A complete 36 hours has passed since we've last seen our main characters being struck down. . .

Shall we see what ensues?


One thing for sure - I hope you enjoy!

A complete 36 hours has passed since we've last seen our main characters being struck down. . .

Shall we see what ensues?


One thing for sure - I hope you enjoy!
He wasn't bound; he wasn't gagged, but he stood helpless—powerless. But he didn't let it show through his voice, "You're not Mac Heath."
He leaned forward in his chair, "Quick, aren't you?"
A silence stretched out, before the fake Mac Heath offered, "What's your name, you have regal blood in you—that much I my werewolf friend could smell, but, son—"

Oren bit his lip. This alchemist was no one's father. Especially not Oren's.

"—this'd be easier if you'd talk. We'll get you back to your royal family." Oren waited for the catch, and it was readily given. "For a price."
Ransom. Oren lifted his eyebrow in a silent, sarcastic question. Ransom?

"Ransom." Fake Heath affirmed.
That meant only one thing to Oren: he'd have to escape before anyone was alerted to his whereabouts.

"Fine! Don't talk but I know two things about vampyres—they need human blood and they die in sunlight. And not talking is a quick way to lose the former. I need you alive, not—" "What about the human," It was commandeering, an order. "Will her needs continued to be provided for?" "Don't you forget who's in charge here." Fake Heath said rising from his seat, and so abandoning his sedentary position of power. And Oren spat, "Answer my question." "Don't think—for a second—you can fool me into thinking that you care about that human, because we both know that if you cared you would have left her at home." Oren could have said a whole host of things, then; but it would do no more than antagonize his captor. The alchemist scowled, "Your silence will cost you."

But, Oren didn't ask for—or care about—the price.
"He's no Mac Heath, I uh...met the actual Supernatural when I was—a long time ago; he came to my mother's court to—pay respects." Actually, the vampyre had only come to threaten Queen Evelyn with an ultimatum. Oren remembered the Supernatural's cold voice, as emotionless as stone— "Exterminate the treasonous Demetrius Carter, or I will." His mother didn't take kindly to being ordered; her voice as smooth as a pebble, "You are not welcome here, and if you ever threaten one of my kin again. I will not hesitate to have you removed. Permanently." Marisa took it all in stride, "So, we've got a compulsive liar on our hands."

"What we've got is two days to get back to Setra."
"Do you think she'll still give us the information even if her brother's—" Oren didn't want to say no; instead, "They're planning on ransoming us. Separately."

And Marisa said what she thought he was thinking, "So, we need to escape. Now."
"What we need is to wait." He said, "For an opportunity."
Marisa waved a hand, "Exactly." And planted herself into a chair. "20 questions." Marisa blurted.

And Oren waited for it.
"I ask a question, you answer; then you ask a question, I answer. You can even make rules if you want."

He didn't say yes. But he didn't say no.

"Okay," she said, settling back and thinking hard—
"Don't ask about my childhood; don't ask about my about favorite pastimes and for the love of everything and ANYTHING—do not ask if I sparkle." "If you sparkled, I think I would know by now." "—Good point."

"Okay, then—how did you meet your buddy, Brock?"

"I was seven. Mom arranged the whole thing."
She huffed, "I might as well have asked your shoe size."
"She always talked about the importance of someone who you know has your back."

"Don't stop there." She looked him in the eye, "I mean who else do you have to tell?" Oren exhaled heavily, placing himself in the only empty chair: "Not to put too fine a point on it, but you aren't exactly what I would describe as a confidante." After a bleak second, "Your turn." He turned his gaze on her, "What are you going to do about you-your—"

"My mother and grandmother?" She shook her head, "I'll deal. That's the Roberts way. I bet my answering machine has a ba-jillion messages." She sighed and looked away, "I'm the last of my family. I've got nothing but the name and my parent's bills."
"Try looking on the bright side." Oren said weekly, unconvincingly.


She half-smiled at him. "I doubt the debt collectors will think to look for you in Egypt."

She gave a short laugh, and glared at him, "Not. Funny. You'll jinx me."
"Your turn." He mumbled softly, like he didn't want to break the moment. "Okay," a laugh tumbling from her lips once more, "Why do you pretend to be so heartless—I mean, your doing all this just to save your mom, right?" Oren thought for a second about how to answer her questions, and when he realized that he didn't even WANT to answer he shook his head, "Not gonna talk about it."

