CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Zanell spun around and stared at the door. A curious tingling sensation had passed over her body as she’d stepped through. She tried to re-enter the docking bay but the door had locked itself. CHAPTER NINETEEN “NO! BRIAN!!” Nick screamed, as the evil, black hand pulled his best friend through the portal and into the Daori dimension.
Panic began to brew up inside of her. Something terrible had just happened as she had left the bay, she could sense it. Desperately, she tried to prise the door open with her hands.
“What’s wrong, Zanell? Don’t like it here do you?”
She spun around and saw two of Zator’s men standing in front of her. Both of them had guns.
“I think you’d better come with us,” one of them said.
Zanell took a deep breath and nodded. She stepped forward. The shorter of the two men smiled and clipped his gun back onto his belt. Zanell suddenly lashed out and kicked the man with the gun in the groin. He moaned and fell to the floor. Zanell quickly grabbed his gun and shot him. She turned to the second man but he had withdrew his gun and had it pointed directly as her.
“Put it down, Zanell,” he said.
For a second, the two stared at each other and then Zanell shot him. He slumped down, unconscious beside his companion.
Zanell looked again at the locked door. She hoped that N*Sync would be okay while she was gone.
She had to find Nick and the others.
“Brian!” Nick screamed, as he heard his friends shouts come from nearby.
The others exchanged glances before tearing away down the corridor.
“Brian!” Kevin called. “Where are you?”
“In here! Please hurry!” the call came from a room just up ahead.
The four of them burst through a the door and immediately felt the force from the black tunnel pulling at them. Nick was forced to grab hold of the door to stop himself from being pulled in.
Brian and Justin were both clinging to a console for dear life in the centre of the room.
“What is that?” Howie said, staring at the tunnel while trying to keep hold of the doorframe.
“Zator’s opened a portal to the Daori dimension!” Nick cried. “We’ve gotta get them out of here now!”
“Howie!” Kevin called, taking charge. “Hold onto Nick’s hand! Nick, you try to reach Brian and Justin! Me and AJ will keep hold of Howie and we’ll pull you all back into the corridor, okay?”
Nick gulped and nodded. He would be extremely close to the portal and could easily be sucked through. AJ and Kevin held onto Howie while Nick gripped his hand tightly as Kevin had told him to. Slowly, he began to inch his way across the room towards Justin and Brian. Howie kept a tight hold on his arm to stop him from being pulled through the portal. Nick’s poor burnt arm felt like agony as Howie pulled on it.
Eventually, he reached Justin and grabbed his arm. He looked across at Brian and wished that he could have been the first one that he saved.
“I’ve got Justin!” he yelled.
Kevin nodded and he and AJ began to pull Howie back into the corridor. Nick felt as if he were being torn apart. The portal was pulling him and Justin in one direction but Kevin and the others were desperately trying to pull him in the opposite direction. Eventually, when Nick thought that he would scream in agony, Kevin’s super strength prevailed and they all toppled into the corridor into an untidy heap.
Nick pushed Justin off of him and pulled Howie to his feet.
“Quick, we’ve gotta go back for Brian!” he said.
Once again, they formed a human chain and Nick began to creep towards his best friend. Justin watched from the corridor, ready to help Kevin pull them all back.
Nick stretched his arm out as far as he could, but he couldn’t reach Brian.
“Brian, let go of the console and grab Nick’s hand!” Kevin called.
Brian had his eyes closed in terror and he shook his head furiously.
“No! I’ll get sucked in!”
“Brian, it’s the only way! I can’t reach you!” Nick said. “The console’s beginning to come away from the wall! Let go!”
Brian slowly released one of his hands from the console and reached out to Nick. Nick wasted no time in seizing Brian’s hand and squeezing it reassuringly.
“I’ve got you Brian, don’t worry. Kev, I’ve got him! Pull us back!”
Suddenly, the fierce pulling force from the portal increased dramatically and Nick felt Brian’s hand being wrenched from his own. Kevin and AJ were trying their hardest to pull them all back. Nick could see that Justin was helping them as well.
“Kevin, I can’t keep hold of Nick!” Howie called, suddenly.
Nick realized that Brian was not the only one in danger of being pulled into the portal. His own hand was slipping out of Howie’s.
“We’re going to lose them both!” Howie called.
Nick held onto Brian and Howie as tightly as he could, ignoring the wrenching pain in his arm.
There was a tremendous growl from the portal and the force increased even more. A long, thin hand suddenly came out of the portal and seized Brian’s leg. Brian screamed as talons dug into him. The hand gave a huge tug and Brian’s hand was yanked out of Nick’s.
All of a sudden, the powerful pulling force that was coming from the portal stopped. Nick let go of Howie’s hand and dashed across to the portal.
“Nick, don’t!” Howie yelled, grabbing Nick’s arm.
