“Perplexity is the beginning of Knowledge.” – Kahlil Gibran

I ran with power, the ice was breaking under my feet. I couldn’t let her down. She was trapped on the thinnest part, and I just couldn’t let her die for my mistakes. The girl screamed out to me. Just as my name left her mouth, the ice broke and she fell in. “No!!” I screamed. I jumped in the icy water, but I couldn’t see her. I looked back up at the sky and a blob filled the area of the hole. It was the girl. She smiled evilly at me and the ice closed up. I swam back up and banged on the ice, it was now more than a foot thick. My lungs ached, and I couldn’t hold my breath any longer. I sucked in a breath, and I drowned right there, trapped under the ice.

I screamed and sat bolt upright. I looked around the room, room. I sighed with relief, it was my room. Waterfall sat in her bed staring at me with a bewildered expression.

The relief only lasted a moment. I felt the pain in my right forearm quickly. It hurt, but nothing looked wrong. “What the hell? What the hell?!” as my senses increased, so did the pain.

“What?” Waterfall had no idea of the pain I was in, she still seemed half asleep.

“Ow! Shit! Ow! What the hell is happening?!” I grabbed my forearm and tried to feel for the irritation. Where was the pain coming from?

“What’s wrong with you?” she got out of bed and walked over to me.

My arm burned liked hell, the pain kept increasing. I squeezed my arm tighter, but the pain increased once more. I had never felt anything like this. Then, the pain in my chest hit me. It felt like I had broke my arm and was having a heart attack at the same time.

My chest felt like something was trying to eat its way through it. I scrambled with my shirt. Waterfall started to freak out too, she ran to the door and yell for my father and hers. My eyes blurred, and I couldn’t tell if I was crying or if I couldn’t see.

I twisted and turned, trying to get my night shirt off to see what was eating me. I fell off my bed and onto the floor, but I had to get my shirt off. The searing pain got worse and worse.

I didn’t care if I ripped the buttons off or not, I had to get it off. I could hear the fabric ripping and I could hear Waterfall still freaking out. My eyes were blurred still, so I couldn’t see anything but blobs. Blobs, I had seen a blob right before I drown.

Was I going to die? From something eating me? I threw off my shirt and clawed at my chest. The pain eased for a moment, but the pain in my arm got worse. I tried to rip off whatever was on it.

I felt hands pin down my arms. I arched my back and screamed out. The pain peaked in my chest. “Get it off! Get it off!” They wanted the thing to eat me! It had to be! I pulled and kicked and tried to pry them off, but whoever it was was determined to keep me pinned down.

“Please! Get it off!” I could feel the tears running down my cheeks. This time I knew my eyes were blurred because I was crying. The pain, oh the pain, I had never had pain like this. Even on missions, I had been tortured, and nothing was as bad as this.

The pain seemed to go on and on. It seemed to last for years before it had died down enough to let me sleep. I tried to sleep, but the pain would peak and wake me up. At least, I thought it was peaking.

Once when I was awake, the pain really peaked. It was so bad, I think I started to spasm. Once again, I felt hands on me, trying to hold me down. When the pain got to the point of unbearable excruciating agony, and I felt like killing myself to get rid of the pain, it just went away.

The pain just stopped. No more pain in my arm, no more pain in my chest. My breath was rugged and heavy, but the pain was gone! I prayed to the Gods it wouldn’t come back. My eyes were closed, so I opened them slowly.

My vision was blurred still, but it soon started getting clearer. As my eyes adjusted, I focused on a face leaning over me. She smiled down, and said, “Are you okay?”

It took me a minute to find my voice, but when I did I said, “Fine, you?”

She giggled and said, “I think I’m a lot better than you. Wait! You talked!”

“Yeah, and?” she had short brown hair, light green eyes, and wore an emo outfit. It was a faded black and white 3OH!3 t-shirt, a black pair of jeans, and a pair of black converse. If I was right, she even had a faint hint of purple in her hair.

She turned away from me and yelled, “Hey! He’s awake! And talking!” I heard footsteps running up the stairs, then the door opened. Waterfall was the first in. Ah Waterfall, still as beautiful as ever.

She dropped down next to me and cupped my face. “Squirt? I could sock you if I knew you wouldn’t fall apart! Try to scare me like that again! I dare you!”

“Water, I’m fine. I had some kind of pain in my chest, and my forearm…” I had pointed to the underneath of my forearm, and my eyes almost popped out of my head. “What the hell is that?!”

“Wow, dad? What is that?” she scooted away from me, and the Prof. squatted down. He slapped his forehead and said, “I should have known! Squirt, didn’t you say three days ago was your birthday?”

“Three days! It was only three days?!” I was astonished beyond belief. It had felt like years, not three days!

“Yes, his birthday was three days ago. Why, what does it matter?” the girl had spoken for me. And it seemed to tick Waterfall off.

