My head felt like it was about to explode, everything was blurry. I realized I was in what looked to be an old warehouse. My wrist hurt like crazy and I saw that this was because I was chained to an iron rod. Next to me was Liz. She was already awake. Her expression said anger, defiance, a look that said if you touch me I’ll rip you apart, but I knew better. I could see the fear in her eyes. I knew because she stole that look from me, except for the fear, I have no fear. “Liz, where is Carmen?” She turned to me her expression immediately relaxing as she saw me, “I don’t know, when I woke up you were unconscious and I didn’t see Carmen, do you think there is a chance she got away?” I sighed, “No, Carmen would never leave us.” Well crap I thought. “Emma,” said Liz
“Yeah?”
“I’m glad you’re awake,” I gave her a reassuring smile.
“What do you think he wants with us?” she asked.
I said the first thing that came to mind and the only thing that made sense, “Liz, Carmen is a millionaire; this guy is just a coward working on another ‘get rich quick scheme.’
“Mhmm ransom,” she mumbled, more to herself than me, acknowledging that this proposition made sense to her. She had forgotten that Carmen was a millionaire but I didn’t say anything; I understood. I had moments like that often even when we went to her house it stopped dawning on me that she was up to her ears in money, probably because I practically lived there myself. Now it only took moments like these to remind me how very different Carmen’s life really was from ours.
“Here comes Carmen!” I said eager with worry and wanting to know what to expect next. “Along with him,” it came out almost a growl. He chained her up next to us, “Are you ok? What did he do to you?” I whispered to her.
“Relax I didn’t hurt her,” he said wrapping the chains around her wrists.
“I wasn’t talking to you!” I snarled.
“Mhmm feisty for someone chained to a bar,” he said amused.
“Emma, he didn’t hurt me,” said Carmen.
I looked at her, I was glad she was ok, but now completely confused, “What do you want with us?”
“I could tell you but what fun would that be?” he said grinning. “Now you’re next,” he said pointing to Liz.
“Touch me and you die,” she said glaring at him.
I gripped the pole above me, lifting myself up and kicking off the wall behind me I swung at his head and gave him a good solid kick in the face. “Looks like someone is eager to go next,” he said standing back up and holding his jaw. He undid my chains and I fell to the floor. Dropping from what had to be at least four feet off the ground I braced myself for the impact of the cold concrete yet to my surprise two seconds after my release I found I had landed on my feet perfectly unscathed.
It looked like the warehouse was an old abandoned machine factory used to cut and transport steel. “I give you my word you shall not be harmed,” he said as he watched my eyes scanning for escape routes. Obliviously he didn’t take kidnapping into account. Hanging out in a dusty old warehouse was not what I had in mind for tonight, and what kind of hobo says ‘shall’ anyway? Who the heck is this guy?
He walked over to a back room that looked like it used to be an office. He opened the door waiting for me to follow and to my gut wrenching disgust, I did. The room held a dusty table and two chairs. There were no windows, the only light came from a crooked light fixture. He shut the door behind us.
The wallpaper was torn with what looked to be faded sailboats.
The dust made my eyes itch, it was evident we were the only people who’d been in here in years. He took a seat on the table offering me a chair causing the dust to billow out from under him and me to sneeze. “That’s a beautiful necklace” He said. There was silence. What did he want me to do, thank him? “It’s very symbolic,” he continued. Absentmindedly I stroked my necklace as he spoke. It was a half-crescent moon shape with the two beads attached at the knot above the crescent. My mother had given it to me. After she died I never took it off.
“The two beads that dangle beside your crescent moon represent balance and power, and I don’t know if you can see it but beneath the surface of your crescent moon there should be an image of an eye.” He stated calm and informative, patiently awaiting my response. My eyes grew wide but I quickly recovered. How did he know about the eye?
His calmness unnerved me. He looked to be about 6’2 and 280 lbs. give or take, he obliviously hadn’t showered in weeks. He seemed to be the type of guy that knew he could use his sheer mass bodyweight to intimidate people. What surprised and unnerved me was that he didn’t have that effect on me. He 57 seemed to recognize that he didn’t have to be threatening for others to know he was intimidating, his size spoke for itself. I wasn’t sure if I should be more or less frightened at this fact.
His words rose barely above a whisper yet in them I could not help but feel an underlying threat. I felt as if I moved or even breathed the wrong way I would be creating even more agitation and heaviness to this small dusty room.
“Who are you?” I had stopped playing with my necklace.
“My name is of no consequence,” he replied.
“Why are we here?” I asked, surprised he was letting me interrogate him.
“Why do you think you are here?” he questioned back.
“Enough games you’re just toying with us!” At this point I was on my feet practically screaming at him.
“Sit down,” he commanded in that whispery growl.
“You will get your answers as soon as I get mine. Now I’m curious, why do you believe I have brought you all here?”
“Ransom,” it came out a question. He grinned something fierce with a sparkle in his eye.
“Good guess my dear but if I were asking for ransom you would be dead already.” It took me a few seconds before I realized I had been holding my breath. He sighed, “I’ll explain, you see logically I would have only taken the rich girl, however the two of you intervened and considering both of you had seen my face I would have disposed of you quickly. Now aren’t you glad that I am not interested in ransom?” he inquired.
I had to ask, “What are your intentions?”
He got off the table, taking the second chair and turning it so that it was not facing me. “Well, I do believe it is story time. It all starts long ago before man walked the Earth.
