On the window's other side
Summary: There's something he has to protect. He'll do anything in order to have Jay back. OneShot, guess the main character…
Warning: Just for the sake of it. I can´t think of any. But anyway – last chance to run.
Set: Directly after vol3
Disclaimer: I visited a bookstore yesterday, determined to buy a book… I didn't find one. I'm saving my money for Night School. Until I can afford to buy it, I don't own it…
Dedicated to Snowlia, as a thank you and with my best wishes. I hope you like it!
Darkness has only just begun to fall.
Jaq doesn't care about how dark it is. He is a creature of the night, as per definition, and his sight is excellent even in the darkness and the dim circles of light the street lamps cast onto the dark asphalt. Behind him, he can hear the soft steps of the thing that inhabits Marina. It´s strange to see such resolve and grimness on her sweet features, but he doesn't really care.
She – or rather: the Sohmera inside her – has promised to help him to find the weirn girl responsible for Jay's death. They are going to find her, and the one he loves so much will wake up again.
Up in front, Cassidy, Teresa and Ten are leading them towards their final destination. He sees the resolve in the way their shoulders set, their head carefully move from right to left in order to keep track of the shadows surrounding them. Terrence and Nadya and Jay mean a lot to them, too, Jaq knows, but there is a difference between him and his hunter colleagues: He doesn't care what happens to the other two as long as Jay returns to him. The boy is the only reason he is alive, and he will do anything – anything – to get him back.
Kill. Spell reverses. Time goes back.
The words echo in his ears, a faint sound against the soft whispering of the wind. He smiles again, a grim, anticipating smile. Yes. The weirn girl is going to die.
They stop in front of a small, inconspicuous house – Number 222, just as the Sohmera predicted. They hide in the shadows because Cassidy wants them to discuss tactics first. Normally it's Teresa who thinks it unnecessary and Jaq listens alertly. Today, roles are reversed. Be it because their second leader still is shocked by the way they were defeated by the pack of werewolves two days ago, or because she really worries about what might await them, but Teresa is quiet and concentrates while Jaq doesn´t even bother hiding his contempt for their delay.
"I'll check where she is", he says coldly and leaves behind his startled hunter comrades. The last thing he sees is the grin on Marina's face. He doesn´t think much of it.
The garden is wild and looks like it hasn't been tended in years, and Jaq makes good use of it. Ducking and weaving, he quickly approaches one of the few illuminated windows of the house. Slowly straightening, he peers through the window.
Hate hits him so hard he cannot breathe for a second.
There she is.
The weirn girl is young, maybe as old as Marina, which makes her four years younger than him. She still has taken out three trained hunters all by herself. He needs no reminder. This isn't just an ordinary little girl, she is a member of the Sohmera, and he has seen what they can do. Here's the person responsible for the fact that the person he cares most for is slowly dying, slowly sucked dry of life and energy, slowly breaking apart. She has drained his time from him, has stolen Jay's life, and she will pay for the theft dearly. There's nothing more valuable in this world than the one life she has taken carelessly.
The girl is sitting at the kitchen table, her back to him. Her astral is wound tightly around her shoulders while she seems to be eating. A slim arm, a small hand move mechanically, holding fork and knife. Another place is set at the table, food already on the dish, water in the glass – strange. Jaq immediately falls into hunter mode, pushes aside his hate and anger to analyze the situation. If there's someone else in the house, it's probably a weirn, too – and trained. It has to be, why would a little girl like her be living alone? They would have to be even more careful, he'd have to tell Cassidy. Or maybe he shouldn't, because if his leader knew, he wouldn't continue with their plans while it was vital for them to go on... Jaq's gaze swipes the entire kitchen and comes to linger on a photo pinned to the fridge door. It shows the weirn girl in front of something he can't really see…
Alone.
So she is living alone, he concludes, there's no one else on the photograph. The entire kitchen seems too clean and tidy for more than one person. But then, there still are two places set at the table, and since the food is already on the plate she's not waiting for a guest. No, she's not expecting anyone for dinner. It rather seems like she wanted to make herself believe she wasn't alone, wasn't the only inhabitant of the old, big house. Like she had set the table for two, desperately, because she didn't want to eat all by herself. But that meant she had been living with another person for a while, and this person…
This time, realization hits him with the force of a high-speed train.
This girl has been left.
And she´s still waiting for her special person to return.
A dark house. A silent kitchen. No one there, no one left, only him, and he's the last one, he has been granted the gift of survival and he doesn't want it. He wants to be dead, along with his family, along with his brothers, he doesn't want to live on, carrying the burden of being the one who was too weak to fight and therefore survived...
The astral wraps around the girl's shoulders even more tightly and Jaq sees the strain in her posture, the fear of being alone, the desperation of knowing there is no one to turn to. Her entire figure is screaming out loneliness, and he abruptly feels a deep kinship with the weirn girl.
She's young, she's alone, she's lonely and she's terribly afraid.
She is just like him.
No.
She is his enemy.
He almost forgot. She is the one who is responsible for Jay's condition. She'll pay for it. No matter how much he will be punished for acting against the treaty, he'll have his revenge. And he won't stop until she's screaming for mercy.
Then he'll kill her.
"Jaq?", a soft voice calls and Ten looks around the corner, localizes him and gestures for him to get down.
"Get back. We're going in."
Feeling his lips twitch in grim determination, Jaq glides to the ground elegantly and follows Ten back to where the others are.
He can't wait for them to begin.
On the other side of the window, Alex stares at Sarah´s untouched plate and refuses to give in and cry.
