Chapter 17 -A Glimpse of Carl Winters

Everything was different.

He hadn't realised that his brother was taller and leaner than him - or what used to be him. The lanky frame needed some getting used to operating, like changing from automatic to manual gear shift - some things just needed more concentration and care.

For example, he knew Melvin was red-green colour blind. But what it meant didn't really click until his favourite pair of sneakers looked a weird shade of red instead of the forest green he knew it was. The height of this new body also messed with his gait and he had to get used to the difference of perspective even if it was merely three inches extra from what it had been before. Seeing himself in the mirror for the first time after his transition, now that had been a shock to the system, even if he knew exactly what he had done. The accusation of betrayal he had glimpsed in Melvin's kind green eyes had sent him reeling before he had reigned himself with an answering glower. Melvin was gone. For good! he had repeated to himself over and over until he had seen his own slightly tired yet triumphant self staring back at him through the mirror. To tell that his first shower had been an experience would be saying Tom Brady was some athlete. Under-fucking-statement.

Drag your damn head back in the game, Carl. He chastised himself as he walked along the deserted corridor of the left wing of the main building. He did not need the distraction of those unproductive thoughts right now, not when he had an important task ahead of him.

Hecate, the goddess of all things grey, had struck him as a right erratic bitch. That life-changing meeting happened during the first hour of his…demise. That strange period of time was still etched into his memory, surrounded by a dark plethora of wild emotions that still made him feel wrong when he examined them close enough.

He had been in a numb, dissociated state, hovering over his still body that lay at an awkward angle next to one of the lion cub statues of the fountain. He still remembered feeling queasy after noticing the impossible angle of his neck and how his right arm rested on the bank of the pond, bent and twisted and broken. Then there was the blood - the thick coppery scent that had sent his insides rebelling to expel anything and everything as he had been compelled to watch - frozen and befuddled and helpless - as that red liquid had continued to flow out of his unresponsive body to pool around in a dark puddle. Only there hadn't been anything in his guts to vomit. He had no guts, no throat, no body - no nothing.

It still puzzled him how he had smelled his own blood that day.

Stuck in a strange state of invisible and intangible existence, he had wondered what happened to him until the memory of his last moment had hit him like a bolt of lightning. He recalled the rage - that pure, all-encompassing white-hot fury at the one who had made him kill himself - blazing like an erupting volcano that engulfed his entire existence, or what was left of it by then.

There may have been a light, a ruffle of feathers and maybe an impression of a dark cloak swinging in the wind. The memories right after that intense fury were still hazy, until the moment Hecate, the goddess of doorways, crossroads, witchcraft and the moon chose to make her appearance - wearing smiles in all three of her otherworldly faces that had been glorious in their malevolence.

The memory of her lethal presence still gave him shivers as his mind inevitably drifted over to that encounter.

-oOo-

He was badly startled by the strange voice that suddenly came from nowhere and everywhere at once. Those mystical tones reverberated inside his mind like a riot of tinkling bells caught in a heavy gust of wind, instantly demanding his attention.

"Carl Winters… oh, Carl Winters…"

He turned so fast at that call, his form - Oh God! His transparent, shapeless, cloud-like form that looked like it could vanish any moment - wavered and blurred dangerously, confirming his panicked realisation.

"Huh!" he wasn't sure whether he was actually talking or projecting his thoughts directly into the… entity's mind. "W-who are y-you?"

At his question, an image manifested before him. An image that was so unimaginably strange it took his breath away for a long moment.

She was made of moonlight, stardust and waves of a stormy ocean, his muddled mind started to babble like a not-very-great poet. Her form wavered and changed every passing moment, shining in shades of gold, silver, jade and sometimes a lethal crimson. Her long hair reminded him of a dark moonless sky and her faces - all three of them, had varying expressions that changed from amusement to anger and contempt at incomprehensible intervals. Hidden in the wild whirlwind of her manifestation, he thought he glimpsed a few dogs - massive hounds with blazing red eyes - howling in anticipation.

"I am Hecate," the voice sang in his mind. "I am the ruler of the crossroads and doorways, the lady of witchcraft and magic, and the deity of the night, stars and the moon," then she glided closer, making him feel like a fly caught in a gale. "The strength of your emotions, your righteous convictions have drawn me to you from afar…"

From afar alright, he thought to himself. She did not look or feel like she belonged in this world.

"What, uh… what happened?" he asked in trepidation, hoping somehow this goddess would say that he was mistaken in his assumptions. That he was not yet done with his life.

Her laugh was as gentle as pelting hail on battered and bare skin. "You know what happened, Carl Winters." Her song turned mocking. She had nothing but contempt for his plight.

"Why did I have to die?" he screamed in frustration. His anger had given him some strength to stand up to this bully of a goddess.