“He can speak for himself, he’s not helpless.”

“But he’s sick right now, so I was trying to help him out.” She shot back the same stubborn attitude as Waterfall.

“Well, he’s perfectly fine to talk. So there’s no need to answer for him.”

“Girls, girls please.” Prof. Hess saves the day. “Another time. Squirt has now become a man. His symbol has grown in, now the search is on.” He smiled and patted my arm.

“Search?” I paused to sit up. Waterfall and the other girl’s hands both shot out to help me. “What search?”

The girl giggled and said, “The search for your soul mate silly. Haven’t you ever heard of it?”

“No, what is it?” her face fell, it was obvious she wasn’t expecting that answer.

Waterfall started quiet, as if she were embarrassed. “It’s, like, when your symbol grows in, and you have to find the one person with the same symbol. Everyone has the symbol of either Agosmith, Vestonaga, or Halapheus, depending on which is your god. But the symbol is personalized for your personality. The one person with the same symbol as you, will be your soul mate. Symbols grow in on boys on the eighteenth celebration of their birth, the exact time they were born. The girls grow in on the seventeenth celebration.”

The room was quiet for a moment, then the girl said, “I’ll help you look for your soul mate!”

“Um, okay?” I looked at her with a puzzled expression. Who was she? After I spoke, Waterfall stood up with grace, and walked out of the room.

Prof. Hess looked worried. “Oh dear, this can’t be good.”

“What can’t be good? I’m confused!” he helped me to my feet and we walked over to the window just as the front door slammed.

We got there just as Waterfall came out from under the overhang, and ran onto the street. She didn’t even sprint, it was an all out run. She headed down the south-west street. I knew where she was going.

I moved away from the window, and stood against the wall. The girl and my father started talking to Prof. Hess about me, and since everyone was distracted I decided to make my move.

I slipped out the door and down the stairs. I eased the front door open and closed without a sound. I felt like my energy was fully restored. So I sprinted down the street after her.

I sprinted all the way to the school, where I walked over to my guild. I could hear activity inside, and knew it was dangerous going in. But as I have said before, I will do anything before I admit I’m scared.

I walked through the passageways with my senses fully alert. The clattering sound was coming from the arena floor. I passed through the locker rooms and down the steps in a few strides.

Waterfall had hung up a punching bag and was kicking the crap out of it. She was doing all different kinds of stuff I had never seen her do before. I started to say something, but quickly shut my mouth when the punching bag broke loose of its chains and fell to the ground.

She spun around and grabbed a set of throwing stars from their holster. One by one, she threw them and hit the bull’s eye every time. Next she threw a few daggers and some knives. I had to stop it before she got to the swords.

I ran out and yelled, “Dude! Water! What are you doing?!” she ignored me and kept throwing things. “Waterfall stop!” she turned on me and glared at me with hate filled eyes.

“What?! What do you want?!”

I could hear the pain in her voice. I knew it was safe to walk up to her now. I walked over and grabbed her arms. She dropped the weapons, and I wrapped my arms around her for comfort.

“I want to know what’s wrong with you?”I laid my head on hers and rocked her back and forth.

“I hate how she thinks she knows you well enough to speak for you. She doesn’t know you at all.”

“And I don’t know her either, I don’t even know her name. There’s something else upsetting you, so spill it!” her knees gave way and we fell to the ground.

“Damn it.” She looked scared as hell now, not even mad.

I pulled her into my arms like I did on the dock so long long ago. She looked (and apparently felt) very vulnerable at that moment. I brushed strands of hair out of her eyes, and held her tight.

“Now, are you going to tell me what’s wrong?” She mumbled it so low the first time, I couldn’t hear her. “What?”

“I said I’m seventeen!” she looked up at me, tears filling her eyes. “And I have been for a week.”

“Is that a bad thing? I’m confused.”

“Didn’t you hear what I said earlier? Girls get their symbols at seventeen, the exact moment they were born.” Now that she mentioned it, I did remember. And I had been noticing her wearing a long sleeved shirt that day.

“Did yours come in?!”

“No! And that’s the problem. I’ve been seventeen for a week and my hasn’t grown in yet.” This stumped me. I understood why she was upset now, sort of. “I’ve heard of people who have never had there’s grow in because their soul mate was already dead. What if I grow up without a soul mate?! How will that effect my life?!”

I started trying to think of ways to calm her down. An idea popped into my head, and the more I thought about it the more I thought it could be true. “Hey, who told you your birthday was a week ago? What if, someone got your birthday wrong. What if, someone just told you that because they couldn’t remember?”

“That’s awful!”

“I know, but it’s better than your symbol not growing in, isn’t it?”

“Well, that’s true.” I actually made her smile with that.

