“And if he’s serious about abandoning the case?”
Felton smirked, “Then we’d better take notes.”
---*---
11:35 AM
Bothell, Washington
Vladimir could tell, as any young person could upon entering a classroom that was devoid of arraigned seating, that the room was divided into small circles of friends and cliques. As he did not know any of the individuals within the room, he retreated to a table toward the end of the room and sat alone. He hardly felt out of place in a room filled with people he was unfamiliar with, as his life seemed filled with that sort of isolation. However it seemed as though his solitude would not last; Rachel walked into the room shortly after he claimed his seat and once she espied him in the back she joined him with a smile.
He greeted her and asked how her classes were. After exchanging a mundane reply she repeated his query to him, to which he told her his courses were interesting. She smiled more and asked if he’d made any friends yet, though he regretted to say it was too soon to tell.
Their instructor walked into the room and a majority of the class fell silent. The conversation between Rachel and Vladimir even stalled, though Vladimir did not immediately see why. The class began with a brief introduction to the course, the roll call, and then a brief overview of the first assignment for the course. Their teacher, Miss Keller, then bid them off to their work and retreated back to her desk to let the class begin their assignments.
Vladimir had not even received a copy of the project before the instruction ended, which stirred doubt in his instructor’s ability. “Is she usually this curt?” he whispered to Rachel whilst he perused the document.
Rachel told him to get used to it. “She isn’t the most efficient teacher, but you do get two hours to do nothing but art. And the cool thing is that her assignments don’t take as long as the allotted time, so we get to work on other homework or projects in the extra time.”
Vladimir frowned and asked whether they would ever have the opportunity to learn about the great artists or even if Miss Keller would teach them how to use other mediums they normally would not be familiarized with. Rachel said it was doubtful. “Then she is not doing her job.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that this is not an art class,” he said a bit louder than he meant to. His words caught the attention of some of the others at the tables nearby, though he failed to yield to social customs and still his tongue, “If I am able to spend this entire year painting in water colors and pass this course with little difficulty, then this cannot be anything more than playtime.”
His final comments reached Miss Keller’s desk, which although she heard him left it alone. Rachel noticed her glare and quickly asked Vladimir to stop his speech. She made a final attempt to change the subject by asking him what his idea was for the project. He admitted that he was unsure and thought to give it some consideration before he began. “What about you Rachel?”
“Since it’s a landscape project I’ll probably go into Seattle, take some pictures, and try to find something there to draw.”
“That sounds interesting.” He paused a moment before he asked if she would mind if he went along on the trip. “I’ve only been to Seattle on a few occasions with my host family and I think it would be lovely to see it with you.”
She lit up and said she’d love for him to join her. “That would actually be a load off my mind if you did.”
“Why?”
“Well,” she looked away in search of a reasonable excuse before she lied and said, “I’d just feel safer if you were there rather than if I went alone.”
Perplexed, he asked her if Seattle was a dangerous place.
“Not really,” she said truthfully, “I’d just feel better if you were there.”
“Ah.” He glanced down at his syllabus and asked, “Will Jordan join us?”
She rolled her eyes and muttered, “He doesn’t care about art or anything of the sort. He’d find just about any excuse to get out of it anyway if I did ask him to go.”
“Would he if he knew I was going to be there?”
She didn’t answer him.
Miss Keller walked over to their table and asked to have a chat with Vladimir about his work ethic. He agreed and followed her out into the vacant hallway. She then made her best attempt to chastise the young man for his belittling comments about her teaching methods. Vladimir listened to her words yet failed to acknowledge the fear she tried to instill in him. She wrapped their conversation up with a final warning and then allowed him to return to his project. He did so without so much as another word. Rachel quietly asked what she talked to him about, though Vladimir smirked and told her all of his claims were right, “She did little more than confirmed them. Now,” he left the matter alone and returned to their conversation, “When did you want to take this trip into the city?”
---*---
12:58 PM
Kenmore, Washington
Nick’s first day wasn’t special in any way. He made a few acquaintances, suffered through lunch without knowing anyone, and only had one final period left in the day when he walked to his next class. Nick no longer attended Bothell High School. He thought it would be easier for him if he simply changed school to avoid all of the talk, memories, and apologies about his brother.
None of his courses interested him; all he could think about was the drastic turn in his life. Mizuno told him it would take time to adjust to everything, but it didn’t feel right, even after a week and a half. What bothered him more was that he still didn’t know anything about Mizuno. The man came out of nowhere, convinced him to join, and hardly said a word about who he was. Strom didn’t tell him anything, Melanie hardly said a word, and Nick never had a moment to ask Mithra. In fact, the only two people with any connection to Mizuno that Nick had an opportunity to speak with since Mumbai were Strom and Mizuno, both of whom were reserved.
Nick walked into his final class and found Mizuno at the front of the room. He almost didn’t recognize him though, as he wore jeans, an unbuttoned plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a gray shirt under it, glasses, and tennis shoes.
Mizuno glanced at Nick and let out a breath, “I’m glad you showed up early.”
