Impact (Book 1): Regenesis
Page 55
“Who?” Lauren asked.
Strom told her that Jeremy Dalton worked with the man who killed her parents and was responsible for at least two complete ethnic cleansing waves throughout Sudan and Somalia. “But you need to realize that this killer, this charlatan, is going to continue to slaughter innocent people. And Nick,” he made sure the young man listened, “You need to make a decision about who you want to be. Mizuno’s right, although I hate to admit it, but you’re either going to move forward or you’re going to stay the same little boy who lets people kick him around.”
Nick told him he didn’t want to kill anyone.
“Then don’t,” Strom barked. “This world is in a constant state of flux, with people being brought into and out of this world, and I know that a good amount of those people leaving are dying because of someone else’s actions. You need to understand that people are going to die whether you pull a trigger or not. If you sit at home and let the world progress without you it’ll become something you hate simply because you didn’t do anything to change it. Nick, you have a chance billions of people could never imagine having and you’re letting it remain dormant because you’re afraid.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean you need to make up your mind and fight for something rather than sit on the sidelines and let the world pass you by.”
“What should I do though?”
“Do you believe that there is evil in this world?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want it to change?”
“Yes.”
“Then go out there and change it. Every second you waste could be the second you needed to be somewhere to save someone.”
Nick sat without a sound for a moment. He looked at Lauren and asked what she thought he should do. “I can’t fix anything,” he admitted, “But…”
“This guy killed my mom and dad,” she reminded him. “Killing him won’t change that. But if you can stop him from killing others, well maybe you should.”
Strom agreed. Nick cleared his throat and mentioned the charlatan’s parting message, “He said he would find and kill Lauren, so long as there was still a bounty out for her. So what do we do?”
Strom tried to shrug but immediately recalled the wounds and dealt with the recoil. “I’m not sure, but unfortunately you’re going to be on your own, seeing as I’m hardly in any position to help.”
Nick scratched the back of his neck while he gave the situation some thought before he suggested that she stay there in the hideout with Strom.
“No offence, but I’m not staying here with him,” Lauren blurted out.
Strom told her it was fine. “Besides, she’d have to go out and get food or something if she stayed here, and if Dalton happened to find her and trace her back here she’d be dead.”
“Then what should we do?” Nick asked. He stopped and asked Lauren what she wanted to do, “You never told us whether you wanted to stay or leave.”
Lauren said there wasn’t much she could do but stay with them. “Going home isn’t really an option, seeing as I’d have to deal with my parent’s death as well as the publicity that would come with my parents’ death.”
“Which would most likely lead Dalton to kill her there,” Strom added.
“So staying here seems like my only option…” Lauren then corrected herself and clarified that staying around them, but not alone, was her best option.
“You do realize that until either you turn up or your body does, there will be a missing person’s case,” Strom reminded her. “I’m not suggesting that either of you need to worry too much, but I think it would be prudent to limit her public exposure.”
Nick agreed.
Strom waited a moment before he suggested, “She could stay with you.”
“What?” Nick asked, alarmed.
Strom chuckled and said he was joking. “I’d say the best idea would be for you to check out of that hotel and relocate here.”
“What about my classes?” he asked.
“Get up earlier and make the commute?” he suggested. “Or you could just drop out.”
Nick nodded and said it wasn’t that bad of a plan. “We can’t do this forever though,” he said. “I mean, hiding is fine until you’re healed, but what do we do then?”
“I really don’t know what to tell you kid.” Strom reached for his copy of The Great Gatsby and flipped open to a very early page and continued where he left off. Nick noted the stress it caused him simply to sit and turn a page, but noted how he didn’t relent either.
Nick asked Lauren if she had any ideas, though they both were without a plan.
---*---
4:05 PM
Baltimore, Maryland
“So whoever’s next is going to have A positive blood?” Sergeant Murdock asked Officer Maguire.
He nodded, “Unfortunately it’s a really common blood type and it’s the only lead we’ve got at the moment.”
“Then our chances of finding them are slim,” Felton murmured.
“Yeah,” Mia sighed.
The four officers sat in Sage’s old office and poured over what little information they had for the investigation. Naoto Suzuki was the seventeenth victim, who Cladis killed on the twenty-second, though the official autopsy was uncertain of how he died. He worked at a small teriyaki restaurant which happened to be only four blocks from where Mia lived. Because of the nature of his work, he potentially met with dozens of new people every day.
