The more he tried to escape from the hallucinations, the worse his condition became. He was like a headless fly barging head first into the window pane just because it could see its freedom outside.
The toxins began to drive him mad slowly as blood leaked out of his fresh wounds. The old tamer wasn't at all concerned about the wounds as he had bigger monsters to defeat in his mind. He began to run around and bumped into things. He fell down hard each time but the fear wouldn't let him stay in place.
The old Tamer suffered from the same fate for a few more minutes before lying completely still. Of course, the time he thought he had suffered for and the time he had truly suffered weren't the same at all. The mind was a mysterious thing and could change the perception of time whenever humans were too excited or too afraid. That's why time passed quickly when one was happy and passed slowly when one was in pain.
The old Tamer's idea worked to a fault. He had been hoping that a swarm of the poisonous wasps would be able to easily take down an A rank mage.
He was following along the lines of the theory that said even ants could take on an elephant if they were in sufficient numbers. He just hoped that the number of wasps he would ultimately tame would be enough to take care of a high ranking mage like Clara.
Ironically, he ended up testing his theory on himself. He became the first victim of his own scheme which he had not even had the time or the opportunity to use. He hadn't even lasted a minute. The experiment could even be considered a huge success. Unfortunately, he was no longer in the world to record those results.
…
"Come on Zach, are you really going to leave me hanging like that?"
Clara's voice, sweet as tangerine, sang its way into Zach's ears. Her puppy eyes lingered on him suggestively. She drew even closer to him;
"Don't act you don't know what I mean! You still haven't told me how that story ends. Don't be mean!"
Zach threw his head back, and chuckled.
She practically clung to him like a second sleeve. Zach could not shake her off even if he wanted to. Her voice, firm and assertive, she stubbornly pressed on;
"Tell me Zach! Tell me what happens next before I loose my mind!"
Zach found it fairly amusing- all of it.
Clara's stature was kind of misleading. She had that petite, cute, small girl thing going for her. But that was just about where it ended. It did not take much to get on her bad side.
As Zach regarded her through his drooping eyelids, he knew that she was more than capable of lashing out at him in ways he would never see her coming.
Zach sighed;
"Well, where were we?"
Delighted, Clara's energetic self entered a whole new gear of excitement;
"Yes!" She adjusted to face him properly. "Before we were rudely interrupted by that big bad rhino, you were saying something about a skeleton key???"
…
After a full hour and a half, Zach finally managed to steal away from her, with the promise that he would find her later that night.
Of course. It was all but a ploy to get away.
As Zach trudged his way back to his room, for the first time in a hot minute, it was looking like he could afford some free time for himself!
Alone in his room, Zach began the first itenerary on his to do list.
On his carpet, seated cross legged in meditative stance, and with his arms stretched out on his knees, he inhaled deep, rich gusts of air, filling his lungs in preparation for the meditation to come. Zach closed his eyes and his own thoughts echoed in his mental space;
'Finally, some peace. . .'
Fully submerged in the feeling of nothingness, he allowed himself to simply exist. Slowly, he began to become unaware of his surroundings, and more aware of himself- his inner self.
Zach began to distance himself from the humid climate of his room. He no longer perceived the fruity scent of the pineapples on his desk. The cooling effect from the occasional gentle breeze was lost on Zach completely. Zach became so still, and his breathing so controlled, that he would have passed as a coma patient.
He wanted one thing only- the undisputed power that came with weilding lightsaber. But to do that. he needed to develop his ability to tap into the force. And as luck would have it, meditation just so happened to be the one true path to getting jiggy with the force.
However, Zach was quick to find out that it was not as easy as he had thought. Gradually, despite having perfect mental coordination, his concentration began to wane.
"Oh screw this!" He cursed as he broke formation; "This isn't working at all. System, proffer the fastest possible solutions to tap into the force!"
An embarassing silence screamed back at him.
He glanced at lightsaber resting on his knees. With renewed zeal, he crossed his knees again, placed lighsaber across his knees for motivation.
Very slowly, he went into meditation- again.
Cross-legged, eyes closed, and heartbeat so dangerously low, he took the journey into a supremely meditative state once again.
At the base of his existence, he felt his consciousness slowly link with his spirit. He felt himself getting sucked deeper and deeper into the chasm that was his own self. In the process, Zach completely lost all concept of time.
Perhaps an hour had passed. Maybe even two- or more.
BANG! BANG!! BANG!!!
It was his door.
Zach heard it, but he was submerged so deep in his introspective astral journey, that it genuinely felt like it was coming from a long way off. It sounded like something at the edge of a dream, like some faraway land. The annoying, violent disruptive knocking came again.
BANG! BANG!! BANG!!!
Zach could not hold back on his temper.
He finally opened his eyes, and spun his head wildly in the direction of the door.
"WHO THE FUCKK IS THAT???"
"Zachyyy it's me!"
Shit, he froze. That was a voice he knew all too well.
"Come on! You promised you'd finish the story about the wizard boy!! Let me in Zach!"
When he realized it was already late evening. Jeez! Had it been that long already?! It felt like he had only closed his eyes for a few seconds! At best, a couple of minutes! But apparently he had been out for at least a few hours. While he figured out what to do, stubbornly, Clara began to tug at the door handle, trying to force her way in, despite not being invited.
Zach jumped to his feet quickly, and began to search for a way out! Zach bounded towards the other side of his room. Already breaking out in cold sweat, he deftly leaped over his bed, narrowly avoiding crashing into the six feet vintage lamp, and glided towards the window lintel.
Heart racing, he found the bolt and detached it, with the hope of giving Clara the slip.
But it was all over in an instant.
Just as Zach's feet was touching down on the other side, Clara's petite form came lunging at him like a small, portable rocket. She virtually came out of nowhere. And as Zach was not expecting her at all, her right shoulder came hurling at him, and caught him right in the gut.
"You thought you were slick huh?" she sneered at him as she got up, "Nice try. But you got me all hot and bothered about mister Potter and his friends. You're not going anywhere Zach. So, shall we?"
She stretched out her hand to him.
Zach, still on the ground, smiled mischevously as he took her hand;
"Sure. . ."
As he pretended to pull himself up by her hand, Zach suddenly burst forward. This surge of strength pulled Clara towards the ground. And to make sure she fell, he playfully set his foot to trip her. Clara ended up paying the full price for being too trusting. She came crashing down, and she crashed down hard.
Zach tore off in the opposite direction immediately, eager to put some distance between them. However, Clara had pulled a nasty trick of her own. In that brief tussle, she had snatched something that levelled the plane field- Lightsaber.
"Zach!" she called out after him; "Look what you dropped!
Zach was no child. There was no way he would fall for that. Not until Clara said;
"Am I also a jeddi now?"
Zach decelerated so hard and so fast, he spun a complete one hundred and eighty, only to see her holding the hilt of his sword.
"Clara. . ." his voice dropped several decibels lower; "That is no toy. . . hand it over."
Though he genuinely wanted to keep her from hurting herself, he had inadvertently told Clara that she had something of grave importance to him. Zach saw the silent streak of insanity flash in her eyes. It was the same insane streak he had seen in her eyes before she rode off to battle.
He held his breath as she stretched it out towards him invitingly;
"If you want it. . ." her voice was dripping with heavy sarcasm; "all you have to do is come get it. . ."
With a dash that was so quick, even her shadow could not follow, Clara sprinted on her heels and tore away in the opposite direction.
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