The Stalker

It was raining outside, as Lucy saw outside her hotel window with her elbows firm on the window porch, lifting her rather sullen face glancing outside of the windows, seeing the small specks of water rolling down the window. At the same time, Lisa in another hotel room was observed the black tome, which had piqued her interest from the moment she laid eyes on it, grinning until she had reached a certain page with a spell, in the same room Mark was sitting on the couch, pretending to rest his eyes already gaining suspicion of Lisa with instinct alone and occasionally opening them to observe her. Socrates, sitting on the dining table then moved to Mark and rested on his belly, purring in satisfaction. Usually this gesture alone would send Mark angry and lead him to throwing the cat away from him, but this time, Mark ignored the cat and continued pretending to rest.

Andre, who regularly spent his time resting, was excited when he heard that the hotel featured a swimming pool, gym and sauna and spends most of the day boasting and achieving and even exceeding massive feats of heavy lifting getting stronger with each lift. He was determined to continue, even in the face of his own struggle and was persistent with each lift. His body sweating, his arms trembling, his mind focusing yet struggling but his heart constantly pumping, trying to overcome his battle of attaining strength.

Adrian on the other rested on the bed, closing his eyes and imagining, letting his mind ponder over the strange events of their journey. He seemed reluctant to move; as he was struggling to review the fact that this wasn't the happy adventure he expected it to be. From the faces he saw when they reached the hotel in the rain, he knew that it would take something little for everything to break into pieces. He opened his eyes, watching the fan on the ceiling rotating around swiftly and got up from the bed walking towards the clothes hanger with his jacket supported on one of the hangers. He reached into the pockets and in his hand emerged a photo of a young Claire and him with two other people in front of a Ferris wheel at night, he looked at the back of the photo and written in thick, dark ink wrote: Don't let her go… Until she has already made her decision…

Claire sat at the entrance of the hotel looking up in the lights, almost hurting her eyes. She sniffed, wondering if this journey is doing her any good. The entrance of hotel featured high ceilings with glamourous chandeliers. The floors were polished, almost to the point that you were capable to see a dim reflection of yourself. At one point, a little girl had lost her balloon as it floated high towards the ceiling, trapped in one of the expensive chandeliers that looked as if it was made from diamonds. Panicked by the loss of her balloon, she pulled her parents sleeve and pointed towards the yellow balloon that she had grown attached to and has lost possession of. The parents grew concerned, the father humourously jumping up towards the chandelier in attempt to retrieve it, despite it being too high for any normal man's grasp. Claire, slightly interested in the events pointed at the balloon and gestured with her index finger for the balloon to come to her discreetly. As she did so, the balloon slowly hovered towards her, with her taking hold of the balloon. The parents were too distracted by telling the receptionist for assistance in retrieving the balloon, while the girl walked towards Claire. The girl took tiny steps, and fell at one occasion but still smiled happy to see her balloon out of the chandeliers and to someone who might possibly return it to her. She was at least 5 years old and had little hair on her head, but hers were a shiny dark hair, her eyes widened as her tiny arms tried to reach for the balloon that was previously hers. She was adorable.

"Can I have my balloon back?"

"Sure, here you go." Claire said with much enthusiasm, in which she thought was amazing due to her sombre and dull attitude towards things at that moment. It was a change.

"Your eyes are purple." The girl said, out of the blue.

They are? Thought Claire. Why would they be purple? She peered on the shiny tiled floors and saw a reflection of herself, even when it wasn't very clear, the purple eyes glowed and were easily apparent from the shiny floors.

She's right… By why are they purple? She faced the floor, peering to see more of the purple eyes with the dim reflection and saw small shattered pieces of darkness flying into her pupils. It was exactly as when she saw Adrian, who too suffered from this predicament. That must have been the thing that Adrian saw in me in the plane! No wonder why he reacted so strangely.

Claire shut her eyes tight, shaking her head in disbelief and her hands pressured on her head, as if she was suffering from a headache. All of a sudden, she ran outside the hotel building without a thought, her mind was muddled and she had no idea what to do. She opened her eyes and felt heavy ran all over her clothes and head. She walked away from the hotel confused and out of her mind and couldn't comprehend the darkness that she saw within her eyes.