Marisa sighed but nodded. Without an invitation, "Can you tell me a story?"

"Uh-ah-um—"

"It's either that or we can talk about you some more."

"Good point." He repeated meekly.
A pause stretched out.

"Oren?"

"Gemme a second, Risa."

She blinked at the nickname but he didn't notice.
"Okay, so a time ago there was a young woman—"

"I love a good heroine."

"Good for you, so anyway, there was a young woman and her life wasn't easy, but she wouldn't call it hard either, she and her adopted mother had just moved to a new town. Because if there is one thing you need to understand about this mother-daughter pair is that they moved a lot—I could tell you why but that's another story entirely—so, the young woman soon found friends and a place in the new surroundings she was in. And though there were a few surprises here and there things remained relatively normal. Until she found out she was half vampyre—"
"Go on."

"I'm just trying to remember how it goes."

"Okay. Well, don't take too long, otherwise—"
"A strange woman—black eyes, black hair—with strange abilities revealed that the young woman's birth mother was a very, very powerful vampyre queen and that she had a sibling. Originally the young woman didn't believe a word of it, but the truth of it gnawed at her. Fast-forward a handful of weeks her brother and the strange woman (Nita) had become mentors of a sort, teaching and helping her with her empathy abilities. And one day her famulus, a cardinal, was bestowed upon her—"

"You're not really much of a storyteller, y'know?"
He just looked at her, "Upon returning home she got a phone call telling her that the boy she—"

Marisa rolled her eyes; "There's always a boy."
"Anyway, he was in the hospital. She went to visit him. There were emotions, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera—the heroine retreated from the emotional overload and then Nita's nephew under orders from Nita's sister—his mother—the nephew kidnapped the heroine." He stopped resolutely. "Go on, Oren—"
Oren added, "The End."

"Oh, you have got to be—that is not the end." Oren didn't respond, because she was right: that was far from the end of the story, it was just that eventually Marisa might start to connect the dots and find out that the fabricated story wasn't fabricated to begin with. Furthermore, that it, eventually, had to do with himself. "You owe me a better ending than that, Oren!"

Again Oren didn't say a word. "Then, what happened to the boy—to get him in the hospital?"

Laconically, "Fell."

And whatever verbosity Oren had felt seconds before was dead and gone.
"Did those people have names?" Marisa asked absently.

Oren attempted to think up a response, but just kept his mouth shut.

And this time silence stretched for a long while.
Marisa shook her head, "Wake me up—if you smell out any of those 'opportunities' you were talking about." Mumbling, "It's about time for a siesta anyway." Oren merely blinked at her and it was only after he was sure she was asleep that he admitted to himself that he was tired too— *



A hand clamped down on my shoulder and I just managed to stop myself from jumping; I spun around: "Brock." The name smarted on my lips. He was the last vampyre I wanted to see.

"Prince, I'm sure your mother doesn't want you watching—that."

The next words dropped matter-of-fact from my mouth, "One day that will be my job."
"Not any day soon." He promised; he led me back down the hall and it was quiet for a moment. "I thought you'd be in the Archives—Or trying to get past one of the traps in the ruins," Brock explained; "You've never shown any interest in court affairs before."

Though I had grown to understand that talking, communicating, was a natural part of life, I didn't feel the urge to respond. So I retained the silence. Beside me, Brock exhaled a light sigh: "Your mother said once you talk as much as your father did—and twice as less willingly." I don't know my father; neither does Brock. Queen Evelyn talks of him often enough but I could never quite understand her quiet smile and soft wistful voice she maintained whenever she spoke of him—like if she talked to loudly the memories would rub away. And my mother never reveals his name, whenever someone asked she would look at me, straight in the eye: like she had lost something in them, a stare that made me uncomfortable with its intensity and she'd say I got these green eyes from my father. And that was that. "Sounds like a charming man—" From nowhere all at once.

Brock jumped, "Whoa—hey, Councilman Zeth. Nice to uh—" "Please," A dangerous smile, "Lie to my face."

Brock, wisely, didn't say a word.

Zeth zeroed in on me, "Hello, little Prince." Not. A. Word; escaped my mouth. Correction: Zeth was the last vampyre I wanted to see. I placed myself closer to Brock; he was the only person who could save me from this dire situation. Zeth noticed. "I would like to have a moment to chat with my best friend's son." I wasn't sure if my mother would describe Zeth as her friend but Brock stood firm, "That's not a good idea."