“How long do we have until the next murder?” Murdock asked.
“Friday, that’s the next date on the calendar,” Maguire told him. He pulled a tan piece of paper from his pocket and showed them the hand drawn calendar he fashioned to follow the pattern and presumed dates of deaths for the future victims. “All of the red numbers represent the next victim’s death.”
“Are you going to write down the blood type for that date too?” Felton asked him.
Detective Felton’s question caught Bryce off guard, “Oh, I hadn’t thought to do that actually…”
Felton tossed him a blue ballpoint pen from Sage’s desk and suggested that he write it down. The detective rubbed his eyes and told them they needed to talk with Suzuki’s manager, possibly acquire copies of the security tapes for all of Suzuki’s shifts from the time of Sara Knowles’ death until Suzuki’s death, and talk to the boy’s parents to see whether he mentioned meeting anyone within that four day period between the murders.
Chief Johnson opened the door and with an exhausted look told the group they had a visitor.
“What do you mean?” Bryce asked.
“I mean there’s someone here who claims he’s the next target of Cladis,” Johnson clarified.
“Are you kidding?”
“No I am not, now let’s move.”
Chief Johnson led them to one of their available meeting rooms where the man waited. He introduced himself as James Resnik and waited for the five of them to situate themselves. Resnik was in his early forties, stood slightly over six feet tall, and wore jeans, a dark polo shirt, and a thick jacket.
Detective Felton began by introducing himself and proceeded to ask, “What exactly makes you believe you’re the next target?”
Resnik revealed that he followed the case as closely as he could through REFOIA and the local papers and presumed he was next. “I met Naoto Suzuki two days ago, obviously before I knew he was the seventeenth victim, and now I’ve developed an ability.”
“What’s your power?” Maguire eagerly asked.
“I can read any language and I see it as English,” he told them, “Japanese, Spanish, or even random scribbles, as long as someone was trying to convey a message.”
Bryce looked at the group and asked what languages they spoke. “I can speak and write in Spanish,” he told them.
“I’m fluent in German, French, and Latin,” Felton admitted as he retrieved a pad of paper and a pen from his jacket. He scribbled down a few lines before he handed the paper to Res
nik.
He glanced at it and said, “Altogether it reads, ‘disaster is first step toward immortality. Only afterwards can we truly live forever.’”
The group looked at Detective Felton who nodded and said he was right. Maguire looked quizzically at him until Felton told him it was a line from a book he’d read recently that he was fond of.
Johnson thanked Felton and asked Resnik, “How does your power work?”
“At the start I see the writing like all of you do, then the words unscramble themselves and I can read it as plain as day. Strangely, I still find it difficult to decipher handwriting,” James explained.
“So what’s next?” Mia asked the Chief.
“I have no clue…”
James laughed, “Of course…And now I’ve dragged all of you into this too.”
“Don’t worry about that,” Johnson told their guest. “You probably saved us a bit of time and a headache in searching for you. However we will need you to remain here, so we can try to keep you alive until Friday.”
Murdock turned to the Chief and asked, “Do you really think it could be that simple?”
He shrugged, “We don’t have any other options at this point, so we may as well start there. Cladis, or whoever this character is, seems to be extremely adamant that the murders occur in his preset pattern. So my theory is that to save Mister Resnik here, we’ll need to keep him alive past the intended date Cladis has set to execute him. Perhaps it will disrupt his pattern long enough for our team to locate him and take him down.”
“But why do I need to remain here?” James asked them.
“It’ll be easier to protect you here,” Felton explained to him.
“I thought this guy isn’t going to kill me until Thursday.”
“He won’t,” Mia stated, “But that doesn’t mean he won’t capture you and kill you later.”
“Has that happened?”
Bryce shook his head, “No, but since you’re here and we know who you are, we’d like to avoid losing this chance.”
“Chance at what?” Resnik questioned him. “Are you all going to try to capture him?”
“Something like that,” Mia muttered.
James gave it a moment of thought before he agreed. “I would like to visit my wife’s grave one last time before I’m supposed to die though. Is that too much to ask for? I don’t mind if you feel like sending someone to accompany me.”
Chief Johnson agreed and told him they would make the arrangement happen. “For now, let us handle things as best we can. We’ll get a room set up for you to stay in.” He asked Murdock and Bryce to see to it while Mia and Felton slipped out of the room.
