Chapter Text
“The mystery of human existence lies not in just staying alive, but in finding something to live for.”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
“Margo always loved mysteries. And in everything that came afterward, I could never stop thinking that maybe she loved mysteries so much that she became one.”
― John Green, Paper Towns
“We'd stared into the face of Death, and Death blinked first. You'd think that would make us feel brave and invincible. It didn't.”
― Rick Yancey, The 5th Wave
“Even if she be not harmed, her heart may fail her in so much and so many horrors; and hereafter she may suffer--both in waking, from her nerves, and in sleep, from her dreams.”
― Bram Stoker, Dracula
“Alone. Yes, that's the key word, the most awful word in the English tongue. Murder doesn't hold a candle to it and hell is only a poor synonym.”
― Stephen King
TAWOOD COUNTY, IONIA
MAY 21, 2005
It came at night, like a shadow no one is able to avoid, like a lighting that strikes exactly where it intends to. It is the monster under the bed, and the figure at the corner that someone can see at night for one second and then disappears. It is the presence in the dark that seems to be watching you everywhere, but you can’t find it even if you are searching for it meticulously.
The street is quiet, with no sound of passing cars, of no teenagers that decided to secretly hang out with friends when they were supposed to be at home and no sound of nature brushing through the dark trees in the forest that surrounds the place. The nearest street light blinks for a second before it turns off suddenly and when the waxing moon hides itself behind the nearest storm cloud, the darkness seems to consume the place, leaving only the bright lights from the gas station to flicker rhythmically as if following an inaudible heartbeat.
Her long copper hair seems to glow against the artificial light inside the small convenience store. She wore it down, adorned with beautifully placed small flower hair clips that seem to sparkle when she moves. Her clothes are simple and show the importance that she holds among her friend group. Her dark denim mini skirt elongates her legs that are covered by a thin pattered pantyhouse. Her white crop top shows her belly and the silhouette of her body, while her long black jacket covers her enough for her to feel safe during the cold spring night. She looks like a perfect image of a fashionista, a rich popular girl known by everyone in the school, with a brilliant future and an even more notorious friend group. However, it could see through all that.
It could see the frayed edges of the miniskirt as if who made it wasn’t experienced enough with working with denim yet. It could see how big the jacket truly was, as if she got it from a bigger family member and it wasn’t originally hers. It could see the clear signs of use in her red backpack, as if she constantly used it for years. It could see it in the grayish colour of her shoelaces. It could see it in the way she treated the older worker inside the convenience store. It could see it in the uniform jacket she just put inside her bag. The girl wasn’t rich, she didn’t have the power, the money nor the future that she constantly tries to portray as if she had. She was just a poor girl working for a living, trying to help sustain her family and maintain the image of being the heir of an important family.
Slowly she opens the door of the convenience store, looking outside for a moment, cursing out the insatiable rain that refuses to go away. She turns back to the other worker, an elderly woman with long white hair, a warm smile and lines in her face that betray her age. The girl has a small timid smirk on her lips and with a wave of her head in her coworkers direction, she opens her red umbrella that matches her red converse.
“Are you sure you don’t want a ride, sweetie?” The older woman says, breaking the small silence created by the hum of a malfunctioning television behind the counter where she stands, along with the sound of rain outside.
“No Ma’am,” The girl says. “I live close to here” A lie. “and I don’t want to bother you.” A truth.
In reality, the girl enjoys the silence. She likes walking home and pretending she does it as a hobby, not because her dad can’t afford to buy her a used car. Besides, she told her dad she would arrive by 10:00 PM at the latest. Since it is 09:45 PM, it is better to walk than to wait until 11:30 PM, when the woman’s break usually happens. If she did arrive late, her dad would be mad and wouldn’t let her go out tomorrow with her friends, something that she couldn't afford to risk. She couldn’t miss the concert that they had been planning to attend for months now.
Nothing truly bad ever happens in Tawood, Staesia, Ionia. It’s the kind of city where doors are never locked and neighbors look after each other. Why would anything happen to her while she’s walking home?
“Goodbye, see you on Monday.” The girl says before walking outside with the umbrella protecting her from the heavy rain.
She walks slowly, looking around her as if searching for something, someone, for it , even if she has no clue that it had been following her the whole time, hidden in the darkness of the forest closest to the road. It was close. It could hear the hesitation in her breath. It could see the fear in her actions when she looked around. It could touch her if it wanted to. She stopped walking, looking around once more, the gas station was still close, like a lighthouse shining bright against the darkness of a storm, but no one would hear her if she screamed. She could go back and ask for a ride, but if she did it, she would have to miss the concert. She started to walk again, this time holding her light pink cellphone, her most precious treasure. Without looking, she dials one of the numbers.
“Clara?” She says as soon as the person answers, her voice trembles. “Yeah, I’m walking… What are you going to wear tomorrow?”
She tries to keep her voice level and not show how afraid she truly is, but it doesn’t matter, it knows. She continues walking, trying to pay attention to her friend, trying to pretend that she can't feel the eyes at the back of her head, trying to ignore the shiver that runs through her body. Slowly the clouds cover the moon, making the dark, even more dim and gloomy.
Soon, the gas station disappears from view and her friend keeps talking, masking the unusual silence that inhabits the forest. The closest street light blinks and it turns off, leaving her in complete darkness. She walks faster, but as soon as she reaches another light, it turns off too. She stops walking for one second, and when she does so, she can see the rest of the street lights slowly turning off, she is stranded, she is unable to see any signs of light for miles. Maybe she could go back to the gas station, maybe she could call her dad and tell him that she is going to arrive late, maybe she can ask someone for a ride, maybe she can keep walking and the lights will turn on by themselves, maybe the weird feeling of being watch was due to the horror movie she saw yesterday with her friends, maybe she would be alright.
“Clara, I..”
She begins to speak, but it's soon replaced by a terrified scream, followed by the sound of something hitting skin, her cries, and her desperate pleas—for her life, for mercy, for it to go away — echo through the empty road. Then, suddenly, silence. The lights turn back on, and the only signs of what happened are the red umbrella being carried by the rain and a light pink cellphone on the ground, where a faint voice can be heard calling “Annabelle?”
TAWOOD COUNTY, IONIA
MAY 22, 2005
Nothing truly bad ever happens in Tawood, Staesia, Ionia. It’s the kind of city where doors are never locked and neighbors look after each other. When the sun rose in the horizon the next day, the city was buzzling in rumors, gossip, and speculation. Some whispered that the girl ran away, burdened by her home life and the weight of her secrets. Others suspected she was kidnapped by visitors. And others dismissed it, believing it was all a prank, convinced she was going to reappear once again when the dust settled. By nightfall, the whole city and the surrounding region were plastered by missing posters and the urgent need to find her.
TAWOOD COUNTY, IONIA
MAY 23, 2005
Nothing truly bad ever happens in Tawood, Staesia, Ionia. It’s the kind of city where doors are never locked and neighbors look after each other.
“They still haven’t found her.”
The man says, while reading the newspaper that was delivered earlier to him. He is full of sharpness and straight lines, as if his features were specially carved to precision and to be able to cut with only one stare. He has dark hair that seems to be made of shadows and almond eyes that appear to be able to read anyone’s true intentions. His arms are covered by dark drawings, and his slender fingers closes the newspaper with ease, before putting it beside his empty plate and turning to the three teenagers in front of him. For a second, worry tints his black eyes, something that he quickly hides by slowly stroking his mustache.
“Don’t ever hitchhike, do you hear me?” He says, breaking the pregnant silence that joined them since the image of the ginger girl appeared on the cover of the man’s newspaper.
“Love, don’t scare them that much.”
A second man says, crossing the space between the stove and the table, before sitting down in his assigned seat once more. Unlike the first man, his face is filled with curves, softness and calming features. His dark hair has begun to grow silver, and the worry in his eyes is less straightforward, but still present, as if he is scared of letting the younger ones know how truly unease the girl's disappearance makes him. He takes another long sip of his tea before resting it on the table and turning to the first man. Their kiss is simple and quick, but their love seems to overflow it anyway, unable to fully keep it locked between the two of them. The kind of thing that only happens between people that have shared a thousand kisses before.
“I’m not scaring them, I’m telling them that if they do it, I’m gonna fucking kill them. I don’t have a good feeling about this.”
The first one replies, when they finally decide to break the kiss between the two of them. He points at the newspaper’s direction, at the girl’s picture located there, whose smile once felt cozy and inviting and now feels like a mockery. He turns to the kids, two that legally are theirs and one that spends so much time in their house that sometimes they feel they have adopted too.
The girl on the further left seems bored. Her long ebony hair is tied up in a ponytail, and its tips are dyed dark purple. Her makeup is all done, and the only clue that lets everyone know that she hasn't just arrived home is the pajama that she is still using, as if she was getting ready to go out and had to stop to eat with all of them. She waves her head, showing everyone that she is paying attention, but her eyes seem more interested in her purple and pink nails.
On the further right, a boy with copper hair and deep blue eyes keeps eating the pancakes that were placed twice on his plate. His lips are turned into a warm and carefree smile, and his eyes are unable to focus on only one thing on the table, as if he was constantly in search of more food to eat, or more people to talk to.
In the center, between the two of them, is a boy that carries his emotions and feelings behind shields inside his eyes. He looks like the personification of the shadows, with dark raven black hair that reaches his shoulders, distressed and messy, the clear image of someone that just woke up and didn’t care enough about his appearance at the moment to decide to properly brush it. His almond eyes are sharp, deep and intelligent, observing every minuscule thing that goes around him, from the way his sister seem to be impatient to leave, constantly turning her wristwatch in her direction, to the way his parents seem to be sharing brief and longing glances of a conversation they don’t need to use words to have, or even the apprehensive way his friend is holding his fork, more nervous about the disappearance than he wants to lead on.
The young man’s glance is coloured a profound hazel that in the dark — or in the shadows — looks like an intense and vast chocolate brown. His skin colour is richer than that of those he calls his family and he has freckles scattered throughout his body, like small stars that decided to call him their home. He seems like a hazardous person, someone that wouldn’t think twice before doing something to help himself or his closest friends and family or saying his truthful opinions even if that would hurt someone else.
Like his father, his right muscular arm is adorned by a well composed tattoo that starts on his wrist and stops at the base of his neck. It is a mixture of black lines and bare skin that, depending on the moment, seem to evolve and change, letting the figure that is seen be decided by who is relishing in the beauty of the art. Sometimes it looks like a dragon flying and exploring the bareness of his skin, or like a crow resting on a log in the middle of the night, or like shadows darkening his skin, but once he could swear he saw a figure of a man holding a scythe emerging from the dusk. At his back and on his shoulders, the beginning of another tattoo can be seen, but it is soon covered by the material of the black tank top he is using.
He has the silhouette of hidden dimples on his cheeks, something that only comes to light when he feels truly comfortable in the presence of someone, because of this, he can count on his hands those he knows for sure have seen it. His rosy lips have snake bite piercing on the sides, and when he raises his left eyebrow, another piercing can be seen. He is the perfect image of a bad boy, someone that should be ignored, but is constantly being chased by those that believe they are capable of taming the darkness and storm that reigns in his eyes.
He slowly drinks the dark coffee that the second man prepared for him while he was waking up. Unlike his sister, his attention is clear, but too is his disinterest and disdain. He is not the kind of person that would do what they are asking them not to do and he finds it ridiculous of them to insinuate he would let anyone kidnap him.
“I’m not telling nor advising you not to do it, I’m ordering it.”
The man long ago came to the conclusion that the best way to discipline a child is to talk to them and ask them their opinions and needs, never ordering them around or diminishing their views simply because he is their father. As a result, the two people that they call their kids were raised by imperative questions and an array of ways to get them to listen. They were always asked, even if compliance was not negotiable, even if there was only one correct answer, even if it would sadden their dads if they chose anything else.
“I’m sure that she is fine, people are organizing groups to search for her and I’m sure that they will find her.” The second man responds, putting his cup down and holding his husband’s hand between his, trying to call him down. He has always been the more composed and serene one between the two of them, the only one that is able to calm down the storm of thoughts inside the other man’s mind. “Nothing is going to happen with our kids, they know not to trust strangers.”
“I sure hope so.”
“This has been great and all,” The girl interrupts, standing up from her seat. “But, I have a date with my girlfriend today.”
“Ew, homossexuals” The younger asian boy says, looking at her with fake disgust present on his beautiful features. She rolls her eyes before hitting him at the back of his head.
“At least I have a girlfriend. If you were less annoying, maybe you would have one too. But then there’s the issue of your… how do I put it? Ugliness.”
“Kids, behave.” The second man says after sighing. “So you're not going to train with us today?”
“She is terrified she is gonna lose.. again.” The younger asian replies with mockery in his voice tone.
“Are you gonna stay, honey?” The second man asks the ginger, watching him smiling and shrugging.
“I don`t know, Mister Shen… You know that I don't fight like you all.”
“You would be even better if you trained with us, Settrigh, instead of just focusing on punching things senseless like you usually do.” The first man replies.
