Ironside

by jjc21

Tim Ketris, accused for the murders of the swim coach, his parents and the explosion at the school. Saved by hunter Desmond he is trained for the fight ahead to keep the world as it is. Safe. All story in one upload due to story being 53 chapters long.

Ironside

A Supernatural Story

By

Jamie Callow

Chapter 1

There was a time when I didn't believe. There was once a time when if anyone told me that demons existed, that I would laugh in their faces. That if there were vampires, werewolves and fucking sea monsters, I would have committed them and got the $75 without guilt. Now it's different. Now I need to believe in all those things. Now if I were not to believe, it would mean that I contradict myself in every way.

My name is Tim. Once upon a time, I grew up in a small town as most people who live through my situations do. It seems to be the stereotype that bad things only happen in small towns. They would be wrong. The things I have seen would warp your perceptions of even the clearest world.

I was born into a Catholic family. Though I no longer believe in God, I use to. He was everything to me, my soul mate. My mother though I was headed for a priesthood. That was until the unspeakable happened. There was an accident. An accident I was blamed for.

It happened when I was doing my community service hours for my high school. There was only two people allowed to do such, one male and one female. Now you may not be well acquainted with the High School degree program of Ontario or OSSD. You need to complete 40 hours of community service in order to graduate and thus complete your OSSD.

I spent my time, as did the female equivalent of my diploma requirement did, cleaning the changing rooms and creating a specialized program for the male students enrolled in the swimming program. Not that their instructions had to follow the program that I put forward, but hey, I could claim all the community service hours that I spent doing that sad programming. I got a lot of free hours out of the situation.

Today I had to clean the showers, the swim team had finished 20 minutes previous and had left in a hurry, anxious to leave school. Maybe the coach wasn't in a good mood. That would be great for me, I was the only one left in the changing room due to my community service hours. My tools for cleaning the showers included a shaggy mop, a bucket and a washcloth. With these materials I was expected to clean the entire boy's locker room, as sentenced so by the head coach of the swimming team, Coach Grehy. In all honesty, I never really clean all of it, and was just finishing the shower room when he walked in.

"Oh hey Coach Grehy." I said as I rinsed the walls of the shower room in a diluted solution of CLR and water. Apparently the school board couldn't afford any sort of adequate calcium, lime and rust removal product.

"Good job Tim. Keep it up." And he walked into the pool room. I kept cleaning the showerheads, which they only required me to clean once every two weeks. Eventually the coach came back. "Tim, I'm gonna need you to wipe down the benches in the changing room to."

Ridiculous. I washed them once every month. At a half hour every day after school towards my community service, I totally didn't need to take up extra work. Especially since I hated nearly everyone on the swim team because they were self-absorbed jocks and general man whores.

"Why?" I asked in a somewhat sarcastic tone.

"Because I told you to. Need any other reason?" Coach Grehy asked me.

I snorted in defiance and continued to mop the main floor of the locker room.

"Is there a problem?" He asked me putting on his teacher voice.

"No." I muttered under my breath. Coach Grehy walked up closer to me again and asked again. "Need any other reason?"

I turned away from him. "No" I said again.

"I knew I shouldn't have let a nerd into the locker room. You've had four years to prove that you're worth my time and you haven't." he laughed slightly and walked towards the door.

"Is there a fucking problem with the way I do my volunteer job?" I pushed him forward. I instantly regretted the situation as he could not only revoke my community service position but tell on me and get me suspended for assaulting a teacher. Not really assault but at the same time, you're not allowed to touch a teacher for any reason, as they are not allowed to touch you.

"I think you should apologize." He told me, looking me straight in the eyes with his own icy-blue ones. He suddenly seemed much more intimidating than normal, larger and much more muscular. I gulped down hard. Despite my martial arts training, I didn't think I could take this man. Instead, I receded back to my mopping, hoping that he wouldn't notice my weakness.

"I said that I think you should apologize." He put a hand on the mop and pushed himself towards me, trying to scare me into submission. I stood my ground, knowing that he was in the wrong.

"You don't scare me. You may be the big shot coach, but not to me." I stared defiantly at him, directly in the eyes to know that I was serious.

He pushed me over onto one of the benches in the locker room and said, "You think you're tough ay?" Well let me tell you that I've put down much stronger jocks than you, a little cleaning kid." He mounted me in a guard position; apparently, he was adept in grappling. My legs instinctively grabbed around his thighs. "Ah so you know how to wrestle then?"

I wouldn't have called it wrestling, but I did know my way around ground fighting. He threw me off the bench and pinned me down as soon as the thought blocked my perception of reality. "See? You're not that tough." He sneered at me as I stared at him on top of me. Suddenly I was feeling very small and weak.

He jumped up off me and coughed. "You alright?" He nodded but covered his mouth to cough more. He turned over on his stomach and coughed more. Pulling himself up on all fours, he coughed and coughed until finally, something came up. A bloody pile of phlegm it seemed.

"Whew!" He laughed it off. "Man that's gross." He seemed to have recovered and all what had happened seemed to have been forgotten because of his sudden cough. Then he started coughing again.

"Coach are ya sure you're ok?" I asked getting up of the bench.

He moved further away from me, coughing more and more. "Holy shit!" I backed up against the wall and he threw up pure blood all over the floor. "Coach? Are you alright?" I stepped forward towards him but slipped on the blood and landed flat on my back, hitting my head hard.

He threw up blood again, this time on me. I screamed and the last thing I remember was him being dragged up the opposite wall and his skin just splitting. As if someone were taking a knife to it, but there was no one there. The blood gushed out of his body, with his slowly decreasing heartbeat and I blacked out.

Chapter 2

I awoke with a start in a hospital bed, my head wrapped in bandages. My mother sat in a chair beside me. Her already too thin frame emaciated further, hair disheveled and looking as if she either A) hadn't slept in days or B) was a zombie. These days I'd pick B. but then I picked A. "Mom?" she looked up at me, tears in her eyes.

"Hi Tim." She didn't rush up to hug me and kiss me. Why? "I uh. Heard about what happened." Oh. That's why. "How are ya feeling?"

"My head hurts." I said rubbing it.

"Ok. Well… A nice boy, Dean Remmy, from your math class found you covered in blood. And… um Coach Grehy's body in the changing room and… well Coach Grehy is gone hun. I'm sorry."

"What happened to him?" I wondered out loud.

"I don't know." She answered anyways. "But your father and I have been talking about it, and we can't have people like you in our lives."

"Wha…?" Probably a mixture of pain, meds, and shock.

"Well you are a sinner in the eyes of God and we can't help you. Unless you want to help yourself." I put a quizzical look on for her but I knew what she meant. "You need." She closed her eyes to spare her from looking me in the eyes. "You need to go away to fix your problems."

"What problems mom?" Tears were welling up in my eyes. I assume it's a common response to those who have been betrayed by their families after a traumatic experience.

"Your…violence." It's not okay in the eyes of the lord and I've asked Pastor Culling."

"I didn't do this and you want to send me away?"

"It's for your own good. We love you, but…"

"No you don't. Don't even say that to make yourself feel all high and mighty in the eyes of your God. And Pastor Cullin molested me when I was 5, is that okay in the eyes of your God?"

"God will judge him."

"Bullshit!"

She closed her eyes again. "Your father and I will discharge you and give you 3 days to get your affairs in order. Then you need to leave." She began to tear up and then fled the room in hopes of me not noticing.

"Woah." A voice said as the door flung open by my mother. "Oh yeah lady, I'm fine thanks!" I was confused. But then it all became clear. Well as clear as it can while you're tripping on morphine and pure oxygen. A man in a suit came into the room widening his eyes in a 'what a crazy bitch' way then stopping to look at me. He wore an out dated suit, though he managed to make it look modern. His hair was light brown, maybe a few inches long as if he hadn't shaved it all off over a month ago. His eyes were as green as the shining through leaves. He smirked at me. "Tim? Timothy Cetris?"

"Ketris." I said replacing his soft 'c' with a hard one.

"My mistake. Mr Ketris. My name is Richard Anderson, I'm an RCMP with the Toronto district police service. I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions about what happened?" He smiled politely at me.

"I guess." I was more concerned with what my mother was saying to me.

I sucked on my teeth for a minute or two. "We were…arguing," I looked down to my hands that were mindlessly dancing with each other on my lap.

"Ok, that's ok." He smiled at me, an odd smile that hid its true meaning. It bothered me. Ok, so what happened?"

I told him about the moving up the wall, then the cuts… the blood. Everything I could remember.

"Well Mr Ketris, I'm sure you agree with me that that is crazy right? You said you hit your head. Maybe you're hallucinating?"

"You're a bad liar."

"That's what they tell me." He muttered under his breath, trying to hide it from me, but I heard anyways.

"I saw what I saw and I told you. Now if you don't mind, I have to worry about where I'm going to live now that my mother has kicked me out of the house for something I didn't do." I rolled over, out my back towards him and dealing with the pain that the IV gave me for disturbing its job.

He paused for a moment. "Ok Mr Ketris I'll come see you if I have any further questions." With that, he left. I could almost feel his presence leave the room.

A day later my parents drove me home, not saying a word until we got in the door. My father's health plan covered my medication but he refused to talk to me, no matter how hard I tried to communicate.

"Ok Tim," my mother said when we got in the door. "Go up to your room and get some rest." She hesitated.

"Three days?" I asked matter of factly. "You're both fucking assholes. I'm your goddamn son." I walked up the stairs. Stumbled to various curses from my father and mother about using the lords name in vain the moment my head hit the pillow, I was asleep.

I dreamed about the events of that day at school. I saw Coach Grehy move up the wall, cuts slowly opening across his sculpted chest. The look in his eyes that asked 'why?' and 'what?' at the same time. He didn't understand and neither did I. in my dream I saw the perpetrator. I stood up, screaming that I was covered in blood, staring at my hands. I looked to Coach Grehy and his limp body fell to the floor in a heap of flesh, blood oozing out, no longer pumping out. I ran out to the pool door and I saw across the room a shadowy figure dressed in tattered clothing. A ripped shirt exposing key parts to a statuesque body, a scarf that did not seem to have been knit and cargo pants. His skin was covered in dirt, but it seemed to be freckles of varying sizes, from miniscule to thumb-print sized, fused to his skin. But it was his blue eyes that captivated me. As I did, the pool deconstructed itself around me and I was standing in a barren desert staring at a katana sticking out of the ground where the mysterious man once stood. I walked over to it, feeling as though I would know everything once I took hold of it. But at the moment something grabbed my forearm. I turned around and screamed.

I shot up in bed and looked to the hand on my forearm. It was Richard Anderson's. I thought he was the one in my dream, but the one in my dream had less hair and more pronounced cheek bones. "Sorry if I startled you Mr Ketris. But I have a few more questions for you."

I sighed. "You woke me up from a dream."

"Hope it was a good one."

"It was. It had the man who murdered Coach Grehy in it."

He looked dumbfounded. "What a coincidence!" He smiled. "Just the thing I wanted to ask you about. Can you describe him for me please?"

"Wait you think an invisible man killed Coach Grehy?"

"I'm covering all bases here." He smiled again.

I described the man I saw in my dreams, down to last detail of muscle I saw through his ripped shirt. I was dreaming about him, which was odd seeing as he had killed Coach Grehy. Odder than that, I wasn't more bothered by this fact.

"Alright," He jotted down some notes. "That's all I need. Thanks again." He left my room in quite a hurry.

My mother brought me a sandwich later that day but left without saying a word despite how much I talked to her. She was clearly trying to separate herself from me to get herself ready for tossing me out. Bitch.

Chapter 3

That night I was dreaming I was back in the changing rooms of Ontario High School. My mind was replaying the event over and over again until my eyes shot open from the screeching scream of Coach Grehy.

Once again Richard Anderson's hand grabbed my forearm, pulling me out of my dream. "GO!" He screamed, pointing to my windows.

He wasn't wearing a suit, instead, a thin t-shirt and jeans. He carried off a sawed shotgun in his right hand, using his left to throw me out of the window. I landed in the bushes below in a lot of pain, I'm sure the head injury didn't help.

A crash beside me and Richard too joined me, with significantly less scrapes. "Blue car, go. NOW!" He screamed and shot in the direction of my window.

There was a blue car in front of my house, I climbed into the back driver's seat and covered my head as another shot rang out. The door opened and closed. Then the car started. Richard slammed on the gas and we sped off into the night.

After a few minutes I composed myself enough to move into the front seat. I looked at Richard and his forehead was bleeding. But he just looked at me and said, "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine Richard, what was that? Where are my parents?"

"My name is Desmond Langley, your parents are in pieces on your living room floor and you don't want to know what that was."

"What the fuck! Who the fuck? I don't get it, what the fuck is going on? And who the hell are you again? My head hurts…fuck!" Pacing back and forth in the tiny motel room, I flung my arms around in anger, frustration and general feeling of helplessness.

"Look Tim, I'm sorry ok?" Whoever the hell this guy was put his hand on my shoulder to try and calm me down. He failed.

I spun around and grabbed his hand, continuing the motion, I spun him into an arm-bar. "Who the fuck are you?"

He shifted his body the other way to release himself and returned the favor. "I told you…Desmond Langley."

I breathed heavily in his tight hold, getting angrier and angrier. If it's one thing I cannot stand it's not being able to move. If any part of me is confined to one position for any reason, I start having an anxiety attack. Kind of like right now. "You had a fucking shotgun… why did you bring a shotgun to my house…?"

"You're in deep kid, so I'll tell you," He let me go, anxiety releasing instantly. "Might want to sit down." He raised an eyebrow and nudged his head at the bed.

"I'll stand." Whoever you are sir, I will not get onto that bed with you in the room.

"You know the things that you thought went bump in the night? Well they do and they bump back, real hard." His face was like stone, no emotion, nothing. Just blank.

I laughed at him. A full hearty laugh. He let out a deep sigh, turned around and put his face in his right hand whilst placing his left hand on his hips. After a moment I composed myself. "Ok, so you dragged me out of my bed and brought me to a motel to save me from the boogie man?" I laughed again.

He turned around slowly and put both his hands in his jean pockets. "I killed a boogie man in your town two months ago; there won't be another here for at least a year." He stared at me, sucking his teeth.

I stared straight at him and sank onto the bed. "You're not lying…" I looked at him, "Are you?"

"'Fraid not sport. Everything you can imagine that it bad, is out there, and chances are, it wants to kill you, eat you, rip you apart or some nasty combination of the three."

"Fuck me…"

"Nah. Thanks though." He winked at me.

Wait, it was him… it was his fault. "You asshole!" I threw myself at him. "You brought them to my house! You brought them to my parents, to Coach Grehy, what the fuck?" I threw punches at him and he mindlessly pushed them aside, sighing once again.

After a few more feeble attempts at hitting him, he grabbed both my wrists and forced my arms apart, staring into my eyes. "You about done?" I must have been red with anger and hate and he could see it. "Tim, your parents hated you, they wouldn't have cared if anything came to get you. You weren't their son anymore." He let my wrists go.

A wave of depression swept over me. I collapsed onto the ground. Richard, Desmond, Fred or whatever he was called, pulled up his jeans and joined me. "Fuck…"

"You know, you've used that word in just about every way since we got back here." He chuckled and it made me laugh with him. Once our eyes met we stopped laughing and there was a long awkward silence. He suddenly stood up. "So I think I know what this thing is."

He walked over to the night stand and opened a file folder with the seal of the Toronto Police Department on it. "A vengeful spirit."

"Like a ghost?"

"Yeah like a ghost." He shook his head. It seemed like he expected me to know these sorts of things. While still freaking out, I thought I was doing remarkably well for myself, considering I found out 'the truth' not ten minutes ago. "But its angry, it kills people in a predictable manner, sometimes echoing what happened to itself before it died."

"So before it dies it got sushi'd?" I tried to make the most out of this situation.

"This guy…" he pushed the folder to me. Behind the coffee rings and yellowness of the pages was a picture of a boy no younger than I was, except he was dead, purple and blue skin, sunken eyes and lifeless. I touched the photo, not sure why, it just seemed like the right thing to do. The folder was snatched from my hands. "He was attacked by a guy 15 years ago who was on the swim team. Beat him up real good too, enough that he died on the locker room floor from his injuries in a pool of blood."

My mind relapsed back to Coach Grehy puking blood all over me. Shocked at the memory, I stumbled backwards. Desmond lurched forward to catch me. My vision reset itself back for a moment then faded in black sparkling light back to the real world. "You ok?" he asked me as he loomed over me.

"Yeah. I'm ok. Just remembering… What do we do now?" I kept looking straight into his bright green eyes.

"You go to school." He smirked at me.

Chapter 4

Walking back into the school was weird. Everyone was looking at me, everyone was judging me, some I'm sure were blaming me. But I couldn't think about that now. I had been given specific instructions by Desmond.

"Go to school as normal." He told me. "Spirits have a one track mind, it probably doesn't remember you. Just don't get into any trouble in the locker room ok?"

Deep breaths, I'm just going to class. I walked into math class with everyone staring at me. Dean Remmy was there, the one that found me and Coach Grehy. He instantly whispered to something to a pal of his who was on the swim team and the glared at me as they noticed I was watching them.

The teacher froze when he entered the classroom, eyes fixating directly on me. "Hi." I waved sarcastically.

At lunch our plan went into action. I was to look through the locker room for anything suspicious that a spirit could 'cling' to. Blood was even a possibility Desmond told me. I had 55 minutes (yeah, lunch HOUR, I know.) before the 3rd period class would be coming in.

I held off going into the shower part of the locker room, instead staying with the actual lockers. I searched through all of them but found nothing. I slowly walked towards the showers, the police had it roped off with caution tape. I peered around the corner slowly. My mind flashed back to Coach Grehy hanging in the air, blood gushing out of the cuts and pooling on the floor.

I closed my eyes and stumbled backwards into the room.

"Hey freak." My eyes shot open. It was Dean Remmy and Terrance, the other guy from math class. He punched me in my face. I fell to my knees, my head ringing, temples beating and breath gasping. My head was not right, too much pain for it to be right…something was wrong. I began to stumble on my words. I meant to say 'What the fuck?" but it came out much more inaudible.

"Just where I want ya." Dean kicked me in the stomach and I rolled over in pain. "I wasn't good enough for the OSSD, but look what happens when you put a nerd in to do the job."

"Aw man we tried to get the coach to change his mind," Terrance laughed while grabbing me by the shoulders and picking me up, "but he would never change his mind."

"This is a bad idea…"I mumbled.

"Shut up." Dean slapped me in the face and then grabbed me by the back of my head and pushed me into the bench. I immediately fell to the floor gasping in pain. My vision was going in and out of focus. I don't remember much except I was getting bashed about a lot, I dunno who by either, Dean or Terrance, maybe both, probably both. Then one of them spoke to me. "Tell anyone it was us and we will kill you." Then I blacked out.

I heard footsteps coming through the shower room and they sounded like thunder in my head. I didn't know what to do, I was going to get caught again. I was going to be expelled this time, I was…

"Dude!" It was Desmond… "Aw common!" He thrust his arms out in a helpless gesture. "I said look around, not test out the theory." He bent down and helped me up. "Easy does it…"

"Shut up… my head…" I moaned.

Desmond led me over to the shower room and turned one on, despite the caution tape. He took of his jacket and began to get rid of the drying blood on my body. He turned the shower off and ducked under the caution tape to grab his jacket. He threw it at me. "Dry off, your gonna be ok." I didn't believe him for a moment, but when I looked at his face, I could tell he was being sincere. I think he felt bad for me.

I stared at him until he snapped me back into focus. "Let's go! The bells going to ring!" I wasn't bothered, I was soaking, I couldn't wait to get out of here. Then we left the shower room for the last time.

Chapter 5

"So it's not the dead kid." Desmond said as we zipped back in his blue car.

"Then what happened to him?" I asked more to myself. I curled up in the seat and placed my head on the window. It slid down since it was still wet.

"I dunno…Demon? Nah, no sulphur…" He hit the steering wheel with the base of his hand. "Dammit! What the hell are you?"

We went into the motel room and I collapsed on the bed. Desmond sat at the edge of it and turned the TV on in a huff.

"Breaking news this afternoon at a local High School." I shot up from my prone position and sat beside Desmond on the bed. "The entire gymnasium and the adjoining pool at Bridgemount High School was leveled just moments before Chanel 7 News arrived at the school for an unrelated story. Police are saying that it was most likely an attempt to foil the investigation of the murder of a teacher in the same locker room earlier this week. The lack of evidence in the explosion and how exactly the explosion was contained to only the gym and pool is leaving investigators baffled…"

Desmond stared blankly at the screen. "What the hell are you?" He said somberly.

Chapter 6

I could barely sleep that night. I couldn't go home, that was a crime scene, I couldn't go anywhere. I was now a prime suspect the news said. My parents end up dead and the crime scene Coach Grehy died in is wiped off the map…it didn't make any sense.

Desmond and I got some sleep that night but I couldn't get off. Maybe he thought there was something wrong with me...that would be worse. I'd hate for him to feel like he's responsible for me now but at the same time hate me or be completely horrified by me.

I slowly up at around 2am after 4 hours of just laying on the sofa tossing and turning, most likely disturbing Desmond. I paced along the floor and grabbed the keys to his car. I'd just go get some fresh air, but I didn't want to be outside and completely vulnerable. At least a car would make a quick getaway if I was in trouble. Wow , I'm getting paranoid.

The night air was cool and the cold stung my face. Maybe I should have grabbed a coat…I made my way to the car, not too far away. I opened the driver's door and sat down inside. The cold somehow made my head feel better, making it not quite as hot and heavy feeling. I closed my eyes and drank in the night. I was totally relaxing.

I must have dosed off for a few minutes because when I opened my eyes the car was all fogged up and my head was aching again. With one hand I attempted to hold my brains in my skull and the other I reached for the glove compartment. I needed something for the pain. My meds were in there right? Yeh, why wouldn't they be? They weren't…

"Urgh…" I popped the trunk, they had to be in there. Stupid Desmond moving them. Where was he anyways? Jerk.

I got out of the car and stumbled to the trunk. I wouldn't have if the earth didn't move so move. Stupid world…stabilizing myself on the trunk, I lifted it open. I instantly sobered up. Blades, guns, weapons of every kind and more ammunition than you would need to take down parliament. I stared in confusion at the trunk until it dawned on me…Desmond was some sort of serial killer.

He told me all that shit about spirits and boogie men to get close to me then he was going to use these…things on me. Ah, fuck.

I picked up a heavy shuriken; it seemed to be silver with golden runes imbued on it. Great, he was a witch too? Am I a sacrifice? Moving some things aside I found a collection of daggers, most of the blades were twisted in some unnatural way. They almost looked like knives used in torture movies, the "maximize pain, minimize damage" ones.

"What are you doing out here?" Desmond called from the doorway to the motel room.

I grabbed at the closest thing. A knife. I pointed it at him. "What are you? Why the arsenal?" I gripped my head in pain. "Don't you dare try anything with me, I'll kill you. You're a liar! You killed my parents didn't you!"

"A Vorpal Blade?" he shook the idiocy out of his mind. He crossed his arms in front of his bare chest and walked out into the night. He wore only his underwear and a silver chain around his neck with a coin on it. Making his way towards me, I threatened him with the knife and stepped back.

Like someone fed up with a small child, he simply walked up to me, grabbed the knife from my hand and placed it carefully back into the trunk of his car. His back was smooth and muscular, but he had goose bumps all over it from the cold. He turned to me and grabbed me with one hand firmly.

"Common," he said, "med time." He guided me effortlessly back into the motel. He put me into bed and brought me a pill. "Here take it." He shoved his hand at me but I stubbornly refused to take anything from him. "Dude it's 2 fucking 30, take the pill." His face grew stern with his mouth open ever so slightly, ready to snap at me if I protested.

I took the pill and downed it with a mouthful, then moved to the sofa.

I still couldn't sleep. Too much was going on, but on the plus side, my headache was gone for the moment.

"Desmond …" I whispered through the complete darkness. A grunting 'what?' was my only response. What are you?"

"Hunter." He said in a mumbled voice.

"What is that?" I was confused…A hunter of what…? Please don't let it be people, please don't let it be people…

"I hunt the bad things." He grumbled. "Spirits…" he yawned and held me tighter. "Anything that could hurt you. So that nothing can." With that, he fell back asleep.

Chapter 7

I awoke as the sun peeked through the windows. The alarm clock in front of me said 5:30, Desmond was still fast asleep, snoring lighting. I took a deep breath and slowly and quietly slipped out of the motel room.

I didn't know what I was doing or where I was going. I just started walking.

Not that I didn't appreciate what Desmond did for me, but I needed to comprehend what was going on. He was hunter. He hunted evil things. So what was really out there and classified as 'evil'? I went through all the normal Halloween monsters, mummies, vampires, witches, ghosts… were they all out there? I hoped not. And who was right, Bram Stoker or Anne Rice? It was all a little too much.

I stopped walking and found myself standing in front of my house. The grey clouds behind it and the dim orb hanging behind them made it look more ominous. I hesitantly approached the front door and pulled out the key, still in my pocket. Unlocked it, I ducked under the caution tape. The living room was in shambles. Everything that was once on a mantle or hanging on the wall was on the floor in pieces. Even the tables seemed to have deconstructed themselves, screws and pieces of wood lying everywhere.

In the very center of the carpet were two large patches of blood. Between them, the glass of the coffee table had been stabbed into the ground. There were blood hand prints on either side of it. Whoever it was didn't allow them to touch in their final moments. What a sick fuck…

I had to force myself to turn from the living room and I ran up the stairs to my room to grab some things I thought I would need. Mainly, my stash of cash. Throwing open the door I saw him again…

He was standing at my window looking out. As I opened the door, he turned to face me. His tattered shirt and well worn cargo pants looked extra dull against the little light coming through the window. The scarf he wore was a long piece of fabric, also tattered, but it covered his mouth. Attached to his back in an unseen way was the katana I had seen before in my desert vision.

"Hello?" I said meekly. He was instantly in front of me. His face was strong and his cheek bone pronounced. The black creeping up his neck and partly engulfing the right side of his chin looked to be ask, but part of him, not on him… his eyes were a deep blue, but as I stared into them, they turned a very light red, almost pink. I was horrified, but transfixed. His skin seemed thick and battle worn. This man had seen some rough times and survived them.

His eyes studied me as his arm moved to his mouth. The scarf moved from his mouth exposing perfect white teeth that seemed to shift into jagged shark fangs. They pierced his skin and the blood ran down his chin, I tilted my head slightly, still hypnotized he put his bleeding wrist to my head and pressed hard. I fell over and when I looked back to the doorway, there was nothing.

I ran to the bathroom to look in the mirror but there was nothing on my head. The dark red blood simply didn't exist. Was I hallucinating because of my head injury? What was going on? I touched it and shook my head. No headache. Hmh.

I walked hastily into my room, pulled out the loose piece of drywall that hid my stash and grabbed all the money inside, $60… Woohoo… I turned and left my house.

Closing the door, I heard a car door slam. I looked up and it was Desmond. He stared at me for a moment then visibly sighed. He began the walk up from the street to my front door and I met him halfway.

"You alright?" was all he asked.

I nodded slowly. "I have nothing…"

"You're coming with me, we'll be alright." His face showed immense sympathy and I felt a swelling up of emotional closeness to him, as if he were a brother, he gave the house a once over with his eyes then said, "You done here?"

I nodded and walked over to him, he put an arm around my shoulder and we walked to the car.

Chapter 8

I don't think that anyone is really ready to learn that their parents died in some horrifying way by what was most likely a terrifying supernatural force. It's not really the norm either. Not many people can really say, all-knowingly that this traumatic event occurred in their life. Fortunately, I am one of them. Fortunate you say? Well the normal suburban life of a man would be nothing compared to killing creatures from your nightmares, guns, knives, freaky books on demon lore. Add to this the face that my parents were going to throw me out and you have the perfect recipe for a hunter. I also would have never met Desmond.

It had been 36 hours after I walked into the living room to find two pools of blood separated by the glass from the coffee table. 36 hours since Desmond told me everything was going to be alright despite all that had happened. It had also been 36 hours since I had a sane enough mind to speak.

"Hey Chapman." Desmond said closing the motel door behind him. It was raining outside and he was dripping all over the floor. "Brought food…hungry?" he thrust the bag of take out in my general direction. I was sitting in bed with my arms wrapped around my covered knees. "No? Good I only bought one." He sat at the small table in the room, pulling out the burger, took a big bite and smiled at me through bulging lips.

He grunted. "But I did…" he stood up and retrieved some pills from his back pocket and threw them at me, "raid the pharmacy. Anti-depressants…not sure how many to take so…be liberal"

Apparently, this was some form of joke. I threw the bottle back at him. It hit him square in the head. Holding back a smile, so as not to show emotion, I laid down and threw the covers over my head.

