"Shh!" Astrid hissed as soon as she heard the door open.
Sam blinked and squinted in the dark of the room to make out Astrid climbing over bodies as she hurried over towards them, telling them to be quiet. She climbed over the mattresses on the ground and hurried to help them in and stand so they were not disturbing anyone else sleeping in the room. Emily was on a blow up mattress, completely asleep and only half her body actually on the mattress under the quilt, lying face down with the other half on the tiled floor of the kitchen, her wrist pressed against the kitchen cabinets. She was dressed in strange panda pyjamas; a large head on the top and little panda's covering the bottom, they were blue apart from the black and white pandas. While Kevin was on the sofa, curled up comfortable and completely under the quilt so happily that he must have only just fallen asleep, though he snored quite loudly, filling most of the room. And then Roger, who was lying on the spare mattress, blinking like he had just woken up from a gentle sleep, dressed only in his top and boxers. He slowly sat up and looked over when the door opened.
"Everyone asleep already?" Sam whispered, feeling strangely happy.
"It's been a long day for them." Astrid shrugged. "Come on. We can talk in Diana's room. I think she's still awake."
"Here." Edilio whispered, handing the butterfly to her. "If you don't mind I'm gonna join the others and get some sleep in."
"That's fine. You're sharing with Roger." Astrid explained.
She took the butterfly from him and locked it in the same cabinet as the Lizzie Lizard. Sinder Butterfly was moving but it was hard to see because of the darkness so Astrid didn't get a good look before she was locking it away and joining Dekka and Sam as they tiptoed over to Diana's room. Edilio stripped off down to his boxers and climbed in beside of Roger, moving close to feel his body before the two of them drifted back to sleep together.
After knocking gently on the door they stepped inside to find Caine yawning and rubbing his eyes like he had just been asleep, or was fighting off sleep. Diana was on her feet, arms crossed, scowling at him like they had been arguing, dressed for bed but refusing to get into the bed. No time for that now, though.
"So what happened?" Astrid asked, sitting on the edge of Diana's bed in front of Caine's feet, Diana sitting beside of her.
Sam explained about the butterfly. He told them how it had mutated in front of their eyes and even explained how they had caught it. It felt important to point out to Astrid that this creature was acting territorial like the Zekes over this tree it had settled in. She didn't say anything but her lips kept pursing and unpursing so she clearly wanted to say something. In the end she waited for Sam to finish his story.
When he was done he puffed and huffed to get his breath back, waiting for her to give him the answers. The problem was that Sam was now used to the fact that sometimes Astrid just didn't have any answers for him. And this was very much the same. He could see the clock was ticking in her head but she didn't give them any answers.
Then she just gave up and sighed, shrugging her shoulders and glaring down at her body like she was to blame for not knowing.
"I don't know," Astrid growled. Sam smiled, remembering how much she hated saying that.
"What do you mean you don't know?" Caine scowled.
"I mean I don't know!" Astrid snapped, turning to glare at him. "If you have any answers, Caine, then feel free to step forward!"
Caine scowled at her as she turned away from him. Everyone else looked back at Astrid apart from Diana. Diana watched Caine and frowned at him as he leaned back and sulked. Did he know something? Had he received any answers in his dreams? But she would have to wait; she couldn't blurt it out in front of everyone else. If she did then Caine would clam up and refuse to tell them anything.
"Look we better just get some rest." Sam sighed. "We're all a little frustrated and tired from so much work. Plus, we'll have a better chance of thinking answers with a clear head."
"I suppose so..." Astrid grumbled but she didn't seem happy about it. She turned to Dekka. "I hope you don't mind, we don't have much room so you'll have to share a bed with Emily."
Dekka didn't mind but she would have rather not. She liked having a bed to herself so she didn't have to worry about kicking when she had nightmares (or anything even more embarrassing when she had nicer dreams of Brianna) but it looked like Emily wasn't going to be on the mattress much longer anyway. It was rude anyway to argue so she just nodded her head. After changing in the kitchen she lay down in her dark purple plain night gown beside of the moaning girl and was asleep within seconds of shutting her eyes.
