CLOSING A GATE

"Is everyone out of town?"

Cole jogged towards his truck followed closely by Charlie, Jim and Drake. "Everyone except for the Stones and the Patsons sir." Jim replied getting into the truck with the rest of them. Cole frowned. "Bethany and her dad haven't left town." He enquired further. "No." Said Jim. "Her dad said she just jumped out of the car and ran off. Boris and Daniel have gone off to help him find her."

Cole nodded with understanding. "And the Patsons?" He asked. "No one knows. They aren't in their homes, their car and all of their stuff are still in their house, Michael says he didn't see them leave town but there's also a possibility that they may have decided to leave without carrying anything. Maybe they thought their lives were more important." Reported Jim. Cole nodded with understanding and started his truck down the road. A few minutes later, he and the rest of his officers were jogging up the woods, a police copter flew overhead keeping a bird's eye view of the woods. They soon arrived at the cabin and took their places around it. As they waited, Cole studied the teenager who stood next to him. Drake was holding a sword whose sharp edges glistened in the light of the setting sun.

"So did you get that here or did you come with it?" He asked. "I came with it for protection." Drake replied never taking his eyes off the cabin. Cole nodded aware that he was not in the mood for conversation, he shouldn't even be trying to start up a conversation at a time like this. It would be dark soon and those creatures would be coming out of that cabin any minute now to end all of their lives. At least they'd be dying for a noble cause.

The sun had barely set when they heard the first shriek from the cabin. They all immediately aimed their weapons. Another shriek, then another, then another, then suddenly...

BOOM!

The roof of the cabin tore open and pieces of wood went flying everywhere as hundreds of Nightprowlers rose into the air. They were so many of them, that together they looked like a black mountain. Jim took of his glasses, his jaw had dropped. "What the f***" He cussed unknowingly. Cole tightened his lip and commanded. "FIRE!"

Bullets were released into the air. Crack! Crack! Crack! Bang! Bang! Boom! Some of them let out cries of pain and fell to the ground dead but it didn't have that much of an effect on their number. Cole had to admit that they were way more than he and any of his men had anticipated and the chances of at least one of them getting out of here alive seemed more and more unlikely. The beasts headed straight for the helicopter, tearing it apart and letting it crash somewhere in the woods and then all of them, like birds of prey, curved around and began heading straight for the officers on the ground who were desperately shooting at them. As Cole watched the huge mass of black grow closer and seemingly bigger, he became convinced that there was no way any of them would survive this. The creatures were only a few feet from them when suddenly, one by one they began to bounce back as if they had come into contact with some invisible wall. Cole's brows furrowed with confusion, his men scratched their heads quizzically and even the creatures themselves appeared puzzled.

They kept trying to fly towards them but kept knocking into some kind of invisible shield. Drake's heart thumped with a bit of excitement as he surveyed the area and when he finally spotted her his lips spread into a grin. Cole eyes studied the boy's face his brows knotting with confusion and he followed his gaze. In the distance not too far from them, Bethany strutted in their direction, from the way she held out her hands it was obvious that she was the one responsible for the invisible shield that now protected them.

Bethany drew in as much energy as she could from the air around her and blasted it at the night prowlers. The creatures let out loud, terrified, shrieks as the force sent them flying backwards in different directions. She approached Drake and Cole with a smile on her face. "I hope I'm not too late." She said. Cole let out a small laugh and shook his head. "Well, better late than never." He said giving her a friendly slap on the back that caused her stumble a little. "What made you change your mind?" Asked Drake. "In the past two weeks lots of people have hurt me and let me down." Bethany explained. "I'm not going to do the same to Molly."

SHRIEK!!!

Everyone whirled around in unison. The familiar cry was coming from within the cabin and the officers once again had their guns aimed at the building. "So I went to check out the cabin a couple of days back. The person used a mirror as the gate..." Drake began. "Here's the plan." Bethany cut in. "I'm going to use my powers along with the help of the cops to draw as much of the Nightprowler's attention to me as possible. Drake use your dimensional vision to keep a lookout. Once you notice that a room is clear, teleport each girl to MY house. I have spirits guarding every possible entrance so they'll be safe there. When you're done, give me a signal. I'll close the gate."

Drake and Cole stared at each other stunned at her new attitude. "Does that sound good?" She asked oblivious to their surprise. "Um... Yeah sure." They both stuttered. As if on cue several Nightprowlers burst out of the roof and began to attack. The officers began firing their bullets, Drake sliced at any one that headed his way with his sword while Bethany, using telekinesis flung as many of them as she could in different directions. She used so much energy that it knocked the Nightprowlers out the minute they landed. Once she felt their numbers had lessened to a good amount, she shut her eyes and began chanting something inaudible. Pink wisps of smoke sipped out of her hand and when her eyes flew open again they were glowing a bright shade of pink. The ground began to rumble causing a few officers and Nightprowlers to temporarily lose their balance. There was a weird moan from the earth as hands began reaching out of the soil. The hands clamped on the foot of the Nightprowlers and as the terrified creatures tried to fly from their grip, they instead pulled the entire body from within the earth. Zombies rose from the ground everywhere, letting out loud moans and attacking the Nightprowlers.

