the Dream

Tristan lay in the darkness of his room, still trying to figure out what was happening. His mind had been churning all day, through homework and dinner and everything else. He knew that Destiny, Blair, and Jared were different. He also knew that Destiny had taken Blair somewhere, but that was all he knew. He didn't have enough pieces to finish the puzzle, and it frustrated him.

Finally he decided to just wait. If Blair wasn't in school tomorrow, he'd know something was wrong. If she was, he'd try to talk to her. He knew Destiny wouldn't talk to him, but maybe Blair would.

Satisfied, he rolled over and in moments had fallen asleep.

__________

He walked down the street of an unfamiliar city, warm sun beating down on his head. A quick scan of the street told him that the team was still around, blending into the crowd so well only he could see them. They'd spent all their lives training for such a hunt, and they did their training proud.

He glanced at the girl walking beside him. The culling process back at the Citadel may have left them with only the best warriors, but he didn't know those warriors. He only knew her.

She felt his eyes and turned to give him a reassuring smile. She'd had no problem trusting the others, but for all he knew she'd grown up with them. "Don't worry so much. Everything's going to be fine."

"I just don't want to hit my head again," he lied.

"The zorn-dust caused that paroxysm, it won't happen again. See anything?"

"Well, the guy trying to bilk Wolfe talks to birds, but that's it."

"I'll get his name. Keep looking, they're around here somewhere."

"I know they're around here somewhere," he muttered after she left. "Otherwise we wouldn't have been sent here." He looked around again, sighed, and kept walking.

Without any sort of warning a rock dropped into the pit of his stomach, and the world spun around him uncontrollably. He stumbled to a storefront and leaned against it, trying not to lose the lunch he never ate. The girl shook his shoulder and tried to talk to him, but he couldn't hear her over the screams resounding in his ears. He bit his tongue against a scream of his own as an echo of agony rippled through his body. Someone--an empath. An empath was being hurt and she was calling for help the only way she could.

He pushed himself off the wall and looked towards the cry. The source was a tall office building, no different from any of the others in the city, and one he'd already dismissed. But now he could see the darkness exuding from the windows, a thick sludge of pain and suffering three blocks away. He shivered, wondering how he could have missed it before. "That one."

The girl followed his gaze. "You're sure?"

"Yeah. It's that one."

She nodded. "Then it's time."

__________

The dream faded into darkness, and when Tristan woke the next morning he barely remembered it at all.