| Marching Orders |
[07 May 2008|06:42am] |
Months had passed. How many, Tyler did not know. Perhaps even a year. Time was a comical concept to the young immortal at this point. It was the one thing, truly the only thing, that he had in spades. Yet he craved to trade it in for other things. More intimate conditions.
For the first several months, Tyler had been rebooted into a better version of himself. He had endured mental and physical training with some of the best teachers that the West had to offer. And when that time had passed, his father had brought him home to Japan to begin all over again. Through the frustration, the endless effort, the exhaustion, the pain, the blood, and the slow passage of days, Tyler had finally been molded into a perfect weapon. A fire wielding, timeless soldier who was fit to carry out the end game to all that his clan had been taxed and toiled trying to vanquish.
For eighteen days, Tyler had been completely alone in the hills, left alone to his thoughts and given the chance to finally get some much needed rest. But when he rose up from his sleep on the nineteenth day, he found something that brought back a different kind of recollection. He spied, laying on his small wooden table that he used for dining and for burning incense upon, a commission letter of the very same mold and type that he use to be sent when there was a mission that he was to carry out. It was, without any doubt, the official marching order of his clan.
finally.
Tyler could not move to the letter and tear it open fast enough. It was obviously from his father, for he was the only one who could move in and out of a room Tyler was sleeping in and not wake him up; a fact that Ty attributed to the connection of comfort owed to the formative years the young man spent being raised by the very same man. His adrenaline rose as his dark eyes scanned the ink on the page.
Son,
The time you’ve been longing for has come. There’s business that you are to finish. Be at Davey’s Locker tomorrow evening for a meeting. More will be explained to you there than I have time for now.
And please, try to be careful.
Tyler did not need anyone to tell him where the bar was located. He dropped the letter, and by the time it hit the ground, he was already on his way back to his village to pack his belongings and necessities. He wasn’t sure that he could make it in time, but he would be damned if he wasn’t going to give it a hell of a shot.
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| Good Timing |
[07 May 2008|09:59pm] |
Mallory had become very careful with her schedule. Up early to go running just after the sun came up, then back to the trailer for a quick breakfast before cleaning up the dishes and taking Tuffy for a long walk. After that she'd usually go down to the diner to drink a couple of cups of coffee while sitting at the counter and watching Verlie give the evil eye to the truckers who talked too loud when they straggled in from the highway.
The trailer was too quiet. She'd unplugged the phone to keep herself from weakening and using it to call Victoria, relying on the cell phone Agent Markowitz had issued her when she'd gotten her badge because the vampire didn't have the number. She'd done the right thing. Made the mature decision, the only decision. She'd also woken up crying for the past three mornings.
If there was nothing DHS needed her to do, she stayed to herself and didn't seek out company because she couldn't stand being near anybody. Not even Julie, who she loved like a sister, but she knew Julie wouldn't be able to be honest and say she was sorry it was over between her and Vicky. She wouldn't ask Julie to lie for the sake of their friendship, so it was better to keep away from her.
She hurt, hurt worse than she'd ever hurt. And she was so Goddamned lonely that she kept the television on all the time just so she could hear another voice. She cried a lot, randomly, bursting into tears while she was cooking dinner or cleaning the bathroom or carrying the garbage out. Mrs Abnernathy caught her bawling while leaning on the rearview mirror of the truck, a bag of groceries sitting at her feet, and the old lady had offered her a glass of too-sweet tea to make her feel better. That just made her cry harder.
She'd done the right thing. She had to stick to it. Even if it made her feel like she was dying.
Of all the gifts Hannah Flynn had been entrusted with upon her death and rebirth, being empathic wasn’t one of them. Her appearance at Mallory’s trailer was coincidental. It was no longer strictly necessary to materialize in the middle of someone’s living room. Nowadays, the ghostly Agent could access her solid body and follow traditional habits, such as knocking at the door.
This she did now, frowning at certain signs that all wasn’t right in Mallory’s world. Scrubby grass poked up around the front steps and begged to be cut back. A couple of newspapers hadn’t been brought inside the trailer. Hannah held an electronic bill in hand, which she’d found below the mailbox, coated in desert dust, as if the redhead had dropped it and hadn’t even noticed.
This was her old neighborhood, too. Certain precautions had to be taken upon appearing there, lest a nosy person take note of Hannah’s post-mortem visit. She wore nondescript jeans and flip-flops, topped off with a yellow hoodie, which she pulled tight around her face.
Hannah rapped her knuckles against the door a second time. “Mallory?” she called, attempting to project her voice through the door, but nowhere else. “Um… don’t freak out… just an old friend.”
( Heart to Heart )
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