Blinding Light (BLS Book 1)

Mila

Back in the cabin, with Raven still frozen in time, I let out a breath of anger. My shuddering breaths all come out at once. My fingers unbroken, my shoulder in place. I rub my hands together and bend my fingers, just to be sure.

I can’t wrap my head around this. My mother didn’t die of natural causes, she died when I was five years old. She died because the prince poisoned her. He somehow miraculously used witchcraft and poisoned my mother and somehow made me think that she didn’t die.

So was everything a lie?

Why?

What did Mother do to deserve this? What did I do to deserve this?

“Heed my warning, sister. S’il vous plait.”

It was Raven—her warning.

I breathed out deeply. Raven tried to warn me about him. But I forgot.

AGAIN

The one person I had opened up to had broken the thing thread that was holding on by a dot of glue. He betrayed me more than the worst way one could think of.

How can I live to see his face, knowing what I know? I can’t attempt anything. He’s protected by the palace guards and the royal court.

And what happens when the brother of the original prince gets assassinated too? This kingdom will be ruined, my house will be ruined, and my life would be over.

I can’t risk that. I care too much about this damn kingdom to do this to it. I can’t do that.

TOO WEAK

I use both of my hands to grab the sides of my head. Too much.

TOO much.

What just happened?

“The…truth…”

“What did you do? What happened? When will you give me a straight answer?!” My shouts ring out in the cabin. Then I feel the heaviness of the truth sink in.

“Why can’t you give me a straight answer?” I sob quietly. I’ve just relived what I thought was my worst nightmare. The nightmare ended with a twist into a lie. Mother dying on the bed, instead of being fifteen, I was five. A ten-year span that I can’t even comprehend.

“Letter…can’t say…read…”

“What letter?” I let out a trembling breath, my breath hitching in my throat.

“Letter…” In the folds of Raven’s frozen figure’s dress, something glows a goldish-green shade, the exact shade of Evren’s eyes. My shaky fingers reach towards it and grab it. The material is rough on the edges, and it looks burnt, blackened in some spots. Surprisingly, the writing remains clear.

Dear Mila,

Hey. It’s Rave. From the future.

I don’t even know where to start. I don’t even know how to explain all this. How do I explain that time travel is real? How do I explain that you have powers? I can only try. Forgive me, dear sister.

Let me start by telling you a story. A story of humanity.

We began in the BCs; we all know that part of history. But what you don’t know is that in the later 23rd century, the human population began a significant decline into the early 24th century. Nobody knows the exact reason. Humans have already started to leave this Earth, one by one.

The rest of them, the remaining ones, didn’t know what to do. All their research failures led them into total despair. They don’t know what that will bring except the straight fact staring at them in the face—the end of the human race.

To what extent, will they try? Of course, as selfish human beings, they will try everything they can to survive. They had their resources, They’ve examined...everything. They were devastated. Until…they stumbled themselves across a myth: a normal girl, who’s born with the power of life itself. However, she doesn’t discover it until the day before she dies, as an old woman by then. Her will to use her abilities is unknown, but they knew she held the key to their survival.

So, they assembled a team to seek out this myth. It was their last hope—if they wanted to survive. They were willing to sacrifice…well, anything. They researched this myth for months until they came across a clear result: she lives somewhere in the 17th to 19th century. It wasn’t an exact date, but it was something. They sought out to seek out this girl—needed her ability to save everyone—to survive.

The Project started in the year 2288. It took 34 long years to be exact, but they’ve found her, still unborn, in the year 2322, along with her family. Her mother tried to escape, pleaded with her friend to hide them. She was successful.

The mother and her friend set up a meeting, a plan in 2323, where her mother will leave her newborn daughter, the one they need, underneath the bridge of Honfleur, Normandy. Then, her friend could take her to her hometown, all the way across France: Calanques—the birth mother did not know this fact.

One year later, in 2324, she leaves her older daughter along with her brother, scared that they’ll come after the rest of her children.

Her friend takes both in and cares for them. All is well until the birth mother was rediscovered by the team a year later in 2325. They made a deal with her, and her choice changed everything—she agreed to the deal. I don’t know what the deal was about, but it must’ve been an undeniable one.

