13 The Nightmare

'Dad, I want to go to Saloran Academy!'

'Kiddo I don't think you're ready for school just yet,' my father told me gently.

'But I'm seven now! Everyone starts attending an Academy at seven.' At least, that's what my best friend James was doing.

'And what if you lose control again?' my father asked as he looked me in the eye. Right, this is serious. I've got to think it through.

'Uh… I'll be careful! That way I won't lose control!'I said with pride. That had to be the right answer! My Dad smiled and gave a small laugh.

Then my Mom said, 'Kyrie you will lose control, again. And this time you will hurt the other children. You can NOT go to an academy.' When did mom get here? The plan was to get Dad on my side, so he could help me convince Mom. Wait, she said I'd lose control.

Does she trust me so little? 'But I've been doing really well. And I'll be careful I promise.'

'Kyrie stop this your already losing control!'

'Wha no I'm not! I'm-'

'Do we have to send you to the basement?'

What!? No, no. I can't do it. I can't go back to that place. That deep, dark, hell. I can never go there, again. Trapped, alone, chained, in that horrible place. "P-please no." I pleaded. I just might not make it out of that place if they send me there.

"Kyrie? Are you okay?"

Did someone just touch me? Oh, Legends they did. No sane person would be near me. Unless. Unless they were taking me there. To that large, creepy, carved, stone door. Down that never-ending set of stairs. To the room. My room. It was slipping. The door I have to keep closed was slipping. That door so eerily similar to the one leading to that place.

The room was getting colder, why was it colder now? No. No, it couldn't be, was-was some taking me there! "Shit!" Dad, is that dad?

Oh, my feet are on the ground.

"WAKE UP!"

Wake? Up?

♢ ♢ ♢

Kyrie blinked and glanced at the person trapped under him, then around his unfamiliar room. Where is this? What happened? Dad's not… he's… right. Seventeen not seven.

"Dude could you move?" DJ asked with his cheek shoved into the carpeted floor. His left arm was pinned under his body. And his right ached in Kyrie's grasp. DJ had tried to wake Kyrie up. That had been a mistake. It sounded like Kyrie'd been through a lot – was haunted by a lot.

"Sh-shit," Kyrie said as he scrambled to get away from DJ and his other teammates, who were standing in the doorway to his and DJ's room. As Kyrie scrambled for distance from them his back hit a wall. There was no more room to escape. He couldn't leave. And that horrid door.

Kyrie sank to the ground with his knees in front of himself and his head between them. He needed to breathe. In. Hold. Out.

In. Hold. Out. Check if the door is still sealed. Good, it's still closed.

Did it open when he wasn't aware of it? Yes. Shit, how much energy did he take in? Could he contain his current aura? No, yes. Kyrie fingers dug into his hair. He'd try. He had to try.

"DJ are you okay?" Centra asked as she watched her boyfriend roll and stretch his right shoulder. Centra kept her telepathy focused on how Kyrie was doing, just in case she had to use it on him like she had a moment ago.

"Uh, yeah. I'm fine," DJ said as he watched Kyrie. Kyrie was fast. Even when he was a sleep, he was fast. "Turns out I can get a lesson in self-defense every time I try to wake Kyrie up. How about we make this a regular thing, Kyrie?" DJ joked in an attempt to ease the tension.

"NO! We are not doing that!" Kyrie gasped as he focused on his breathing. His right hand anxiously rubbing at the ribbon on his left wrist. They should leave him alone. Being here – being around him wasn't safe. His mother was right he shouldn't have come here.

Liza glared at DJ. "Is this really the time for jokes?"

"Maybe not but you didn't hear him in his sleep, Liza."

"Shouldn't that have made it even more apparent that this is the wrong time?"

"Guy's stop. Arguing it is not going to help. Why don't you pups grab DJ's things and take them to my room? I'll try to help Kyrie," Centra said as she bit her lip. How do you help someone through a panic attack? Was moving DJ out the best choice?

As the others grabbed DJ's things, DJ watched Kyrie. "Kyrie? Do you want me to move out? You seemed excited about this earlier."

"DJ, he was thinking about wanting to be left alone, that's why I said to grab your things."

"Yeah, but maybe we should wait until he's not having a panic attack to do this? What someone thinks or says in the heat of the moment isn't always what they want later," DJ said.

Centra glanced between DJ and Kyrie. She was worried that Kyrie and Raven Clof were right, that Kyrie was a danger to those around him. She just wanted to keep DJ safe. But then safe wasn't a part of the job description of a LegendSlayer was it? Centra sighed and said, "I guess we should wait."

Centra and the others each found a comfortable place to wait. Centra sat on the floor next to Kyrie. DJ sat across from Kyrie and talked about various things in an attempt to distract him. James sat next to the door and watched the others. Liza was perched on DJ's bunk. Eventually, she got into an argument with DJ about what good music was.

40 minutes later, DJ and Liza managed to get a laugh from Kyrie and pull him into the argument. Centra smiled and joined in, glad that her boyfriend was very distracting and kind. Even if he makes jokes at the wrong time.

All of the team, but Jasper chatted into the early morning. Eventually, they decided that DJ would continue to room with Kyrie and fell asleep in their various positions. Liza fell asleep on DJ's bunk snuggling his pillow, Centra was sleeping under a blanket with her head on Kyrie's shoulder to reassure him that he wasn't alone. DJ was stretched out into the center of the room, with his head lolling to one side and drooling a bit. Jasper left the room not long after his teammates had finally fallen asleep for the night.