I heard a foot shuffle in the shadows, and I Immediately knew we weren’t alone. “Someone is here.” I whispered.

She looked up at me and we both scrambled up as fast as we could. We looked over at the shadow, and chuckles filled the air. Two people stepped out into the light. Gravel and Titan.

“Don’t let us stop the show.” Titan grinned slyly as he spoke.

“Yeah, you know why she’s really upset, don’t you?” Gravel’s smile was one of his worse.

Waterfall’s fists balled up and she started toward him. I grabbed her arm and pulled her back. “Calm down, I know why you’re mad. And that’s that, nothing else.”

“Oh you do? So you don’t care to break her heart.” Waterfall pulled free and I had to almost tackle her to get her stopped.

“What are you talking about?” I let go of my grip and she pulled free.

Gravel started backing away, buying himself some time. “I guess you don’t know. She was only mad because she’s completely and utterly in lo…” Gravel’s last words were drowned out by Waterfall’s shrieks.

She fell to her knees and clutched her arms to her chest. “Water? What are you doing?”

“Look who’s being a drama queen now.” Titan laughed and Gravel joined in as she kept screaming. I jogged over and squatted down.

“Waterfall, what are you doing?”

“Oh! My arm! Shit! Something’s eating my arm! Damn! Get it off! Squirt! Get it off!” it dawned on me, they had gotten her birthday wrong.

“Shit! Your dad’s still back home! What do I do?!”

“Dude, what are you talking about?” Gravel was now seriously puzzled.

“Just get it off! Damn it Squirt! Get it off!”

“Water! There’s nothing there! I know it hurts! I know, but I can’t help it!” she started to scream about her chest then, and I knew it was starting to hurt bad. “Gravel! Give me your phone!”

I ran over and dialed Prof. Hess’s number. “Prof. Hess! You got her damn birthday wrong! It’s growing in now!! Get down here right now! I don’t know what to do!” Titan and Gravel started to laugh, so I turned around to see why.

Waterfall has been hanging around me too long. She was ripping her shirt off just like I had. “Oh damn it. Just get down here!” I hung up the phone and tossed it back to Gravel. I ran over and pinned down her arms. “Water! Stop! You’re just hurting yourself!”

“Squirt! It’s eating me! Help, please!” she let out another shriek, but this was louder than the rest. It seemed like it had peaked already.

Within a minute, Prof. Hess was here and helping. Gravel and Titan sat on the bleachers, not wanting to miss a minute of this. I couldn’t take it anymore, I didn’t care how much torture I went through. I wasn’t going to let her go through the same.

“Can’t I fix her like I did when Bloodshed hurt her?! Or make it go faster or something?!”

“I don’t think it works like that, plus a girl’s process is ten times as painful but it’s also ten times as quick.”

“Shit, I don’t care! I want it done now!”

“I don’t think you can do anything Squirt! I’m sorry!”

“I have to try!” I was about to put my hand on her right forearm, but then I remembered what she said. I slammed my right hand down on her left forearm and scream in desperation, “Stop!!” I used some power I didn’t even know I had.

Waterfall lurched and arched her back. She didn’t scream out, but her mouthed was open in a silent scream. I pushed my power through her more, and suddenly she let out a piercing scream so loud, everyone covered their ears.

I stopped to cover my ears, along with Titan, Gravel, and Prof. Hess. The glass windows shattered all around us and then, nothing. Everything was silent. I looked down to see Waterfall lying very still, and very limp.

“No!” I felt of her neck, there was a pulse but it was fluttering. Wait a minute, no! it was gaining strength by the second.

“Squirt? What did you do?” he said it accusingly. I didn’t blame him, I almost killed his daughter, I think.

“I…”

“He got it off.”

“Huh?” Prof. Hess and I said at the same time. Waterfall looked up at us and smiled at me.

“I told him to make it go away, and he did.” I noticed I was hanging onto her left forearm. I slowly lifted it, and removed my hand. The symbol was clear as day.

“How did you do that? It normally takes girls a day to get it. But it’s been less than an hour since you called me.”

“I don’t know, I just did.” I looked at the symbol closer, I had seen it somewhere before. “Hey Water, I think I’ve met your soul mate.”

“Oh really? Who?” a goofy smile was on her face.

“I don’t know, but I’ve definitely seen that symbol somewhere before. Don’t ‘member where though.”

She took her arm from me to examine it. “Yeah, me too. I can’t remember where either though.” I scratched the back of my head with my right hand, trying to think of where I had seen it.

Immediately, Waterfall gasp, clutched her symbol, turned away from me, and said, “Shit!”

“What?” her father and I asked at the same time, again.

“Um, nothing. Can we go now, I’m really thirsty.” This stumped us both, but we agreed. We left the guild, and made sure Gravel and Titan were out before leaving the campus.

Copyright © 2011 Amanda Woodson. All rights reserved.