Post by StoryGirl83 on Jun 4, 2010 21:28:24 GMT -5
Chapter Seven – Getting Personal
When Chris picked up the phone, he didn’t expect the panicked voice on the other end.
“Oh, thank goodness,” his cousin, Hope Halliwell, breathed. “I was beginning to think no one was home.”
“Is something wrong, Hope?” Chris asked concerned.
“I can’t find Ladybug or Cilly?” she informed him with a sob. “First, Mom and Dad don’t come back, now my sisters are missing, too. Can you help me, Chris?”
“I’m coming right over,” Chris informed her. “Can you hold on while I come over?”
Hope sniffed and nodded. “I’m scared.”
Chris put down the phone, but left it off the hook and orbed out.
Chris reappeared in Hope’s bedroom. The ten-year-old was huddled in a corner with the phone to her ear. As soon as she saw Chris she dropped it and ran to give him a hug. “I’m so scared. Once moment Cilly was there. I turned around to get something and heard her start to scream. When I turned to look she was gone as if she’d never been there. I went looking for Ladybug, but I couldn’t find her. Will you help me look?”
Chris exhaled slowly, trying to come up with an answer. “We’ll find her, okay. We’ll find both of them, but I don’t think . . . Hope, when Cilly disappeared, did you see anything? Anything strange?”
“She wasn’t there,” Hope insisted. “That’s strange. She should have been there.”
Chris nodded. “Yes, that’s strange sweetie. Could she have teleported out?”
Hope shook her head. “No, there wasn’t enough time. I’ve been around all of you long enough to know that. There wasn’t enough time. She was just gone, as if she had suddenly turned invisible.”
Chris frowned as he looked at her. “What did you say?”
“I said she was gone.”
Chris shook his head. “No, the part about her turning invisible.”
Hope shrugged. “That’s faster than leaving, just not being able to be seen.”
“Like this?” Chris asked as he closed his eyes and concentrated.
Hope gasped. “Chris?! Where are you?”
Chris reappeared. “Would that timing work with what happened to Cilly?”
Hope nodded. “When did you learn to do that?”
“When magic came back,” Chris informed her. “Listen, Hope, a lot of children have been disappearing, some of them as old as Ladybug and Cilly. I don’t know why how, but we’ll find them, but I need you to come with me okay?”
Hope nodded.
“And there wasn’t anything more you can tell me?”
Hope started to shake her head. She stopped and frowned. She ran across the room and pulled open a drawer in her nightstand. She pulled out a slip of paper and ran over to him. “I think Cilly dropped this. She was working on homework.”
Chris took the piece of paper and unfolded it. Hurried letters spelled out, “James Thom”. After the last letter was what looked like the beginning of another, but he couldn’t make it out. “I’m not sure if it’s any help of not, but I will definitely show this to Mom and Wy. Are you ready to go?”
Hope nodded. “You’re going to get my sisters back, right?”
“I will do everything I can,” he assured her.
Hope hugged her arms around him. “Okay, let’s go find my sisters.”
Chris reached down and hugged her shoulder to him. Clutching the paper with the other hand he orbed them away from there.