She didn't care that the rain was heavily pouring in the streets, she ran further and further away from the hotel, almost having in mind that she was never to return.

"Are you okay Lucy?" May asked, emerging from the bathroom with a toothbrush in her hands (with toothpaste all over her mouth, dripping onto the floor).

"Yeah, I'm fine… Really fine." Lucy said nodding her head, still watching the rain from her windows. May approached her. "Are you sure Lucy? You seem a lot different today. You've been watching the rain from the window ever since we got here. Look at me! Are you alright?" May demanded, expecting another lie from Lucy, but hoped for Lucy to speak truthfully.

Lucy turned her head slowly, nodding her head frequently. "Yes I'm fine… I'm really just fine" she said, smiling but May wasn't convinced by Lucy's response. However, she thought it wasn't deemed necessary and walked inside the bathroom yet again to continue brushing her teeth. As she left the sight of Lucy, she turned to the window again, with one arm wrapped around the other, while the hand the end of that arm was pressing against the window. The rain grew heavier and heavier, pressing harder against the window with each drop.

Andre stopped working out at the gym only to pass the entrance hall to see Claire disappear. He rushed to the elevators and pressed the buttons as fast as he could, as he was concerned of her disappearance. He went to each of the 3 rooms that each of the members of the group discussing about Claire's sudden absence. He gathered the group together in the dining hall that could be found at Adrian's room.

"What? She's gone, we have to try and find her!" May replied, releasing angelic wings from her back.
"Not so fast little Angel. The city is big, she could be anywhere in the city. It will take more than us to try and find her." Andre commented. Socrates gobbled up his dinner with haste, having no care over the situation.

"Is there anything you care about apart from your own stomach!" May said, outraged by Socrates' selfishness. "Our little girl Claire is out there somewhere and she could get hurt."
"I wouldn't worry about her if I were you. She was a waste of our time. Besides, she can return safely, unless she's incapable of barely taking care of herself with the power of the stars." Lisa said, taking no interest in the girl's safety while reading the dark tome.

"I don't want to go through the same shit we went through before Lisa. How dare you talk about Claire like she's none of your business! We care for her and we are all wishing for her safety. Accusing her of being a liability, look at yourself. You've caused more damage than you've helped us in this journey. And yet you don't see how generous you are staying with us."

"So is that how you really think Adrian? Your precious little Claire being the angel out of the whole situation while you viewed me as the person at fault? Please, you know this girl is the reason why we are stuck here for such a long time. Please explain what's beneficial to our journey than to be asked to wait nicely and patiently in the entrance of the hotel and then running off, making everyone else worry about her."

Adrian muttered things under his breath and gave up on arguing with Lisa. He cared for Claire, but knew that Lisa had a point pointing his head down at the floor playing with a rug that was positioned there with the side of his shoes and his hands in his pockets. Throughout the whole of the discussion (or arguments more like it), Lucy was left at the balcony and without anyone's notice, she was watching the rain and looking down from the height that she has be elevated and supported from. Her thoughts only lingered on futility and how futile it was to actually find any enjoyment out of this journey. The rain fell on her, but as she remained in her thoughts, she could think of nothing else and neglected the rain.

It was only until Adrian caught her with the corner of his eye that he rushed out and grabbed her. "What are you doing outside the rain, you'll get sick!" Lucy lifeless in motion closed her eyes, resting her head on his shoulders. "I don't care anymore…"

"What do you mean you don't care anymore?"

"Adrian… I've been holding on to this journey for so long. What does it really matter? If we can't even progress through this little obstacle then what can we do? Already we are acting like little children with these stupid arguments and this needing to avoid each other. I've had enough of it. It's time that I think…"
"Think what? Lucy what do you think?" Adrian said with alarm. "It's time that I need to rest and stop feeling so sad in this journey. I'm going to rest."