After forty years of searching, finally, in 2328, they’ve found her along with her sister and brother, both with abilities out of this world. They poisoned the birth mother’s friend, took the birth mother’s three children, and departed. They were astonished, terrified when the brother fought back, but they had the technology and put him to sleep, taking his unconscious body to their lab, bringing all of us here through time travel.

Now in the 24th century, the year 2340, something went wrong. Your ability came in early and it was not what they expected. Of course, they had the technology to keep your ability intact: Cryogenics’ sleep—to let your ability slowly develop so they can analyze it. You were kept under that drug for twelve years, from the day they found you, to today.

They were going to preserve your ability and were ready to reveal to you little by little what you could do in your memories to get you on their side. It was going to be a successful Project, Accessible Project Transfusion, the APT, they called it.

However, your ability weakened throughout the twelve years under the cyro sleep. There has been no progress for twelve years—no signs of the Life Manipulation ability, as they called it, ever coming back. In those twelve years, the team experimented every day, they were able to manipulate your memories to let you know only what they wanted you to know. It was almost pointless before they finally hit the point a couple of months into 2340. I don’t know what that point is. But I believe you hold the answer to that, Mila.

What happened this year that was different from the rest?

Continuing with the progress, the team was delighted that the Project was on again. They couldn’t rewind the forty years of their lives because of the dangers it held with the constant time travel. It could not preserve their memories like the other rewinds. So, they rewind their own lives of the twelve years, preserving what they could. The team needed young, healthy, working brains rather than old ones. You, me, and your brother, including the other kids, were the only ones that have aged in the past twelve years. There was no boost until July of 2340. Now, they’re more desperate than ever to awaken your ability. Testing you with different types of obstacles in your own mind.

It’s probably confusing to you. Hell, it was confusing to me. Let me tell you my version: when our birth mother abandoned us under that bridge in 2324, our adoptive mother did find me, along with your brother Evren. You have a brother, Mila, I think it was finally time that I, used whatever it took, to tell you that.

Mother took us both in, Evren at age nine and me at four. Evren didn’t know what was going on. He was so scared when our birth mother just told him to stay there. She told him to stay with a 4-year-old kid, under a bridge, all alone. She told him to stay and wait for her. He didn’t know what was going on until her friend showed up, hours later. It took a long while before he left with her in tears. I still remember him telling me everything is going to be alright. That everything was fine.

Fast forward four years to 2328, the technical year we were all ripped away from our lives. I was taken to a lab where they did weird and strange tests on me. They told me I had a gift, a gift of Precognition. The team memory wiped the past eight years of my life to make me think that I was with them the whole time. That’s when I met the team members: the kids—Asher and Nolan.

Evren’s ability allowed me to remember my true past. To remember things that I couldn’t remember. His Omni-Telepathy ability, they called it. I was scared and confused like you are, Mila. I remembered the terrible things I’ve witnessed when they took you, hurting my family. And as fear went on, of course, I did the one thing my sanity told me to do: deny it.

The team told me that I had a little sister that could save the world—save everyone—a hero. They told me that I had the power to guide her. They modified your memory to make you think that I had been by your side the whole time. I didn’t know I had a sister until two months ago in July. But I couldn’t be with you, I’ve never seen you before until that day they gave me the offer to meet you for the first time.

They provided drugs for us. Drugs to link our minds so I could see into your mind. I knew that you were my sister as soon as I laid eyes on you that day at the introduction ceremony. Then my ability kicked in and showed your head submerging underneath a lake. I was so scared; I didn’t want to lose you. So, I followed you that day, as soon as I entered your mind. You ran away from me as soon as I came to. When I saw that came true, I immediately rushed to save you. When my feet touched the chilling water, a memory spiked through me of the old me. The old me was afraid of water and drowning. It took me a while before I could fight the old me back down and save you from drowning. After that, they took me out of the linking, saying I did something to the Project.

When I woke, they told me you were going to save everyone, and I would be a part of that. I didn’t know what was going on, but I was pleased, happy, to meet my sister for the first time. I didn’t know what they were planning. It wasn’t until Evren broke the ability dampener they managed to get access to, and contacted me that I knew what really was going to happen. They were going to kill you, Mila. The team was going to kill you to save themselves. And I was helping them.

