Zander watched the man walk back and forth in front of him, waving his hands in a persuasive way.  He knew the Abissen law enforcer wouldn’t just keep them this long for trespassing.  The prince’s idea was preposterous; he expected to make a bargain with them: their freedom for help in a war. What kind of freedom was he offering?  Zander hardly considered working for the enemy’s army to be freedom. Who’s to say that he would keep his promise to release them? The man would most likely use them as a new weapon against all that opposed his power.  Surely he didn’t think that they were that idiotic!

  Jaden kept a steady hand on his son’s shoulder, sensing that his anger was rising.

Calm down, son…

  Zander relaxed a little, but was still angry.  Who did this bastard think he was?  He paraded around and expected people to just give in to his every desire. Zander had a good mind to reach out and punch the prince, but his logical side kept him from doing such a reckless act, and Jaden was digging his fingers into his shoulder.

“Ow!”

  Zander looked back at his father and was met with a cool stare.  Sighing, he turned back to the speaker, rubbing his shoulder as he listened.

 “…Besides getting out of this jail, you will also get fifty grantess. I’m sure that you will find that after doing this act for me you will be much better off.”

Right, if the conceited rich boy actually keeps his word…

  Jaden gave his son a warning look, and Zander cowered a bit under it.  He pushed his son behind him to make certain that he didn’t do anything rash.

  Finally, the man was done and he looked upon his more gifted prisoners.  Smirking at the thought of using Jedi’s against those jungle dwellers.

“We’ll think about it,” Gavrin lied.

  The prince nodded his head and left the group, believing that he had made a great break-through and that he would finally win.  The planet would belong to his people alone; no inferior being would get in the way.

  Zander shot a venomous look at his uncle, “We’ll think about it?  Why are you giving into that asshole?”
 

  Gavrin looked at him and with an irritated tone responded quietly, “I’m not giving into anyone, Zander.  I’m getting us more time for escape.  That man most likely would’ve killed us off if we denied him what he was asking for, so I led him on, ok?”

  Zander went silent, feeling suddenly very sheepish.  The grown-ups were not amused; Gavrin looked at him with irritation and both Jedi’s stared down at him with a look that told him that he should’ve known better.

  Sighing silently, he walked away from glares and to his younger cousin, who smiled slightly and patted his arm. Kaster knew what it was to feel inferior at times. His father often came down hard on him and his grandfather was always so much wiser than he was.

  Zander smiled back then looked around the cell.  If he hoped to regain his dignity then he had better do something to help.  All he saw, though, were hard walls and beams of energy.  He could’ve helped them with getting the beams’ energy down, but the look in his father’s eyes told him that he’d better stay put.  He slumped down beside Kaster, forgetting completely about regaining his dignity.

  A small beeping noise drew their attention.  Zander looked down flabbergasted; it was Kaster’s communicator!  The guards hadn’t taken it away!

  Quickly, Kaster’s nimble fingers opened the top and looked into the screen.  Zander smiled, he’d never been so happy to see them in his entire life.

  They moved into the corner and spoke quietly to them,  “We’re at a city about five miles away from the house, to the North-East.”

  Krysta nodded in the screen, and absorbed the information.

  “The people are the Abissens, and the best time to enter the city would be at night.  They didn’t see Kaster and I until daylight.”

  “All right,” she said softly, “well, perhaps you’ll think before you run away next time.”
She raised an eyebrow at him, and held up Zander’s letter.

  Zander’s eyes narrowed in irritation, “Mom, not now…”

  “Fine,” she said calmly, raising her hands, “but we will talk about it later.” She stressed the word will, and raised her eyebrows in an enforcing way.
 
  Zander rolled his eyes: of all times to give him a lecture why now?  Hanging up the phone, he leaned against the wall, and looked down at Kaster.  “Parents,” he said simply, folding his arms.
 

Kaster smiled, “Can’t live with them, can’t live without them.”

  Zander nodded an affirmative, ignoring the glares he got from Jaden: even he had to admit that parents made mistakes and upon occasion lectured needlessly.

  Sighing, he folded his arms, and looked up at the grown men.  “They’re coming for us, so what do we do now?” he asked silently.

“We will look for an opening,” Shawn answered cautiously, looking through the bars at the walking guards.

  “If the law enforcers are as overly confident as that prince, it shouldn’t be too hard,” Zander said quietly, looking along the walls.  He’d seen light before, when he was lying on the ground.  There was a crack somewhere.