No room for disagreement; I was suddenly very grateful that Brock was here.
Again with the smile, "Our little Prince here seems to be fond of you, Brock, but don't think you are irreplaceable—if I find an issue with how you accomplish your task of protecting our heir." Angry disbelief then determination flickered across Brock's face; Staunchly, he dropped to my level and said, "I'll be right over there. If you need anything just call me and I'll—" "You'll what?" Zeth mocked. Brock, stiffly, walked off. I was quiet and still, unnoticeable, a forgotten shadow, something to be overlooked, left to gather dust, something to be— "Answer me." His voice low and savage. I hadn't heard the question, and my lips wouldn't move to form the words that might appease him. "When your mother tucks you in tonight, I want you to ask her a question—" "Wh-who is my father?" She looked sad but not all together surprised as she whispered the words—






* "He's powerful. I can feel it."
—Oren blinked himself awake. Noticing that two distinct sounds interrupted the silence.

Voices, two familiar voices:
"So, what're we gonna do with our two new prisoners, boss?" The fake Mac Heath responded with, "Officially, they are hostages. That girl will for sure get us a buck or to from her worried and desperate family—that is once they get word—and the guy, the vampyre, there's somethin' off about him—his power, it's been diluted. I've sent an officially inquiry to Tick, he'll tell us anything we need to know about that green-eyed blood sucker." Oren didn't like the sound of them finding out that he was worth a whole lot more than just a couple of bucks, more than a couple million even.

The flunky started again, "Boss? Isn't it about time we feed—"
"Get on that. You know where I'll be."

And the footsteps receded.
Oren glanced at Marisa, who surprisingly sat wide-awake, watching him; worry becoming of her mouth at the words she just heard. She must've caught his expression because her next word was a hopeful: "Escape?" Oren nodded and mumbled, "When he comes in to give us our food, this is what we're going to do—" "It's funny, I recall you saying we but this plan seems to rely heavily on me." "Let's hope you're a good actress then."

She was about to return the remark but she was interrupted by:
"I'm comin' in. Get to the walls!" The two obliged. He placed the two trays and made to leave but an exhausted looking Marisa offered him an innocent enough smile, "Sir, I'm sorry to bother, but I was wondering if I could get a cup of cool water—this heat, it's getting the better of—" Marisa toppled to the ground.

Dramatic. Oren noted.
The man glanced desperately at Oren, who excitedly encouraged: "You heard her—water! She needs water!" And in his haste he didn't shut or lock the door behind him. She was already getting to her feet, "I think this may just work."

Oren nodded his agreement. And motioned her to follow him. The duo headed toward the truck in the distance. Marisa went for the driver's side door. "Key's in the ignition. Lucky. Lucky." "We drive for five minutes, then we get out and walk." Marisa didn't quite see the logic, but she wasn't about to start questioning his orders now, "Aye, aye." "Nice parking job."

"Well, y'know—" Marisa replied half-heartedly.
"Actually, I could really use that water right about now." Oren didn't respond. "Is it just me or does this heat make you sleepy?" "Risa?" Oren muttered to the bleary-eyed person beside him, "We're almost to the horses—so pull it together."
She yawned, loudly. "Wrong oasis."

Oren ignored her rejoinder.
"Oh, I have never been so glad to see a horse in my life!" Marisa leaned heavily on the beast, taking a second to close her eyes against its warmth before—her head drooped.

"Marisa!"
"I'm awake!"

"Good, now let's go."
"You never talk, ever." A simple statement of fact, but her voice was as tired as her words, "I mean—it—is—exhausting having a conversation with you, you don't respond half the time and the other half of the time you're sooo out of context that you don't even make sentido—" She was rambling. "You're such a—" She searched her extensive multilingual vocabulary for the right word—"A uh-unh—" "Risa." He tried again. "I hear ya, bobo, I hear ya—"

Oren forced himself to say, "You can't ride a horse half out of your mind. Take the sleeping bag and—sleep."

"Saddlebags." Marisa presumed. But didn't protest.
And he was left awake, to count the hours until Zoe's brother was dead and the information—the person—Oren so desperately sought left him behind.

Again.


Whelp, this is kinda a transition chapter from the sparkling sands of Al Simhara and Setra, Egypt to the. . .

Well, you'll have to wait and see.

More questions answered and created next time on -

What About Yesterday! Stay tuned!

. . .And for always and for ever:

I Hope You Enjoyed!