 
# About the Author

For as long as I can remember I loved stories. Even as early as my youth I would get invested in the characters in shows like Saved by the Bell or Power Rangers. As I got older this transitioned to things like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel and now I find myself with a backlog of things to watch and read that will likely never get completed as there isn't enough time in the world.

At around 18 I came up with the idea for a group of people that would find themselves dragged into the world of the paranormal but with none of them having any powers to be able to have the advantage. Over a decade later this idea would develop into Forces with many plot points in this and subsequent books being planned out all that time ago.

As for why I didn't write this back then? I had other priorities, such as being a lazy young adult who was far more interested in drinking than sitting down to write a book. One of my many regrets.

I hope you enjoy Forces and that by the time you reach the end you're eager to see where this journey takes the characters. I'm eager to write it all.

# Chapter 1 - It's Just Dinner.

Dinner, a simple meal out for two. That's what this was meant to be. It was an evening Rick Abbots had been counting down the hours to, given his love for food. In this instance, he was taking Sophie out, so he got to have the boyfriend brownie points and the steak, a win-win, he thought to himself.

Rick had been with Sophie Hayter for just over eight months, and he'd been trying to get her to go out on a date with him for a solid year before that, but she kept insisting she could only see him as friend. He is proof that persistency wins through on occasion though. This wasn't a special dinner, no anniversary, no proposal on the cards or anything significant, just a regular meal out on a regular evening. Well, at least that's what they thought: they had no idea how wrong they were, or how things would end up turning out.

As the two of them sat there, enjoying the food and each other's company, they weren't to know that as soon as they left the restaurant, their evening was going to turn sour. They especially could not have predicted that going to dinner would signal a dramatic change in their lives, as well as the lives of those closest to them, but then that was something nobody could have foreseen. At least the meal itself was as good as they had hoped it would be.

'I could literally eat steak every single night with no feeling of guilt,' Rick said. Or at least that's possibly what he said; it was hard for Sophie to tell given that he had a great deal of cow in his mouth whilst saying it.

You see, when you have been together for longer than six months, it can be easy to forget the manners reserved for impressing somebody. Sophie thought back to how on their first date, he would have cut the meat into the smallest of pieces, how he certainly would have made sure it was cooked to at least medium in order to avoid the dripping red sea of juice that exuded from it now. She didn't mind though, since by this point she had already managed to spill gravy down her top and had tried to wash it off with lemon water. It was clear to both of them they were a well-suited couple.

'I think you pretty much do eat steak daily anyway,' Sophie responded, as she continued to scrub at the gravy that was now looking worse, thanks to the large water stain appearing around it.

'No I don't, but it's the dream,' said Rick, getting lost a bit in his own meat-related thoughts. 'When fame and fortune arrive, I'll have a private chef in the house just to make steak at whatever time of day I feel like having it. Breakfast steak, lunch steak, dinner steak, one day it will happen.'

'You're a strange man with strange life goals,' she said, not wanting to indulge him by admitting that it didn't sound like the worst dream to have; she quite liked the idea herself.

Rick smiled: she was his life goal. She who now had a blotch on her shirt the size of an apple was the person he wanted to spend the rest of his life with, but he couldn't say that to her just yet; it had only been eight months. Instead, he did what he did best: he resorted to humour. He lifted up a giant piece of meat attached to his fork and stared longingly at it. 'Don't listen to her, baby,' he said to the dripping piece of steak, so big that surely one person couldn't eat it in one go, 'she'll never understand what we have.' Impressively, he proceeded to eat the whole thing.

Rick and Sophie were close friends long before anything romantic happened between them. He liked to think he eventually won her over thanks to his charm, but it was actually due to Tony Bales and Kim Heaton, their best friends and two people who had been a couple far longer than they had. Tony and Kim had been together longer than anyone could remember, with the type of childhood romance that nobody ever thinks will last. They had always been determined to prove everyone wrong, and it was a case of so far so good for them on that front. It was the strength of those two as a couple that caused Sophie to take a look at her and Rick: they made her realise their chemistry was worth risking the friendship for, to have something as special as their friends had. She had never told Rick, but she always had feelings for him too deep down, but they were just so close already that she was always scared of losing him altogether, should any potential relationship fall apart.

Tony had no idea he was one half of an inspirational couple; Kim did though, thanks to Sophie. She had long planned on keeping that ace up her sleeve for if she ever needed a favour. She's the sweet and innocent one of the four best friends, but that doesn't mean she won't try and make things work to her advantage if the opportunity ever arose. As for Tony, he and Rick were similar in a lot of ways and it's why they get on as well as they do, the difference being that Rick is the more sensible of the two. Tony's not exactly irresponsible, but if there's an opportunity to slack off, or to find a joke in something, he'll have found it long before the thought even occurs to anybody else.

'Anybody for dessert?' asked the waiter. He'd just wandered over and was trying not to look at the stain on Sophie's shirt, failing miserably in doing so.

'I'm okay, thanks' Sophie responded, short and with a glare, noticing him smirk at her unfortunate accident. Rick didn't do much to help the situation by smiling back at him.

'I'm glad you said that, because I feel like I have literally just devoured a whole cow,' added Rick. 'Just the bill, please.'

As the waiter headed off, Sophie couldn't help but notice Rick chuckling away to himself. 'It's not that noticeable,' she exclaimed, with mild frustration.

His response of 'NASA is currently pondering what this new anomaly on the Earth's surface is' was probably not the wisest of comments Rick could have made, but he stood by it, purely for the comedy value. Luckily the smile he got in return was validation that, not only did she find the remark funny, but the situation too. Another example of them being perfect for each other, he thought to himself.

The waiter brought them the bill and walked away as quickly as he could, without making eye contact with Sophie, safe in the knowledge that the only tip he would be getting is 'don't make fun of your customers.' Rick proceeded to reach for his wallet.

'Hey, we said we'd both pay half.' Sophie reached into her bag for her purse.

'No, it's fine, scratch card win. Technically neither of us are paying for this.' He was lying of course, there was no scratch card win; he wanted to pay, and lying was a good way to avoid the inevitable ten-minute conversation about why he shouldn't that would surely have followed.

'Then in which case, thank you.'

'You're ever so welcome,' replied Rick, thankful that it was agreed far quicker than it normally is when the subject of who's paying arises. Sophie's very headstrong, always wanting to pay her own way, even when it's her boyfriend treating her.

It had been a nice evening, the only complaint from either of them being that the gravy was a little runny. It should have remained nice and it would have, were it not for the choice they made in which way to walk to the car. They could have walked the quickest way, straight down the road and it would have taken them about ten minutes. Or, they could have taken a slightly longer route, a route that they would never normally take, one that would lead them through an alley. Were it not for the weather outside, that second option wouldn't have even been considered.

Rick looked towards the door: the wind outside had picked up since they got there and leaving the confines of the cosily-lit restaurant didn't seem like the wisest of moves. However, it was late and the restaurant was closing soon, so they had little choice in the matter. How was he to know that not long after walking outside, everything was going to change? Not just for him, not just for Sophie, but for Tony and Kim too. Two people who weren't even there with them that night were going to be caught up in something that would prove to be life-altering. Leaving at that time, walking down that alley, those choices were to alter things for all of them. For Rick at this moment though, he just didn't like the thought of the cold wind.

As they stood up, each making their own variation of the noise you make when you've eaten too much, they put on their coats. Rick placed the money for the bill on the table and they headed for the door. The waiter who collected it was pleasantly surprised he did get a tip after all; it was obvious to him who out of the two of them must have paid.

