by Joshua Chou
He summoned his Sol. Gabriel appeared in a quick flash of light. The two Wraiths below hardly had time to respond. Ethan’s Sol conjured two walls of ice to block the alleyway.
One wall barricaded the path to the street. The other closed off the way they came. Both monsters howled with confusion and fear, as all trapped animals do. The unholy creatures were trapped.
“Don’t wait up,” said Ethan.
Nora stared wide-eyed. “Wait, don’t leave me!”
She grasped out to get a few fingers around Ethan’s jacket. But Nora was too late. Ethan already dipped below to fight.
He grabbed onto Gabriel and descended down quickly. Ethan’s Sol broke the fall like a descending bird, if that bird were secretly a demon in disguise.
The Wraiths glanced at each other momentarily at the newcomer. They attacked, but too late. Ethan and Gabriel made a synchronized swing to cut both down.
The mutt lay with its stomach strewn open and spilling black sludge. Meanwhile, the fox lost a leg and half its left breast and collapsed on the floor. They were in no condition to escape.
He drew two talismans from his pockets and placed them on the dying Wraiths. Both purifying seals conjured fire and light from their targets.
As the black flesh and mist vaporized with the night air, the light subsided. What remained were two unfortunate homeless people, a couple from the looks of it.
One male, one female, and they were roughly the same age. Chances they were runaways who left home around the same time, which would explain their similar ages. Evidently, they became Wraiths.
Ethan was curious. He knew Iris was listening, as usual. She could only hear what he was saying, but she had to know what thoughts were brewing in his mind.
“Iris?” he said aloud. “We have two Wraith Victims. Both are breathing.”
Noted, Iris replied. Keep me posted.
A rattling of frail iron and screws came behind Ethan. He turned around. Someone shuffled down the fire escape. Ethan looked up to see Nora frantically rushing down the rickety metal stairway to meet him.
Ethan balled a fist. Gabriel mimicked him perfectly. As the two of them released the fist, Ethan’s supernatural companion released its magic. The ice barriers broke down and evaporated instantly.
Shards of ice dispersed and crashed on the tar. Each was created from water droplets in the air, which then crystallized to form something solid that Ethan could use in combat.
Ethan’s Sol disappeared into thin air. It took plenty of energy to keep him in solid form, so Ethan had to release it when he could. As the Sol disappeared, so too did the arcane ice that he created.
Thanks to Gabriel’s sorcery, the frost that quickly formed evaporated as soon as he released his hold on the air. Blocks of ice fell apart like crumbling sand and vaporized immediately. A fresh breath of cold, chilled air came with the crumbling ice.
While the wind washed over Ethan like an ocean wave, Ethan spotted something out of the corner of his eye.
Something like a looming shadow peered behind a parked car across the street. It almost looked like it was wearing a ratty hoodie that covered his entire face.
A pair of sinister golden eyes stared right back at Ethan. They were old and all-seeing, almost as if their owner was looking at its new prey.
Ethan glanced harder at what he was looking at. Not a figment of my imagination, is it?
The shadow dipped behind its cover. Whatever it was, Ethan knew it had to be a person. It was brief, but he definitely saw it. He had the chance to find it.
“Hey!” Ethan called out. “Get out of the street! There are Wraiths in the area!”
To Nora’s dismay, Ethan ran off. What surprise was written across her face turned into something more flabbergasted than before. She was definitely going to chew him out for this, but Ethan had to check this out.
He ran across the street to the car. As he did, he held his hand ready to summon Gabriel. Ethan turned and realized that the mystery shadow person was gone.
“What happened?” asked his friend.
Ethan turned to Nora. She finally caught up to him. He turned back and looked at the spot where the hooded man once stood.
“Ethan?” she asked again. “Talk to me.”
“Please tell me you saw him too,” said Ethan.