Astrid and Sam went into their own room, being careful to avoid Quinn who was stretched out on the camp bed with limbs hanging down beside of him at the end of their bed. They climbed into their beds, barely stripping much clothing before curling up beside one another. Slowly in the night they did somehow strip off until they were left in their underwear, both too lazy to change properly into their night clothes. Astrid moved up and rested her head on Sam's chest. She loved falling asleep like this, able to hear his heart beat, listen to his life. And he loved feeling her in his arms, feeling her safe and with him. It made the nightmares easier when he woke up.
Meanwhile Diana walked over and made sure the door was tightly shut before she went back to Caine's side and crawled up onto the mattress, moving to his side and placing a hand on his head.
"Tell me the truth now, okay." Diana whispered.
Caine sighed and rolled his eyes.
"Seriously. What did you dream about?" Diana whispered.
Shrugging and wincing, Caine pulled himself up and looked at her. "It wasn't really much this time. It was of me, falling after Pete looked at me in the eyes and I saw a load of images all around me and I felt my body burning and then I blacked out and woke up back here on the bed again."
"What sort of images did you see?" Diana pressed.
"I dunno..." Caine mumbled and thought hard about it. "Okay. I saw... I saw a Parrott that kept shouting something. And I saw leopard that lifted off into the air. I saw a bird that was screaming and I saw a badger that seemed to be smashing invisible objects around it with its paws. And then I saw this... Something, I don't know what it was. It had a cat lion like mask and was touching me and my arm burned and... And loads of other stuff too. None of it made any sense."
"Maybe those are the animals we're looking for." Diana whispered. "What else did you see?"
"I don't know it all blended in with each other. They were the ones I remembered. A parrot, a leopard, a bird, a badger and a weird Egyptian like thing." Caine mumbled.
"An Egyptian thing?" Diana blinked. That wasn't an animal... But then the butterfly wasn't exactly an animal either.
"Yeah. I remember it vaguely from cartoons and stuff but I can't remember what it was called." Caine shrugged.
"Hmm... I think Astrid had a book around here somewhere about that stuff..." Diana mumbled.
"Of course she does." Caine said, rolling his eyes.
Diana left the bedroom and spent a few minutes stumbling in the dark. She was trying not to wake everyone else up but Astrid and the others had pushed their small home made book shelf to the side and she had to pull it away from the wall in order to reach around and began to shuffle through the books. And even then she had to pull out her phone to use as a light so she could see their covers before finally pulling out a thick white hard backed cover book about Egyptian life. She carried it back to the bedroom, nearly tripping over Edilio in the process. The book was at least as big as her torso and she threw it down onto the bed with a huff before quickly shutting the door again.
"What am I meant to do with this?" Caine snorted.
"Look through it, flick the pages and find the one with the thing you saw." Diana shrugged. "Just see if anything jumps out. Maybe you do, maybe you don't. No harm in trying."
Caine hesitated but then slowly opened the first page and began to flick through. Diana sat down beside of him and watched the pages closely though nothing really seemed very interesting, to her at least. There were a lot of strange symbols and beliefs and rituals in the book. There were at least three whole pages full on that focussed about the funerals and death they followed, making mummies and locking them in tombs underground. It looked interesting but Diana got bored after reading a few lines when Caine happened to pause on a page long enough for her to read. He looked at each of the pictures but none of them seemed to stand out to him. They didn't look like the creature he saw in his dream.
And then he saw it. It was near the end of the book but it looked exactly like it did in his dream when he was falling passed it before it burned his arm.
"This is it." Caine said, turning the book to her.
Diana frowned down at the page. She slowly began to read the page out loud as if for both of their benefits.
"Sekhmet is one of the oldest known deities. Her name is derived from the Egyptian word 'sekhem' which means 'power' or 'might' and is often translated as the 'Powerful One'." Diana said, already finding herself to be growing bored. "She is depicted as a lion-headed woman, sometimes with the addition of a sun disc on her head. Her seated statues show her holding the ankh of life, but when she is shown striding or standing she usually holds a sceptre formed from a papyus, the symbol of northern or Lower Egypt, suggesting that she was associated primarily with the north. However, some scholars argue that the deity was introduced from Sudan, south of Egypt, where lions are more plentiful."
"That's what I saw?" Caine snorted.
"It's too much information to get at once." Diana grumbled and began to skim over the page quickly, only picking up little bites of detail. "... A temple was constructed by yadda yadda ya... It was hoped the Sekhmet would protected the border, blah blah blah... Sekhmet's main cult and centre was in Memphis where she was worshipped as 'the destroyer' along side others, yabba yabba yab..."