They exited the restaurant and stepped onto the street, the cold of the nearly ending winter immediately hitting them both. It wasn't snowing, but there was an icy chill in the air and the wind stung their cheeks as they battled against it. It was of course typically blowing directly at them as they were walking and there was a lot of road between them and the car. They wrapped themselves in their coats as tight as they could, the cold wind beginning to cause them to lose the feeling in their faces. Rick told Sophie that he knew a way to get there that would get them out of the wind, the only downside being that it would add an extra few minutes to the walk. It was a cut through, a diversion that would take them through an alley.

'There's a turning up on the left, we're going through there.' Rick was adamant they had to get out of the head wind. As they approached the turn, it didn't look welcoming. There were no lights, the gale was blowing toppled metallic bins across the ground, rubbish circled the air and whilst it might have got them away from the icy gusts, Sophie was cautious that it could also get them killed.

'Really? You want us to go down there?' she asked, her apprehension at the idea not disguised by the unimpressed sound of her voice.

'It'll be fine, it's about a minute of creepy alley and then it's just sheltered roads. It'll take us away from the wind,' he said, eager for them to get to some form of shelter so he could start to get the feeling back in his face and fingers.

'If we get axe-murdered to death, I'm blaming you.' Sophie's half joking words were at odds with her nervous tone as she spoke them.

'Fine, I'll take the blame,' he said, unaware her fears of something terrible happening were extremely, albeit unknowingly, well-founded.

As they veered left into the alley, the mood changed. It wasn't something either of them could do anything about, but there was an air of unease that couldn't be shaken off and despite the howling of the wind, it felt desperately quiet.

'I should probably apologise for bringing us down here,' Rick said, the sound of his voice now as nervous as Sophie's.

They continued to walk further, their pace slowing.

'We could turn...' Before Sophie could finish her sentence, one she would come to wish she had started a mere two seconds earlier, she tripped on something and tumbled to the floor with a thud, cracking her head on to the concrete of the floor below.

Rick quickly scrambled for his phone to give them some light. The darkness of the alley was stopping him from making her out, despite her being right in front of him.

Sophie, dazed from the knock to her head, tried to lift herself up. She turned slowly to the right to see what she had tripped on and at that moment, Rick aimed his light in her direction. She immediately focused on what was in front of her, a body, eyes wide open, lifeless and vacant. She froze, overcome with an inability to take her gaze off it and unable to muster the courage needed to make a decision as to where she should go, or what she should do.

'Sophie, get up and back away,' Rick said, horrified by what he was staring at.

'Rick, what's going on?' she asked, shaken and paralysed by fear. Sophie continued to stare at the person lying next to her, a girl who appeared to be no older than she was. She began to focus on the horror of her surroundings, and noticing a puddle of blood, she realised she was lying right in it. She panicked and quickly shuffled backwards to Rick who put his arms around her.

'We've got to go.' Rick's voice was quiet, barely reaching a volume louder than a whisper. 'We need get out of this alley and call the police.'

Sophie nodded and looked down at her shirt, it was covered in the blood of whoever this girl was. She didn't know why, but all she could think was at least she couldn't see that gravy stain anymore. At least that was all she could think, because Rick's next sentence contained a word that immediately caught her attention.

'Whatever did this to them could still be here.'

'Them?' she asked, 'why did you say them?'

She got to her feet, Rick's light shining down to where she had fallen and there was the girl. She was a brunette, and Sophie thought to herself the dress she was wearing looked pretty, not the obvious thing to think at this kind of moment and she couldn't explain why she thought it. Her eyes gradually moved to her left and she saw this girl was not alone. Her blood-soaked hand was holding onto someone; there was somebody else lying dead on the alley's cold concrete floor. It was a man and she once again couldn't take her eyes off the scene; she was almost in a trance, transfixed by the gruesome display that lay before her. After a few seconds, she began to register Rick repeatedly calling out to her. She could then feel him dragging her away, but all she could do was stare at the horror at her feet. Whoever did this, whatever did this, it did it with ferocity, it tore into them so quickly they didn't even let go of each other's hands.

'Sophie, let's get out of here, now!' Rick yelled.

She regained her composure, saw Rick's desperate face staring at her and nodded. They turned and headed back the way they came, back onto the street and out of the alley. That cold wind didn't seem so bad anymore.

# Chapter 2 - Spreading the News

Langton isn't a big town. It's not so small that you can't make it to buy some milk without running into someone you know, but it's the kind of size where news travels fast. For instance, if two brutally maimed people are found dead one night, that has the tendency to move whatever supermarket has been given planning permission from the front page of the local paper.

The names of the victims were known fairly quickly, Alexander Summers and Abigail Gibbs, a couple in their mid-twenties who were celebrating their two-year anniversary that fateful evening. With their details in the public domain, it was the same newspaper article that named the people who had discovered the bodies too. Rick and Sophie had obviously spoken to the police, but they hadn't spoken to the Langton Herald, although that didn't stop their names from appearing in it. At this stage, they were unaware that they had become famous in the local area, since they hadn't surfaced that day and neither had gone in to work. Rick and Tony worked together at a call centre and it would be fair to say all the talking that day in the office had been about the night before. In Rick's absence, it was Tony who was bearing the brunt of the questioning.

'Is Rick okay?'

'How's his girlfriend?'

'Did they know the people killed?'

'Did Rick get a photo of the scene?'

Tony was asked these questions a lot throughout the day, the last one surprising him the most. 'Yes, he did. I think he's planning on sharing them on Twitter at some point' was his sarcastic response to that disturbingly inquisitive colleague. Most people who were there when that question was posed knew Tony was joking, some didn't; with those few he began evaluating the people he allowed to come near him during his working day.

Despite not bitterly hating his job like some, he couldn't help but be jealous of Kim. She worked in an office in the city, and with all the murder and crimes that occur there, they probably wouldn't even know that anything had happened in Langton. He was fully aware of how strange it was to be envious of her working in a bustling location with a higher crime rate, but after question number one hundred and fifty-six, he stood by his thought process on the matter.

Amidst the frustration of the day though, he was worried about his friends, two of the people closest to him who were normally so carefree would surely be changed by what had happened to them. They had plans to head out the following weekend, would that be cancelled now? It was a trivial, almost selfish thought to have, a few drinks in a rundown bar was hardly important right now, yet he couldn't help thinking it. Mostly though, he was just worried about what he should say to them. There's no handbook on how to deal with friends who have seen something so barbaric.

Tony's 5pm ritual was straightforward: make sure he was out of the building no later than a minute past the hour, then he would head to the station to wait for Kim's train to get in. This was a daily thing, since he and Kim didn't officially live together, though they may as well have done at this stage. They had been a couple for so long and she had more clothes at his home than at her own; she also had far more space in the wardrobe than he did, much to his annoyance. Today, however, when the train pulled in and she got off, there was a different atmosphere.

The usual fun mood they would instantly find themselves in was replaced by sadness. Kim too had been having the same thoughts as he had; she may not have had any frustrating and sarcastic Twitter-related conversations on the subject but like Tony, she was just worried about what to say to her friends when she saw them. Both were aware the other wasn't acting normally, and the greeting pleasantries were followed by a prolonged silence and that didn't tend to happen to either of them. Normally it was hard for them to stay quiet for more than a minute.

'Have you heard from them?' Kim asked, concerned because she hadn't.

'No,' Tony replied, 'not even a text.'

'Same, I keep wanting to send Sophie a message, but what would I say? Kim held her phone and stared at it, awaiting an inspiration that was never to come. 'Hope you're okay' wouldn't really cut it I don't think'

Tony remained silent, a bit too silent for him until he noticed Kim's glare. 'I couldn't think what else to send other than that,' he responded coyly. 'Plus, we're guys, direct and to the point seems to work for us.'