A few moments later, I felt the side of the bed compress and a hand on my shoulder. "Look T… I like to think that I know what you're going through, but I know that everyone grieves in their own way. And for what it's worth, I'm sorry. I truly am."

As much as I wanted to have a nice sob fest over the end of not only my parents lives, but mine as well, I really wanted to lash out. And regrettably, Desmond was the only one in the room with me.

"How could you even begin to know?" I threw the covers off me. Sitting up I stared directly into those green eyes "If you hunt things like this then you see it all the time! Everything I know is gone; I cannot go back to anything remotely familiar! EVER! So don't you dare try to patronize me!"

"Vampires." He looked into his hands.

"Huh?" I put my 'deer caught in the headlights' face. Vampires…?

"We don't know what killed yours…But mind was vampires." he sucked on his teeth while nodding his head ever so slightly, staring into nothingness. "I was…10? Who knows," he gave a nervous laugh, "I…we were at out cottage. We didn't know anything was out there. If we did we wouldn't know how to fight them…Late at night I went to the outhouse and on my way back I heard noises coming from the cottage…Crashed, things breaking…Screams. I'll never forget that sound. I was petrified and one of them came out towards me. It's skin was white, almost waxy, blood dripping from its mouth. As it came up to me, it turned less pale and more…human. 'Don't be afraid' it said, ' I've come to show you something.' It move my head slowly to the side and made this hissing sound." He paused as if recalling it. "Then its hand burned my head and I stumbled back. Its body fell to the ground and its head soon followed. The skin burned away leaving only a charred skeleton. The skull had these fangs…And somehow, the skull had this evil look to it, like it was angry… But without skin you know? The skeleton soon burned away too, but much slower. I was saved by a man named David. He was part of a group of vampire hunters that had been tracking the nest that attacked my family. But they were so late. They raised me to be a hunter… So yes. In some way, I can understand. But I wish to god that I couldn't." He looked me in the eyes. His held all the sadness in the world.

"It's fine. I dealt with it a long time ago." He wiped his eyes. "You just…" his breath picked up, "take all the time you need."

"Such an emotional memory." A woman voice came from the door.

In all honesty, I'm not quite sure where the gun was hidden, but in a fraction of a second it was pointed at the source of the mysterious voice. His rock-steady aim flexed and finger ready to squeeze the trigger.

The voice came from a pale woman in a white dress, embodied in gold, standing in the doorway to the bathroom. Her hair was a fine blonde, almost like silk. Her light brown eyes hid behind large eyelashes. Her face had very smooth features, but she looked anywhere from 20-40 years old, it was impossible to tell. She glided across the floor and sat at the table, crossing her leg and smoothing out her dress. Desmond lowered his gun and sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed.

"That was nothing." Nothing? "Just sharing stories." His voice seemed even more masculine, as if he was trying to reaffirm it not only to the woman in white, but also himself. He stood up and folded his arms,

"Don't be rude Desmond." She closed her eyes gracefully as if to say 'you know better.'

"Oh… Uhh…" He stumbled "This is Tim Cetris. He uhh… He had some… problems…" He gestured to me nervously

"Ketris…" I corrected him.

"And Tim… This…" He gestured to the woman. "This uhh…"

"I'm Winnie." She stood up very properly. "A pleasure to meet you." She smiled sweetly and it faded to a stern look when she looked to Desmond. "Can we talk?" She hastily made for the door to the motel room and stood there waiting for Desmond to follow her.

He smirked at me and followed, opening the door for her. He let out a large and audible breath before following her outside and closing the door.

I moved around the room to try and here what they were saying… Hang on, how the hell did she get in here?

What I heard was only muffles. "What is he doing here?" "Well… he just…" "Shh!...don't care…taken care of…?" "What do you mean 'no'?" "We had… it set us back…" "…Luke?" "That's what I thought." It continued on like this for a few minutes until the door flew open and Winnie and Desmond walked through.

"So it may be that we got off to a rocky start. I do apologize Timothy." She smiled at me as Desmond closed the door and came back over to sit on the bed. With Winnie looking down at us, she seemed somewhat intimidating. "But you know, it is proper etiquette to clean off one's face, especially when in the presence of someone you barely know."

Desmond and I looked at each other puzzlingly. "Win, there's nothing on his face."

"Well of course there is right here…" She licked her thumb and went to press it against my forehead. As her hand approached, my forehead became quite cold and then burning hot. "Oh goodness…" She withdrew her hand, it had turned black. The whole thing seemed to wither up like a spent match. It cracked and twisted into a shape unrecognizable as a hand.

"Oh my god!" I shouted.

"Oh relax, more of an inconvenience than anything." She shook her twisted, blackened hand and it seemed to shift, like crossing your eyes and then uncrossing them. In a flash, it was perfectly fine again.

"What the hell?" I stared unbelievingly at the woman in white.

Desmond leaned towards me, "She's a witch." He said matter of factly.

"WHITE witch." Winnie said equally so, giving a little flourish of her newly re-formed hand. "And besides, I'm not really here anyways."

"Huh…?"

Desmond spoke quietly into my ear. "She's just an apparition, a vision. She lives way up by Hudson's Bay."

"Thank you Desmond." She said giving him a polite nod. "Well Timothy, it seems you've been marked." Looking at me quizzically, tilting her head back and forth, she placed a hand on her chin. "Had anything strange happened to your forehead recently?"

I paused. Probably should have mentioned this to Desmond. "He didn't say anything Winnie, leave him alone…"

"Well… When I was in my house…"

"Ok see this is something you need to have said." Desmond blurted out. He hot up and joined Winnie glaring down at me. He folded his arms and shook his head, "Well?"

"There was this man there… He had red eyes, sharp teeth. He bit his wrist and pushed it onto my forehead… Then he was gone." I answered meekly.

"Poltergeist?" Winnie looked to Desmond.

"Could be, but they rarely show themselves… Vampire?"

"In the light? Could be an Obayifo?"

"Is that supposed to be a joke?" Desmond looked sternly at Winnie.

"…I see why you might think so but really I didn't mean it that way."

"Can someone tell me what you're talking about?" I asked in a very irritated tone.

They both looked at me like I had three heads then back to each other. "You'll need to come see me." Winnie said quietly but forcefully. "Until we know what this is, I don't think he should be out in the open. Whatever did this is probably much more than you can handle Desmond…" he opened his mouth to say something, "and don't even try to tell me otherwise." He shut it abruptly. "I'll expect you in a few days."

With that, the vision of Winnie stuttered, collapsed in on itself and was gone. Desmond sat back down beside me.

"You need to tell me if anything like this happens again." He said sitting down next to me.

"I know. Sorry…"

"Common." He said, slapping by back. "Let's get some sleep." He stood up to turn the lights off. I heard the slopping of wet clothing and heard him crawl into the bed. I sighed, turned over on the sofa and fell asleep almost instantly.

Chapter 9

"Hey T…" he whispered. "You awake?"

"Yeah." I whispered back.

"How… uh… did you sleep?"

"Good. You?"

"Mmmh… I could use some more sleep though."

"Well where are we going to meet Winnie?" I asked

"We've got a long way to go. Let's put it that way. What time is it? He rubbed his eyes.

I looked over to the alarm clock on the night stand and was surprised. "It's 5am…"

"Argh!" he rolled over, fiddled with the clock and stayed with his back to me. "Mmm sleep time is now."

I huffed. "Hm? You alright?" Desmond lifted his head to stare at me with one eye.

"Yeah. I'm totally fine." I turned over again on the sofa and fell asleep quickly, not bothering to think of anything else.

Chapter 10

Once again, I awoke with the sun higher in the sky.

I turned over to see what time it was, 7:25am, and no Desmond.

I shot up in bed. "What the fuck?" I looked around the room. Sitting at the table was him…

He stood up, scarf dangling onto the floor. His mouth still hidden, his blue eyes gazed into my soul. He tilted his head down then peeked up at me. His hair was still short, but it had grown since the last time I saw him his shirt was still torn, but his pants remained intact. But what I noticed most was the dark, ash-like spots that crept up his neck.

Before I knew what was happening, I was walking towards him, transfixed by those eyes. I reached him, never breaking eye contact. Was I hypnotized or just so transfixed and curious about this stranger that I lost all control? No, I was thinking clearly, I was able to think for myself. Then again, I had never been hypnotized before.

"Where's Desmond…?" I asked meekly. He said nothing, but just looked to the door. "Did he leave?" His eyes returned to me, just staring. "Why would he…" was he mad at my comment before we went back to sleep? I looked to the man again. "What… Are you…?" He ignored me.

"What are you?" I asked more forcefully.

He smelled life fire. Not strong or overpowering. More like the soft burning smell of a camp fire. I inhaled deeply through my nose, his eyes…they were shifting, fading to a soft pink.

Then he spoke in a rough voice that at the same time set my soul at ease: "I cannot say…" then he placed his finger on my eyelids and pulled them down. I heard soft whispers of hundreds of people and then nothingness…

Chapter 11

"Hey!"

I awoke with a start. The room slowly came into focus and Desmond stood there with a hand on my shoulder, shaking me. "Wakey, wakey…" he cooed.

"Desmond?"

"In the flesh." He tossed off his name like it was nothing.

"Ah…" I put a hand to my forehead.

"What's wrong?" his tone changed. "Is your headache back?"

"NO...Uh…Wh…Where did you go?" I asked lethargically.

"I went out to get coffee and muffins. Common, get up." He walked over to the little table where he had a package full of muffins and two steaming coffees. "Now I wasn't sure what you liked so I got a bunch of them and I didn't even know if you liked coffee so I got a tea bag just in case and a bunch of milkettes and creamer…"

"Desmond!" I cut him off. He was rambling nervously. "You were gone forever…Where did you go?"

He looked at his watch. "Dude it's 7:30…I went to get breakfast…"

7:30? I spun around to look at the alarm clock. 7:31am. I spun back to look at Desmond with a baffled look.

"Ok one minute off isn't that bad. Geeze…Bite my head off…"

"Bu… hang on what?" I got out of bed and looked myself over. I was wearing what I had on the night before. "No, no, no…" I started freaking out. "No, no it was real.: I ran to the window, looking to see if it was raining up or if there were seven moons, something strange to prove this was the dream.

"Woah, woah, what was?" Desmond took a few steps towards me and I pushed past him into the bathroom. I don't know what I was looking for but when I came back out, Desmond was blocking my path so I pushed him aside. "T!" I froze impulsively. He walked over to me and turned me around with a hand and pushed my back to the wall. "What are you talking about?"

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. "That guy that I saw in my house and in the pool… I saw him here too."

He smashed his fist into the wall beside my head. My eyes shot open to look upon the angriest face I had ever seen. His jaw jutted out, giving a slight under-bite in an otherwise flawless dental structure. His eyebrows bent downwards and his eyes seemed to darken. He pushed away from the wall and rubbed his mouth with a firm hand. He turned to face me, pointing at me with a bloodied hand. "And you didn't feel this was necessary for me to know? Why didn't you tell me?" He boomed.

"I just did and it just happened…I think…" that was something he could shout about tomorrow or next week, not the phrase that one would use for an event that happened not 5 minutes ago… Or did it? "Oh god are you ok?" I asked looking at his hand.

He stormed past me into the bathroom, "Eat your fucking muffin." The wall beside the bathroom door had a huge hole in it and the rest of the wood panel was decimated.

I wandered back defeated to the small table and began to pick at a cranberry muffin. It was awful.

About 10 minutes later, I heard Desmond's heavy boots clunking towards me from the bathroom. In the short distance many things went through my head. Was he going to kill me out of rage? He seemed so excited when he woke me up… Fuck I'm going to die. He's going to shoot me, or choke me, or…

"Incubus." He sat down in the other chair. His hand was covered in poorly applied band-aids and his silver medallion was hanging on the outside of his shirt and old corduroy jacket.

"The band?" I was relieved that he had calmed down… Probably regressed those feelings and would explode one day.

"No it's a type of demon." A few minutes later and a trip out to his car, Desmond was back with three books. "An incubus is the male equivilent of a succubus." He opened one book to a page in a strange language. On one page was a female with large bat wings hovering over a sleeping body, the other was the same but a male. "They come to you in your sleep," he slammed the book shut and opened another one. It looked almost Sumerian. "And they mess you up good as well, make you go mad." He slammed it shut and opened the last book to a page with a male spector hovering over a pile of male and female bodies. "Meeting one or one on multiple occasions can lead to sickness, disease, possession and death." He slammed the dinal book closed and stared at me with an angry and slightly smug look.

I was dumbfounded. I met a demon? A demon? GROSS. "I…had no…"

"No idea. Right." He cut me off. "Next time, try to keep away from him as long as possible." He stared angrily at me, though significantly less so than before.

"My mouth dropped open and my eyes bulged outwards. "Wha…" No. he didn't deserve it, how fucking dare he. I grinded my teeth and stood up. "Well then make up your fucking mind." I sneered at him "And the muffins were shit."

His hand tensed into a sort of claw-like grip and he grunted as he swallowed his anger and formed his hand into a fist. I walked outside mildly happy with myself but also dying inside from what he said.

Desmond sniffed once rather loudly from behind me. As I reached the door to the car, I turned around. He was still in the doorway.

"Did it smell like fire in there to you?"

Chapter 12

This seems to be a common theme in my life as of late, me angry with Desmond over something. Although I am not one to give into the high school bullshit of 'I'm mad at you so I'm not going to talk to you,' I flat out refused to talk to Desmond. Call me a hypocrite if you want but really, would you? It was harsh.

As a result, I had not talked to him since telling him that the muffins he had bought for breakfast were shit. My face had remained in a constant infuriating face when he looked at me, and a mildly lesser one when he did not. My eyes watched the road whipping by outside of the window.

From what I cared to listen to, we were headed to Kapuskasing, where Winnie lives. Or those of you who don't know Canada, it's really fucking far North. Around ten hours from where we are now. There was much rejoicing.

I'm not entirely sure as to why we are going up there, but it does have something to do with my incubus. Perhaps Winnie has a way of getting rid of it? I started to feel as though I were in a danger of dying because I had met and talked to it on a multiple occasions. I had to find out more. Once we stop for the night, I'll grab those books he was looking through.

"Hey look at that, a deer." Desmond smiled. That was the 34th time that he had tried to get me to say something. "Ever seen one of them before?" 12th time he'd tried to start a conversation with me. "Ok look, I'm sorry I said, I was angry." 8th time he had apologized. He paused, glancing from me to the road. I continued to look out the window into the farmer's fields, recently plowed and still a deep brown, the sun not getting at it much.

"Fine." He said, turning on the radio, this being the 52nd time he did this to break the silence in the car. From the other numbers I was keeping, I knew that soon her would turn off the radio saying that the song that was playing was crappy or country.

And we drove along the winding highway 12 North of Kapuskasing. I'd never been there, heard it was a big timber town but the mill was going under. Unfortunate. But why would Winnie live all the way up there? Some sort of spiritual connection with the land probably. Maybe there was a Canadian Stonehenge or something.

The day proceeded into the early afternoon when we reached Nobel, a small town outside of the Parry sound. "Argh! I can't drive anymore! And this song is crap!" 53.

He got out of the car and slammed the door. Placing both hands on the rood he looked to the ground and stretched his legs, letting his head fall down. I slowly got out of the car and looked around. We were on a dirt road with nothing around us but trees and a field. I wandered, looking at the unfamiliar ground and tall grass that encroached on the road. I broke of a piece and proceeded to pull it apart into sections, discarding them on the road.

Desmond looked up. "Where are you going?" I didn't look back. I just wandered where I felt like I was being led. I heard footsteps coming after me on the soft dirt. "Common back to the car, it's not safe out here." Why not? I pondered. But the pondering only led me further down the road. "I'm serious Tim! Common!" He scurried up to me and grabbed my arm forcefully.

"Don't you fucking touch me!" I screamed at him. I took his arm and jammed it back into his shoulder, it would hurt for a while. "Ah fuck!" he grimaced. "Well at least I gotta word outta ya."

"Don't get used to it." I kept walking down the road.

"Tim look…" he jumped a few steps to catch up to me. "I shouldn't have said that. And I'm sorry. Really I am" he stopped and grabbed me again, this time with both hands on my arms and forced me to face him. "Look at me!" I looked him in the eyes. "I. Am. Sorry." I felt the anger melt away from my face as I looked into his eyes. They looked almost but not quite as sad as when he told me about the vampires. "I know it hurt… I know I hurt you and it happened, but can we move on? I was angry, I was…" he let out a big breath and looked to the ground. "I was really angry." He said looking back to me.

I stepped away from him and his hands stuttered as they let me go, unsure what my reaction was and unsure if they should reaffirm their grip. "My life was taken from me." I whispered, not sure how I even felt. "You're it…Never." I said bringing up a hand in a 'stop' gesture.

"Never again." He said quickly and bluntly. I turned on my heels and started back towards the car.

"We need food." I called back to him.

"Are you hungry?" he started after me.

"No." I turned my head to look at him. "You're stomach was grumbling through your whole speech." He chuckled at me.

Chapter 13

"Maple syrup is proof that god exists and that he loves us." Desmond said as he drizzled it all over his pancakes, sausage and salad.

"That's disgusting." I said with a concerned look on my face.

"That's the beauty of all day breakfast Timmy, pancakes and whatever the hell else you want. Then you mix it all together," and he did just that.

"Sounds like cafeteria chili." I moaned remembering the horrible stomachaches. I went back to my ham sandwich whose tagline was 'grown right here in Nobel, no bull here!" I think it was a pun, but I wasn't sure.

The small diner was made out of the front portion of a house, the kitchen in the back was wide open for all to see, separated only by a long counter where a few men were sitting and eating.

"Hey hun, need anything?" the waitress was a woman in her mid 50s, red curly hair pulled into a bun. She wore a striped red and white shirt with jeans and an apron that covered her rather large breasts.

Desmond grunted a 'yes' behind his food and began pointing at the table. The waitress looked confused but when he tried to open his mouth, food fell out. In a mildly disgusted face, I turned to her. "Coffee please." I smiled. "He's a friend." Desmond nodded and grunted enthusiastically.

"So are you aware yet of how much food you mouth can hold or are you completely oblivious?"

A hard swallow. "I'm actually trying to become a squirrel. It's going good." He shoved more food into his mouth and smiled at me, teeth full of sausage. I laughed through my nose and finished my sandwich.

By the time we were finished, it was nearly 4. We walked up to the car and faced each other over the roof.

"I don't wanna drive anymore." He shrugged.

"Ok…I can't drive so…"

"We'll stay put for the night then. Get in; I saw a motel back on the highway. You may have been blinded by hatred." He smiled.

"Too soon." I said getting in the car.

"Ok." He said in a 'woops' type of way and biting his bottom lip.

We drove for a few minutes up the road and reached the small motel. It consisted of six rooms in an open courtyard, each with the drapes drawn and white plastic chairs out front. Very stereotypical, though small. Right across the street was a sizable bar called Mickey's, the sign in neon letters with an olive dotting the i. Classy…?

We walked into the office to the left of all the rooms. No one was there. Desmond walked up to the counter and dinged the little bell. "Hello?" He called out.

I walked over to a rack of magazines and the local paper. Shifting through them, I found nothing of interest. "Where the hell is everyone?" Desmond glanced out the window then turned back to the counter. "Hello?" he dinged the bell a few more times.

Man attacked by wolves was the headline on the local paper, Northern Times – Nobel. There was a picture of him, a school photo, the ones with the blue background. He was smiling wide. He wasn't an older than I was. "Stomach ripped open. That's fucking sick." I read aloud. Minus the 'fucking sick' part.

"Oh hello there!" a woman stepped out from a doorway behind the desk. I'm fairly certain that it was not a doorway but a time machine because she looked like she came from the 1980's. Her hair was in a beehive and her clothes were bright and fairly tight. "Awful to hear about James. He was such a good boy." She said half smiling. She was very..peppy…"So! What can I do for you gentlemen? Need a room?" he Northern Ontario accent was thick.

"Uh yeah…" Desmond said a little taken back.

"Okie dokie, one bed or two?" she picked up a pen and it hovered over a ledger on the desk. She looked at us with a blank expression.

"Two please." I said.

Her blank expression sprung into a big smile. "Greaaat. Ok then you folks are in room 6, right at the end there. Ok? Now there's no one else stayin ere so you've gotten the good one. Although I think the truckers might come in a lil bit later. Okie you two have fun!" She smiled and looked down at the ledger, writing furiously still with a huge smile.

"What'd you say about that kid?" Desmond walked over and said quietly.

"Oh that James character!" She looked up again. "Attacked by wolves, shame no? You know my husband always shoots wolves whenever he sees 'em cause they nothin but problems up ere. But they go for the gut first you see? They don't eat veggies but deer and we sure do eh?" She chuckled. "But don't you go worryin yourself over that, tell ya what." She finally took a breath. "You two go over to Mickey's tonight and you'll have a great time! It's karaoke! I'm gonna be singing Total Eclipse so don't you miss it ok? Bye bye now!"

Desmond looked at me and I turned to look at him. Our eyes met and a look of confusion was exchanged. We left the office without another word.

"People are fucking weird." Desmond unlocked the door and stepped into the dark and dusty motel room. He threw open the curtains and the setting sun let what little light it had left into the room. The two double beds sat the stereotypical distance apart with a nightstand in the middle. Another nightstand that was propped up on cinderblocks served as a table with two bar stools on either side.

I dropped my stuff onto the bed closest to the door and walked to the sink at the back of the room. Off to the right was a small stall with a toilet and shower. I turned and saw Desmond flop down onto the other bed, covering his eyes with his elbow. "There's no TV." He whined. I grabbed the keys that were hanging out of his pocket and went to the car to grab those books. "Hey…" he sat up.

"Relax." I muttered

a few minutes later I returned with the books and put them on the table. Desmond looked at me with his head tilted down. "Curious?" He asked.

"Mostly how to get it to go away." I said opening the largest book.

"They don't go away. Not that easily." He leaned on his elbow and turned his body to face me. "There's some bullshit about excommunicating them, but that's just crap. Exorcisms are pointless too. We did the only that is doable by accident. We moved you."

I looked over to him, "It says that it's a night demon. Does that mean it only comes out at night?"

"Usually." He nodded.

He didn't seem cold and his eyes were difference colors, not red. And I saw him in the daylight, while I was awake. I doubt this was an Incubus." I closed the book triumphantly.

Desmond sat in silence for a moment sucking on his teeth and looking into space. He got up in a hurry and was behind me opening the book in no time. "What are you…?" he pondered out loud in a hushed voice. Flipping through the pages I saw only glimpses of other creatures. He stopped on a page with the name Vrykolakas on it. The picture beside it was horrifying. A small imp-like creature with rotting flesh sat upon the head of a sleeping individual. It's face turned towards the reader in a ghastly expression as its claws sunk deep into the chest of the sleeping person. "It's a shape shifter, sometimes associated with an Incubus."

"No it was a person Desmond." I stepped out from beneath him and sat on my bed. "He had feelings, emotions, he was gentle."

"How the fuck can you say that about a monster?" He closed the book and crossed his arms. I opened my mouth to say something but he beat me to it. "No you are. You're talking about him – it like a little school girl. It's got a spell of some kind and I bet it has to do with curing your headaches.

"I don't know. I just know what I felt."

"Well I don't want to feel anything right now." He dropped his arms walking towards the door.

"Where are you going?"

"Mickey's. I need a drink."

"I can't drink."

"Sucks to be you." The door closed and he was gone. I huffed and returned to the books that lay on the table. Opening one to 'Obayifo,' I started reading.

Chapter 14

By 9 o'clock my eyes were burning and there was still no sign of Desmond. There was one street light outside by Mickey's and one directly across the street at the motel, but other than that, there was no light except the moon and the stars. I recommended going outside of the city as often as you can, the stars are beautiful when you can see them.

I went to the sink and grabbed the small packaged plastic cup to get a drink. I tilted my head back and took a sip, that's when I saw a dark face smiling at me from behind my shoulder. I spat the water out onto the mirror and spun around. No one was there.

"It's you isn't it?" I called out. My heart would have leaped across the room if m ribs didn't hold in check. My breaths became silent and deep, but still too loud for the silence of the room.

I was paralyzed by fear. What if I wasn't? What if it was some crazy night terror that had come to kill me because I nice a sweet piece of meat all alone in a motel room with no one within screaming distance? Oh, fuck…

"Hello?" I called out. With all my courage, I took a step forward. My senses heightened, I could hear the buzzing of the lights and the creaking of the wind against the windows. Hearing the dripping of the water from the mirror. The face glared back, dark and menacing. Teeth sharp in an evil grin. I screamed and took off, slamming the door behind me, I ran across the street to Mickey's.

The darkness pushed against the circles of light made by the streetlights. I slowed to a walk, looking behind me. It was only in mirrors, it's ok. Now what the fuck is that? What the fuck is following me now? Do I have menagerie of spirits and demons following me around? Bats squeaked overhead. "Oh fuck this is shit!" and I ran the rest of the way to the bar.

I burst in the doors and slammed them behind me. Breathing heavily I leaned against them as the warmth and music of the bar filled my senses. There were Christmas lights hanging from the banister to add to the already bright lights that hung above each table. It was a large bar and apparently all of Nobel came out for the karaoke night. The woman who ran the motel was halfway through Total Eclipse.

"There' nothin I can dooo I'malways in tha dark…" She was speaking in her Northern accent instead of singing it. Probably a good thing because it seemed like she was tone deaf anyways. She waved and smiled at me as I stood at the door "Hey hun! When livin in a powderkeg and givin off sparks…I really need you tonight!"

"Desmond!" I called out, rushing through the bar, pushing people out of my way. "Desmond!" I yelled louder. "Where are you?" I finally spotted him at a small table on the far wall of the bar, just behind the stage. I ran over to him. "Desmond!".

"Woah there buddy, I'm having a conversation here." He gestured to the woman across the table from him. She was a little larger than average girls, but by no means fat. She had long black hair that ran halfway down her back. She sipped at a beer. She offered a greeting. "I need to talk to you." I ignored her. "Like now time."

"Fuck off dude." He said while smiling, trying to play it cool. He returned to the girl and grinned wider. "So where did you say you lived?"

I grabbed his arm. "It's about the guy we met home." I gave him an obvious look.

"I'll be right back hun." He winked t her and took me by the arm out of the bar. He threw me against the wall, "What?" looking sternly at me, Desmond crossed his arms.

"Well I think it was him, I saw him…"

"Did you speak to him again?"

"Wha…? I know, let me finish. K thanks." I got a little upset with him for bringing it up again after he promised not to go there ever again. "I saw this dark figure in the mirror and then it was gone the next minute… When I turned back it was in the mirror again. Then I ran here. I don't know if it was him or not." The force in my voice rose as the explanation continued.

"Shadow man. They don't do much, just annoying." He muttered. Looking up into the sky he apologized for what he said. "But why do you have all these things following you…What did you do recently to piss something off?"

"I don't know." I said sheepishly looking to the ground. "And… Who was that girl?" Our eyes met his looking down and mine looking up. Silence for a moment.

"It's Cindy, her mom is the crazy motel lady. I was… information gathering." He smirked at me.

"Sure. Whatever." I rubbed my eyes. "Whadowe do? I'm not going back there alone. Can we kill this thing?"

"Nah, there's no need to. They just scare you and you can banish them easy enough with spring water…And there's a lot of different theories as to what they are so it's hard to pinpoint how to kill one." He noticed the concern in my face. "Common, we'll get some water…" he sighed and led me back into the bar.

The door burst open as Desmond reached for it. "Hi there boys!" It was the crazy motel lady and her daughter. "Now I thought I told you gents to come see my performance! That's ok though, no harm done. Desmond! Cindy tells me that she was talking to ya and that you're into guns huh? Well like I said, my husband goes out a huntin every now and then and if ya wanted, you'd be more than welcome to go! And of course your friend here can go too! I'll tell Herb when we get home but we've gotta go it's getting late and there's no telling if a wolf will jump out and nab us eh? Ok loves bye bye now!"

We stepped aside a bit bewildered. "What happened?" I whispered to Desmond.

"I'm not sure, but I think we're goin hunting'…"

Just then, as the crazy motel lady and her daughter were in the center of the road, a baby started crying in the distance. "Hurry up Cindy!" she sounded uncharacteristically mad. "You boys be ready for 'round 5am now ya hear?" she waved at us and took her daughter by the arm, leading her into the motel office.

"They're crazy…" I mumbled. "Does something seem off with them?"

"They're people Timmy, I find them all weird."

"Even me?"

He gave me a side-long glance. "You've got at least two spirits following you…yeah you're a little odd."

We walked back into the bar and straight up to the bartender.

"Two whiskeys my good sir." Desmond winked at me.

"Desmond I'm not…"

"A drinker?" he said loudly. "Nah common, this is time for a celebration!"

"What are we celebrating?"

"Just shut up and take the shot." He tipped it back and bared his teeth. I tilted my head back slightly and Desmond flipped my elbow upwards, depositing the shot in my mouth. I coughed as it burned its way down my throat. "Ah, 'at's my boy. He patted me on the back and ordered another round.

