Far miles away from Bion City, to the western-south of Westeros, tiny drops of rain continued falling from the sky with deafening thunder sounds and strikes cracking through the canopies of the tall trees. Leaves floated in the air, falling with the same speed at which the rain descended.
The dried stoned earth now wet, filled with countless stones and sticky sand, shook as brown wheels marked with tiny lines of hardship rolled on top of it, pressing hard on the jagged stones.
Black silk cloth covered the top of the caravan, extending from the top of the driver's head to twenty feet length back, flopping at the side as the heavy wind tore in the sky. Lightning stirred from the sky to the side and front of the driver's, striking and leaving him dead without even uttering a word.
With no driver to control the van, its head trembled, breaking loose and leaving a portion of its length uncontrollable. Inside the fifteen-cart left behind, wide eyes darted around in the thick dark texture untouched by light.
Voices of women and children crying kept on echoing every time the base of the cart slammed into a raised rock. Hands drummed from the inside of the cart as it crashed into a tree and stopped, only for half of it to be hanging at the end of a cliff.
…
"We have to reach there before the village falls into the hands of the creatures," Gray said, placing his hand on the window of the seat beside the driver's. He moved his hands out through the now-opened window, letting the rain fall on his clenched fist, wetting his gloves.
He closed his eyes, imagining how the operation Kai and Max were leading was going and smiled, opening his palms to feel the rain more.
He gestured toward the man dressed in a black suit, steering the bus to stop when they moved past a long cart suspending dangerously at the tip of the cliff, and a curled tree.
"Stop the car!" Gray said, opening the door and stepping into the harsh rain.
Slowly, he walked nearer, stopping an inch from the cart, and moved sideways, trying to see how long the cliff was, and also the length of the bus being suspended. He slipped, nearly falling from the cliff, but managed to loosen the speed at which he was sliding on the wet ground.
Luckily for him, he held on to a branch of the curved tree, but unluckily, the branch he held onto was the same branch holding the cart from falling.
"Help! Help us!"
Screams echoed from inside the cart, as he tried pulling himself upward, followed by drumming sounds that even pushed the cart forward, adding more weight to the suspended side.
Instinctively, Gray rose from the ground, gripped the metal hinges, and tried pulling it by his own strength, which for a moment helped the cart from slipping off completely. But as the stone he locked his leg on broke and slipped, the screams echoed again.
There, he whistled, signaling everyone in the bus to come out and help him, but failed to pull the cart when it slipped from his hands and stopped at three weak trees at the side of the cliff.
"Throw me the rope!" Gray shouted, raising himself slightly and gesturing toward the now fourteen men all dressed in black uniforms, standing still with stunned expressions.
Within seconds, a two-by-five thick rope twisted and merged tighter flew in the air and landed beside Gray.
He took it, rolled it in the air forming an invisible circle, and threw it, letting it curl and tie itself around the moon shape of the cart. He held the rope, shook it until his men began pulling the rope.
"Pull…" he shouted, adding his left arm to the rope, pulling.
After about a minute, noticing the cart coming upward, he loosened his grip on the rope and rushed forward, grabbing the section of the cart visible to him and began pulling it with his might.
Footsteps echoed around him, but he bothered not to check and kept on pulling until he felt the cart lighter in his arms as his men joined him in pulling it backward.
"Thank you," a woman said, coming out of the opened cart and clutching her fingers around a newly born baby on her shoulder, crying.
Gray stood there watching as every last person in the cart descended. He looked at them and smiled, remembering Kai as he saw the boy to be of the same age as Kai.
"Boy, what's your name?" he said, walking toward the six-year-old-looking boy.
"My… my name is Ryo," the boy said, tilting his head around and scanning the faces of all the men dressed in black.
"Where is your mother?" Gray said, but stopped the boy from answering when a roaring sound echoed from the distance ahead of them.
He tore his gaze to his men, alerting them of the danger ahead, but still went and sat in the bus, still looking at the boy he'd met.
A young man with thick brown eyes and black hair darting around his shoulders ran to Gray, placing his hands at his sides as he stiffened his body.
"Sir, what should we do with them?" he asked, respectfully greeting and straightening his face.
"Let them occupy the second bus, drive them out of this place, and take them to the City of Bion. Feed them till they want no more."
"Sir, what about…?"
"Just do what I've said. Remember to help Kai and Max take good care of the barracks," Gray said, tapping on Kinji's shoulder.
Tears welled in Kinji's eyes as he stood there watching as the engine of the bus got sparked and began moving at high speed. He remained still till he saw no trace of it before calling the people and arranging them in the bus.
"Sir, come back and give us the training you promised to give some of us after we're done with Bion military training."
He sparked the bus three times before setting off and turning the steer in a three-sixty, and stepped on the accelerator, moving at high speed. Evaporated air spiraled around the tires wherever the bus passed, leaving the pattern of the tires behind.