“He is just saying that because they want to have a date and they feel bad third-wheeling me.”
“Kayn!”
“Are you gonna say that’s a lie? No kissing on the mat though, dads, that’s just disgusting.”
“One day you are going to find someone and we won’t let you forget this conversation, honey.”
“That’s impossible, I don’t do this shit called romance or love.” The first man stands up, signaling for his husband, and son to do the same. At the same time, the girl leaves them, waving at the parents' direction.
“Tell your mom that we said hi, okay Sett?”
“I will, sir.”
“Just call us by our names, Sett, I feel so old being called Sir.”
“Okay, Sir.” The man rolls his eyes before waving to everyone to walk.
“Later on, we should help in the search for the girl.” The second man says, opening the door for their home gym and entering the place.
“See you later, Sett.”
“See you, Kayn. Try not to die.”
“As if… They are old and slow, easily beatable.”
“I’m gonna kick your ass, Kayn.” The first man says, pulling his son in his direction and resting his arm on his shoulders while walking. “Did you hear that, honey? Our baby son thinks he is gonna beat us.
“And I will, dad, and when I do, you owe me a new guitar.”
When the door to the kitchen closes behind them, locking them inside their home gym, one last thought of Annabelle Travers crosses their mind, a wish to find her safe and sound. A wish that is shared by most people that reside in Tawood County, a city where nothing bad ever happens and kids are always safe and sound.
ARIOSON CITY, NEAR PILTOVER, BAYREUTH
MAY 28, 2005
“It’s my turn to be sacrificed.”
The girl with long braided blue hair and deep vibrant cobalt eyes screams from the top of her lungs, while pulling the nearest leg of the guy lying down on the dirty and old hospital mattress. Jinx Veilstorm was always known for her impulsivity and her constant talk about death. In her left hand she carries a gun covered by her drawings, even if she has no intention of shooting anything tonight.
The guy lying down has a dark mahogany complex, curly short black hair and a captivating smile on his lips, as if he finds the discussion fun. Ekko Voltari is his name, he likes to be known only by Ekko and finds the use of his last name a waste of time.
“No way, you almost were sacrificed last time. Today’s my turn, Jinxy.”
He responds, quickly closing his eyes when the dark golden haired guy with shining facial scars positions his flashlight in his direction. Ezreal Starhaven, usually known as EZ, pronounced as E.Z. or Easy, looks like the sun in human form. He is all light and easy lines. He has caramel hair, composed of different hues of blonde and even light ginger, that when looked against the sun gives him an appearance of a god in his mortal body, or a star brightly shining.
His eyes are strikingly bright blue with light hazel in the center, giving it an appearance of two sunflowers locked inside his gaze. His face and body are adorned by freckles, some are well hidden between his clothing, but others, such as his face, seem to want to be seen and embellish him like small kisses from a god that long ago was deemed as dead. His face is marked by a scar, starting from the left side of his forehead and running through the direction of the right side of his mandible, continuing down until it reaches his hand. Near his eyebrows a smaller scar emerges from the bigger one, crossing his left eyebrow and eye. He usually hides his facial scars with make up, but he didn’t deem it necessary to do so today because he didn’t have any intention of seeing anyone else aside from his friend group.
Sometimes, his eyes seem to glow, losing their flowers and staying completely sky blue. That's when his hair seems to become even lighter, with white strands appearing to emerge between his usually golden caramel hair and his scars start to glow a bluish hue, being accompanied by two small triangular blue marks that appear on his cheek bones.
He smiles in their direction, with his left eye completely blue and the right one with a sunflower on it. Slowly his hair starts to seem lighter, but still not the snow white colour that it sometimes has.
“No way, it’s my freaking turn.” He gestures to both of them. “Jinx, we tried to sacrifice you last time. Ekko, your turn was before that. Today is my time to shine.”
“You are always shining, brother. It’s your speciality.” Ekko continues, jokingly rolling his eyes.
“Stop lying, it’s Lux’s one, and we all know that.” EZ responds, lowering the flashlight that he is still holding.
“That’s not what your cheeks are saying, little firefly.”
“You are not taller than me, Jinx.”
“Exactly.”
“And what would that make you?”
“Hot.” She says, at the same time as Ekko replies. “Mini Firefly.”
“Besides, I have it written down here, in my journal.”
EZ throws the flashlight in the dark skinned guy’s direction and for a second it seems like it’s going to hit the floor, but at the last moment, he is able to catch it, standing up for a brief instant, before laying down on the dusty bed again. The flashlight is turned off, but the glowing blue light that EZ emits seems to be enough for them to continue their conversation.
“Don’t do that” Ekko replies, annoyed by the action.
“Why not? You caught it.”
“I hardly did. I didn’t the first time.”
“You did it though, so why does it matter, time boy.” Jinx answers before Ez could do so, but Ekko refuses to continue talking, rolling his eyes and refusing to look at any of them.
The blonde guy slowly takes off the backpack off his back, taking care to not disturb the cat sleeping inside of it. Yuumi has a long white fluffy maine that seems to get into every nook and cranny inside the backpack. She is wearing pastel blue clothes and seems to be in a deep sleep. Yuumi is not an ordinary cat, unlike any other one out there, she has the ability to talk and think rationally, even if she prefers to use that intelligence to talk about fish or sleep. They met her during a mission they were still unable to complete and since then she has turned into an important member of the group.
The backpack she is currently sleeping in was originally black, but EZ has been using it for so long that it has now acquired an old dark grey colour. It is filled with buttons he spent years collecting, but his favourites ones are the white cat one, with a separate white paw, the Pentakill one he was given on his last birthday while attending a concert and a custom one of three pairs of angel wings together, an image he keeps seeing on his dreams. It has strapped against it a skateboard with the same six wings motif —which he spent hours painting — and the name “Spectral Crew” written in bold graffiti style letters with six signatures and a paw print on the side.
Carefully, he opens the bag, rummaging through the huge collection of things and the sleeping cat, until he can find the exact notebook he was looking for. The journal is leather bound and it has a deep brown hue, but its spine is blue coloured. His initials — E.Z — is written on the cover in white over a deep blue washi tape, next to it is a small drawing of a pair of white angel wings. It has frayed edges and it seems incapable of being properly closed down, because of this, its owner tied it with a long leather strap that matches the blue on the spine.
Slowly, Ezreal undoes the knot and flickers through the routinely used journal, until he is able to find a specific page near the end, adorned with a small drawing of a fae and a yellow post-it note by its side. The well written page seems to gleam in front of him and he avoids looking that close to the contents of it, he hasn’t finished writing it yet and he is sure it is filled with inconsistencies he still needs to correct before making it permanent with ink. His index finger brushes against the post-it note until he can find the content he was looking for, the name of the person they last joked that would be able to sacrifice themselves for the greater good of the group.
“See here? It’s my turn to die, so get the fuck off.”
Quickly, he closes the journal once more, he ties the leather strap with the expertise of someone who has done it thousands of times before. He waves his hand in the direction of the bed, and it seems to respond, moving from its place with a loud obnoxious sound that all of them know he can avoid. When it stops at the center of the white room that used to be a psychiatric chamber, the mattress slowly rises, while the guy laying in it tries to unsuccessfully stay there, tightly hugging the item and trying to ignore the dust and smell of it.
“Fuck you, EZ.” Ekko says as soon as he is unable to keep holding on and falls to the ground with a painful sound.
“I told you to leave.”
EZ responds, putting his journal again inside his backpack. He thinks about a direction, choosing the location he would rather be at. Finally, he takes a step closer to his friends, but mid action — instead of continuing stepping down on the hard concrete floor — blue, white and yellow light envelop him. When he appears again, continuing his movement, he is on the other side of the big room, on top of the mattress he just kicked Ekko out of. With a confident smile, he throws himself backwards, laying down at the same place where his friend was before him.
“Show off.” Ekko says, crossing his arms and walking in his direction with a fake annoyed face. “Can I be sacrificed with you? I’m sure the ghost wouldn’t mind.”
“Hey! I’m gonna be sacrificed with Ez, go fucking elsewhere, you asshole.” Jinx declares while pushing Ekko aside.
“No way, I wanna die like I lived, completely alone.” Ezreal raises his arms, holding the metal frame of the bed.
“That’s rich coming from you, dumbass.” Ekko comments before laying down at his side.
“Stop cheating, Ekko.” Jinx interrupts, throwing herself on the blonde’s other side. “Leave, time boy.”
“I won’t, I layed down first, blueberry head.”
“Calm down, there is enough Ez for everyone.”
The white cat moves, quickly getting out of the open backpack with the loud sound of the skateboard hitting the floor. She moves quickly, as if scared of being alone. She jumps on the bed and immediately starts walking on top of the blonde, until she reaches his chest. She stops moving, looking at him apprehensively.
“Own, hey Yuumi.” He responds, as soon as he sees her, with a smile still present on his lips. “Do you want to be sacrificed with the rest of us?”
“Is there enough space?” The cat replies with her usually amused voice, before laying down exactly where she is.
“There is always space for you.”
“I’m falling down!” Jinx screams, while trying to hold on to the blonde and to the bed.
“It’s because you have a big head and are not worthy of staying with us.” The other man responds, even if he is in the exact same position.
“No one is going to be sacrificed today.” Another voice says, at the door, surprising them enough for the two people to fall down with loud noises and even louder mentions of pain.
Luxanna Crownguard, or just Lux, is the image of a well lived life. She has long straight blond hair that seems to have been brushed to perfection, porcelain white skin with no flaws and eyes so blue that they must be the inspiration for the skies. Her arms glow soft with a mixture of pink, purple, white and sometimes yellow light, as if she was made of stars, a galaxy of colours that no normal human should have or achieve. Lux’s power is the proof that the universe has a sense of humor, giving her the ability to be what everyone always saw her as, the light in the midst of the darkness.
“Hey blondie.” Ekko responds as soon as he can, standing up while brushing his hair with one of his hands.
“Pancakes!” Jinx exclaims, jumping to her feet and brushing her hand on her trousers to get the dust out of it. “I didn’t see you there!”
“No one is going to be sacrificed today.” She says it again, to be sure that they all heard it.
“You are boring as fuck, did you know that?” Ez responds, brushing the cat's fur, still laying down on the dusty and old bed, not caring enough to get up from it.
“Ez, do you want me to tell Garen what you just said?” She answers, walking closer to him while rolling her eyes.
“Why do you always wanna tell dad about everything?”
Ez sits up, putting the white cat on his lap, before running his finger through his hair. Garen Crownguard, Lux’s older brother, was the closest thing most of them had as a father figure. For years, he was the only one responsible for keeping them all alive. Having a warm presence, a responsible mind and a tight grip around the group, he quickly received the nickname Dad, especially for those that most needed it. Currently he is attending the last weeks of university before his holidays begin and he is able to go home to all of them.
“Because you listen to him.” The cat jumps down from the bed, at the same time as the guy moves his legs to the right.
“I listen to people whose opinion matters.”
He stands up in a huff, waving with his hands as if that was quite obvious. He theatrically rolls his eyes, before flashing her a smile and subconsciously touching the bracelet on his left wrist, feeling their mission is close to begin and needing to reassure himself he is prepared for it.
“Ow, I wouldn’t let him say that to me.”
The dark skinned man interrupts, pulling the golden haired guy close to him, resting his left arm on his shoulders, as if afraid of what the two blondes would do if they continued their lane of thought. However, before anyone can respond, another person enters the room.
Aurora Evershade looks like she always does, a mix of inexplicable calmness and uninterrupted agitation, like the sun, that always looks serene, but is filled with tiny explosions inside of itself. She has long and curly ginger hair with platinum blonde strands that makes her look inflamed under sunlight. She has an uncountable amount of freckles that fill her pale face with colour, dark blue eyes that seem to see more than she lets people know and she wears rounded golden glasses that are always a little bit, but undeniably, crooked.
“Mister Johnson is coming this way.” She says, waving her hands in their direction, the conductor of a well trained orchestra.
“Calling them by their names still freaks me out.” Ekko says, breaking the silence that has grown between them as soon as soon it was clear that it was time to work.
“Why? We all have names even after death.” Aurora continues, lost in thoughts and silently talking to invisible creatures that only she is able to see.
“True, but let’s not forget he is a crazy psychopath that likes to make people lose their minds.” Ekko responds matter-of-factly.
“He still has a name, even if he is not a good person, Ekko, he still has the right to be called by it.” Lux says, while picking up the backpack that was abandoned minutes ago and throwing it in Ez’s direction by the bed, which he is able to catch quite easily.
“That’s right, but why are his victims' names forgotten, making them only be remembered by a conjunction of numbers and his name? They are never remembered as they were, people in their own right, with names, dreams and futures, they will always be linked to him and his crimes. Why does he deserve the right to answer to his name, while his victims are only that, his victims?” EZ says, while the bed moves by itself to the center of the room. Not knowing how to answer that, Lux stays quiet, as does the rest of the group.
