Chapter 29

I sat quietly in the seat, my mind working feverishly trying to figure a way out of this. My worst nightmare had become reality, and largely through my own stupidity. I was caught in a place I couldn't get out of, without any of my Protectors or Guardians. Worse, I had a just-discovered new family member, an unknown entity that I had to protect. Finally, I had a cat I had to worry about. I like cats, but if it were a choice between Sarah and me or the cat, I would say hell with the cat. But Sarah loved that cat; I was not going to let her first day back in the States be marred by the death of her cat. Besides, Megan had grown fond of the little fur ball too. If we made it out of this alive, I was not going to have Sarah tell Megan I had tried anything other than my best to save him too.

So, it was just me against the bad guys. I had no illusions who the bad guys were. There was only one man that would be bold enough and have the connections enough to nab me in broad daylight in a busy American airport, lousy security and stupid moves on my part notwithstanding, with my Dad on the premises. I was surprised that Bandor would come back to the States so soon, however. We must have really irritated him the last time. Bandor and I had always fought to a standstill before; the only times I had beaten him were when my girls were with me.

I knew I was relatively safe from him. His black could not affect my white, at least not enough to make it worth the time and effort; it would take days for him to defeat me. Unless he pulled a gun on me by surprise, he couldn't really hurt me. Unfortunately, the same was not true for Sarah. He could hurt or capture her, and I would be helpless to do anything that might cause him to hurt her more. He could also kill her outright. Also, it wasn't as if he couldn't affect me at all. If he could overpower me, knock me out, something like that, then he could take me wherever he wanted. All he had to do was drop a hint as to where I was and he and I both knew my girls would come for me.

I thought back to what I knew about Bandor. There wasn't much, all of it contributed to my memory by the white energy. I knew he was a surviving member of our race. He, that is, the black energy, and I, that is, the white energy, were opposites. I worked for good. That is not to say I was completely good. I messed up a lot, as these books made clear. But Bandor was completely evil. I don't think there was a good bone or thought in his body. There was nothing too evil for him to try, and he enjoyed it all, particularly making innocents suffer. His favorite was to eventually corrupt, seduce, or break them to his side, to make them a willing (?) accomplice.

Bandor, Megan and I (the colored energy equivalents of us, that is) had known each other for a long, long time. Bandor had even tried to court Megan before he had shown his true colors (pun intended), or rather, lack of colors. Of course, you have to be either really, really stupid, or really, really in love to try to fool a mind reading, genius, precognitive empath like Megan. He apparently was one or the other. When Megan tried to let him down easy, being the sweet thing she is, by telling him she was in love with me (true), I earned his eternal hatred. Megan had always felt guilty about getting me involved that way. It didn't matter to me. He was going to find out eventually anyway, and it wasn't like I was not going to be involved in defending her anytime anything happened.

His power was almost limitless. There was very little he couldn't do, and his shields were overwhelmingly powerful. You would assume that I should be almost limitlessly powerful on the other hand. You would probably be right, but since I had the white energy in me for only a short amount of time, I had not learned everything I needed to yet. It was a given of the white energy that it seldom directly manipulated events by the use of its power only. There was nothing wrong with us humans learning how to do it and doing it ourselves; any way we could learn to use that power ourselves was fair game, as long as we used it for good. Since we spent so much time fighting and dying through the cycles, we were far behind in reaching our potential. The black side had no compunctions against the energy acting directly. That was one of the reasons why they were evil.

Sarah was still blissfully unaware of what was happening. She had apparently never been in a limousine before and presumably didn't know you were supposed to be able to see out the windows. Besides, she was giggling helplessly at the antics of her cat as she teased him.

After only a few minutes, I felt the car slow, then stop. I prepared myself to react when the door was opened, but these guys were not amateurs. All the doors were yanked open at once and nothing but the barrels of automatic rifles showed through the doors. A pair of hands grabbed Sarah and yanked her out of the car as she screamed. I was pulled out just in time to see one of the men zap Sarah with a stun gun. Apparently, someone was familiar with her teleporting ability and wanted to make sure she didn't just zip us out of there. They effectively ended my attempts to escape by making me carry Sarah. She was as limp as a sack of potatoes in my arms. I wouldn't have left without her anyway. They didn't even pay attention to the cat following along behind us.