Nick pushed Howie away and ran to the portal. There was no longer any force at all trying to suck people in it. It had what it wanted.
Nick pressed his hand into the portal. It was like water. There was a sudden growl. Nick withdrew his hand, sharply.
“You okay?” Kevin asked, running over.
Nick nodded. “We have to go after him, Kevin,” he said.
The others exchanged nervous glances.
“You can’t be serious!?” Justin said. “He’s as good as dead and so you will be if you go after him!”
The four Backstreet Boys turned to face him. That probably wasn’t the smartest comment that Justin had ever made.
“It’s your fault he’s there in the first place, Justin!” Nick snapped, angrily. “And if we go after him then we’ll take you along as well!”
Before Justin could reply there was another growl from the portal. This time it was so loud that the whole ground seemed to shake. The surface of the portal rippled slightly and then stopped.
“What the hell is making that noise?” Nick whispered.
“I don’t wanna know,” AJ replied.
Nick approached the portal again and stared into its black depths as if hoping to see Brian staring back at him. He turned to face the others.
“Come on, guys. We can’t just give up on Brian.”
As Nick spoke, something began to come through the portal. First its ugly head appeared, followed by a long, thin, winged body and a thick tail.
“Maybe we could – Hey what you all staring at?” Nick asked, seeing the horrified looks upon his friend’s faces.
There was a thunderous roar from behind him. He spun around and found himself face to face with a huge, black dragon. Its horns dripped of slime and it’s mouth was full of razor sharp teeth. Two malevolent red eyes leered at him.
Nick jumped out of the way just in time to avoid being slashed with the dragons, long talons.
“What do we do? What do we do?” a terrified Justin gibbered.
“I don’t think that thing wants us to go after Brian,” AJ said.
“We’ll have to fight it,” Nick said, drawing his swords.
“Fight it? You’re crazy!” Justin cried.
The dragon raised its claws and again tried to hit Nick.
“We don’t have a choice!” Nick pointed out, using his swords to stop the dragon from slicing him.
The dragon bellowed with rage as Nick’s sword struck it’s foot. This was too much for Justin. He gave a whimper of fear and charged out of the room.
“Justin, you idiot! Come back!” AJ called, but Justin was already gone.
Nick used his sword to stab the dragon in the foot again and then jumped to avoid the tail as the dragon swung it at him.
“Guys! I could do with a little help here!” Nick cried.
“Hold on, Nick!” AJ called, firing his guns.
The two thin, bright bursts from the lasers hit the black beast on the side leaving purple scorch marks behind. The dragon growled menacingly and swung around to face its new enemy. It began to take a deep breath.
“What’s it doing?” Howie asked.
“Howie, you do know that most dragons breath fire don’t you?” Kevin said. “Get out of the way!” He grabbed Howie and AJ by the arms and dragged them over to the far side of the room where Nick was.
The dragon turned to face them and then exhaled a huge burst of purple flames. Kevin and the others only just managed to dive behind a console in time to avoid being burnt to a crisp.
“We can’t fight this thing forever!” AJ said.
“Don’t worry, I have an idea,” Howie said, putting his hands to his head.
Howie put his hands to his head and four figures appeared beside the dragon. They were identical images of Howie, Nick, AJ and Kevin. The dragon turned with a growl to stare at the illusions beside it.
“Nice one, D!” AJ said. “That’ll distract him! Now what’ll we do?”
Nick suddenly leapt to his feet and jumped onto the dragon’s scaly back where he dug his sword into it’s neck.
The dragon screamed and began tossing its head, trying to dislodge its rider. It stomped about angrily, ignoring Howie’s illusions now it had something much more painful to think about. As it did, AJ fired his guns and hit it squarely on the nose. The dragon began to breath in again.
“Uh oh!” AJ said, ducking back behind the console as another jet of flames came their way.
“We’re beating it!” Nick shouted as he stabbed it once more.
The dragon swung around and Nick was forced to hold onto the tendrils at the top of its head. it threw its head forwards and Nick lost his grip and fell heavily to the floor. The dragon glared at him and raised a clawed foot to crush him with. Before it could do so, however, it was suddenly jerked backwards. Kevin had grabbed its tail and was pulling it away from Nick.
Nick took advantage of the situation and drove his sword into the dragons ugly snout. It roared and began to try and lumber back towards the portal. It had had enough.
“Kevin, it’s going!” Nick called.
Kevin nodded and gave the beast a final push towards the portal. It roared once again at them before disappearing back into its own dimension.
“We did it!” AJ called excitedly. He grinned and high fived with Howie.
“Come on, we have to save Brian!” Nick said running to the portal.
However, once again the portal rippled. Kevin put a hand upon Nick’s arm to prevent him from going any further.
“Something else is coming through,” he said.