• [Roger]

    I saw the inventions once already but this time, under the sun, it looked amazing! All the weapons and armor shined and gleamed—the armor was plain, though, nothing special.
    “What’s with all this?!” Mika Shrieked.
    “You know already what it is” Jen said.
    “But these weapons…I thought you guys used swords!”
    “Eh? No, Roger uses swords!”
    “But you and Trek were training with—“
    “Yeah, incase we lose our main weapon”
    “Okay, so what’s up with that thing?!” she was pointing to a large hammer. It was crimson red with a gold spike in the center.
    “What’s wrong with that?”
    “What’s wrong with—it’s enormous! Five times bigger than a head! Why is it so big?”
    “Cause it just…is?” Jen scratched his chin.
    “Who’s is it?” Netti ask.
    “It’s Treks” Kert replied.
    The girls gasped. “But it’s super heavy!”
    “I can carry it” Trek stepped forward and grabbed the handle of the hammer. He tensed his muscles then lifted. Everyone stared in awe. For some reason, it looked really light. “Amazing!” he beamed. “It’s as heavy as any regular hammer!”
    “No way!” Netti had the same expression he had.
    “Yeah! And I wonder if…” he ran some distance away with the hammer, leaped high in the air, and bam! It crushed the ground into pieces, a giant hole about ten feet wide.
    Such power! That made me and Jen look for our weapon. He found his first.
    “What is that?” Mika asked. Netti was too busy admiring Trek who was showing off.
    “Blades” Jen said. It was as long as his arm and it rested on his forearm. The blade was connected to thin metals that outlined a glove. He put it on—the metal flexed at the wrist. “Whoa, whoa! Is that even possible?”
    “It is” Kert replied, grinning.
    “This is amazing!” Jen was testing out his weapon against the air. Mika watched him.
    “Here!” I grabbed my sword. It was long and big, almost as tall as me! I pointed it towards the sky, it was beautiful. The blades were razor sharp, too.
    Kert picked up his longbow. It was gold and bronze—so were the arrows. “Hey, you put on the armor, too. Just to get use to it” he put on his armor over his clothes, we did the same.
    It was heavy but at the same time, not heavy. We could move in it easily and it didn’t get in the way of our fighting.
    “This is some invention!” I said.
    “Your very best by far” Jen put a thumbs up.
    “I feel invincible!” Trek waved his giant hammer around.
    “I’m glad you guys like it” Kert lifted his bow, pulled out an arrow, and grinned. “Now shall we put these weapons to the test? See how strong they really are?”
    All three of us cheered yes.
    “You guys are crazy” Mika said sharply. We turned to her. “But in an admiring way” she smiled.
    I sighed with relief, and smiled too. “I’m starting to like your girlfriend, Jen”
    Jen was shocked, at least he was pretending to be. “I didn’t know we were dating!” he looked at Mika. “but there’s a lot of things I don’t know about, hunny. How about you come over here and give your teddy bear a big hug?” he held his arm out to her and beckoned her forward.
    Before Mika could blow out all her frustration on him, Phili said my name, loud and clear. I had absolutely no idea why she said that but she sounded serious, determined, like she was going to start a really complicated conversation. Everyone turned their attention to her. That’s when she got nervous.
    “I uh…well I…” Phili fiddled with her thumb. “I—“
    “We better get going now” Kert said sharply.
    “Huh? Why now? I thought—“ I began to say but he cut me off.
    “We have to go”
    “”But—“
    “Now” he was really anxious.
    I can see his eyes narrow, cautiously scanning the trees and bushes. We got quiet and followed Kerts gaze. I didn’t see anything particular, didn’t hear anything particular either, but if there’s someone who could sense trouble a hundred miles away, its Kert. I opened my mouth to say something but stopped halfway as the bushes rustled. Someone would’ve thought it was a psycho killer ready to murder but living in the wild so long, my natural instinct is to say it was an animal. That’s what I thought it was till Trek whispered to us.
    “People” he stared at his watch. “A lot of them”
    Right after he said that, there was shouting and cursing all coming from up ahead—just one direction. Good, so they’re not surrounding us. That gives us a nice pathway for retreat. And Trek was right, those were a whole bunch of villagers—angry ones. Once they came into view, we realized that they weren’t looking for any missing merchandise as they usually do. They were looking for a fight. Each villager was holding a pitchfork, a nailed club, a hammer, just any home found weapon you could think of. The mob was loud, all roaring something different at the same time. I couldn’t even hear my own thinking! But there was one thing clear to me; they wanted us out, somewhere farther than the forest, somewhere out >there.
    A woman shouts, “We’re sick of dealing with you pesky thieves! Letting you take off with our merchandise and doing nothing about it—no more!” the mob blares.
    Now a man spoke. “That explosion last night—what was that?! A mishandling? Trying to rid the forest? Or trying to rid us?!” he gestures to our armor and weapons—the mob goes wild with rage. They shout even more horrid things at us. They think we kidnapped the girls, too.
    I sighed, I guess our schedule got bumped up a day early. Me and the guys exchanged glances after we were done scanning the crowds. “You see them?” I asked.
    “Nah” Jen said.
    “So our dear parents didn’t join, what a pity” Kert sighed.
    “Yeah” I grinned slightly. “It’s a shame they won’t be able to see us off”
    “Maybe they’re hiding behind some tree together?” Trek asked. It was obvious that they were cause he was beaming foolishly, pointing at his watch.
    “Aw” Jen claps his hands together, brings them up to his cheeks, and bats his eyes. “Mommy and daddy are scared that we’re leave the nest”
    “Stupid!” Mika glared at him. “Why are you joking around >now of all time?”
    The mob was starting to lose patience, realizing that verbal threat wasn’t making any impact.
    “I’m sorry my dear, but I’ve gots to go” Jen says to her.
    “But you—“
    “Nuh uh uh” he waves his finger around, as if he was scolding her.
    “Be serious—“ she was cut off as Jen ran to her and gave a farewell pinch on her left cheek.
    He was just messing around, but one things for sure. That innocent little touch on her face made the mob go ballistic! It was the trigger to their inner wildness. They came rushing at an instant, but we already took off. They stopped behind Phili, Netti, and the ferious Mika.
    When we were a good distance away we stopped, turned around, took a deep breath, and shouted with all our might. “Goodbye mom, dad! We love you!” that was the longest farewell I ever said. We literally finished with no air in our lungs. The villagers were silent for just for a split second, then began rioting again. I wasn’t paying attention to the crowd, though, neither of us were. What we were eagerly staring at was behind the crowd, way, way behind the crowd. Our parents walked out from a giant tree, one by one. First Jens mom and dad, then Boas, then Kert and Treks, then mine. I smiled as I saw their faces, thinking about how long it’s been since I last spoke to them and how sorry I am for lying to them. Before we turned back around to leave, they smiled a warm be-careful-now smile. I chuckled, parents.

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