We were led into a large room, with a door on the other side also. I sat Sarah in a chair and sat next to her, holding her up with my arm around her shoulders. I checked to make sure she was still breathing. She was. She was still out, her eyes rolled back into their sockets, with only the whites showing. She was starting to moan softly, though. Cire hopped up onto her lap and stood there, facing the other door. His hair was standing up on end, his tail fluffed up, and he was growling at the door as the men left. I could tell by the muscles in his legs that he was ready to pounce at a moments notice. If I had to describe the look on his face, it would be 'pissed'.

Sarah was just beginning to show signs of life when the door at the other end of the room opened. Gee, I bet you can't guess who walked in? Well, you would win and you would lose. Bandor did indeed walk through the door. Walking behind him was a raven haired woman, a beauty that I was very familiar with from many years ago. I had even dated her at one time before Megan. Looking back, I couldn't believe I had ever been that stupid, although she had been much nicer before she met Bandor.

"Carnella." I murmured. "I wish I could say I was glad to see you. Hasn't he killed you just for fun yet? You never can depend on him to do anything right!" She smiled, showing all the affection one would show for a pet dog that had just gone on the carpet.

"Katoro. Still alive I see. Where's that slut Nagalla? You get tired of her and dump her already?" She laughed. I considered the source and didn't react.

"If you don't mind, we have business here to conduct," Bandor said to Carnella. She immediately shut up, fear in her eyes. I wondered if the bruises still showed on her.

"Where's the black haired girl? Not here? Damn, I wanted to play with her again," Bandor commented. He seemed truly disappointed.

"Sorry, she couldn't come. She had more important things to do. I think she said she had to sort out her sock drawer," I answered. His eyes narrowed. Bandor doesn't like anyone or anything that doesn't magnify his own importance.

"I guess I will just have to punish this one, then," Bandor commented. Before I could react, a black bolt caught Sarah in the chest, and as the cat jumped to the ground, Sarah was slammed up against the wall and held there. I heard her begin to gasp for breath as the black force holding her against the wall shut off her airway.

"Get the black haired one and Nagalla here, now, or she dies. Not right away. Not until she begs me to kill her. After she begs me to let her have my baby. After she willingly and joyfully performs every sex act I can think of with me. Is this one of your favorite ones?" He laughed evilly.

"You're blocking my mental connection," I reminded him. I was stalling. I had seen something very unusual happening. I didn't know what it was, but I knew neither Bandor nor Carnella were doing it. I knew Sammi had some unique powers that worked over distances, at least according to Amy, and I was hoping maybe she was interfering.

As soon as Sarah was thrown against the wall, I had noticed that the complexion of the lighting in the room had changed subtly. Everything was blurred somewhat. It was like double vision, except that the two images were so close together that they were just blurred instead of doubled. There was also a very faint echo in the room. Just as I thought I had stalled as long as I could, when I was afraid that Sarah was going to die, there was a bright flash of light in the room. This I had seen before, kinda.

Sarah was just showing signs of coming around when the door at the other end of the room opened. Gee, I bet you can't guess who walked in? Well, you would win and you would lose. Bandor did indeed walk through the door. Walking behind him was a raven haired woman, a beauty that I was very familiar with from years ago. I had even dated her at one time before Megan. Looking back, I couldn't believe I had ever been that stupid, although she had been much nicer before she met Bandor.

I noticed some changes right away. I knew we had just undergone another repetition of time. This one was different than the first one, though. The blurred vision had not been there before. But perhaps the biggest change was the cat. Cire was still orange with black spots, but he was huge! He was at least the size of a Siberian Tiger! I saw that Bandor was wary, realizing something had happened too.

"Carnella." I murmured. "I wish I could say I was glad to see you. Hasn't he killed you just for fun yet? You never can depend on him to do anything right!" She smiled, showing all the affection one would show for a pet dog that had just gone on the carpet.