It was battle of the supernaturals. The Nightprowlers were fierce and easily ripped the zombies apart but the zombies were not living beings and their bodies quickly reassembled. This seemed to freak out the Nightprowlers and they focused their attention on the strange beings trying desperately to kill them. This gave the officers the chance they needed to shoot at the Nightprowlers and kill a good number of them. It didn't really create a good enough impact as more and more of them kept flying out of the cabin. Drake's eyes darkened as he peered into the realm of Skotagi. He saw the Darka's stone castle and peered even deeper. He saw the girls in their usual rooms, still asleep but there were still a few Nightprowlers in their room.

"There's still too many of them." Drake yelled to Bethany over all the chaos slicing off the head of a night prowler that had flown towards him. Bethany stopped three night prowlers flying towards her mid-air and flung them in the direction of some trees deep in thought. There has to be something that'll scare all of them so much they'll all have to come out. She thought hard then finally it hit her.

"Got it! Possession." She cried out happily. Cole who stood next to her gave her a quizzical look. "What?!"

She smiled to him and yelled. "Like in horror movies were demons possess people and make them do stuff, I think if I manipulate my powers right, I can summon spirits to take over the bodies of the Nightprowlers and make them do whatever I want." With that she closed her eyes and began murmuring again. A chilly breeze washed over the battlefields and suddenly it was like there are whispers coming from everywhere. The trees, the bushes, even the rocks. The smoke sipping out of Bethany's hands turned blue and suddenly about half the night prowlers stopped attacking. They slowly turned around and began fighting amongst themselves instead. Bethany opened her eyes and beamed with satisfaction. "That should be threatening enough to get the attention of others."

She was right. The amount of night prowlers that came swarming out of the cabin a few minutes later, had doubled. She nodded to Drake who began peering again. His face brightened when he saw that the girls' room were now empty and unguarded. He gave Bethany a thumbs-up sign and disappeared. Bethany then focused on manipulating the night prowlers so they fought amongst themselves. Her powers weren't strong enough to affect all of them and so a few rogue ones did attempt to attack her but ended up being shot dead by the police officers. This went on for a few minutes and Drake still hadn't returned.

"What's taking so long?" Yelled Cole. "I don't know. But... I'm starting... to feel... tired." Bethany panted out. Turns out using her powers depleted a lot more energy than she had expected. Her arms and legs ached and she was beginning to feel a little light-headed. What they didn't know was that Drake himself had run into a little bit of trouble. He had managed to teleport Patricia and Lola safely out, but when he got into Molly's room Darka stood there waiting for him.

"Bala autem duisternis."

A dark spell sent Drake flying to a nearby wall. Before he could comprehend what had happened, he found himself rising from the ground and flying into another wall. This time though, his head made greater impact with the wall and he felt blood trickle down the back of his neck. "Did you really think, you could come into my castle and kidnap my wives without me knowing?" Darka scoffed. "Unbelievable."

Drake wiped the blood from the back of his neck and stood to his feet. In a brief second, he teleported to the other side of the room, picked up his sword and teleported right in front of Darka his hand raised ready to strike. To his surprise, Darka dodged the blow and he found himself flying towards a wall once more. "Pathetic." Mocked Darka his eyes turning pitch black. "You really thought you could kill me that easily." Drake began gasping his eyes widening with shock. It was like all the oxygen had been sucked out of the room and he was suffocating. "There's a reason it took all seven stones to banish me away."

Oxygen flooded the room once more and Drake immediately began sucking in deep breaths. Darka laughed as though he found the entire scene somehow entertaining. Drake found himself gasping for air again when what felt like an invisible hand, grabbed him round the throat, squeezing hard and lifting him off the ground. "I'm going to give you a slow and painful death." Darka hissed. The grip around Drake's neck tightened and tightened, his head was already turning tomato red. He tried teleporting but the pain was too immense for him to properly focus. His heart rate had picked up and his eyes were beginning to roll to the back of his head.

"Hmmm." There was a stir from Molly's bed and Darka turned around. Temporarily distracted his spell weakened and Drake quickly took the opportunity to teleport out of his hold and grab his sword which had fallen to the floor. With one quick blow he had knocked out Darka and was running to Molly's bed. Molly's eyes fluttered open and she stared sleepily at him. "Where... where am I?" She croaked weakly. "Don't worry." He reassured her. "I'm here to take you somewhere safe."

