An Unwelcomed Visitor

[Erin Rakal]

The screams of rage.
The burning from the thorn lashes.
The adrenaline rush, multiplied at least twice more than any normal human's, making her seem invicible.
Erin loved it all.
The screams of pain.
The burning in her muscles as they finally grew weary.
Still the adrenaline, but a warmer, slightly weaker form as one person after another fell from getting too close to her.
Not this time, though.
Normally she would have killed them in a heartbeat. Every last one of them. Why didn't she?
Two reasons.
One. She tended to get a bit....let's just say 'carried away' with the fighting.
Two. There had to be at least a hundred people. Every last one weighed down with guns, anything sharp. Heck, she even spotted a couple with a spear or two.
Yes, she was terribly outnumbered this time. The only advantage she had was the headstart, which was growing bigger by the second. But she didn't slow down even after the mob stopped giving chase.
She kept running. Running beside a river that eventually ended in some strange, vast forest. But she didn't stop once inside.
The trees passed by as white flashes in the black background. Everything that had heat was so bright. As the sun filtered through the thick cover above, it would hurt Erin's eyes, even through the blindfold.
Finally she couldn't run anymore.
She had to stop, already feeling the 'super-adrenaline' dying away as she collapsed to the floor.
The only problem with her super-powered helper? The effects.
She felt every single burn, itch, scratch, and every part of her that was tired. The pain came to her so fast and so powerful that she couldn't keep the scream in.
A single cry, seemingly an inhuman roar, split through the silent forest, scattering birds as Erin lay there, letting the blood from every wound flow freely. Pretty soon she had a small pool, every scratch on her body adding to its size slowly...
She knew that there was the possibility that she was in a stranded forest.
Erin strained her eyes as hard as she could, desperate for any sign of heat that might have fallen off of a person days, maybe even weeks ago if it was strong enough.
Yes! It was a very faint trace, but she could see it's milky orange light radiating on top of a pile of leaves, slightly distorted in her strange yet familiar vision.
She was going to be okay...

[Rachel Hymer]

Rachel walked though Blueberg forest on a glorious day. She had a free period and decided to see what she could find though the dark, old trees that lined her path. She as in a good mood, and behind her, little flowers where growing where her feet had just been. If she had been in a bad mood, she could have been killing plant in sight, but not today.
She walked further into the forest, as it got darker with every step. The trees began to block out the sunlight, but it didn't really matter, she could still see.
She continued to walk, but heard something. It sounded like a person. She headed toward the sound and found a girl on the ground, with cuts on her.
"My goodess," she said, bending down to get a better look. With out thinking, she started to touch every cut, making the skin connect and heal.
"Sorry if this hurts a bit." she said, continunig to heal the stranger. "What an earth happened to you?"

[Erin Rakal]

Erin flinched as suddenly out of nowhere a girl popped out and started healing her. Of course, she only felt the pain and thought Rachel was an enemy. She closed her eyes tightly; she'd taken off her blindfold to see better in the dark. Now, as a massive source of heat came into close view, it glowed as bright as the sun, seeming to set her eyes on fire.

"OwowowOW!" Erin said, suddenly throwing her weight backwards. "Leave me alone! You're hurting my eyes!" Erin almost seemed to hiss at Rachel, covering her eyes with her hands. Not even that seemed to work, and Erin could only writhe in pain. She gritted her teeth as frustration bubbled inside of her.
"I'm fine! I said leave! The pain's getting really bad now!" she snarled viciously, her words dripping venom. Curling up in a little ball, she refused to try and grab her blind fold. If light were to hit her eyes then it would seem a thousand times worse...

[Rachel Hymer]

"Well sorry, Missy for trying to heal you! For goodness sake, that's that I'm meant to do, I'm a carer ." She said, getting sllighty annoyed. "Well maybe I'll have to get Will down to help." She continued to heal the stranger. She had been working in the Hosptial Wing for a few months and knew how to act with people who seemed a bit rude. "I'm going to help you anyway. I'm not bad, or trying to kill you, or anything like that. If I wanted to do that already, I would have by now. Why? You're not one of the enemies? They took that girl Macy, and they're not going to take me!" She touched the last cut she could find, and sat back. "There, as good as new. So what happened?" She asked again.

[Erin Rakal]

Erin growled.
"No! You don't understand!" she said, remaining curled up.
Her eyes were starting to water from the light and pain.
"You're body heat is hurting my eyes!" she said, sitting up while still covering her eyes.
"Hand me my blindfold," she said. "It should be around here and it's....off white," she finished, faltering as she thought of the blood stains that would be all over it.
"I'll tell you what happened as soon as you hand me my blindfold. And please, don't take your time. I think I'm going to melt if I stay like this for much longer," she grimaced, adding a hint of sarcasm to the end of her sentence...

[Rachel Hymer]

Rachel looked round and noticed the bit of cloth lying near the girl. She picked it up and handed it to the girl.
"Well, atleast your not bleeding to death." She said, looking at the vanishing scars. She was pleased with her handy work. "So, I suppose you're not going to tell me what happened. Well, try not to do it again, I suppose. Or if you have to, try not to get cut as much. Well, I've seen worse..." She said, thinking back to injuries she's seen while being in the hosptial. One that stood out in her mind was when someone came in with all limbs dislocated. Then there was that guy who made her get called out of the dance to heal, the one who was there when that girl got taken.
She shook the memories out of her mind and focused on the girl before her. "It seems like you don't go here..." She said, feeling slightly suspicious.

