Chapter 15
Jack
“Who are you?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
A flash.
Grace stood before me, clutching her sword against the man in black.
“Shadows?” the man’s mouth twisted wryly. “You don’t interest me.”
Grace suddenly slid back into me, and we fell to the floor. I could feel something warm drip onto my hands. Blood ran down Grace’s arm.
The man in black began to walk toward us, shaking the blood off a knife. It gleamed wickedly.
I tried lifting Grace up. “Come o-AHH!”
I was pinned against the wall, his hand crushing my throat. The cold metal tapped my face. A swift pain. He licked the blood from his blade. My head began to spin. Two voices – laughter and worry. I could hear Grace screaming. I could hear laughter, such terrible laughter. It all drowned out to a strange thumping. My eyes began to close.
Silence.
The man’s eyes opened white. His grip loosened, and we fell to the floor.
“Are you alright?” A man in a suit stood before me.
I was covered in blood. My back hurt. My throat still tried to reshape itself from his grip.
“Hank! Hank!” Grace ran toward me. “Oh my god.”
“It’s not mine.”
“We should leave,” the man stated.
“Who are you?”
“I am an agent of the Children.”
Grace helped me up.
“What do you want from us?”
“I would like you to come with me.”
“To where?”
“To meet my master.”
“And what does your master want?”
“Only to talk and to offer answers.”
“Well, we would like to be left alone.”
“Maybe Miss Lovenson would like answers to the event from twelve years ago.”
Grace’s eyes widened.
“Okay.”
The two of us followed the man. I turned behind me and saw the man draped in black on the floor. Blood flowed onto the street floor.
“Please get in,” the man in the suit stated.
He opened a door to a black sedan – luxury class. We entered the back seats, and he proceeded to the front. My phone began to ring. I looked at it curiously. It died yesterday, and I had not recharged it.
Eason calling…
“Hello?”
“How are you two feeling?”
“We’re fine.”
“I went to check this morning, and you two had already left. Where are you headed now?”
“We’re meeting with the Children.”
“What?!”
“Just to hear what they said. We listened to you too.”
Silence.
“We also met the man in black.”
“Are you alright?”
“Yes. He’s dead. An agent of the Children killed him.”
“Where’s the body?”
“Drive down Raleigh to Kensington. You’ll see a crashed cab and our dead driver.”
“Okay. Be careful about the Children.”
“Okay.”
“We’re here,” the agent stated.
The car stopped in front of an apartment high-rise. He ushered us in pass the lobby to the elevators and then to the tenth floor – the suites. We exited the elevator and found ourselves facing a door. The man opened the door, and we found ourselves in a suite the size of an entire floor. Before us was a crossed stairway. A woman holding an umbrella stood on the landing.
“Hello, Hank. Hello, Grace,” she stated. I had heard her voice before but where?
Suddenly, I heard a strange thumping in my head. Like the sound of a heart, but then, it stopped.
Ring. Ring. I looked at my phone.
Eason calling.
“Hello?”
“He’s not here.”
“What do you mean?”
“Jack isn’t here!”
Text and Images © Jonathan Lee
2 comments:
Jack totally makes me think of Jack the Ripper. I wonder if there are people without aspects that work with the children or Eason's group, only because there seems to be alot of people involved with these organizations who are finding out about Hank and Grace rather fast. You could totally do a filler chapter about the day in the life of an accountant at the Children of Medea's place. Either way I think you need to start developing some new characters that have nothing to with the current ones. Not that I am bored with them, they are interesting characters, its just that you could build suspense by ending a chapter on a cliff hanger and then cutting to a new set of seemingly unrelated people that explain a different side or give more back-ground on the overarching struggle/conflict apparent in this periodical.
Those thoughts aside, is there a planned end point like a novel being published in a magazine or more like a manga that ends when it needs to end?
This is a spectacular comment, Tommy.
Jack is awefulsome. More on him soon.
There are people who work for them without Aspects. More on that later too.
I'm avoiding other people's stories because this is told from a first person perspective. What will happen, however, are events outside of their direct sight. Those events might never be told, but they will be referenced. Background is necessary, but if we think about all our lives, there are so many things happening around us in the background that we didn't see, we won't see, and we'll never see. But those events still play important roles in our lives. That's what I'm aiming for here. You never know what tomorrow will bring, so - take it one day at a time.
There is an end point, but I don't know if that's The End or if it's merely an end.
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