He gathered her into his arms and teleported out of the room. A smile spread across Darka's face and he stood to his feet, dusting himself off. "You're already too late, descendent."

🌚🌚🌚🌚

Bethany struggled and struggled with her own body's fatigue trying to maintain her control over the Nightprowlers which was now weakening. Everything seemed to be spinning and she could feel herself staggering. Come on Beth, just a little longer. She pushed on. It was a battle against her own body and she doubted she'd be victorious. Finally after pulling on a few more agonizing minutes, she collapsed to the floor. She couldn't do it anymore. She's way too tired, her vision was so fuzzy that she couldn't tell Nightprowler from everything else and she was starting to have an excruciatingly painful migraine. Cole rushed over to her and picked her up, cradling her in his arms. She slowly raised her eyes to meet his and smiled weakly. A few drops of blood trickled down her nostril and left eye causing Cole to feel a pang of fear.

"Don't worry..." She assured him her voice almost in a whisper. "I'll be okay."

"I know you will. Just hang in there a few moments longer." He said. The loud cries from the Nightprowlers above however caught their attention. They seemed to have snapped out of Bethany's spell and began flying more enraged than ever towards them. Gunshots rang in the air again but a few bullets were not enough to stop them. Cole let out a sigh of defeat and clamped his eyes shut, placing a hand over Bethany's as well. There was no helping it, they were goners, unless some miracle was to occur.

And a miracle did occur. The sound of crackling fire and the smell of smoke caused Cole's eyes to fly open. He was shocked to find that he and his men were now surrounded by a ring of fire. The Nightprowlers appeared afraid of it because even though they let out loud shrieks, they didn't dare approach the fire.

"Are you all okay?" Came a feminine voice filled with concern. Shannon stepped into the ring of fire the red stone on her bracelet practically beaming in the night. She rushed over to Cole and Bethany. "What happened to her?" She asked checking her pulse. "She's fine just used a little more power than she could handle." Said Cole. After examining Bethany and confirming Cole's words to be true she nodded with understanding and went off to check on the other officers. "Don't worry everyone, those things are really scared of sunlight and fire." She announced. "We're safe for now."

Jim walked up to Cole. "Can you please explain to me why I have three super powered teenagers?"

Cole didn't reply. Instead he placed Bethany carefully on a bed of leaves and jogged over to Shannon. "What are you doing here?" He asked. "What does it look I'm doing, I'm helping." She said. Cole eyed her suspiciously, there was one descendent responsible for opening the gate, could she be the one. Cole opened his mouth to ask another question but was interrupted when Drake teleported into the ring.

"I'm done." He called out to no one in particular then noticed Bethany lying, now unconscious, on the bed of leaves. He teleported right next to her and gave Cole a pleading look. "Please tell me she's not dead."

"She's not dead." Cole repeated and Drake let out a breath of relief. "But this does mean you'll have to do the spell to close the gate on your own." Cole added. Drake nodded, gave Shannon a puzzled look and teleported once more. The inside of the Cabin with it's now open roof was infested with Nightprowlers and it took a lot of slicing and slashing to get to the mirror. But could not say the spell because he was too distracted with killing the Nightprowlers who were now focused on him.

Meanwhile outside...

Cole tapped his foot impatiently, Drake had been gone several minutes and the Nightprowlers still seemed to be growing in number meaning the gate hadn't been closed. Bethany's eyes fluttered opened and she said in a whisper. "He needs help."

The night prowlers suddenly froze mid-air unable to move and it took a couple of seconds for the officers to lower their guns wondering what was going on. Cole groaned. "Now what?" He complained. Shannon with her eyes filled awe pointed in Bethany's direction. Bethany was floating some feet in the air and her eyes glowed a bright shade of blue. Blood fell freely from her eye like tears and blood now trickled down both nostrils. Cole quickly ran over to her. "Beth! Stop you're hurting yourself." He yelled. She turned to him. "I can't. He needs my help."

"But Beth..." He protested. Within the cabin, Drake noticed that the night prowlers had all stopped attacking and were now frozen in a place for some reason. They still blinked occasionally and their chests heaved and fell showing that they were breathing but they just weren't moving. Not waiting to find out the reason why and risk them snapping out of whatever spell they were under he immediately began to say the spell.

"Harak marlos patrians shevros" He chanted over and over again. The mirror began trembling and a bright light burst from within. The cracks began to appear on the glass till finally it shattered to bits. Bethany moaned as she fell to the ground, rescued from making contact with the earth by Cole who caught her in his arms. The ring of fire around them died down as the sun began to rise, the Nightprowlers now back to their senses noticed the warm glow of the sun rising in the distance and began flying away in different directions in panic. The officers aimed at them but Shannon stopped them. "Don't bother." She said. "They're not going to make it."