****
Time passed. Or, at least, Phoenix assumed it passed. It was hard to tell when he was stuck in a bag!
It took him a while to come to terms with the need to simply sit and wait for Jade to get them out. Having a Warrior body and Warrior brain, added to his own natural impulse to be moving and doing, meant he wanted action. He’d had enough of waiting and hoping in the real world. With nowhere to go in the Bag, he paced and fretted. Finally, frustrated, he practiced aikido kata in an attempt to get his warrior body to do what he wanted it to. It sort of worked but he still felt stupidly unco-ordinated and got more frustrated as his body didn’t respond as easily to the moves as in the real world. At last, even Brynn’s cheerful patience wore out and the boy snapped at him to sit down.
After that, they sat on the unseen, unfelt floor and shared out the remains of what edible food they had. Brynn produced some sort of whistle and piped lilting, sweet tunes until he ran out of songs and had to stop for breath. Afterward, they talked in snatches for awhile; but the conversation eventually petered out, stifled by the darkness. Nothing changed. It was still suffocatingly dark and mind-numbingly boring.
Marcus fell asleep with the amazing ability of a seasoned soldier to rest when and where he can. His deep, even breaths were barely audible. Even Brynn gave up his usual pert chatter in the face of the strange muffling effect of the Hyllion Bagia. He leaned against Phoenix’s shoulder and occasionally sighed.
In due course, Phoenix must have fallen asleep as well, for the next thing he knew, Marcus was shaking him.
“Wake up.”
“Wha…?” He blinked in the darkness. He rubbed gritty eyes but it was still dark. “What’s going on? Why’d you wake me up?”
“Something’s happening.” Marcus’ hand still gripped Phoenix’s shoulder. “Wake Brynn.”
Phoenix shook the younger boy and all three stared into the thick darkness.
“So?” Phoenix asked. “What’s happening? I don’t see anything.”
“I’m sure I heard Jade’s voice,” Marcus assured him.
Phoenix sighed. “You were probably dreaming.”
“No,” the other replied, unperturbed, “I’m certain I heard her; and there was a flash of light for a moment, like she’d opened the bag.”
“Well if she did that,” Phoenix pointed out, “why didn’t she say our names and get us out?”
“I don’t know,” Marcus had a hint of impatience in his normally-calm voice, “but she might at any second and I thought you’d like to be awake for it, rather than half-asleep.”
Phoenix grunted, wondering if the eternal darkness and freakiness of this place was finally getting to the calmest member of their little band. It was nice to know something could ruffle Marcus’ cool feathers.
“There!” Brynn’s high-pitched shout jolted Phoenix out of his musings.
A flash of light overhead made him look up. Surely this was Jade hauling them out of oblivion.
What he saw silhouetted against the light wasn’t Jade’s hand. Instead, it was a puzzlingly large, curved object that seemed to be both falling towards them and yet falling away from them at the same time. It appeared to be getting closer but in a strange twist of logic-defying physics, it was also shrinking as it got nearer.
The three boys stood, dumbstruck, staring up at the object for several moments before the light vanished and took with it their ability to see anything at all.
“Ummmm…” Brynn began, “I wonder where that thing will fa….” Thunk!
“OW!” Phoenix clapped his hands to his head and howled in pain. “Ow! Bloody Ow ow ow ow!” He doubled over, grasping his head tightly as if pressure would somehow reduce the agony. Using more swear words than he even knew he knew, he stamped hard on the non-ground until even swearing and stamping wasn’t helping any more.
“You alright?” Brynn’s concern didn’t help, nor did Marcus’ soft snort of amusement.
“Whatever that was,” Phoenix replied crossly, “it hurt! Man!” He fingered his scalp. “I’ve got a lump the size of a chicken egg on my head.” He glared up at where the light had been and shook his fist before realising the gesture was wasted because no-one could see him. “What the heck was Jade thinking, tossing something in with us like that? She could have killed me! What was it, anyway?”
“I don’t know,” Brynn replied, too cheerfully. “I can’t find it now. I think it’s part of the bag’s magic. You called our names when you came in, so we found you.” He explained. “Since we don’t know what it was Jade threw in, we can’t name it and so we can’t find it.”
“What,” Phoenix rubbed his scalp gently, “so if I said, ‘Pilum’, one would….”
“Don’t…!” Marcus cried, too late.
“Ow! Bloody ow again!” Phoenix yelled.
A Roman spear had whacked him on the arm. Ruefully, he rubbed his elbow and had to laugh.
“That was pretty stupid. At least it wasn’t the pointy end.”
Brynn giggled.
“Well...” Marcus tactfully didn’t complete the sentence.
“Still,” Phoenix said at last, “I guess I’m just lucky she didn’t toss something sharper in with us.” Marcus and Brynn chuckled.
There was a companionable silence for a few moments then Brynn spoke again.
“Did you hear that?”
“What?” Marcus and Phoenix asked together.
“I thought I heard someone call my name,” Brynn replied doubtfully. There was a few seconds of silence as they all strained to hear. “Oh well,” the boy laughed nervously, “just wishful thin……”
There was a brief flash of blinding light. Before Phoenix could react, the comforting pressure of Brynn’s thin leg against his own was gone. Phoenix leapt up with a shout of alarm.
“Wait!” Marcus’ yell and firm hand brought him up short. “The only person who could have got Brynn out of here was Jade.” His words were annoyingly reasonable. “She’ll call us next, so just be patient.”
Phoenix growled. Once again he’d reacted first and thought later. It was so frustrating to have the Roman boy showing him up by being so darned cool, calm and collected all the time. Phoenix scraped his fingers roughly through his hair. He had to get a handle on himself. Surely he hadn’t always been like this? It must be this stupid digital warrior’s fault.
Back at home he’d been really good at thinking before he acted – or at least, he’d learned to be more that way after his mother remarried. Come to think of it, he frowned in the darkness, his real father used to tease him about being too reactive; too quick to get angry. He smiled, remembering many bruises, skinned knees and hands from his youthful schoolyard fights and daring adventures. He’d soon learned to curb his hazardous activities with Jacob watching his every move. Being grounded and threatened was good incentive to restrain himself. OK, so maybe being here in 80AD was just giving him an excuse to go back to his old, stupid ways. Maybe that wasn’t such a good thing after all.
“Marcus, do you think-” He never got to finish his question.
There was another bright flash of light and the last Phoenix saw of Marcus was the boy’s startled, upturned face.
Then it was dark. He was alone. Again.
“Man,” he muttered, fingering his still-sore head, “I’m really getting sick of this.”
****