Saturday afternoon
Location: Video store, Santa Carla
"What the actual Fu-" Kai fumed at the video store clerk. Fumed was a polite word, he was actually blowing up in her face, "Where is he then?" The master of fire was waving his hands around like a mad man. Most of the regular video store patrons had left in a hurry, others had stayed behind to watch the spectacle unfold, standing back respectfully so as to avoid any backlash.
Zane, being the one who was usually the 'go to guy' for his calm demeanour and exemplary skills of diffusion, had to physically restrain the master of fire, pulling him back as he continued to glare at the meek curly haired girl behind the counter.
Her face was unreadable throughout. And her voice gave away no clues to her forced deception. "He doesn't work here anymore," Nicole stated monosyllabic, with a nervous disposition that would match any guilty criminal in a police line up.
"This is ridiculous," Kai threw his hands up in the air like a petulant child, for added emphasis, "-she's obviously lying, Zane."
"I think we should..." Zane started but was cut off by Kai's angry tirade that was still running its course.
Kai shot a look of disbelief at the female, "-so, you're telling me you haven't seen him since what Thursday, you're kidding me, right?" He was almost at the point of climbing over the counter with the lack of answers she was providing, "Do you think this is a game?"
Zane frowned at her expression and body language. Every movement she gave off was synonymous with a lie and the withholding of the truth. For starters; Zane noticed that her eyes were darting all over the place, then she was playing with her hair even her fingers were being nibbled on. "Kai," The calm master of ice hissed in his ear, "Not here, we can come back later." The latter said clearly under his breath so that the clerk and her male assistant wouldn't hear.
But the master of fire was still glaring at her, his hazel eyes were fixed onto her brown irises, "you think this is over, it's far from that...I want answers otherwise we're going to the police with this. Don't think we won't."
He kept his finger pointed at her, specifically at her, because the other assistant was near on losing control of his bladder and hadn't said a damned thing to ease the tension or relay any new information pertaining to Jay. No, he'd just stood back and watched it all unfold, not even stepping up to the plate once. So much for male bravado.
"KAI, please!" Zane urged, he was still unsure of her intentions or why she was choosing to purposefully hide this information. Maybe Kai was right. Maybe they needed to go back to the Sheriff, because something was most definitely wrong here. Gradually, he hoisted Kai away from the startled cashier before he had a chance to throttle her. Remarkably, in Zane's opinion, she stood her ground when threatened by Kai's brash attitude, although her hand looked to be two seconds away from dialling 911 and that was something Zane wanted to avoid.
He mused on how typical that would be to have to police force show up. It would be more likely that the police or Sheriff would turn up for a little disagreement involving a store and rowdy customer but at the same time they'd shrug their shoulders at the vast amount of missing persons. The numbers of which were increasing day by day.
"I am sorry, Miss..." Zane grunted as he heaved Kai off of the remaining section of counter. "-our mistake," he mumbled and hastily pulled Kai from the store. He watched from the corner of his eye as the female clerk started to speak to a young man. It was strange, suspicious activity to Zane and Kai knew it too. Her eyes and expression were almost calculative in nature, like she knew more than she was letting on.
In his heart, Kai knew that Nya wouldn't have made it up but heck, Jay was initially missing for just over 48 hours. Then somehow, miraculously, he just reappeared in his work attire at midnight; a little under two days ago and his overall appearance made him look like he'd been dragged up a ravine backwards... Something was definitely off, something was definitely a foot here. It was just a case of getting to the bottom of it, and at the same time getting to the bottom of what was wrong with Cole because the two were more than likely linked. After all, Jay vanished when Cole went off with those other men.
"I'm okay Zane-" Kai said as he snatched his hoodie out of Zane's impossibly strong grasp, "-I can walk myself ya know."
"I am sorry, Kai. You cannot afford to let yourself become over emotional like that," Zane released him and stood back a little.
Kai didn't respond to those calming double edged words, nor the fact that he'd been given free use of his body again.
Zane continued on "-I feel, or more likely, I know that something is a little suspicious in that store...but this situation now requires for us to be surreptitious from here on out."
"Agreed," Kai huffed and waited for Zane to walk around the car to the drivers side.
Both got into the station wagon once the thing had cooled down to a manageable heat. The old thing was sounding decidedly clunky this afternoon as Zane started the engine. He checked the rear view mirror and noticed a back door to the store. The locks wouldn't be too difficult to break, and repair after that. He wasn't really wanting to cause damage for Max because, as far as Zane was concerned; Max was just the old man that owned the place. And finally, they just wanted answers from his store because surely, this store couldn't be as clean and innocent as it looked from the outside?
"Do you not think that this whole thing is highly suspicious?"
"Suspicious?...More likely that Nya led us on a wild goose chase?" He regretted it as soon as he said it, dropping his head in shame ans he kicked the back of his pumps, "-uhm, I'm sorry Zane, I didn't mean that..."
Zane gave him the time to recollect his thoughts. He didn't want to interrupt Kai mid rant, he'd already done that once this holiday and Kai had almost flipped his lid at that time too, "take your time, Kai," he motioned, "This is not easy for any of us...what with what is happening to our brothers, and Jay."