'Did he reply?'

'No.'

'Didn't cut it then, did it?'

There was no response needed. It was a difficult situation for everybody and both Kim and Tony could only feel a little foolish for how much stress it was causing them. They weren't there, they didn't go through it. Really, it was just another day as far as they were concerned. There was no way either could predict the events of the previous night would have such an impact on them in the future, but then, why would they?

The walk home was an odd one; attempts at small talk failed and attempting to have a nice evening was always going to be a hard task, but when they got to Tony's front door, they saw what neither of them was expecting to see. There stood Sophie. She looked drawn and pale, at least that was Kim's first thought although she felt awful for thinking about her appearance at a time like this. Now there was the awkward situation, waiting to see who of the three of them would speak first. Tony sadly didn't have a reputation for dealing with awkward situations very well, and he said the first thing that came into his head.

'Was the food nice last night at least?'

The glare that Kim had cast his way earlier was nothing compared to this one. This was the glare that's reserved for special occasions, for times when his stupidity reached heights that even she couldn't quite wrap her head around.

'I'm so sorry, that wasn't what I'd planned to say' he said, hoping he had been able to backtrack quickly enough.

Luckily Sophie knew him well enough to know what he was like, so the small smile she sent in his direction was enough to cause him some relief, and it also allowed Kim's still angry stare to gradually drift away from him.

After walking into the house, Tony offered drinks and made himself scarce, since it was pretty clear Sophie needed Kim right now.

'Was the food nice?' whispered Kim to him before he left the room, still shocked he had asked it. There was a witty response he could have given, and indeed he had about five different ones swirling around in his head, but he thought better of it and headed upstairs to the safety of his own company.

Sitting on the couch, Kim was desperate for Sophie to talk first. That whole issue about what to say at a time like this wasn't any easier in a real-time situation. Thankfully, after a few seconds, Sophie broke the silence.

'Is everyone talking about it?'

'You made the papers,' Kim replied in a cheerful tone, one she quickly realised to be inappropriate given the subject matter.

'Great, there was me thinking I could fly under the radar on this one,' she replied.

This wasn't what Sophie wanted to hear; she had been concerned things wouldn't be returning to normal at any point soon to begin with, but now that everybody knew what had happened, she feared she would be the talk of the town for weeks.

'Not in this town,' Kim said, her warm smile making things feel a little better for Sophie, just for the briefest of moments. 'I was worried about what to say to you and honestly, I still don't have a clue. I mean do you want to talk about it? I can listen?'

'I do. I feel I need to.' Sophie's voice was cracking as she tried to speak, with the memories of those eyes staring at her haunting her mind as she spoke. 'If I think about it though, I'm there again, I'm back in the alley with them.'

'Sophie, I can't even imagine what it must have been like.'

'Her eyes were just staring at me,' she continued, 'but there was nothing behind them, no life, just emptiness. I just don't understand how something like this can happen in the middle of our town, how something this horrible can happen to two innocent people.' Sophie was trying to stay strong, to stay composed, to not let the tears come, but it was an impossible task.

'Sophie, we're going to get you through this, alright?' Kim was desperately trying to reassure her friend that she would be okay, even if she wasn't confident of that herself.

'They were a couple, Kim, the two people, they were together. This thing attacked them, it tore them to pieces and they didn't even let go of each other's hands.' The sadness of that sentence and the memory of seeing it overwhelmed her, the tears she had been trying so hard to hold back broke through. All Kim could do was hold her as she cried. 'They were still holding hands,' Sophie said again. It was an image that no matter how hard she tried would stay lodged in her mind, flashing back when she least expected it.

'I wish I knew how to help you, Sophie. I want to be able to at least make a start in taking your mind off it.'

Sophie began to compose herself. Her demeanour changed, as if she had suddenly worked out what she needed and it wasn't to take her mind off of what she saw. 'I don't want to.'

Kim stared at her blankly, not understanding the point her friend was trying to make. 'What? You don't want to what?' she asked, puzzled by what could be going through her mind.

'I don't want to take my mind off it.'

Kim's look of confusion grew, but suddenly Sophie seemed totally composed. The tears had subsided and Kim noticed the determination on her face, a resolve that indicated whatever she was about to say, there would be no talking her out of it.

'I want to find who did this, or what did this. I want to find them and I want to know why. I want answers.'

Kim was concerned but aware she was dealing with a delicate situation. Sophie was going through a lot right now and it was important that she supported her, even if she wasn't coming across as rational. 'How? How are you thinking of doing this?'

Sophie looked at her right in the eyes and said something Kim didn't see coming. 'I want to go back.'

'Back? What do you mean back?' Kim asked, worried as to what the answer to that question could end up being. Shock can make people do strange things, can make them act in ways that are far from rational and Sophie seemed primed to give a perfect example of that with her response.

'I want to go back to the alley.'

By this point, it was generally considered to be an almost certainty that Alex and Abigail were killed by some kind of animal. Sophie hadn't read the news reports into what happened, but the wounds they had could not have been caused by a person. Whatever creature it was though had not been found; it was still out there, and with that in mind it had been advised to the people of Langton not to go near the alley or its surrounding area. Kim explained this to Sophie, advised her it was a place that was deemed unsafe and that there was a worry this thing could attack again. Sophie understood but remained undeterred. This was what she needed, since her head was clouded by the need to do something and even if she had to go alone, there was nothing anyone could say that would talk her out of returning.

# Chapter 3 - A Man Walks into a Bar

People handle things differently. Some people feel the need to talk about a situation that's affected them, some like to keep themselves busy through work or activities, while others would much prefer to head to a local bar and drink their memories away. Rick firmly fell into category three. There are many bars in Langton: some are aimed at the youthful crowd, with the music turned right up and people dressed to impress whoever happens to stumble in, while there are also ones that are more commonly known as the old man pubs. The Langton Arms is definitely an old man's pub. It has just the one pool table that's on a slope, peanuts on the bar that may well have been there since the dawn of time and a few regulars making slurred attempts at communication. Tonight though, they had a new face there, Rick, and he was certainly doing a great job at fitting in with the rest of the sullen patrons.

Tony knew where to find him: he just thought about where he would go for a drink if he'd had an experience like that. He definitely had instant regret about trying to be a good friend the moment he walked in and saw the place though. In no mood to hang about, he headed straight over to Rick and sat next to him, making sure he brushed the seat down a bit too vigorously before sitting on it.

'Well, you sure know where to go for a pick me up, don't you?'

'How did you find me?' Rick asked, sullen and despondent.

'I narrowed down the possibilities, thought about where the most miserable place in town was and here you are, brightening the joint right up with your dazzling smile.'

'I'm not in the mood, Tony. I'm not the best company either.'

'You never are and it hasn't stopped me before.' Tony knew his attempts to lighten the mood weren't working, but there wasn't anything else he could do. He needed to get his

friend out of this funk before Sophie went and did something she might live to regret. 'Look mate, we need to talk,' he said, direct and without a hint of humour in his tone.

'Do we? Can it wait until I've finished this scotch?'

'Scotch?' Tony replied. 'Just because you're drinking in an old man's pub doesn't mean you need to drink like you are one. Besides it can't wait, it's about Sophie.'

'She okay?' The mention of her name was enough to bring Rick out of his slump, even if it wasn't to last long.

'She's with Kim,' Tony replied. 'But man, she's talking crazy.'

