toughest prisoner in here.”
    The
rookie asks, “Really?”
    “We
have the Ghost of Sephera here, as well,” the veteran guard says, and the
rookie’s eyes light up. Strategic information about the prison is being blabbed
away, because the two knuckleheads handling me believe I am still unconscious.
The veteran guard sees me recover further, and he promptly shuts up, then says,
“We will have the nurse check on him and then we’re out. Nurse! Get your ass in
here.”
    The
nurse rushes in. She pierces my skin painlessly and hooks up a saline feeder
tube. After she injects something into the line, I suddenly become jittery. My
bladder is near explosion; my willpower is nil, and thus I am left with only
the humiliation of unloading.
    “Haha!
He pissed himself,” the rookie says.
    “Guns
at the ready, rookie,” the guard says.
    “Oops,”
said the nurse, looking down at the ground next to me. She turned her head angrily
at the turrets and shouted, “Look what you’ve done! You’ve scared me!”
    “Sorry,
missus,” the guard apologizes. Apparently his hardened persona could soften at
the sight of a pretty nurse.
    She
kneels down into the ground, searching for an object. “Got it. I dropped a
needle. Alright sirs, I am finished,” the nurse announces out loud. Before
standing up, she leans in close next to my ear. Her lips are but a hair-width
away, and she breathlessly whispers to me, “See you, Theo.” Aroused, I
recognize her voice, but it would not be the first time my ears play a trick on
me.
    The
guard removes the temporalysis and I bounce up quickly to identify the woman,
because few ever call me by that name. The rookie perceives my alertness as a
show of strength and yells, “Keep your head down prisoner! Don’t move. The
turret