"Zane, I just find it all a bit weird..."
"In what way, define weird?"
Kai raised an eyebrow, it hovered, questioningly, "Uh Jay vanishing again, mostly."
"...It's just that, well, Nya saw him last and before her it was Cole. Seems a little odd that even after both say that they saw the blue blur, he vanishes yet again." He sighed, closing the car door and placing his belt. "This whole place is weird, it gives me the creeps. Jay's apparently as elusive as the four leaf clover!"
"There could be a perfectly plausible explanation for it Kai?" Zane offered.
"What the way I feel or Jay?"
"Jay, actually...both" Zane stated. He was signalling to manoeuvre and waiting for someone to let him onto the busy stretch of road. "What are you thinking Kai?"
"That he didn't have a job here to begin with?"
Zane was in typical safe driver mode, "No, I am fairly sure he worked here. I was here when he had an informal meeting and was offered the position after a thirty three minute interview."
"I was being..." Kai shook his head, "It doesn't matter. Look, we need to speak to Nya again."
"And Cole?" Zane suggested.
"I'm not going near him until he can prove he isn't going to bite any of us..."
"And just how do you propose that, we really do not have a choice in the matter?" Zane asked as he pulled off cautiously, "-besides, have you bought a metallic gag, actually do not answer that. That I would rather not know."
Kai scrunched up his face in mock disgust, "No, just maybe we can tie him up and stuff,"
"That is a little barbaric, No?"
"What? Zane are you listening to yourself," Kai was subconsciously licking his lips as a cyclist passed close to his passenger side door. "Should I remind you that he tried to bite a chunk out of Lloyd, almost got the dog too."
"The dog?" Zane released a sigh, "It was a moment of weakness."
"Moment of weakness, who has those?" The proximity of the cyclist to Kai's side was obscenely close, he could have grabbed her and licked her all over. Until he shook that worrying thought from his mind, "God dammit, I'm so hungry. Can we have steak tonight?"
"Excuse me?" Zane said, waiting patiently for the lights to change.
"Steak?"
"What?" Zane mentioned again, turning his head slowly to watch Kai leering and drooling out of the window like a slobbering dog. Not that Kai was panting or anything, he was exhibiting some very extraordinary traits that didn't seem to stem from his own psyche. At least not from any part of Kai that Zane had ever noticed before.
"Mmmm, juicy!"
"Wow," Zane exclaimed, he wasn't entirely sure what was going on in Kai's head at that exact moment but whatever it was, it wasn't healthy or normal. "Kai, that was a very sudden and intense change of subject, even for you!" He noted, turning his head slightly to observe Kai's increasingly peculiar behaviour. "Something you wish to share with me?"
"Uhm, no...just come over...hungry."
"Indeed, you have," Zane noted, "-that small fact could also be attested by the excess salivation you are exuding whilst you look at that female to your right."
"Wh-what?" Kai mumbled, still staring out the window at her.
Zane released a deep sigh, Kai was not listening to him at all. He was in his own world, somehow guided by hunger, not that he was going to be able to get his fill of food from a human. Zane had been warned of how grouchy a man could get when he was hungry, the same could be said of Cole and Jay too. But this was just bizarre and quite surreal to witness. Now Kai was acting strange, well stranger than he normally did, and Zane had noticed these slight changes a little over twenty hours ago. He'd said nothing, of course. He'd been more preoccupied with helping Cole to come back to terra firma and then talking about it in great depth than he had been to notice Kai's mood fluctuating when he got back from picking Nya up from her shift at the diner.
Still, to placate the master of fire, Zane kept up the premise, "-Kai, we can ask Donald, I am sure he has some Porterhouse and T-Bones in the deep freeze." He tested the waters, "Besides, frozen steaks and those that are aged provide the best flavour."
"Mmm, nothing fresh and just killed then?" Kai licked his lips again at the image of such succulent juicy uncooked steaks dripping down his mouth. Again he rubbed his face vigorously to remove the thought that just seemed to erupt from nowhere. He almost felt like he was feeling some of what Cole had felt and the thought shook him to the core. "Actually Zane, you're right...frozen would be b-better."
"Kai, are you alright? You are acting different..." Zane stated without a hint of irony. He was the epitome of different but everyone had grown used to him.
Zane had noted that the master of fire was wafting himself and simultaneously wiping at his mouth whilst looking at the cyclist next to him. Zane swore that if Kai was any closer to her he would have slid out of the window and began the startings of human sexual interactions judging on the fact he was staring at her lustfully, or was there something else because he was not looking at her face. His gaze was glued to her jugular vein and carotid artery. "KAI?" He shouted a little too loudly, before toning down his voice somewhat. "This is not acceptable, these light sequences are taking far too long to change?" He muttered under his breath.
"Mmm, yeah?" The master of fire had stopped wiping his mouth for a few seconds, his tongue had uncovered something impossibly sharp and he quickly wound his window back up. Now he was looking dead ahead, "s-sorry, I think it's the stress of losing J-Jay and Cole..."
