“Keep looking forward.” she continued.
Followed by who? How long have they been tailing us?
Terra, who was now alert and focused on evading our pursuer, grabbed my arm and moved up beside me. She slid between me and Tath and whispered something – – to him, probably alerting him of our pursuer.
I turned my head slightly, and looked out of the corner of my eye, but was pulled by the arm.
“What did I tell you?.” Terra hissed.
“Sorry, I couldn’t help it.”
I didn’t get much of a good look at the person behind us, but I saw that it was a short and thin figure with a hood that obscured their face. Hopefully, they hadn’t noticed that we had caught on.
The elevator and the two guards positioned there were just in our sights. Suddenly a loud thud halted all of the previous chatter and music on the floor. A few screams interrupted the short silence, and a commotion of whispers sprang through the crowd.
“What was that?” Tath asked.
We all looked around to find the source of the loud noise that echoed through the hall. I used the confusion as a chance to find the hooded figure, but I couldn’t find them.
Where the hell did they go?
“Let’s go, before something else happens,” Terra said, motioning me to the almost empty area in front of the elevator.
As we were leaving the crowd, my poncho hood was tugged, pulling me back deeper into the crowd. A pair of muscular arms were now wrapped around me, along with a barbaric stench that almost made me throw up on the spot.
Who the hell…?
I looked up to see who my captor was. It was a large tan man with a shaved head and tattoos up and down his arm. He grimaced at me, showing his stained teeth his disgusting breath seeped through them. He looked familiar, but my face was distorted from the foul smell, and could barely open my eyes.
“Come on, freak.” the man said, with a deep laugh.
I tried to free myself by kicking and thrashing but it was no use. The man was much larger than I was and his grip on my body became tighter, as he tried to pull me away.
“You there unhand him.” I heard Tath shout.
Tath was facing my captor, with his hand ready to draw the saber at his side. Terra was busy doing crowd control, in case something – a potential brawl– happened. One of the elevator guards joined her as more people gathered around, while the other stood ready to jump in.
“Looks like the boy is cuddling up with these Corzon’s” the man laughed while pulling my hood down.
I heard assortments of gasps, and chatter from the crowd, most likely because they noticed who I was.
“Look at him sneaking around with these guards, pretending to be one of them.” he continued, pointing at my escorts.
His voice sounded familiar but I couldn’t make it out. A few shouts in agreement came from the spectators. I could see their fear and confusion out of the corner of my eye.
“Yeah, you tell em’ Argo!”
Argo? As in Argo, the third in command of The Sands?
That Argo?
“This is none of your concern. Unhand the boy now and I’ll overlook this incident.” Tath replied.
“Come on, we all saw it, that freaky power in the arena. We need explanations, or rather would you like me to show everyone a demonstration?” he said as he squeezed my ribcage.
Tath drew a rapier-like sword from the scabbard that sat on his hip. “Final Warning.”
“We just wanna see what's so important about these magical freaks. After all the rumors on this ship, now we’ve got one of our own. Right before our eyes. Isn’t that right champ?”
“Let go of me!” I argued.
There I was, standing between Tath and his rapier, and Argo's monstrous body. I was confident that he was even bigger than Shen. I looked around to see if anyone would help me, but they were petrified to even stand up to both Argo and a Corzon guard.
I looked over to Terra, her hands ready to draw her weapons as she eyed the crowd for any lurking Sands members. She carried two short blades on both sides of her hip, both concealed in sheaths.
Tath was preparing a stance in the middle of the audience around us, that was growing even larger from the commotion. I’m sure that a few guards were trying to make their way through it, but were caught up in the chaos. And I doubt the way the crowd was behaving towards the guards, they wouldn’t be let through easily.
“I knew this was a bad idea,” Tath said as he shook his head and sighed.
“Very well.”
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