"Oh, child, isn't that the question all you humans ask when the time comes for you to pass?" she asked rhetorically, glancing at his dead body cooling by the fountain. Already forgotten. Her face twisted in revulsion. "That is a rather nasty death indeed."

Screw you, bitch! "I will avenge myself!" he snarled.

"Yes, you will!" When she turned back to look at him, there was a look of contemplation in her onyx eyes. "I can see your determination shining as bright as the sun itself."

"I, uh, how, though? I'm not real. I'm not substantial," he looked down at himself and wailed. "I'm nothing but wind…"

"Alas, you are, Carl Winters," she agreed before her gaze turned contemplative. "I may be able to help with that condition of yours if you are amenable to a bargain perhaps?"

"A bargain?" he was sure his confusion came through laced in his tone, even if he didn't have a face to twist into a frown. "Did you mean you want to offer me something?

"Indeed. I can offer you many things, Carl Winters. I'm a goddess after all."

His curiosity peaked. "Like what?"

"Knowledge, power, information…" she trailed off

Why couldn't this woman give a straight answer?! "That doesn't tell me anything, lady."

She narrowed her eyes and pinned him with a look that said she did not care for his tone. He felt trapped, and insignificant in her all-encompassing presence. The realisation that she could swat him like the fly he was left him trembling in fear. Satisfied that she had him properly chastised and humbled, she released him from her lethal gaze, smiling another teasing smile.

"You are a lost soul, Carl Winters, untethered and not belonging to this world anymore," she informed him conversationally. "Even though you have successfully managed to avoid the call of your minder, there are others, agents, who hunt the likes of you to send you to Purgatory where you'll suffer stuck in a limbo with no way out,"

"What?!"

"I can give you knowledge about those hunters and how to avoid them," she murmured. "I can grant you the power to fight back against those hunters. I can teach you how to regain another body for you to live in. I can give you information about how that girl managed to hurt you in the first place…"

Put into a list like that, the lady knew exactly what he needed. He wanted to break into a grin, but the lack of facial features stood against his intentions. But Hecate seemed to understand him just fine, he thought, judging by the indulgent grin she flashed at him.

"Yes," he said with conviction. "I have nothing to lose, nothing to give but myself and my words. I'd do anything to be able to pay back for what had been done to me, Hecate," he met her gaze unflinchingly, and he was pleased to see approval in her glinting eyes. "I'm prepared to bargain with you, my lady."

"Very well."

-oOo-

"Must separate the Shield and the Shepherd, for they are too powerful together," Carl muttered to himself as he turned the corner. For that, he needed something more substantial than flimsy spell casting. According to Hecate, the Shield he had to deal with could disintegrate those without much effort. What he needed was…

There. The two-man patrol was exactly where they were supposed to be. Mr Gray and his rigid schedule had some of them walking these corridors - even during these deserted hours. The strength the mad goddess had lent him was more than enough to take off this minor inconvenience and acquire the weapon.

It was almost painfully easy and simple. Both of them turned together hearing his footsteps. He saw the way their shoulders relaxed at the sight of him - just another kid, he could almost see them thinking, up until the moment he was right in their personal bubble.

His right fist lashed out at the agent on the right. He was in his mid-forties, silver-haired and had the demeanour of an ex-soldier. The right hook took him by surprise and he went down in a heap. Carl couldn't have done it with the awkward limb of Melvin without the extra boost Hecate had given him, and as it happened he didn't even feel any pain when the back of his knuckles impacted the agent's jaw with a satisfying crunch.

The second agent managed to snap out of his shock and went for the gun in his hip. Carl struck out with his left and clamped his hand around the man's wrist. He felt the bones grind under the pressure he applied and used the distraction of the agent's agony to punch him with his free hand. He ended up crumpled on the floor next to his colleague, leaving his gun in Carl's hand. He made quick work of the agent by taking their communications gear, spare weapons and ammunition. Then he dragged them both inside the nearest broom closet and locked the door with them deposited inside, hands and feet thoroughly bound.

Granted, it was not going to keep the lot of them away from him for that long. But he didn't need that long to execute his side of the bargain.

Tucking his new supplies into his backpack, he calmly strolled on the corridor to the end of the wing where the library was located right next to the emergency stairs that led up to the rooftop. He could catch up on his reading homework until his prey showed up in a few moments.

-oOo-

Frank stood up and stretched, cracking the sides of his neck and back. Checking his watch, he realised that only a little over two hours had passed. It felt like a lifetime had passed listening to the Saunders twins, learning a whole lot of things that were still tumbling around his brain in circles. He took a deep breath and concentrated on what needed to be done first, pushing the rest of it to process and understand later.

"Are you guys feeling alright?" He asked, looking down at the girls who hadn't moved. Constance had her face firmly hidden behind her hands and Temperance was rubbing her temples in circles, her eyes squeezed shut. Joe was supinely sprawled on the carpet, staring up at the ceiling, blinking slowly.