“We have 2 minutes, more or less.”
Ekko interrupts the silence again, and as an answer, Ezreal once again opens his backpack, quickly looking through the items located there. When he sees the leather bound journal with gold details and the brown spine, he hurriedly and efficiently pulls it out and throws the bag in Ekko’s direction.
They watch the route of the object and notice it almost hitting the floor, if it did so, it is clear that the skateboard that is tied to it would break, but at the last possible second, Ekko is there, holding the object between his hands.
“Can you fucking stop doing that?” He says, using the back of his hand to clean a small trace of blood from his nose.
“If I was a serial killer, I would like to have a badass name… Like The Grim Reaper, or some shit like that.” The blue haired girl says, not paying attention to the rest of the conversation. She spins the pistol in her hands for a second, before letting it stop with her finger on the trigger.
“You already have a name, it’s Jinx.” Ekko says and she laughs, as if that was the funniest thing anyone has ever told her. “Now come help me, I can’t do everything by myself.”
Ez thought about denying that and answering that he for once has all the time in the world to do whatever he wants to, but instead he stays quiet. Jinx nods and obeys, even if there is still a trace of laughter on the corners of her lips. With a flicker of her wrists, the weapon disappears, leaving her hand bare, ready to receive the metal container of salt that Ekko fished out of the bag. They work fast, with Jinx circling the bed creating a line of salt around it, as well as a pentagram that covers the mattress, while Ekko, after putting the backpack on the floor, lights up candles in all cardinal points of the star.
Ezreal carefully holds the book in his hands. He can feel the old leather texture of the cover under his fingertips, as well as the golden carved “5” detail that shimmer against the blue light that the marks in his cheeks emit. He can feel the power on the pages, even if they aren’t really magical, and he can smell the old yellowed paper as if they were part of his destiny and inheritance. He would do anything to know the author of the book, but for now its expertise was enough to satisfy his mind’s hunger for knowledge.
The journal looks like a mixture of the thoughts of a well composed intellectual and the irrational mind of a madman, filled to the brim with writings, drawings and even newspaper scripts. It looks just like one of Ez’s own diaries, but he has no clue if it served as an inspiration for them or if he shares the exact same kind of madness as the author of these pages. He prefers to believe that the similarities are due to the quality and consistency of these kinds of diaries, serving as a way to put thoughts into pages and organize them easily.
Attentively he opens the book, flicking through the pages easily. The journal is big and filled with enough scripts and items to not have the annoying habit of always opening to the same ones. When it finally rests still, Ezreal finds himself staring at one of the blank ones near the back, where they assume the author was unable to continue writing before whatever happened to him made him stop. When they first encountered the book, Ekko wanted to fill the blank pages with their own thoughts, but was easily vexed by Ez, who wanted to keep it as it was, believing that he would rather die than let anyone else write on his own journals.
“He is coming.”
The white cat dressed in a small blue flowery dress says, with the fur on her back raised. She jumps on Aurora's shoulders, getting ready for the next few minutes. The girl stops talking to the invisible creatures located there and walks quickly to the center of the room, staying behind Ez, as he flips through the pages as quickly as he is able to, in search of a specific one. Lux, trying to be helpful, stops at Ez’s right, raising her right hand to create an even bigger light source for him to be able to see.
Jinx flickers her wrists again and her weapons appear on her body, ready to be used, she leaves the container of salt inside the bag, before walking in the group’s direction, she stops at Aurora’s right, behind Lux, with a finger on the trigger of her favourite pistol. At the same time, Ekko crosses the distance and positions himself at the left side, close enough to Ez and Aurora. Suddenly a gust of cold wind rushes inside the room, closing the door with a loud bang, with enough force for them to feel it on their bones.
“He is here.”
Aurora whispers, raising her hands and touching the guy in front of her at the same time as she feels the hands of the other three on her shoulders and arms. Ezreal stops flipping through the book, finally finding the exact page he was looking for.
“This is it,” He says, holding the paper open carefully to not damage it.
Abruptly the room starts to move, the items that were previously placed randomly through the area start to get distorted. Pipes are pulled from the inside of the walls, erupting with loud bangs similar enough to small explosions. The metal tubes that used to compose bed frames fly to the only door to the place, slowly reducing the exit to something that none of them is able to go through. The windows start to close and the distress sets in. All of the sudden, the backpack starts to move, flying through the air with ease, but at the last possible moment before it can join the rest of the items blocking the door and windows, Ekko is able to jump and hold it close to his body.
“What the fuck is he doing?” Ekko screams on top of all the sounds, once again cleaning the trace of blood from his nose with the back of his hand.
“Locking us in.”
Aurora responds at the same time as Jinx starts to laugh and bullets start to ricochet through the walls. The ginger seems to find it difficult to breathe, with chills piercing her body, she closes her eyes and covers her ears with her hands. Light seems to shine even brighter, when Lux raises her arms and tries to hit an invisible enemy.
Hurendly Ekko rummages inside the bag searching for something that he is unable to find, a curse word escapes his lips before he closes the bag and puts it on his back. He pulls a piece of wood from a pile beside him, ready to strike anything that gets close to them. Ezreal, still looking at the worn out book on his hands, raises his left one without facing the mess all around them. He tries to focus, to stop things from flying around them, he tries to open the door again, but it is only when the small latin shant leaves his rosy lips, that the place seems to erupt in ruins. Suddenly, the windows are completely closed, leaving them in absolute darkness, until Lux’s pink and yellow light disrupts the phantasmagoric obscurity, betraying their position.
A terrifying and ancient laugh echoes through the walls. Chills run down their spines, fear turns in their stomachs and raises the hair on their arms. They look all around them, trying to assess the damage the room is in, watching the way that everything is moving seemingly by itself.
Before they are able to pronounce a single word, the wind turns against them, roaring at their faces and pushing them around with enough force to steer them elsewhere. They try to keep their footing, remaining at their places for a few seconds more, before they are forced to walk slowly backwards. The group struggled to remain standing, they held each other with the fear of being isolated, but that was not enough to make them stay linked and close to each other.
Soon, Ekko stumbles, fighting the unseeable creature and the blood that starts to rush through his nose, the visible sign of his power being used nonstop. For a second he turns to EZ with a remorseful face, muttering something that none of them is able to recognize and later on they would assume was a plea for forgiveness. Ezreal tries to reach him, while simultaneously trying to protect himself and the old book in his hands, but before he could even move, Ekko is pushed backwards, hitting the floor with a deafening noise, a groan filled with pain, and the loud sound of wood breaking under him. He doesn't immediately stand up, remaining there, not answering their calls, even when they try to run to him.
As if as a domino effect, the rest of the group is also pushed around, separated between the chaos of the attack. Some are pressed against the walls, others find themselves hiding between the rubble and the forgotten hospital beds, but they know, due to their years fighting against creatures like him, that they are stronger together and being isolated like this could lead them to their deaths, or to the ghost to escape, stronger them he was before.
“Ekko!” The blonde man screams, but he still doesn’t dare move from his place beside a broken column at one of the corners of the room. “Rora!”
He screams again, this time to the ginger girl a few meters beside him, but as if to avoid their conversation, the ghost laughs again, throwing bits and pieces that he finds in all directions. Ez stands up, looking at his friend’s worried faces and holding the journal against his chest, as if he is afraid that he is going to lose it in the middle of the battle. His blue and blue-and-hazel eyes, looks around, searching for ideas and what to do, at the same time as he searches for clues of the ghost’s position.
“Rora!” He screams again, on top of his lungs. “Where the heck is he?”
His voice is quickly muffled by the sound of things being thrown around and hitting the surfaces around the room with enough force for cracks to gradually start to appear on the old white painted walls. Suddenly the temperature of the room seems to increase, rapidly making it difficult for them to stand in the corners and remain near them. A small fire erupts from one of the sides of the room, a small candle-like heat that tints their faces with an orange-like hue. Abruptly fire bursts through the walls, following the cracks and destroyed items, like an uncontrolled blaze that was burning secretly and finally decided to be seen. Immediately, the group of friends run away from the burning fire that seems to follow around them.
“I have a plan!”
The blonde boy says at the same time as the blue haired girl starts shooting again and the loud and screechy sound of a scream echoes once more through the small room.
“It would be nice to know the fucking plan, EZ.” Ekko screams back as soon as he can, bashing the debris flying around him with the beaten up piece of wood that he is still holding on as if his life depends solely on it.
“If you would let me fucking speak I would tell you dumbass.”
He responds at the same time as Lux screams on top of her lungs.
“Language.” She says, unfocused and with fear hidden in her tone of voice. “You wouldn’t want me to tell Garen about your poor excuse of a vocabulary.”
“Ow, fuck you too Lux.” He continues, hiding behind the closest untouched pillar he could find. “Why does my vocabulary and language matter when Ekko’s and Jinx’s doesn’t? It's quite unfair innit?”
“It’s because he cares if you speak like an impolite idiot, but not so much if those idiots do it.”
“Ouch, pancakes, I didn’t think you thought so highly of me.” Jinx interrupts with a joke, shooting a flying debris close to her, and then one flying in Lux’s direction.
“Ow, shush it, darling. You know that I adore you.”
“Since when can we flirt during a battle?” The black man says, throwing himself on the floor when a broken up bed frame flies in his direction, he once again cleans the blood on his nose. “I thought we had a fucking rule? Once there are foes, we are not hoes? Or some shit like that written on EZ’s cute poetry.” He grunts, tiredly, before turning in EZ’s direction for a second. “Love, you look quite dashing today.” He turns again to the place in which he assumes the ghost is in. Ezreal in his place, just rolls his eyes and pushes his hair away from his face.
“I’m always dashing, it’s part of my charm.”
“Stop being so fucking smug about it.”
“You look quite ugly if I can say so myself.” A sincere and entertained smile finds its place in Ez’s pinky lips, before he bites it away and turns in the supposed ghost direction. Using his raised hand to push away a flying object that was almost hitting Lux, who was constantly trying to control the burning fire the ghost created, while still regulating the amount of light in the room. “But that is a your face problem , not a ghost problem .”
“Guys!” Aurora says, but is quickly interrupted by Ekko speaking to EZ again.
“You didn't seem to mind my supposed ugly ass face when you were kissing the life out of me.”
“Guys!”
“Gods, Ekko, that happened years ago. Didn’t you get over it already? Are you still in love with me? That makes me sad.”
“Guys!”
“Ow, shut the fuck up EZ.”
“Not a fucking chance, I quite enjoy the sound of my voice.”
“E.Z. Starhaven! Ekko Voltari! Can you both shut up for a second please?”
Aurora screams, breaking the train of thought that the boys are following. Maybe it’s the fact that she is not the kind of person that usually screams, or maybe it's her worried and scared voice tone, an unusual thing when talking about her, but they both obey, immediately staying quiet, waiting for her to continue and for Jinx to stop laughing.
“Can you tell us your plan EZ? Please?”
“Can you bring us to the spectral helm? First we need to be able to see him.”
“Sure, but I need to touch you all.”
“Yeah, we can do that.”
“That’s easier said than done, pretty boy.” Jinx interrupts again, before Ez can continue talking, something that earns her a roll of his eyes and a distressed grunt.
“It would be if you would let me finish. Do I have to do everything in this team? Rora, where is he?”
“Near that big pile of rocks.” She waves in one direction, the closest to Ez in the north side of the room.
“Great. That’s so fantastic.” He mumbles softly to himself, before turning back to the rest of the group. “So the plan is… I know that it’s going to hurt, but we can think about it after we leave this place. On the count of 3, Lux, I want you to blind him, do the same thing you did to that maid ghost like two months ago.”
“I don’t know how to do it.”
“I trust you, I am sure that you are strong enough to do it.”
“Ok.”
“Jinxy, create a spiritual flame chomper.” He says, and at the same time, the girl raises her hand and a translucid grenade appears in her palm, as if it was always there and no one was able to see it before.
“It’s so pretty…” She says, incapable of taking her eyes off it.
“It is Jinxy, on the count of three, I want you to throw it in Ekko’s direction. OK?” She nods, carelessly throwing the object between her hands. “Ekko. How good is your baseball talent nowadays?”
“It’s great, as always. Thanks for asking.” He moves the wood in his hands with the talent of an athlete before winking in the blonde`s direction.
“Ok, so you know what to do?”
“Sure.”
“So I will count and I believe we will have a few seconds before hell breaks loose, so you know… Reach Rora and shit. Don’t die, that would be depressing.”
“What about us?” The cat finally speaks, still on top of the ginger’s shoulders.
“I want you to come to me as soon as you can Yuyu, ok? It's important.”
“Are we gonna be okay? I don’t want to lose my friends again.”
“We are not going anywhere, Yuumi.” Lux speaks softly. “You will never lose a friend again, we promise it.”
“I mean.. I would die for a hot dog right now.” Ekko interrupts again, spinning the wood in his hands nonchalantly and ignoring the stares he receives for it. “What? I’m hungry.”