Chapter 15

"AHAHAHAHA!" I leaned on Desmond as he opened the door to the motel room. I fell in and lay on my back on the floor. "My head is sooooooo heavy!"

"Dude you are fucking trashed!" He laughed, barely able to stand up while drunk and laughing.

I shot up and looked him in the eyes. It's your fault! I…I've never drunken that much before. So it's your fault cause I haven't drunken that much before.

Desmond looked down at me for a moment then burst out laughing again, closing the door and sliding down it to a sitting position. "Oh oh! Do the shit."

"Ooooooooooooh yeah." I stood up with the help of the table on cinderblocks and took a bottle of water out of my pocket. "Fuck you, you shadow…thing. Wha!" I opened the bottle and let some fly out of it, landing on the floor in an arch. "And fuck you mirror… You little bitch." I threw the bottle at it. It hit the mirror, splashed a little and them emptied onto the counter, dripping onto the floor.

"Fuck you shadow people!" Desmond shouted from the door. He stumbled to his feet and walked over to me and then crashed into me, both of us fell to the floor laughing. "I just need to pee! Hahaha!"

"Eww… No golden showers!" I laughed and crawled onto my bed and looked at the ceiling. I heard him unzip, fall into the wall and then nothing. "Did you pee on the floor?" I shouted out.

"A little." Came the meager response.

"Every now and then I fall apart!" My eyes shot open to Desmond singing Total Eclipse just like the crazy motel lady did, moves and all. "And I need you now tonight! And I need you more than eva! And if you'll only hold me tiiiight, we'll be holdin on forever!" He made his way to his bed and collapsed in a heap. "And we'll always be makin it right…" he whispered drunkenly, "cause we''ll never be wrong together…"

"I love your gangsta remix." I laughed.

"Shut up!" he smiled with his eyes closed and attempted to push me off my bed but passed out in the process.

A scream of utter terror awoke us.

"What was that?" I said, still mildly drunk.

Desmond didn't reply, he just got up out of bed and hastily ran to the door, opening it in a blue. And he was gone.

It took me a moment to compose myself, but once I had my balance and wits about me, I followed at a much slower pace.

"Somebody help me!" a woman's voice screamed. Desmond was running up to her. "HELP!"

"Woah woah lady, are you ok?" I caught up to them and she collapsed into Desmond's arms. She was holding a wound on her stomach.

It's alright…Timmy help me." I supported her left side and he her right. We took her into our hotel room. A baby was crying in the distance. The sound seemed to terrify her and she tried to run. She didn't get far and we brought her into the room, closing the door.

Her breath was heavy and her eyes were wide open, yet they focused on nothing.

"What happened?" Desmond demanded. When she didn't answer, he grabbed her shoulders and shook her.

"Desmond stop it!" I pushed him aside. "Are you alright?" she blinked and looked at me.

"I heard crying… There was a baby… Then…" She looked down to her stomach where a scratch was oozing blood. Not to deep, but deep enough for there to be a lot of blood. "Oh god I'm gonna die." She dropped her head back and cried. Her face was dirty, the tears carving pathways down her face. She had soft blue eyes and light brown hair. She couldn't have been more than 20.

"You're not gonna die." Desmond said forcefully. "Where was this kid?"

"In the forest…" She went catatonic and just stared right ahead. Desmond opened the door, flinging her on top of me and rushed out. She remained motionless. It took me awhile, but I moved her to the bed and I hurried out after Desmond.

"Desmond!" I shouted. The wind had picked up and the sound of a baby crying was coming from everywhere. My body realized it was still drunk and I fell onto the road. I hit my head, scratching it. The little bit of blood showed on my hand when I checked it. I shook myself out of the fuzziness and looked towards the motel. On the second floor of the motel office there was a woman watching me. She had dark hair and wore a white night gown. I could only assume it was Cindy.

As I looked at her, her hands appeared on the glass in a menacing, claw-like grip at the window. I say 'appeared' because one moment they were at her side, the next on the window. There was no movement involved. I shook my head again and she was gone.

"Desmond!" I called out again. I thought I heard a faint response and I hurried to find it. We played a game of Marco Polo until I found him in the forest behind Mickey's the crying got louder and louder. "Desmond what are you…"

"Incoming!" He shouted as a screaming mass flew past my head.

"Did you just throw a baby at me?" I was dumbfounded.

"That's not a baby…" he walked past me holding a knife.

"Where do you keep these weapons?" I shouted through the intensifying wind. I walked after him to the small crying mass on the road. It certainly looked like a baby, it was small enough. But it's skin was slightly grey, it had sharp teeth and claws that thrashed around as it attempted to get Desmond and me. It's small stature and top heavy head made it impossible.

"It's a ghoul of some kind." Desmond drew the knife high into the air and plunged it into the infant's chest. This only served to aggravate it, slashing and biting at Desmond's hand. "Ah fuck!" He pulled back, the knife leaving a wound that quickly healed. He kicked it. He bled slightly onto the road. "I hate kids…" he took off his jacket and threw it over the top of the grey baby.

I was still staring blankly at him.

"Be glad you don't have kids. They tend to turn into shit like this.

We got back into the hotel room and he dropped the squirming package onto the floor of the hotel room. Luckily it had stopped screaming. I walked over to the table that still held the thick books. Desmond checked on the girl who was asleep and then joined me at the table.

I had sobered up a lot and was able to read with only minor difficulties. I looked up everything I could do with babies. There was so much and none that seemed to fit the bill of a grey screaming baby with huge claws that attacks people. "I don't know." I finally said, "there's nothing here."

"These books have nearly everything out there in them. It's here…"

I fell asleep at the table, dreaming of swarms of screaming babies, only to be awakened when Desmond poked me. "Hmh?" I squinted at him. His face was accomplished as he pushed one of the smaller books in front of me. "Pontiac?" Isn't that a car?" I mumbled.

"Pontianak." He corrected me. "It's a demon still born baby." He explained "Comes out at night crying so that people come and pick it up, then it eats their intestines and drinks their blood." He gulped heavily and leaned back against the wall.

"Says here we have to puts its hair in a hole in its neck? What the hell is that about?

"I dunno… it doesn't say how it's created. Just how to stop it. Buts it's a night creature and can't move on its own so I threw it in the room safe."

"What?" I looked up from the book. "Under normal circumstances that would be morally apprehensible."

Desmond chuckled. "Well I don't really have morals Tim. We'd better go to bed." He looked over at the girl laying on my bed then to me. "Guess we're bunking. Sorry if you still hate me."

I didn't want to let him off the hook that easily but I also wasn't about to force him to sleep on the floor. I silently got up, turned off the lights and crawled into the bed. I heard Desmond wandering around the room and then some rustling in the bed where the girl lay. "What are you doing?"

"Tying her down. She might be a little crazy when she wakes up. This way we'll at least be able to talk to her and tell her what happened. She's stopped bleeding." He seemed to be talking to himself.

The bed compressed as he got in beside me. I rolled over, putting my back to him and curling up.

"Desmond?"

"Yeah T?" that was the first time he had called me 'T' in a while.

"If the Pontianak can't move on its own, how did it move from where James died?"

The question was lost on us both as we fell into a dreamless sleep.

Chapter 16

"Hey Homos!"

My eyes opened to see the girl still tied to the bed. Desmond was asleep on his front, snoring lightly.

"Desmond?" I said to wake him.

"Hmh?" I seen him smile.

"Desmond!" I shouted. He awoke with a start, jumping up. A bead of sweat rolled down his forehead and he grabbed the medallion around his neck, gasping for breath. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah I'm fine." He said bluntly. He changed his clothes and untied the woman before bothering to do anything else.

"Thanks…" she said, rubbing the parts of her that were bound. Getting up and walking over to the table, she looked at the books that lay sprawled out. "Pontianak?" she looked up at Desmond, "What's that?"

"Do you remember anything from last night?" he said sitting down on a stool.

She sat down as well. "I remember a lot of crying, screaming…"

"Well that was this…" he pointed to the page on Pontianaks. "It's a still born baby that feeds off blood and organs. And it attacked you."

She laughed. "Oh well then! Glad you saved me from the crazy mutant demon baby!" she laughed again and walked to the door. "Shouldn't it be with its mother? The crazy mutant mommy?" She laughed again and opened the door. There stood the crazy motel lady.

"RUTH!" She shouted.

"Mrs Constance." She froze.

"What are you boys doing associating with such trash?" Mrs Constance grabbed Ruth by the hair and led her out of the room shouting things at her, "How are you come onto my property you little wench!" this was the ugly side of Mrs Constance. "Little slut! You mess up MY family and then come to mess up MY business too? You get out of here before I call the police or get Mr Constance to shoot you down you hear me girl?" Her accent was mysteriously gone.

Ruth ran off down the road and Mrs Constance turned to us with her big smile. Coming towards us, her accent was back. "That girl ain't nothin' but trouble. Few years back she got into a scrap with my Cindy and she's never been the same since. Girl nearly ruined everythin'" She trailed off into thought, a sour expression revealing itself. "Anyways boys! I hear you didn't make it up for 5 like I told ya. Not a big deal, don't worry 'bout it! He hasn't left yet, waiting for you boys. So I came to wake yous up! Well common boys time's a wastin, those deer won't shoot themselves ay?"

"Actually Mrs Constance we've got a few things to take care of ourselves so… sorry but we've got to get goin…err going." Desmond stumbled and I held in a laugh.

"Well that's fine then boys you go do what you wanna do here in Nobel. Great town, lived here me whole life, never left. I love it. So you boys go on down the street right there, turn left and you'll find a great bunch of shops suited for whatever you boys are looking for. Tell 'em I sent ya and there should be no problems. See sometimes folks 'round here don't like te sell to strangers but no worries, my name'll get you anything…"

"Ok thanks Mrs Constance." Desmond turned me around and pushed me back into the room slamming the door. "I'm gonna kill that bitch…" Desmond stood there tense.

"Hungry?" Desmond came out with suddenly.

"Not really." I said and walked to the bathroom. I leaned my head against the wall in the tiny stall and listened as Desmond punched something. This seemed to be his way of taking out aggression, punching walls.

When I washed my hands, Desmond was sitting on the bed we had shared with his elbows on his knees. "I think it's time we looked into Mrs Constance."

Chapter 17

Calvinism is completely lost on you isn't it?" Desmond said as we sat in the Nobel archives. He had a stack of papers on land ownership, marriages, everything you could possibly want to know about a town. And I was drawing on the wooden table completely ignoring the work he was doing.

"Not religious." Was my only response.

"It's the work ethic I was talking about."

"Not ethical."

"Can you maybe go and get me a coffee from somewhere?"

"Am I distracting you?"

He gave me a once over and breathed in deep. "Yes." And he went back to the books and papers.

I got up slowly and walked to the stairs. I turned and Desmond was looking at a bunch of books and papers. I took the steps two at a time.

The small building was about a 10 minute walk from the motel so we had left the car there. Not that I know how to drive, but it would have been interesting to try.

"Excuse me." I said to the clerk. "Where is the nearest coffee shop?"

"Turn left, five minutes." He looked at me through thick glasses then tilted his head down to see over them. "Your friend finding everything ok?"

"Oh yeah, he's done this lots of times."

"And what exactly is his thesis on?"

"Northern Ontario…land…settlement…something like that. I just tag along."

"I bet." He returned to the computer screen he undoubtedly stared at for countless hours entering data into the National Archives. Poor guy.

I walked down the deserted road humming to myself. The birds were chirping and the breeze was slight. After my second attempt at a run through Total Eclipse, I noticed the birds had stopped singing.

"Hey I'm not that offensive." I sloughed at their mocking. The wind was gone as well. I stopped and looked around. "What now?" I said as I turned around to face Him.

I jumped into the air and fell backwards. He extended a hand to help me up and I took it. He looked away into my eyes as per usual. Nothing about hum changed really since the last time I saw him. His shirt was still torn, black, semi-tattoos still dotted his neck, retreating into his shirt. Cargo pants still dirty and old, mouth still hidden by a long dirty red scarf.

"I need to know." I said softly. I figured that it would help ease him. There was something wrong with him, he might be human, or might have been at one point, I wasn't sure. But he had severe insecurities. "Who are you?"

He just stared at me.

"I know you can talk…" His body straightened at the compliment and he stretched his neck upwards, cracking it to either side. "You're not an Incubus…" He shook his head. "You're not a Shadow Man." He shook his head again. "I don't want you to be a Vrykolakas." He let out a nasal laugh.

"I…cannot be here…" He said in a rough voice.

"No, you can. Why not? It's ok." I was stumbling trying to get him to say more.

"But I needed to know why you left." His voice was muffled because of the scarf.

"We have to go and see someone. Desmond told me that…"

He snarled. "The witch…" he took his hand out of mine. "I am not permitted to see her."

"Why no…?"

He hissed at me, baring his teeth, spit dripping down from the ones that had begun to grow into fangs. "They won't let me…There is so much I would do." His voice grew sad and he turned away. "I will pay for this."

"I don't understand, who are they? Maybe Desmond and I…"

He hissed again at me, much more violently. I took a step back and he recoiled. "There are too many." I blinked and he was gone. Leaves rusting in the forest showed his escape route. He was human.

Chapter 18

"About time." Desmond grabbed the coffee from my hand and took a sip. "Ah! Come to me my sweet…" Another one.

"I saw Him on the way to the diner."

He slammed the coffee down on the table. "Why didn't you come right back?" he demanded.

"Because he ran away. He's tormented by something Desmond, I want to help him."

"You idiot!" he stormed. "He is the reason I had to take you away! He is the reason that you life before me is over! He is probably the reason your parents are dead and you want to help him?" he slammed his fists onto the old table and it shook. "You clearly don't want mine or Winnie's help." Picking up the coffee and a small notebook, he made his way up the stairs.

I followed. "Don't you need any of those papers?"

"No. I have what I need."

The old clerk was reading a book when we came up the stairs.

"We're done down there sir. Thanks for all your help." The old man didn't respond. "Hello?" He waved his hand in front of the clerk's eyes and the book. Nothing, he was frozen.

"You know, I say come see me and you take a detour to the Archives." Winnie was gazing at pamphlets beside the desk, we had either missed her when we came upstairs or she just appeared. "Dizzy you hate research."

"Hello Winifred." Desmond sighed.

"Timothy darling how are you?" She looked back to Desmond without a reply from me. "Now get in your car and get moving, we've got to find out what's following Tim and the spirits are telling me that there is Darkness not too far away from here."

"Well Timmy over here managed to get the thing to follow us here." He gestured at me with his head.

Winnie looked at me. "You're scared… you needn't be Tim. Desmond is one of the best hunters that I know of. He grew up doing this, it is his calling. I would get to you myself if I thought Desmond was unable." She looked to Desmond. "And Dizzy darling, you're green. It doesn't look good on you." Desmond shifted uneasily on his feet. "That's better."

"I saw him on the road. He told me that he would pay for coming to see me but he wanted to know why I left." I admitted and Winnie's apparition looked thoughtful.

"I understand how you feel Timmy, and as much as Desmond does not, he is right. We do not know what this thing is, what it is capable of and why you are important. You must come to me right away."

"There's another problem. There's a Pontianak in town." Desmond sucked on his teeth. "And I think the motel owner is connected to it."

"Oh?"

"Yeah…" we listened intently. "About a year ago, Mrs Constance didn't live here in Nobel, she lived in Parry Sound for half a year. She said she'd never left here, so she lied. Her daughter Cindy Constance was admitted to the Parry Sound hospital during that time because she was going into labor. After that, she moved back her without her daughter, that's when the wolves started attacking which we found out was the Pontianak. Since a Pontianak is a stillborn child, I'm guessing that Mrs Constance brought the child back for whatever reason as a corpse, did a little black magic and made a zombie baby."

Winnie nodded. "Maybe, but a Pontianak is not created from black magic. It can only be created when the mother also dies in childbirth."

"Cindy?" I said. "No no she's alive, we saw her at the bar, she wasn't looking too dead and blood sucky."

"Long dark hair? Dressed in white? She's a Languir, the mother of a Pontianak. The lore around them is muddled slightly so you may not have gotten the true story from your books. But legend has it that if you tie a red ribbon around the bed post of the Languir, you can control it. If Cindy was not on a violent rampage to drink blood and find her child, then someone is controlling her." Winnie lost herself in thought.

"Pontianaks can be turned into normal people if their neck is plugged up with hair, is it the same with a Langsuir?" Desmond asked.

Winnie nodded.

"Wake us up. I know what's going on."

I awoke on the floor of the basement, Desmond at the table. He shot up out of the chair, grabbed the coffee and helped me up with one arm.

"Told ya Mrs Constance was up to no good. She's harboring a Langsuir."

Chapter 19

"Oh hello boys, did you have a good time out on the town today? I bet you did, lots to see here in Noble." Mrs Constance shuffled after us on our way to our motel room.

"Shut up bitch." Desmond said as he slammed the door in her face. "We haven't got much time. The Langsuir can't come out during the day but you'd better bet that she'll stick it on us now."

"Why the hell would you do that?"

"What better way to get them both where we need them?"

Night came slowly as Desmond gathered weapons from the trunk of his car. A shotgun, a few knives, short swords made of silver and iron. He gave me a curved dagger, polished to perfection and told me to only use it if I needed to.

When the sun was down, the baby started crying from the safe where Desmond had shoved it. "Game time." He said as the door flew off its hinges and smashed into the mirror on the opposite side of the room. There stood a twisted and grotesque Cindy, Long black hair and sharp claws. She screamed like a banshee and seemed to fly at Desmond.

He shot two shots off before the Langsuir reached him. He put his foot on her stomach, rolled onto his back and threw her into the far wall, smashing through the bathroom.

"I knew you were onto me once you saved that whore Ruth!" Mrs Constance was in the doorway, smug look on her face. "Once I'm done with you two, I'll get Ruth, the whore. When James got my daughter pregnant, Ruth forced him to leave her so they could be together…I'll show her…I'll show everyone not to mess with the Constances!" Accent gone, she had reverted to a power hungry psychopath. "And I'm going to use your card to pay for all this mess!"

"The card's fake bitch" Desmond chuckled.

"Why you… CINDY!" a vicious roar came from the pile of rubble and Cindy sprang out of it and flew once more at Desmond.

She tackled him to the ground and he dropped his shotgun. "ARGH!" He screamed as Cindy lurched down with supernatural strength onto her victim. His face tuned red and he screamed as his muscles quickly reached their pinnacle.

I scrambled for the safe. The baby. All she wants is the baby. They died together and Mrs Constance kept them apart. "Fuck!" I shouted at the combination. I looked at the knife on the ground. Picking it up, I made a mad charge for Mrs Constance. "Die you bitch!" I shouted.

"CINDY!" She screamed. The Languir leapt from Desmond and latched onto my back, digging its claws deep inside. I could feel them wiggling in between ribs and the pain was astronomical. It burned and I screamed in pain, unable to wrestle the claws of Cindy from my back. She had me pinned.

"Hey Cindy!" Desmond called out. "I thought we had such a nice time at the bar." He flung his jacket still containing the Pontianak at Cindy, who retracted her claws, just as painful as going in…she caught the jacket and ripped it apart. I rolled over to see her coddle the baby in her arms, two rotting piles of flesh embracing. The baby made goo goo noises and then screamed.

The creatures looked to Mrs Constance who's expression had turned to horror. "Cindy no! I did it for you honey…I was going to release you!" But it was too late. The mother threw the child at Mrs Constance which immediately bit beep into her neck spraying blood up the doorframe. Cindy tackled her mother and all I could see were bits of Mrs Constance flying around the motel room. Her screams were piercing and almost made me puke. The smell of iron filled the room as her screaming died down.

Desmond ran to my side and helped me sit up. "Oh god…No you'll be fine…" He took off his shirt and pressed it against my back. When we next looked up Cindy and her child were gone and Mrs Constance was a beaten and bloody pile of bone on the parking lot.

Chapter 20

"Yeeeeeeeow!" I screamed as Desmond dabbed vodka on my back. "This is alcohol abuse…"

He chuckled and sat me up to re-wrap my upper torso in gauze, the only thing we could fine. We had to re-locate to Parry Sound, assuming that the locals would think we had pulverized Mrs Constance.

"Hey, at lease you're alive. That's all I care about." He said as he helped me put on my shirt. It was difficult since I could barely lift my arms parallel to the ground.

"Alive, but immobile." I laughed at myself.

"T…You saved my life you know." Sitting down beside me on my bed, he ruffled my hair. "I owe you one."

"Hey," I tried to act overly cool to the point of being lame, "Not a problem man. It was totally nothing." We laughed and then both yawned.

"Bed time." Desmond stood up and removed his shirt, walked to the lights and turned them off. "Goodnight T."

I yawned again. "Night Dizzy." I laughed quietly to myself. I heard Desmond lie down in his bed and then I fell asleep.

Chapter 21

It was dark…so dark…the stars seemed reluctant to show themselves in His presence. The moon hid behind clouds. He didn't want to do this, he didn't want to betray his master. What could he do? He'd done it before…countless times and it gave him a sort of solitude, peace of mind. Or maybe that's just what they wanted him to think.

He could smell them, smell their blood, hear their hearts. It was altogether sickening. He didn't want to be like this, to see the things he saw or all the things he heard calling out from the darkness. He breathed deeply and methodically, prepping himself for the onslaught of voices he knew could come once he began his mission.

He held his long red scarf in his hands, studying as he often did. In the faint light of the streetlight, he could barely see the intricate weaving of the scarf, his favorite part of looking at it. But in the absence of light, the one white patch that remained stood out like a beacon. He always kept that part under his chin, there, no one could see it, but he knew it was there. A constant reminder of all he had lost. But what had he gained? This half-life? Slavery? What?

Midnight. "Witching hour…" he muttered. The voices began. They urged him to jump out of the tree. They told him he was worthless, nothing more than a sickening sack of meat. Others threatened his life, or told him of the things they would do to him once they got out. The gruesome details of how his skin could be separated from his body made him cringe. Until…

ENOUGH! This one was his favorite. He called himself Rabnix, whether that was his real name or not, he was unsure. But he was the strongest, and always so kind to him, as much as was possible he assumed. "Now we all know what must be done." Rabnix spoke through his mind. But all of this was mindless chatter, "I'll peel back your skin and rub salt into your muscles, bah! Superficial hogwash. You do what you are told to do." Rabnix was talking to him now. "Don't let these fools stop you. Remember that you command them, not the other way around.

"Thank you…" He said, wrapping the scarf around his neck.

"After all, it is I who is going to gut you over and over again until the end of time.

"Comforting…" He said and leapt down from the tree.

He was in a residential neighborhood, rare for his jobs. If anything, he would be out in the woods at some log cabin. Diving into a bush for cover, he looked to the roof of number 287 Fallsview Crescent from across the street. There. And he jumped. He felt time slow down as the wind ripped past his ears. Of course it didn't really slow, he just liked to savor the moments of his weightlessness. But all too quickly, it was all over and he landed silently on the roof.

Unsheathing his blade, he slipped down onto the patio in the backyard and approached the glass doors. He motioned for the latch to open and it did as it was told, it knew better than to ignore his wishes. Gripping the handle, he swung it open with little effort and stepped inside.

He was in the kitchen of a large house. An island separated it from an oak dining table containing a basket of fruit, a knife block and a sink. Nothing of use there. All fairly average.

A flashing light caught his attention. An alarm system. Usually he wasn't that carless, perhaps it was his thoughts of Tim.

"I will rip those thoughts away from you boy if you think of him again tonight."

He closed his eyes and let the memories slip away into the black void of his mind. Mocking him, taunting him, daring him to defy his orders. But he kept walking, one step at a time. When he reached the top of the stairs, there was a hallway of five doors, three of which held his prizes. He walked past the first one, running his hand along its surface.

Bathroom. A voice whispered to him. The second door, her name is Karen. Then the voice laughed. He hated it when it told him their names and the voices knew it. So why not play with him?

Waving an open hand infront of the doorknob, it opened without a sound. He approached the sleeping form on the pink princess bed. Jasmine, Cinderella and Belle looked at him from the lamp on her nightstand accusingly. With a quick motion, they were covered in Karen's blood, blinded by it. He watched silently as her spirit floated up from her now lifeless body. She stared at him and a tear formed in her eye. It was rare that a spirit knew what had happened to them so soon after the deed was done. He mouthed 'I'm sorry' as she was sucked through the wall screaming and taken to her resting place…or elsewhere…he tried not to think of where is victims went, a way of coping.

He left the room, a voice made sure that the door closed just as silently as it had opened.

"The third door, you'll like this one," a voice chuckled in his ear. The door opened and he went inside.

It was the room of the teenage boy. Derek. A voice told him. He cringed. He slowly walked up to the bed. The boy was laying on his back. It was Tim…

"Come, don't get cold feet now!" "Kill him, you know you want to taste his blood among other things.

"You're sick. Stop!" He shouted. The face of Timmy melted away to show the boys true face, a pimply 16 year old red head. Another trick, courtesy of the voices. But Derek's eyes opened. He gasped as the blade sunk deep into his throat, pushing into the metal bed frame. He only stopped when the hilt of the katana crushed Derek's adam's apple. Withdrawing the blade, he heard the boy's spirit scream as it was carried away. No haunting for these tortured souls.

Office…sang a voice as his hand brushed against the fourth door. Staring at the fifth, he breathed heavily as the blood dripped from his sword, echoing in the empty hallway.

A voice opened the door before he was ready. "Go inside." They forced him. The master bedroom held two sleeping forms in the same bed. He walked slowly forward.

"Now!" the lights flew on and a shotgun discharged in a brilliant flash of light.

He screamed in agony as the rock salt burned into his skin, bringing him to his knees. His left hand was wounded. He threw up his right hand which shook uneasily, pinning the woman against the wall, drawing her upwards towards the ceiling. He had her neck and she choked.

"Linda!" the man cried out and re-loaded the shotgun.

"Oh let me do it! I want to! Please! I need to!" One of the voices said

"No no! Me! Please! I haven't had a woman in so long!" Another voice pleaded.

"I don't care!" He screamed, still in the grips of a burning wound. The result of his carelessness lit the woman on fire and sent her crashing into the large mirror, whose shards proceeded to freeze in mid air. They hung there for a moment and then redirected themselves into her wreathing body. The flames died down and she smoldered.

"Linda…" the man began to cry and took off through a doorway.

"Pull yourself together. It's not as bad as what I will do to you." Rabnix sneered. The pain was suddenly not so bad and he stood up, sword in hand. He bolted through the doorway that the man had taken into his office. The room was well lit and the man stood at the far wall sorting through a secret compartment of weapons.

The man let out a forceful grunt and flung a spinning blade towards him. He put his hand up and the shuriken changed direction, embedding itself into the nearest wall. The man discharged two shotguns but by the time the rock salt had reached him, he had driven his sword into the ceiling and knelt on it as if it were the floor. Another two rounds and he stood once more on the ground, wiping the drywall off his blade.

"A sword slinger huh?" the man said uneasily. "Alright…" he withdrew a long sword from the compartment. It held runes which he was positive was meant to ensure what it cut stayed cut. "Alright big boy…common."

He began walking to him slowly. The man couldn't be serious, challenging him to a sword fight? Ha! He drew a small smile, this would be fun.

AAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGHH! The voices screamed at once. He stopped dead in his tracks.

"Haha! Devil's Trap boy!" Must be painted under the carpet. The man let the sword fall to the ground and picked up a book off the shelves. "You're going back to hell for what you did…"

He closed his eyes and took a shaky step forward. It was like walking towards the giant fan of a wind tunnel. The other food.

"Impossible." The man stared wide eyed.

"Sure?" He whispered. The man's head rolled across the floor.

As he left the house, he felt his body swell with heat. The voices were working their magic. The wiring in the walls erupted into flame, burying the grizzly things he had done.

On the walkway he collapsed into tears. The voices called him weak. "How could I… he whispered to no one.

"Oh my good lord!" he looked up. There was a woman in her nightgown staring at him from the neighboring porch. The house had not yet taken full light but it was still visibly burning. A trail of blood led from the door to the discarded sword laying beside him.

He stood up. Tears streaming down his face and sniffling uncontrollably, he approached the terrified woman, "Why did you have to come out?" He pleaded with her. "Why couldn't you just stay inside? Why did you have to care?" He was furious but devastated. Fear gripped the woman, paralyzing her in place. His sword slid gently into her stomach. "I'm sorry."

Chapter 22

I was laying on my front, as Desmond put a paste on my back where Cindy had stabbed me. The concoction he had made from the small chest of herbs in his trunk smelled like strawberries and pomegranates mixed with a little bit of paving tar. I didn't know how he dealt with it.

"You alright?" Desmond asked quietly as he gently rubbed the paste into the holes in my back. It stung a little at first, and I told him so. "Good. Then it's working."

