by Noree Cosper
Zeus hadn't stopped there. He decided that humans were worse with these spirits and sent the Great Deluge to destroy humanity. The flood devastated the world, but a few survived. Pyrrha, Pandora's daughter, endured and swore to rid the world of both the evil daimons and the gods themselves. After all, gods who don't give a shit for people shouldn't rule. This was the woman I descended from and, of course, my family was crazy enough to keep this plan going for centuries.
I finally found my voice. "How is this new?"
Aunt Jo gave a disgusted snort. "Now they're invadin' our safe homes. We lost contact with the Millers from up North."
"Why doesn't the Pyrrha handle this? She's our leader."
Aunt Jo snorted. "You still got something against your Aunt Dahlia, eh?"
"That's not the point," I said. "She's supposed to be the one who protects us."
"That's what she's tryin' to do, Cassi girl. That's why yer comin' home now."
"So, what? She's going to fit all the pandorans in her house? Have them camp out in her yard?"
Aunt Jo turned to stare at me. "You know that as her niece you have priority."
"But everything is fine here. I'm safe. I have a school full of people."
"You think that will stop Them? They possess people, remember? It could be yer best friend back there. There's somethin' off about her."
"It's not," The tang of grilling meat wafted past my nose and twisted up my already knotted stomach even more. "You said up North. That's not even close to Dallas."
"And we got planes. Yer safer at home," she said. "'Sides, it's time you accept yer fate like the rest of us."
The rubber handles of the wheelchair bit into my palms at my tightening grip and as I stared at an ant crawling across the concrete. It must have lost its way from its nest. It was free to roam the world, unlike me. The muggy night air grew thick. My family was cutting my time short. I was supposed to have four years away from it, away from the training, the fighting, and the nightmares. Well, the nightmares had never left, but my freedom had muted them. My mother's glazed eyes flashed in my mind, her soft smile twisting into something sadistic.
"You promised I could graduate," I whispered.
"Well, the Pyrrha is payin' for this. She can pull you out. And there's a need."
"Do you even know which one it is?"
Aunt Jo shook her head. "We just have the disappearances to go on."
"So, you all could be overreacting. I mean, this isn't exactly a safe lifestyle in the first place. What if they fell to the resonance?"
"A whole family of five?"
I gulped. That was a lot of us. Still, if they had found a god instead of a daimons, it was possible. In order for us to return them to the jar, we had to absorb their essence. That essence left a resonance, an echo of the old being that tainted our being until we imprisoned the being in the jar. We could do this with a god we came across as well; after all, it was because of Zeus and his ilk that we were in this mess. The gods held a much stronger essence and could actually possess us.
"Still," I said. "We don't have to panic yet. I'm staying."
"Oh, no." Aunt Jo glared at me. "I'm not goin' home empty handed."
"Please. This year is important to me." I gave her my wide eyed look. The tears welling up in the corners were real.
She stared at me for a few minutes before sighing with a shake of her head. "Fine. But you better not make me regret this by gettin' killed."
I beamed and wrapped my arms around her. "Thank you."
Aunt Jo looked up at the gloomy haze of the sky. "Don't thank me yet. Somethin's brewin' here, and it tastes dark and bitter."
5
I stood and slammed the game controller on my vacated spot. Across the television screen, winner scrolled over Batman in the background. I turned back to Serenity with a grin.
"Best three out of five?" she asked.
I laughed. "Oh, no. Two out of three. You're not going back on this bargain."
I sprinted into my bedroom, tossed my purple rose comforter to the side, and dug through my backpack until I pulled out my handheld camcorder. I flipped open the display screen on the side as I walked back in. The light at the top flashed red and then a steady green. Serenity's image appeared in the side screen.
She grabbed a cushion and blocked my view with a laugh. "Now? Can't you at least wait until I'm not in my underwear or something?"
I hopped up on the couch and batted away the pillow. "I'll do only a close up of your face and edit out all the naughty parts."
"You make it sound dirty."
I grinned at her and wriggled my eyes brows. "Well, maybe it is. You know, the underside of the Proprius Project."
The smile on her face disappeared, and she sat up, brushing her hair from her face. "It's too early for there to be an underside yet."
"True." I plopped down beside her, keeping the camera trained on her face. "So, Serenity Vargoss, how did you enjoy the first day of the project?"
"It was pretty hectic," she said. "Hopefully James will be able to iron out all the kinks in our team."
"What did you think of him being named lead developer?"
She gave a one shouldered shrug. "It's something I don't have to worry about. I can focus on actually writing the program."
"How do you see this project turning out? Do you think it will succeed with all the different groups involved?"
"I think there's the potential for something extraordinary here." Her eyes took on a faraway look. "The concept is brilliant. Whether we accomplish it I think is up to the people running this."
"Brilliant, huh? You almost sound like you were complimenting Mercer Chaplin."
She wrinkled her nose. "Who said he came up with the idea?"
I shrugged. "It seems like his sort of thing. So, why don't you like him?"
"He's an asshole."
"I think it's more than that. How long have you two known each other?"
She flashed her gaze to me and narrowed her eyes. "I don't see what that has to do with the interview."
