Fear

"Don't break it." Darkness warned as he handed a small glass ball to Amora.

"I promise I won't!" Amora smiled and yelled as she turned and ran into the living room.

She got out her paint that she got yesterday for her 6th birthday and she starts painting the glass ball.

Darkness walks into the room and sits next to her. He smiles and picks up another glass ball and starts painting with her.

Amora finishes her glass ball and placed it on a rack on the counter. She returns back and sits down on the couch after thanking Darkness.

She turned on the TV and saw a newly recorded interview was ready. She used the remote and started watching Leon and Reyon talking to the cameraman. The caption underneath them stated "The first interview in years."

Amora sat in amazement and had not noticed Darkness sit down next to her. Later that night when he was putting her to bed, Amora quietly whispers, "Did you know my parents?"

Darkness smiles kindly, feeling a bit heartbroken, and said, "No, I found you. They left you behind. I'm glad I found you. I don't know how I'd live without you." His throat hurts saying it to her.

Amora smiled and flipped to her other side. "I love you brother," Amora said, going quiet and softly breathing.

"I love you too, you little monster, sleep tight, wake me up if you need anything." He leaves the room, looking to Amora's small nightlight in the corner. Which may have just been her beacon of hope.

***

Amora jolted awake and saw Reyon sitting on the couch.

"Hey, you seemed to have been sleeping well," Reyon said, smiling softly.

Amora rubbed her eyes and managed to say, "Yeah. I thought I walked into a hallway and fell into some water... it seemed so real."

She stared blankly at the ground, waiting for her mind to catch up with what she was thinking when suddenly Reyon said, "You did wander into the hallway downstairs. We managed to get you out of there."

Amora froze for a minute and then said "Oh, I had no idea. I was panicking. Someone was behind me!" Amora widened her eyes and Reyon giggled.

"No, it was a mannequin attached to a rail. Someone set it up." Reyon said this, but Amora was too busy worrying about something else entirely.

"Where are Leon and Andrew?"

"Well, Leon is looking for Andrew, we heard a weird sound and Andrew has been missing, Leon left about 10 minutes ago, I think he'll be okay."

Suddenly the stairs creaked and Leon walked upstairs holding Andrew on his shoulder. He walked past Amora, only smiling while passing her, and whispered something into Reyon's left ear as he lay Andrew on another, dustier, and ripped couch.

Leon then sighed and said, "I don't even know what happened to him."

Leon explains how he walked downstairs and suddenly Andrew was on the floor.

"Well, this day isn't going too well then," Reyon announced.

"Nope."

"Amora's awake."

"I see that."

"Oh, you do?" Reyon said with a laugh while pointing to his eyes.

"They are healed enough." He said, smiling back.

"What should we do?" Reyon asked, changing to a more serious conversation.

Leon ended the conversation with: "Let's go to the next place."

Amora had been wondering and soon asked: "This isn't all for training is it?"

Everyone was silent, especially Andrew, who had just woken up and was rubbing his eyes.

Leon finally broke the silence saying, "No. It isn't. We wouldn't just train random kids we find. We found you, and we plan to bring you to a safe place for you guys to wait for your parents."

Amora felt betrayed and her heart dropped, she suddenly found herself yelling, "What?! Why?! I don't want to go back to him. I don't want to see Darkness ever again!"

Amora abruptly stopped speaking and ran off.

Reyon stopped walking and stared, "Damn it! Why would you say anything?" Leon very quietly said "They needed to know. It would be bad if we showed up and didn't explain why we're there."

Andrew had given Leon and Reyon a horrible look as he ran after Amora. "She seemed very happy we would train her." Reyon said while turning and walking after Amora and Andrew, Leon turned and did the same while saying, "I know she was, but honestly, we were just babysitting them, we couldn't actually train them while their loved ones worried for them."

Reyon nodded and then said, "Well, let's send Andrew home. We can keep Amora with us. Darkness took her like he... well like before like I was saying... she was taken by him from her parents. We can't send her back to him, can we?"

There was a brief silence as the sunlight finally freed itself from the clouds and shone on them.

"Yeah. You're right, we never know what Darkness had been planning to do with her." Leon went silent and then continued, "but she isn't staying with us forever."

Reyon smiled and they picked up the pace after Amora. "I know, I know, we can find someone to take care of her when we need to, first, however, let's actually train her! Otherwise... well if he comes back, he'll take her before she can even fight back."

***

"Amora!" Andrew called out as loud as he could, he had stepped further into the forest and looked behind a tree.

"Amora! Where are you?" Andrew continued as he made his way through tall grass and thick piles of leaves.

He tripped and fell into a pile of leaves, quickly jumping away as he saw a raccoon had been sleeping inside. "Damn raccoon." He whispered as he walked past, the raccoon, while fixing its home, turned and made a weird hissing sound at him, to which he replied: "Yeah, you too."

He continued his search.

Once he made it to a ledge, he climbed down and made his way through the dark side of the forest.

He soon found a small wooden shed and opened the door, supplies toppled down on top of him and he fell backward, landing on his back.

"God damn it! What the hell?" He pushed the rakes, shovels, and tent stakes off of his chest, still swearing.

He then looked inside the shed and noticed dust, moss, and mold covering the walls and floors, a lonely spiderweb lay in the corner.

Andrew left the door open as he made his way around the shed. He looked around and saw footprints in the watery-moss that was ahead of him. He stares at his shoes and his heart begins to burn.

"Ah man... not my shoes..." he says miserably as he steps into the moss with water underneath. He cringes as the water slowly rushes into his shoes.

"This sucks. I swear if I can't afford different shoes, I'll blame her forever."

***

Amora stumbled as she quickly made her way through the moss.

Her wet shoes kept slipping on the moss and ground beneath her. She felt tears slowly falling from her eyes, and no matter what she was doing, they would continue to fall.

"Why?! I don't want to! I don't! I can't go back!" She stumbled and fell into a mossy-puddle deeper than most. She slowly stood up and continued running away, she was covered in moss and mud as she made it to a fence.

She put her back to the fence and slid down to the ground. She finally felt that the mud was cold and she felt the wind making it worse.

"I hate everything!" She yelled, putting her hands up in the air and when she was putting her hand down, she felt a shiver go through her left hand and suddenly a burst of air flew out and slammed into a nearby tree. The tree snapped and fell almost on top of Amora. She felt glad it had been a pretty thin tree, but she screamed and suddenly Andrew ran up and hugged her.

"It okay now... let's go, I doubt they'll give you back to Darkness," he said as she started crying again.

"G-go where?" She managed to say in between tears.

"Back to them." Andrew said and then continued with, "I know what they plan to do, they are only sending me home."

***

Leon and Reyon finally reached the edge of the forest where Andrew and Amora had entered. They stared forward as Andrew was walking out towards them with Amora, hand in hand.

"Well. It wasn't too long. Let's have a chat with them then, get this sorted out... and go."