He finished bandaging me up and walked to the bathroom. Turning my head I watched him go. The sink turned on and Desmond soon emerged drying his hands on a towel.

"Common, get up, we've got a lot more driving to do." He said, walking over to the side of the bed. He helped me stand up without moving my back around too much and dressed me.

"Why can't we just stay here for a little whilst I heal up?" I said.

"Winnie knows more about this stuff than I do," he said, "she can heal you in a few hours. Plus hers is the only place where we are safe and can figure out what's going on."

I sighed in silent agreement. It was 9am. We could have gotten two more hours of sleep.

Chapter 23

"I fucking live for coffee!" Desmond shouted out across the crowded diner after taking his first sip. A few parents with their children shot a disgusted look our way.

"Heh…Sorry." I smiled embarrassingly at them. "Desmond shut up!" I hushed him down.

"What? It's true."

"Yeah and I love pancake but you don't see me shouting it across the bloody room."

"You boys alright over here?" The kindly twenty-something waitress asked. Desmond tapped his spoon against the empty coffee mug and stared at it intently. "More coffee?" she offered. He just kept tapping until it began to flow into the cup.

"Hey can I borrow that?" He pointed to the waitress' hand towel hanging out of her apron. She gave it to him confusingly. He folded it up a few times and placed it on the table, grabbed the coffee pot from the waitress' hand and placed it on the cloth. "Yeah we're good." The waitress rolled her eyes and walked to the counter.

"You have a problem." I said finishing my pancakes. "Psychiatrists, they'd be lost. Someone with narcolepsy would stay awake just to see how much coffee you can consume, it's ridiculous."

"You tease because you love." He shoved half a slice of toast into his mouth and smiled.

"You look like a chipmunk."

We paid the tab and I apologized profusely for Desmond's conduct at the table. I explained that he wasn't housetrained yet and that seemed to satisfy the waitress' curiosity.

We drove for hours, of course we stopped every half hour so that Desmond could pee, but that's beside the point. It was a long trip. We drove just outside of Kapuskasing, to a small blue farmhouse on a big piece of land. There was no driveway leading up to it, just a break in the fence and a ten minute drive over the cattle grazing land.

It was a strange house with two stories and a white porch. It looked like all the other ones you would see, it just happened to be farther from the road.

We stepped out of the car, my legs felt weak and tingly. You could see all around the house onto more farmland, a great forest in the distance and a smaller one just behind the house. Everything else was the dead yellow of wilted crops. Desmond motioned me towards him in front of the stairs leading up to the porch. He put his arm over my shoulder. When I winced, he stepped back a step.

"Now remember," he warned, "she's a witch. A good one, yes, but a witch. She does some freaky shit and has her own way of doing things, so don't get in her way. She knows everything about anything so don't question her. Never touch an alter unless she says so and for god sake don't eat anything she gives you." He walked up the steps and knocked on the door.

It creaked open and he waved for me to follow him. I walked up the steps and he pushed me forwards into the dark house. Both his hands were on my shoulders, I felt sort of like a human shield.

"Winnie…?" Desmond sang through the dark wooden corridors. The lobby of the house showed a grand staircase twisting up into the ceiling with a wonderfully ornate banister. Pictures of black and white people and families lined the wall on the way up. They all seemed to stare at me. "Hello?"

"Dizzy!" it was a faint summon coming from the left.

"Ah, here we go." He moved me in front of him still as we passed a large archway of dark stained wood. We passed into the kitchen which was the exact opposite of the lobby, it was bright yellow. And there she was in a black gown baking cookies. She looked just like in the visions, except her hair was a little darker and she had a good 10 extra pounds.

"Oh well that's rude Timothy, a lady's got to eat something!" She walked over to us.

Desmond leaned over without taking his eyes off of her and whispered in my ear, "She reads minds."

She gave Desmond a hug and kissed him on the forehead. "Glad you could come Dizzy." As if we had a choice. She basically forced us and now she was acting like we were unexpected company.

"And finally, Timothy in the flesh! Our little magnet!" She kissed my forehead too and patted my shoulders. "Won't hug you until I've taken care of the Langsuir wound you have there." She smiled. "Shall we?" She gestured towards the stairs and I followed her. She turned to Desmond and grabbed my forearm to stop me from proceeding. "Dizzy please make timothy some tea. No sugar, a little milk and a drop of blood please."

"Huh?" I protested, but Winnie just pushed me forward and up the stairs.

The pictures continued up the stairwell and along the upstairs hallway on both sides. There were a few rooms and all the doors were closed. She approached one; it had a latch instead of a handle. She lifted it and pushed firmly. The door creaked open and she ushered me inside.

"Now my darling," it was her laboratory. There was a large cauldron in the center of the room resting on a painted pentagram. There were hundreds of bottles lined up all along the walls on shelves with a few books here and there. She dotted contently along the walls grabbing bottles and placing them on a table to the side of the room. It was large and stained the same color as the lobby. "Take your shirt off and lay down, mind the bottles won't you?"

I did as she commanded and waited patiently. I could hear jars clanking together, opening, closing and a grinding sound. After about 15 minutes of this, she finally smeared some strange paste onto my back. It was cold and yet calming. About time…Oh crap! I thought.

"Patience is a virtue, possess it if you can, found always in a woman, but never in a man." And she slapped my back with a large stick with beads wrapped in cords around it. I screamed out expecting pain but there was none. "Feel silly now don't you?"

She hummed a little tune and peeled the now dried goo off my back in one large piece. Once it was off, I turned over and stared at her. She showed it to me, there were ten scabs on it. I rubbed my back, felt no pain and smooth skin.

"Pretty nifty huh?" She tosses the jello-like substance into a small garbage bin beside the door. "Now common, they'll open back up if you don't drink your tea!"

"How could the two possibly equate?"

"You're really going to ask questions to a witch?"

I nodded defeated, and swung my arms back and forth enjoying the renewed movement.

Chapter 24

"She's weirder in person." Desmond told me through the candlelight. He got into his bed. I was sitting in mine, arms linked around my knees. "You get used to her. Don't worry."

"I'm not too keen on the whole no electricity thing." I admitted as Desmond came over to me.

"Well, I've been telling her that for a while, but she says that electrical appliances give off negative energy. I told her to use rose quartz and she still refused, so I don't know. Anyway, feeling better?" He asked.

I looked over to him and nodded. "I couldn't feel better if I tried."

He straightened up and smacked me in the face with the pillow he had retrieved.

"Ah! You son of a bitch!" I reached behind me and whipped mine at his face, sending him somersaulting off the bed, landing with a clunk on the floor.

He roared like some sort of cat and leaped over the edge of the bed, smoothing me with the pillow. "Do you give up?" He yelled playfully at me, a big smile on his face. He removed the pillow for a few seconds to hear my 'No way' then replaced it.

A booming voice came from everywhere, "GO TO SLEEP!" we burst out laughing. "I MEAN IT!"

Desmond moved to the other side of the room and blew out the candle before getting into bed. I drifted off into a dream-filled sleep. They were vivid, but about nothing in particular. It must have been the magic in this house.

Chapter 25

Muffled voices were what woke me from the beautiful dreams. I like it here. Very peaceful.

I walked down the stairs and learned what the muffled voices were saying.

Desmond was mid sentence. "…but I doubt it very much."

"It is your feelings that cloud your judgment and inhibit your actions Dizzy. While you may not find again what you had, what is the point to living in sadness?"

Desmond exhaled loudly. "I guess… how do you deal without Richard?"

A long pause. "The spirits help." I could tell what was a lie. "Good morning Timothy. Come down here, it's rude to eavesdrop." Probably shouldn't have thought that. "No probably not."

The yellow kitchen looked even brighter in the morning light, showing the cracks that the years had placed on the walls. Desmond sat at the small table in black sweatpants rolled up to his knees. His hands held tight to a large cup of coffee. He smiled as I walked into the room and I walked up to him. "Hey."

"Morning." He said. And sipped his coffee and stood up beside me.

"Breakfast is on the stove." Desmond squeezed my shoulder in warning.

"No thanks. I'm not hungry."

"Yeah we'll get something later." Desmond released me from his grip and I sat down.

"Here…" he moved to the stove. "Want some tea?"

"K." I said automatically. I stared at him unsure what to think. What about the mystery man? Hmh/

"A paradox." Winnie said to me. "And you know…" she pulled a ventriloquist act and spoke without moving her lips, most likely she was speaking through my head, but I couldn't tell. "he's very fond of you. I'm helping him through some issues you may have noticed he has.

"Yeah…" I trailed off into thought.

"Here you go." Desmond put a teacup down in front of me along with sugar and milk. He looked very pleased with himself, smiling like a fool.

"Did you add blood this time?"

"Nah, sans blood." He winked.

"Good, cause it was awful. You need more sugar in your diet."

"Wha? And ruin this?" He flexed.

"Dizzy, sugars aren't always necessarily bad carbohydrates. You see, there are good sugars such as…"

"Blah blah apples blah blah." He responded. "Common Tim, I've got something to show you. He grabbed my arm and hurried me out of the room.

"You can't just get sugar from coffee you know!"

"She talks too much… Common." He opened a door and entered a dusty room. There were books piled up in countless numbers, scrap paper littered the floor. There were armoires, four in total, in a line on the wall to the left of the door. He walked into the middle of the room and spread out his arms. "Well? Whaddya think?"

"It's…impressive?"

"This was my study when I was a teenager…" He hurried over to a small desk, covered in paper, he shoved them off. "Look." Carved into the desk was his name: Desmond Langley. He was excited as a kid in a candy store. "And this!" He took a book from the desk and opened it, revealing a hidden compartment where a little toy witch sat. it was posed on a broomstick and looked surprisingly like Winnie.

"Wow." I began walking around the room, running my hands over the dusty tomes. "So this is why your head is like Monsterpedia?" I opened a books, spells for exercising demons.

"That's a good one." He was reading over my shoulder and startling me. He placed his hands on my shoulders to ease me. It worked. "Richard always called it the Hell Order. Strong stuff."

I closed the book and stepped out of his grasp. Once I made it all the way around the room and back to the door, I looked at Desmond. "Who was Richard?"

"Winnie's husband. He was a witch too, and a hunter. She gave up hunting when he dies, they were kind of like a pair. Now she just helps out with any problems hunters come across.

"And you lived here?"

"For a little while." He crossed his arms. "Me and a few other kids. We were all victims of various supernatural tragedies. When the vampire hunters that found me couldn't keep me with them anymore, they brought me here to live with Winnie and Richard." He seemed to slide off into his memories.

"Who's this?" I said pointing to a picture of two boys, one obviously Desmond who had his arm around a shorter blonde boy with a thin build.

"Hey! Winnie wants me to teach you some stuff. Common!" He ran out of the room. I stared at the picture a little while longer then I followed Desmond down the stairs.

For the rest of the day, Desmond taught me lots of this…How to shoot a gun…properly…How to make a sawed-off shotgun, sword fighting, about holy water and a little Latin.

At around 6pm Desmond went out to get a pizza for the two of us claiming that raccoon was not meant to be eaten, which made Winnie a little upset. While we waited, Winnie and I sat at the kitchen table looking through old albums of her life. She didn't seem old enough to enjoy doing this but she told me that she was much older than I thought she was.

"My Uncle Herbert. He killed 73 werewolves by the time he was 24. Remarkable man, a little on the loopy side however." The picture was of an insane looking man with a pelt on his shoulders and an axe in one hand.

"Creepy." I remarked.

"And my Auntie Sabrina, powerful white witch she was until the demons got a hold of her. Twisted her gift for their own aims and that was the end of her, some hunter cut her head off. When he buried it, he told me that it was still yelling at him 'How dare you! Put me back!'" She chuckled. "Oh, but no white magic can bring people back from the dead."

"Can black magic?" I inquired.

"Well it can, but it requires the help of a demon or other being of extreme power. Strike a deal for your very soul and they'll give you anything. Of course you'll spend an eternity in hell, but some see it as worth it." She turned the page. There was a group of around 30 people. "Now this was something. 'The league of Magicians'. They were…"

"That's him…" I stared dumbfounded at the picture. That was the man in the scarf. He stared back at me, a much older version but I was positive. "That's the guy who is following me…"

"Impossible…" She said quietly. "No, Alexander Ironside died over a hundred years ago. He was in this League with my great grandmother and father," She pointed to two people holding hands.

"I'm positive… What happened to him?"

"Well, the league of magicians was a powerful coven of white witches, they helped so many through so much. But it split in half. Alexander and his friend Daniel Leavens were convinced that they could amplify their power through tapping into black magic. The white witches told them it was madness, claiming that using black magic was against everything they stood for. The lot of them died out… Black magic comes from demons and they cannot be trusted."

"No. this is him, or at least a relative."

"The Ironsides are all dead Timothy. The demons killed everyone of them once they picked up on what they were up to. Demons are nasty creatures."

"Hey T! Pizza time!" Desmond walked in smiling, holding up a pizza box and a bag of what I could only assume to be pop.

"My god!" Winnie looked stunned, her eyes glued open.

"What's wrong?" Desmond said putting down his bounty.

"Chris and Linda Somerfield are dead!"

Chapter 26

It was a cold night and I couldn't sleep, I crept my way out of my bed silently so as not to disturb Desmond across the room and wandered about the room. Though it was small, Desmond had told me that he had shared it with three other children that Richard and Winnie looked after. They were apparently foster parents for the children who had lost their families to the forces of darkness. Probably why she had so many pictures.

I had avoided looking into mirrors since I saw the shadow man in Nobel, but I thought that I might as well. Desmond was here. Winnie had put up insane wards on the house, nothing evil would pass through the door. Desmond said that when they were younger, Richard had them dig a trench around the house and fill it with salt a foot deep.

My reflection stared back at me. I found it difficult to look at myself in the eye without searching for a problem with it. A black head, bump, scratch, something, but there was nothing out of place so I was forced to stare at myself. Once I couldn't take it anymore, I moved to the window, looking out over the fields. It all had a blue tinge to it, bathed in the moonlight.

But that's not all I saw in the field. There was something else, a shifting blackness moving through the dead crops. When it settled in the yard it was Him. I put a hand on the glass and he just stared. I put on Desmond's coat and went downstairs and out the door.

I approached him slowly, knowing that there was something evil about him, but not sure what. The salt line would protect me. I hoped.

"Hi." I said, stopping a few feet from Him. He nodded to me in greeting. His eyes were blue and full of sorrow. "Are you alright?" I took another step forward.

"I…" He stuttered, realizing that he usually didn't talk to me. Gathering courage he said: "I have done something…horrible." And he began to cry. Not convulsing into tears, but they flowed down his face as if he was. "Please…" He beckoned.

Hesitantly, I stepped forward, across what I presumed was the salt line. He exhaled, knowing I was within his grasp. He took full advantage, grabbing me with both hands.

I felt a whoosh of air and the surroundings changed. We were in a sort of cave, somehow lit with different colored light.

There was a bed, a few chairs, a fire pit and a pile of books beside a small pond. I examined the room.

"This is one of my home… We're safe here." Safe from what, I could only imagine. Maybe he thought Winnie was a threat…Or Desmond.

"Alexander Ironside?" I ventured.

He paused and moved further away from me into the cave. "How do you know that name?" His deep voice became concerned and unsure.

"Is that your name?"

"Don't worry about my name…" He muttered, almost incomprehensible. "It will only get you into trouble."

"With who?"

"You don't want to know." He held his scarf in his hand when I noticed a small white patch in the center of it.

"Who are you? Why do you come to me and leave without answers?"

No answer.

"Did you kill Coach Grehy?" I'm not sure that I was ready for this answer.

"I've killed a lot of people." He turned his back to me so I couldn't see his face. His voice grew sad. "And yes I killed him."

"Why?" I demanded.

"He didn't care about you! Look at what he was doing to you, abusing you!" He turned to face me once more." And those other two…" his eyes were blood red, "they escaped me…for now."

"So what? You blew up the locker room?"

"That place was not fit for you to be treated so poorly in!" I was a bit taken back, never hearing him yell before. "I…I apologize…it needed to go away so that those memories could as well."

I sighed. He killed for me? Then… "It was you who killed my parents wasn't it?"

He nodded slowly. "I can see that I have hurt you, and I am sorry. But those people chose not to love you simply because of my actions. They did not deserve to live for hurting you in that way."

I sighed. I needed to change the subject to stop myself from pummeling his face in. not that I could, he would most likely kill me before I got to him. "If you aren't Alexander Ironside, then who are you?"

"My great…great grandfather…" He suddenly grasped his head in pain. "No no no! Stop it! Stop! I won't…No! STOP!" He pleaded with his mind. In a moment of strength, he looked to me. "I'm sorry." He placed his hand on my head and I heard voices in my mind…Kill him! He's no use to you! A good way to get rid of it all…Rip him apart! He'll betray you to the witch. Fool…

Then the world went black.

Chapter 27

"Tim! Hey Tim wake up!" Desmond shook me awake. It was morning and I was on the lawn outside Winnie's house. Winnie stood behind Desmond in a silver night gown, exposing her pale arms. Her hair was in a neat bun. Desmond wore only joggers, both had clearly just gotten out of bed when they realized I was missing. "T, why are you out here?"

He helped me sit up. "I…" I struggled to recall. "I know who he is."

"Let him sleep." Winnie's calm voice was all that I heard. My eyes were closed and I was almost awake.

"But I was just gonna…"

"Alone." Winnie emphasized to Desmond. I let myself give in to the tiredness.

I dreamt of being back in the cave with the Ironside fellow. We conversed in mindless babble that made absolutely no sense which often happens in dreams. It was more vivid, as dreams in Winnie's house were. It wasn't until the world shifted that I realized I wasn't alone in this dream.

Suddenly there were two Ironsides sitting beside each other in the same position. The clone removed his sword and sliced the other body in half, its body disintegrating into black dust that was carried away on an unfelt breeze. He stood up. I did too.

"You startled me. I did not know what to do." He told me. "How did you find out his name?"

"I uh." I wasn't sure if telling him would be the best idea. "I saw an old picture. In town."

He took a step closer to me. The sword in his hands floated up and attached itself to his back. "My family, were never this far north. Tell me the truth." He looked imposing, straightening up to his full height and pushing his chest out slightly. His eyes changed to a bright red.

"How do you do all of this?" I asked innocently. His body slumped back down. I'd successfully changed the conversation. That wasn't too hard. "If you're related to a person, then you must be human." I moved closer to him. "You can tell me."

His red irises were joined by pulsing blood vessels as his eyes teared up. "I can't. Say." Weakling. Cry you wimp! Suffer! Suffer! I relish it! "Shut up!" He grasped his head and was brought to his knees.

I began to be scared. "What. Were those voices?"

He looked up at me, crying tears of blood. "Torture." Was all he said. He bent back down and continued to cry.

I began to back away slowly. I couldn't help feeling sorry for him. But it was not the sort of pity you give just anyone. I genuinely cared. Mustering up the courage, I came back towards him and kneeled down in front of him, offering a hand on his shoulder. "Listen, whatever this is, you can fight it. I can help you if you would let me."

"You cannot help me," he said in a sobbing voice, "no one can help me!" He sniffed. "It's not possible to undo that which has been done. I am bound forever! Nothing I do is good enough, I obey everything he says and still I am nothing more than a dog!" he composed himself and took me in his arms. "Tomorrow I receive the final voice. I'll be complete. Perfect. I may change. I may not be me. I may not see you again."

I was a little taken aback. This man who had practically stalked me, killed my parents, killed or tried to kill everyone who had looked at me wrongly. "Why?" was all I could say.

"I cannot stay much longer." He rubbed his hand down my face. "The power of the with makes it difficult to maintain this dream walk. But I was hunting someone who was hunting you."

He faded from my dreams as it returned to the fuzziness that often comes along with dreams. I lost control of myself and the dream ran its course until I awoke.

"Hey kid." Desmond called out to me from across the room. I'd never been in this room before. There were a few single beds lined up along one side of the wall, I was in the middle one. Desmond sat in a chair, its back pushed against the wall. His elbow rested on a small rustic desk and he chewed on his fingernails.

I sat up. "Hey." He came over and sat on the end of the bed. "How long was I out for? Why was I out?"

He laughed. "I dunno, you were pretty tired I guess."

"Yeah." I trailed off into thoughts of the previous night.

"And I know about him." His hand was gripping the sheets as he stared at it intently. "I'm not mad. I get it."

"Desmond I'm sorry but I..."

"Stop. I hate apologies that have a but in them. They're not real. And besides, I'm not angry, so there's nothing to apologize for. I dunno." He got up and made for the door. "We've got to go into town for some things, so whenever you're ready, I'll be downstairs."

I felt as though that conversation was very uncharacteristic of Desmond. I'd known him for little over a week and I felt as though I knew him fairly well. We seemed to click. But that was awkward. I couldn't put my finger on it.

I rose from the bed and opened the door. I was just beside the study. I wandered into the room Desmond and I shared to get my street clothes for our little outing. I opened the door and the room was in shambles. It looked as though a hurricane had come through it. Some of the wooden furniture was cracked, decimated even. The bed was flipped over onto its side, curtains pulled down from the rod. Either there was a fight in here, or Desmond lied when he said that he wasn't angry. Or at least, he wasn't anymore.

I found my clothes easy enough. They seemed to have escaped the wrath of whatever came through here. I put them on and left the room, closing the door firmly behind me. I ran right into Desmond.

"Oh. Hi." I stammered.

"What are you surprised to see me? I've seen you every day."

"No. I just. I didn't expect to see you. Right now."

He looked at the door. "Yeah, sorry its kinda a mess in there. I had a fight."

"Oh my god who with? Are you ok?"

His brilliant green eyes sparkled at me and he smirked as he said, "Yeah of course." He moved past me and opened the door. "Winnie just has strange ways of having you deal with your own inner demons. She likes to manifest them."

"Huh?"

"Never mind." He grabbed his wallet off the floor, pushing some woodchips aside. "I forgot this. You ready?"

"Yeah." I perked up, smiling at him.

"Good. I'm starving." He leaned down to my ear. "And between you and me, Winnie made bread for breakfast and it's fucking inedible."

"I heard that!" Came a flustered shout from the kitchen. Desmond laughed, putting his arm around me and we went downstairs and out the front door.

As we walked towards the car, I shuddered and stopped in my tracks. My hand went to my head and I felt dizzy for a moment.

"Hey T, you alright?" Desmond said opening the driver's side door.

"Yeah. I just felt weird there for a second."

He chuckled. "Hey, maybe there's some witch in you yet! You just crossed the wards Winnie has set up on this place."

"Stop confusingly me today!"

"Relax kiddo, it just means you're more sensitive to magic than the normal person. Doesn't mean anything. Sort of like caffeine affects some people more than others. No big deal."

"Can you relate everything to coffee?"

All joking was aside. His face was serious. "I really need a coffee right now."

"You have no self restraint." I said sitting in the passenger seat.

"No I have too much." He started the engine and turned the car around.

Chapter 28

Desmond gurgled his coffee as if it was mouthwash.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"Gargling." He said all 'I'm at the dentist' like.

I was confused. "Stop."

He swallowed. "Helps get the caffeine into me faster."

"How does that even make sense?"

"You're young, I wouldn't expect you to know." He winked at me.

We were in a small store off the Circle in Kapuskasing. It was an army/hunting type place with a limited selection. Apparently, it's difficult to get things this far north, despite that fact that it is primarily a hunter society. He was standing in front of a display case showing a wide selection of knives, the one thing the store had a plethora of. Being across the store looking at bows to the mere shock value of it and being able to hear him add to the disgustingness of the situation.

"I'll take this one I guess." He pointed on the glass to the longer of the blades and the man took it out of the display, placing it on the counter. Desmond picked it up and made a slashing motion in front of the store clerk's face. He didn't even blink.

"I'm going to have to ask you to refrain from doing that." He said in a tiresome way.

Desmond smirked. "Ah, I'm just playing." He took another gulp of coffee, gurgling it. The man stared blankly at Desmond from behind thick glasses. "Refrain?"

"If you wouldn't mind."

"I'm waiting in the car." I said as I opened the big wooden door.

"Bye honey!" Desmond called after me. "What? Refrain?" I heard as the door closed.

It was mid-day the sun was nearly directly overhead and there was no breeze, a warm day. I sat in the car with the windows down and watched people through the mirrors. I enjoyed watching people through the mirrors. I enjoyed watching people and picking out random facts about them or making them up. For example, there was a large man in a yellow shirt that I decided was into bestiality because the yellow shirt made him look kind of like a fire hydrant. Things like that.

A knock on the driver's side window startled me. It was a police officer. "Excuse me can you get out of the vehicle please?" I did as he said and was met by his partner waiting outside my door. I didn't notice him.

"Sir, place you hands behind your back."

"Huh?"

"You are under arrest." He then proceeded to rhyme off a much longer than you might think, list of rights as my hands were cuffed.

"Look it's not my car, I'm sorry if it was illegally parked."

"Sir, you are not under arrest for a traffic violation," the partner said, "You are under arrest for two counts of first degree murder, one count of second degree murder and arson."

"Ah fuck." I muttered.

Chapter 29

Desmond is gonna be pissed. I thought as I waited in a holding cell. There was no one else around, being noon on a weekday. It wasn't very big, I assume because it was a small town. I was at the very back of the room in a cell with two walls and two barred walls, making for a very cozy experience on the whole.

"God this is fucking stupid." I wished that Winnie was watching so she could tell Desmond or warp me out of here or whatever the hell witches could do. Could they blow things up? Was Ironside a witch maybe? It would explain a few things. Ok more than a few things, more like everything. Maybe he'd rescue me? No, he said that he was going away for some final voice or something. I don't know. One of them would save me, I hope.

"Timothy Cetris." Mused a man in a collared shirt holding an open folder. He was slightly older, typical detective that you might find on a TV show. Sans suspenders though. By he did have classic brown hair parted on one side and a goatee.

"It's a hard 'C'."

"Really? I don't care." He stopped in front of the bars and slapped them with the folder. "Just had this faxed up from Toronto. You've been bad." He smirked. "Killing your parents? Your teacher." He held the last syllable in his mouth. "Blowing up the locker room? How'd you manage that?"

"Just talent I guess." I stood up trying to look confident and cocky when really I was scared shitless. "So what. Two? Maybe three days tops?"

"Ah common Mr Cetris, think about it. 3 murders and an arson attack. He laughed at himself. "No, this is 50 years min? Good behavior of course, but I don't think you will be able to be released early. Shame really. He chuckled and opened the cell door, came in and took a swing at me.

Blinking, trying to get up off the floor asking, "Why?" to the police officer, wondering why he would do that to me.

"He was my brother, Wes, and you killed him!" He yelled, tears streaming down his face, "And this is how he will be avenged, by getting rid of you." Avenged? Really? Did he really just say that?

"What…I didn't…I didn't do anything…" I started but was shut up with a fist to the face.

"This maybe unprofessional and illegal but I don't care, I would do anything for my brother." He kicked me in the stomach over and over again and I doubled over in pain, trying to move as far from him as possible, but in a small cell it was pretty impossible for me to move. He picked me up by my shoulders and pushed me against the wall, my head hitting the wall with an audible bang. My mind went back to the fight when Dean and Terrace were treating me like a rag doll, it seemed my life had gone into rewind for a moment when the cop suddenly moved away, aware of his actions.

"I'm sorry… I don't know what came over me." He cried.

"Really? It's fine anyway, you're gonna die anyways."

He looked at me with an expression of concern on his face. "What do you mean?"

I smiled knowingly at him, wondering if I should say anything. I opted for yes. "Everyone who…hurts me say, dies. Call it payback, but I don't kill anyone and I didn't kill Mr Grehy, my parents or blow up the school. He did so good luck dealing with him when he shows up."

"You're lying." He said turning to leave.

"If you're sure." I closed my eyes to try and shut the pain out and sleep. I didn't know if I was lying or not to tell the truth. But either way, I'd scared him.

A bang of the door closing made me open my eyes. The detective was looking at me with a mix of fear and anger. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

"What the fuck?" I heard from outside the holding cell area. I smiled as the detective drew his gun and ran to the door.

Guns went off and men screamed. The light from their discharging weapons lit up the doorway to the main area of the police station. Someone or something was out there. The only question remained as to whether it was Ironside or Desmond. It was hard to tell.

Just then I heard the sound of iron bars breaking behind me. I turned around and Desmond crashed through the small window in the upper part of the cell. The bars looked as though they had been heated and then snapped. "Uh-oh." I said.

"What's wrong with you? Common, I'm jail breaking." He smiled at me and pulled a rope down from the shattered window. The detective was flung through the doorway to the holding area with a crash. "What the fuck?" Desmond stared in awe as Ironside walked through the door.

They stared at each other for a moment, realizing who each other was. Ironside was different. His eyes were fierier, he seemed furious. "YOU!" he shouted and stormed towards the holding cell we were in. The bars bent effortlessly around Ironside as he approached them.

"Holy shit." Desmond stared wide-eyed at the display of power.