I snapped the display shut and rested the camcorder in my lap. "It doesn't. But this goes so much deeper than you want to let on."
She crossed her arms in front of her chest. "It's not something I want to even think about, much less talk about."
"You weren't some crazy stalker or anything? Maybe an ex-girlfriend?"
"What?" She gaped at me. "Of course not."
I reached out and poked her knee. "Come on. I'm worried about you."
"What about the woman that showed up the other night? You called her your aunt."
I clamped my mouth shut and chewed the inside of my cheek. She watched me with a raised eyebrow and a slight smile hovering. If she expected to me to back off with that threat, she was wrong. Besides, Aunt Joanna wasn't leaving anytime soon. She'd flat out told me she wasn't returning home without me. So, Serenity would see more of her in the months to come.
"Aunt Joanna came to visit for a while," I said. "She wanted to surprise me."
Serenity raised an eyebrow. "She came all the way from Georgia for a surprise visit?"
I shrugged. "That's what she said."
"I almost thought you were an orphan with how little you talk about your family."
"We don't really see eye to eye."
"Is that why you always avoid their phone calls?".
"What about you? It's not like you're so forthcoming about your own family."
She leaned back against the armrest and clutched the pillow to her chest with a sigh. "Mercer is."
I blinked. "Mercer's what?"
She glared at me. "I swear you can be dumb at times. We're related."
My jaw dropped. "Why didn't you say anything? Your uncle? He seems too young to be your uncle, though. A cousin?"
"Something like that," she mumbled.
"Come on. Tell me."
"Look, we're barely related, okay? I don't think we've ever even done a Thanksgiving together. He thinks he's to
o good for our family or something." She shook her head. "Like I said, he's an asshole."
"Yeah, but a famous asshole. I mean, he could help you get almost any job you want."
She rolled her eyes with a soft chuckle. "And end up owing him for the rest of my life? Hell no."
"So, what happened between the two of you? The usual family tiff?"
"Not exactly..."
The air conditioner pushed a cool breeze through the vents and it, along with the music from the video game was the only sound in the room for several moments. I leaned forward, waiting for her to say more. Now was my chance to delve more into the mystery that was Serenity. We'd been roommates for three years, but neither of us had gotten too deep in our pasts. We'd both focused more on our common interests--video games, comic books, and science fiction movies. A part of me had wanted to open up, but how could I? She'd never believe I came from a family of witches that hunted evil spirits and gods. It sounded almost as ridiculous as some of those teen book plots. I'd always wondered why she held back, though. Every time I'd asked she'd deflected to something else. It couldn't be worse than my secret.
She cleared her throat. "It's nothing."
"It has to be something if you're holding a grudge for this long."
She rubbed the back of her neck. "He's just the type of person who chews others up and spits them out without even realizing it."
"You already said he was an asshole," I said. "Several times."
A smirk flitted across her face before it changed to a frown. She met my gaze. "That's why you should stay away from him."
I sighed. "I told you, it's just an interview."
"I saw your look, Cassi, and I've seen it before. This is so much worse than James. He'll break more than your heart."
"What more could he break?"
She gave me a sad smile. "You have no idea."
"Yeah," I blew my hair from my face with a long sigh. "How can I if you won't tell me?"
Her frown deepened. It was time to back off. Whatever her secret was, she really didn't want to talk about it.
"Are you worried he came here to one-up you or something?" Maybe I could help the situation without making her reveal it. "He could have changed."
"He'll never change," she said.
"You don't know that. There are lots of stories devoted to how people can change."
"Those are just fiction. Great for comic books." She waved her hand to the television. "Real heroes don't exist."
"All stories come from somewhere. All legends are true."
"I'm done with this conversation." She stood, dropping the pillow on the couch. "Just drop whatever fascination you have with him. It's not worth it."
She headed back into her room and slammed the door, leaving me alone with only Batman looking triumphant on the screen. At least one of us felt that way.
6
The next morning, I hurried across the campus toward the Waller Hall. My alarm had once again failed to wake me. Professor Marshall was going to kill me. Not really, but she would give me her death stare for disturbing her lecture. Maybe I would get lucky and could sneak in the back and grab a seat without her noticing.
A girlish giggled carried across the quad on the warm morning air. Mercer stood by the fountain in the center surrounded by a group of college girls. He tilted his head and laughed as he took the hand of a busty girl with a blonde ponytail. She arched her back and pressed her chest forward as she smiled up at him. These girls seemed to have no classes they were late for. As much as I wanted to join them and admire the way his blackberry colored hair glinted with blue highlights in the sun, I couldn't afford to miss this class. Marshall would make me regret it with a quiz concerning only her notes. I rounded the corner of Turner hall and stopped short.
Aunt Joanna sat in front of a large board covered with a multitude of photographs of a girl. The perfume of several bouquets of flowers as well as half melted candles that surrounded the board wafted to my nose. The students had come together to create the memorial for Tessa days after her death. A small memorial had been held a couple weeks ago with her roommate giving a tear jerking speech that had most of the girls sobbing loudly. The school had allowed her monument to remain for the rest of the year.