“What are y-you…What are you doing here?”
“I’m teaching.”
“Seriously.”
“Seriously.” Mizuno took one of the syllabuses off his desk and showed Nick, “I’m Go Takahashi, graduate of the University of Washington with degrees in Unites States history and teaching.”
Nick set the document aside. “You’re joking, right?”
“Hardly.”
“Then was this why you wanted me to transfer here instead of Lynnwood High School?”
Mizuno shook his head. “This is a better location as it will be closer to the project’s general meeting place in Bellevue. Also, Lynnwood High School is in the Edmonds School District while the Bothell and Inglemoor High Schools are part of the Northshore School District, so the transfer process was far simpler than moving you back to Lynnwood.” Mizuno walked toward the door of his classroom, retrieved a key from his pocket, and locked the door. “We need to talk Nick.” He offered Nick a chair and took a seat himself. “I know this is all relatively new to you, so I’m trying to keep that in mind while I develop my plan.”
Nick stopped him and asked, “What is this project anyway?”
“Simply put, it’s an organization. I shy away from calling it a team or group as we are hardly cooperative enough to label it as such at this point…” He paused and added that he also hated the connotations that came with calling his project a super hero team.
“Then what are our goals?”
Mizuno hesitated to say it, but did anyway, “We’re going to save the world.” He continued before Nick had an opportunity to roll his eyes, sigh, swear, or make any remark at all, “I’m aware of how cliché it sounds, but it’s true in one sense of the word, and all I ask is t
hat you at the very least consider it as you’re already this far along into the insanity.”
Nick agreed, but asked, “Who are all of the other members?”
Mizuno told him there were a total of thirteen members including the two of them. “You’ll meet everyone on Thursday, which is also when I’m going to tell you and the rest of our party about the overall goals of our group.”
“Is there a reason you can’t tell me right now?”
Mizuno nodded, “Class is about to begin.”
The first bell rang and Mizuno left to unlock the door.
“Nick?”
He turned and saw that Amy was one of the first people through the door. She wore a white skirt, a terracotta blouse, sandals, and seemed shocked to see him there.
“What are you doing here?” she asked. “I thought you went to Bothell.”
He cleared his throat and nodded, “I did, I-I…” Nick stopped. He remembered what Mizuno instructed him to do to help stop his issue with stuttering, so he took a breath and restarted his sentence. “I did, but I transferred here because I thought it would be easier for me to attend this school to avoid all of the aftermath of my brother’s death.” He looked away from her and apologized, “I shouldn’t have left you at the party like that.”
Amy told him it was fine. “Did you want to get coffee or something after class and talk?”
Nick looked at her and saw how hopeful she was and though he wanted to he wasn’t sure whether Mizuno had any plans for him in respects to his project or not. He glanced at Mizuno, but the Asian man had his back to them so Nick guessed it would be fine and accepted.
He wanted to talk to her about the project and everything he had done over the past week, but he doubted she would believe him or that Mizuno would allow it. After another thought Nick doubted it was even a good idea as the two of them still hardly knew one another…that and Nick still had no real grasp over what Mizuno’s plans were.
Amy took a seat next to Nick and asked, “So what classes are you taking?”
---*---
10:15 PM
Baltimore, Maryland
Mia shut her car door with her foot while she carried a basket of clean laundry, her notebook, a duffel bag with her uniform and a change of clothes from work, and a tied plastic bag of Chinese take-out. She always parked on the street as there wasn’t a garage in her building, so her evening walks home tended to keep her on her toes, especially while she passed anyone. Most of the other officers lived outside the city or at the very least didn’t walk the streets alone, but she didn’t care. Mia was born and raised there. She knew everything there was to know about the city and its people; where the best pizza was, where the speed traps were, the location of the worst potholes, the history, and the streets you just didn’t want to walk down at all. She became an officer because she loved the city so dearly and hated to watch it waste away.
“Do you have any change?”
Mia’s heart raced as she realized someone called out to her. She found a man on the sidewalk in a worn hoodie, dirty cargo pants, combat boots, and a tattered blanket draped around his shoulders. He held a frail paper cup in his left hand with some change in it and held a cardboard sign made from a pizza box lid in his right hand.
She took a breath and apologized to him while she walked away.
Mia finally made it to her apartment, shut and locked the door behind her, and set her things down on her couch. She opened her notebook straightaway and tore out a few pages in the middle of the book and walked over to the wall adjacent to her door.
She’d recreated the wall in Sage’s office from only a few photos she took without anyone’s permission and expanded it by digging into all of the victim’s lives. There were thirteen photographs on the wall, (as she wasn’t convinced whether Detective Sage or Jenna Bell was the true victim in the case), and next to each photo was a brief biography of each person, how they died, medical conditions they had listed in previous medical examinations, family, relatives, friends, and anything else she felt was relevant to the investigation. There was also a hand drawn calendar at the beginning of the wall with certain numbers on specific dates circled in red. Six dates, the sixth, eighth, ninth, the eighteenth, the twenty-second, and the twenty-eighth of September was as far out as she’d gone. Mia held every hope they would apprehend Cladis long before those dates passed, but she felt she should be alert to the possibility of an ongoing investigation as well.