"God this is pointless." Caine moved and lay down, careful of his side and shutting his eyes, prepared to sleep some more.
Diana, however, was still interested and ignored him to continue to read aloud. "Sekhmet was represented by the searing heat of the mid-day sun... terrifying goddess... friends could avert plague and cure disease..." She stopped and frowned down at the page. "Hey, listen to this. She was the patron of Physicians, and Healers... She was basically a healer... and her priests became known as skilled doctors..."
"A healer..." Caine mumbled, frowning without opening his eyes.
"Yeah. Maybe you dreamt of her because of your injuries." Diana said, shutting the book and dropping it on the floor as she climbed in beside of him. "You know, you wished you had a healer."
"Hmm, maybe." Caine mumbled but he didn't believe that for a second. He had a whole different theory in his mind but he could share that with Diana tomorrow...
G*O*N*E
Breakfast seemed so crowded with everyone sitting on the mattresses on the floor because there was no room anywhere else for them. Emily sat crossed leg, eating a bowl of golden balls cereal with Kevin eating the same on the sofa, slouched down and still half asleep. Dekka sat on the other side of the sofa, eating buttered toast the same as Edilio and Roger where they were sitting on their bed. Sam and Astrid sat on the end of Edilio and Roger's bed, nibbling on bacon while Caine and Diana were still in their room but with the door opened wide, eating breakfast biscuits since neither was up for a real meal.
They had all woken up at their own time, Caine first because of pain and also because of the dreams he continued to have. Eventually he rolled over and struggled enough for Diana to wake up beside of him. Then Emily had woken and had stumbled loudly into the bathroom, waking Edilio and Roger up just to tell her to keep it down. Astrid had woken crying from a nightmare that woke Quinn and Sam and eventually Sam had woken Dekka as the day wore on and she continued to snooze on her own time. No one wanted to disturb anyone else while they were sleeping, and if they were honest they weren't even sure what they were going to be doing on that day. But that didn't stop those being bored as they waited for the rest of them to wake up.
"So what are we doing now?" Dekka asked, after finishing her breakfast.
"I guess the only thing we can do is try and work out how to kill these things again." Astrid sighed, heading for the kitchen where they were stored. She came back carrying the two boxes they were in and setting them down on the ground in front of everyone.
"But it makes no sense!" Kevin snapped. "How do we kill something that hasn't yet died?"
Astrid huffed and sat down. She really did hate not knowing things. Especially things about life and death.
"Maybe it isn't how they died?" Emily shrugged.
"But that was how the Bette Cat died!" Astrid argued angrily.
Emily shrugged. They fell silent once more. The silence was stretching longer and Dekka finally stood and walked over to the boxes just for something to do. She put them side by side and looked in on the butterfly, still dashing back and forth in its confined space. The butterfly stopped and stared at Dekka. It glared at her like they were in a staring contest, once again reminding her of the Zekes.
"There has to be a way to kill them." Dekka grumbled. "Have you tried killing it in the same way as the Bette Cat?"
"Hitting it around the head?" Edilio asked. "Yeah."
"Crushing it?"
"Yes." Diana chimed in.
"Cutting it up?"
"Yes." Edilio nodded.
"Burning it?"
"Yes." Edilio said then hesitated.
"Well sort of." Roger shrugged.
"What do you mean, sort of?" Diana frowned from the bedroom.
"Well we tried to burn the lizard's leg off, but nothing happened and we didn't want to get too close to it with fire in case it could control it." Roger explained. "I mean we tried it but we just didn't try it very hard."
"So why don't we try that again." Dekka said, carrying the butterfly into the kitchen, setting it down by the cooker and starting a fire on the top.
"Wait, you best do it with the lizard." Astrid said, gathering the box and walking over.
"Yeah, we have the lizard tied up and can hold it by its tail, but the butterfly can shoot all over the place and bite us." Sam nodded.
"Okay."
Dekka took the lizard and set it to the other side, making the flames as large and hot as they could go. They only had to wait a few minutes before it was ready. She planned to just hold the Lizzie Lizard by its tail over the flame until it burned its head. It might come across as cruel but it had to be done. Anyway, Dekka had never been over loving towards animals before, and if she was then the FAYZ certainly would have changed that when they had to eat pretty much everything in order to survive including house pets.