He looked at her with wide eyes. Despite the moderate autumn weather, Ethan was beginning to break out in a cold sweat. His knuckles turned white from gripping his sword too tightly. Not ten seconds passed since the skirmish, and he was this shaken by something else.
Nora realized something else. Something she hadn’t seen before plagued Ethan’s eyes: terror.
“Where did he go?” she asked finally.
“He, uh, he got away,” said Ethan finally. “He was hiding right here. Not sure where he went.”
A pause ensued. Ethan found his head feeling too light to think straight. This usually didn’t happen, but something about their mystery person just unsettled him.
Nora waited for Ethan to stop overcharging his senses. She waved her hand before his eyes to see if he was still functional. Ethan finally came to his senses.
“Let’s regroup with the others,” she said. “Think you might want to tell them what we saw?”
Ethan nodded. Only then did he notice how tightly he was holding onto his weapon. He sheathed the katana.
***
After the debriefing during the ride back to the West Side, Iris was not pleased either. She barked her orders immediately as they pulled into the parking lot.
“To the Command Room,” said Iris. “I need to file the after report.”
She plucked her dead earpiece out of her ear and tossed it to Liam. He caught it for the umpteenth time. This was not the first time she threw sensitive equipment at him.
“Easy!” Liam exclaimed as he caught earpiece. “This thing costs more than my take-home income!”
“It’s insured by the government,” Iris retorted.
“But don’t throw it!”
Iris marched away without sharing another word. Liam gave Ethan a brief glance and lowered his shoulders with reluctant acceptance of being ignored.
“I’ll catch up,” said Liam while downcast. “Head on inside, guys.”
Their leader snapped her fingers. Ethan and Nora quickly followed Iris back into the building. She pushed open the glass doors so hard that she nearly threatened to bash them into the walls.
“We have nothing to indicate that Winston’s involved at all,” she said while marching. “And Winston would be indoors like everyone else during the curfew.”
“But it wouldn’t hurt to check, right?” asked Ethan.
Iris rushed through the lobby and up the stairs to the Command Room.
“That’s not the point,” she replied. “The point is that you are grasping at straws.”
They tried to keep up, but found that catching up to someone more agile and agitated than they were was difficult. By the time Ethan stepped into the Command Room, Iris already pulled up a template for official A.X.E.L. paperwork and finished half of it.
Nora closed the door behind her. She walked beside Ethan and cupped a hand to her mouth. “Still think he did it?” she whispered.
He shrugged. “I could be wrong. Maybe that guy in the hood wasn’t Winston.”
“Come on,” Nora replied. “We don’t have enough to work with here. Winston’s just a guy mourning for his brother.”
He was tempted to fold his arms, but Iris was still in the room. For now, he had to pretend there wasn’t something obviously wrong with not knowing who the hooded man was.
Plastic and mechanical pistons clicked and clacked. The sound of keys pounding in a grating rhythm filled the void of sound.
Ethan and Nora waited anxiously as Iris typed away on the console’s keyboard. Words spread almost magically as their leader filled in the blanks for an after report of tonight’s patrol.
They usually didn’t stick around to see her writ
e, but Iris hadn’t told them they were allowed to leave yet. Based on the look on her face, she temporarily forgot to mind that there were other people in the room.
Keys beat against each other in such rapid succession that it almost sounded like a woodpecker developed a taste for plastic.
Neither of them asked what her words-per-minute rate was, and seeing Iris type so feverishly made them afraid to ask anyways.
Iris punched in the last swipe of the Enter key. She finally turned to Ethan and Nora. They stared back without moving a muscle.
“Well this is new,” their leader began to say. “Your idea doesn’t hold any water.”
Iris folded her arms and crossed her legs. Neither Ethan nor Nora dared to speak before she did.
“Winston Wright lives in this dorm,” said Iris. “If he knew of the night Hector was possessed, we’d have security footage of him leaving the dorm past curfew. But look.”
Iris clacked two keys. The screen switched to a recorded feed of a camera inside the West Side dorm. She pointed to the only person in the footage: Winston.