She took her Chinese takeout into her kitchen and left it on her counter while she retrieved her cell phone and checked her messages. She set it to speaker, “First message: ‘Hendricks? It’s Maguire. I know we’re supposed to keep things pretty quiet on all sides of this investigation, but I had a thought and I wanted to know what you think about it. We’re still in the dark about who stole Detective Sage’s body, and Jenna Bell’s for that matter, but I had a thought that Cladis stole them. But that leads me to think he might have also stolen the remains of all of the other victims as well. I think we should look into it, though it might be difficult to do so. Just let me know what your thoughts are.’ End message…Next message: ‘Miss Hendricks? This is Mary Ferrell-Johansson, I just called to let you know that there have been some minor charges on a credit card addressed to you, but these charges were made in Seattle Washington, we’ll clear them up, so you don’t have to worry about that. We feel that we’re closing in on this, so hopefully it’ll be resolved soon.’ End message…End messages,” she ended the call and left her phone on the counter.
Mia planned on putting her laundry away but only took two steps before her phone vibrated on her countertop. Mia picked it up, read the number and knew it was a Baltimore city payphone. She answered it anyway, “Hello?”
At first all Mia heard was the familiar sound of cars passing and the wind, but when someone finally spoke, she couldn’t recognize who the speaker might be. The caller’s voice was deep and gravelly, “September twelfth, go alone to the Federal Hill Park. I believe I can help you.”
Mia scowled and asked what he could help her with.
There was another pause before the man answered, “I can help with what’s strung across your apartment wall.”
Her heart raced again while she quickly demanded to know who it was.
“Twelve, the night of the twelfth at Federal Hill Park at midnight. Come alone and I will help you.”
“Who are you?”
There wasn’t an answer. She thought she heard the phone’s cord snap tight as if it’d been dropped. In the background she heard a siren wail and seconds later she heard it through the call. She knew the caller was nearby and raced outside to see who it was, but the individual was gone before she could locate the payphone with the dangling phone. She froze when she saw the booth though. Painted over the walls of the booth, the phone, and the base of the phone was a clear message: ‘MIA STOP CLADIS.’
---*---
Chapter 14
September 6th, 2029
8:20 AM
Athens, Greece
Their journey proved Audrey right. Neither said a word of contempt or spite since their decision to leave and the peace they felt soothed them both. Jason remained upset but Audrey saw him return, ever slowly. The days were blurred but marked by happiness between the two of them. Best of all was how natural and nearly unstructured their vacation was, contrast to how rigid her past holidays were with family. Audrey and Jason spent their evening watching a purchased movie and ordered dinner in one night and simply talked, something they both neglected too often. But she felt that they were growing together once more, and it relieved her.
Slits of sunlight crept through the curtains in their room and softly woke her. Audrey blinked several times before her vision focused in on the clean white curtains on her left. Her back was toward Jason and she feared he was gone once more. She turned to face him and discovered she was alone once again. Audrey sighed and pulled the covers up close to her chin and tried to imagine where he would go so early
and without her.
Her vain attempt to fall back to sleep fell short due to frustration. Audrey finally got out of bed and wandered to their bathroom. She bathed silently and listened for Jason to return, though she finished her lengthy shower without his return. Audrey donned a robe and returned to bed with her wet hair stuck to her face and neck.
She turned the television on and flipped through a few channels until she arrived at the news. The unfamiliar reporter spoke in Greek for only a moment before an English audio track caught up and replaced the announcer's voice.
“–moment it’s unsure whether the billionaire’s son could have killed his father, but authorities in Tokyo have apprehended the young man and are holding him at this time. In other news a very strange rumor is out in the streets of Athens this morning. A handful of witnesses claim to have seen a man engulfed in flames, though only moments later the flames died down and revealed the man completely unharmed. As a result of recent articles from REFOIA some citizens who witnessed this phenomenon allege this man possessed super human powers that could range from combustion to invulnerability. He’s also been suitably nicknamed the Burning Man.”
The camera changed from the reporter to a young man on the streets of Athens who gave his account of the incident, “I just saw him running down the street and his foot caught on fire. I yelled at him, ‘You’re on fire! You’re on fire!’ but he must not have heard me.”
It panned to a second witness, an older woman, who told them, “I thought for sure he was dead, but the fires disappeared and he stood there, unharmed. It was a miracle, no matter how you view it.”
The camera returned to the newswoman who continued the report, “No one is quite sure who this so-called ‘Burning Man’ is, and although there have been sightings and rumors of super powered individuals across the world, many doubt both the credit and plausibility of these claims as there hasn’t been a single concrete verification of any such super human people. Some experts claim this phenomena could be nothing more than an effect of an over indulgence of media over the past–” Audrey shut the program off.
Impact (Book 1): Regenesis Page 30