[Erin Rakal]

Erin was deeply confused.
"I don't go where? What, there's actually something beyond this endless forest?" she gave a snort.
"You want me to tell you? Fine," she said after swiftly tying her blindfold around tightly.
She sighed, relieved. "That feels so much better. Seriously, being able to see in the dark has some serious disadvantages!" she said.

Then she waved her hand as if to change the subject.
"Anyways...Let's see here. I stole from a shop, so he started chasing me, along with previously robbed shopkeepers. I killed a couple of their people next to a coffee shop, so everyone in there started chasing me along with witnesses. I set fire to a few houses, and then I saw just how many people were trying to kill me, so I ran. They chased me, I ran some more through this cursed forest, scraping my arms and legs on I don't know how many thorns, rocks, and or branches. I lost them, and I kept running until finally I collapsed from exhaustion and pain on this here forest floor," she said.
Afterwords, she gave a sarcastic, crazy-looking grin.
"Just another day for me. The floor here is very soft. What, with its nice, jagged rocks and its venomous visitors and everything," she said...

[Rachel Hymer]

Rachel listened with a weird, dazed smile.
"Hmm...sounds like fun..." She said. She didn't really know what to say. "Well, you seem to be accustom to people being afraid of you, my dear, but I am not. My little blind bandit. And Orchid Hill, the school, nearby. It's a school for gifteds, that's why I go there. I can heal, and make plants grow, and minipulate time. This forest is on it's grounds, it's about a mile back. Do you want me to take you there to get you checked over? There's some of the best healers there, who can make sure you are fine, to go on your way. And to make sure that you actually arn't from the enemy armies, Northern Ice should go to..." She asked, waiting for a reply. If she was an enemy, she would automatically say 'the south', if she was from the school, she should say 'the west', but if she actually didn't come from there, she would probably say 'what?'

[Erin Rakal]

Erin gave a dry laugh.
"If you aren't afraid, then you don't know the real me..." she muttered slightly too loud.
"School? Pah! That's the last place I want to go," she spat.
"What's school ever done for me?"

Erin simply stared at Rachel about the Northern question. "What?" she questioned, a frown obviously plastered on her face. "I don't know...North? South?"

[Rachel Hymer]

Rachel pursed her lips, looking at the girl.
"I might not know the real you, but what I see know doesn't sem too theatening. But if you want somewhere to stay, the school has a couple of spare beds for travillers, incase you've got no where to go. You don't have to enroll as a student, or anything like that. I don't think they'll ask too many questions, but since what's happening recently, they might, but I don't know."
She looked down at her watch and saw that her next class should have already begun.
"Augh, sorry, I'm late." She looked round her to see if anyone else was there. "Okay, I'm going to do something that'll look weird to you, but all I'm going to do is stop time for a few minutes, so I won't be so late for class. To you, I'll just disappear, but I've just gone back to the school. If you want to find me, my next class is 'Earth Control', in the east corridor. I'll be out in about an hour. You should come over, so I can make sure that you're all okay before you go. Okay? Stay safe." She stopped talking, held her breath and stopped time. Everything was standing still, she looked at the girl one last time before getting up, picking up her things and running back to the school. She ran though the corridors and came to her class. Before entering, she started time again and went in.
"You're late, Miss Hymer." The professor said. She took her seat, still thinking about the stranger she met.

[Erin Rakal]

"Oh, great. She left!" Erin said, wincing as her stomach growled.
"I would have gotten you some food if it weren't for those dang shopkeepers!" she told her whining stomach. "Now be quiet. I have to figure out where this school is."

Part of her wanted to stay away from school, or any public place for that matter. {The only thing public places have is normally food and people freaked out by me.} she thought bitterly. But, the fear that she seemed to feed off of wasn't so bad. Although she hated it, she loved it at the same time. Normally she would get food without any trouble from the shopkeepers that fell to their knees before her. She wanted to be normal, but...in a different way.
She shook her head. Well that didn't make sense. How could you be like everyone else and be different at the same time? It just couldn't happen.
By now she'd realized that her feet were moving, every step causing her muscles to scream out in pain. {If only that strange girl could have healed my other pains besides my cuts.} She thought.
The idea of having someone who wasn't afraid of her? It scared her and comforted her. It made her realize that she wouldn't be able to get whatever she wanted simply out of fear from everyone.
She'd eventually have to use force...
The very thought of it made her shudder, and with her lack of control over the wild fire that always threatened to take over, she couldn't risk doing anything without destroying the entire town.
She closed her eyes tightly, flushing out the painful imaginations as she still followed the trail of body heat that naturally left Rachel. It was kind of nice being able to see heat, but it became annoying when the heat could tell that you saw it. Because then it would crowd around you, begging you to make it into fire and give it life.
Already she could tell that the tiny heat inside the trees was starting to figure it out. She finally started running, her muscle pains dying away; they were used to running frequently, but they always were sore when she needed to walk. As she ran faster and faster, she could feel herself lower until she was on all fours. You see, when the chemicals had washed over her, not only did they give her powers, they stunted the growth of her legs, and when her arms grew slightly longer, she found the ability to run like an animal. It gave her better balance and control, and she sped over the forest floor, her fingers digging into the soft earth as she kicked up the pace at the sight of what Rachel mentioned being the school.
As she realized what Rachel had said, a spark of hope sprung inside of her.
{They...just might be able to help me control my powers.} she thought fleetingly, the very thought giving her energy until she was seemingly a blur headed right for the school.
She didn't know why, but something inside of her told her she would be happy here, and that she should enroll in the school.
And Erin, always acting upon impulse, never second-guessing herself, would follow the feeling...