  He got up slowly, so as not to give himself another headache, then moved across the cell to where he’d lain.  He gestured vaguely to the crack above him, noticing a faint shimmer of light come through.

  As he began to scratch some of the dirt away, a strong hand took hold of Zander’s arm.
“What are you picking at?” a low, menacing voice asked.

“N…nothing,” Zander answered, his eyes widening.

  The man stepped closer in a threatening manor. “It had better be nothing, little boy.  Should I find your grimy fingers anywhere near the ceiling or floor, I’ll feed you to the beasts.”

  Zander’s hand was dropped, and he stood there tensely while the man made his way out of the cell and resumed his march up and down the prison hall.  He looked up to see Jaden looking over him.  Once again he’d been defeated, and proven to be unwise.

Patience, son, patience.

  Sighing for what seemed like the hundredth time, Zander hung his head.  He hated being the naive one in the group; it was degrading and humiliating.  At the small forest-town he was the least ignorant of all his age.  In fact, he knew more of life than those who were two years older: his school and class mates.

  Jaden sat his son down, were they began waiting for dusk.  Hopefully, if they were lucky, the coming of the night would bring the girls and more chances for deception.
 
 

………………………………………………………………………………………………
  Darkness fell quickly about them, cloaking them like a blanket.  The hills in the distance
could no longer be seen, and only a small glowing mechanism kept them going steadily.

  Zeana looked about her cautiously to see if her surroundings were like what she’d seen in her vision.  She was now certain that it had been on the planet, but couldn’t identify anything else that was exact.

  She glanced up at her mother, who was leading them through the jungle with ease. At least someone knows where they’re headed…  Zeana was glad to have her leading with the solder; it made her feel secure knowing that there were people with military background protecting the group.  It was the one time that Krysta’s commanding presence was of great use to her; it kept them all alive and alert. Instead of pushing her needlessly in areas of academics, Krysta’s persistence was keeping them going to the cell where her captive family members were.

  She looked around once more, hearing a noise.  Curiously, she stepped closer to the bush…

All turned quickly when a short scream was heard.

  “What the hell’s wrong?”  Cyera asked in a raised voice.  Her teal eyes were strangely wide.  She’s thought that the pre-teen had been killed until she’d turned around.

  Zeana stood rigid, staring at the jungle brush with shock in her eyes.  She pointed toward the brush and stammered a few words about some short creature with pointy ears.

Cyera looked at her with even more shock. The girl has gone insane!

  Something in the brush moved, and all stood quietly with wondering eyes.  Finally, something emerged.  It was a very skinny creature that looked to be about three feet tall, had pointy ears, and to their astonishment, had very piercing green eyes that penetrated all that looked.  It looked like some kind of forest demon. Were they dreaming?

It stepped back shyly from the human gazes, huddling into a small ball.

  Cyera looked at the creature with a newfound gentleness.  It was small child.  “It’s all right,” she said soothingly, kneeling down on one leg to the ground. “My name’s Cyera, what is yours?”

  He looked up shyly, and murmured his name softly.

“What did you say?”

“Logan,” he said. His voice was barely audible, and he still crouched into a tiny ball.
 

“What is the name of your people?”  Zeana asked.

  “We are called the Progie. We have lived in the jungles of this planet for many years,” he said as he began standing up.  “Who are you?”

  “Just call us human travelers,” Cyera answered with a slight smirk,  “My friend and some of his relatives were captured by some people in an industrial city.”

The boy cocked his head, “What is meant by industrial city?”

  Krysta smiled, “It’s a bunch of tall buildings built together where they make things and sell them.”

“You mean the strange white peaks to the west?” he asked with eyes lighting up.

They nodded vigorously.  “Can you tell us how to get there from here?” Krysta asked.

  A smile crept upon the small face, and his eyes filled with excitement.  “Come, I will lead you!”

  The group ran after the Progie boy as he hoped quickly among the leaves, following a path seen only by himself.

  Logan was very swift and full of what seemed like far too much energy.  Even the muscular solder struggled to keep up.  He seemed like some kind of sprite from the old fairy tales.

  An Elf!  That’s what the boy reminded Zeana of.  She’d read about them in her ancient mythology club.  The only difference in appearance was his height; Elves were often no taller than four inches.  His personality seemed very different from them however; he didn’t seem mischievous at all.