"How dare you show your face here mortal." He was so much more hostile than before. What had happened to him? "I'll gut you with the rest of this filth!" Desmond was flung against the wall, held a few feet off the ground by an unseen force. He screamed.

"Stop it!" I ran towards him but was thrown against one of the bar walls. They dug into my back, pressing my spine inwards. I screamed out in pain. "ARGH! Why are you doing this?" I pleaded.

"Silence!" A shot rang out through the cement room. Ironside lurched forward and Desmond and I both dropped to the ground. His chest began to bleed, staining the torn shirt. He turned around to see the cop poised to shoot another round into his target. But the cop was bloodied and clearly unstable on his own two feet.

Another shot was fired as Ironside turned to face the cop. The bullet spun a few inches from his face, suspended in mid air. "Ah-ah-aaahh." Ironside scolded. "Bad pig." The bullet lodged itself in the cops leg and he yelled out in pain.

Ironside continued towards the wounded officer as Desmond put a hand on my shoulder. He moved towards the window and helped me up. As I pulled my body through the broken glass, I heard a sword unsheathe. Desmond soon followed me and picked me up, running towards the parking lot. I had cut myself on the glass, my forearm bleeding profusely.

Desmond somehow opened the car door, while still holding me and placed me inside. Screams from the police station muffled the squealing of tires as we sped away.

"Are you alright?" Desmond gasped for breath, trying to look at me and the road, going far over the speed limit in the dark of night.

"I'll be fine." I said, taking off my shirt and wrapping my arm in it. I pulled it tight and winced as the cut was forced to close.

"Was that him?" Desmond said meekly, followed by a deep gulp.

"Yeah" I muttered. I could tell Desmond was worried. Almost as if he knew then if it came down to it, he would lose in a fight for me.

"Ok." Was the last thing he said for the entire trip back to Winnie's. His eyes remained glued to the road, almost unblinking.

Pulling up to her house, Desmond finally spoke. "If you were more comfortable, I could set up some wards around a hotel room." I looked to him. His green eyes shouted concern. "You know. Cause he knows Winnie lives here."

"No." I said. But for the wrong reasons. "We're safer here."

"I know my way around some white magic T." he protested.

"I still feel safer here." I admitted. "Ironside isn't the only one who is hunting me."

It seemed as though Winnie told him the name of the mystery man since he showed no reaction to me naming him. "Whaddya mean?" his hand went to my left shoulder and grasped it almost painfully. "T?" he said without giving me proper time to respond.

"Ironside told me that the reason he found me was because a hunter he was hunting was looking for me. His master is getting him to slowly wipe out the hunters."

"Chris and Linda Somerfield." He mused and turned his attention to the windshield of the car becoming lost in thought.

"I can only assume that he killed them. But I don't know. All I know is that there is a hunter out there that wants me for something, but I have no idea who it is. How many are there?"

"Hundreds." Desmond said still mesmerized by his own thoughts. Snapping out of it, he let go of my shoulder. "Common, let's get inside."

We got out of the car and walked to the house. Winnie opened the door just as Desmond was reaching for it. "Way to clear the glass Desmond." She said as she hurried me to the stairs.

Desmond protested. "Hey! At least I spent the effort to find him instead of 'leaving it to fate'!" he mocked.

"Oh relax." Winnie hushed and pushed me up a few more steps.

"NO!" he shoved Winnie aside. "We do this the old fashioned way." Winnie looked startled and emotionally hurt. "I'll do it myself." He said in a calmer voice, seeming to remember that she basically raised him.

He ushered me into the room we shared and got me to sit on one of the beds. Slowly and without protest, he removed my shirt that dressed the wound. He warned me about the sting and poured some alcohol onto my arm. It did sting and I winced. He put the bottle to my lips and I gulped down a hefty amount. It only stung my throat.

Desmond opened the cloth bundle and threaded a needle. He then took a swig of the alcohol and ran the thread through his mouth, visibly washing it. "It's ok." He reassured me and poked the needle through my skin, the first of many.

It was awhile before I was stitched up, and afterwards, we went straight to bed. When I awoke, it was still dark outside, but something was urging me to wake up.

I went to the window as if it were a dream and saw Ironside looking at me from across the salt line. I put on Desmond's coat and went down to see him.

He was covered in blood and had a serious expression on his face. "I just finished dealing with them. All of them." He snarled.

"You've changed. What happened to you?" I asked.

"I told you that I would change. I told you that I may never see you again and I have!" He growled and tried to come at me but stopped short of the salt line. He breathed heavily in anger.

"You're right. You said all those thing." He stared wide eyed at me.

"Oh no." He paused and his eyes teared up, not blinking. "Oh God NO!" He collapsed to his knees, seeming to recall who he was. "What I did to them. The screams. The blood. So much blood. Tim you need to save me! Please, help me!"

"I don't know if I can." I said and turned towards the house. I tried to ignore his shouts and pleas for forgiveness, but I continued towards the house.

When I made it back to the bedroom, the screaming had stopped and I found Desmond sitting up in his bed. He stood as I entered the room.

"I'm proud of you." He said and got back in bed.

Chapter 30

A small, physically distorted Imp placed a festering bucket under the Rack then hobble away muttering to itself. Ironside was strapped to this circular framed contraption with leather straps made of human flesh. The strongest kind his master once said because they were made with suffering. A limb to each non-existent corner of a square, Ironside hung helpless in its grip.

"I told you to kill him." His master said in a calm yet agonizing torturous tone. "I expect what I order to be done." A surge of pain emanated from Ironside's back, as if a long, rusty knife was cutting into his flesh. "You disappoint me greatly when my order are not carried out…" Another three cuts opened on his back. Screams of torment followed, begging for his master to stop and give him another chance. "Another chance? You would only screw it up again. Making you the perfect killer was just that, your emotions still cloud your judgment… humans are so weak." Another sore opened on his lower back.

"Stop! Please… I'll do it… I promise you…" Ironside pleaded .

"The word of a helpless mortal succumbed by pain means nothing to me." He walked around to face Ironside. Dressed in a black cloak that covered his decrepit face spared Ironside the sight of looking into the face of evil. His hands were also covered in black leather gloves. While no feet touched the ground, the floating form was quite obviously bound to the same 'laws' of gravity. "No… if you are to continue your task, you must do it away from temptation." An invisible sneering smile could be felt through the cold blackness of the masters hood.

"I would die." Ironside whispered faintly, unable to muster the strength for much else.

"Well we wouldn't want that." The form chuckled. "Your breed is too precious to me. It has cost me too much time… but you can't be set loose in the same area as your homosapien lover. If you come within a mile of this boy, you will be eliminated."

"You wouldn't kill me… I'm the only one who…" another burning cut dragged down his spine and he screamed out in agony.

"That may be. But my task is much more important than you life. Since you failed to eliminate two hunters, I will be forced to do it myself." He walked past the countless alters to a table full of miniature stone pillars.

"What will you have me do master?" Ironside obediently asked.

"You will continue to eliminate the hunters in preparation for my time." He picked up one of the pillars and felt it in his leathered hands. "I will take care of you failures." The pillar turned to dust that he allowed to fall onto the ground and sizzle in magical embers. "If you fail me…" he was speaking to something else now, "I will send you to a layer of hell so deep that the light from the fires will not give you hope."

Chapter 31

It had been a few weeks since I last saw Ironside. I assumed that his newfound rage had taken him elsewhere. In that time, Desmond and I lived with Winifred and I learned all that I could. I had been kept busy trying to memorize all the books he had memorized over the course of years in a month.

"See? I told you he wasn't and incubus." I said one day while Desmond whittled a stake as he often did while I read. "Says and incubus radiates cold, he radiated warmth." I told him.

"So he was warms…do you want a medal for figuring it out?" Ok he so took that the wrong way. I got that.

"No…I was just saying…" I turned the book I was reading around to show him. I felt like he had shot me down. I was too embarrassed even to talk. You know the feeling.

He didn't respond. Instead, he looked at me with those green eyes and went back to his whittling. I returned to my reading but the feeling of uneasiness stayed with me for a long time.

After an hour or so, Desmond stood up. "Do you want anything? Tea?" he offered. I shook my head 'no' and he went downstairs to fetch whatever it was he was after. I took this time to think. What was I doing? Did I really want to be doing this? I shook these thoughts out of my head; he was my family now, the only one who didn't turn away from me. I did want to be here.

I slammed the book shut on 'Furies' which may earn me some disfavor in the future, but I didn't care. I decided that I did want some tea after all. I left the room and heard Desmond speaking.

"He was like a brother…"he trailed off. Well fuck. He thought of me as a brother and now he doesn't. I collapsed onto the stairs. I had promised myself I wouldn't be like those whiney guys who cried over every little thing. I was raised to have a tougher skin than that. But it still took me a few minutes to pick myself up from the stairs and reach the first floor. "How can you expect me to move on?" Was he talking about me?

I entered the kitchen and Desmond was standing alone watching the kettle boil. He turned to me when I entered. "Hey T…" he restrained himself from moving.

"Hi." I searched around for Winnie.

"She's not here." He began "Went out to collect herbs from her gardens." He smiled at me then withdrew, looking at the steaming kettle on the stove. "Wood stoves take the longest to heat up." He chuckled nervously.

"Perfect. Then I have some time to tell you something." I sat down at the table. "I'm sorry that me meeting with Ironside has made you hate me…"

"Good morning Timothy!" Winnie mused as she placed a basket of random berries and herbs on the table. I turned my back to Desmond so I could look at her.

"Hi Winnie." I answered much less enthusiastically. I focused my mind and spoke loudly and clearly as possible in my head: what is wrong with him? I didn't realize it, but my eyebrows turned down in a concerned face.

Winnie looked at me in awestruck. She apparently didn't have many people speak to her specifically through their thoughts, she more or less just listened in. She wiped away that part of her face and put on a new one. "Shouldn't you be studying?" she smiled and began to string up hers on the walls to dry.

"I'm just taking a short break." I glanced at Desmond who was still watching the pot intently. "But I'll get back to it." I saw the momentary hurt in Desmond's face before I left the room to go up into his old study. Way to show you care, I said to myself as I ascended the staircase.

But then I stopped. I hoped I was far enough up the stairs for Winnie not to sense me. I wanted to hear what they talked about, even if it was an invasion of their privacy.

Chapter 32

Desmond sniffed loudly, pouring his tea into a large mug. He hesitantly took a seat at the table. Foreseeing that Winnie would give him a good talking to.

"Desmond Langley I could just smack you." She let the herbs she was holding onto fall to the ground. "How could you let that poor boy think such dreadful things?"

"Winnie, it's not that simple."

"Oh harpy shit!" She seemed to grow larger and more intimidating. "How many years ago Desmond? Really…grieving is one thing, but allowing yourself to suffer to such a degree is… well it's idiotic!"

"I know but…"

"I'm not finished!" she boomed. "If you think for one second longer that I'll allow you to deal with this in your own way, you're a bloody idiot! Two years Desmond. Two years!" she sat across from him at the table. "Let him rest. Luke deserves it, and so do you." Placing a hand on his, she seemed to lighten. "If anything should happen to the boy, with that Thing or otherwise, I know you'd never forgive yourself."

Desmond put a finger into the boiling cup of tea. It hurt. It turned blood red, but he kept it in for a slow count of ten. Taking it out, he resisted the urge to suck on it. "It's my burden." He whispered and made for the stairs. "Your mind games won't work on him." He said without looking up.

Chapter 33

I made a mad dash for the study and managed to close the door quietly just before Desmond pushed it back open. I stumbled backwards but Desmond grabbed my hand. "Woah there. You alright?" He chuckled, pulling me upwards to a stable position.

"Yeah I'm fine…Just…headed to the bathroom." He smirked at me then stood to one side. You seem to be dealing with your burden just fine.

"Hmh?" Well that's unfortunate. I said it out loud…awkward.

"Did you know that it's illegal for a teacher to not permit you to go to the bathroom?" I jested. He let his head drop against the door and pivoted on into the room. I walked to the bathroom then made a sharp turn towards the stairs. I needed to talk to Winnie.

"I figured that you would listen." She was in the den when I reached the main floor. I turned 180 degrees to meet her all-seeing gaze. "You're far too predictable." I snorted a laugh at her. "Come and sit." She patted the cushion beside her, inviting me to sit. I complied.

"You know…" she said taking a photo album out from beside her arm and the couch arm, "I sort of assumed that Desmond would avoid the subject with you." She turned to a copy of the picture that hung in Desmond's bedroom, the one with him and the blonde skinny boy. "But I think it's time you knew the truth behind Desmond's depressed state."

"I wouldn't really call it depressed, more withdrawn." I defended him.

"Call it what you may, his soul is still scarred and deeply saddened by the loss he felt all those years ago." She took the picture out of the album and handed it to me. It felt cold in my hands. The glossy photo with its paper backing felt somehow unnatural and disconcerting. "Soon after Desmond came to live with us, another boy did as well. They soon became the best of friends…more like brothers…" She turned the page to a sad looking boy beside an old car...

Chapter 34

"Desmond darling…" Winnie said with her hand on the shoulder of an unknown boy. "this is Lucas Kanski, a child all alone like yourself." She smiled and pushed the boy towards Desmond. "But now, we all have each other. Don't we? Richard darling! Bring the boy's luggage from the car when you come in won't you?" She ushered the boys together more forcefully. "Now then, you two run along and play hmh? Show him how fun this rickety old house can be!"

Desmond scowled at the child and ran off, not waiting for the poor boy. He let the door slam behind him as he ran off into the woods that brought him so much joy.

"Go on now." Winnie urged. "He's an alright boy, just takes some getting used to."

Much later on, Lucas found Desmond deep in the forest by a stream, playing with the minnows, trying to get them to eat pieces of dirt he made to look like food.

"Hello." Lucas called out from behind a tree. Desmond stood up and grabbed the stick he carried while adventuring through the woods.

"Who's there?" The dirty faced boy demanded. "Come out or I'll make you, ya hear?" Lucas slowly and shamefully stepped out from behind the tree. Embarrassed and scared he did a little wave to show some form of peace. "Oh, it's you."

"My name is Lucas…You're Desmond?" He tried.

"Don't be stupid. She told you my name." He went back to playing with the minnows, struggling against the current.

"Well, yes but…Desmond…"

"It's MISTER Desmond to you." He said smugly. "And don't you forget it. I am the boss here and you're just a lowly house-folk."

"What's a house folk?"

"People who live in Richard's house. Winifred, Richard…Justin. They're who you should be playing with, not me." Then he took off through the forest. Lucas followed.

Over the logs and under the branches, the two raced towards an unknown destination. The twigs scratched Lucas' face as he whipped by them, trying desperately to keep up with Desmond. The forest seemed determined to make this impossible. He tripped, fell and got his clothing caught on nearly everything. He called out to Desmond but the boy didn't slow down, he just raced faster into the trees that swallowed him up. Even the leaves seemed to drift back to where they were before Desmond disturbed them.

Lost, rejected and alone, Lucas fell to the forest floor weeping. "I've only just come here," he sniffed, "and I already don't feel very welcome." He cried for what seemed like forever until a small voice called out to him.

"Don't be sad little human." Lucas opened his watery eyes and saw a small person standing on his knee, too light to even feel. "Everyone feels a little lonely and scared when they find something new." The small creature looked female, but had greasy hair and leaves on its back that twitched now and then.

"Who are you?" Lucas wiped away his tears.

"My name's Lily." She began to glow and the leaves flapped until they were a mere blur somehow keeping her in flight. "Common… I'll take you to Desmond. He's so stubborn, unlike us!" her childish giggle echoed through the forest, the trees seeming to relish in its sound, reverberating off them. She zoomed off, leaving a train of light for Lucas to follow.

"Keep up!" The fairy giggled again as Lucas stumbled across the uneven forest floor. "Common." She urged.

They soon reached a circle of standing sticks, sunlight piercing the tree branches to light it up. The fairy flew into the circle and disappeared. Cautiously, Lucas followed, unsure of what to expect.

Though he found Desmond, the boy was on his way out of the forest. He seemed dejected, sad… though what about, Lucas was unsure.

The next day, Desmond set out into the forest on a mission. Lucas followed having been awoken by Desmond an hour before. Desmond was after something, but Lucas did not know what. The older boy lead Lucas into the forest, deep within, past where the fairy had taken him. It was unfamiliar territory and the boy felt a degree of uneasiness that only came with complete terror of the unknown.

"Argh… What do you want?" Desmond said as Lucas approached.

"What are you doing out here?" Lucas was trying to be friendly but it would not work on Desmond's iron personality.

It's none of your business. I'm here on a hunt that I found myself so you have no business being here." Desmond turned away from the boy and continued on his unseen path.

"Can I come? I like this game. It's mysterious."

"You idiot." Desmond turned to face the youth. "You think this is a game? How did the witches tell you how your parents dies? Some freak accident?"

"They said that the monster under my bed got to them. But there wasn't a monster under my bed. I checked every night."

"That's right. It was probably some sort of boogey man." The boy snorted and continued deeper into the forest.

"Wait up!"

"Why should I?"

"Because I'm all alone!" Lucas didn't mean for it to come out that way, it just did. But he was alone. Plucked from his family, Lucas had no one else in the world to identify with. How could he ever survive if there was no one he could talk to about his monumental problems?

Desmond stopped and turned around to face the boy. "Then hurry up." He said after a long silence.

They reached a grove, perhaps made by the fairies, perhaps by natural means the forest created it itself. It was impossible to tell. Though hardly a word was spoken between the boys, the afternoon had crept up on them and placed them in the middle of sunset.

"Where are we going?" Lucas asked.

"The Queen told me to keep going North. So that's what I'm doing." He said in a condescending way,

"Who's the Queen?"

"Ugh... The Queen of the fairies, are you that dim?" hacking away at some ferns, the boy brought them to a clearing in the forest. A rock face adorned the back portion of it. Desmond looked around expecting something.

"Where are we?" Lucas asked.

"In a grove. Don't run, whatever you do ok?"

"What would..." Before Lucas completed his sentence a fierce growl came through the darkness of the forest. It sent a chill up Lucas' spin, yet Desmond seemed unaffected. "What is that...?" Lucas asked, guessing that it was inhuman.

"Don't ask." The boy said, pulling a gun from the back of his pants. He aimed it into the abyss.

"Put that away! What is that!" Lucas shouted.

"Be quiet! You'll only make it angry!" a snarl came from the bushes. A second one came from atop the rock face. "Stay close to me." Desmond grabbed the boy and pulled him close. Their hearts beat as one in the face of whatever lurked in the shadows.

"What is it?" Lucas feared the answer more than the monster under his bed or the one in his closet. This was perceived by two people, not just him, alone in the dark.

"Werewolf." Desmond muttered. A huge shape plummeted down from the rock face. It was humanoid, but animalistic. It had hair over its entire body and it was androgynous. But its snarling growl meant business. "Don't run, you'll only provoke it." But this warning fell off deaf ears as Lucas was already 50 meters away in a solid sprint. "NO!"

He ran out of fear, denying the orders that he thought he heard from Desmond. All that mattered was getting as far away as possible. Dear god it was going to kill him. He could hear the wolf-like panting growing closer and closer until he could almost feel the warm breath on his neck. It was

over.

Lucas turned around to face his fate but nothing struck him.

"RUN!" Desmond screamed as the small boy bear hugged the werewolf. It was to no avail and only managed to hold the wolf back for 3 seconds at most. But it was enough to redirect its bloodlust. "Common you bastard..." Desmond taunted.

A gun flashed in the dim sunlight. Desmond had a plan, he was hunting, planning to kill this beast. "I've got you." Desmond whispered.

It truly was a wolf on hind legs. Front paws recoiled to its chest, ready to strike. Desmond was its new target, its animal nature taking over. There were two objects of easy prey. Not a problem. It lunged at Desmond, snarling its teeth with its claws outstretched, poised for attack. Desmond

leapt away.

"Lucas!" the gun was tossed to him. Without a moment's hesitation, Lucas pulled the trigger. A sound louder than any he had heard before rang out. The werewolf laid on the ground, a smoking, sizzling bullet wound in its stomach. The creature whined like a wounded dog, what it was. "Do it." Desmond urged.

Lucas stared at the helpless creature, unable to deal the final blow. It was after all an animal, a vicious one, but a poor animal none the less. Desmond snatched the gun away.

"Pathetic." He said as the gun released its bullets again and again into the werewolf, this time in its heart. The sound of a grieving wolf pack sang through the sunset, coming from the corpse. It crippled and shrunk until all that was left was a lifeless pile of fur. It was dead.

"I think I'm ready to go home now..." Lucas said as Desmond smirked.

"Wait..." A small voice came from behind them. They turned to see a procession of small, pointy-eared people. Each had wings resembling leaves and used them to hover at the height of the humans' faces. "We wish to give the new comer a present."

A fairy much larger than the rest approached, dressed in purple robes in a hollowed hazel nut shell, pulled by creatures so small, they were nearly invisible if not looking right at them. She was beautiful in her microscopic stature but carried with her a large silver medallion.

"I wish to give this token of appreciation to the one who liberated us from the werewolf." The robed fairy said. "It has plagued us for many full moons and to finally be rid of it will allow us to roam free during our most magical and sacred of times." Her wings flittered and she rose with the medallion to Lucas' face. "I thank you mortal for our freedom." With a wave of her wand, seemingly made of cricket's leg, the medallion hung itself around Lucas' neck. On a silver chain, the medallion hung half way down his chest, much too large for a boy so young...

The following morning, the two boys were on their way to the forest when Justin stopped them.

"Is this Lucas?" the large boy inquired. "Kinda scrawny." He poked Lucas a few times.

"Hey, stop that." Desmond shoved Justin away. "Leave him alone."

"Hey I just wanna have a little fun with the rat. Commere Rat!" Justin grabbed Lucas and threw him to the ground. Lucas grunted. "I'm the oldest, so I get to initiate the newbie's."

Lucas was fearful of what the initiation consisted of.

"He's got hunter's blood." Desmond said, shoving Justin to the side. "Don't you dare touch him like that again." Desmond warned. He was much, much smaller than Justin, but his courage made him a giant. "Ever." He reiterated.

"What are you gonna do?" Justin laughed, "Fight me?"

"If I have to."

"Bring it! ...Pulsus!" Desmond flew backwards as Justin forced his open hand forward, producing a slight distortion in space. Desmond landed in the mud. "See? Don't mess with me kid."

Lucas pistol-whipped Justin as he turned around.

Chapter 35

The final picture in her slideshow was of two men, Desmond now looking much more like Desmond and Lucas looking much scruffier and older than previous photos.

"And then they went off together on their first hunt." She sighed in calm remembrance. "They were so much closer when they came back." She smiled. "But it was two years to the day that…" She paused and wiped away an invisible tear.

"What?" I asked. This couldn't be the end of the story.

"Luke didn't come back from one hunt." She closed the album and rested it on her lap gently. "Vampires again. They've taken everyone Desmond has ever cared about. I'm not sure if it was all or at least part of the group that killed his family, but Desmond cried for days…I had to hypnotize him into eating anything or else he would have wasted away."

"What happened to Luke?"

"The body?" Desmond said he burned it and scattered the ashes out in the forest, somewhere to be at peace. He refused to tell me where exactly and the fairy's magic has hidden it from me. Fairies don't like grownups you see, once you become one, they don't show themselves to you anymore unless they absolutely have to."

"That's so sad…"

"Yes, but not you know. It happened just over two years ago now." Winnie stood up and put the album on the shelves in no particular order. "Well! I've got to get back to my herbs and you've got to get to studying!" She shooed me up the stairs.

"Say, whatever happened to Justin?" I turned my head towards the hundreds of pictures lining the staircase to listen to her response.

After a long silence she settled on an answer. "One day when he was about your age he just got up and left. I haven't heard from him since and have not been able to find him. He simply…Disappeared. Maybe he willed himself away, maybe he perished. Lacking an answer bothers me to this day…"

"Willed himself away?" I pondered aloud.

"He had strong magic within him… if he had trained himself without my knowledge, he could will himself to be elsewhere and he simply would." She looked to the floor with hopelessness. "I miss him."

Unsatisfied, I continued up the stairs to the landing. I walked slowly across the creaking floor boards to the study and slowly opened the door. Desmond was snoring loudly, drooling onto the collar of his coat that he wore for some strange reason. When I slammed the door, he awoke with a start and his hand suddenly had a gun in it, pointed at me.

"Oh…Hey Tim." He smiled and placed the gun on the table beside him. I smiled, knowing I have finally found out the truth. But something told me that he didn't even want me to know in the first place. So instead I read all about a Fury.

Chapter 36

Hours later, Desmond put his hands on my shoulders, "What do you say we get outta here?"

I tilted my head back so I could look up at him. "I dunno. I have so much to learn about Vepar the Demoness that if I leave now, I'll never know how to get her to make the oceans roar with storms." I said, much more grandiosely than necessary. Desmond smiled down at me.

"Well, tell you what, I'll let you in on the secret if you have a shot of tequila." That was enough for me. The next thing I knew, we were in the local bar tipping back a shot.

"Can I see some ID there bud?" the server asked me.

"Do you honestly think that I'd bring a minor in here Keith?" Desmond asked the server with a raised brow. "I like to think you know I'm smarter than that. Why would I set my favorite bar up to get its license taken away?" Keith stammered a moment. "Ok then, another two my good sir!" They were delivered.

"You are amazing!" I said drunkenly. After the 4th shot, it started to get to me. "How do I know you're not lying to me about everything? I demanded.

"Because I can't…" He trailed off.

"Ok." I burped. "Then why is it, that Winnie needs me close to her?"

He looked at me, his eyes seemed less vibrant. "She needs you to be safe. I need you to be safe.

"Why?" I burped again. "This is all kinda fishy… Ironside fellow told me he was hunting a hunter hunting me. Was it you?" I think that writing that sentence makes it seem a lot less slurred than it really came out. It was probably something like: 'hiss ll kinda fshy…i-ronsd fellow tld em e was hntn a hntr me. Wsst yeh?'

"I'm not sure what you're saying, but I think it was something like 'I need another shot.' Keith!" he stuck up two fingers at the bartender and laughed.

"Did you laugh like this with Lucas?" His eyes died and his hand leapt to his chest grasping his shirt tightly.

"You wouldn't understand." His eyes watered and eyebrows turned downwards, he leaned back into the leather cushion that was nailed to the bench, severing all physical ties with me.

I collected myself. "You really do still…" I searched his face for a sign that my words made an impact. Finding none, I didn't bother to finish the sentence. I knew the answer, and I didn't want to hear it out loud. Fuck my life.

"I'm sorry." He whispered, as if trying to make it inaudible to me. "I wanted to just forget, but it's harder than I thought. You wouldn't understand." That last part he meant for me to hear, said louder, more forcefully.

"All about a fairy queen in the woods? How she gave him that for taking out the werewolf?" I motioned towards his hand, still clenched at his chest.

Shock replaced his neutral expression. "She told you…?" He let go of his shirt, seeming to forget I mentioned anything related to Lucas. "There haven't been fairies in those woods since a boy disappeared from Winnie's house when I was young. They told me before they left that a great evil had come to the house to take him away and that they could no longer stay so close to where evil stood." He sucked on his teeth. "But I guess Winnie told you that too huh?"

"No…" This was turning out to be much more than a drunken conversation about our lives. "No she neglected that part."

"What the fuck?"

"Oh my god!"

Screams came from the bar. They were bone chilling. A young woman, as if she was being ripped apart there and then. Desmond's and my gaze shot over to the scene. A man was grabbing at the screaming woman, blood dripping from his mouth. He had her almost pinned, except for the three men he ignored that were trying to pull him back. Though they were muscular biker-types, they had a hell of a time getting him off her.

"Hey!" The bikers and the man looked to Desmond. His gun erupted, sending a bullet through the man's head, embedding itself in one of the biker's thighs.

"Mother fucker!" he shouted.

"I'm sorry." Desmond said moving over to the woman, moaning on the ground. I followed him. A large piece of flesh was missing from her back left shoulder, it was bleeding profusely. Keith pressed on it with a dish cloth from the bar. "It's ok." Desmond said, "You're gonna be fine, just a flesh wound. No big deal."

The woman didn't believe him and screamed anyways.

The man who attacked her was laying on the ground beside the bikers who were tending to their own wounds. He was wearing a dusty beige suit, his hair was long and his skin was sunken and grey.

"Holy shit." Keith said. "That's Harold Nekolty…" Nothing strange about that. "He died a month ago." Huh? "Heart attack…"

"Close all the windows and doors." Desmond said. "And get me some salt." He looked to me. "And a lot of bread and water."

Chapter 37

"Zombies, Desmond? I knew that you and Winifred were up to some crazy shit, but really?" Keith said, bandaging up Laura, the girl who was bitten.