“We ate before coming here.” Lux says with her usual aristocratic accent, sighing while looking around, still using as much of her power as she can.
“Yeah, but kicking a ghost’s but is a quite tiresome ordeal.”
“Mate!” EZ says, with the same accent, something that he is quick to hide with a cough and a sudden higher quantity of blue light coming from his blue marks. “I mean… bro.” He says with the same accent that Ekko and Jinx have. “Bro, pay attention, we can eat afterwards.”
“Mate.” The dark skinned boy says, laughing, before turning to the blue haired girl’s direction. “Did you hear that, Jinxy? Mate, you are an absolute cunt and a wanker.” He says, roughly copying the blonde’s real accent, knowing that his cheeks are glowing even more because of it.
“And you are a twat!” Jinx screams back with the same poorly done accent, laughing, while throwing the grenade between her hands.
“The both of you are insufferable.” Ez says using the same Zaunite accent he usually has, an accent he uses as a shield to hide his real one. “Three…” He starts counting, not having the patience nor the need to wait for them to stop laughing. “Two…” His hands find their way to his own hair, pushing the long blonde turning white strands aside, behind his ears, so nothing can affect his attention or vision. He is able to see the rest of the group getting ready, quieting down and stopping laughing, even if Jinx and Ekko still support two matching grins on their lips. “One…” Ekko raises his makeshift bat in position, holding it with both his hands, and Jinx takes off the security pin of the grenade and turns in his direction. “Go!”
Ezreal screams and the world seems to start moving again. He trusts his friends, so he has no need to actually be sure that they obeyed him. For a second, he closes his eyes, imagining his next position, the one closest to Lux. He takes a deep breath, before once more opening his eyes. He hears the loud sound of the grenade being thrown and without looking at it, he takes a step in his next direction. A mixture of yellow, blue and white light seems to involve him for a second, and when he finally appears again and continues his step, he is beside the blonde girl.
“Ez…”
She whispers tiredly, her face acquiring a pink hue due to all the hard work and power she has been maintaining for long minutes now. He smiles at her, but he doesn’t find in himself the need to answer, he doesn’t have enough time for it. He hears the deafening noise of a wood bat hitting the metal grenade, and he holds her in a half hug and starts moving again, a new step that bursts into lights and finishes beside the ginger girl and the cat. Without waiting for even a second, he takes a step back, appearing beside Jinx, locking arms with her and jumping through space once more, leaving her beside the other girls.
Ezreal knows that he doesn’t have enough time to reach Ekko and escape back with him before the explosion happens and the two of them are engulfed in flames and pain. He also knows that since the grenade was planned for a spectral adversary, it will mainly focus in the spectral helm, however, years of exploring the supernatural world made them realize quite quickly that since the bomb was thrown in the normal helm, it is able to affect them too, not as much as it would if it was created for this world, but enough for them to not want to be stuck in crossfire. Therefore, Ezreal hopes that Ekko still has a little bit of his magic to help him escape on time.
Once more, Ezreal steps aside and the blue light evolves him. When he appears again, he feels Ekko’s hands touch him, pulling him close. A loud bang of an explosion breaks the silence between all of them and the temperature seems to increase suddenly. The blonde turns in the direction of his friend, supporting a confident smile on his lips, even if Ekko’s face has turned into a worried expression. EZ is known for being the carefree and optimistic friend that always has an improvised plan for everything, he can’t let them know he is just as terrified about dying as they are. He doesn’t actually want to die.
“You are not going to die, Ezzy, my little bunny, I won’t let you.” His conscience answers his worries and he immediately is able to calm himself, his conscience has never failed him before.
“Are you freaking insane?” Ekko says, with a line of blood starting to run through his nose, the sign that he is currently using his power and the time is stopped around them. “Was that your plan? It fucking sucks.”
“Ow. It’s a brilliant plan! You are just mad you were not the one to create it!”
“Yeah, sure, because dying in a ball of flames is quite my cup of tea.”
“Oi! We are not going to die, and I have everything in my control.” EZ waves at the other guy’s direction for a second, before turning again to the explosion. “This is quite nice and all, but can we go?” The sound of Ekko’s watch echoes through the stopped world, signaling that half of their time has already passed.”
“Shit! You dumbass! Let’s go!”
Ekko takes the blonde’s left hand between his and starts running as fast as he can, trying to get far enough from the glowing and burning fire behind them. Slowly, a millisecond at a time — something that is only noticeable because of the stopped time around them —the world starts moving again.
“Shit! That’s why we should start talking about stuff after we are out of danger, asshole.”
“EZ! Teleport us”
“I can’t!”
“Why the fuck not? Teleport us!”
Unlike the rest of the group, Ez does not have a consequence when he frequently uses his power. He is not prone to fainting, nor blooding out, or has any fever afterwards. He can use it how many times he wants it to, that is, until he reaches a threshold he has always been too afraid to truly cross.
Since he can remember, Ez always felt that there was a bridge inside his mind, leading to somewhere unknown and full of power. It was tempting to cross it, to welcome the unknown and truly get to know the power he can feel is locked on the other side.
He always loved adventures and treasure too much and that seemed like a brilliant one, but he was too afraid to cross it and discover that part of himself and what powers he had hidden there. Everytime he uses his abilities, he feels a force from that part of his one sided bridge, calling for him, pulling him with more force than before, and he is afraid of answering and getting lost on the other side, never to properly be himself again.
So no, he doesn’t actually have a consequence for using his powers too much, but he can’t use it at will, he has a set amount of power he dares to use before having to rest and fight against the pressuring hand pulling him closer and closer to the beginning of the path he knows he won’t be able to go back from.
Teleporting now was out of the question. He was too close to the edge and he still had to use his powers later as part of his plan. He can’t and won’t do it.
Another sound of Ekko's watch betrays the fact that they are one second away from going back to the normal time, and they are still too close to the explosion. Ez can feel the heat increasing at his back, like an uncomfortable hand he is unable to get away from, searing its path on his back.
“EZREAL! TELEPORT US.” Ekko screams at his side.
Suddenly, Ezreal feels his body obeying, even if he had no intention to do so. The both of them are engulfed in blue and yellow light and suddenly they are thrown in the rest of the group’s direction, stumbling against their bodies. The heat of the explosion hit them at the same time as the sound and they all fall down, unable to stay on foot and needing to protect their faces from the fire. Ezreal feels pain emanating from the side of his body, where it made contact with the floor. He grunts, running his hands through his now completely white hair, both his eyes are completely blue and his scars seem to glow even more, but he knows they still haven’t won.
“Wow! That was great!”
Jinx is the first to break the silence and the first to stand up, but soon the rest of the group follow suit. Once more, they are linking hands and touches, and taking advantage of the ghost’s brief incapacitation, Aurora closes her eyes, slowly welcoming the others to the Spiritual Helm, a place that usually only she is able to see. At his left, Ezreal can see Ekko once more cleaning the blood from his nose.
Gradually, the world seems to lose its colours, being substituted by a blue glow, a weightless feeling and the low ringing sound they know it’s due to the malicious ghost that is haunting the place.
Peter Johnson looked just like Ez expected him to, a ragged old looking mad man in a hospital gown. His hair is as dark as pitch, his eyes are gloomy and sinister, seeming to glow red with madness. However, half of his body looks like it was consumed by fire, his skin seemed to have been burned off, and more than once Ez could swear he saw liquified limbs dropping from his body and splashing on the ground.
“I would’ve liked to know he looks like a half-consumed wax figure before seeing him. Creepy.”
“EZ!” The ginger says, gasping and looking at the blond with a shocked face.
“What? He was a serial killer man turned serial killer ghost, he doesn’t deserve my respect, Rora.” He shrugs before turning in Lux’s direction. “Luxy. Here.” He quickly gives her the journal he is still holding, opening it to the exact page in which the chant is located. “Can you do the chant?”
“Why? You are better at Latin than me.”
“Well, I can’t possibly read it and do what I need to do at the same time, can I?” He answers quickly, with a reassuring smile on his lips. “And I’m certain you can do it just fine.”
“But…”
“Luxy, who else do you expect me to ask to do it? Garen is not here, you are the only alternative.”
“Okay.” The knuckles on her fingers seem to whiten.
“Come Yuumi, we have work to do.” The cat immediately changes position, jumping from Aurora’s shoulders to his with ease, he immediately feels his burns closing up and the ache on his body slowly vanishing. “Wish me luck and be ready for action.”
Without waiting for their response, he turns to the ghost still screaming in pain in the corner, covering his ears with his hands and trying to disperse the ghost fire that still seems present in his not melting part of his body, which was done due to the bomb.
With a flick of his wrists, the gold bracelet on his left hand turns into a long gold spear with wing detailings all through it. Ezreal smiles, and at the same time, his platinum blond hair seems to start floating, waving along to an unseeable wind, his eyes achieving a piercing deep blue glow and the marks on his cheeks start to shine even brighter against the darkness. He laughs, entertained and filled by the emotion of what he is about to do.
“Hey! You! Wax-looking Psychopath!” He screams, making the ghost look at him with a furious glance. “You know, you don’t look half as menacing as you think you do. Try burning all the way next time. You look quite pathetic like this, once we met a little ghost girl with a possessed teddy bear that looked more terrifying than you do.”
“I don’t know if it’s a good idea to anger him, E.Z.” The cat whispers beside his left ear and his smile seems to grow.
“Don’t worry Yuyu, I have a plan.”
“Do any of your plans actually work?”
“Ouch. I mean, no plan survives first contact with me, but that’s when I create newer and better plans.”
Finally he holds his weapon with all his might, before throwing it straight where the ghost is located. The trajectory of the object is predictable and done with precision, hitting him square on the chest and going straight through him. EZ didn’t expect anything else, he knows that his weapon is just as part magical as it’s physical, but generally the creatures usually feel the hit in some way, but the ghost didn’t seem to care, or feel it in any way.
The dead man screams again, and the fire seems to grow, to obey what he is doing and it quickly covers the distance between it and the rest of the crew. Ezreal has studied enough about fires to know that the smoke is a deadlier killer than the actual heat, besides being burned alive seems like a horrible way to go. His eyes look around for a second, analysing how bad their real position is before turning once more in the direction of his friends.
“Get down and avoid breathing in the smoke, I can’t… I can’t help you, I don’t have enough magic… Try not to die.” He says, before coughing briefly and turning once more in the direction of the ghost.
He raises his left hand and the spear comes flying to him. Quickly it changes appearance, obeying his need for another weapon. It loses its long stick, turning thinner and rounder and maintaining two long wings by the sides. Once it reaches him once more, it looks like a small bow around his wrist, just as powerful as the other version of his weapon, but with even more magic in each of its attacks. He pulls an invisible string and a huge bow made of blue energy appears, as does a big arrow made of the same magic. He holds it for a second, before letting it go, hitting the man on the chest again, but this time, he seems to respond, floating quickly in his direction.
“Don’t make me put my glasses on. They’re decorative.” He gestures to the object on top of his head, its tinted lenses seem dark inside the burning room.
“Aren’t you colour blind?” Yuumi responds against him, the fear is almost palpable in her voice.
“Honestly Yuumi, are you going to ruin every one of my catch phrases? You are embarrassing me in front of the dead guy.” He says, continuously pulling the energy string, trying to hit him with smaller but quicker arrows, something he doesn’t always succeed in..
Once the ghost is close enough to almost touch him, EZ jumps back, being involved by the blue, white and yellow lights he knows so well. He appears a few feet beside where he previously was, a daring smile breaks the worried expression he was wearing before.
“Over here!” He says, waving in his direction. “Sorry, I wasn’t paying attention. Were you trying to kill me or something? Tough luck.” At the back, where he has left the remaining of his friends, he can still hear the sound of fighting, things being hit aside, or blown away with bullets. At the corner of his eyes, he is sure he has seen one of Aurora’s portals changing the position of a fire that was almost reaching them.
his friends helping him on the back
As a response, the ghost screams again, and before he can reach him once more, Ezreal starts running as fast as he can, constantly throwing energy arrows in the ghost’s direction to maintain his attention on himself and not on his friends that seem to be feeling the consequences of using too much of their power, while trying to help the bruises they have. Once or twice, when the creature was about to reach him, he had to teleport himself elsewhere close without really having a destination on his mind, one time he was sure he was about to die..
Finally, he enters the salt circle they have made even before they had encountered the ghost. He jumps on top of the bed, turning in the creature’s direction and controlling his need to sneeze due to the amount of dust that he action released from the object. Focusing a higher amount of his magic, he pulls the string once more, however, this time, once again the energy bow seems to appear on top of his weapon, turning more and more powerful until he releases it. The blue arch slowly crosses the room, putting out the fire it crosses and dissolving the black smoke that is near it. It hits the ghost with a loud sound and an unmistaken force, making him flicker for a second and lose its strength.
If they were another crew, they would have found a way to escape the room and let the weakened ghost roam the hospital again, but the Spectral Crew is better than that. They are known for resolving everything once and for all, they knew they had a bigger objective than simply weakening it, they wanted to release the ghost from the mortal realm.