Memorabilia from his high school track and field career decorated the wardrobe and cold walls. A spare shot put ball, roughly 16 pounds, sat atop his bed.
During the recording, Winston read out of a book while walking around the room. Their leader clicked another button, and a time-lapse of Winston played in fast-forward. Winston stayed in his room nearly the whole day.
Ethan looked back to Iris, who was still glancing back with scrutiny.
“This is the night Hector was possessed,” she said while pointing to the recording’s date. “And this is when he died. Winston never left his room. No pills in his room either.”
Iris awaited Ethan’s answer. He realized that if he didn’t find something smart to say, she would have more fuel to add to the fire he started a few days ago. Ethan felt the skin on his back crawl every millisecond he was under Iris’ gaze.
Nora looked away in fear of what her leader would say next. Ethan noticed out of the corner of his eye and dared to ask his last question.
“Well where is he now?”
Iris clicked another button. The recording gave way to a different screen. This time, they were looking at live footage of Winston’s room. All eyes turned to the console’s screen.
It was empty.
“What?” Nora exclaimed.
Suddenly, the sound of thunder burst outside the building. There was no mistaking the sound of a shotgun.
“Iris! We’ve got trouble!” Liam said via radio.
Iris jumped to her feet and peered outside. Ethan and Nora rushed to see what was happening as well.
“What is it?” Iris demanded.
The shotgun sounded once more. It was followed by a hollow click of a hammer hitting an empty shell in the chamber.
“A Wraith! And it’s a big one!”
Chapter 10 – Winston’s Wraith
Winston felt rotten before he heard the shotgun.
Another day had gone down the drain. That’s how most days felt recently. His mother was mortified upon hearing the news from AXEL. They sent someone to deliver the bad news to their home, and she called Winston immediately after.
Hector was dead. A monster got him. But that was all they could tell.
Winston paced around the rooftop with his hands in his pockets and the wind biting at his face. His head was boiling with blood and irritation. Not even the cold wind blowing past his face could cool his growing temper. But at least he could brood alone up here.
He knew that he looked pathetic walking around at night on a rooftop by himself, but this was the best way for him to sort out his thoughts.
Now that he was living in a new dorm, he had no one to talk to about his problems. His immediately family was too far, and Hector was gone.
Hector is gone, Winston reminded himself. Someone else knew the truth, and he had to find out what it was.
Ethan had to know. Everyone knew he was in the AXEL program. It wasn’t a secret if someone was accepted into the biggest program Elysium University had to offer.
Sorry, Ethan’s words were clear in Winston’s memory. I’m not supposed to talk about it.
Everyone knew that AXEL business was strictly confidential. Winston wasn’t stupid. But Ethan didn’t have any heart to his confession. It almost sounded like he didn’t care at all.
Winston used the heel of his academy-issued shoe to kick the concrete below him. "Stupid new kid," he muttered to himself.
He unwittingly conjured more dark thoughts around his brain until a loud boom sounded in the distance. Winston paused and glanced in the direction of the explosion. It was gunfire alright. But who was shooting?
After waiting a few tense seconds, another burst erupted through the air. This time, it was much louder.
"What the hell?" he muttered to himself.
Winston cautiously paced over to the edge of the rooftop and glanced down. A metal fence was posted around the building to prevent anyone from accidentally falling five stories to the ground.
Hector’s brother leaned against the fence and looked into the streets below. He saw little to nothing in the direction of the noise.
Winston shook his head. "No way there’s shooting here," he said to himself. "Just me talking to myself, and I'm hearing things that aren't there..."
A dull thud shook the rooftop. Winston's heart skipped a beat. Whatever shook the roof, it was right behind him.
He was tempted to see what caused the thud, but something made him freeze in place. Winston had no idea what he would see, but there were few things that could carry enough force to shake a building.
Curiosity overwhelmed his better judgment. He slowly turned around to see what had just jumped behind him.
