TIME FLOWS: 8- A FIGURE IN THE SHADOW

    Sanctuary, Greece. July 1968.

Some time had passed since Orianne and Eridanus Crenea decided to work together as a student and teacher. The initial intentions were good, but they had some arguments still from time to time. Crenea had to remember her almost all days to put on her mask, since she wasn’t used to it. However they always put them out during training, since they used to go to female saints area or the mountains near Sanctuary, were no men were around.

Orianne finished with warm-up and looked at her teacher. She indicated her to start pulling a 2 tones rock way up the mountain.

-It’s been a month already- said Crenea, thinking aloud.

-Should we do a cake and celebrate it? I like Chocolate cake, lemon cake, blueberry cake, red fruit cake, … and we can write “for the first training month” with liquid chocolate on top.

-Who would celebrate such thing?-asked Crenea, doubting if her pupil was pulling her leg or not.-Remember that I’m counting time too, so don’t waste it talking too much as usually.

-Yes ma’am.

After pulling the rock 1 kilometer, Orianne ran for three hours, smashed rocks and other similar exercises.

-I’ve been doing these things very often; we should do more complex practices!-complained Orianne.

-As I explained, I want you to polish the basics and your physical endurance before centering in fights and techniques.

-And how much more will that take?

-As much as it needs.

-Hmph!

Crenea stared at her student. She had been trying to not make those exercises too much repetitive, but she had a document to fill with Orianne stats. Luckily, Orianne was responding very well to the physical demands. “Of course”-she thought- “She had an intense training at the Pyrinees already, that will make the whole process faster”. The only problem was the so irritating attitude of her student, demanding all days to have fights with saints.

-If you make a new personal record I’ll show you something.

-Wooohoo! There I go!

                 A couple of hours later. Sanctuary nearabies.

-Is it a hidden cave? Oh! I’ve got it! It’s like “find the treasure” game! Are you going to give me clues or a map?

-Have a little patience! - begged Crenea - We are near, and try to memorise the way to it.

They were walking away Sanctuary, through the ancient pines and old dry rocks. Suddenly the happy chat ended when a strange cosmos filled the air. It was a hair-raising sensation, coming from some hundreds meters away. Crenea raised guard, and walked carefully to not be heard towards the origin of the energy. Orianne followed next to her. They could see a floating figure with dark purple clothes, between the trees. They couldn’t see the face since the mysterious person was wearing a hood. At that point they saw the figure was floating near a man who was lying exhausted on the ground. Crenea showed herself and yelled:

-Stay away from that man! Who are you?!

Artwork by ZauriArt

The figure turned to see Crenea, stared for a moment and vanished in the shadows of the trees. The strange cosmos disappeared.

Crenea and Orianne ran to help the man, who was skinny and a bit injured. His face was terrible, like having passed through many things.

-Don’t worry, I’ll take you to a doctor- said Crenea, rushing to carry the man.

-Who was that thing? What has it done to you? - asked Orianne.

But the man’s live was fading away, he could barely say “It’s useless… they always find you…” before expiring.

There was a big silence, while they watched the lying corpse.

Crenea started to wandering around the zone, like searching for something.

-What are you doing? The thing that attacked this poor man has gone, you won’t find it.

-I’m not searching for that person, I’m trying to find anything that can helps us to understand what has happened here or something that could help us to know who was it.

-”It’s useless, they always find you”, what can it mean? - asked herself Orianne.

- “They”, that means the attacker is not a lonely wolf, it is part of a group… I think that’s all that we can know for now - concluded the bronze Saint, stopping her search.

A Saint appeared, confused by the scene. She was a tall girl with a very long blue hair.