"I don't care what you think. But would a man who dies a month ago walk into a bar and tear a chunk out of some girl?" He pointed his gun at Laura while talking to Keith. I finished salting the final window in the bar. 13 of us were inside. Lucky. "Now you can fight with me on this all you want but I can hear some moaning outside. D'you wanna chance getting eaten? Alive?"

Keith put his head down, paying more attention to Laura's wound.

"Done." I went over to Desmond and he gripped his hand on my arm.

"Good job." Even in tense circumstances he was still warm and caring. What as goin on inside his head? "Keith, if you have any ammo for these things," he nodded to the hunting rifles around the bar, "get it."

"There's a box in the back…" he went to retrieve it.

"Wait…" A thin man said, stepping from the surrounding mob into the center of the room. "If she was bitten by a zombie... Will she become

one...?" This provoked a worried uproar from the rest of the patrons. A few

stepped forward in hostility.

"No... NO!" Desmond pointed his gun at those who stepped forward. "It's a good point but there's no reason to be hasty." He lowered his weapon as the mob merged back into the collective. "Some zombies are made through bites, all Resident Evil and shit. But some aren't. Some are made by magic, and if so, she's not gonna become one." He looked to the sweating, gasping woman and closed his eyes. "Tie her up." She screamed in protest as objects with rope or leather straps were taken down from the decorated walls to bind her.

"Diz..." I felt his arm. "What can I do?" I had a shotgun now, loaded from Keith's successful ammo run. "I want to help. And fucking hell I can help." A series of scratching and moaning came from the front door, blocked by tables and stools. "If they're viral, they'll get through the salt." I said, earning an approving smile from Desmond. "Lock and load!" I called to the bikers who held the rifles and shotguns, now loaded. "Aim for the head and don't miss, we've got a limited supply here." They `yea'd in acknowledgement.

Thunder clapped from outside and rain began to fall onto the roof, making a

deafening sound inside the bar. It was a torrential down pour.

"Dammit Keith!" Desmond shouted. "I told you to get this shit fixed!" I looked to the front door to see it leaking, the salt running in a river towards the lowest part in the bar. The line was broken, anything could get through that door.

The door jerked forward with a smash. The wood splintered and the people gasped, pushing to the walls as far from the door as possible. Keith should have fixed the windows too. At the same time, two people on opposite sides of the room were ripped out by something. The glass shattered and the rain got in, ruining the salt lines further. My work was useless in the rain.

"It's not a virus..." Desmond breathed heavily. "It's something else. And it wants us dead." The crowd of 9 civilians moved to the center of the room in a huddle. Desmond and I stood facing the door with our guns ready. The bikers watched the windows without being told. "Shoot if it moves!" Desmond ordered.

A gun sprang into action, putting shrapnel into the wall around the window. "Got it!" the attacker called out. A corpse hanging half into the window confirmed it. The people grew squeamish. I can guarantee this is not how they wanted to spend their evening.

"Ugh..." A woman grabbed her stomach and looked as though she might throw up. Desmond and I turned around to look at her. As we did, she was thrown against the wall, screaming as she was gutted, blood spattering the wall, floor and nearby tables. As she fell to the floor dead, a man in 19th century clothing flashed beside her corpse. Its image blinked and it moved towards the group of 7... 7?

"No... This is a zombie uprising..." Desmond worried. He sprang towards the specter and tried to tackle it. It displaced to the other side of the room. "Iron! Keith get me something iron!" the man disappeared into the kitchen.

A dying scream came from the kitchen and I ran to the swinging door. Each pass in front of my vision gave me a different view of the zombie tearing pieces off of Keith and shoving them into its mouth insatiably. It noticed me. I aimed and fired, spreading its head on the pristine white walls of the kitchen. I looked around hastily and grabbed a big pot and a few frying pans.

A spirit dissipated as I threw the massive iron chili-pot at it. I gasped open-mouthed at Desmond who absent-mindedly fired a shot into a zombie's skull that was crashing through the front door. More behind it tried to crawl over it to get to their prey.

"Iron cookware." I threw a frying pan to one of the civilians, a male in his 50s. I finally took my eyes off Desmond to smack a ghost in the face with my pan, producing a very loud, very stereotypical frying pan-hitting sound. The ghost disappeared in a swirl of glowing dust.

When the sun peeked over the horizon, there were the two bikers and Laura left along with Desmond and I. Like sitting ducks, the spirits and zombies picked the civilians off one by one, except for one faceless guy that seemed to have slipped out during the ordeal. But once the sun came up, the rain stopped and so did the attacks on the small bar.

Us four men helped Laura into an empty car and the two bikers took off towards the hospital, swearing to say the bar was attacked by a savage cult.

"Who is going to believe that?" I asked Desmond whose arm hung around my shoulders.

"It doesn't matter, so long as they do I don't..." a meteor slammed into the departing car, flattening it in an eruption of flames. We both stared awestruck at the burning wreckage until Desmond pushed me aside as another meteor slammed into the spot where we were standing.

"What the fuck!" I shouted.

"INSIDE!" Desmond screamed.

Desmond dove on top of me as a third meteor obliterated the entrance to the bar. In the dank, dusty stronghold, Desmond looked down at me. "You alright?" he said. A serious of moans came from outside the bar.

"It's toying with us." Desmond pulled me to my feet. "It wanted us to think that we were safe during the day."

"What is it? I haven't gotten this far in my books."

"Me either apparently…Some kind of sorcerer…Necromancer. I don't know!" he shot a female zombie, making her head explode into decomposing goo. "We need to get to Winnie, the house. We're safe there." He grabbed my hand and pulled me outside to a hoard of the undead.

There was about 10 of them surrounding Desmond's car, seeming to know that's where we were headed. Our only escape.

Desmond shot two in the head before he began to reload. They came closer and closer to us. I could smell their rotting flesh. Their faces weren't much easier to look at. Missing ears, eyes and flesh to decomposition. I took aim and fired. Empty.

"Reload!" Desmond shouted as they were coming upon us.

Instinctively, I thrust my hand outwards, open palmed, fingers tense and bent slightly. "Pulsus!" My heart skipped a beat, as did my vision. As the whiteout faded back to color, my hand was engulfed in an aura of altered space, as if I was seeing it through a wave pool. The zombies were a few feet away on their back struggling to stand back up using undead mentality. My hand returned to normal, but wrinkled. It hurt more than I can tell you. The joints swelled and curved as the skin grew grey and spotted. It was almost arthritic.

Desmond stared in disbelief for a moment, but only for a moment before throwing me into the car and speeding off.

"You wanna tell me where you learned that?"Desmond half asked, half demanded. A meteor slammed into the road behind us, lurching the car forward with its force.

"I don't know! I just did it…" I nursed my hyper-aged hand in my youthful one."

Desmond glanced at it then back to the road, just in time to steer clear of another crashing meteor. "If Winnie has been teaching you anything…" He shook his head in a threatening manner. Not to me, but to her.

"No, she just told me the story of how Justin did it to you and…it just clicked into my mind. It was the only thing I could think of doing to save you…us…" I stumbled.

"She has been teaching you."

"No, she just…"

"That's how she does it Tim. She just implants thoughts in your head and lets you sort them out! I'm gonna kill her." He sucked on his teeth. "Not another one…" he said quietly.

"She taught Lucas things then didn't she?" I studied his expression but it failed to change. "Didn't she?"

"Alright! Yes! She did… But he didn't age." He looked at me, the look was unmistakably worried, for something other than my hands' well being.

The car tumbled towards Winnie's house, stopping in what you could call the parking lot, a series of tire treads in hardened, grassless earth.

We made for the front door. "Look out!" Desmond pushed me to the ground and we both looked up to the sky as yet another meteor exploded three stories above us. Its pieces disintegrated unnaturally fast before they reached anywhere near us.

"I don't like this shit!" I said, being pulled up and into the house.

"WINIFRED!" Desmond screamed. "Where are you witch?" He stormed through the house. Not finding her on the first floor, her thumped up the stairs two at a time. I went after him.

Failing to open the door to her laboratory, he kicked it in. The latch gave way easily. Winnie sat in the middle of the room, in the center of the pentagram drawn on the floor, eyes closed. A small bowl sat in front of her. As I stared at her, a bubble was scarcely visible around her, extending out to the tips of the pentagram, sparkling slightly. It I moved my eyes or blinks, it disappeared until I looked at her for a few moments. It appeared as if she was casting.

Desmond contained himself from talking about what I had done to my hand. "What is it…?" He ground his teeth together.

"Silence." She demanded. Outside of the small window, the only one in the room, meteors were falling, hundreds of them. They fell into the dried grass and it caught on fire. As the brambles burned, it was clear that if the wards and salt line were going to keep whatever it was from getting to us, then it would burn us out of hiding.

"Ah shit." Desmond said, realizing what I had.

Winnie took in a deep and audible breath as her body seemed to fill with life. Her head tilted back and her eyes opened, they were solid blue, shining against the dim room. As the last of the breath escaped her, her eyes faded to normal and the surge of life seemed to leave as well. She hunched over a moment then stood up, composing herself. The shimmering bubble around her faded.

"How dare you teach him that!" Desmond roared. "Look what you've done!" He grabbed my hand and shoved it towards her face. She did not blink but I grimaced in pain.

"Yes, look what I've done." She pointed to the window. A misty rain engulfed the field, extinguishing the fires caused by the meteors. "Manipulating the weather is not easy Desmond. And before you say what you're thinking, that I don't care about either of you, know this: I had to ponder every possible way that that bar fight you had could turn out. I had to calculate what that Lich would do if you got away and whether or not you would escape it. I had to stir a dragon to conjure up this minor fog so that when you got here, you would be safe!" she seemed as furious as Desmond. But she was a witch, that made it worse. "So before you accuse me of teaching you friend here 'Pulsus'," a few jars shook and a slight wind grazed my face, "think about all that!" She stormed from the room, the door slamming itself behind her. "The nerve!" she could be heard saying as she walked down the hall.

"So I guess it's a Lich." I said matter-of-factly.

"Raiser of legions of undead, dark sorcerer, returned spirit to its now dead human body. We can't burn the bone on this one. They're up and walking around."

Chapter 38

Winnie was fairly upset, partly at us, partly at the world. She outright refused to come out of her room. This was fine by us, we had bigger things to worry about.

"A Lich may be hundreds of years old." I began while already walking down the stairs, holding a book in my good hand. "The soul of the human is trapped within its body even after death, commanded so by black magic. The lich are most commonly under the command of a magic user of some degree but have been known to be commanded by demons and there are at least two documented cases where the lich were created by itself, owing allegiance to no one. Though immortal, the body continues to decay until it is only a skeleton held together by the dark magic."

"Yeah, yeah, how do we kill it?" Desmond opened the door for me and I passed through without looking up, nor realizing I even passed through the doorway.

"'If the body is destroyed, the spirit will return to its phylactery until the body regenerates'. So we need to find its phylactery…what's that?"

"Anything. Fuck my life." He started the car and slammed on the gas, spraying mud until the tires caught on something. We flew backwards, Desmond steering with his arm on the back of my seat, eyes straight forwards. The car shot out onto the road and skidded 180 to face towards town, running over a zombie.

"Gross…" I said as the body thumped down the hood of the car.

"Aw, it's just a little decomposing flesh, nothing to worry about." He looked at me then drove on, clearing the windshield of zombie goo.

The ride towards town was depressing, we could see where the undead had been, pieces of human and animal flesh scattered around the small houses. But we couldn't waste our time defeating all the lich's creations, it we killed it, minions died too. We passed the bar from the night before, zombies still wandering around outside. Every once in a while a ghost would shift into view but dissipated soon after. We drove to a cemetery just on the outskirts of Kapuskasing, the thick gates had been pushed open and moans could be heard from inside.

Desmond turned off the car and got out, clicking the latch for the truck to open. "Alright…" he said as I came to stand beside him. "I want you to grab a sword, a shotgun and a handgun, plenty of ammo too How's your hand?"

I looked down at it, it seemed to be that of a 70 year old as opposed to a 90 year old. "Much better I think. It's coming back."

He nodded his head. "Then take this too." He handed me a pouch. "Hex bag, the good kind. Winnie made it me for my birthday. Just a little strength booster." I grabbed it and felt much more powerful, more physically dominating. My shoulders raised with the new strength. Desmond chuckled, "Yeah, like that."

He grabbed a few things for himself and closed the trunk. "We're looking for a grave, it'll be fairly obvious that evil has been there. A lich could have raised everyone in this place so don't let your guard down and keep your ears open."

I slung the shotgun over my shoulder, letting it hang on its strap. The sword attached to my belt loop and I shoved the gun down the back of my pants. Holding a curved knife in one hand, I ran my fingers through my hair with the other and cracked my neck. "I'm ready."

Desmond looked up from attaching his sword to his belt and paused, letting it fall to the ground. He put both of his hands on my shoulders in a mentor-like way. "You look…"

"Good? Yeah I know." I said cockily, striking a pose.

"No…" The sound of a gun went off and Desmond stopped and turned around. A headless zombie fell to the ground. "You ready?"

"Yeah." He picked up his sword, tying it to his belt. He went to the cemetery gates and I stood there beside him.

"Be careful T." The moans had faces now, no less than 50 of them, all noticing us and walking haphazardly towards us. I gripped the knife tightly and lunged forward.

"T…" Desmond started.

"Zombies…Zombies…!" I shouted.

"Oh shit yeah." A gun shot, we both jumped over the decrepit fence.

There was a flurry of gunshots. I aimed at the heads of zombies, going full out 'Tomb Raider' style. There was no stopping them though, every dead person for the past hundred or so years was up and walking, with the possible exception of those who were cremated, posing their own problem.

"Desmond!" I shouted but he was too far away to hear me. A gunshot deafened my right ear as he suddenly appeared beside me to shoot a corpse away from me we didn't separate again.

"T, it's too much. We can't kill them all." He said to me sadly "We've gotta find out who the lich is!"

As if by an art of the gods, I stumbled up on a grave. It was no ordinary one, for a few feet around it, there was no life. The grass had dies, the air seemed stale…it was an empty, cursed space. "Diz…" I said after decapitating a zombie with my blade, "This is it." He bolted to my side, covered in blood.

"Perfect…This is it." He looked to me with several lines of blood sliding down his face. "Good job." He nodded a few times.

I put a few shells into a zombie behind him. Luckily, it seemed to be the last one as far as I could see.

"That's it?" I asked, not expecting an answer.

"I guess." Desmond said. "Erin Roctor…" He read the name on the grave mysteriously. "We need to find out who this guy is…or girl I guess…?"

"Well you clearly can't be too prejudice." I joked. But before I knew it, we were far away from the graveyard, approaching Winnie's house. I was wiping the blood off my face and various other fluids that came from corpses.

"Well we're here." Desmond said as we pulled into a tiny parking lot. "The archives. I'm assuming that I taught you enough to get access to everything you need?" He looked at me smiling.

"And then some." I said opening the door. "When will you be back for me?"

"In a few hours. Promise." He paused. "Cause you know, shit might happen. So I'll be back. Call me if you need anything. I'm going to go chase some other leads on the lich."

I nodded. "See ya."

He nodded also. "See ya." And he drove off.

It was a small building, almost like a church, but somehow, it worked as the archives for the region. In Canadaland, there's usually an archive for each district/region. With no one else around, I slowly made my way into the small building, gun at the ready.

"Hello?" I called out once the bell at the door produced no immediate responses. "My name is Tim… Is anyone there?" I rounded the desk and a bloody mass of flesh stared back at me. They had been here. Perhaps they didn't want me to know what they did. I put a few bullets in the corpse's skull for good measure. Never can be too careful.

There was a computer, spattered in blood, on the desk of the ex-archivist. The name Erin Roctor yielded a few results. Two news clippings: one was an obituary, and one was a link to a newspaper article. I wrote down the name and number of the article and went down into the basemented archives.

With my gun drawn and holy water ready, I searched the basement until I found the shelf that I needed. Sifting through a few files I found the answer I had searched for, for so long. It was not only the name of the Lich, but what its phylactery most likely was, and why this particular body had become a Lich in the first place. He was once a…

Chapter 39

Desmond pulled into the bar from the previous night. There was something else here and he knew it. Even though the place no longer felt of demonic energy, he knew there was something there, all those years with Winnie didn't count for nothing.

He stepped on the broken glass that scattered the room, making a stealthy entry impossible. But stealth from what? This was ridiculous. He picked up the pace and started looking around for clues. The undead had to have left something behind, and he was going to find it.

With a grunt he lifted a table near the bar, hoping for anything to reveal itself. There was nothing. From moving the entire bar, he was a bit sweaty and discouraged until something miraculous happened.

"Desmond?" A hollow voice came from behind him. He spun around and pointed his rock salt-filled shot gun at chest height.

"Who the fuck are you?" As he gazed upon the sight, he was struck by a sense of awe. "No…it can't be." His gun lowered and his mouth dropped open.

"It's me…Luke." A figure flickered into existence a few feet away. "Don't you remember me?"

This is cruel. A demonic joke. "You're not real." Desmond said in a strong tone. "No way. I buried you myself." He kept the gun aimed at Luke. It was difficult. His body had materialized exactly as it should be. Thin stature, lanky build, barely able to build any muscle.

"I came back." He said, walking closer to Desmond. "And I missed you so much."

"No…This is the Lich's doing." Desmond said as he backed away.

"It is." The form nodded in agreement. "But it's still me. He just…facilitated my return." He reached Desmond, having backed him against a wall. "Desmond, it's alright. It's me. I promise."

Desmond started to cry softly. After a few minutes he looked at the specter in the eyes, "On the beach…in June…we…"

"We threw rocks into the river after laughing at a Siren's attempt to seduce us." He put a hand on Desmond's shoulder.

"At…" he hesitated, "At Richard and Winnie's…when we came back from hunting the Pooka…"

"It made an oil tycoon stuck on the thirteenth floor of his office building for hours after giving the go ahead for an excavation project." He looked at Desmond with sad eyes. "We…You know…Des, it's me. It's alright."

Desmond grabbed the ghost, surprised only slightly to grasp something solid. "I missed you so much…" He said.

Luke laughed. "Hey, I've missed you too." He flicked the necklace from underneath Desmond's shirt as if able to see it under the fabric.

"Shut up." Desmond said.

"Des…I've been watching you. With this Timothy character."

"He's nothing, I've missed you so much."

"Yeah, you keep saying that. You've missed me. I get it." Lucas said. "I can't help but think that you've replaced me." He looked into Desmond's green eyes. "You haven't have you?"

Desmond looked at his 'brother' of many years. But he HAD moved on. But this relapse was frankly a little too much. Even if it was a Lich's magic, the spirit's emotions couldn't be trifled with. That was beyond a Lich. "Never." He lied.

"We were brothers." Lucas said, holding onto Desmond tightly. "And you have no idea the torture I've been through to get back." He laughed. "We always joked about death…but the real thing is…" He withdrew, folding his arms and letting out a deep breath. "It's bad."

"Hey it's alright. You're here now and that's all that matters."

"I thought you'd forgotten about me. This Timothy guy that they told me about…" he laughed again. "I thought he was for real but I know that you couldn't really forget about me."

"Yeah…" Desmond reminisced.

"All those times that we snuck out to go hunting in the middle of the night…" They both laughed. "I know…that I'm dead. But I can feel you."

"You have no idea," Desmond said shaking slightly, "what it has been like to live without you." It was as if Luke was whole again, he felt as real as ever. "No this isn't right, you're not real." Desmond said suddenly.

Luke laughed again. "Nah… it's me. Just not the same. I'm alive because of the Lich Desmond, so let it live."

"No Luke…what?" Desmond stammered.

"You can nail it back into its coffin. Put wards around it… so long as it's alive, so am I. We can hunt gain until the day you die. Then you can have someone kill the bastard."

"Luke stop…"

"Do you want me to die again."

"Luke you know I don't want you to die again, but…"

"Then nothing!" he pleaded. "That's just it. You can't kill it. It brought me back, it brought us together again!" Luke stepped away from Desmond looking at him straight in the eyes. "I know that you haven't forgotten me. I also know that you still wake up and hunt with that tramp, thinking about me."

"Don't call him that."

"That's what he is. You know it's the truth. Des…I wouldn't say this if it weren't. You know that."

Desmond struggled for the right words. "It's not right. You died."

"But I came back! If me being dead makes you think differently, then what does me coming back mean?"

Chapter 40

I was deep in a book when Desmond walked into the archive basement. He carried a big bag with him. He was sad, by why? His forehead always made this strange crunch when he was upset that never really went away until he killed something.

"Hey you…" I said getting up from my chair.

"No." Desmond said. "Don't get up. It's alright…Everything's going to be alright."

Ok, you're weird…but listen to this. Erin Roctor was a member of that League of Magicians that Winnie talked about. The one Ironside's Great Grandfather was in. And get this, you know how they had a split over the power of demonology? Well guess who took up necromancy as a hobby?"

"That's great." Desmond said as he dropped the bag to the ground. He pulled out a small bowl and three candles which he arranged in a triangle with the bowl in the middle.

"What's this?" I asked. "Looks kind like a banishing ritual." He drew symbols on the floor to confirm my guess. "Is there a ghost following you that you need to banish?" A black candle was lit and placed at the top of the triangle. "Woah…Tough spirit?"

"I'm not sure…" He sniffed a little. "It might be. I don't know yet." He shook the sadness away and lit the remaining candles and removed a lighter, salt and a large hunting knife from the bag, which now laid empty on the floor.

"What do you mean? Is everything ok? I thought you'd be stoked to know that the Lich was in league with the Ironsides…Diz?" He was crying and holding the knife. I started to get a little scared. "Desmond what's wrong?"

"I have to…And I'm sorry…" He looked into my eyes. His began to rain tears. They streamed down his face making small puddles on the floor. "But I can't do it anymore. You need to go away."

I got up from the chair and threw it to the ground between us. Desmond stood up with the knife and stepped towards me, around the alter.

"I'm so sorry."

The figure of a boy flickered into the corner of my vision. He was lanky and blonde…It was Lucas?

"Desmond…What's going on?"

"Shut up." Lucas said to me, shifting directly in front of my face. Desmond was blocked by the boy. "You fucking bastard." His voice was chill and echoed. I flew to the right, against a wall, pinned.

"Pul…" My mouth slammed shut, biting down on my lip hard enough to make it bleed.

"I know your tricks. You don't think that Winnie didn't teach me the same things? They'll drive you crazy you know." He flung his hand out from his forehead, "Make you see things that aren't there. Make you think that you can do the shit she can do. She's fucking using you man…She used me." He held his arms out parallel to his body, "And look where it got me." Two tiny holes in his neck began to bleed. "Eaten by a fucking vampire."

For the next few moments, all I remembered was pain. My neck was being ripped apart and my vision whited out. When I saw again, Luke's hand was out stretched towards me. It was my neck, it was bleeding, two sprays from my jugular. I could feel the like draining from me as Luke smiled sadistically.

"Diz…" I mouthed with no sound.

Lucas grabbed his chest in pain, sinking down to his knees. "AGH!" He screamed. I dropped to the ground, released from his grip. He turned around to look at Desmond.

"You were a brother to me." Desmond said as he dropped the medallion into the burning bowl. A few sprinkles of salt and Lucas shouted out in protest but disintegrated into nothingness. A faint outline on my retina was all the remained to Lucas, the remains of a brilliant flash of light.

Desmond ran to me and put his shirt to my neck. "You'll be fine…" He reassured me. "We'll be fine." He corrected himself. I sunk into him and passed out from blood loss.

Chapter 41

Ironside hung in the circular torture device allowing the blood to drip from his nose onto the ground. His whole body ached and he could feel his wounds being to fester. His breathing was short and shallow after the lengthy torture session with his master. The room was abnormally quiet, his screaming, his master's laughter and the sounds associated with flesh ripping torture had all stopped.

He stared at one singular point on the ground for what seemed like ages until his master returned.

"I've just been topside slave." He demeaned him, a way of showing who was the boss. Although in his compromised position, it was fairly obvious. "The Lich has done more that I could have hoped for. He raised a brother of Timothy's friend and now he's dead. How sad for you." The news cut him deeply. He gathered the strength to life his head to stare at his master silently. "Too bad."

Ironside lost it. "I'll fucking kill you!" He struggled against the straps holding his limbs in place and the meat hooks that were still deeply embedded in his back. "You're dead! I'll fucking kill you, you mother…" Followed by thrashing and screams of pain, Ironside's master stood there rather calmly watching the man tear his own back off.

"Are you quite finished?" his master walked behind him to an alter. Ironside's chest heaved and sticky blood went down his back in rivers.

A tear fell, carving a skin colored trail down his cheek through the blood. I'll kill you." He sniffed.

"Oh hush! I promise that I'll resurrect him."

"I'll fucking kill you!" the struggling and the pain started again as his master laughed.

Chapter 42

I awoke in the car outside of an abandoned shack in the middle of the woods. Desmond's coat was my pillow and some discarded rags were bundled around m neck. The front of my shirt was covered in blood and my head hurt.

I moaned and looked around, pressing the rags to my neck as I moved just in case. Not seeing Desmond, I assumed that he was inside. I opened the door and stepped on a salt line. How thoughtful of him. I stumbled from the car, legs weak and still half-conscious. I was probably white as a ghost. I moved towards the house and in the open door.

It was an old creepy house, the fact that there were symbols drawn on the walls in blood didn't do justice for the creepy factor. I walked into the main living area, everything was pushed to the walls and a large pentagram was drawn on the floor boards. But this was different... It looked almost like the Hell Order but a bit different.

"T?" I turned around and bumped into Desmond. "Are you alright? Should you be up? Here…sit down." He ushered me to a couch that was up against the wall.

"I'm fine." I said as I stumbled over my feet making that statement more than false.

Desmond laughed. "Yeah I'm sure you are." He sat down beside me.

"Where are we?" I asked.

"The Fellowship of Dark Magicians' place. I got a lead on who the Lich might be. I was just looking through some stuff when I heard you come in and came down to shoot you." We laughed. "I wouldn't kill you."

"Then why did you try?" His eyes spelt confusion. "Luke was going to kill me and you didn't do anything until it was too late. Why did you hesitate?"

"Well…" he stumbled. "Luke was…"

"A ghost Desmond. And that's what you do. You kill spirits and evil things."

"He was real though…He felt real…"

"He what?" I got a little woozy. "Don't tell me." I turned around and went off through the house. Desmond's loud footsteps followed me.

"He was like a brother to me." He turned me around.

"Yes, but he died. And the second he comes back you're willing to let me die until you have a sudden attack of conscience? How is that fair? I'm a person too Desmond and I have emotions too and that hurts Desmond. It hurts a lot."

"I have nothing left of him T. Nothing! I let him go, that necklace was all that I had of him. And yeah I hesitated but you know what? I destroyed it because he was hurting YOU. Because YOU were in danger. So fuck you and your stupid assumptions and how I'm feeling. Fuck you!" And he stormed off up the stairs.

I punched the wall and a fraction of a second later I heard the same from upstairs, except Desmond was much stronger than me so his sounded like it went through the wall.

"You ok?" I called up.

"Yeah." Came back down.

I wandered through the halls of the house. Much like Winnie's, they were filled with pictures of people. I saw a copy of the same picture Winnie showed me of the League of Magicians along with a very young Winnie and Richard with their arms around a third man. He was very stereotypically European, he wore a bird skull around his neck which made him look creepier. I took the picture out and read the back: 'Winifred, Richard and Erin.' In a frame close b was Erin and Ironside standing back to back outside the house. Ironside wore a white scarf and Erin, that ugly bird skull.

"Des…" I called out but stopped. We're fighting. Erin Roctor was the name on that grave we saw earlier with the dead grass around it. I bet this was our Lich. I pocketed the pictures and went towards the stairs, slowly walking up them to see where Desmond was.

I found him in a room, sitting at a desk, reading a book. "Hey." I said and he continued to read.

"I found a picture of Erin Roctor."

"Yeah, a picture isn't a Lich is it?"

"You don't have to be an ass."

"You're an ass…" He mocked quietly and childishly under his breath.

I sighed and put the picture on top of the book he was reading. He slowly moved it off the desk so it fell to the floor. "I'm reading." He said.

"But just look at it." I picked it up and put it back on the book in front of him.

"I'm reading." He moved it off again.

"You're ridiculous!" I left the room in a huff.

Across the hall was another room, a bedroom with a sizeable bookshelf and small bed. The old tomes were all apparently manuals of necromancy and other dark magic's. I pulled one down and opened it. Raising golems or something like that. I gave it a quick flip through and threw it to the ground, I did the same a number of time but each book was as useless as the next. I laid down on the bed and looked up at the symbols on the ceiling wondering what they meant. Maybe the stop someone from dream walking in the person's head who slept here? Maybe they were to communicate through dreams? Who knew. I could look it up, but it would waste too much time.

"Get up. We're done here." Desmond stuck his head in the room then proceeded down the stairs.

"What were you reading?" I asked as I followed him.

"Just stuff on evil things. It's not important."

"It's what I do. I kill evil things. Get in the car." He ordered and got in himself.