“What do you think we can even do to keep him safe?” Mia asked Detective Felton. “We didn’t exactly have a great success last time we harbored one of Cladis’ targets.”
Felton admitted he wasn’t sure. “We could try to move him when we take him to visit his wife’s grave. Maybe if we try to move Resnik out of the city earlier we’ll have more success. But we have some time to formulate a plan, so let’s consult with the rest of the team before we get too ahead of ourselves.”
---*---
5:43 PM
Bothell, Washington
Drake spent his afternoon building a massive domino line that ran through his entire house. He spent two-hundred dollars for a large quantity of the game pieces and bought out three local stores of the item. His domino line started in his bedroom and ran out into his hallway, down the stairs, through his living room, under his couch, into his kitchen, and at the last domino was designed to trigger a small fulcrum with a marble on one end that would, if Drake’s planning was successful, flip the marble into a small water filled water bottle.
His phone rang as he finished the project and normally Drake would have cursed his luck, as the phone was at the opposite end of his home, but he simply stopped time, minded the line of dominoes as he dashed to the phone, grabbed his phone, returned to the start of the line, and finally allowed time to return to its natural course.
Drake paused for a moment to ensure his masterpiece hadn’t been disrupted before he answered his phone. “Hello?”
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Drake sighed and knocked the first domino over, “
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Drake followed his domino trail through his house and debated whether confronting Jonathan was truly the next step. “
Sho said he didn’t know what they were even looking for. “
Drake admitted that it was a possibility, but added that he still felt convinced that there was something more to it. “
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Drake admitted he wanted to wait until he felt there were no other options but to include Jonathan. “
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“” Drake followed the dominoes into his living room. “
Sho told him he’d take a look into it and hung up just as the final domino flipped a small blue marble into the water bottle without any complications.
Drake set his phone down and stopped time to clean up after himself. However without realizing it, or intending to, he found himself in Japan at a small wedding reception. The bride and groom sat at a small table, smiling like crazy while every one of their friends and family congratulated them and wished them well.
He walked over to one of the tables near the entrance and found a book with the names of the bride and groom embroidered on the cover.
A microphone screeched for a brief moment before a man apologized and cleared his throat. “” he chuckled along with the crowd, “
Drake tuned out the rest of the speech and laughter as he wandered through the crowd and over to the happy couple. He looked at them, hands together, fingers laced, and completely serene.
He blinked and found himself back in his home. Drake let out a breath and slowly started picking the dominos up and sorting them back into their many cases.
---*---
Chapter 24
September 26th, 2029
7:10 PM
London, England
“Alright Jason, hurry up and slip into it already. I’m dying to see it.”
Audrey sat cross-legged on their bed with her eyes fixated on the bathroom door. Their room was in shambles from her two week long project. Scissors, tape, needles and thread of all sizes, staples, pins, concept art, and piles of snippets and intact fabrics and plastic based material lay strewn about their hotel room and the need to keep her project a secret barred housekeeping from thenceforth (though both agreed early on to keep housekeeping out of their room). The mess didn’t incorporate their laundry, shoes, her purse and his wallet, dishes, trash, and their other personal items scattered throughout the floor, counters, and bed. Both Jason and Audrey were normally clean and tidy individuals, and even though all the untidiness and clutter was for a just cause, both anticipated the move into their new home at the end of the month.
She’s going to be distraught. Jason finally emerged but did not wear the outfit. He held the black pants in his hand and frowned while he apologized, “I’m sorry Audrey, but they don’t fit.”
He watched her heart sink. “Oh…Well are they too big? Too tight or short?”
“They’re a bit tight,” he admitted regretfully. I would have torn them to shreds if I’d pulled any tighter.
She frowned and asked for them back. “I knew I should have worked a belt into it,” she sighed. “I’m sorry honey, I’ll get these done as soon as I can.”
“Alright, but,” he hesitated, “They’re tight in the thighs too dear. But the rest fits wonderfully.”
Audrey already tuned him out and fixated on the pants. She muttered to herself and decried her foolishness in neglecting to leave additional room.
I wish they fit but I would have ruined them, and I know that she would have been heartbroken if I’d done that. I only hope she knows how much this means to me.
He checked the time and told her to put it off until tomorrow. “You’ve already worked so hard; please don’t exhaust yourself on my account.”