"I just want to eat! Do you have to bite my ear off with all your complaining?" Socrates said, in anger towards May. "Can't I just eat for once instead of having you destroy me with your yelling?"
The two constantly argued, Adrian appeared in the dining hall with his head down. Lisa picked up on this, realizing that Lucy wasn't with him. "She's taking another one of those stupid 'rests' again Adrian? She's been an awful pain to deal with these days."

Adrian clenched his fists in anger. "I'm warning you, one other word like that from you and I'll make you have an awful pain that you'll have to deal with and it will be a lot worse than you think." Adrian's eyes began to turn purple in colour; a dark aura surrounded him as pincers as if they were ready for attack.

Lisa quickly got her gun out of her pockets and readied her gun, holding it at his direction; a blue crystal began to shine around her neck. "So your true colours are beginning to shine? Well how do you feel knowing that I've got the powers of the moon on my side? Sit tight, cause I'll blow a hole right through you with my charged up Alchemy gun."

"Using your dead sister's powers? Seems unfair that you keep on milking the fact that you miss her, even though your ready to kill her spirit to kill me."

"You don't even know what you're talking about…" Lisa insisted, threatening to pull the trigger.

Socrates stood between them, holding his arms out gesturing to stop. "I'm sorry that I have to do this, but here it goes." He opened his palms, emitting two small balls of light towards them, hitting them direction and pushing them back against the walls causing them to faint.

"Socrates, why did you do that for!?" May asked.

"It's because they need to be separated. They can't be in the same room without fighting each other." Was Socrates' response.

"We've got a little girl that's disappeared. We've got to find her, quick!" Andre suggested, jumping and waiting to run outside the room.

"Wait, Andre. We have to separate them first… And I think it's futile to actually look for her now."

"What do you mean Socrates? She might be in danger!"

"But like Lisa said, it's a big city. We'll have no chance to find her. We are just going to have to wait until she returns…"
"What about the police? They can find her!" Andre suggested.

"The police will make too much publicity. We want to be discreet in our travels."

The three separated the two and then took watch over them to supervise their activities. Mark mysteriously vanished, only to be in his room, lying asleep on the couch.

Claire ran out in the rain, slowing down and looking back on how far she was from the hotel. It was a tall structure, so she felt compelled to walk further away from it, as she could always see it from a distance.

A suspicious man wearing a beige trench coat was following behind her with sunglasses and short but spiked brown hair. The girl started to walk faster and hold onto her amulet in preparation of the suspicious man, as he could be possibly a stalker. The man followed quickly behind, his steps could be head closer and closer until finally he had caught her under some shelter at a dead end.
He waved his hand across her face. "Oh no, you've already been infected by her curse." He waved his hand a second time across her face

"W-what are you doing to me?"

"Don't worry, I've got the powers to temporarily disable Mystic's dark curse of the moon. A curse that supposedly distorts your memory and… kills you slowly, but don't worry I'm here to help."

"Kills you slowly? The curse?"
"Yes, symptoms of the curse include: distortion of perception and memory, split personalities, newfound powers, irregular aggression and depression and the most prominent being purple eyes."

"How do you know all this? Who are you?"

"I'm David Esterton and I'm a medical magician for the Magic Alliance. Sounds funny when you put medical and magician together one after the other right? But that's what I am."
"The magic alliance… What on Earth is that?"

"It's a group dedicated to fighting against those that discriminate or cause harm against those with magical beings. I can't talk about much since you aren't actually a member. But I'm willing to help you out on your feet. Would you like to come to headquarters?"
"No! I barely even know you! David Esterton… What kind of name is that?"

"Well I born David and my father's surname is Esterton, there's no questioning that. Anyways, I'm glad to have met you, I've got to go to headquarters, and they called me up in a meeting. Bye!"

Claire stood in the rain watching the man run towards a certain direction and this time… She started to follow him to the mysterious headquarters of the Magic Alliance. Maybe this time, she may be able to find an answer because of her curiousity. While back at the hotel, Mark got out of the balcony and watched the full moon shine bright.

"Where are you heading? Trying to find the girl? I wouldn't bother if I were you" Lisa said

"Maybe I'll try look for her on the side, but for now I've got important business to attend to." Mark said, flying to the sky merging with the stars and scenery.