"No. I'm not getting in until we settle this." He got out.

"Fine. Bitch away." He threw his hands out to the side. I threw the rags at him. It didn't bleed so I guessed that the holes had clotted properly. The rags landed on the hood of the car, shy of their target.

"You don't think I have a right to be angry at all?"

"It's a free country. I'm not telling you to do anything."

"You're so fucking petty! You nearly let Lucas kill me and then you expect me to not be mad?"

"Did I save you?" I stared at him. "Then shut your mouth. What I do is my business." He put his hands on his hips. "And besides, Ironside has killed so many people you care about."

I walked around the car and punched him in the face. He barely moved. "Feel better?"

"No." I punched him a few more times, each blow shifting his body slightly. He didn't try and stop me at all. "Pussy. If you're gonna hit me, hit me." He punched me, sending me soaring backwards and landing on my back. He leaned against the car. "Like that."

I stood up. "Pulsus!" I shouted and he did back flips over the car, hitting his head and landing in a heap on the other side. My hand ached as arthritis set in again. Walking around to the other side of the car, Desmond was just pulling himself up and wiping blood from his eye brow. "How's that?" I asked.

"I've had better." He smirked at me with anger, provoking me more. "Common let's see how old you can make yourself. Betcha I can take more than you can dish out." He lunged forward and grabbed my hand, squeezing it making me scream. I fell to my knees and he laughed. Until I punched him in the balls.

We wreathed on the ground in pain. Me holding my hand and him holding his groin. When we stopped moaning we were both on our backs gasping for breath.

"I'm sorry." He said.

"Yeah…I'm sorry too." He helped me up and we got into the car.

After a long silence, he started the car. "We've gotta get to the cemetery and dig up ol' Roctor. See if he's still around." He put his foot down on the gas. "If not, then we gotta find the sucker."

He looked over to me slightly as if he was about to say something then shrugged and drove on.

Chapter 43

Nothin…" Desmond said as her tore open the coffin. "Not even dust. This thing may just as well have been buried empty." I grabbed his hand and pulled him out of the pit. He dusted himself of. "It's him. Gotta be."

"How are you so sure?" I asked, wiping some sweat from his eyebrow. The salt might hurt the wound, I'd given him…shut up.

"I was reading his diary. Some really dark stuff and it mentioned experimenting with living forever. Liches, demons... There weren't many options to choose from. Also said something about voluntary possession... Whatever the hell that is. But Daniel Leavens apparently did it.

"Those guys were fucked." He picked up his coat and gun and started towards the car.

"Like, demon possession? That would account for the devil's trap in the living room."

"Good eye T." He patted me on the shoulder. "Ya, maybe that's where they did it. I don't get why they would want to voluntarily possess themselves... I mean, possession must suck. All the head spinning..."

"And crab walking down stairs and pea soup."

"Ah I hate pea soup." We left the cemetery and came upon the car which was swarming with undead. "Ah shit."

There were zombies, skeletons and the odd twitching person slamming their hands on the car, trying to disable it. "Get the fuck away!" Desmond shot a skeleton and it shattered to a pile of bones.

I took out my sword and ran at the zombies, hacking their heads off easily enough. Rocksalt blasts took care of the ghosts. We made quick work of the unwelcomed guests but the real battle had just begun.

"Kiiill them!" A harsh voice came from behind us. we turned around to see a glowing blue corpse. It hovered slightly off the ground and wore tattered clothing. It's jaw was attached only slightly by a few pieces of flesh still visible. It had one eye and a few long, thin strands of hair that still clung to its skinless skull. It wore the ugly bird headed necklace and pointed at us menacingly. At his command, ghosts swarmed around us and a few corpses raised from the ground just inside the cemetery gates.

"There it is." Desmond said as he shot it. The shotgun blast didn't penetrate the blue aura. "Shit."

"Get the ghosts!" I shouted back to him as I ran up to the Lich. Its hand lazily shifted to me and I tripped, slamming my head into the pavement. I heard blasts of rocksalt whiz by me as I got up and made another run. Decapitating a zombie, I jumped at the Lich and swung the sword. I was the one that ended up swinging though, right into the decrepit gates.

"You alright?" Desmond called up to me.

"You…" The Lich stared at me with its one eye and I thrust the sword forward to stab out its eye. It didn't work too well. But I managed to get up while it was distracted. "You die." It said and reached forward to touch me.

I swung my sword and cut its arm off at the elbow. It didn't seem to mind and reached for me again with the other one. I quickly did the same thing to its other arm. It shifted away from me and began to float to Desmond.

I ran after it and stabbed it through the chest. "Ha!" it turned around and looked down at the sword him. It twisted its body and knocked me over with it.

"Kiiiill them…" It repeated to the hoards of undead now converging on the car.

I stood up and Desmond began shooting wildly at the approaching Lich. Pieces of bone went flying but nothing stopped it. I ran to the car, past the two of them to find another weapon. Then it dawned on me.

"T…Hurry up and get something!"

"Duck!" I shouted. Desmond complied instantly, getting onto one knee. I jumped off his back and while passing the glowing corpse, reached out and grabbed the bird skull that hung from the Lich's neck. Landing on the ground I pushed it into the ground. It shattered and the pieces stuck into my palm. "Kick it's ass!"

"With pleasure." Desmond pulled out his pistol and shot at the Lich. Each bullet took more bone off than the one before. Unloading an entire clip into the Lich, Desmond grabbed the sword out of its chest and hacked what remained of the Lich to pieces.

I got up and looked at the pile of bones beneath a sweaty, tired Desmond. We stared at each other as the zombies dropped all around us, making a loud, collective 'thud'.

The smell of dead corpses made me sick. We got in the car and drove off back to Winnie's.

Winnie was standing at the door when we pulled up. "Who was the Lich? Was it Daniel?"

"No it was Erin Roctor" Desmond said with confidence.

"I see." She looked at me then to my hand. "You've been casting?"

"I didn't mean to. I just sorta…did it."

"Hmh…Natural if you're born with it." She studied me. "I'll fix your hand. Come."

"Aw common!" I protested. But she grabbed my hand and pulled me upstairs.

In Winnie's work room, she told me to sit down in a chair and went to work pouring liquids and herbs into a small bowl. "What did you cast? How many times?"

"Pulsus. Twice I think?"

"That's a lot of damage. Your body isn't used to flinging energy around. Lucky you didn't launch fire or I'd have to amputate. She was different. Angrier than before.

"Will you teach me more?"

She put the bowl on my lap and dunked my hand in it. "I could. Desmond would be quite angry though. I taught a few things to Luke." Hmh… "He doesn't understand because he's a brute. But for those of us who aren't built of muscle and sinew, magic helps in hunting." She got me a towel and by the time she got back and handed it to me, my hand was normal and pain free.

"Thanks." I said quietly.

"I'll teach you some things, yes. But only if you don't tell Desmond. We're on shaky ground as it is." I agreed. "Alright then…First of all…"

Within the hour, I was able to cast Pulsus without aging my hand. She also taught me a sort of summoning command: Volo. It was strange. It let me grab things from across the room and fling them towards me. Sort of the reverse of Pulsus. This was strange territory and I felt really weird doing it all. Then I remembered something else I should be doing.

"I gotta go." I said suddenly. "No offense!" I shouted as I ran out of the room and down the hall to our bedroom. It was dark outside now. Probably around 9.00. I opened the door to find Desmond fast asleep on his bed. So I guess we won't be training tonight then.

Chapter 44

I awoke and it was bright outside and I heard Desmond and Winnie downstairs talking. I got up and went to get my shirt then thought again. "Volo." Wicked. This whole spell casting thing is going to make me really, REALLY lazy. I laughed and went downstairs.

"Your necklace is gone." Winnie said to Desmond as I came into the kitchen.

"Yeah." Desmond said without looking at me. "Thought it was time to move on."

"Mhm…He came back. I told you, you should have gotten rid of that thing. Nothing but trouble. And look, it caused nothing but trouble." She put a cup of tea in front of me. Desmond nodded that I could drink it. He took a long sip of his coffee.

"Well it's done now. Nothing we can do." He said, and then went back to drinking his coffee.

"Could you have?" I asked innocently.

"I don't do black magic Timothy. How dare you even suggest otherwise." Desmond squeezed my shoulder. "No. I'm thinking another member of the Fellowship of Dark Magicians did. They'd be very old now, but just like me, magic keeps them alive." She fixed her hair. "I'll make a list of the Magicians and you two will check them out alright? The closest one I know of is in Sudbury so you two have got quite a ways to go. I'll keep in touch with astral projection." She got up to leave. "But right now I've got some things to take care of." She left the house in a hurry.

"What's got her knickers in a knot?" I asked.

Chapter 45

"Ok then." Desmond said as we walked back upstairs. "Lets pack I guess."

"Where do you think she went?" I asked folding a shirt into a duffle bag.

"I don't know. She's always secretive about that. I just assume she's either tending her herbs or casting something in the forest." He placed some jeans in the bag. "She doesn't really have friends."

"That's unfortunate. But I guess neither do you huh?" I teased.

"Nope. But my social network is huge."

"Oh its huge alright." He threw a shoe at me. "Ow! Common, a shoe? Who throws a shoe when there's plenty of softer things around?"

"First thing I saw." He looked at me with a sarcastic expression and I chose to ignore it.

"You sure that Winnie won't mind if I take these clothes?"

"T, look around. So many kids have lived here over the years and left their shit. So no one is gonna mind."

Unless Justin comes back and beats me up for taking his Cookie Monster pyjamas."

"Are you really taking those?"

"Hell yes I'm taking them. Mostly for shock value." I laughed and put them in the duffle bag.

Desmond put a few pairs of socks in the bag. "Well that should do us for a while. Lemme just grab some stuff from the basement and we're good to go."

"This place has a basement?" I slung the bag over my shoulder and carried it to the front door, letting it fall into a heap.

"It's an old farm house. Of course it does. Where would Aunty Em go when the tornados come?"

"Dude this is Ontario, not Kansas."

"Common T it's a classic."

"Nothing like the book you know." He opened a door that was sort of hidden amongst all the pictures, there were a bunch hanging on it that clinked together as it swung it open. We descended the stairs and Desmond pulled a small cord. It was a weapon vault. Everything you could imagine. There were books, guns, knives, bows, arrows made of basically everything, all in various shapes and sizes and all hung up on the wall in a very OCD fashion.

"Holy shit." I said. "Why didn't you show me this before?"

"I didn't really like you that much."

"You're a prick." I said then Desmond reached behind him and grabbed a gun, placing it to my head. I stuck my finger in the hole in the hilt of the gun. "You loser."

"There's something not quite right about calling a man with a gun a loser. Can't quite put my finger on it though." He dropped his hand and walked around examining the guns.

"What are we looking for?" I asked, running my hands across the blades.

"Anything that might be useful." He picked up a shotgun and pumped it before he checked to see if the barrel was clean. Who knows what we might be going in to with these Dark Magician guys. They've probably got all sorts of crazy necromancy shit going on. Or demons…" He put the gun back onto the wall. "What we really need is a good specialist knife."

"What's that?" I withdrew my hand from the knives expecting one to suddenly attack.

"Well, anything can have a curse or an enchantment put onto it. Depending on your abilities, you can make them take out a bogeyman in one swift slice or have them personalized. You know, Winnie once made this knife that forced the undead to stay dead." He reminisced for a while.

"That would have been helpful…Where is it?" I said in a 'what the hell' way.

"Justin stole it. Then he ran away. Never saw it since then and Winnie never made another one." He picked a knife off the wall with a glass handle and handed it to me. "Cut me with this."

"What! No, I'm not gonna stab you!" I pushed the knife against his chest but he refused to take it back. "That's stupid."

"Ah common, do it wimp." He taunted.

"You're not going to convince me to stab you Diz!" I put the knife on the ledge that encircled the room.

"It's a personalized knife T. If anyone besides the owner uses it, they'll miss." He picked up the knife and lunged towards my chest with it. He twisted around and fell onto his back. "And Richard's dead."

"So no one can use it?" I helped Desmond off the ground with a firm hand.

"Nope. Never again." He handed it to me and continued gathering things.

"Do you have a knife?" I asked examining the knife. It looked as though it had something in the handle, but I couldn't make it out in the darkness.

"Nah." He smiled at me doing up the bag and slinging it over his shoulder. I'm not special enough to have one made for me." He winked.

"Why not?" I followed him up the stairs.

"Cause that requires a lot of magic, and a lot of love. Winnie made that for him so her love would protect him. See, it's suppose to be an enchantment so that no one would be able to use it against the owner. But it's got a little more kick to it than just that." He picked up the other duffle bag at the front door and proceeded to the car. Those bags were really heavy.

"I'm sure it's nothing personal here lemme carry one of those." I tugged at the clothing bag.

"Nah T its fine, I got it." He said and carried on walking. "And I know it's nothing personal. It's not like she made one for anyone else. Just him." He opened the back door and threw the duffle bags in. "So whatever, I don't need one with my cat-like reflexes." He did a bow and I got into the car. He hopped over the hood and got in the driver's seat. "So where to?"

I put the knife in the pocket of the door and pulled the list out of my pocket. "Fellowship of Dark Magicians" I read. "How ominous!" I giggled. "Well like Winnie said, the closest would be Ida Krustofsky in Sudbury."

"Then off we go." He pulled a three point turn until we were headed away from Winnie's house. Not for the last time mind you.

Chapter 46

So when I woke up, I had a Q-Tip in each ear, nostril and a few in my mouth. Freaking out, I ripped them all from my face and stared at Desmond who was laughing hysterically.

"Well I'm glad you find it funny!" I emphasized the 'you' more than can be put down in text. "Where the hell are we?" I asked rubbing my eyes.

"We're not quite in Sudbury yet." He admitted. "But I think we might stop for the night. I'm pretty tired and I wouldn't want to kill us or anything." He winked at me. "It would ruin m master plan."

I closed my eyes and shook my head. "Well if you manage to contain yourself then I'm sure your master plan will work out better than you could possibly imagine."

Desmond looked at me with a half embarrassed, half angry stare. His eyes moved back to the road and we drove on in silence.

We pulled into a small bed and breakfast off the 144, just past Halfway Lake. Desmond walked as I stumbled into the office to book a room. He held me up as much as he could. How was I so tired when I slept for most of the car ride?

"Hey, can I get a room please?" He smiled at the young boy behind the desk.

"Queen or two doubles?" He winked at Desmond.

"Doubles please. We're not, you know, together." He smiled at the boy. The boy smiled back. He was definitely old enough to know what he wanted. And apparently that was Desmond.

"Here's your key, you're room number five. You let me know if there's anything we can do for you." He winked again and dragged his hand across Desmond's as he placed he key in his hand. I reached for a weapon but found none. I hadn't yet mastered Desmond's style of hiding weapons.

We both walked out of the office and headed to our room.

"I'm gonna get a drink." I said to him

"Mkay, see you in the room."

I walked over to the pop machine that stood in the lobby and pondered the choices.

I heard the lad behind the desk talking to himself about Desmond and there was no way I was gonna let him talk about Desmond in that way. I rushed up to him in a single motion, latching onto his trachea with my fingers. He choked. He tried to release my grip with his hands but I clamped down on his throat more and he tried to cough, but it was impossible with my grip.

"T" Desmond called from the door. "You coming?" He asked.

"Yeah." I said releasing the kid. He backed away from me. Desmond's hand reached out to grab mine and he pulled me through the office door.

"What the fuck was that?" He demanded while dragging me down the walkway to room five. "We need to keep a low profile."

"He was saying stuff about you!" I protested.

Desmond stopped and faced me. "What color is your hand?"

"White?" I guessed.

"Look at it."

I held my hand up in front of my face. It glowed a pale green, even in the final brightness of dusk. "Green." I admitted.

"It's not an attractive color." He said as he released my hand and opened room number five.

"How did you…"

"You're magic is sensitive now. You can see things that others can't. you know things, whether through a vision or just plain guessing." He threw the keys onto the table. "She taught you other things too didn't she?"

I looked at him and then realized I couldn't like about this. "Yeah."

"Fuck!" He grabbed his chin and turned his back to me, only to turn towards me a few seconds later. "She taught Luke some things too. And then he died." His eyebrows turned down and his eyes showed all the sadness in the world.

"Well you won't lose me, and if you do I'm gonna haunt ya." I joked with him.

"Then I'd have to hunt you and get rid of you then." He retorted. "I've gotta go grab some stuff. I'll be back soon. Call me if you need me." And with that, he fled the room in a blurry form.

"Ok…" I said aloud and walked further into the room. It was much like every other room. There was a partition of sorts that separated the door from the rest of the room. There was a small table off to one side and two beds, positioned on either side of the nightstand. The stereotypical motel room.

I flopped down onto the bed and felt a sinking feeling on the bottom of the bed. "What the.." I sat up to face Ironside. The door slammed shut and he moved forward.

"What are you doing here?" I said.

"Well the witch isn't here to put wards up against me so I thought I would come."

"No…you have to go." He waved his hand in my direction and I felt a force grab my arms and pin me against the wall. I tried to move my limbs, but it only resulted in a painful stabbing sensation " I am sorry Tim." He faced the door, sword in attack position, waiting for it to open.

"Ironside." I said. This stirred him, making him weaken his grip, only to be replaced by a stronger one. "No. You don't have to do this."

"But what if it is him?"

"Who?" I begged.

"The hunter who is killing us!" I froze. Us? "I cannot betray my master again. As much as I would like to…" He looked at me. "This is my last chance for survival. You understand?" He was right. He was different. Whatever his master had done to him, changed him towards a much violent outlook on life.

"Ironside stop. We can help you." I pleaded. "Don't kill him." Tears began to run down my face "Please."

"He is a threat to us. To the master and his masters. And you will be quiet." I opened my mouth to speak but the same pain that afflicted my muscles when I tried to move them afflicted my throat. I stared at him, ready to kill Desmond. I hoped something held him up. I wished that the kid at the office desk managed to distract Desmond just so he wouldn't walk through that door. But he did.

"T, I got some…What the fuck?" He was slammed against the wall perpendicular to the door. Whatever was in his hands was now scattered across the floor. He was held in the same debilitating painful grip I was.

"And it is said," Ironside stepped closer to the pinned Desmond. "that one who might lead to our demise," Pulsus…"will lead an army of mortals against us." Pulsus! "Their magic will put that of the demons to shame," PULSUS! "yet with their demise, the beginning of the reign of us will be nigh…" PULSUS! "and all of their humanity will know the wraith of he."

"PULSUS!" I finally screamed out in agony. Whatever Ironside did to me, speaking was the worst pain I had ever felt. Coupled with the hurt of him going to kill Desmond, it was nearly unbearable. But this screaming yielded only positives. My vision whited out as my eyes went as wide as possible. I felt a pulse emanate from my body, one that I could only have imagined in my wildest dreams. Partly out of pain, and partly out of exhaustion from producing such a monumental amount of energy, I passed out and fell to the floor.

Chapter 47

Once I awoke, the world was a blur. I looked around the room. There appeared to be two human shapes conversing, but their words were only a dull sound in my broken ears. I blinked and nothing changed. But the shapes turned towards me and a concerned sound buzzed in my ears.

"I can't see anything…I can't hear anything…" I tried to say out loud. Whether the shapes heard it or not was a mystery to me. Until one of them made a move to contact me, I felt alone.

The shape touched me on the shoulder. It was Desmond. I could tell from the softness of the touch. I blinked a few more times and the world became slightly clearer. I could see Ironside standing a fair distance away, and Desmond sitting beside me.

A few more blinks and the laziness that I felt faded into normalcy. Though my hearing was still muddled, I could see everything. Ironside stood in a devil's trap…The Hell Order… I could hardly believe it, but it made sense.

"All those voices…" I stood up and walked to the invisible wall. "You're possessed…" I looked at him with tears forming in my eyes. Was I caring about him? More than one? What the fuck was this?

His response fell on deaf ears and I tried to pop them by sticking my fingers in them and wiggling them around. They popped. "What did you say? I asked

"I am…as you call it…possessed." I rushed to the duffle bag that laid on the floor, presumably from Desmond sealing him inside the Hell Order circle. Reaching for a vial of holy water. I had to know for sure. I threw it at him and it smashed on his skin. "That does not work on me. I'm almost perfect. This..." He reached through the Hell Order boundary with his hand and a picture on the wall fell off and shattered. "Barely works on me."

Desmond came up behind me and put his arm around my shoulders. "It's alright, he's stuck there. He can't hurt you. I won't let him."

"And yet there is nothing I would not do to you!" Ironside spat angrily at Desmond.

"You've got nothing here now. Otherwise, you'd have done something to me by now." Desmond pushed a chair into the circle and Ironside sat down reluctantly. Desmond and I sat on the bed. "So talk…what do you want with T?"

Ironside closed his eyes. "I don't have to answer to you." He folded his arms "I don't have to answer to anyone really. Except my master, and even that is debatable."

Desmond stood up with a start. "You listen to me you demon scum, tell us what we want to know. I can call up Winnie and she can give e some VERY persuasive ideas on what I could do to you."

"Winifred…Yes…Of course you would run to her."

"What do you mean?"

"She's playing you for a fool. Both of you." He got off the chair and kneeled down. "Tim, I do care about you, but I can see now that you hate me because of what I have done to those you care about." He motioned towards Desmond. "As much as I would love to skin him alive, that would give in to the monster insider. Well…monsters." He forced his hand through the invisible barrier and began to scratch at the Hell Order that was drawn on the floor. Desmond moved to stop him but it was too late, he was loose.

A force pinned Desmond against the wall and he screamed in pain.

"Stop!" I ran over to Ironside and pushed him. The force did not waver and Desmond still cried out for help, blood oozing from his mouth.

"I told you that I will not kill him." Ironside said putting his hand on my shoulder. Desmond gasped in physical and emotional pain. "After all I have done to hurt you I can't make you choose. Please understand that. I will release him. But in turn I ask a favor."

"Anything" I began to sob slightly. "Whatever you need."

"Help me." He pushed a piece of paper into my hand and I fell backwards with the force. When I looked back to him, he was gone, the door was open and Desmond lay on the floor.

"Desmond!" I ran to him. "Oh no…" He was still bleeding. I threw off his shirt and he had a large cut, like that of a wild animal, ran the length of his stomach.

"T…You can fix me." He was breathing so quickly. "I know you can." He took my hand and stuck it against the sticky, bloody wound. "Just concentrate. He's testing you…They need you for something…"

"I…I don't know a spell…I don't…"

"Just trust yourself!" Ah fuck…How could I save him? I thought of that knife Winnie had made for Richard. How did she do that? He was going to die…The blood pumped between my hand, coating it in a thick layer of metallic smelling blood.

"I…I…Can't…"

"Yes you can!"

"How do you know?"

"Because…Because…Be…" Life slipped from his lips. The light in his eyes faded, he was dying. At the edge of life. And there was nothing I could do to help him. Volo, Pulsus…nothing. Nothing could heal him. His face relaxed as his last breath left him.

"No…" I started what little I knew of CPR. 1…2…3…4…5…Breath? No shit it was to 15! "Diz no!" I pumped at his chest, only causing blood to ooze out of the wound. "You can't fucking die! You're all the family I have left…" and with that I let a tear fall on his lifeless face. It didn't work. "Fuck!"

I pounded on his chest with my fists. "Wake up!" I collapsed into a crying mass on top of him. "Wake up…" With my ear on his chest, I couldn't hear his heart beating. He was gone…And it was Ironside's fault.

I felt my anger and hatred build inside me like a furnace. The door to the hotel room bent to my will and exploded open, wood splinters shattering outward. This was not over. Not by a long shot if he wanted me to help him then I would, by killing him. That should release him from his suffering.

I stormed out of the hotel room and walked to the car. I felt weak and disorientated. But by the time I reached the trunk, I had regained my composure and blasted it open with a Pulsus. The trunk hood flew through the air and landed in a tree. I grabbed what I could carry, what I figured I would need to kill Ironside. To get my revenge. Once I got into the car, I realized that I didn't know how to drive. The basic right means go, left means stop got me to Winnie's house half a day later. Once again, the door bent to my will, splintering before me.

"WINNIE!" I screamed out. The door recollected itself behind me.

"Timothy? How dare you break down my door!" She walked down the stairs and I threw her against the wall with Pulsus. "Timothy!"

"Shut up witch! Desmond it dead!" I stared at her while she took in this information. She looked hurt, then composed herself.

"He has served his purpose then I suppose."

"How dare you say that!" I took a step towards her and she grunted in pain as I pushed her further into the stairs. "How could you…" I was flung into the door. She said nothing "Argh!"

"Stupid boy! Don't you dare think that I would teach you enough to be able to defeat me." She stood and smoothed out her black shirt. "I've lost too much to get this far, and I'll be damned if I'll lose you and have the whole thing for not!"

"What are you talking about?" I tried to send out a Pulsus, but he was stopping me somehow.

"Hmh." She laughed. "Desmond was a tool for Richard and I." She came up to me and caressed my face. "But I assure you that it was in the best intentions." Her voice was calm and understanding. "I needed him. We needed him. Richard and I." She closed her eyes in mourning. "Richard and I discovered something long ago." She opened them and moved into the kitchen, leaving me pinned against the wall. "Something that he died for…Justin, Christine, Lucas…They all died for it. And you will be the fifth and final." She re-emerged from the kitchen holding a knife and a bowl, both ornately designed. "But you need to be willing to die for this cause Timothy. This is why I let Desmond find you. Why I hunted you down and let Desmond find you." She looked into my eyes. "Are you ready to learn the truth? Why Desmond met you…Why Ironside longs for you?" I stared back in disbelief. "It's alright, it all will make sense in the end, then you'll understand why you need to die. And you will embrace it."

I was scared. "It was bliss." Ironside had told me. But what was special about me? A stupid kid from outside Toronto that could possibly attract the attention of a possessed guy, a hunter and a 'white' witch from Kapuskasing?

"You know you have power Timothy." She sat on the stairs with the bowl and knife. "You know that. And you know that you can do amazing things, more than any other mortal. You're like me. You're like Richard, Lucas, Justin, Christine…All of you have the same power. The power of light!" She looked through me. "You have the power gifted from…from…God! If you will, I told you long ago that black magic comes from demons. I can only assume that white magic comes from God, angels, fairies. The sworn enemies of the things that we fight!"

"So where does that leave me? Descendent from fairies? Angels?"

"NO! Blessed BY them!" She stood and took my face in her hands. "Blessed!" She smiled again. "Richard and I found Justin on our own. But Desmond…He was sent by a higher power! He could sense others like us in a way that we could not. He was drawn to you! Drawn to your innate power! Don't you see? We were all chosen." She released me and walked to the stairs to pick up the bowl and knife. "Chosen by God, blessed with his magic." She moved the knife to my neck "I'm sorry if this hurts."

"Winnie! No…Stop!" I was going to die… I was going to die…

"Five are needed…Sacrificed…When we found Desmond, we knew that he could find us more of our kind But no more exist. So Richard gave himself to the cause. As did all the others. As must you. Embrace that you are doing the work of the gods! To defeat the evil on this earth, we need you and your spirit."

"So I'm some sort of weapon to fight evil? I thought Desmond and I already were fighting?" My heart sank at the mention of his name.

"Yes, but the ultimate weapon can only be created through the sacrifice of White Witches. Like us." She pushed the knife into my neck, not breaking the skin, but close enough to make me sweat. "The Fellowship of Dark Magicians left because they sought a demonic answer to the supernatural problems in our world. Us White Magicians stayed to find a godly answer. And we found it! And it's us! Join the power of the White Magicians Timothy, and we can rid the world of darkness. Ours is a just cause. Surely you must know this. A world without evil…without monsters and demons. It will be a utopia. Dying is hard to understand, but know that your death will be for the common good, and it will not be in vain. If what you say is true, then Desmond is gone. You've nothing else to live for. Join us, help me become the perfect weapon."

What sympathy I had for her cause was shattered by her mention of his name Anger built within me. She shout of 'anger leads to dark magic' fell on deaf ears as I sent out a wave of energy that obliterated the knife, damaged the bowl, and left her unconscious on the stairs. I spread my arms wide and I felt pure power flowing through them. The walls of the house shook and the ceiling began to collapse. I was angry…So very angry at her and at everything. I made short work of the house, its wreckage burying my teacher and mentor. I hoped that she rotted in hell for what she had done.

Chapter 48

I cried forever. Laying on my back in front of the rubble, looking at the setting sun, I cried until I couldn't do it anymore. Event the prospect of revenge did not quell the sadness within. What did I have anymore. The ground was my bed, and I had to lay in it. Probably forever. I don't think that I slept from sunset to sun rise, but my dry tears were still there when the sun lit the sky once more. My throat hurt from screaming in pain and my eyes burned from lack of sleep mixed with lubrication.

It was high noon before I pulled myself together enough to stand without falling over. As soon as Ironside was dead, this hollow shell that people would call a man would die as well. Why bother living? I was now officially on a suicide run. I would kill him, and probably myself in the process.

