The arguing had finally subsided and the three hadn’t talked to each other since. A lot of time has passed, but Luc wasn’t sure how long. He felt much calmer now after letting loose all his anger. He felt a little silly for arguing with Sasuke again, but ever since their journey together started, the two have been arguing quite regularly.
“I wonder how much time has passed,” the magician said quietly.
The voice broke the ninja’s trance. Sasuke had forgotten all about Luc and their argument, but instead was thinking of something else.
He looked up at the small window. Judging from the position of the moon, it should be around midnight. The sun was just setting when he first woke up in the prison and it was somewhere in the afternoon when they had fallen into the bandit’s tea trapping.
“I guess we’ve been in here for about ten hours.”
“…”
Luc felt a bit relieved that Sasuke had forgotten about the argument and was still talking to him just like after all their other quarrels, but this time Luc felt a bit sorry since he was the one who started it.
“Sasuke.”
“Yeah?”
“…nevermind.”
‘Maybe I’ll apologize some other time,’ Luc thought.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Sunlight broke into the uncovered window and shot a strong beam of light down the prison walls. The beam moved along with the sun until it reached the eyes of the sleeping Sasuke. His eyes blinked opened and he woke up just in time to hear a loud banging on the prison door.
“What in the world?”
Sasuke shaded his eyes to look at the metal door. Dents were starting to form on the door as the banging continued.
“What is that?”
Luc and Futch were already awake from the noise. The banging went on and finally with one last bang, the metal door fell to the floor. Sasuke thought it was the floating dust blurring his vision, but he couldn’t believe it when he saw Viktor standing at the entrance.
“Viktor!” the boys said in unison with surprise and question.
“Yo boys! I knew you guys were in here,” Viktor said proudly to himself. He was still standing in the doorway with his arms across his chest and the boys didn’t say anything, but stared. Then Flik appeared from behind Viktor with a grin on his face. The man with the blue headband dangled a ring of keys in front of Viktor’s face.
“Always doing it the hard way, eh?”
Flik was trying to ruin his fun. Viktor felt he should do something about it so he said,
“I don’t waste time looking for keys like you, Flik. If you want to rescue someone, you got to do it with you muscles.” He placed a foot on the broken door and looked at it triumphantly. Flik just shook his head.
“How did you know we were in here?” Sasuke asked.
Flik still had that grin on his face. Then he turned a bit so they could see what he was holding in his other hand that was hidden behind Viktor. “By these,” Flik held up Luc’s rod, Futch’s spear and Sasuke’s shuriken. At this point, Viktor began to smile as well.
“And this too,” he said and stepped back to reveal the rest of what Flik was holding in his arm.
Upon seeing Futch, Bright squealed with delight in Flik’s arm. Soon he was let down on the ground and was held into a tight hug by his worried master. Everyone present at the scene couldn’t help but smile at the two.
“We heard about you three from Shu,” Flik began explaining as he started unlocking the restraints on the boys’ ankles with the keys. Then Viktor took over the rest of the conversation. He spoke while he leaned against the doorway with his arms still crossed.
“Seems that Shu has been looking for us during the past few weeks, but we weren’t at the headquarters. Ha ha,” Viktor gave out one of his loud laughs and then he went on.
“When we finally got back yesterday, the guys at the headquarters practically pushed us back out saying that Shu had some urgent stuff for as at Radat and when we got there Shu told us the problem has already been fixed yesterday morning.”
“Hey, I thought Klaus said you guys were setting out for a long journey. How did you get back so fast?” Futch asked now that he was feeling better with Bright by his side.
“Nah…” Viktor shook his head and leaned back against the doorway. “Everyone thought we took off for a journey…” Viktor gave off a chuckle and added,
“Can’t really blame them since we sneaked off in the middle of the night. We just suddenly felt like drinking some of that good wine back in Toran Republic so we went there. Who would’ve thought we would stay there for a whole three weeks.”
At this point Flik had to stare at Viktor in awe and stopped unlocking Luc’s manacles in the process.
“If you still remember,” Flik had this annoyed tone to his voice, “you left your money at the headquarters and we both drank over what I could’ve paid for so we had to spend the last few weeks fighting monsters to pay that bartender back.”
“What kind of expensive wine were you drinking?” Luc perked a brow.
He found this to be a bit too stupid to believe, but Flik quickly dismissed him with a shake of his hand.
“There’s no point in telling you kids anyway. It’s not like you three can drink anything in a bar besides lemonade.”
Luc was getting annoyed. He wanted to tell them that he was much older than he looks and shove it into their grinning faces, but he was quickly lifted by the sides to stand upright after Flik has finished with his restraints.
Luc never got a chance to say anything. He was handed his rod and Viktor began talking again.
“We heard about you guys from Shu. You three must’ve made quite a show back there. The people of Radat were all cheering for you. They were having such a party when we arrived.”
“And of course we joined in on the fun,” Viktor paused a bit to add, “so we ended up with nothing to do.”
“Heh,” he gave off a sly laugh, “Shu tried really hard to think of something for us to do, just so he wouldn’t send us off without doing anything, but he couldn’t think of a single thing.”
At this, Viktor had to stop and laugh for a while. Naturally, Flik joined in with him on the noisy chuckling. The boys stood still as the men continued laughing. They looked like they had no idea on what to do as the tiny prison rumbled with each of Viktor’s cackle.
It’s true that the young magician despised noise, but Luc was not angry—he was speechless, because he too agreed that Shu orders people around too much, just like Lady Leeknat. But Luc can never get angry with Lady Leeknat. He doesn’t really mind if Viktor and Flik laugh at Shu so he stood silently by his other two companions and waited until the laughing dwindled.
“So…how did you end up here?” Futch has been waiting politely to ask.
“Alright, let me continue,” said Viktor after finally calming down. “In the end, a few of the villagers told us that there were some bandits up north in the mountains. Those bandits have been disrupting trade recently by laying traps and tricking the merchants.”
The boys’ eyes grew wide as the information sunk in.
“Then a peddler that has been tricked came over and gave us some details.”
Viktor stopped a bit, but noticed the boys’ peculiar undivided attention for his words and decided to continue. “One of the bandits would act alone to trick a passer-by, making it seem very safe, but hiding in the mountains were dozens of bandits getting ready to strike,” Viktor finished.
The boys were silent. Flik examined their faces. They were full of shock, anger, and he couldn’t really tell what Luc was thinking. Then he asked them, “You three fell into their trap, didn’t you.”
The three said nothing. Flik got the answer but Viktor had to add, “Guess my assumption of you three getting caught from fighting with the bandits was wrong. Those bandits got you easy, didn’t they.”
Two heads snapped up immediately towards Vikitor’s direction. The man has successfully channeled the boys’ anger from the bandits to himself…well, at least for two of them. Viktor instantaneously kept his mouth shut.
“So…” Flik hoped to change the subject before anything bad might occur. “We heard from Shu that you three were going on a journey,” Flik paused, “not just a regular quest but a…”
“A journey led by fate,” the small magician finished for him. Then he was silent again, as if he was waiting for Flik’s opinion on the topic.
“It must be tough going around with no aim…” the man finally said after some careful thinking. With a flick of his cape he casually strode out of the cell as if he never said anything. Viktor followed out and the three boys as well.