Demons and creatures of many shapes, sizes, forms and such unbearable cruelty that I pray the earth never tastes again. Every living thing has a life source he explained. The Earth being life, one and of itself, its life began to diminish; drowning in blood and chaos. Seeing this, the gods intervened, sending the creatures back from whence they came by bending the fabric of space and time to an alternate universe, so very foreign from our own.” He soon began to lose himself in his words, his eyes portraying a far off expression. “The Great God Orion forced all of them off this world where they could no longer wreak destruction and havoc on Earth, sealing the portal of their world behind them so that they may never return and in turn restoring balance to the Universe.” “And they all lived happily ever after THE END.”
His brows furrowed disapprovingly, “No interruptions,” he snarled.
I ignored him, “So if the portal was closed then why the story?” Not that I believed any of this for a second. He gave me another stern look before he continued.
“Because dear child the portal reopened, they returned and Orion was no longer there to stop them.” What did this story have to do with me and my friends I wondered? “It is my theory,” he continued, “that the demons could smell, sense the newfound blood that seeped into the Earth’s core and hungered for it. It is this hunger for blood, violence, for more; that I believe was somehow able to help them escape from their world and into ours. The portal had reopened; with Orion’s death, his three sons equally took their place at the throne.”
The scent of metal, sweat, and soap filled Liz’s nose as she twisted and wiggled uselessly chained to an iron rod. Carmen was far enough that Liz was unable to reach her.
Ignoring the pain in her wrist she slowly forced it through the chains, gently at first then harder. It was as if she was still at home trying to persuade the lid off of a pickle jar, slowly but once it started to give away she yanked it free! With her now bloodied hand she reached back pulled one of the chopsticks out of her hair. Using it she managed to manipulate the chains to her advantage. They soon fell to the floor in a loud CLANG. At the last second before falling to the floor with the chains she grabbed hold of the iron rod to ease herself down. “I don’t know how Emma did it but I’d rather not be chop suey”. Emma had fallen straight to the ground with ease.
He stretched, wrinkling his nose as he stirred the dust.
Sitting back down he continued on, “Here comes the part you’ve been waiting for; the reason you’re all here. The three brothers, he continued, created reincarnates of them using a citizens spell, the same spell used to create servant gods.
Anyway these three warriors were sent to Earth’s aid many years ago. However, though created by gods they were not invincible. When one died, their powers would roam the Earth in search of the next heir.”
“Nice story, what do you want?” I interrupted, clearly unimpressed. What a looney, I thought to myself.
“My medallion has the power to locate such powers.” The corner of one side of his mouth twitched in amusement. I was confused; I thought this guy was nuts in the beginning but now he was just plain psycho. “I’m sorry to say I lied to you 62 Emma. I promised no harm would come to you, but unfortunately your powers are already upon you and I cannot take your power from you without there being a negative impact, it’s just not possible. If your powers had not come just yet like your friends then perhaps, but unfortunately…”
Anger washed through me like a wave. “I don’t know who you think you are but I’m leaving and I’m taking my friends with me.” I went for the door.
“You’ve been seeing things, things you can’t explain like that shadow in the alley? It was real, all of it” he said standing up to block the door.
“I’m leaving,” I repeated, now seriously freaked out. I leapt over the table and ran straight for the door. I threw my arms over my head before I slammed face first into wood. I heard the door split open from the impact and when I opened my eyes I found myself outside against the far wall. My arms were incased in armor. As soon as I regained myself I got up to run, with psycho hobo at my heels.
“Alright genius what now?” asked Liz after tossing her a chopstick and helping Carmen down. “Thanks, let’s go get Emma.” she replied, rubbing her wrist to ease to the pain.
“They’re somewhere in the back of the warehouse, that much we know.” She said running towards the back. It was then that Carmen and Liz nearly ran over Emma as she was running out of an office. Liz saw the hobo not far behind her. Quickly she grabbed a crowbar and waiting till Emma passed by her she swung the crowbar at him as hard as she could, dropping it as they ran.
“Emma, are you alright!” asked Liz out of breath. I had pulled my sleeves down to cover the armor encasing my arms.
“I’m fine,” I retorted. No one said anything else until they were out of the warehouse and at least three blocks of zigzagging and fence jumping. “Do you think it is safe?” asked Liz.
“He knows where we live,” said Carmen “Where are we supposed to go?” They sat on the curb still out of breath but too afraid to stay in one place for too long.
He stood slowly and painfully a large bruise already beginning to form. He had at least one broken rib. The feeling of cold cement tickled his skin. A thousand sharp knives, pins and needles entered his brain forcing him to reel in agony and lose consciousness yet again. He awoke to blackness, it engulfed him. Images swirled around like a whirlwind. Standing he let his vision clear, the images coming closer into view. It suddenly dawned on him, these images were his memories. Pictures of his past flashed before his eyes one after another. The first image was of him and his father. He found himself in the library of the institute where he grew up. He could smell the leather binding, candle wax and dust; it felt so real and yet there he was standing there staring at his younger self and his father who had died many years before. “I know who you are Nova,” said a voice that echoed through the darkness.
“Who are you!” he said with more courage than he actually felt.
Stay away from the Angels, Nova,” said the voice, “Or I’ll kill you. This is your last and only warning Nova, do you understand? Their powers belong to me.”