Tired and feeling his magic close to the edge, Ezreal brushes his hands on his pants and breathes with difficulty. His blue markings seem to glow with even more intensity. He brushes his hair aside and doing so the tiredness that used to be seen in his face disappear being substituted by a proud smile. Yuumi purrs at his shoulders and he feels his energy increasing a bit and a translucid shield appearing around him.
“Don’t you want a sacrifice, waxy? Come get me, I’m yours.”
The ghost roars and floats fast in his direction. His hands are raised by his sides, as if he's afraid the blonde is going to run away again. Ezreal breathes deeply, counting and preparing himself to run away. As soon as the protective bubble around the bed is breached by the creature, he lets his body fall backwards, being involved by the rest of his powers. The blue and yellow light circles him at the same time as Lux’s latin chant starters echoing through the darkened room. When he appears again, he is beside Jinx and Ekko, lying down between their arms.
He closes his eyes, hearing the mixture of the ghost’s screams, the chant and the voices of his friends around him, trying to care for him. He feels the cat once more purring beside him, trying to make him feel better and increase his health. He breathes with difficulty and for a second he feels like he is about to pass out. The weapon that used to be around his wrist turns back to its usual form, the spear, and falls to the ground with a metallic sound.
“Well done, little bunny.”
He hears his conscience saying with its usually deep and rough voice, an ancient sounding voice that always seems to know what to do and say to make him feel better. He closes his eyes, hearing the ghost scream another time, and suddenly he stops. Ezreal hears the sound of the rumble the ghost used to lock them inside loudly hit the floor. The heat seems to disappear. His hair starts to turn gold again, even if his scars and markings are still brightly glowing.
They had done it, they had released the ghost from this realm. The silence seemed to echo around him, being interrupted by his friends’ heavy breathing.
“Man, I would sacrifice myself for a large pepperoni pizza right now.” Ezreal finally says, breaking the silence. Still with his eyes closed, he can feel someone hit him on the side of his arm.
“That was not funny.” Lux says, hitting him once again. “I didn’t like your plan at all. What would you have done if it didn’t work?”
“Well, Luxy, improvising is my middle name, I would have thought of something else to do.” He finally says, opening his eyes, revealing once again the hazel flowers that exist between the blue of his irises. He tiredly sits down, they were once again in the real world and the room seems to be even more disheveled than before.
“Isn’t Jarro your middle name?” Jinx interrupts, sitting down beside him.
“Well, say that again and I will start telling people your name is Powder.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Ow, I sure would, Jinxy.”
“Can we go now? EZ talking about pizza made me hungry.”
Ekko says, but he doesn’t stand up, in its place, he lays back, not caring how horribly dirty his clothes will be because of it. Soon, the rest of the group follows suit, closing their eyes and recovering their breath, while Yuumi does her best to cure them with her health powers.
“Hey, EZ?” Ekko finally says, breaking the comfortable silence that has formed in the absence of evil.
“Yes, Ekko?”
“I’m sorry about your skateboard. I tried to save it, but it always ended up broken, or if I was able to protect it, something bad always happened to one of us.”
“Nah, don’t worry about it, mate.” He responds, using his real accent for a second. “I prefer having you all safe and sound, I can always buy a new one, or use my previous one, I don’t mind.”
“Well, I mind, It was one of your birthday presents from last year and you spent hours doing the drawings on it.”
“Don’t think too much about it man.” Ezreal opens his eyes again, turning in his friend’s direction with a reassuring smile on his lips. “Besides, my birthday is arriving, I can always ask Dad for a new one.”
TAWOOD COUNTY, IONIA
MAY 28, 2005
“They still haven’t found her.”
The ginger, Settrigh, murmurs, immediately being interrupted by the loud sound of the game he is playing blasting through the machine. His best friend, Kayn, beside him slowly leans against the nearest game to the left, a zombie shooter first person game that used to be really popular at the arcade some years ago, until Aphelios Noctisveil — other member of the trio that Shieda Kayn considers his best friends — was able to achieve a high score so huge that no one was able to even get close to it, and consequently everyone lost interest in the game, aside from the one-off chances that people try it that never go nowhere.
“I still think she ran away from home.”
The dark-haired guy answers, as soon as the game music stopped playing. He runs his left hand through his hair, letting his eyes linger away, stopping at a dirty-blonde guy who long ago used to be his friend and now just seems to want to annoy him to death and get on his nerves. Kayn rolls his eyes, before turning his attention back to the fighting game Sett loves too much.
“I would if I were her,” He continues, “I mean, if I was lying to everyone I knew and pretending to be rich, while being dirty poor and needed an out because I was about to graduate, I would disappear too. What did she intend to do? Did she expect her friends to not think it was weird she decided to not go to a top university with them and stay behind working at a gas stop? Did she think they would just not know about it? Running away from home was the better answer.”
“I don’t think she did, though. She was not that kind of person.”
Sett answers matter of factly, while hitting the big red button in front of him, making his character, a muscular looking man with cat ears start punching the bulky guy holding an axe in front of him. Once more, Kayn rolls his eyes, grunting.
“Ow, yes, because you are so close to her, I forgot you were best friends.” The sarcasm in his voice is almost palpable.
“I may not have been her closest friend, but I knew of her, Kayn.”
The ginger started to respond, but the asian once again was lost in thoughts. His golden eyes run through the area around them, looking for something he is not entirely sure what it is.
The arcade has always been one of his favourite places in the city. It is one of the few locations where people can meet without prejudice, without caring about the titles and stories that living in a small city gives them. In here, their families don’t matter and nor do the embarrassing memories they have lived through, or the nicknames they received because of them. The games and friendships are the only things that truly matter.
Some people might say that the Church is the heart of the city, but Kayn knew better and he couldn’t deny that the arcade seemed to be more important and more meaningful to the masses.
“I used to have swimming lessons with her.”
“You were both like five years old, I doubt that counts as knowing her.”
The loud sound of someone achieving the highest score in a machine some meters from them briefly interrupts the conversation. Kayn crosses his arms, looking around, at the games carefully placed around the place, as well as the group of kids running between them, trying to be the first one to reach a game on the other side of the place. Somewhere else, a group of people started to scream celebrating something, and beside him, Sett continued talking.
“Yeah, maybe it doesn’t…” At the corner of his eyes, he can see his friend briefly shrugging, before turning back to his game. “Besides, the newspaper has been publishing stories about her…”
At his line of sight, Kayn can see a long pink haired girl he knows so well, Kai’Sa, his sister’s girlfriend. She is entertained playing a dancing game that Kayn never really understood why people liked so much. For a second, he thought about calling her over, she is an interesting enough person and the few times they talked they had a nice conversation, however he knew better than to do that.
Sure, the arcade is a “safe zone” where people can be themselves without being afraid of the consequences, but the “Shieda-Jhomen Tethi” Siblings have rules of coexistence, which includes, never interacting in public, and where Kai’Sa is, Akali is close enough to follow. He shrugs again, losing interest in talking to her, they could do so during the family dinner his parents insisted on doing every Saturday night.
He was about to turn in Sett’s direction again, to continue listening to him talking about the missing girl, when two people walking in their direction demanded his attention. Their expressions of boredom and curiosity were matching, as well as anything else in their appearance outside their hair, gender and height. The Noctisveil twins are that rare type of fraternal twins that look so much alike they could be mixed up, even if they have different genders. Alune Noctisveil is a petite looking asian girl with fire in her eyes, that always seemed more connected to the spiritual world than the real one. In its place, Aphelios Noctisveil is quite a skeptic, living in the real world, avoiding anything spiritual and letting everyone know his opinions, even if he hardly ever talks out loud. They have the costume of sporting matching hair colours, which means this time Alune has bright orange hair and Aphelios has red strands so bright he could blind someone.
The twins are part of an influential family that is said to have founded the city, they live in the northeast side of the place where the temples are located, and one of them is destined to become a priest or a pristest. It is said their family have lived there even before the city even existed. This means, of course, that unlike Sett’s and Kayn’s families the Noctisveil Family are quite important to the city and its people.
Kayn nods in their direction, before turning once more to the ginger, listening to him mumble something about what he thinks happened to the girl, as well as talking about the mechanic of the game he is playing. He seems so entertained that he doesn’t even notice when the twins stop walking and stand beside them.
“What are you talking about?” Alune interrupts him, making him stop playing and turning in their direction.
“Lune!” He says brightly, smiling briefly in her direction, before turning in the guy’s one with a huge smile on his lips. “Mooncake!” He half screams, before pulling the red haired guy in his arms.
“Ew.” Kayn as always finds himself saying as soon as the lips of the two meet.
It is not as if he doesn’t approve of their relationship, he was the one that made them stop joking around and being so strange when they had crushes on each other and were too afraid to say anything. He thinks they are good together and make a good couple, and he is not homophobic, so he has no problem with them being together. Regardless, since he was a kid, he had the costume of making disgusting faces when people he knew kissed each other, it is something that he was never being able to stop doing even if he wanted to, which he didn’t.
He finds himself staring at the game, looking at the health bar quickly depleting. He could just let Sett lose and laugh at his face because he decided to stop playing the game when he was about to have the highest score, to kiss a guy he has kissed millions of times before. However, the score slowly rising and the health bar almost at zero enticed him, and soon, Kayn found himself holding the controls, moving the joystick and clicking the buttons with the expertise of someone that has spent hours in this machine before.
“We need to find you a boyfriend.” Sett finally says when his lips are not entertained in exploring Aphelios’s mouth. “Like urgently.”
“I’m straight.”
“Yeah, right.” The ginger answers, as if he doesn’t actually agree with the statement.
“And what about Talon? Didn’t you have something with him before?” Alune says, positioning herself beside the machine, looking at him with curiosity in her eyes, while glancing at the dirty blonde guy Kayn knows is nearby.
“We kissed, and that’s how I know for sure I’m straight. He was an experiment.”
“If you say so.” She says, with a smile on her lips, but her eyes made it obvious she disagreed. Under Sett’s arm, Aphelios shakes his head disapprovingly.
“And besides, you all know that I don’t date. It seems too personal, soul shattering and reality bending. I don’t want to be interested in someone and give them the way to break me for good.” He says, quickly hitting the buttons to create an overpowered ability.
“Ow, you are quite a romantic.” The girl once more says.
“I’m not? I’m the exact opposite.”
“Kayn, you think loving someone can break you and goes out of your way to avoid falling in love. If you actually didn’t care about love, you wouldn’t think like you do, you wouldn’t be afraid of it. You wouldn’t lie to yourself and say you are straight.” Because of the reflection on the machine, he can see Aphelios agrees with what his twin just said, he feels his cheeks hot and he is sure they are achieving a rose colour.
“That’s not…” He begins, but he doesn’t know what else to say, so he stays in silence.
“What were you talking about before we interrupted?” She finally says, giving him an out and changing the subject.
“About the missing girl.” He says, the thankfulness in his voicetone is almost palpable.
“Annabelle? What about her?”
“Kayn here thinks she ran away from home.”
“Well, I would have if I were her and I was lying to everyone I knew and my secrets were about to be revealed.” He shrugs, hitting another combo and noticing he just passed the highest score. He feels proud of himself, even if most of the work was done by Sett.
“And I was telling him I don’t believe she would, she is not this kind of person.”
“You don’t know her, Sett.” Kayn says at the same time as Alune says something else.
“Yeah she wouldn’t, the last time we talked she said she had plans for her birthday, it makes no sense for her to disappear the day before.”
“Do you know her?”
“Yeah, we were part of the Sewing Club together.”
“I didn’t even know that shit existed.”
“Of course you didn’t, Kayn, you have no interest in sewing. My point is, if she was going to run away, she would do it after her birthday, but I still don’t think she would do something so wreckless.”
“Yeah, you need to be in a position similar to hers to actually think about doing so.” Kayn replies once more, his voice tone is heavy with an emotion that none of them is capable of describing, they all know he is talking about his past, before he came to the city and even before he was adopted by Zed. But none of them dared to ask him anything about it.
“I know a way we could discover what happened to her.” Sett says brightly, taking their conversation from the dark place it just arrived at. “There is this blog I’ve been reading for years…”
“The Spectral Crew one?” Aphelios finally whispers and Kayn immediately rolls his eyes.
It is not as if he doesn’t agree with his friends' tastes and opinions. He knows he would go to war for them, but that crew, their blog and their lies pisses him off. He has lived long enough to know they are a bunch of con artists that at best lie to people, creating fictional stories for their blog, and at worst are criminals, constructing things for them to uncover. They all know that the supernatural doesn’t exist. How can a bunch of teenagers go against vampires, ghosts, evil spirits and whatever else they insist they have encountered?
“Why would you want to call them?”
“Why wouldn’t we? We have a mystery in our hands, they love mysteries and I would love to meet them.” Sett’s excitement is almost contagious, but at the moment, Kayn’s angry expression was enough to protect him from that sentiment. “I think you would actually find E.Z. quite interesting.”