  Their new companion led them to the city in what seemed like a mere five minutes.  Either they were closer than they had thought, or that boy really knew how to move people quickly!

  Cyera looked around the white city carefully, scanning to see if there were any immediate dangers.  She found none.

“You should go back home now, Logan, there may be trouble,” Krysta told him quietly.

  Logan shook his head and refused to budge, telling them that they might need his help, that he could do something.  When they finally left, thinking that they’d convinced him, he hid behind a building and waited for them to come back.  From what little he’d been told about this place, he knew that it was going to be hard to get out and away safely.

………………………………………………………………………………………………

   Jaden looked up at the ceiling of the cell as tapping noises began to sound.  He knocked back softly with one knuckle, and the tapping ceased.  Giving a glance to his father, he notified all awake that it was time for each to do their part.

  He woke Zander quickly, and put a finger over his lips to show that he was to be very quiet.  The pre-teen rose slowly, and looked at him inquisitively, his eyes asking what he was supposed to do.

  Jaden pointed to the hole where moon light crept into the cell, and told him to be as inconspicuous as possible.

  Zander dug at the hole quietly, while Kaster kept an eye out for guards.  Jaden and Shawn worked on taking the beams and mechanical security devises off-line, while Gavrin looked for any other traps or alarms within the cell.

  Soon, everything was off-line, and Gavrin confirmed that nothing could be seen in the ways of extra security.  Cautiously, all of dug at the hole in the ceiling: hoping to make an opening big enough for them to crawl through.

  Zander looked about him warily; this had been too easy.  There had to be more than this, but then again they could be naïve like the prince had been about them.  A dark feeling still hung over him; the situation simply didn’t feel right.

  A loud clash made Zander spin.  Metal bars had come between him and his family.  As he turned, he heard an irritating cackle.

  “Well, well, it appears that you’ve fallen for it.  You’d had a chance to get out of that cell, but instead you decided to fall into a trap.  Definitely not the choice I would have taken, but then, I’m not you now am I?”  He smiled a mocking smile at the group, “You, know, it’s a pity.  I could have given you so much, but I suppose that it’s too late now. Perhaps if you had…”

“Oh, shut up!”

  The outburst came from Zander.  He stood defiantly with his arms folded, glaring coolly at the arrogant man.   “We’re not going to listen to your speech about how you’ve supposedly fooled us, so go tell it to someone else.”

“My, my, quite the sprit you have.  You’ll die first.  Guards!”

  A blaster wall came down in front of the cell, and from it a gas was released, making Zander coughing violently.
 

  On impulse, Jaden made the bars between them rise, and held Zander to him.  Sticking his hand into the left wall of the cell, Jaden pulled out a circuit from which one of the beams had come. He worked quickly, pulling some things out of the wall, and made a crude laser sword.  With it, he chopped at the ceiling above him and made an opening.

  Zander was out first, gasping for breath as the others made their way through.  He looked up to see his sister, mother, friend, and some big guy wearing camouflage.

  He grinned slightly when Cyera knelt beside him.  “It’s about time,” he said, mischievous humor shining in his eyes.

  She looked at him just as mischievously, “If you start with that attitude I’ll have to chop away your manhood.”

  Zander amused her by giving her a fake terrified look and putting a protective hand over the crotch if his pants.

  He rose slowly with her help, and stood stiff as he tried to get rid of the pain in his head.  The weakness is worsening…

  “You’ll be all right once you get some rest,” Jaden assured him.  His eyes scanned the prison site quickly; preparing him for anything that could come.  “Unfortunately, son, now is not the time for it.”

  A siren behind them went off, and they ran toward the jungle.  Zander and Kaster were carried across the city and into the jungle.

  Logan hollered for them to follow him; no one argued.  As they ran after the Progie boy, the scenery changed quickly.  When they finally stopped they found themselves in the heart of the jungle, surrounded by his people.  The siren was no longer heard, and as far as they could tell, no one had followed them.

  Zander and his cousin were put down, and found themselves stared at by many strange creators.

“These are my people,” Logan explained to his newer companions, “The Progie.  This is our home.”

  Zander stepped back as an Abissen stepped out with a cluster of people.  The stranger held up his arms, “It’s all right I’m a friend to you and these people.  I’m a scientist.”

  When the scientist was still looked at with disbelief, he went on to explain that he was an outcast to his people, and they considered him a disgrace to his people.  He was as much against the Abissens as their group was.