"Where!" I mean to ask, but instead it comes out as an exclamation.

Forgetting my pounding head, I jump up, making Lager cast me a concerned glance, which I ignore and instead focus on Peter.

"Uh-well, I can't be sure, but I'm almost certain he's in this cave not too far away from the Core. If you have a map, I can show you it's location."

I remember running away from a Lyncher with Becky and Zero, using a cave to hide. Dad must have had the same idea. Like father like daughter.

"Lager." I say, turning to him and barely being able to control my jitters. "Do you have a map?"

Lager doesn't seem happy about any of this, but he reluctantly lifts his hand and snaps, a map of Dalton forming from just darkness. The map lands in his hand and I jump over, snatching it and running over to Peter.

I grab Peter's hand and he yelps as I drag him to the bed, but not before slamming the door in Sylvia's face. I hear a growl and she flings it open again only to receive the full force of Lager's glare. She immediately drools her shoulders, Boeing her bead as she back out of the room and closes the door quietly.

I lay the map out on the bed, taking a second to study all the interesting features before shoving Peter in front of it.

He stumbles, his face red as he rubs the back of his head, and I realize I haven't let his hand go yet.

Quickly I release, taking a step away so he doesn't get the wrong idea.

"Hurry!" I say, snapping him out of it. I bounce on my feet nervously as Peter leans over the map, observing it with a scrutinizing look as Lager stands to the side, watching him completely un-amused.

Silence envelopes the room.

After a minute of nervous anticipation on my part has passed, I finally break.

"Are you just going to stare at it all night? Where is he?" I say harshly, then since when I realize just how rude I was being.

Peter grimaces, before glancing up at Lager.

"You don't suppose you could create a pencil too, could you?" He inquires.

Lager scowls, expression going dark, before he flicks his pinky finger. A pencil materializes out of shadow just like the map, and it floats in the air, before shooting towards Peter at lightning speed.

He yells, putting his hands up while I gasp, but at the last second the pencil slows, controlled by a tiny tendrils of darkness that leaves the lead point only inches from the space between Peter's eyes.

Peter slowly lowers his hands, gulping.

I turn to Lager, putting my hands on my hips. "Now that was uncalled for." I scold.

But Lager ignores me.

"The next time you think to ask me, a Darkling High Commander, to use my powers for something as useless as a pencil, think twice, or else that pencil may find its mark next time."

I shiver at how dark and frightening his voice sounds. Someone must be in a bad mood.

The pencil drops into Peter's hands, and he looks at it like it might come alive again and stab him, before slowly enclosing his fist around it.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Lager smirk at Peter's fear, and give him a pointed glare.

Sneakily, Peter extends his hand and puts the tip of the eraser on the paper, right smack dab in the middle of a familiar volcano land feature.

"This is our current location." Peter states, earning a snort from Lager at how obvious what he just said was. He traces the pencil in a slightly curved path to the left, through a landscape of forest, before stopping at a circled part.

"And this is the Core." He says, and I lean in closer. "If I remember correctly, the cave should be about.......here!" He says, stabbing the pencil at a part in the jungle close to the core.

Not that far from Highclere, but even closer to the Core.

"How do you know he's there?" I ask, suddenly suspicious. What If he's working for Mrs. Clark and this is all a ploy to get Zero and I back? Then again, Peter has never been the best actor or liar, based on the amount of times I've played two truths and one lie with him because of boredom.

"I told you that when we were all attacked it was all a little blurred, and I couldn't remember much besides the fact that I was about to die, but that's not true. I was in the shower a few minutes ago-".

"Little too much information!" I cut in, and Lager jerks his head in a nod of agreement, pretending to wretch.

"Well anyway, I remembered that in all the chaos, I had run into Dr. Cartwright, who was close to being trampled. I know what cave he's in, because I was the one who led him there myself. I knew you would never forgive me if I let him fend for himself, so I got him to safety first, before running."

I breathe out a sigh of relief, never feeling more grateful in my life to have Peter around.

"Peter! You're the best!" I exclaim, jumping towards him with my arms outstretched going in for a hug, only to slam into a brick wall. I stumble backwards, cursing as I rub my throbbing nose.

I look pointedly at Lager, who's giving me an innocent look.

"My power slipped." He says casually.

"Sure it did." I say sarcastically, watching as the brick wall dissapears. I don't make another move to hug Peter though, who looks semi-dissapointed.

Suddenly, the door opens, and Becky storms in, Max trailing her with a love-sick puppy expression.

"I've had enough!" Becky, exclaims stopping in the middle of the room and throwing her arms out wide. "I'm sick of staying around here when Ashley 's dad is in trouble!"

My eyes widen, and I take a step towards her, my hand slowly going to rest over my heart.

"Aww, really? I didn't know you cared that much." I say, feeling extremely happy and pleasantly surprised.

"I don't really." She says flatly. "It's just this idiot over here won't leave me alone." She says, jabbing a thumb over her back at Max and ruining the semi-heartfelt moment.

"You don't have to be rude about it." Max pouts. "And besides, it's not my fault I can't resist your irresistible charm."

"Ugh," Becky groans, squeezing her eyes shut and throwing her head back. "He's been saying lines like that this whole time."

Despite the circumstances, this whole scene between Max and Becky compels me to laugh. They are so perfect for each other, too bad Becky is as stubborn as a mule.

"So are we going or what?" Becky says, putting her hands on her tips.

"Going." I say.

"Staying." Lager says.

"I'm hungry." Max cherps. We ignore him.

I turn on Lager, confusion across my features.

"Staying? Why would we stay? Now that we know where my father is, we can go get him."