Kayn has no idea of who that is, but his immediate disgust is quite obvious. He would rather never discover who any of the Spectral Crew were, especially that E.Z. guy. However, the sudden eruption of screams nearby were enough to break his concentration in the game and in the conversation.
He bites down, ignoring the discussion and trying to control his game situation and avoid his character's death, but a bad position turns into a worse one when the adversary was able to complete a combo. Soon his small health bar started to deplete even more, and, unable to reverse the situation, he was greeted by a “Defeat” screen.
He grunts loudly, covering his eyes with his hands with an undeniable frustration. He feels Sett getting closer, resting his arm on his shoulders with affection, even if he knows Kayn is not a physical touch kind of guy.
“That sucks bad. I’m sorry bro. I’m sure you will be able to succeed next time.” He says simply, resting his body weight on the guy that is just a few centimeters shorter than him.
Maybe it’s the situation, or maybe it’s the way Sett just said that, as if he was the one that spent the last half hour grinding in this game, but Kayn was unable to contain a loud laugh that escaped him. Quickly, his worries disappeared and he didn’t care that much about the result anymore. He removes the hands from his eyes, brushing them on his medium length hair, before once more turning to the game. After clicking a random button, the high score list appears, and a collection of names pops-up, just one time after time. SHADOWREAPER , the name seems to glow and Kayn is unable to contain the gleam of satisfaction that fills him. It’s quite a satisfying sensation to know that he is the only one who holded the high scores for so long.
“See? That’s better, your dimples are quite cute when you smile.” Sett continues, and Kayn rolls his eyes. He is not that fond of letting people he is not close to see that side of him and smiling inside of the arcade seem to make him quite vulnerable. “I was thinking of calling them…. The Spectral Crew I mean. Aphelios and Alune think it’s a good idea.”
“I don’t see why you would like to call a bunch of con artists to find a runaway girl. They are going to say.. Shit.. She ran away or turned into a spirit or something, you are just wasting your money.”
A new high score appears in the first place position, pushing one of his names aside. Its name is a bunch of blank characters ready to be filled. He was about to write his name on it, but then he stops and steps aside, letting the position in front of the controller's open.
“I think they are legit, I've read their blog, Kayn.”
“And well, I know people like them and they are all full of shit, Sett, but don’t let me stop you, call them if you want to do so, but know that when they don't do shit, I’m going to tell you I told you so.” He says, before waving in the direction of the game. “Now go, put your name on it.”
“Don’t be an asshole, Kayn.” Alune interrupts. “They seem quite legit to me, they have a blog and they have good reviews. Why would they lie about it?”
“For money, of course, some innocent people are sure to fall into their trap and being an asshole is not a bad thing, Lune, it’s even my middle name.” Slowly he feels Sett removing his weight from on top of him and walking closer to the machine.
“I thought you didn’t have a middle name.” Aphelios signs beside him, his stare seems to be able to pierce him in his heart, as if he wanted to know how much he disagrees with what Kayn is saying right now.
“I don’t, but if I had one, you wouldn’t know about it.” Kayn replies, shrugging.
“I would.” He says, matter-of-factly.
“Well, that’s quite stalkerish of you, Phel.”
The red haired guy just shrugs as a response, before his twin cheerfully jumps into the conversation once more. After taking a long time to think about which name he was going to write down, the ginger finally starts to click the buttons in front of him.
“We could always have a bet.”
“A bet?”
“Yeah, Sett calls them and until they discover what happened, you have to prove to us they are a fraud. If you are able to do it, you have the bragging rights to pester us about it for eternity, and if we win, you own us and the crew a pizza dinner…” She stops for a second, thinking, before continuing talking. “And you have to ask E.Z. on a date or ask for his number.”
“Why the fuck do I only receive bragging rights and you all receive pizzas? Do you know how much Sett eats?” He rolls his eyes, gesturing in the typing guy’s direction.
“So you don’t mind asking E.Z, on a date? That’s nice to know.”
“I’m not going to lose, Lune. So it doesn’t matter.” She smiles as if she just won an award.
“Ow.. So neither would the pizzas we would win.” She raises her hand in his direction. “Do you wanna bet or not, Kayn? You don’t strike me as the fearful type.”
“I finished it.”
“Yeah, the bet is on, Alune.” He takes her hand on his, sealing their fates together. “And you all are gonna lose.” Finally he turns into Sett’s direction, a confident smile on his lips. “Call them Sett. I dare you.”
Kayn can see Sett’s bright smile on his lips, but his attention was soon stealed by the bright name glowing behind him in the first place. BossReaper. It says, a combination of both their gamer names, TheBoss and ShadowReaper.
“You didn’t have to do that, big guy. It was all you.” he says, breaking the silence and looking at his friend.
“Well, you helped at the end. I would have died before placing, it didn’t feel right to not credit you too.” He shrugs, taking his cellphone from his back pocket. “So let’s do this. I want a Tony's pepperoni pizza just for myself when we win, and Kayn? The twins and I actually think you will really like E.Z. so don’t worry about it too much.”
“Why do you all care so much about this stupid guy? I will show you how much of an ass and a liar he is and you will all owe me a pizza.”
“Well, your victory pizza was not in the bet… Soo..”
Sett shrugs, winks and dials the number. He puts it on speakerphone in the middle of the circle they formed beside him. It starts ringing and Kayn is unable to avoid the nervousness on the pit of his stomach, as well as the strange pleased feeling that starts to take hold of him when thinking of the future… It must be because he will brag about his victory to his friends, yes, that must be it.
ARIOSON CITY, NEAR PILTOVER, BAYREUTH
MAY 28, 2005
The exhaustion takes hold of the blond boy sitting down on the floor, an overwhelming sensation that grows inside of his body that he is unable to avoid. He feels his limbs too heavy for him to move, stucking him to the floor like glue, and for a second he thinks it is a good idea to stay there for the night, sleep and pretend he is not in the middle of a wrecked room.
He closes his eyes, but soon he opens them again, raising his hands to the person in front of him, Ekko, who has spent the last minutes putting everything back inside of the backpack they brought. Ezreal silently asks for help to stand up. His green and blue eyes look around the room and a twinkle of humour fights for space in his face. Finally he turns back to the dark skinned boy for a second, strongly holding his left hand, while holding his spear with his free hand.
“Well I believe they will be quite upset about the room.” He says, his usual playfulness is clear, even if his voice makes it obvious how truly tired he is.
“We can always blame it on the ghost.” The other boy responds, pulling the guy closer and helping him stand up and use his spear as a walking stick for a second.
“It is not blaming the ghost if it is actually his fault.” Jinx declares, standing up with a jump and holding the white cat in her arms while making the guns disappear into nothing.
“The main director might agree with us.” Lux interrupts for a second, brushing her hands against her clothes, before getting close to Ezreal and half hugging him and helping him walk. “But I doubt that doctor is going to believe us, he sure made it obvious he thought we were.. You know…”
“Full of shit?” Ezreal completes her line of thought, shrugging with a clear annoyance in his voice. “I don’t understand why people call us for help if they don’t believe the supernatural is real, it’s quite frustrating.”
“We can… Always make them believe…” The usually quiet ginger girl murmurs, but all of them are able to hear her perfectly.
“Are you implying what I am thinking, Rora?” The blue haired girl says in an energetic way Ezreal sometimes questions how she can always maintain.
“Yeah, I think so… Show the Ghost Realm, or.. you know, our powers..”
“That would for sure make the Doc lose his mind.” Ekko declares triumphantly.
“Yeah, it would for sure make him believe it, but we all know that showing our powers to people would compromise us and create consequences we are unable to contain. And we promised to never do it. My brother would be quite mad at us.”
“Relax, blondie, we are not actually doing it, it’s just a joke, we don’t need dad to know about it. okay?” The dark skinned guy brushes his hand through the cat’s fur, noticing how dark it has become. “Ow, Yuumi, you urgently need a bath, I think it would be better if you don’t lick this.”
“I don’t think any of you look any better though. I do, of course, I always look quite dashing.”
Ezreal expresses with a proud smile and a nod of his head. Yuumi, Aurora and Jinx were about to respond to him with clever remarks and in Jinx’s case some bad swear words, when the loud sound of a ringing cell phone started to echo through the room. The conversion briefly stops for a second, while Aurora rummages through her pockets and backpack in search of the item, but as soon as she has the blue and silver object in her hands, as if on cue, they start talking again.
“Is it dad?” Ezreal says, using the nickname they created for Garen some years ago, when they first started their adventures as a supernatural hunter and mystery solving crew.
“I sure hope it is, so I can tell him all about the shit you just pulled.” Jinx almost screams pointing in his direction while jumping around, not at all tired like most of them, even if her powers depend exclusively on her blood.
“You wouldn’t dare, Jinx, he would kill me!”
“Yeah, he would,” Lux agrees. ”That’s why we need to tell him. He is the only one that will convince you to not pull something like that again.” The blond harshly turns to the girl beside him.
“Can you stop always agreeing with her? It’s frustrating.” He says, rolling his eyes. “If you want to kiss her, do so already.”
“Ha! Someone got angry!”
Jinx screams again, deciding to start poking him on his rigs. At the same time, Aurora rolls her eyes and decides to accept the unknown call and put it on speaker mode. Immediately they are able to listen to the loud sound of music, screams and the rumors of the high score of an arcane game being reached.
TAWOOD COUNTY, IONIA
MAY 28, 2005
Kayn apprehensively watches the call ringing nonstop. For a second he thought the person wouldn't accept it and he was ready to bother the rest of the group about it. That is, until the ringing stops and, before they are able to say anything, the loud sound of voices erupts through the object.
“That’s so fucking funny. Ha!” A girl's voice says, and it’s closely followed by a boy's one that seems quite irritated about something.
“Language, Jinx.”
“Or what E.Z.?” Kayn can feel the glances in his direction, but he refuses to look at any of his friends and give them the satisfaction of seeing his reaction to the voice. “Are you going to call your fucking daddy and tell him about it? Wow, I’m so scared… I’m terrified.”
“Oi!” For a second a clear aristocratic and elegant accent can be heard, before it goes back to his normal Zaunite one. Kayn can’t lie to himself and say he didn’t find the voice quite attractive, but he would rather die than let any of his friends know about it. “For fuck’s sake. Stop fucking touching me.”
“Or what?” The girl, who he assumes is Jinx, responds, before the loud sound of something metallic moving and hitting something can be heard. “Ouch!” She screams loudly.
“Stop fucking touching me, dumbass.”
“Oi!” A new voice howls in a tone of clear frustration, immediately making the two voices stop fighting. “Can you both stop? Jinx, stop touching EZ.”
“But…”
“E.Z., stop hitting her with your spear.”
“She started hitting me first.”
“Yuumi, stop licking yourself, you look disgusting. Ekko, stop rummaging through the wreckage.”
“We need a souvenir!” A new voice says and the screaming girl puffs loudly.
“Can you stop that and go get our money? Lux, can you take EZ to the rv? He looks like he is about to pass out.”
“I’m not!”
“I don’t care, I’m not pleased with what you did and I doubt dad would be either, you need to rest and if you refuse, I will assign this mission journal entry to Jinx.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“You know full well I would and I would tell your dad about it. You don’t want to hear what he thinks about your actions today, do you?”
The curiosity inside Kayn seems to grow at every citation about the past. It makes him want to uncover everything they did and decide for himself what the attractive voice did that was so wrong. The unknown boy grunts and a chill runs down the asian’s spine. He is sure he is blushing, but he refuses to move or cover his face with his hands and let his friends know for sure what he is feeling.
“Is that the crew you all believe will locate her?” He finds himself saying, breaking the silence that formed between his group, receiving replies telling him to shut up. “They don’t sound professional at all.”
“Okay, geez. Just don’t tell dad. Okay?” The guy continues, when he abruptly stops talking. “Oi! You! Shut the fuck up. Unprofessional is your fucking flat ass.” It soon is followed by the sound of a loud slap.
“EZ, stop, go, I can handle this. No. You don’t have to say anything else, go. Jinx, can you order the pizzas? The same as usual.”
“Hum.. With Coke?”
“Of course, dumbass.” The attractive voice replies as a whisper, the clear sign he obeyed and started walking elsewhere. Finally at least, the owner of the phone sighs before turning back to them.
“I’m truly sorry about that..” She says tiredly. “We just finished a mission and some controversial actions were committed.” She sighs again, before a cheerful tone appears on her voice. “I’m sorry for making you wait. Spectral Crew, Aurora Evershade speaking, what can I do for you?”
“Hello!” Sett starts saying, but before he can continue, he is interrupted by a curious Kayn.
“So what happened? Did daddy dearest stop paying the check and the guy got angry about it or something like that?”
“Ham? What?” The confusion is clear in the girl’s voice, but she is quick to correct it as soon as she understands what he was talking about. “Ah! No, EZ was imprudent, he decided that sacrificing himself to a powerful ghost was a good idea and he almost died.”
“Well was he?”