The car was still unfamiliar but it was getting better. I was handling it much easier on turns and obeying the speed limit became manageable. I headed for the Fellowship of Dark Magician's house. There was something that we missed. Once I exhausted necromancy as a possibility, I would find Desmond's body and bury it.

It was then that I began to question Desmond and myself. If he somehow had an innate ability to seek out magic users, was what he felt just the result of some sort of magic? The answers were just too painful to think about. But never the less, they crossed my mind, clouding my already impaired driving ability.

I stopped at the magician's house. The door was still open and I let myself in. everything was just as we had left it…During our fight. I cried as I tore the first floor apart searching for any sign of how to get Desmond back, or how to find Ironside. Paper and pictures flew off the wall as I marched through the house. I didn't even need to say the word anymore…Reality just assumed what I wanted. And it was destruction. It happily complied.

Once the whole first floor was raped of its usefulness, I found myself in the living room with that odd pentagram on the floor. My head began to hurt as I stared at it, so I turned towards the stairs. Frames shattered and flew off the walls as I walked by them.

Upstairs I looked into the paper covered room that Desmond has once been in while ignoring me. The scattered pages leapt into neat piles out of terror. Not finding what I desired, my mind ripped them apart. It was strange, but I could almost hear the pages scream. Maybe I just wanted to hear something in as much pain as I was in. But my pain fed my anger, and my anger fed my magic. It became glorious.

The room with the marking on the ceiling. I stared at the books on the shelves for a long while, studying the titles. Necromancy, Spells of the Dead, Summoning the Damned. I grabbed Spells of the Dead and flipped through it. Nothing about bringing people back from the dead. I began to think it was impossible. I laid down on the bed, defeated. I looked through almost everything in the house. There was still nothing that could save Desmond. I pounded my hand in anger at the wall. It crumbled.

"Huh?" It was the first word I had spoken in hours. Looking back, it seems anti-climactic. But what I found definitely made up for it. I pulled a small red book out of the hole in the wall. It was leather and tied with a string. I untied it and opened it, reading the first lines aloud... "Property of Daniel Leavens... The one who split the White Mages..." I opened the book and read on...

"Alexander shows great promise in resisting demon possession. Whether his power with the White Magic or some inborn ability, we will examine further..." Later, the book read "There appears to be no effect on Meaghan Ironside when possession occurs. While the demon resides within her, she remains fully conscious and only with pain. The demon quickly left the body. A more permanent possession is required." As books pulled themselves off the shelves, I wondered what this meant. Who was Meaghan Ironside?

I read on. "Lily has gained power over her demon, able to use its power without altering her disposition. Her brother shows little promise for the same. Is it a trait passed through the females?" This couldn't be real. The voluntary possession Desmond and I had found out about... Was this their final aim? "Lily and her brother Keith have died due to their possessions. Their child, Ruby, may be able to resist longer." They were breeding people... Selectively... "Charles shows the most promise as of yet. It is not passed through the females, but merely dormant in males. Male is advisable." Later on... "Not only is Vance able to control a demon, he shows promise for multiple possessions."

"What the fuck?" The journal stopped there. It was infuriating. Vance. Vance Ironside. Was this the Ironside I knew? "Oh my god..." The voices. They weren't voices, they were demons. He was human, but he was a demon. A seemingly impossible idea made possible by the Fellowship. Both sides had their own idea of what a weapon should be. Where did I stand...?

Chapter 49

As promised to myself, I journeyed to Sudbury once more. To the place where Desmond had... Anyways. I Went back and the coroner had removed the body. Obviously. Why didn't I see this happening? Was I not some sort of white magic weapon? Argh... The whole idea was ridiculous. Anything that I wanted to feel towards the situation was nullified by my emotions anyways... I had lost Desmond. What better excuse was there than my unfaltering hatred towards Ironside as a weapon? My powers had grown exponentially, why not use them... Though admittedly, they were hard to control... I'd dived in too deep.

"Single room please." I stared at the Motel clerk, a woman of middle age. She was afraid of me. I could sense it, though her face did not show it. What the fuck was happening?

The room, number 17, was quiet. Just as I had demanded. Jedi mind tricks totally work as long as you believe in them. I collapsed on the bed and cried. Desmond... You're not dead. I don't believe it. I need you. Once Ironside is gone, I will meet you in whatever life there is after this one. I promise.

The room seemed empty. The motel really wanted to give me comfort by this large sleeping contraption? It made me miss him that much more. How would I ever... Stop. Stop it. Get over him like you got over everyone else in you pitiful life.

But no. Though Desmond may be dead, there was someone else out there. After all, Desmond only found me because his genes told him to. He was destined to find those people who could control white magic. It wasn't real. I had to remind myself of that... Constantly...

Chapter 50

The next day I skipped breakfast on favor of learning all that I could about Daniel Leavens from the Sudbury archives and the internet. He had moved to Orillia following the death of his wife rose Perfect.

Three hours later and a fuck load of driving experience, I passed the Couchiching Inn and found where I needed to go. 30 years ago, the Leavens had owned a small cottage that was for sale by the local Remax. I was willing to bet that there was a little something that the real estate agent wasn't saying. Maybe about necromancers... Just a thought.

"And here you can see the lovely view of the lake! Just to the right is the Narrows, where Lake Simcoe is joined by the Trent-Sevren Waterway. It's really a lovely location and... Oh..." She saw me. The Realtor that was showing the cottage to a perspective buyer looked at me quizzically. "Oh hello! Are you looking at the property as well?"

I stared at her angrily. The couple picked up on this and showed themselves out. The Realtor looked at me smiling still.

"You know, this has a lovely view of the lake, and is within walking distance of Mara Provincial Park. So any extra visitors that you have can stay in their tents for a very reasonable price."

"I'm really not interested in your interpretation" I said while examining the walls for some sort of weakness that would give away a secret passage. "I'd like to look around on my own, for me and my wife... Who happens to be a lawyer. You'd best leave." I lied. But you know what? I was getting good at it...

"Of course. I'll just wait outside." She left the house as my eyes followed her. As soon as she crossed the threshold I pulled out the salt I had hidden in my sleeve and sprinkled it along the doorway. She ran at me and hit the invisible wall I had created. "You fucking little bitch! You know what Desmond screams for? Cause it's not you..."

I turned away and slammed the door in her face. She lied... And I doubted very much that Desmond was in hell with all the good he had done for the world. Well... I hoped... No, it was impossible. Don't even think it...

The demon pounded on the door incessantly. I prayed that she didn't make it through, I didn't know how to deal with demons... Desmond had neglected the exorcism lesson in Demonology class...

The house was empty and dilapidated. It was a wonder that anyone would even bother to come and look at the place, there were no redeeming qualities. I worked my way through the cottage examining every crack that I found in the walls, floors and every surface I came across. I let the magical energy flow from me willingly, obliterating anything weak enough. This proved to be more than I originally speculated.

My orb of influence entered the pantry, shattering jars of preserves and blowing away small tokens of the past. But it also shattered a wooden door in the floorboards. There was no handle to the strange hatch, I needed to investigate. No matter what the cost.

The cellar was dark and cave-like. I passed by numerous tables with strange paraphernalia on them, seemingly demonic in nature. They could almost have been altars. Either way, none of them survived the permanent Pulsus that followed me. Each flip of a table brought a dreadful sound from everywhere and nowhere. I reached a large ring in the center of the room at the end of the long passage. It was covered in blood. At each theoretical corner of the circle, there was a loop that held a limp limb. The body did not bleed, but it emanated energy that rivalled my own.

"I see you've found us. I imagined you would." Ironside stepped out from the shadows. I threw a knife at his forehead and he caught it. "Nice try." Two more flew at his heart and leg. Both he caught without missing a beat. "Relax Tim... Why would I let anything bad happen to you?" Ironside walked to the shape hanging from the ring and pulled its head up into the light. It was Desmond.

I ran towards the lifeless body. "Shhh..." Ironside urged. "I don't mean you or him any harm, but there are those who would. My master for instance... Oh if he knew!" His scarf was lowered over his mouth. Its dark crimson blended in perfectly with the darkness of the cave.

"Let him go..." I warned.

"Tim... I cannot. He is not yet healed. Close, but not yet. If I were to release him, or leave, then he would surely die. I have a large sphere of influence over reality as you see it."

"Ya I know... I bet the demons help." We walked around each other, Desmond's lifeless body hanging in between.

"Ah, so you've discovered have you?"

I nodded. "What I don't get, is why you command the demons rather than the

other way around... What are you?" I reiterated the first sincere question I ever asked him.

"I am human... But my spirit is bound to many other things," He stopped to caress Desmond's cheek. "But you needn't fear. I have control."

I rushed up to him by casting Pulsus on the floor below me. The knife I had in my belt buckle found its way into Ironside's heart.

He laughed "You think…" Weakness in his voice. "That you can kill me so easily?" He pulled the knife out of his body, no blood. "I am perfect now Tim. You cannot harm me with the voices taking care of my body."

"What?" No blood. No sign that I even plunged the knife into his chest. "How…"

"A binding ritual."

"A binding ritual?" I repeated.

"They bound the demons' to my own soul. If I die, so do they. It's powerful magic. So powerful in fact, that it killed many of the Fellowship and send its leader into a hastened age. If it weren't for the magic, then he would surely be dead." That's just what Winnie had said. It was magic keeping the eldest of them alive.

" Enough of this fucking monologue." I sent him flying against the wall with a Pulsus. "I don't care about anything but killing you right now frankly." While his body was held against the wall, I withdrew a piece of chalk from my pocket and drew a Hell Order on the floor. A Volo summoned him towards me as I walked away from him and sealed him inside.

"Tim, don't. Desmond needs me." He wasn't pleading. He was faking then. There would be blood...

Chapter 51

Stop! Stop please!" Ironside pleaded as blood ran down his bare chest. If he had control of his body, then he could feel what happened to it. And I loved this fact.

"Stop? Did you stop when you grabbed hold of Desmond?" I carved off another piece of his skin. Retreating to the farthest region of the Hell Order, he cowered, frightened to death of me and what I would do to him. "Did you stop once he was bleeding and dying?" His screams satisfied me.

"Nothing... You can do... Is worse than what he has done to me..." He gasped as he held the bone of his forearm. It tried to heal itself, but it was too slow for my blade. Tears broke out. "This is what you would do to me..."

"And what did you do to me?" I gestured to Desmond. "Don't you dare suggest that you are in more pain!" I wanted to believe this, my heart was empty and my soul was hollow. Desmond had kept me going since the very beginning of this whole thing. I realized this now. He was... Everything.

"T...?" The body stirred.

"Desmond!" I was at his side at light speed. I went to release him from the torture ring.

"No... He cannot stand." Ironside said. I looked to him in disgust. "I am helping him, against the will of the demons. Trust me, please."

"I'm fine." Desmond muttered. "I'm fine..." I wanted to cry. Days without him had passed in a flash, but he was back and alive. Ironside's arm had nearly healed so I cut the other one.

"But I was sorry!" He screamed, tears running down his face. "Why else would I heal him for you. I can't stand to see you sad. All I want is for you to be happy! I realized that after what I did to him."

I stopped and dropped my knife. Looking him in the eyes, I knew he was telling the truth. And yet I had still taken his skin for my own. I wasn't any better than the demons that possessed him. In a blind realization, I stared at him eyes wide. "I'm so sorry."

"No..." He was covered in a mixture of sweat and blood. It made me question what I had become through losing Desmond. I prayed that I would return to normal once this was over.

"Prayers can be answered by anything you know." A voice came from behind me. I turned to see a man standing just beyond Desmond in a black cloak that covered his face. "Do you wish me to answer your prayers?"

"No Timothy..."

"Carnifico." A decrepit hand pointed towards Ironside and he screamed in agony. "There is nothing that I cannot do. This slave is a token of that."

"You're... You made him?" I wanted to separate Desmond from between us. I tried to do so, but like Winnie... He could read my mind.

"I'll not harm you. Only him..." Ironside wretched on the ground behind me. "I'm the only one who can afterall." He smiled, his yellow teeth showing through the shadow of his robe.

"Tim... Help me!" Ironside begged.

"ARGH!" Desmond arched his back in the circle, crying out in pain.

"You can only save one Timothy. The other belongs to me and the darkness..." The man in the black cloak smirked. He was hurting both of them, a thought that I could not bear. But if I could only save one, then who... My eyes began to water as the pressure mounted on me. My mouth watered for both of them, but my heart yearned for only one. I begged for some way to save them both, like in the movies... But nothing came to me.

I spat on the ground behind me. "You make me decide who I can save... Who I

would rather save. But you are not a god."

"Close enough!" he shouted, the sound echoing off the cave walls. He took a step closer and the two men called out for help again. "I only really wish for you to choose one so that the remaining lad will know utter sorrow before he dies. Then I will kill the three of you. So tell me. Who dies knowing that you hate them?"

I stared into his empty, soulless eyes. Whatever remained of the man that was within was so small it was nearly impossible to see. I almost felt sorry for him. My hands went to my face. "I can't choose."

"Then watch as they both die!" He grinned in pleasure. "As soon as there is dark..." The cave was cast into a dim version of its former self. "No light can exist."

His yellow teeth and now glowing eyes showed through the darkness. "But as long as there is a glimmer of hope... Anything is possible." He cocked his head to the side. "Pulsus! Volo!" The wad of spit dragged itself along the floor away from me, piercing the chalked Hell Order. At the same time, Desmond's body flew towards me, having broken out of the shackles that bound him to the ring of torture. It didn't take long for Ironside to realize that he was free and that his master was overwhelmed by white Magic. Jumping from the floor to the ceiling, then back onto the floor, Ironside tackled the evil figure. As the light in the room grew, I almost wished that it hadn't, the blood, guts and cries of pain echoed off the walls. I dragged Desmond out of the cave and the house and rested him on the grass.

"T..." He said through his pain. "I'm sorry for..."

"Shut up." I commanded

"T..." He stopped me.

"You need your strength." I smiled at him.

"K..."

"You'll be fine... Ironside..."

"Ironside?" He looked at me with fear. "What did he do?"

"He hurt you, but he brought you back to me." I smiled and got off of him, helping him stand. He wobbled so I used an arm to stabilize him. "You're gonna be fine."

"But now we owe a favour to a demon... A BUNCH of demons..."

"I hadn't thought of that..."

"Timothy." I turned around to see Ironside emerging from the cottage. He was coated in a thick layer of blood. As he moved towards me, I felt uneasy. I didn't want to have to unleash my new found powers on him. "Thank you..." What? "You saved me from an eternity of servitude by that thing down there..."

"Who was he?" I already knew the answer. Ironside confirmed it.

"Leavens. Daniel Leavens." He closed his eyes and bowed his head as if honouring him. "But now I need your help."

"Anything." I said overtop of Desmond's protest.

He looked at Desmond with hate. "I saved you. Now I need the two of you to help me."

I dreaded to know how to do this. "How...?" I ventured.

"The Fellowship of Dark Magicians has determined every aspect of my life thus far. But now that the master of them all is gone, I can be free. All you need to do is find a way to unbind the demons from me."

"ALL we have to do?" Desmond scowled from the car.

"Then you'll be alright? Safe? Free?" I inquired.

"I pray." Ironside looked to the ground. "I will look for a cure myself now that my master is dead and can no longer control what I do." He looked at me with sad eyes. "But if I were to do it myself, the demons would rebel against me. In a coup they would surely destroy me. But if I can rid myself of them, then I stand a chance. My body is not broken enough to die once they leave me. But at the same time, the black Magic that bound them to my soul desires an equally powerful spell. Only you have the adequate white magic to destroy them."

"What do you mean...?"

"You think that your power just jumped because you learned something new? No... It's because Winifred's power was transferred to you, only you aren't versed enough to control it. You hold the 5 sacrifices required for the ultimate weapon of the Light... I do not know if it is enough to defeat the weapon of Darkness, but I pray it is." He folded his arms. "And I pray that it does not destroy me in the process."

"No, I can't do that to you."

"T... Do it." Desmond urged from the background, the little angel on my shoulder urging me to do the `right' thing.

"No! What if something goes wrong? I don't know what I'm doing!" I looked from Ironside to Desmond. "I can't lose you." I realize that that was a little ambiguous, but to think of life now without either of them was difficult. Near impossible.

"You do what you need to do Timothy." Ironside said to me patiently. "We shall meet at your former home in three days. We shall find an answer by then. I know it." He took his scarf off. His face was beautiful and cold. "I was saving this..." He fingered his scarf until there was a small white patch that rested on his index and middle fingers. He wiped the blood off his face and neck until the white patch was covered in crimson blood, making the scarf one solid colour. "I am finished." He said wrapping the scarf around his neck once again. "See you in three days." And he was gone, the demonic speed summoned him away.

I got into the driver's seat of the car. "You can't drive." Desmond said weakly to me.

"I've done a lot since you died." I gave him a side-long glance. I started the car and drove off without another word.

Chapter 52

"Where are we going?" Desmond asked meekly.

"I don't know. But you need to rest. So that's what we're doing." I pulled into a motel and rented a room. Before I let Desmond inside, I demon-proofed the room. No telling what Ironside would be trying. Yeah, I didn't trust him now that I knew he was a demon...s...

"Done?" Desmond asked as I moved him into the room.

"I'd expect you would do the same for me."

"I have." I placed him on the bed. "Well, I've gotta go and figure out a way to help

Ironside. I'll be back soon. Get some sleep. You're safe." He wouldn't listen to me, but I left anyways. The library would be the easiest way to access restricted journals on `fake magic' rituals and the internet in general. "I'll see you later.

On I drove. The local library allowed me to access all that I needed to. But no matter how many sites I surfed explaining exorcism, I couldn't find anything that would work on Ironside. There had to be something. I felt like a failure. After a few hours and ten dollars later for internet access, I gave up. There was nothing that could save him on the net. The net had everything... But alright. I accept.

The books in the library didn't hold anything on demonic possession. Obviously, it was a small library. Fuck Orillia. Despite the failure at the library, I returned to the hotel to find Desmond up and walking around, if slowly and hunched over.

"Hey..."

"Hey." He smiled at me.

"How are you?" This was an awkward conversation that didn't need to be. "I

mean..."

"I'm alright." He said and sat down on the messed up bed. He had been in a

restless sleep. "Nothing I can't handle."

"Stop being so tough. I know you're tough, you've got nothing to prove. Lay

down." I ushered him to the bed.

He fell asleep instantly so I got into my bed, within minutes I was fast asleep as well. The morning light woke me early it was extra bright since I didn't draw the blinds it was fine I needed time to research anyways. Desmond was still asleep.

"Where you goin?" he asked half asleep.

"I'm going to find out about Ironside and how to save him." I couldn't lie to him, it was a problem.

"He'll be fine."

"I know just give me a few hours to find out what's going on."

"Nah, you don't need to." He fell asleep. Damn people who need to heal! He was so tired, but I wasn't. If I left, then he would worry about where I was if he woke up.

"Diz?"

"Mh?" He was half asleep. That's fine, if he was asleep, then he couldn't object to anything that I proposed. I was right. I fled to the library for the second day. The internet gave me nothing again, despite searching for everything having to do with white Magic. The world just didn't know about it... Sad really...

How the fuck was I going to make it up to Kapsukasing to the Fellowship of Dark Magicians house and back in a day? If there even was anything that could counter their magic there, I didn't find it when I was there before.

In frustration I began looking through the books on demonic and Christian myth. I found nothing on how to exercise demons. Such a failure does not even deserve mention. I had failed Ironside, he who had saved Desmond This was crazy. I had to find something.

"Excuse me sir. The library has been closed for half an hour." The elderly woman smiled at me in a non-threatening way. "I'm sorry, but you need to leave while we restock the shelves for tomorrow." Well shit.

"Ok." I smiled at her in return. In actuality I wanted to kick her book-loving ass. I was busy... Even though I wasn't finding anything...

I returned to the motel with a sense of failure about me.

"Aw T... It's alright" Desmond was feeling better, he could walk without much difficulty and his pain was virtually gone. "You may not be able to save him. You need to understand and tell him. We've got to head on down to Toronto to meet up with him. You need to tell him that there is nothing we can do."

"But, I don't want that to be an option for him. It's not fair. He didn't choose his destiny, he didn't choose what he is!"

"Does anyone?"

"I guess not..." I mumbled, protecting the information that I had. "Are you ok to drive? I'm so done with that shit." He smiled at me.

"Ya... Totally." We checked out of the room and climbed into the car. "Oh baby I missed you." He talked to the car. "I'll never leave you again, I promise." He stroked the dashboard.

"Let's get a move on then T."

Chapter 53

I yawned as we pulled into the parking lot of the Royal York. Hang on what? This was like the most expensive place in Toronto... Right by Union Station and the water front... But I guess that if you're committing credit card fraud, then it didn't matter how much the place cost hmh?

A valet opened my door for me. "Good evening sir." He tipped his hat.

"Hi... Diz..."

"It's fine sir, we've just gotten back from a camping trip. Sorry if we seem... Lower class." He smiled.

"It's not my job to judge sir." Desmond slipped a bill into the valet's pocket. "But I think you're great anyways. If there's anything that I can do for you to make your stay more enjoyable, please let me know."

"We're fine." I grabbed Desmond's arm. I said to him as we walked through the front doors.

"Can I help you?" the desk clerk looked at us in an unimpressed way.

"Yes, I need a room please my good sir, two beds please. We've just come back from a camping trip and really need to be pampered." He slipped the man a bill. "I trust that you can take care of that."

"Of course sir." The bill made its way into the clerk's pocket. "I'll put you in room 511." He clicked away at his computer. "Is there anything else I can do for you?" he asked passing us a key.

"Yes, please send a bottle of champagne to the room in half an hour along with a menu of available room services. I trust there will be no problems." Desmond was priceless. It took a lot to stop me from laughing, but I would have blown the whole thing.

"Not a problem sir. Enjoy your stay."

"Thank you." Desmond led me to the elevator. He seemed anxious, tapping his foot and looking all around until the elevator dinged and we got out. The doors closed and turned on the light. Winnie was sitting on the bed.

"Hello boys."

"NO!" I shouted as she stood and we were flung around the room, knocking off every wall before landing on the floor.

Her white dress fell perfectly on her body. She looked younger than ever if that was possible. As a bit of blood etched down my face, I tried to attack her, but she would have none of it.

"Actually darling, those are mine." I felt the air escape my lungs. But there was more that left me, I felt so much weaker and powerless. "Much better." She cooed. "Back to normalcy... Despite your attempts to kill me Timothy."

"Winnie! I swear..."

"Silence Desmond." His mouth shut and his teeth clanged together. "No one needs to know what your pitiful mind can come up with." She reached to the night table and collected the damaged bowl she had come at me with before. "I have things to do anyways. Timothy… You have something that we all need." She looked into the empty bowl. "I know you think of me as evil, but you need to know that I am doing this for the betterment of mankind. I would gladly give my life for this, but I fear that you would be unable to control the power this spell would bestow upon you." She drew the knife from my belt loop. "So it must be me. I am the only one who can control it, and the only one who would be able to who exists anymore."

"Winnie, you don't have to do this. There has to be another way." I pleaded.

"Oh come now. Desmond had not picked up on anyone else. You're the only magic user left for possibly hundreds of years! And even I cannot live that long." Desmond looked at me with wide, surprised eyes. His mouth was still sealed. "He found you and it's you that I have to contend with." She looked to Desmond. "I'm sorry Dizzy but it's true. Everything you felt for Lucas and Timothy here was because you were meant to sense out white Magic users." Her gazed returned to me. "And now, the fifth and final sacrifice will be made for our cause. I'm sorry Timothy, but I did like you, but I think you understand, so your sacrifice will be accepted."

Her hand drew up high above her head. This was my end. Looking at it was torture, just get it over with. The story ends here... Or does it?

The dagger fell yet stopped at my heart and redirected itself. It missed me, but the force Winnie had put into it continued into her own leg. She screamed at released the dagger, the bowl fell to the floor. The handle was distinctly clear with a little something in the handle, but it was too far away for me to see what exactly it was. Richard's knife. It couldn't hurt me.

"AHHH! I will not permit your trickery! You must die!" She pulled the knife from her leg and let it fall to the ground. She picked up the lamp from the bedside table and pulled the shade off. Raising it high above her head, she brought it down on my head. The bulb shattered, bits sticking into me. The blood ran down my face instantly. Desmond moaned something, but he was still unable to speak or move.

"I'm sorry." She said as the lamp came towards my head for the last time. It was then that the window shattered, a saving grace.

Winifred screamed as a long katana pierced through her body just below her ribs. Withdrawing the sword and in a grand flourish, Ironside allowed her body to fall. I looked to him with sympathetic eyes. He had saved my life more than once now.

"Ah!" Desmond was released from Winnie's grasp as her blood panned out

along the floor. "T!"

"You are free now..." Ironside said. Desmond turned to him defensively. "I'll not bother you again if you have not found a way to free me."

"Ironside... I'm so sorry. I looked. I looked everywhere I could. But I found nothing." His gaze went to the ground where Winnie's blood continued to spread out along the ground.

"I understand." He said as Winnie's blood touched the bowl.

A brilliant flash of light followed. I took in a deep breath as I seemed to lift from the ground. Looking at the room from a heightened and white-tinted perception, Ironside's aura seemed to darken the space around him. Peeking out from his shoulders were seven black forms. I cocked my head and they shook. They screamed profanities at me and proclaimed my worthlessness to the world. I blinked and they were obliterated, disappearing in a flare of blackened dust.

"Ahh..." I moaned and fell to the floor. I saw what seemed to be unseen to the other two in the room. A blast of white light flew out the broken window, ruffling the curtains. It arched upwards and was gone once it hit the clouds.

"Common, help me." Desmond said to Ironside. The pair lifted me onto the bed. I felt so empty compared to when I saw the world through a white haze. Smells, colours and feelings were less than they had been. I could feel Desmond and Ironside in the room. I could feel the life leaving Winnie while the haze existed. But now... I was normal.

"Timothy, are you alright?" Ironside asked me, placing a hand on my shoulder.

"Don't touch him." Desmond knocked his had away from me. Ironside glared in defiance at Desmond. "Common!" Ironside jerked his head upwards. What would normally have sent Desmond flying to the far wall did nothing. A surprised expression was met with a punch from Desmond. As Ironside recoiled, a surprised look flooded his face.

"I'm..."

"T! Are you alright."

"I hope so..." I muttered. Managing to sit up, I looked to Ironside. "How are you?"

"I... I felt that. I feel hurt, angered, shocked... I... Feel..." He laughed hysterically and jumped around the room. "I can feel! I'm FREE!" He screamed. He bounced off the walls with joy. "I can't hear anything in my head. Only my own thoughts..." He took my hands in his. "You have given me more than I could possibly imagine. Thank you... Thank you..."

"You're welcome." I smiled at him. As free as he felt, I felt empty. All that power was gone. Winnie was right, I couldn't handle it if I had it. But I was alive. "Anytime... It was nothing."

"Don't be modest." Desmond pushed him away. The weakened man slunk to the floor. He laughed. "I love it! I love to feel!" He rose. "I've got to go... I've got to... I've got to live..." Even though his demonic speed was gone, Ironside fled the room in a blur of colours.

Alone with Desmond, I smiled at him. "Alone at last."

"Well..." He looked to Winnie's body. Smiling at me, he picked up the phone and dialled the front desk. "What the fuck! Oh my god... Some bitch just crashed through the window! What the hell is going on... 511! We were just down there! ... Well the glass got us a little, but we're fine yeah... You'd better! This is fucked up shit! ... Fine." He smiled at me in that stupid way that he does. "Our card has been upgraded." He flashed his access card at me. "To the penthouse!" He said in a childish and sarcastic way. "All expenses paid..."

I opened the door. But then he stopped and turned to Winnie's body. He spat on it and left the room, not looking back.

A swipe of the card in the elevator and we rose to the very top of the hotel. The lights were on for us and a beautiful view of the skyline astounded me. Awestruck, I wandered into the room. It was beautiful. The phone rang and Desmond picked it up.

"Hello? ... Ok. ... Questioning in an hour?" He looked at me and mindlessly licked his lips. "Can you make it two? ... I trust that you can given what we've been through. ... I thought so. Perfect." With that we both went into the suite. Both of us deciding to give hunting a miss for a while.

What you can't blame us after what we have been through, can you?

So that's it. That's my story. I wish that I didn't know the truth about the world, but I also know that I wouldn't have met Desmond. I tried many times in the following days to cast Pulsus or Volo, but it never worked. Say the word `Floccinaucinihilipilification' out loud and you'll get the same result. Sorta weird and you know it means something, but nothing happens. Desmond expressed interest in his `ability' to find White Mages, but nothing ever came of it either. I don't know what's around the corner for us, but we're doing it together. I know that sounds emotional and weak. But you know what? Fuck you.