Evren told me that it was impossible to stop them because they had the ability dampener and even stole his ability and transplanted them to others. They weakened him so much that he could only communicate with me through fragments of words in my mind.

It took me a while to believe him, to keep m insanity at bay because they manipulated my memories to make me think that Evren’s been working with me the whole time while they have been torturing him for information. You could tell what that felt like after everything you’ve ever known, turns out to be a lie.

After I found out the truth, I panicked. I didn’t know what to do. But Evren guided me through it and helped me write this.

I don’t know when you’ll get this letter, Mila. They probably had taken precautions and wiped my memory, just like they did with you. It’s too late for me, Mila.

It’s too late.

I just wanted you to be happy your whole life. Even as I watched them destroy that happiness, I couldn’t help you, I’m so sorry. But you needed to hear this, even if I didn’t remember any of it. You needed to hear this. And I needed to be the one to tell you the truth.

Please, Mila, you have the most power out of us all, our father gifted you. All of us were. But you are unique, you are the most valuable. You cannot forget, Mila. You must remember.

Your brother has what they call the Omni-Telepathy. They figured out how to use DNA manipulation long before the discovery of us and gave their own teammates abilities. However, they started with your brother’s. They have been experimenting on him too. They were going to do the same to you, hurting you in the process during Project Transfusion. But I persuaded them otherwise using a temporary lie. Time is running short, Mila. You need to understand that these humans are desperate. And desperation can lead to dangerous things. You need to be careful—they have abilities on their side and many manipulative minds—even our mother’s on their side. Please find out why? Why did she do it? Find out for me, Mila.

I don’t know what I’d do with you, Mila. What can I possibly do? I’ve been a coward. I couldn’t save you from this horrid nightmare. But the least I could do is to tell you the truth. Evren’s been helping me with that. You cannot ever forget him, Mila.

Find out who is our mother, find out the reason. Find our father. Rescue our brother. That’s the only things I request from you.

Know this: I love you—forever and always in this forsaken world.

~Raven

My mind explodes with all the information.

What? I don’t understand. Too much.

I glance at Raven’s still frozen figure. I shake away the thought.

Am I even thinking right now? Is this all a dream?

I clutch my head. The information swirling through my mind.

I don’t know anymore.

Everything has been a lie—nothing’s real. I’ve been ‘memory wiped’. I’m in a sleep, been in it for twelve years. I have a brother who’s been communicating with me?!

How?!

…

My life? My dreams? They’re all fake.

What is reality? And where can I find the end of this nightmare?

I bolt out the door. I keep running, deep into the woods, until I find myself where the confusion began to unravel itself. The lake in the middle of Miracle Island.

Why does this place call to me?

“Stay…strong…Mila.”

Who are you?

“Someone who’s…willing to…help…help…”

“Why don’t you ever answer my question?!” I cry out, breaking the silence. I cry out into the darkness, into the endless hallways.

“Can’t…trapped. Need help…” the voice echoes through my mind.

How can I possibly help him if I can’t help myself? How can I lift someone else when I’m on the ground? This can only mean that I’m living in a fake reality. That means all the strange things happening since July had all been real. All the dreams that I’ve had, all the nightmares, the confusion, Midnight, and every single detail that seemed off about absolutely everything…was real.

It was all staring at me in the face. Letting me know that it was there, but I was too far in the hole to reach their hand.

…

How can I trust this voice?

…

Am I insane yet?

How can I trust anyone…how can I?

The last person I trusted was Nolan. Hatred bubbles up to the surface as I thought his name. He murdered my mother. Although I don’t know that fact exactly, I know he was a part of the planned murder, with the ricin poison.

If there is anything clear in this twisted version of fate, I know one thing. If this is all true and I’m really just living a nightmare, I will get out of this hell loop, and find the people who trapped me in it. I will fight through all the obstacles through my mind.

Mark my words, I am coming for you all.

Starting with Nolan.

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Thanks, with lots of smiles

☆•Yiona•☆