“Kayn?” The ginger says, at the same time as Aphelios slaps him at the back of the arm and gestures for him to be silent. “Shut up, please.”
“Was he what?”
“You know… Possessed?”
“Ah, no, he was able to escape at the last second, but still he shouldn’t have done it. We will write it on our blog.”
“Aw, pity. If he had he would at least be a little bit interesting and not a huge ass like he seems to be. Does he always sound like a complaining bitch?”
“I’m sorry.” Aurora says with a clear fake politeness covering an undoubted rage in her voice. “Did you call us because you wanted to insult us or do you have a mystery we can solve?”
“Well, I think you are all a bunch of fucking liars and scammers…” He begins saying, but before he can continue, cold and slim fingers cover his mouth, pulling him away from the phone, Aphelios can surely be quite strong when we wants to be.
“Kayn, please shut the fuck up.” Sett finally says, before once more turning to the speaker on his phone. “I’m sorry for my best friend Aurora, he is quite a skeptic and refuses to believe anything supernatural. I’m Settrigh, but you can just call me Sett, I’m quite a fan!” For a second, his voice loses its seriousness, being substituted by an undeniable excitement. “I’ve read all your blogs! I especially love the Case of the Possessed Doll, I believe it was EZ’s entry not yours though, he is quite amazing with words, it’s quite impressive, his writing always makes me feel like I’m living your adventures with you guys.”
“Ow, thanks so much, I will be sure to tell him and the rest what you said.”
“Thanks so much!”
“Ow, no problem, we love talking to fans. Is that all?”
“Ah!.. No” He says, as if he was just reminded of the reason why he is calling. “A girl… A teenage girl in my city disappeared like… a week ago I believe… and I thought it was a case you might be interested in.”
“Ah!” She finally says, with a curiosity that wasn’t there before. “So tell me what happened.”
“She was walking home in the middle of a storm while talking to a friend. Her friend says she heard screaming and a weird sound, and suddenly she disappeared. She left her cellphone and umbrella behind and she would never do that.”
“Ham… Is that all?” Her disappointment is quite clear.
“Yeah?”
“And why do you think it’s a supernatural case?”
“I… Don’t know… She didn’t leave a trace behind and she would not do that?”
“Is the police investigating it?”
“Yeah.”
“Truthfully Sett, I would like to help you, but that doesn’t sound like a supernatural case. She sounds like a runaway… Or a Kidnapped person at worst…”
“Ha! Told you so.” Kayn says, as soon as he is able to remove Aphelios’ hands from his mouth.
“But..”
“That’s a normal police kind of case. I’m sorry. However, if anything supernatural or weird happens, feel free to call again so we can decide if we are interested in going after it. Okay?”
“Ah… Okay” Sett’s disappointment seems so contagious that even Kayn — who at no point thought they would actually come — couldn’t contain the sadness that overtook him.
“Bye. Have a nice night, it was nice meeting you.” She says, ending the call and letting his group in complete silence for some seconds, until Kayn breaks it again.
“Hey… I’m sorry mate.”
“Ow, shut up Kayn.” Alune is finally the one to reply, rolling her eyes. “We all know that you didn’t actually want them to come, and what was that? Why were you insulting E.Z.? Are you dumb or something?”
Kayn didn’t know what to reply, Alune hardly ever gets mad and when she does, it seems better to admit your mistakes and never talk about it anymore. However, he doesn’t believe he did anything wrong, so he prefers to stay in silence.
Some long minutes pass in a forced silence. The arcade around them still erupts with sounds of games and laughter, but the corner where they are, staring at the floor, seems to be quieter than the rest of the place. Suddenly, Sett breaks the silence with a reserve happiness, waving for them to play again until they have to leave for the Shieda’s Family Dinner.
“Well, at least I was able to talk to them for a bit and she told me I could call again if anything else happens.” He shrugs, once more putting a coin inside the machine he just achieved the high score of.
TAWOOD COUNTY, IONIA
MAY 29, 2005
The night feels cold against her bare skin. It feels too cold. Suspiciously cold. It is as if she was in the middle of a harsh winter, left behind somewhere, forgotten by everyone, not at the end of spring, near the beginning of summer.
How much time has passed? A month? Two months? A few hours? Has anyone noticed she was missing? Is someone missing her? Are her dad and little brother okay? Did they assume she ran away from home?
The clunking of her teeth against each other breaks the silence. She tries to cover her pale legs with her ripped pantyhouse, but it does not help at all. She pulls her legs closer, trying to cover them with the jacket she stole from her dad, the only item of her family she still has with her. Her hands are covered by traces of her own blood, from the times she tried to escape but it was able to catch her before she was able to find the exit of the cavern maze it always left her in.
Her once bright ginger hair has lost all its shine, seeming dull and colourless in the dark. Her face is swollen and her makeup is runny, clear signs of someone that has been crying, but has no tears left to cry.
Suddenly she is able to hear something, the brief and light sound of someone walking far away. She jumps to her feet, fighting against the burning pain of the cuts it has done on her legs. She pulls against the handcuffs, trying to get away from her spot on the cold floor and closer to the opening of the cavern she is in. The big jacket falls from her shoulders, brushing against the newly done cuts still bleeding out and turning her clothes scarlet.
“Please!” She screams to no avail, listening to the echo of her voice getting smaller and smaller in the cavern maze. “It’s me! Annabelle! Please help me!”
She stays quiet for a second, trying to listen once more for the sound of someone passing by, trying to figure out if they were able to hear her or not. However, she soon is capable of recognizing the pattern of the person continuing walking, unaware of her screams for help. For a second, she is not entirely sure if the person is nearby or hundred of kilometers away from her, the maze is capable of making things seem closer than they truly are and make the sounds travel further than they should be able to.
Annabelle continues screaming, fighting for her life to be saved, but she knows in her bones they won’t reply. After being able to escape once, and running aimlessly through the caverns, she knows they are most likely miles away, too far for her to be heard, or for the person to help her.
Soon her voice turns weak, her throat hurts and the cold gets to her again. Each scream seems to echo even less and the frosty vapour that escapes her mouth seems more prominent.
“It’s time.”
A dark and raspy voice says harshly in the darkness, as if it was always there, watching her, waiting for her to stop screaming, but she knows a second ago she was completely alone. Annabelle turns to the direction of the sound, expecting to see something in the dark, the silhouette of a body, or even the cold of its breath, but she isn’t able to see anything. Fear grows inside of her as a response to its presence. Her heart beats faster, a thunderous being telling her to get away from it. A chill runs through her back and she is able to swear the cavern seems to turn even colder. She steps backwards, but is stopped at the furthest point she can go by the handcuffs still on her hands.
“It’s time, little one.” It says again, softer this time, trying to comfort her. “You don’t have to scream or cry anymore. It’s time. You are mine now.”
“No.” She murmurs as a response, as soon as she is able to recover her voice. “Please…” Tears start running through her face and the pain in her body seems to grow even heavier. “Let me go, please, I won’t tell anyone. Please, I have a family, a little brother.”
“Shh.” It responds, walking in her direction. Its footsteps are strong, heavy and precise, the mannerism of an experienced killer. It holds her chin, turning her in its direction, its hands are cold, slim and firm, but it is nothing compared to the icy blade she soon feels against her neck. “I told you already.” It continues, colder than before. She desperately tries to make it stop holding her, but it uses more force to keep her in its grasp. “It is time.”
“But… Please.”
She begs once more, feeling the sides of her eyes turning icy with frozen tears. Abruptly the blade is removed from her neck, but before she is able to breathe a sigh of relief, she feels the burn of a hit against the side of her face. Immediately she falls to her knees, covering the place with her hands, fighting to contain her tears and pain, while trying to figure out something to say or do to escape her fate.
Beside her, she feels it getting down on its knee. She hears the deep sound of his breathing and then… the clicking sound of a delicate metal being rested on the floor close enough for her to hold it. Its knife rests temptingly beside her legs. She wants to get it so badly, but she knows she needs to wait for the opportune moment, otherwise she might get stuck there forever with no way to escape the bands around her wrists. Slowly, it removes her metal shackles, letting it slide against her hands and hit the floor with a loud thud.
Quickly, she lunges forward, holding the dagger between her hands, struggling to properly clutch it.
The object is cold, extremely so. It feels heavy and dark, and as soon as her fingertips were able to touch it, she felt weak and powerless. Her body heat seems to evaporate, the cold reign inside of her. Slowly the dagger gets hotter. She tries to move, to hit it with the weapon or even run away, but she is stuck in place. She feels too heavy to move or to think. She tries to let the item go, but her hand doesn’t obey, stuck in place by a force that is not hers.
Abruptly it pulls it from her, freeing her from the object, however, before she can move once more, she can feel it holding her neck with one hand. It doesn’t use enough force to mark her flesh, but Annabelle can feel the strength it really has and she knows there is no way of truly escaping.
“Try that again and you will receive no sympathy anymore.” It says, before releasing her. “Do you understand, little one?” She nods. “Good. Now, it’s time.” It stands up, pulling her with him and resting her on its shoulders.
In the middle of the city, people are holding lit candles, walking in the direction of the cathedral, talking to each other and wishing to find the missing girl that is beloved by all those she knew.
Minutes later, when the ringing of church bells echoes through the silent streets of the city, calling everyone for a wake and a mass in her name, no one is able to hear the blood curdling screams begging for help and the immense silence that follows when it leaves the body behind.
Nothing truly bad ever happened in Tawood, Staesia, Ionia. It was the kind of city where doors were never locked and neighbors looked after each other. However, when the first light reached the horizon, tinting the city with its glow, they were thrusted in a world of worry and untrustworthiness. How could something so horrible happen to one of them? How could someone be kidnapped and killed so near the city? How could a killer live between them and no one knows about it until now?
TAWOOD COUNTY, IONIA
MAY 30, 2005
“They found her.”
The ginger says, as soon as he reaches Kayn’s locker, near the music room that he routinely uses. Sett takes a long breath, trying to recover from the run he did to reach his friend before the bell rang. Some meters behind him, slowly making their way to them, Kayn can see two figures he knows so well, the twins Aphelios and Alune.
“Yeah. I know.”
He shrugs, slowly closing the door to the looker and avoiding looking at the newspaper that his friend is holding. It is not that he doesn’t care about it, he feels horrible and guilty for not believing she needed help, but he already spent his breakfast hearing his fathers talking about it and begging him and his sister to hear them and avoid committing the same mistakes that the girl did, and after that, he had to spend his morning listening to his classmates talking about it as if she was not a human anymore. He is sick and tired of it, of her being blamed and victim shamed for something she had no fault in, of her feelings being disregarded just because she is dead, and the multiple theories people have to explain the little they know about it.
“They found her.”
Sett says again, more confidently, waving the newspaper in front of Kayn’s face and begging him to look at it. Annabelle’s smile on the first page is daunting, so innocent, so pure, and now so ruined. Her ginger hair looks black on the paper and her blue eyes seemed not to glow as lively as they used to. Someone had the audacity to draw demon horns on her forehead, darken her teeth to make her look like she didn't have any and draw a red line on her neck. Kayn immediately raises one of his eyebrows looking at it, before turning to glance at Sett’s pink embarrassed face staring down at the newspaper.
“It wasn’t me who did it.” He says, and Kayn had to control his urge to roll his eyes. Of course he didn’t do it, they all knew that Sett seemed incapable of reading a newspaper, he always thought they were boring and routinely seemed to be the last one to know anything relevant.
“They found her, Kayn. They found her.”
“That’s old news, big guy. You should actually start reading newspapers.”
He responds, immediately feeling horrible because of his tone of voice. Sett is not to blame for his frustrations and nor should he receive the burden of them. However, before he could say anything else about it, the twins finally reach them.
“Don’t be an asshole, Kayn.” The girl says, throwing her arm around his shoulder and pulling him in her direction. Aphelios chuckles slowly, rolling his eyes and half hugging his boyfriend, when he spoke, he did it so as a low and harsh whisper.
“That would be impossible, Lune. Who would he be if he was not an asshole?”
“Ow. Shut up.” Kayn raises his left hand, immediately showing his friends his middle finger and pushing his hair away from his face. “I have better things to do than spending my time…” He continues, but Sett promptly interrupts him, waving once more the newspaper in front of his face.
“I want to call them.” He didn’t have to express his full thought, every one of them knew who he was talking about and had no need to ask him to clarify it.
“She did say you could call if anything else happened.” The girl says excitedly, waving with her hands as if to rush him.
“That would be dumb.” Kayn once more speaks, changing his weight between his legs and crossing his arms. “In their opinion, nothing of importance happened.”
“Of course something happened! They found her fucking body Kayn, that is not nothing.” Sett is not known for cursing or for having a bad temper, so the sudden use of a swear word as well as his abrupt scream made the asian jump.
“I know they found her! You said it like five times already! But nothing supernatural happened. She is dead! It is a police case, we just need to wait for them to resolve it now. And besides, they are fucking conartists. What the fuck do you expect them to do? Bring her back? I didn’t know you cared that much for her.”