"Are you spying on me?" I hissed at Aunt Jo as I came up behind her.
She nodded up at the center photo-a headshot of Tessa. "Pretty girl. Such a loss."
"Yeah." My voice softened. "She'd been going through a lot at home. I wished she'd talked to someone."
"Wouldn't have mattered." Aunt Jo spun her wheelchair to face me. "They still would have gotten to her."
The corner of my eye twitched. "You can't be serious."
"Can't ya feel it, Cassi girl? This place is burnin' with resonance."
I sighed and rubbed my temple. "Aunt Jo, I don't have time for this. You can't be wandering the campus like this."
"Why are you playin'? Didn't ya just hear me? We have a duty."
"I should have known this would happen if you stayed," I muttered. "The only duty I have right now is to get to class."
"Yer just gonna let this continue? More of yer friends will die."
I clutched the strap of my bag. "I don't sense anything abnormal, and I've been here for years."
She snatched my right arm and yanked me forward. Caught off guard, I stumbled, and my bag swung around on my shoulder. Aunt Jo moved her head to the side to avoid getting smacked in the face. She pulled the sleeve of my shirt up to my elbow and twisted my wrist around, exposing a small black tattoo. The inked fox surrounded in fire sat and stared at us with its flaming tail wrapped around its front. My heart pounded in my chest. I should have worn the bandage today. Not that it would have made a difference when Aunt Jo was determined to see it.
"It's completely black," Joanna sputtered. "What in Tartarus have ya been doing?"
"Nothing," I said.
She leaned closer to the tattoo, and her fingers squeezed my wrist bone. "Yeah, that's exactly what ya have been doing."
"What do you expect me to do? Go out after classes and hunt them down? Take road trips during the weekends?"
"If ya did, ya might have kept yer edge," she muttered. "Now, ya wouldn't know one if they slapped ya in the face."
I glanced down at the fox on my wrist again. Every pandoran was given a tattoo when we reached puberty. It was how we contained the resonance of the daimons we fought. My mother had helped me choose mine. I swallowed the lump in my throat. My mother had held my hand as I had endured the needle for that. She'd smiled and said that the fox suited me. Not long after...
"What are you talking about?" I said in a hoarse voice.
"Yer blocked, Cassi girl." She shook her head. "I've never seen something like this."
"Blocked, how?"
She glared at me. "Well, ya keep denyin' what ya are."
"I'm not denying it. I'm just taking a break."
She held my wrist up, twisting it to the point she could snap it with one sharp movement. "This is beyond a little vacation. Ya have squandered everything we taught ya. Yer just like any of these others, a babe ripe for the pickin'."
"But I have stayed sharpened. I'm a teacher's assistant for my self-defense class."
"But ya been ignorin' yer resonance." She let go of my wrist with a snort of disgust. "We're gonna have to retrain ya."
"I'm swamped with school and stuff." I rubbed my wrist with a sigh. "Are you sure you're not just making this up because you have nothing to do?"
Her glare bored into me. "Tomorrow you will meet me at my hotel and we'll restart yer training."
She wheeled past me in a jerky motion. I stared after her, straightening my backpack. My family never failed to come into my life and cause chaos with the demands they made of me. To them, my fate had been decided at birth. I glanced at the giant clock tower on top of the main hall and groaned. Class would be halfway over by the time I made it.
As a shadow played across the red bricks of Turner Hal
l, a chill crept up my spine. Someone had listened in on our conversation. I sprinted toward the building and around the corner. Three of the girls from Mercer's earlier retinue passed me, giggling and chattering. My spy had disappeared. The only place they could have run to was Turner.
The glass door squeaked shut behind me as I entered. The soft yellow lights reflected off the painted white brick walls eerily, and I walked down the hall carefully as not to cause my canvas shoes to squeak on the tile floor. Classes had already started, leaving the hallway empty. My heart pounded in my ears.
How much had they overheard? I could laugh it off as some sort of game or practice for a play. Of course, if it was anyone I knew, that wouldn't work since I couldn't act my way out of paper bag. Or, if Aunt Jo was right, the daimons knew about the two of us and my little problem. I stopped and stared at the intersection of the hall coming up. Why the hell was I chasing after them?
Aunt Jo would laugh and tell me to handle it myself. I gritted my teeth. Blocked or not, I could at least get a peek at who it was. I pressed my back to the wall and peeked around the corner on the right and then the left. The hall was empty. I let out a deep breath and headed down the right. Muffled conversation drifted from one of the open classrooms. I tiptoed to the edge and leaned against the wall.
"You've only just arrived," a man's hoarse voice groused. "I already have claim on this place."
"Find somewhere else." Mercer's voice was smooth compared to the other. "You're not screwing this up for me."
The other voice snorted. "And how do you plan to stop me?"
A door slammed down the hall, and I jumped, causing the door handle to rattle. Shit. I spun and quickly walked towards the exit. Was that the only empty classroom?
"Cassi?" Mercer called.
I stiffened and froze. Well, no use running now. I turned around, gripping the strap of my backpack, and plastered a smile on my face.
"Hey." My voiced sounded strained under the forced light tone. "Surprise seeing you here. Planning on enrolling?"