"I can't let you three go by yourselves." Lager says, adamant.

"Your forgetting Peter." I remind him.

"Three and a half." He concedes.

My scowl deepens. "I need to save my dad, you can't keep me from doing that. Besides, what are you so scared about? Lynchers? We've encountered them before, we can handle them again."

I don't mention the fact that when we encountered them I was quaking in my shoes and I didn't even see the creature.

Lager clenched his jaw, his eyes flashing, and suddenly, I know this isn't just about Lynchers.

"You're afraid I'll run into Zero." I say monotonously, realizing this.

"If you run into him, who knows what could happen." Lashed utters quietly.

"Zero wouldn't-He'd never...."hurt me, I want to say, but after the past few hours I can't bring myself to finish the sentence. Not after all that was revealed.

Still, even after all of that, I can't bring myself to believe that he did all of that purposefully. Everything we've been through together, it couldn't have been for nothing.

"She will have us." Max volunteers, stepping up beside me and gesturing to Becky who nods once in agreement.

"Do you really think the both of you could stand up against a Kinling High Commander." Lager laughs humorlessly.

"Since when did we start talking about Zero as if he's the enemy?" I inquire, defending him because it's my instinct.

Even if Zero intentionally tried to harm me with this fake bond, and that's a big if, he was still one of my only friends on Braun island, and he protected me on here too.

"Besides," I continue, "we don't know for sure that Zero purposefully wants to hurt me. He may not have thought about the consequences when he created the bond, but I refuse to believe that he doesn't care for me at all now."

"You're missing the point." Lager growls, one fist clenching with the other rubs the bridge of his nose while his eyes squeeze shut. "Even if he never meant for you to get hurt now, you're still dying. And the closer you get to Zero, the closer you get to death. I can't let you take that risk."

"But why? Why won't you let me take that risk? Why am I so valuable?" I blurt the questions I've been meaning to ask for a while.

Lager pauses, eyes slightly wider than usual, before he recovers.

"Remember how I told you I had this gut feeling, that I was sensing something strange coming from the island you were on? Well you're connected to that feeling somehow, and I need to figure out what is going on."

My shoulders slump slightly in disappointment. Is it wrong that I was hoping he would say something else.

Suddenly, Peter speaks up. "Wait, wait, wait......you're dying, Ashley?!?!?" He exclaims.

"She's been dying for a while." Becky retorts. "Get with the program."

I'm about to make a statement about how rude it is to casually mention my death, but then a light bulb goes off in my head, and I let out a short laugh like a crazy person.

"Guys, I just thought of the most easy solution. I can't believe I didn't think of it before. Why not just destroy the bond?" I ask, looking around, excited about my great idea.

Max gives me a look full of pity, Peter looks confused, Lager is back to rubbing his forehead in short, soothing circles, and Becky slaps her forehead with her palm.

"You're more stupid than I thought." She mutters, and I frown.

"It isn't that easy." Max explains, his bright blue eyes full of apology. "To destroy the bond would be to destroy you. I can't extract the bond, or even touch it without causing you harm. The only way to get rid of it, would be for Zero to end the bond himself."

"Still an easy solution." I say happily. "He knows I'm dying, but maybe he doesn't know that he can stop it. If he did know, I'm sure he would get rid of the bond in a heartbeat. All we have to do is talk to him."

"Talk to him?" Becky snorts. "Yeah right, you're forgetting that he ran away!" I wince at her harsh words.

"I can talk to him." I say quietly. "Through our bond. It's kind of like speaking to each other through our minds. It's very easy-".

"Don't. You. Dare." Lager snarls, his golden eyes flashing open to pin me with their hard stare. "Doing that will only bring you closer to death. It isn't worth the-"

"Risk." I finish for him. "Yes I know, but who cares if I have a raging headache? If I can communicate through the bond and then he ends it, I won't have to worry about dying any longer. It's the perfect solution."

"No! And that's final!" Lager hisses.

Anger boils inside me. Who does he think he is, bidding me around, he can't stop me. If I contacted Zero right now he wouldn't be able to do anything. It's not like he can get into my head.

Lager sees the expression on my face and realizes what I'm about to do.

"No!" He exclaims desperately, appearing in front of me in a flash and clamping his hands on my shoulders. "Don't do it! Just wait! I'll-I'll let you go save your dad if you don't."

I pause, right before I was going to use the bond for communication, and stare up at him. "Really?"

He nods quickly, relieved I stopped. "Yes, yes. I'll let you go, and if you run into Zero, then you can tell him. There's no reason to use the bond."

I smile victoriously, eyes lighting up. It's hard to keep myself from doing happy dance.

"But," Lager says, tuning my moment of victory. "You'll have to take End with you."

"End?" I ask, confused. "What can he do?"

"You'd be surprised." Lager smirks. "He can also keep an eye on you and make sure you don't get into any trouble."

"Trouble? Me? Pssch." I say, dubious.

Everyone gives me a flat look. I sigh.

"Fine, but we leave right now."

"Heck to the no." Becky interjected, and Max nods, agreeing with her. "I'm not leaving Highclere to go parading through the forest with only the clothes on my back."

I sigh again, rolling my eyes.

"Fine. We leave in a few hours."

Dear readers, and there you have it! You've learned a little bit more about this bond between Zero and Ashley, and you have seen some Becky and Max action. The last time I did a bonus character interview was before we met the dashing Lager, so what are your guys thoughts on another one, this one including some new characters, like a certain Darkling high Commander someone. Tell me your thoughts. Vote, comment, and stuff yourself with sopapillas cause they are the best freaking pastry ever. Lots of love,

Dangeroustoken