Rick shrugged, because after what they had both been through, he wouldn't expect her to be talking like anything else. He hadn't quite realised the level of crazy that Tony was talking about though, and he would certainly never have considered that she would want to return to the scene.

'That's it, a shrug?' Tony had suddenly become very serious, quickly becoming as fearful for Rick as he and Kim already were for Sophie.

Rick stared at Tony before returning to his drink, a drink that Tony proceeded to take away from him.

'Rick, you need to hear this. I know you've been through something awful but Sophie, she wants to go back to that alley, back to where you found those bodies. She wants to find out what did it to them.'

Rick's depressed face changed; he wasn't sure how to feel now. It was a strange combination between concern, anger and shock but whatever he was feeling, Tony now had his full attention.

'Did she say why?' he asked, trying to understand her thought process.

'Whatever it is, she wants it caught. Hoping she can spot the thing from a safe distance and call the police, apparently,' Tony responded, his disapproval with the whole plan being made clear by the sound of his voice.

What they had both failed to notice until now was that they were no longer the only people in the conversation; a stranger had joined them. A man, not too much older than they were, late twenties, dressed in a suit, with an inquisitive look on his face as he paid close attention to their every word.

'Can we help you?' Tony was quick to ask, annoyed by the intrusion into what should have been a private chat between two friends.

The man sat down next to them, ordered a drink and then turned to initiate himself into what they were talking about. 'Actually, I'm here to help you' he said before formally introducing himself. 'My name is Will, Will Adams, mind if I ask you some questions, Rick?'

Rick wasn't in the mood for what he assumed to be a reporter at a time like this. 'Look, thanks, but my name's already been in the papers today, against my wishes just for the record. If you could do me a favour and go away, that would be great.'

Will seemed unnerved by the response, and he was actually expecting it. He was a determined sort though. He needed information and he wasn't going to stop until he got it.

'Your name is in a local paper, but I'm from a national one,' Will responded. He was as well-spoken as he was dressed and seemingly very confident, though no amount of confidence was going to win Rick or Tony over today. 'You say it was against your wishes, well wouldn't it be better to have your own words in there? You controlling what's printed rather than somebody who's never met you speaking on your behalf?'

Tony might try to play the fool a lot of the time, but he's extremely loyal. He also has a temper on him that causes him to react badly if someone is upsetting those he cares about. It was the first thing Will would learn about him.

'He's already told you to bugger off,' Tony sternly said, rising from his chair as he said it. 'If you don't, I'm gonna make you, on his behalf.'

Will smiled, knowing that for now at least, he wasn't going to get what he wanted. He looked at Rick and Tony and all he had to say was 'Gentlemen.' He picked up his drink and walked away, sitting across the other side of the pub.

'Is this what famous people have to go through?' Rick asked.

'You and Sophie are basically the Kardashians of Langton right now mate' Tony drily responded before returning to what they were talking about prior to being interrupted. 'Now, what do you want to do about Sophie?'

What Sophie had said to Kim shocked her. The last thing she imagined hearing was that she wanted to go back to where the bodies were found, Tony was about to find out what hearing that first hand was like.

'We go with her,' Rick said, having had a few moments to process what he had been told about his girlfriend.

Tony had two choices in his head of how to react to this. On the one hand, he could berate Rick for doing something that seemed idiotic, but on the other, he could try and understand the reasoning. The latter seemed wisest, despite his urge to go straight down the idiotic route.

'You want to try explaining that one to me? A little bit of solid reasoning as to why a group hang out down murder alley is seemingly high on your list of things to do?'

'What harm could it do?' Rick's response almost sent Tony straight back to the calling him idiotic line of thought, but he held his composure.

'Well I'd say us all being brutally slain is an example of the harm it could cause, wouldn't you? Tony was baffled by Rick's reaction. 'The thing that did this hasn't been found, even the police are advising people to be careful around there. I'm pretty sure that means it's not the place to be arranging social gatherings.'

As the two continued to debate the matter at hand, there was something else they had failed to notice, something that if they had, would have alerted them to the fact that mild mannered Will was certainly more than the reporter he claimed to be. But then a bug is normally placed with the intention of not being noticed and it was doing its job here. Will was seated across the other side of the pub, headphones in, eyes glued to a newspaper he wasn't really reading, listening to every word they were saying. The bodies, the plan to go back, Sophie, Kim; he was listening to it all and when the conversation ended and Rick and Tony left the pub, he smiled to himself and quickly finished making notes about everything he had learned. But these were just additions, for in his notepad he already had the location of the alley, he already had Rick and Sophie's names and two words were circled, bold on the page. Follow them. He got up and left the pub, walking calmly down the street with Rick and Tony blissfully unaware that someone was on their tail, monitoring their every move.

He didn't let up either. As the night drew on and everyone was at Tony's, debating what Sophie, and now Rick, were planning to do, he sat in his car outside. He didn't turn any music on because he needed to think; even the calmest of melodies would distract him. Will was patient, his motivations may have been unclear but whatever his goal was, he would not be deterred and he was certainly not under-prepared for any outcome: the handgun placed on the seat next to him made that abundantly clear. It was perhaps telling of his state of mind that for the hours he remained parked outside of that house, he didn't take his hand off the weapon; it was as if it was glued there and he was anticipating something he felt was going to happen.

Nobody did go back to the alley that evening. Tony and Kim had been able to persuade their friends they should at least sleep on the idea before doing anything rash. The mistake they made though was doubting their resolve, because they had promised that if the following day they still felt the same, then not only would they support them in their decision, but they would go with them.

'They'll realise how crazy an idea it is in the morning,' Kim had said. Tony agreed that after what they saw, they couldn't possibly want to go back to the scene, especially so quickly. It turned out they were both wrong.

It was during the following day that Tony and Kim both received the text. It gave them a time and place in the evening to meet, with reassurance that, if they didn't want to go with them, the two of them would completely understand. What else could Tony and Kim do? They had promised after all. Reassuring themselves, they had both come to the conclusion that nothing would happen anyway, after all, why would it? For all they knew, the thing responsible for the deaths could be miles away by now.

As the day drew on, the nerves started to kick in, both of them afraid for reasons they couldn't explain. It was as if they knew something was going to happen and their minds were trying to warn them against going, but a promise was a promise. Rick and Sophie felt the same nerves, but what they discovered awoke something in them. They hadn't thought they were going to see something that night, but they were almost welcoming the idea that it could happen. They needed answers. They met that evening and began their relatively short walk to the alley, the distance covered seeming to take longer than it should have though, the sense of dread making each minute seem like an hour. The four of them were unaware they weren't the only ones walking towards the designated location. At a distance, Will followed, his hand still on that gun.

# Chapter 4 - Back to the Alley

It was a calmer night than the last time they were there. You'd be forgiven for thinking much more time had passed than it actually had; whereas previously the ice-cold wind had been deafening, now the area was quiet. Too quiet. The lack of wind, the lack of any sound, other than the odd car driving past in the distance and the flickering of the police tape, was off putting. Rick and Sophie shared the same thought, somehow this made things even scarier than they had thought it would be. For Tony and Kim though, this was the first time to their knowledge they had been there. They may have passed through it on occasion in the past but if they had, neither of them remembered it. It was just an alley back then after all, without the feeling of dread surrounding it that was now so prevalent.

'Up there.' Sophie gestured to a spot on the roof, easy to get to thanks to the stairs that led up to it.

'Alright, let's do this then.' Rick's hesitant, yet supportive, voice was the motivation she needed to lead the way. He agreed to support her with her decision to go back, thinking it was just something she needed, but he was without question the more apprehensive of the two.

