Did he just punch me? But how, he was so fast…so I guess he was telling the truth about being stronger than me here. I don’t like that.

“I’m only going to take so much abuse, hit me that hard again and when were back in the real worl-“

Aaghhh! I couldn’t see it happen, but I look down and see his foot is lodged into my rib cage. I see another blur. Aghh!

I land a few feet away. I can’t breathe. Every breath makes it feel like more bones are breaking. I think he just lifted me off the ground with a kick.

“We don’t have time to learn slowly, you need to be able to fight off the dark one as soon as you can. If only I had this type of training, knowledge back when I was it’s slave, perhaps I could of freed myself too. Do you realise how big of a gift I am giving you right now? You can tell me to go away now, but trust me when you become my age and look back at your life, you will regret not taking my offer to help now.”

Screw this guy. I raise my fist, and see lines starting to draw all around me. I just need to hit him hard enough to show him that he can’t push me around in here. Push…I think I know what to do. I put all my energy into trying to create a force, I need to push these lines towards him!

I take one deep breathe, I can feel my body telling me what to do. I swing my fist at him as if I were trying to actually punch him from a few feet away. Immediately, I see all the black lines launch towards him with my fist. My first stops when my arm is fully extended, but the black lines surrounding my body are still flying at the same speed. As soon as they hit him I see blood. It looks like they sliced right through him- Wha….What.

I can see Khalid healing in front of my own eyes. Not just healing, the blood on his robes and cutes are disappearing too.

“Wonderful, and don’t look so shocked, remember this is my mind your fighting not my body.”

That’s not going to do. This guy deserves some real pain. I focus on the dark, try to bring as much of it into me as possible. This time I’m going to hurt him so bad he has a headache back in the real world too. I feel it, I haven’t let this much energy build up in me before, I look at my arms, underneath my tattered collared shirt I can see both of my arms are covered in the dark now, this is way more than just my fist. Way more power.

But my body isn’t telling me to cut, before I could feel it like instinct. Could feel it like I felt any other urge. But now what I’m feeling is…to let it stay in me. Use it in me. I feel… I feel strong, fast, confident. I feel invincible. My body is telling me to do something else now. I launch at Khalid, he’s a few feet away but I get there in an instant. Faster than I thought I could get over there. He looks shocked too. Good.

I swing my fist and hit him so fast that I could barely track my own arm. It almost feels like I hit nothing, but Khalid is sent flying. He lands in some sand at least two body lengths away. He looks like he’s in pain. But not enough, I’m going to-

“That’s quite enough.”

He’s already on his feet, but how? I hit him harder than anyone could hit anyone, harder than he hit me.

“You impressed me, strengthening your body with the dark. A dangerous technique I’m sure, letting it fuse with you like that will only quicken your descent I’m sure. But combining that with your new push technique, if we can do those two things consistently….that could increase your control over the dark considerably. Maybe enough that I can start to teach you some mind tricks, to fight the dark off.”

Screw that, I’m – I’m --- dammit…what’s going on. I feel something else now, I look down at my arms, I can see the darkness slipping off my arms, evaporating into thin air right after. I guess I can’t do this for that long. Dammit, I wanted to hurt him more.

“You almost look sad its going away, the person I met in the hotel would have been more scared than sad. Your changing so fast, I wonder how long until…until you’ve changed too much. Nevertheless, let’s end our training here. We could spend much more time, but the more energy we exert the more danger there is of that thing finding us, and if she does I’m dead and your….. well something worse than dead I’m sure.”

This is good, I just need to keep getting stronger, Khalid will train me to use my powers and help me get rid of the dark lady, this is the perfect plan. He just wants me to stop helping her, and I just want to find my mom. Perfect.

“Now that you’ve had a taste of what I can do for you, let us discuss the terms of our agreement.”

What.

“In return for my teachings, I want you to tell me everything you know about how you became involved with the dark lady.”

….wait my mother, he’ll know about my mother. I can’t tell him, what if he goes after her. I’ll make up some fake story a-

“I will tell you my story first.”

..His story?

“So that you feel comfortable telling me yours. Now lets begin. Its not a long story, but it is a memorable one. When I was younger than you are no-”

“WAKE UP! WAKE UP NOW!”

What was that, it was like the sky was yelli-

My eyes are forced open. Did she force me awake? Wait…what is this, who are these people?