“Tststs… Kayn… That just sounds like you are afraid of losing our bet.” Alune says confidently letting him go and waving them to come closer to her. “Besides…”
“I’m not!” He quickly interrupts, receiving a glance from her that made it clear she didn’t believe him. Once more, she waves her hand, gesturing from them to get even closer to her.
“Besides…” She whispers, afraid anyone else would hear her in the crowded hall. “I was talking to Caitlyn between my first and second period…”
“I swear to god Alune,” Kayn once more interrupts, now with an incredulous tone. “Do you have a lesbian club or something? How the fuck do you know so many girls?” The girl rolls her eyes and laughter erupts between the group of friends.
“Do they meet every Thursday to paint each other’s nails and gossip or something?”
Sett says while laughing, forgetting all about the outrage Kayn made him feel. He pulls the amused looking Aphelios even closer to him, and for a second, Kayn wishes he could have something like this with someone.
For an instant, he yearned to find someone that would love him completely, someone that wouldn’t adore him despite his flaws, but yearn him because of who he is, including his defects, weakness and qualities. He wished to find someone that would look at him with such fondness as Aphelios and Sett usually do. However, he doubts it will ever happen, people like him —broken, incomplete and full of traumas —are lusted for, but never loved unconditionally and the faster he is able to fully understand that, the better.
“Shut up, the meetings are on Fridays,” She responds with her cheeks burning red. “and it is not a lesbian club, I simply enjoy meeting all the girls I can.”
“What for?”
“Kayn, just because you are an antisocial prick that would prefer not having any friends beside us, that doesn’t mean the feeling is mutual. I like having girl friends, they are nice to talk to and have emotional development, something that you are severely lacking.”
“Are you calling me an emotionless prick?”
“And a heartless person.” Sett decides to add to the conversation, smiling with a false innocence while Aphelios covers his lips, trying to hide his soundless laughs.
“That is not what I said, but if the shoes fit…” Alune sighs, running her fingers through her long hair, before turning in their direction, once again speaking in whispers. “Do you want to know what Caitlyn told me or not?”
“Do we have a choice?”
“Shut up, Kayn.” Sett says matter-of-factly before turning to Alune’s direction with a whisper. “Yes Lune, please continue. What did she tell you about?”
“Apparently, she was…” As she spoke, her face turned into a mournful expression. For a second she closed her eyes, before opening them again and looking at each one of them with the assurance of someone that knows what they are talking about. “She was cut before death… But not random cuts, Cait said her dad told her she had runes carved all around her body, some were starting to scar, and others…” She swallowed dryly, running her hands through her own hair. “Were fresh, done minutes before her death… and… and..” Once more she closes her eyes and breathes deeply, as if fighting against herself and her emotions. When she finally opens her eyes, she boldly looks at them “Her blood was used to draw runes and symbols all around her. The scene of the crime is all bloody. They are saying she might have died because of that.”
A shiver runs down Kayn’s spine and a bad sensation appears on the base of his stomach. He doesn’t know what he was expecting her death to be, he knew she was murdered and those deaths hardly were pleasant, but being cut and blooded out alive seems a quite painful way to go, and those runes seem quite suspicious.
Kayn doesn’t enjoy learning about true crimes, but the presence of the bloody runes made him feel like the transgression is not an usual one, with its normal suspects and motives. Because of this — even if he refuses to believe in the supernatural — he didn’t find in himself the need to stop his friends when the talk inevitably turned to it.
“That is it.” Sett exclaims, after a minute of silence. “The proof Aurora was asking for. It is a supernatural case.”
He covers his lips with his hands, looking at Kayn as if waiting for him to say something, for him to reassure him that he is wrong, that it would be dumb calling the Spectral Crew. However, in its place, Kayn looks elsewhere, to the dirty blonde guy walking at the other side of the long corridor. He is completely straight, but that does not mean he would mind kissing Talon again. The asian licks his lips before turning to his friends, running his hand through his dark hair.
“Look, I need to go to class. Have fun calling the… the con artists. I hope they actually listen to you this time.” He says, walking away, following the direction Talon went.
“Kayn, your next classroom is not in that direction.” Sett answers nonchalantly.
“Yeah, yeah, I need to do something first.”
“Did he forget we have the next class together?”
“I guess… He is acting weird, why is he going in that direction?”
“He saw Talon…” Aphelios whispered back to them.
“Ah… Makes sense, and he says he is super straight.” Alune answers back, but now she sounds like a whisper among the other voices in the corridor. “So, Sett… When are you calling them?”
Kayn continues walking, pushing people out of his way, and when his friend replies, he is unable to hear the answer. He found Talon some corridors away, near his math classroom and when he came back to the school and once more found his friends, it was the middle of lunch.
ZAUN, BAYREUTH
MAY 30, 2005
“Jinx.”
The blonde guy whispers, turning to the girl seated on the desk beside him, trying to give the math teacher the appearance that, like the rest of his classmates, he is doing the equations he asked them to do. The girl, however, seems to not have heard him, she continues writing something with the neon blue marker she has on her hands, avoiding to look up, or remove the bright blue hair tied in two braids away from her face.
“Jinx!” He whispers once more, when the blue haired girl refuses to look at him. “Jinx I swear to god.”
He continues whispering, angrier than before. As a response, the girl moves, turning her back in his direction, making it clear that she heard him and is purposely avoiding talking to him. He grunts, looking around the classroom and finding the black haired professor at his desk, writing something down without looking at them. Quickly, he rips a page of his notebook, crumps it up into a ball and throws it at the girl he considers one of his closest friends.
“Jinx!”
“What?” She angrily whispers back, hiding behind the loose strands of her hair, giving her the appearance of a mad woman.
“Did you finish the journal entry?”
“Almost.” She raises the journal from her desk, showing him the pages filled with nonsense drawings and half-assed writings.
There was a reason why he usually avoided letting her do the official journal entries. He loves her to death, but Jinx is not the kind of person who enjoys sitting down and meticulously writing what happened during their mission. Her entries are not precise or well researched, filled with drawings that have nothing to do with what happened and usually accompanied with useless things they would never need to know in the future. The “Jinx was here” writing with a monkey drawing beside it at the corner of the page seems especially to annoy him. The blonde once more grunts, covering his face with his hands.
“I don’t know why they insisted on making you write it.” He removes the hands from his face and runs them through his hair.
“Of course you do, it is a punishment.” She replies, once more starting to draw on the page. “Can you lend me your pink highlighter? I ran out of mine.”
“A punishment for what? I didn’t do anything wrong.”
He immediately starts rummaging through the blue and yellow things inside his pencil case, until he finds two highlighters in two different hues of amber. Sure, he could read the labels and figure out which one is the correct one, but instead, he raises both, letting her choose.
“The right one.” She whispers back and he throws the item in her direction, before putting the other back in its place. “And you do know the fuck you did, EZ, you are not dumb.”
“Powder, Ezreal.” The professor interrupts, raising his voice so he can be heard on the other side of the classroom. “What part of silence work do both of you not understand? Do you want me to call your parents?”
“No, sir.” Ezreal replies at the same time as Jinx.
“Which parents?”
“Okay.” The professor says, hitting the palms of his hands on the desk before standing up. “Do you want me to call your guardians?”
“Shut the fuck up, Jinx.” EZ whispers to his friend, before turning to the professor. “No, sir, you don’t need to do that.”
“I know we are in the last week before the summer holidays, but that does not mean it is okay to disrupt my class. Do you hear me?”
The professor starts walking in their direction, but as if on cue, the bell rings, releasing them to their lunch break. Immediately, they put back their things, and before the teacher can say anything else, they walk outside, arms linked and continuing their previous discussion.
“Besides, Ezzy, you can do your usual journal entry in one of yours, like you usually do anyways.” She gestures with her hands, as if that is the most obvious thing he could do and he was dumb for not thinking of it.
“Okay.” He sighs, unable to think of anything else to say about that. “Did you at least put how powerful he was?”
“Yep, I wrote down we thought he was a level two or three, but he ended up being a four and almost killed you. Do you need me to write anything else?” They stop by her locker, that by luck is beside Ekko's, but he still hasn't arrived to eat lunch with them. “Or would you prefer if I gave it to you before I said I finished it so you can add whatever you want to add if it’s not there already?”
“I would like that, yes.” He was saying, when he suddenly felt someone touching him on the shoulders. For a second he tenses, he never liked when people he wasn’t close to touched him, but he relaxed as soon as he heard the voice beside him.
“What are you talking about?” The sun kissed man with a charismatic smile says, carefully pushing EZ aside so he can open his locker, he quickly puts his bat and backpack inside it, before closing it once more and turning to them, leaning on the metallic object.
“About the new journal entry.”
“Ow. Is our little Ezzy freaking out about it already?”
“I’m not that smaller than you, mate.”
“10 centimeters is quite a size difference, EZ, and I was not talking about that, I was talking about your age, dumbass.” As a response, Ezreal crosses his arms and rolls his eyes. “And What's wrong with the journal? I saw you finishing your personal one yesterday, it even had a drawing of the fucking ghost and a chart of his powers. There is no need for Jinx’s entry to be that complete and complex, if we ever need to know something that is not there, we can just see yours! You have thousands of journals anyway.”
“That is the problem, Ekko. Hers is the official group one. Hers need to be complete!”
“EZ, stop stressing out about it.” The taller guy half hugs each one of them, pulling them with him, while walking to the cafeteria. “If Garen and Rora chose that, they knew what they were doing. Besides, that might make you think twice before seriously trying to sacrifice yourself again.”
“You are just jealous you weren’t able to do it yourself.”
“Hm.. You got me there, maybe that’s it.”
“Guys!” A voice says, some meters away, but the group is unable to listen due to the loud sound of conversation around them. “Guys.” The girl says again.
“So, how was your training?” EZ asks Ekko. The three of them used to have most classes together, but due to Ekko’s practice, his lessons were changed, making their schedule completely different.
“It was good, blondie, I think you would like it.”
“I will pass.” Ezreal says with an unpleasant grimace, holding his backpack with his right hand. He should have stopped by his own locker, but Ekko seemed to have forgotten about it and he didn’t find in himself the need to point it out, he is starving anyway and he doesn’t mind eating before going there.
“Guys” They finally are able to hear the ginger girl say. She runs in their direction and stops beside them, trying to recover her breath.
“What’s up Rora?” Jinx is the first one to reply.
“Is everything okay?” EZ continues. “We were about to go eat lunch. Do you want to eat with us or your boss won’t let you do that?”
Until last year, Aurora used to be a student like all of them, however, because she is older than them, she graduated first. She could have gone to university, like Garen has done before her, and meet them during the holidays, but instead of doing that, she decided to work as a librarian assistant at their school for the year, and enrol at uni with the rest of them, if they wanted to do that. Because of this, they could routinely see her, even if they had to pretend to not be as close to each other as they actually are.
“Do you remember the call we had after our last mystery?”
“With that annoyingass guy? Yeah, I remember it.”
“His friends called, we have a new mystery in our hands.”
“Great.” Ezreal replies with sarcasm.
“Don’t say that. They actually have a case, the girl was found dead with runes carved on her and drawn on the scene of the crime. It is suspicious and clearly might be supernaturally linked, so it’s perfect for us. Besides, they promised they will make their friend behave… They talked about locking the both of you inside a wardrobe and seeing what would happen too, but I shut the idea down after telling them you would probably kill him.”
“Not if he was pretty. Ezzy likes pretty guys.”
“You know, Ekko, it doesn’t sound good when you say that, it just sounds like you are praising yourself.”
“Well, because I am. I’m the best looking person you have ever dated.”
“That doesn’t mean shit when you are the only one I ever dated, dumbass.”
“No, no, you are wrong, it just means that I was so spectacularly good and amazing that you weren’t able to find someone better than me.”
“Or you sucked so bad that I refused to ever date again.”
“Celibacy doesn’t look good on you though.”
“Ow, shut up.”
“Sure. You should retouch your makeup, though, your scars and markings are starting to show.” The dark skinned guy gestures in the direction of EZ’s face with a side smile and immediately the blond covers his cheeks with his hands. He was about to walk away, but before he could do so, Ekko turned the three of them in the direction of the ginger. “Can we go already? The classes are killing me, I’m so bored.”
“Yeah, we could pass by Lux’s school and make Ezreal kidnap her.. Or Ekko could go in and stop time, I don’t know.” Jinx finally starts talking again, putting the cellphone the three of them share in her back pocket. “I sent her a message. I’m sure she would wait for us in a good enough place.”
“No, we can’t.” Aurora interrupts before they even could think about a proper plan. “We all know that her parents would kill us if we did that. We need to wait until the end of the week. Okay?”
“But… That’s boring.”
“I know Ekko, but there is nothing we can do. Okay? Now go to lunch before there is nothing good to eat, and come with me EZ, let me redo the freckles on top of your makeup, we all know you can’t do them properly.” She waves with her head in the direction of the library and the group divides itself, being reunited as a whole only hours later, when they all could meet on their shared RV.