As they made their way up the staircase, nobody uttered a word. For Rick, this was an alarm bell sounding, reminding him that his friends were there purely to support them, rather than out of any intrigue they may have into tracking this thing down.

'You guys don't need to be here you know,' he said, looking at Tony who smiled at him.

'Yeah, we do.'

'I don't think I've ever heard you this quiet before,' Rick correctly pointed out.

'It's just stealth mode.' Tony's quip didn't alleviate Rick's concerns but highlighted that whatever happened, neither he nor Kim were planning on leaving them any time soon.

As they reached the gravelled rooftop, they set up camp. While they certainly weren't

sensible for being there, they at least had the foresight to pack for the occasion. It wasn't the healthiest combination in the world, but crisps and coffee were better than nothing. After all, they could be there until morning, because nobody had thought to work out how long they should wait around. It raised the question of just what the plan was for the night; they had all made the decision to be there, but nobody had thought to ask the important questions.

What should they do if something does happen?

What do they do if they are attacked?

How long do they stay for?

What if they run out of crisps?

Admittedly the last question wasn't the most important, but they were equal on the priority list for Tony, so he asked them all.

The response he got summed up how ill thought out this whole idea was. Blank looks and concerned faces were the only answer to any of those questions anybody had to give. Those nerves began to shift up a gear for everyone. The silence they had noticed had become deafening, yet still nobody wanted to be that person, the person who said they should go home. Sophie was never going to say that, out of all of them, it was she that wanted to be there the most. Rick wouldn't leave her; he thought to himself that there could be hundreds of bodies like the ones they saw, but he wouldn't even consider doing that. Then there was Kim- she hadn't said a word since they got there and she wasn't about to start talking now. It was her fear that had kept her mute this far, and she wasn't going to let the first thing she said be a request to leave. Tony then did the only thing he could in the situation; he opened up a packet of crisps, sat back and waited, hopefully for nothing to happen.

As time passed, the fear subsided. The more familiar you get with an unnerving situation, the less there feels the need to be scared of, and to everyone's surprise, that was the case here too. They began chatting as if they were in a beer garden, but the noise volume had to match that of a library. The more they spoke, the happier they all felt. Sophie smiled properly for the first time since that fateful night and things changed from the dread-filled stake out to something more akin to a late-night picnic. For that hour or so, things were normal, things were happy and they were sheltered from what they would soon discover. Their lives could still have remained the same.

It just took a noise for all that to change though. A crashing sound, like metal clanging against metal and a shriek that did not remotely sound like anything any of them had heard before. It was hard for any of them to describe what kind of noise it was, but it was enough to stop the fun everyone was having in an instant. They all rose to their feet and stared out into the darkness, overcome with fear and afraid to move. There was the very real concern that if they were to take a step, they would be walking towards the unknown, towards that sound.

'This is a good example of why we should have worked out what to do if something happened,' Tony was quick to point out. Nobody answered him; he was right of course now though, whatever was going to happen to them was all their own fault. They were there of their own making.

'Do we leave?' Kim asked, unsure and in a trembled whisper.

But here was the problem with that question. Whoever answered it would become responsible for what happened next. Someone could have replied with 'yes', but then if they headed down those stairs towards possible safety and something grabbed them, or grabbed and killed somebody else, then it would be on that person. If someone said that everyone should stay on the rooftop and the same thing happened, again, the only person to blame would be whoever made the decision. They all knew it and for that reason, Kim's question remained unanswered, the fear too overwhelming to take a chance on any plan of action.

The metallic staircase that led them up to the roof was to their left, not far, about a thirty second slow walk away, close enough to hear something coming up it. That's what they heard next. Whatever it was, it wasn't quiet enough to be a small animal, it wasn't loud enough to be a person, but it was certainly something. If it was coming up the stairs then it could only be doing one thing, it must be coming for them.

'Back up.' Rick became that person to make a decision, not that there was any other option than to get further away from the stairs, but somebody needed to say something.

'We're on a roof, Rick. There's only so much backing up we can do.' Sophie had a valid point, but what other choice did they have? The only safe way off the roof was the way they were unable to go.

'Just do it, get away from the stairs.' Rick grabbed Sophie's hand and edged backwards, checking behind him to see how close to the edge they actually were. Tony and Kim followed but as they moved, the noise that was getting ever closer to them changed to the crunching of gravel. It was up there with them, and there was no roof left to put any distance between them and whatever it was.

As it slowly made its way towards them, the lack of light made it hard to formulate its shape. It was definitely larger and wider than a dog, they could tell that much; it also walked as if it were hunting, as if it were stalking. The noise coming from it was now more like a growl, not like the sort you may hear from a household pet; its tone wavered in pitch and it was certainly more feral. At this point, it no longer mattered what it was. Rick and Sophie had seen what it was capable of, and the only options left to them were to face it, or to step off the roof and endure a long fall to the ground below. There was no option for them to be able to win. The closer it got, the louder the gravel sounded. It inched closer and closer, ready to attack, still largely hidden by the darkness thanks to its jet-black coat.

Out of the darkness came a gunshot, the noise from it sending the four of them back a step, nearly causing them to tumble off the edge of the roof. A whimpering noise immediately followed and then there was silence. No gravel sounds, no growling, nothing. Just an eerie calm.

'What was that?' Whispering was out of the window at this point, Tony's high-pitched voice perfectly representing the fear that everybody felt at that moment.

'That was me,' came a male voice from the distance.

That wasn't one of them talking; that voice didn't even come from the same roof.

Added to the fear was now confusion. 'Do we yell thanks?' Tony asked, to be met with a resounding look of blank faces and the odd shrug.

'Everybody alright over there?'

Sophie was the first to reply 'It depends on who you are, I think' she called out.

'Well, I didn't shoot you, did I?'

'We can say thanks now, right? He has a gun, I feel we should say thanks,' Tony said in a mild panic, yelling out 'thanks' after.

'That's not a problem, Tony,' the mysterious voice yelled back.

Rick, Sophie and Kim stared at Tony, intrigued as to how this man knew his name.

'I'm coming over, don't try and attack me or anything. I'm a friend.' The mysterious

stranger went quiet, apart from the sound of him climbing down from the roof he was on and making his way over to them.

Sophie immediately turned to Tony and asked him the obvious question 'Tony, you know who that is?'

'You don't think I'd be a little calmer if I did?' was his response.

It would have been easy to think everyone was safe now, but they were on a roof, awaiting

the arrival of somebody they didn't know, somebody who just happened to be carrying a gun. Sure, they might be safe, but they could also be in just as much danger as before. It took about a minute for the person to join them on the roof, yet it felt like an eternity. When he did get there, he was quick to introduce himself, or reintroduce himself as the case may be for two of them.

'Rick, Tony, pleasure to see you again.' He looked at Sophie and Kim, he hadn't met them yet, but he knew of them. 'You two must be Sophie and Kim, nice to meet you both.'

Rick remembered that he had seen this man before, he hadn't recognised the voice from a distance, now that he could see him, he recalled him instantly 'You're that reporter.'

'Well, yes. Except I'm not a reporter. Sorry, I lied about that bit. Just to be transparent, I planted a bug on you, listened in to your conversations and I followed you for the last day. I thought it may be best to get all that out in the open.'

Rick and Tony did admire his honesty for a second, at least before snapping back to reality and registering what he had just said to them.

Rick quickly chimed in. 'You've just told us that and you've come over here with a gun. Killing whatever that was aside, I'm not really feeling like trusting you right now.'

Will smiled. 'Quite right too, never trust a lying stranger with a gun and night vision goggles.' He knelt down beside the body of the thing he shot and stretched his arm out towards Rick, the gun loosely swinging in his hand. 'Here you go.'