After a moment Dekka turned to the box and opened it, pulling out the lizard. It thrashed in her hands but it couldn't get free and soon Dekka was holding it over the flames of the oven. The lizard continued to twist and turn but even after she had put it directly in the flames and held it there for a few minutes, it didn't burn, nor did it die. She was careful not to burn the bands around it but it meant they didn't have much to burn. Everyone watched, Astrid had gathered water and was ready to help if it turned out the lizard could control fire but if it could then it couldn't do it tied up. When the Lizzie Lizard didn't die, nor burn at all where Dekka held it directly in the flames, disappointment was clear on everyone's face.
Dekka sighed and returned the Lizzie Lizard into the large box. She closed the lid tightly and pushed the box to the side on the counter. She was frustrated and wished she could throw the box around but she was worried about letting the lizard free. Dekka turned, Astrid was already settling back down beside of Sam again. She could see by the looks on all their faces that they were giving up; even before they had started everyone was giving up. Even if they could find these animals, they couldn't store them all in their apartment! They needed a way to kill them.
It was then that Dekka's eyes drifted down and she saw the butterfly. Sinder Butterfly was still trapped in the box, only it was no longer flying around in a craze and it wasn't even glaring at Dekka anymore. It was perfectly still on the end furthers from the over, pressed against the side of the box with its black eyes fixed on the oven. It wasn't moving, it looked frozen like someone had made a carving out of stone and replaced it with the real creature, and its eyes did not leave the oven, even when Dekka poked the boxed and made it move.
"What is it, Dekka?" Quinn asked.
"Something's wrong with the butterfly." Dekka mumbled.
"What is it?" Astrid frowned, standing and walking back over, followed by Sam and Edilio.
As they gathered around the creature, the butterfly still did not move or look away from the oven in front of it. It was completely frozen. It was unmoving. It was shocked.
"What's wrong with it?" Edilio mumbled.
"It's just sitting there. Staring at the oven." Astrid mumbled.
Experimentally, Astrid nudged the box slightly closer to the over. The butterfly gave a spasm and began to turn; pressing against the box wall like it might be trying to crush itself in an attempt to get out. It was frantic, pressing against the side of the box and scratching at it with its non existent hands.
"It's..." Astrid shook her head. If she didn't recognise what this thing was doing she might have stayed quiet but she saw it with the Bette cat too. "It's scared."
"It's what?" Sam blinked.
"It's scared. No, terrified." Astrid whispered.
"Terrified of the oven?" Sam snorted.
"No..." Dekka whispered, picking up the box. She moved it over the flames and the butterfly began to fly and press itself against the lid. "It's terrified of the fire."
"Put it down on the flames." Sam said suddenly.
Dekka did as he said. She put the box closer to the flames until the creature was going crazy inside of it. It dashed back and forth, its wings beating hard, hitting every part of the plastic apart from the lower one closest to the flames. It moved constantly, ducking, diving, skidding, flashing, dashing, chasing and generally losing its little mind inside the box. The others slowly gathered around to watch the butterfly fly constantly, including Diana, before it began to stop and twitch in the middle of the box like it was having some kind of attack.
"What's it doing now?" Emily frowned.
"It's... I can't believe I am going to say this." Astrid snorted, rolling her eyes. She took a step back and pressed a hand against her forehead.
"Say what?" Dekka demanded.
The butterfly twisted in mid air before its wings stiffened and curled in on themselves along with its legs and feet. It dropped to the bottom of the box and lay perfectly still, though occasionally it shuddered like it was cold above the flames.
"It's having a heart attack." Astrid said, shaking her head in disbelief. "It's actually dying of fright!"
They were silent and stared at the butterfly in confusion when it began to turn black. It began to burn and crisp while melting and turning into a mixture of ash and an oil puddle. It began to fill the whole of the bottom of the box and continued to melt and burn even after Dekka had taken it away from the fire and turned the fire off. She set it on the side and they continued to watch it melt and burn.
"That is so gross." Kevin said, gagging.
"Just like the cat." Astrid whispered.
"Hey! What's happening?! I can't get out of bed, remember!" Caine snapped.
Sam rolled his eyes and looked up, but Diana had returned to Caine side to fill him in almost as soon as he began to shout and call out for them. Sam went back over and sat down with the melted butterfly now in his lap. Once again they fell silent as none of them knew what to say.