"Katoro. Still alive I see. Where's that slut Nagalla? You get tired of her and dump her already?" She laughed. I considered the source and didn't react.

"If you don't mind, we have business here to conduct," Bandor said to Carnella. She immediately shut up, fear in her eyes. I wondered if the bruises still showed on her.

"Where's the black haired girl? Not here? Damn, I wanted to play with her again," Bandor commented. He seemed truly disappointed.

"Sorry, she couldn't come. She had more important things to do. I think she said she had to sort out her sock drawer," I answered. His eyes narrowed. Bandor doesn't like anyone or anything that doesn't magnify his own importance.

"I guess I will just have to punish this one, then," Bandor commented. Bandor shot a black bolt out at Sarah. I watched Cire lazily step in front of it, between Bandor and Sarah, and take the bolt right in his chest. I cringed; he didn't even have a shield. So much for saving the cat. Even at his size, this was going to be lights out. I wondered briefly what had happened that he was so big.

I watched, fascinated, as the black bolt just disappeared into Cire's body. I would swear that he grinned, and then his body glowed brightly for a moment. Very pretty, very unusual; his body seemed to be surrounded by all the colors of the rainbow! He glowed for a moment, and then it faded away. A random thought entered my mind.

Pretty colors; rainbows are dangerous; look for them; they will save you. Colors rule, let them shine, no one survives the rainbow.

Bandor looked stunned. I made a mental note to mark this on my calendar when I got home. Bandor was never stunned. I suddenly knew, I just knew, that I would get home again. I also somehow knew that I hadn't seen everything there was to see yet.

Bandor snarled and pulled out a gun, aiming it at Sarah's chest and pulled the trigger. Cire flicked his right front paw, almost as if he were flicking away a troublesome fly, and the gun and bullet flew into the corner, coming to rest on the floor. Then a deep, resonant voice filled the room.

"You will not harm, nor will you even touch, my mistress. I will kill you if you try again." I don't know why, but the voice had a distinctly feline quality to it. Don't ask me to explain; since I've never heard a cat talk before, I don't know what a feline quality to a voice sounds like, but I knew I was hearing it. Bandor laughed. On either side of him appeared a black cat, each as large as Cire. They looked at Cire hungrily, then at Bandor, eagerly awaiting his command to attack.

"Right, kitty. I'm scared. It's too bad I will have to have you killed before I can get to the little girl; I would love you to see what I will do to her. Do you want to surrender now, or should I have my two servants eat you?" I could see the black cats salivating.

"Do your little pussies have shields?" Cire asked respectfully. I laughed at his double entendre. Bandor glared at me. "Please have them activate them now. I would not want to be accused of having an unfair advantage." Cire waited patiently.

Black shields went up around both the cats. They waited impatiently for their orders. Bandor apparently had tired of the game.

"Colo! Kentar! Kill him!"

The two black cats prepared to lunge, while shooting black bolts at Cire. As before, the bolts simply passed into his body and disappeared. He glowed like a rainbow again. Before the two black cats could leap, two bolts shot out of Cire.

I had never seen bolts like these before. They were all the colors of the rainbow, like 7 or 8 bolts stuck together, each a different color, each the width of a normal bolt. That made for a very wide bolt! Each bolt sped towards its respective cat. The bolts tore through the black shields as if they were not even there, absorbing them into themselves as they passed, taking them down completely, increasing in brilliance as they did so. The bolts then slammed into the cats and the cats exploded, disintegrating into black dust. Each bolt almost hungrily sucked up the black dust, glowing brightly as it did so. Then the bolts turned, sped rapidly to within one foot of Bandor and stopped, one on each side of him. They hung there for a minute, then retreated back to Cire and disappeared inside him.

Pretty colors; rainbows are dangerous; look for them; they will save you. Colors rule, let them shine, no one survives the rainbow.

The look on Bandor's face was priceless. He had stared into the face of his own death. If I never finally defeat him, I will always treasure that look. The room was completely silent for several moments.

"I should think you would want to leave now," the feline voice suggested. Bandor looked surprised.

"What? You will not kill me now as you did the cats?" He sounded like he thought Cire was crazy. The cat snorted. I think it was laughter.