"Oh, you are back here with me now are you?" Zane questioned, pulling off slowly as the light eventually changed. "You seemed to have zoned out for a moment?"
"Tired, I guess..." Kai squinted when the sun poked through the cloud cover. It bathed the station wagon in rays of sweltering hot sun, until the clouds gobbled it up again, "Maybe it's being so close to the sea that's why I'm tired?"
"Hmm, maybe when we get back, you can have a lie down and I shall bring you some relaxants and a hot chocolate," Zane said as he turned the car onto the winding country lane, "Nya and myself will keep an eye on Cole. I mean, it is not as difficult as you mention...he has spent the entire morning sleeping in his room. I doubt that he has even left his room since he came back."
"That's because he's a fricking creature of the night..." Kai grumbled and slunk further down into his seat, "Been screwing her, he wreaks of perfume and stuff...lipstick pfft!"
Not that Zane was suspicious of every member of his family but Kai's behaviour was perilously close to how Cole had been. Minus the obvious floating sky high or the lack of a bodily reflection. However, there was the moodiness and the fact that Zane had had to literally drag Kai out of bed at 2pm today. He was squinting his eyes in the day, so much that he shielded his irises and pupils from the midday sun. It wasn't even that sunny, there was some serious cloud cover but even that was too bright.
The rest of the journey had been mostly small talk because Kai seemed to stop commenting, he was mumbling on occasion and his hand remained covering his mouth.
Both Zane and Kai had travelled the remainder in almost silence.
Depending on Kai's current behaviour, things would be liable to change at the flick of a switch. But regardless of this, their first and initial plan had been to come back after nightfall for a little breaking and entering with the brothers three Kai, Zane and Lloyd.
The only real reason for this was due to Zane having a strong feeling that the video store had to be hiding something. It all looked friendly and neontastic from the outside. From the inside it was all translucent perspex and bright garish colours that made the customers want to come in and peruse all that was on offer. A wall full of tv's on the furthest wall, nothing really looked out of place on this ground floor. But they were hiding something, and this place had to herald some clues to Jay's repeated disappearances.
Someone had to know something.
Back at Donald's homestead, the old man was tinkering with his car. The car that never saw daylight because it was always hidden under a tarpaulin 364 days of the year. He was being quiet, obviously deep in thought as he changed the spark plugs and wiped each on his suede apron before placing them back into their allotted slots.
"Eh, ya back are ya?" He hollered with a face and expression that could have rivalled that of the grinch, minus the bad teeth, green fur and further penchant for mischief.
The old man may have seemed ignorant to what was happening around him but he was always aware and his hearing was still perfect, "I heard about Jay," he said and finally turned around, "I'm sorry, I wish there was more I could do for ya...other than what you've already done, that is."
Obviously meant in reference to the facts that they had reported him as missing because that's all they could do. Report and wait.
"It is fine, in a way." Zane stated monosyllabic, "Nya claimed she saw him two nights ago."
He lied, It wasn't fine. Everything was falling apart. Cole was a half vampire and somehow Kai was heading that way too. Jay was ex communicado and had vanished off the face of Santa Carla and Lloyd was untrusting of anybody except for a select few of his kin, Nya and the Frog Brothers.
"Misako is due to arrive today," Zane said, changing the subject and the subsequent awkward silence, "-she should be here in a a few hours."
Donald had stood upright, now with a huge grin on his face, "-I'll make her a good meal then. I reckon she'll be hungry after that commute?"
"Eh Lloyd, what's her favourite food? she like a bit a chilli? or is she a good ol homegrown corn lovin girl?"
Lloyd cringed at Donald's over bearing nature. He knew that the old man had a thing for Ms Johnson, who ever that was, but his mum was strictly off limits. "She likes most food Don- Donald," He was standing behind the car that Donald was working on. It was the only thing he could do to make himself feel worthwhile rather than wiling away inside the house...feeling like a failure at having let his team down.
"She like wine too?" Donald asked.
"I think she prefers water, or Sake." Lloyd suggested. Both of which were clear and pure and neither could be passed off as anything else. "Zane, tonight? You still good?" He still knew of the plans, he'd been the one that suggested both Kai and Zane scope out the video place to figure out why Jay hadn't come back home.
Zane nodded.
"You find anything?" Lloyd asked, hopefully as he joined Zane's side. His green eyes were searching for the answers, looking for any hint of a clue that Jay was back with them.
"It was..." Zane paused, "...I shall tell you later, Lloyd as there are things we need to discuss behind closed doors."
Throwing a nice dinner was the last thing on their minds. Getting Jay back was the priority, then helping Cole after that. Wining and dining was most definitely not on Lloyd's list, even if it was for his mum. And if the majority of assembled ninja would attest, they would certainly have preferred to have been out looking for him tonight. Rather than sitting around a table and listening to some old coot talk about living in this big old house on his own.
So the plan still stood.
After dinner tonight, all loaded up with as much garlic as they could bear. They would take a trip to the video store and begin their close surveillance on the video store that belonged to Max, and this time they would get their answers.