Constance looked up from her hands and squinted. Frank stared back, taking in her rumpled look; her eyes were red-rimmed, her hair was a mess and she looked wiped out. There was something different about her appearance, something he really couldn't pinpoint.

Her eyes narrowed, noting his scrutiny. "You are so young," she said, and then frowned. "Why are you so young?"

"Excuse me?"

"So are you!" Temperance screeched at Joe, causing his brother to jump to his feet and get away from her in one graceless, flailing move. "What the hell was I thinking?! I'm usually great at guessing ages! Constance!" she wailed.

"I know," Constance let out an enraged growl. "I'm going to kill Sierra," she declared, sounding completely serious. "I'll leave Sienna to you."

"Um, what's going on?" Joe asked, crouching next to his bed.

The twins glared at each other for a full minute before looking away. Both of them let out loud exhales at the same time, slumping into dejected postures.

"We can finally see you clearly now the way we should have," Constance mumbled, studiously avoiding eye contact with Frank. "All this time we were seeing the two of you through a veil of influence - a forced, planted, attraction…" she trailed off. Frank could see a blush creeping up to warm her pale cheeks. "Goddammit! You're just babies–" she muttered to herself, shaking her head.

Frank exchanged another confused glance with Joe who looked just as lost. "What?"

"How old are you and your brother?" she asked tiredly.

"I'm eighteen," Frank said, finally starting to understand the reason for their embarrassment. "Joe's a year younger."

"See…" she glared before hiding her face again. "Babies! Urgh–"

"Hey, it's alright," Frank said softly with a chuckle. "We knew even if you didn't. Neither Joe nor I would have let things get carried away anyway if that's what you're upset about–"

"All the same, I'm sorry for the, uh, you know all the aggressive flirting," Temperance said to Joe earnestly before turning to her sister with a murderous expression. "I can't believe they tainted us with temptation of all things…Those bitches…"

"I'm sorry too," Constance mumbled, looking somewhere at Frank's chest. "You're like a little brother. We would have seen through you right away if we hadn't had our perceptions altered–"

"Really? How?" Frank asked, curious. "The others never seemed to notice, and as you know, a lot of others talked to us."

"Well, we have always been good at guessing ages," Temperance explained. "We're good at reading people because of the way we perceive the auras of other people," then she turned to Joe and sighed. "I wasn't kidding when I told you yesterday night about the control one can exercise over another person just by reading and understanding an aura–"

"We've shared the news about you with all our close friends after Willow told us about you," Constance took over. "We were very excited about the entire thing. I guess Sierra and Sienna thought it would be better to influence us to take a liking to you immediately, to draw you in to help with Willow's condition."

"I wouldn't know about that," Frank said thoughtfully. "Those two have been stirring a lot of trouble, and they messed with you to keep you from finding out. Maybe they are up to something that none of us knows about just yet."

"Besides you two look a bit different now too," Joe added before flashing a grin. "You don't look like creepy mirror images anymore. I could actually see the subtle differences in your features."

He received two narrow-eyed glares that had Frank worrying about his brother's continued existence for a long second. Then they both broke into laughter. "Thank you," Temperance said, chuckling. "It's because the alterations on our aura had an effect on the way our image was presented," then she turned to her sister and shook her head. "I'm just glad we got this cleared up."

"Me too," Constance nodded, finally standing up. "Let's go kill some bitches."

"Not yet," Frank interjected. "We need those bracelets you talked about earlier and then we need to find out where Melvin is."

Temperance went back to their dorm to retrieve the charmed bracelets while Constance texted her friends, trying to find out where the rest of their gang had gone, namely the Phillips twins and Melvin Winters. Temperance returned as they all waited for someone to reply with the information.

"There you go," Temperance tied the simple, beaded bracelet on Joe's left wrist behind his watch and pulled the sleeve of his t-shirt over it to cover it. When she did the same on Frank's, the bracelet let out a hiss and a few sparks before setting on the skin around his wrist, drawing out a surprised gasp from him.

"What the hell was that?" Joe glared at the bracelet as if it were a snake. "Did it hurt?"

Frank shook his head. Temperance sighed. "That's what your brother does. He just dissolved a solid three months of work."

"Oops. Sorry."

"Not your fault, Frank," Constance said, looking up from her phone as Temperance tied a bracelet on her. "I just found out where we need to go."

"Where?"

Constance took the last bracelet from Temperance and tied it on her sister's wrist with single-minded concentration. They both had long-sleeved Lincoln jackets on, so they could hide the charms under the sleeves. "Sierra just texted me back. Melvin wants to treat us all to lunch to celebrate his return. Apparently, he wants to talk and clear the air. He wants to bring the Wolves, Hyenas and all of us back together, so to speak. They are all on the rooftop of the main building. We are invited to the party."