Rick stared at him, unsure what he was meant to do.

'The gun, take it. Hopefully we won't need it now.'

Rick took the gun, holding it out in front of him as if he was a cartoon and he'd been handed a stick that had TNT written on it. 'I'm just gonna put this down over here.' He placed the gun gently on the floor and turned his attention back to Will.

Sophie approached him, but Rick was quick to hold her back. He was understandably cautious of Will and nervous about Sophie getting too close. He, like the others, was impressed. This man had saved them, had a weapon and was savvy enough to use night vision to take whatever this thing was down, but they were a long way from trusting him. She edged forward regardless and asked the question that was on everyone's lips. 'What is it?'

'This?' Will asked, pointing down at the creature dead in front of him. 'Nobody knows, I'm sure it has a name, we'll likely never find out though. I call it a Cleeth.'

'A Cleeth?' Tony asked, still as unimpressed by Will as he was before he saved them. Tony had been known to hold a grudge and the duplicity of the man was something that would perhaps make him the toughest for Will to win over. 'What's a Cleeth?'

'This,' Will replied, once again gesturing down to the lifeless creature sprawled out before him. He had an air about him that suggested that whereby this was the most terrifying situation they had been in, for Will, it may well have been a slow night. He spoke to them in the calmest of manners while shining a torch down on the creature, revealing its black fur with a light silver tinting; blood mixed into it that was tricking out onto the gravelled surface it lay upon.

'But what is it?' asked Kim, still edged as far away from Will and the Cleeth as she possibly could be.

'I'm sorry, which are you? Sophie or Kim?'

'Kim.'

'Well then Kim, I just call it a Cleeth, purely because it has sharp claws and sharp teeth. It's a combination of the two words, not particularly clever I admit, but there we go. You are, however, asking the wrong question.'

Tony's patience was beginning to drain. He was never the most patient person to begin with, and in a situation like this though, you had about a minute to get to the point before he began to lose his cool. 'Are you sane? Is that the right question?'

'No' Will replied. 'As in, no that's not the right question, I'm perfectly sane. The right question is where does a Cleeth come from?'

Tony was quick to reply. 'Do you actually want us to ask you the question, or can you just tell us?'

Sophie jumped in without hesitating. 'Where does a Cleeth come from?'

'No idea,' was Will's response. He stood up and looked at the group, sensing each of them were eager for some answers. 'But I'm trying extremely hard to find out.'

# Chapter 5 - A Corpse on the Coffee Table

The body of the cleeth was now in Tony's home. To be precise, the body of the cleeth was now on Tony's coffee table and whilst everyone was taking their time studying it, he was on his sofa staring at it with a look of disdain plastered across his face.

'I eat on that' he said, the comment pointedly aimed at Will.

'We'll clean it off,' replied Kim. Now the danger was out of the way, she was much keener to find out what this thing was. 'Don't make a fuss, come and look.'

'Don't make a fuss? Ok, what else do we do on that coffee table, Kim? When we're alone and fancy a change from the bedroom?' His eagerness to get her on his side was overly apparent.

Suddenly, Kim was the centre of attention, as opposed to the furred corpse that should be the focus of the discussion.

'Thank you for that,' her eyes piercing Tony's soul with anger as she said it. 'So, this isn't your first time with one of these, Will?' Her thought process was clearly focused on moving the conversation swiftly along, and that seemed like the best question to ask in order to do it.

Will was happy to oblige. 'Right, yes, back to this. No, not my first, I wish I could say I remembered the number I'm up to, but I'm beginning to lose count to be perfectly honest with you.'

'Well, your life is quite the thrill ride' Rick said, struggling to understand how somebody could spend so much time living a life that included things like this.

Will didn't respond to him, though the look he gave made it clear that he was aware his life wasn't normal. There was a large part of him that desperately wished it was.

At a casual glance, the Cleeth could have been an overweight dog, it was only when you look at the face that you can tell this wasn't something you'd be feeding a bone to. Its face was disfigured, crushed even; it had teeth longer than a human finger too, sharp and jagged. Also, its legs were clearly primed for speed, while its claws were almost as long as its teeth. They thought to themselves that it was no wonder that couple in the alley were killed in such a fashion, for they wouldn't have stood a chance against it.

'So, what do you do, Will?' Sophie asked. 'You just follow these things around and save people, or are you just really unlucky with coincidences?'

'That's essentially what I do' Will replied. He looked out at the faces staring back at him, remembering they were strangers and despite saving their lives, there was still a deserved sense of distrust surrounding him. 'My parents died, this life was pushed upon me as a result of it.'

'Sorry for your loss, did these things kill them?' Rick genuinely was sorry to hear about Will's misfortune, but there was something about him, something that made it apparent they weren't getting even half the story.

'It was a long time ago, but thank you. No, the cleeths were not to blame.'

Rick wasn't about to let the conversation stop there. 'What's the rest of the story then? Losing your parents must suck, it doesn't explain what you do though. We're grateful and all, but it's hard not to think there's something you aren't telling us.'

'With all due respect, Rick, we've just met. I would love a normal life such as the ones you all have, for a spell I did, I had a rather nice life with my boyfriend for a while there. Even got to take a holiday to Venice. My first holiday as a matter of fact.'

Tony, hearing that sentence couldn't let it slide without making a comment. 'What's Venice like?'

'Lovely. Until you see the person you love torn limb from limb, begins to make one think that either I'm linked to these things or, well, just unlucky with coincidence like you say, Sophie.'

'I'm sorry to hear that too,' Rick said, aware from Will's solemn tone that he wasn't one who enjoyed opening up to people.

'Thank you again, Rick.'

The blood from the Cleeth had begun dripping onto the carpet, and it was all Tony needed to get the conversation back to the matter at hand. 'I'm assuming cleeth blood isn't going to wash out with a dab of water and some Febreeze, so can we decide what's next on the agenda fairly quickly, please?'

Sophie agreed. 'Yeah, what's next? What normally follows this part?'

Will picked up his coat that was hanging over the chair next to the coffee table and began putting it on, making it clear he was ready to leave. 'Well, I'd say put it in a sturdy bin bag and bury the thing.'

'Hang on, you're going?' Sophie quickly interjected, unwilling to let him walk out on them.

'I am. I've done what I needed to do, you're all safe and the beast is dead. Not a great deal for me to stick around for. I set up some equipment at the alley, I'll see if there's anything of note when I collect it and then I'll head home.'

Kim, scared and quiet before, was beginning to get the same bug that her friends had: she wasn't ready to walk away from this and certainly wasn't about to let Will just go without them finding out more. 'We're not done. No, we're in this now and we want to be a part of it.' She may have come across as a little more forceful than normal, but she couldn't end the sentence without following it up with a sweet sounding 'please?' Kim would often think about this moment; looking back, she wasn't sure why she was so insistent on learning more. Most likely she was running on adrenaline from her experience in the alley, her thoughts clouded by the excitement of it all. Even as she said it, there was a thought in the back of her mind, screaming at her to run from this and put it all behind her. But at this moment, for whatever reason, she wanted to be involved.

Will smiled; it was, however, a telling smile. He'd heard this before and behind the smile was a story begging to be told, as if in the past, he would have agreed to let them help, but now he knew better. A link to his lost love maybe? It was a story he was not ready to tell. 'I'm sorry, trust me when I say that you've played the best possible part in all this that you could have.'