Unable to handle the silence, Quinn grabbed the controls and turned on the television, ignoring pointed looks. "Hey. We might find another animal like the Duck Dog."
"Prarie Dog." Astrid corrected. "It's not the same as a dog."
"Whatever." Quinn laughed and Sam found himself grinning too. He watched along with the others as Quinn flicked through the television screen.
"Wait!" Sam snapped. "Go back." His smile disappeared as a male reporter sat in front of a desk looking extremely grim.
"...found in her home, a hole burned through her throat. The woman has been identified as Abana Daidoo, mother of Dahra Daidoo, one of the many children who died in the anomaly. Mrs Diadoo had been married previously but her husband had gone away to deal with his emotional troubles after their daughters death. He returned yesterday afternoon to find her dead in their new home. The window of the kitchen had been broken and each of the rooms either had things missing, broken or moved. There is no explanation as to what exactly caused her throat to be burned through, which was the cause of death, though guesses have been given. There are also no suspects and no one saw anything because of the late hour. However neighbours did claim they heard screams for help, but assumed they were pranks from nearby children. A police investigation is being taken to find out who killed Mrs Daidoo and so we ask for any information to place contact the police and let them know."
The shot cut to Abana's husband, Dahra's father, talking to the camera and looking devastated. They only watched him for a minute before Diana appeared and slammed the television off by the plugs hard enough to hurt her wrist. She rubbed it angrily and stormed back to the bedroom, slamming the door behind her and shutting them all out.
Astrid looked down and Sam had also fallen silent. No one spoke for a while. Then Emily stood, grabbing her things and going to the bathroom to change. Edilio and Roger pulled their clothes on quickly under the covers and Kevin began to chew at his finger nails absentmindedly. Finally Sam stood and walked over to the kitchen, throwing the melted butterfly and the box straight into the bin in silence.
"We should talk about the butterfly." Astrid said quietly.
"We should." Sam agreed but said nothing more about it.
The phone began to ring and neither Sam nor Astrid made any move towards it. In the end Edilio stood and grabbed the phone for them.
"Hello?" Edilio said cautiously, unsure of whose home to call it since there were three different names he could give.
"Sam! Is that you?!" An older voice shouted down the phone.
"Uh, no, who is this?" Edilio said slowly.
"You know what? Never mind." The voice snapped. "I have other people willing to come in when I ask, or at least let me know with a heads up when they can't. Plenty of other people. So tell Sam he's fired!"
They hung up. Edilio was left holding the phone, staring at it and sighing before he hung up. When he checked the time he saw it was already getting close to the afternoon. It seemed the bad news just kept on coming. Now he had to tell Sam that it seemed he was just fired from his job.
As he turned around, Sam still hadn't looked up. Now he stood over the bin staring down at the box and the liquid butterfly inside the box. Astrid had walked up beside of him and put his arm around his shoulders while the rest of them stayed where they were, sharing awkward glances with one another. They had no idea what to do. They had seen a lot of death in the FAYZ but maybe that was it. They had seen death, it was over now, they were supposed to be free but instead it was coming back. What they didn't understand was that part of what was haunting Sam, Astrid, Diana and even Caine, was that Abana had been just like her daughter.
Dahra had wanted to help people. She had helped people. And it was that helping people that had then lead to her death. If she hadn't helped them, then she would not be dead today. They were to blame. And all because she helped Caine and she refused to run away when the rest of them were in danger of the Bette Cat.
"Look, I'm sorry about Abana you guys." Dekka said suddenly, standing. "But unless we do something more people are going to get hurt. I know you guys are upset but we need to put that aside and work out what killed that butterfly and how the kill the rest of these animals so we can save others."
Sam scowled and turned to look at her. "You're right. Let's get to work!"
Astrid didn't look so eager but nodded her head anyway and they gathered back around the middle of the room once more. Emily joined them and they sat in a circle. All of them but Caine and Diana who were in the room, talking about something much more important...
33) What do you think killed the Butterfly then?
34) Any idea who the Sekhmet might be now? (I'll give you a hint: Not Jack, Penny, Gaia or Pete)
35) What do you think Caine and Diana are talking about now?
I finish college in about three weeks, then I can work non stop! Well not non stop since it's been nice weather so far but I will update lots!
