Off The Grid: A War With No End Book 1 Read online

  Chapter 2

  When I woke up, the first thing I noticed was that my entire arm was on fire. Not figuratively speaking, but quite literally. Not only did my arm hurt like the backside of Hell, but it was actually burning. Orange flames danced across my arm, jiggling merrily to their own happy tune of pain, sorrow, and death.

  I screamed, and wiggled my arm around like a wet noodle. While doing so, I managed to set fire to my bed, clothes, and just about everything else within ten feet of me.

  I ran out of my room screaming madly, and bowled into someone. They lunged away from me, and rolled around on the floor madly. Of course, THEIR fire went out. Not mine. I was still on fire. What fun!

  Clearly running madly in circles like a beheaded chicken doesn’t put the fire out. I’m not sure why, it should work. A blast of white foam washed over me, almost sending me flying with its sheer force. The stream continued for a few more seconds before stopping, and leaving me covered in foam. “Thanks.”

  The woman holding the fire extinguisher (Yes, that’s right. Few hundred years in the future and this is still the best way we have to put out a fire quickly) glared at me, and swung the extinguisher at my head like a bat.

  I narrowly dodged it, and the wind blew some of the foam on the top of my head away. “What was that for?” I yelled.

  She swiped at me again, and I lunged out of the way. I turned and sprinted away from her as fast as I could. Jeesh, that was the second time that day too. I ran all the way back to the Council chambers, and burst inside. They all stared at me for a moment, and then burst out yelling. Guards charged inside, and leveled their guns at me. I yelped, and threw myself to the ground. Just so you know; the sound of laser beams is not a ‘pew pew’ noise. It’s more of a constipated Giant trying to use the toilet. The loud roar of the light weapons roared above me, and several red beams shot over me, burning through the walls and sizzling to nothing.

  “Wait, don’t shoot! It’s me, Drake Jinx!” I yelled.

  The guards ignored me, and prepared to shoot again. The Council member who had talked to me before stood up and held out his hand. “Mr. Jinx, what on earth happened to you?”

  I groaned. “Crap. Crap happened to me.”

  He smirked, and waved for the guards to lower their weapons. “Don’t make any threatening moves.” One of the guards warned.

  I nodded agreeably. I didn’t want to turn into a fry roast any more than the next man. I raised my arms above my head, and tried to look unthreatening.

  That’s when my arm caught fire again. Why me? I dove to the floor once more and barely managed to dodge the red beams. “Hold your fire!”

  The guards all propped their guns back up on the floor and froze into motionless human statues. The Council member inspected my flaming appendage carefully. After a moment, he tossed me a little box. I snatched it from the air, or that was what I wanted to do. Instead, I smacked it across the room and it bounced off Rusty, who was just entering the Council room.

  “Blast it, Jinx. Get your crap together,” he growled.

  I reddened and hurried over to him to pick the box up. I opened it to reveal a silver chain necklace with a small golden pendant picturing a flame. Carefully, I picked it up with my flaming hand, and slipped it over my head. Instantaneously, the fire rushed from my arm into the little necklace. It shimmered brightly, and then returned to normal.

  “Thank you, Council. Could you explain to me why…that happened? I have never heard or read about it.”

  One of the Council members nodded. “You are correct. As one of the Council said before, you are expendable. Therefore, you make a wonderful research subject. We tried altering the Leap so it would also give the capacity to control fire. It appears we failed, considering you have no control over that flame and it is restricted to the arm that touched the device that allowed you to gain the power to Leap.”

  I frowned, but there was nothing I could complain about. Half of the Council wanted me dead, and I don’t think they care how. “May I head off now?”

  A Councilwoman frowned. “You need to know how to use the power, don’t you?”

  I shook my head. “No, I’ve studied the subject thoroughly. I believe I can easily control the Leap.”

  “Very well. Before you go, wait for your partner. We can’t just let you gain an unparalleled power and then allow you to traipse off where you will, can we?”

  I sighed. There go my dreams of vacations on warm, sandy beaches with clear blue waters and laser cannons with optical scopes carried by dragons…whoops. Going off track there.

  “So, will my new slavedriv…eh, partner be here soon?” I asked.

  A Council member opened his mouth to respond, but I felt a slight heat in my right shoulder. I leaped to the floor, and the beam shot over my head, slamming into the ground a few feet away from me. I scrambled away from the blast while turning to see who had shot at me.

  The doors opened, and the crazy fire extinguisher wielding woman from before strode in. I yelped, and dove behind a table. “Not her! She’s got it out for me, I tell ‘ya!” I yelled.