A horrific face just like his was looking right back at him. It had golden irises and a smile too sinister to be human.
***
Liam had a bad night.
A massive gash bled across his torso and his left shoulder was dislocated. His dress shirt grew a patch of red across the front and his trousers stained with mud. Sweat covered his face and fear intoxicated his demeanor.
Needless to say, he was not looking good.
He slammed West Dorm’s doors behind him and leaned against them to barricade the entrance. Liam pressed his good arm against the doors while holding onto a shotgun with three shells loaded.
After a moment’s pause, the doors were met with brute force bursting inwards. Liam barely held his ground as the doors buckled. His heels dug into the carpet to get any traction that he could to stop this monster.
He lifted the shotgun and blind fired once through the entrance. The beast outside writhed in pain, but did not die. Liam took the opportunity to shove the doors back and turn the lock.
At that moment, Iris and Nora dashed into the lobby. They saw Liam’s gritty appearance.
“What happened?” Iris demanded.
Liam dug through his pockets for more shotgun shells. Unfortunately, he had none. “I got ambushed while packing up the car,” he grunted. “Damn thing jumped me.”
Nora whipped off her uniform jacket and tried to use it to stop the bleeding. Upon contact, the jacket’s colors became even darker with a new shade of scarlet.
“That’s the Wraith from earlier!” she exclaimed.
Liam shook his head. He listened for the beast outside, but he heard nothing. “Don’t know.”
“I’ll explain later,” said Iris. “Nora, get Ethan! You two need take the back door and get to the armory upstairs!”
“On it!”
Nora was always anxious at night, but the presence of an unseen monster outside was more than enough to scare her out of her wits. There should have been warding runes to stop Wraiths from entering the parking lot. That protection wasn’t worth much with the Wraith outside.
She seldom experienced fear, and this was an occasion when she wanted to scream. The childish anxiety brewing was begging to make her weak.
>
That weakness couldn’t happen. She needed to do what she was told. If Iris needed something, Nora had to be the one to get that task done.
Without further delay, Nora raced for the elevator.
***
Ethan knew a shotgun blast when he heard one.
Their meeting hadn’t ended more than a minute ago. Iris and Nora were downstairs, weren’t they?
Even through the concrete walls, there was a dull thud that punched through the air around him. Ethan knew his own hearing was always sensitive. He wondered what was going on outside.
“Something is here,” Gabriel whispered.
“Could you be less vague?” Ethan asked.
“No matter. Your friend is at your door.”
Ethan jerked himself out of bed and whipped on his hoodie hanging from the chair. Just as he zipped it up, there was a loud knocking on his door.
“Hey!” said a familiar voice. It was Nora. “You awake? Sorry, but I’m coming in!”
Ethan just put on his boots when Nora barged into his room. She wore an expression of both fear and excitement. For Ethan, that was a face he hadn’t seen before.
“What’s happening?” said Ethan. He tried his best to play dumb, even though he knew that the situation was serious. “Did a gas pipe blow?”
“The Wraith from earlier followed us,” said Nora. “Come on! We have to get to the armory!”
Nora grabbed Ethan by his wrist and pulled him out of his room. The duo hit a sprint down the hall and back to the command room.
She wasted no time to turn a portrait on the wall sideways. Behind it was a button. Nora pushed it. A false wall opened up to reveal the secret AXEL armory inside.
Ethan turned behind him. No one fled out of their dorm rooms. Yet. He expected the other students to start panicking if they realized a Wraith was at their front door.
“Can you use one of these?” asked Nora.
Ethan turned back. His friend held a spare revolver from the armory. Nora held the ammunition in her other hand.
He stared at it. Ethan shook his head.
“Seriously?” asked Nora. She took the gun back and quickly loaded the chamber.
A wave of static noise pierced the air and the atmosphere smelled of ozone. They knew what it meant: Iris was speaking with them telepathically.