Chapter 16 - Gods woman are so pretty

"How bad could it be?" Opal asked "Oh it's bad gem, really bad, I mean Miriam almost fell off last time and it's just overall not fun" Penelope corrected. "Agreed, we keep almost dying, Miriam nearly slipped both times she's been on this. And he should be somewhere close on the other side" I mentioned. "Right. Addie, bring out your dagger in case we need it," Penelope instructed, I pulled my dagger out of my boot, starting to fiddle with it again. "I'll go first…again" Penelope was definitely not looking forward to the monkey bars, in fact I'd say she was looking backwards because she had turned on her heel to take a few steps away. Penelope started to run, jumping just before she stepped off the edge and grabbing onto one of the bars, she pulled herself up with a quiet groan. "I love monkey bars" Opal smiled, she didn't do a run, simply jumped up, Penelope helped the small ravenette up, a small flicker of pain in her green and gray eyes. Once the two were maybe four or five rungs down I jumped up and grabbed a ring, swinging up to get my legs up onto the next rung before sliding between the two. I hit my back again and sat up to take a few moments to deal with the pain before I started to crawl to the other side, my back stung but I needed to keep going. I really didn't want to get stuck up here, I kind of understood why Miriam hated heights so much. It was pretty freaky to be up here, just the feeling that if I fell…I would definitely be going to see Hades. Everything was going…shockingly well, Opal and Penelope were ten rungs away from the other side and I was halfway across the monkey bars. Were we finally going to go across the monkey bars without anybody dying, no, no we were not. There was a loud boom, and I mean bust your eardrums loud. I started to jump up, slipping on the bars and falling through. I held on with one hand as my ears started to ring, though it doesn't make sense to describe it as ringing. It was more like a loud high pitched drawn out sound that made my ears hurt. I closed my eyes feeling the cool metal start to slip from my grasp, I didn't want to die. Not with Miriam waiting for me to return, not without knowing if she would be safe. I tried to grab the other bar with my left hand as my right started to slip, finger after finger. Then a strong grasp enveloped my wrist, I opened my eyes to see Penelope's staring back at me. "I'm not letting you die idiot" She spoke through pursed lips, struggling to pull me up by only one hand. One of her ears was dripping blood, crap if she lost her hearing that would be a serious danger. Not only to her but to the rest of the group, if one of us lost one of our main senses, that would be detrimental to the rest of us. I used her help to pull myself up and back onto the bars, Opal was shaking only three rungs from the other side. She had frozen in place, not too unlike Miriam a few days ago. Penelope had helped me up now, I could kind of see her muscles a bit better as she strained to pull me up. Gods though muscles, she was just as well built as the Ares statue I had done my final art project on but soooo much prettier. And those eyes, I wasn't sure if I wanted to be with her or be her. Though if I was going to be with anybody here I think it would be Miriam, all the boys our age are icky and she's so pretty, and super sweet. We could talk for hours about almost anything, though we'd switch between topics about as fast as a cheetah. Crap, I've been ranting again, I haven't done that in a while, and…never about a person before, or at least…not like that. When we got to the other side, I somehow managed to mess up even more. I jumped off the final rung, usually I was pretty graceful, using a mix of hearing a sight so intertwined I didn't even have to think about it. Except my hearing has met Hades before me, how dare. So I fell flat on my face, biting my tongue and causing it to start and bleed. A coppery taste filled my mouth, making it feel a little warm. I always kind of thought blood being warm was so…creepy. Penelope held her ear, her arm shaking slightly, Opal had gotten down and sat on the floor. I slumped down against the wall "Well team…I hate the monkey bars even more now, I think they're cursed" I declared. Opal chuckled "Yeah I think so…should we go back?" She asked looking up at Penelope, Penelope didn't answer, she didn't even make a sign she heard us as she paced back and forth. "Penelope!" I called out, she turned to us, making a confused noise "Hm?". "Opal wants to know if you think we should go back. I think so but if you want to keep going we can, I'm not to hurt" I made sure my voice was a little louder than usual since I had a feeling Penelope's hearing wasn't very good right now. Penelope was about to answer before there was the distinct loud noise of stone scratching against the floor. Opal moved away from the walls before I could even figure out what was going on. Both exits started to close with large stone walls, different from the mosaic walls that we were used to, taking their place. Penelope was luckily able to hear them as well though it did take her a bit longer, rushing over she tried to get to the other side but she was far too late. Penelope banged her fists against the new stone walls "Damn it!" She cried out, Opal put her hand on her shoulder. "Don't beat yourself up, nobody could've done anything" Opal's voice was too soft for Penelope to hear but the older black haired girl could definitely feel her sister's hand on her shoulder. Penelope sighed, I slumped down on the right wall to rest for a moment "Well, I guess that answers the question. We can't go back…or forwards, what are we going to-" I was cut off by the feeling of the wall behind me retracting. I fell back, listening to the sound of mosaic tiles scratching against hard stone. It was like nails on a chalkboard but so much worse because I couldn't stop it. I covered my ears, wincing and sitting up. Luckily, I hadn't hit my back too hard. I definitely knew what that felt like. Back when I was younger I used to climb the tree at the back of my school's yard, I had fallen out one day onto the large rock in the middle of the three trees. But I still came back the next day to climb, and everyday after that. I…still did back before all…this. And the hole at the back of the fence, that was one of the best parts. Since we ran on a similar schedule to the high school our building was attached to we didn't get recess, so our teacher would take us out for DPA. Usually there were only a handful of teachers out there and none of them came to the back of the field, so me and some friends were able to sneak through the hole and off of school property. At first we would only go a few steps away and only leave for a few moments as one of us watched for teachers. Normally we would pick some of the flowers or maybe step onto the gravel path just outside the fence. Then we started to go farther and farther, maybe a few steps along the path. Then down to pick some flowers even farther down the path. Occasionally we didn't even have somebody watching for teachers. Though we were always careful to stay on the path, a good bit away from the lake even though I really wanted to go see the ducks. Then we had started to go nearly to the edge of the path, to where it looped around to the other side of the yard. One time me, Miriam, and another girl were on the path but we were all the way at the edge of the fence staring at the lake. Seeing as we were on the opposite side of the fence we should be, we could've gone down there, and we would've if Miriam hadn't started to run the other way. The other girl followed and I could've sworn I heard one of them yell camera! So I rushed back, we all scrambled through the small hole before we caught our breath. Then Miriam had admitted there was no actual reason she had run, she had just decided to run and we both freaked out and followed. We had just both been scared of getting caught on the wrong side of the fence, though it wasn't like any teacher would be able to sneak up on us without our friend back on the right side warning us. Another time me and that girl were going down the path, on the opposite side of where we had the scare, we had already rushed back once because she thought she heard a student coming close to the fence. We should've been more careful after that, but we weren't. Then we heard people approaching, there had been an entire daycare of little toddlers and the daycare attendant. We walked past them as I gave a small explanation of we dropped something on the other side of the fence though the attendant didn't care. We scrambled back through the small hole on our hands and knees. That was the last time we had gone through the hole before this. I wondered how my friends and family were feeling, about me being gone…and Miriam…and Basil. But we had to keep moving or risk starving to death.