  Once I got a better look at her, I had to admit that I was impressed. She had straight black hair and two piercing grey eyes. She was wearing combat boots and practically had an arsenal strapped to her body. She also had more muscles than everyone else in the room combined, if I didn’t count Rusty’s robotic form.

  She stalked over to me and yanked me upright. “I don’t like you, but the Council told me to baby-sit you while you waltz around trying to build an army. I’m still sure a rock would make a better commander than you would.” She spat.

  I shrugged. “Well, since your head is full of them maybe you should take over…”

  I leaped over the tabletop to avoid her tackle, and she nearly crashed into a Council member. “Enough! Mr. Jinx, you will go to the Void immediately, and do not return here until you have an army strong enough to defeat this strange army. Lilly will be going with you. Now get out of our sight.”

  And with that, the entire Council stood up as one and strode out of the room, leaving Lilly and I alone. She glared at me. “Let’s get this over already so someone stabs you and I can go back home.”

  “If I get stabbed, you aren’t going home since you won’t be able to exit the Void,” I grumbled.

  I walked up to her, and placed a hand on her shoulder. So, that part was over. All I need to do now is manage to use the slight knowledge I learned from reading documentaries from people who could Leap to attempt to do that very thing. Maybe I should have listened to their explanation?

  I closed my eyes, and immediately noticed faint green lines in the darkness. I focused more of my attention on them, and they moved around like a pit of snakes, forming into a green cubic Grid. I opened my eyes, and the green cube stayed suspended in my vision. I dragged Lilly through the doors towards the cube, and it slowly got larger as we walked across the hall.

  “Where are you taking me?” Lilly growled, and knocked my hand from her shoulder.

  “Cork it. You’ll see in a moment,” I muttered, and grabbed her shoulder again. The green cube was now so large I couldn’t see the top. I carefully walked past one of the green lines, and when nothing happened, continued towards the center.

  Moments later, I saw it. Just as the books had described, there was a green circle in the middle of the Grid. I walked over onto the circle, and a wave of darkness washed over us. I could hear Lilly screaming something about stabbing thousands of little harmless puppies in front of me if I didn’t stop using my foul magic on her. Ignoring her, I looked around in fascination as faint green lines began to etch themselves across the darkness in front of me.

  There were so many, I couldn’t have counted them all in a hundred lifetimes. The green cube appeared in front of us again, and then shrunk itself down to a size that was about the size of a basketball. “That’s amazing!” I whispered.

  Lilly was holding a gun towards my head. “What did you do?” she cried.
br />   “I activated the Leap. Now, put your dumb gun away.”

  “Make me.”

  I was no longer listening, having long since wandered over to the cube. I carefully reached to it, and made an expanding motion with my hands. The cube floated up higher into the darkness, and expanded exponentially. It became rectangular and thin, much like a cracker, and then multiplied itself so there was an enormous stack of green crackers before me.

  I swiped upwards with my hand, and the green plates spun for almost thirty seconds before halting. The one directly in front of me pulled itself from the stack and turned so I could look at it like a computer screen. Hundreds of little white dots appeared on it, making it look like a Grid.

  “So this is how I can enter and leave the Void,” I whispered to myself.

  “What’s a void?”

  “The Void, not a void. It’s the space between the packets of time, where no time flows. Right now, nothing is happening in any time period, or rather, we have just exited the flow of time. In here, you are immortal. I’m not even sure if you can die in here.”

  Lilly raised an eyebrow. “Want to find out?”

  I shook my head hastily. “No, I’ll leave that to someone more qualified. Back to matters at hand though, look at these dots. This green plate is a single world, and the farther to the right you go, the later into this planet’s time period you enter. They’re stacked in columns by the way. I hope you know what a column is…”

  Lilly nudged me with the barrel of her laser pistol. “Mhm. The targets are columns. Funny, you look like a column too; It would be a shame If I accidentally shot you.”

  “Is that a compliment saying I’m not fat?”

  She gave me a rude gesture, and I held my hands up in defeat. “Sorry, sorry. Now, let’s make our first stop. You’re going to have to do the fighting for us, since I set all my weapons on fire. All I have on me is this little dagger I made in my free time,” I said, pulling the small weapon from my belt.

  “An energy dagger? Why on earth would you make that? Nobody fights with swords or daggers anymore, you nimrod.”

  I shrugged, and pressed my hand to a random white dot on the plate, about halfway through its visible timeline. The Grid disappeared along with all of our light. “Drake, what did you do?” she asked with a tinge of worry in her voice.

  Before I could reply, a violent lurch picked us both up and we were both spat from the darkness like a vegetable from a little kid’s mouth.