'Right, well thanks for stopping by, we'll add each other on Facebook or something.' Tony's thoughts on the notion of putting an end to it all were as transparent as the cleanest window the world had seen. The looks he got showed that he was in a minority of one; he didn't care though, because a line could be drawn under the whole thing and for that, he was thankful. He knew going to that alley was a mistake. Initially, he thought it was just a waste of time, but he wanted to be there for his friends. As far he was concerned now though, they couldn't move on from it all quick enough.

Unfortunately for him, a line was not about to be drawn and they were not just going to move on. Whether Will walked away from them or not, it would make no difference to the outlook his friends had. 'We're not done here,' said Sophie, her words an encouragement for Kim, who was pleased to hear somebody else vocally back her up. Not that Kim was surprised, since Sophie had always been a headstrong and determined person, always doing what she believed in, regardless of the consequences. Of course, this mentality had never involved a dangerous situation such as this one. Kim admired her friend's dedication, whereas she was close to backtracking on her bravery, Sophie had seemingly already made the decision to go all in. There was of course the possibility this was just shock, but Kim didn't think so. Sophie's need for answers would be the thing to keep driving her.

Will glanced at Rick: would he be a voice of reason, a happy medium between the girls and Tony perhaps?

'Will, I've learned the hard way to have Sophie's back, if she's in then I'm in. We'd stand a much better chance of not getting killed with you by our sides.'

'My decision stands.' Will was firm in his choice and he wasn't changing his mind. 'Just out of interest, what's the plan here? You'll stalk the streets at night until you find another one? Then what? Because if tonight should have taught you anything, it's that you don't stand much hope of surviving an encounter.'

Will was right and deep down they knew it. Had he not turned up, the chances are that one, if not all of them, would not have made it home. They didn't have the weapons, they didn't have the skill and no amount of enthusiasm would save them if they ran into one again. It wasn't going to stop them though, with the exception of Tony, who by this point had headed off to the kitchen for a snack, since in his eyes it was a pointless argument. His friends couldn't possibly stick to this train of thought, and after a night's sleep they'd realise they were better off out of the whole thing at least that's what he hoped. Will headed off, the lack of response was all he needed to know that he was making the right choice. Everyone else called it a night after he left, unsure of what they would be thinking the following day.

Will's evening wasn't over though. He barely made it down to the end of the road before sensing he wasn't alone. He stopped in his tracks 'You could just tell me you were there, it would save us both a great deal of time' he said, before even turning around.

'I wasn't trying to hide,' came the response.

Will's eyes widened. He had assumed somebody from the house had followed him, but that voice was one he was not expecting to hear, because this was a voice he knew all too well. He turned to see a man standing there, mid-fifties, a worn suit and a weary smile. 'What are you doing here, Charles?' he asked, evidently none too pleased to see this particular person.

'You know the answer to that, William. Why even ask?'

'Can I help you with something? It's been a long day.' Will's attitude had changed. There was an anger behind his eyes now that had remained hidden from those he had saved. It was an anger that he always tried to hold back, afraid of what might happen if he let it out.

'You followed me here,' replied Charles. He wasn't looking back in the same way; he obviously didn't care for Will but the rivalry, whatever caused it, had gone on for so long that he was simply growing tired. 'Those people you were with, are they the next casualties in your war against me?'

'I think we know who the next casualty in this so-called war will be, don't we, Charles? It's only a matter of time before your luck runs out.'

Charles remained calm, the two of them had been on opposite sides for so long now that Will might actually have been right, he may well have been pushing his luck, but then that wasn't going to stop him. His work might be dangerous, but it was also deeply personal. It's just how personal it is that makes the aging man such a threat.

'Well, William, you should get to wherever you call home these days, there's dangerous things out there.'

Will knew that all too well, since he was looking at one of them right now. Both men exchanged a glance and headed off in their respective directions; as meetings between the two of them go, this was as civil as either of them could have hoped for. It was an unnerving encounter for Will though. Charles hadn't approached him for a long time, and for him to have casually made contact with him in such a manner was deeply unsettling. It meant that whatever Charles was doing was further along than it had been, that Will was close to stumbling upon it with his hunts for cleeths and whatever evil was in his path. If he wasn't a threat to Charles, then he simply wouldn't have considered him worth approaching, yet there he was, trying to rattle him. Will found himself more determined than he had been in quite some time.

As for those whom Charles considered to be the next set of casualties, sleep did very little to deter them from their thoughts on what to do next; they remained the same as they had been the night before. The following morning, they each headed out into the life of normality. Rick and Sophie found themselves sitting behind desks and dealing with things that suddenly seemed so trivial. What was important before no longer seemed so. As for Kim, as much as she enjoyed her job, she too was unable to concentrate as much as she normally could, the pull to be doing something else tempting her away from her office. There was a calling they had each found and for whatever reason, it had a hold on them.

One person who didn't go into work that day and wasn't feeling this call to a new life was Tony. By his reasoning, a dead hell beast bleeding onto his coffee table was as good an excuse as any to call in sick for the day. Not that he was having a relaxing time watching day time television in his pyjamas, since he'd somehow volunteered to be the one to dispose of the body. Surprisingly for him, it was a task that caused him to take a look at his stance on how involved they should all be.

Having driven out into the woods, he dug the hole required. Dropping the body inside, he took another look at its teeth as it fell into the dirt below. These were the same sort of teeth that had killed Alexander and Abigail, the same sort of teeth that could have killed him and his friends, that could have killed Kim. It was the thought of Kim getting hurt that really made him reflect on how against this whole thing he was.

'Reg, can I call you Reg?' Tony sat down by the edge of the hole, and he was aware that talking to a dead creature wasn't the sanest of things to do, but right now it was the only thing he had around to sound off to. 'If we don't do something to find out where you came from and somebody else dies, well everyone's going to be feeling pretty guilty. If I stop them from getting involved and that happens, then I'll never hear the end of it. To be honest, whilst I should know the answer, I really couldn't tell you what's worse. So really, what choice do I have here? What choice have you given me Reginald? I've got to keep Kim safe, even if in reality I'm sure it's the other way around. You've started something by attacking that couple, by attacking us. Plus, I really want to know where something as ugly as you came from.' Tony stood and dug his shovel into the ground to get his first mound of dirt, and he proceeded to pour it down the hole and onto the cleeth. 'Bye Reg.'

As the day ticked by, Tony returned home and sat on his sofa, staring at his freshly cleaned coffee table, contemplating things he would rather have been doing on a sick day. Eventually, the evening set in and Kim arrived with Sophie and Rick in tow.

'You got rid of it then?' Kim asked, admiring what a good cleaning job he'd managed to do.

'No, I put it in the oven, figured waste not, want not,' Tony joked.

'Sorry I couldn't stay here and help. Tony, we need to talk about this whole Cleeth thing.' Quickly remembering some of the crazy things her boyfriend had done in the past, Kim added a question to that sentence. 'The oven thing was a joke, right?'

'It's buried in the woods, all taken care of.' By this point, Rick had already made his way to the kitchen to check the oven, he quickly closed the oven door upon hearing Tony was joking and re-joined the others.

'I know you think we should stay out of whatever it is we've stumbled upon, but can you honestly say you'd be comfortable doing that? Kim's words may have helped had Tony not already come to the same conclusion. 'I'm not saying I want to dedicate our lives to tracking these things down, but we should at least consider finding out more, don't you think?'

'Guys, it's fine, I had some bonding time with dead Reg earlier and you're right, I'm not thrilled by the idea and I've zero clues how we'll even help, but I'm in.'

'You named it Reg?' Rick asked, confused by the choice. 'Why Reg?'

'I don't really know, I like the name and it made it a little less creepy.'

'Well we're all on the same page, but what do we do from here?' Sophie asked, as aware as everybody else was that, despite the solidarity they had, it didn't mean they had anything close to a plan of action. 'More stake outs? We could get some kind of weapons, make sure we're prepared this time?'

'No' replied Will, standing in the hallway, startling everyone with his unannounced arrival.

'Will, what the hell?' exclaimed Tony. 'Do I need to start triple locking the door?'

'I'm sorry to come by without warning.'

'Can you apologise for not knocking too? I feel that warranted an apology more' Tony hastily added.

'I feel I may have been a bit rash in my decision to not ally myself with you in this. I have reasons for being so quick to dismiss you, but I ran into somebody last night, someone I wasn't expecting to see. As much as I would like to keep you all safe, I know I could use some additional help.'

Will took a seat on the coffee table, admiring the cleanliness as he took off his jacket, resting it on his knees.

'Sure, come in, make yourself at home' Tony said, irritated by Will's return after how quick he was to walk away the night before.

'Tony, let him speak,' Sophie sternly said. She knew this was the perfect chance to ask the questions that had been swirling around in her head all day, and she didn't want anybody distracting Will when it seemed he was ready to talk.

Rick asked the obvious question. 'Who did you run into?'

'A man named Charles Daniels, suffice to say he's not a good person. He also seems

explicitly linked to wherever it is these things originate from. Charles and I have had dealings with one another over the years, but for him to show himself to me willingly leads me to believe he is close to something. Or that possibly I am.'

Rick proceeded to ask how Will knew Charles, how he was so sure that he was involved with the cleeths.

Will seemed to want to talk; his encounter the previous night had had an effect on him. He was no longer eager to leave this group behind, though he was still apprehensive about bringing them in on everything he knew. A large part of that was for their own safety, but there was a significant part of him that was worried about getting close to people. The odds of those around him remaining unscathed were slim. 'Well that would be a long story,' he said. 'I will tell you all everything, but once you know what I know, you won't have the luxury of ignorance anymore. You'll see why I've given my life to what I do and you'll know the sort of things that really exist in this world, what hides in the shadows.'

'You're being mighty ominous here, Will. Fancy dialling down the drama and getting to the point at some stage today?' It may have been blunt, but Tony was essentially saying what everyone else was thinking at this point. They had each spent the whole day wondering what more they could find out about Will and the cleeths, and now they were so close to learning new details, they just wanted him to start talking.

'While I'm not sure I can dial down the drama as such, I will get to the point. It will just take me a while to arrive there. To tell you this story, I need to go back to the beginning.'

Everyone sat down, eager to hear what Will had to tell them. Tony fetched himself a large family sized bag of crisps from the kitchen, joining the others with snacks in hand, ready to hear this tale.

Will then began his story. 'Back in 1992, I was 6 years old and I was happy'

# Chapter 6 - William

For the first few years of his life, young William had everything he could ask for. He had a home of such grandeur that the other children in his class thought it was a castle; he also had loving parents that had no issue spoiling him with every new-fangled product on the market. Whilst his classmates were reading about the latest in gaming technology, he was at home playing on his Super Nintendo and was the envy of those around him. Had things not turned out the way they did, it's possible William might have grown into one of those entitled people that it's hard to care too much for; really though, he wasn't at risk of that for too long.

The last time he remembered things being normal, he was in his room playing Earthworm Jim 2 and he was content. The game was as tough as they come, but he was more than up for the challenge. He began thinking, even at such a young age, that maybe his love for gaming was his calling, could he have discovered what he wanted to be when he grew up already? His thoughts went back to the matter at hand, completing the level and running out to tell his father the news. Jeremy Adams was never into computer games himself, but the joy he took in seeing his son so excited by them made up for it. William never did complete that level.

The knock on his bedroom door was distinctive - not a normal knock, it was almost feeble. Looking back, he could just picture his mother on the other side of it, hesitating and trying to build up the courage to go through with what would likely be the hardest conversation she would ever have. It was also one of the hardest conversations that he would ever have, not that he said much during it, but then what could a six-year-old contribute to a talk like this? After hearing his father wasn't coming home again, the only thing he could think to do was to ask 'why?'

The story he was told was that it was an accident, his father had simply been driving too fast, in the country during the winter, and that was never the wisest of moves. 'He just didn't see the ice' was the extent of what he knew about the crash. For young William, this didn't make sense. His memories of his father grew patchy over time. They began to fade as memories do, but he always remembered how careful a man Jeremy was. Would he really have sped? On a winter evening, no less? That was what his mother told him and that's all he had to go on. He often asked his mother for more information, but she would always stick to the same version of events.

As the years went by, his obsession with gathering as much information on the death as he could didn't subside. He had seen photos of the crash, he had read the police report and yet he couldn't let it go. It was the same when he lost his mother, there was more to what happened on both counts than he was privy too, and that need to find out more would be the thing that defined him as he entered adulthood.

Jeremy's death changed Margaret. William had always remembered his mother as being very driven; her work was her priority, whatever that work was, but she loved her family. After the crash, she just wasn't the same. There were too many babysitters for him to count, and it seemed she cared less about being a mother and more about whatever project she was working on. Her friend at work certainly saw more of Margaret than William did and that caused resentment, William began acting out, changed by the changes around him. The well-spoken child with a future in the gaming industry began to slip away, his optimism and enthusiasm for life was being chipped at piece by piece with every extra day of neglect.

Margaret didn't mean to do this to her only child, because she loved him as much as any mother loves her son but it appeared that through the tragedy, she had lost the ability to show it. It may have been her work that permanently took her away from William, though originally, he was the reason she worked so hard to achieve her goals. She wanted to always be able to provide for him. She would have been devastated that he lived his life never knowing that. Not that it would have made too much of a difference, since the damage was long done by that point.

Jeremy's accident seemed suspicious, but Margaret's was even more so. There was a fire at the laboratory she worked in, and the only other person there was also the only one who knew what she was working on, her business partner, Charles. The more she and Charles worked together, the more she changed, the less like a mother she became. It was only years later, when Will discovered she had invested all the family money into this mysterious project, that he truly saw how much she had been consumed by it all.

It would be fair to say the relationship between William and Charles was fraught. Charles had been around for a while before Jeremy's death, and even as a young boy it was easy to sense the tension there. William was ten when he lost his mother. He had got the impression that Charles was trying to be more than just his mother's work colleague for many years before that. Margaret had written it off as typical resentful child behaviour, the man trying to replace a boy's father; to a degree that was the case, at least at first. But the more Charles was there, the more Margaret changed.

It wasn't just her, William noticed a change in Charles too; he never liked him before but now, there was something about the man that made him feel extremely uneasy. Margaret and Charles grew colder, with every success they were overheard speaking about in relation to their work, the more distant they would become. To William, it always felt like he was in the way, that Charles wanted his mother all to himself and he was an obstacle in that desire. The truth was that by the time she died, William didn't really have either parent, the only person he could think to blame was Charles. At this point, he was only ten, and even he wasn't expecting this animosity to intensify as the years went by.

Following the fire, William was taken into care and placed in a foster home. His foster parents were nice enough people and they gave him a good life, but his younger years had already shaped him. As he grew up, he became determined to find out what really occurred. It could have been a simple car crash. It could have been a simple fire. But then again, it could have been something else. Charles? He was the common factor, he hadn't been seen since Margaret's funeral though. By the time Will turned twenty-one, he had been unsuccessful in tracking him down, despite searching every way he knew how. Why would someone vanish like that if they had nothing to hide? That was the question that plagued him. It was the question that Peter had heard him ask over and over again, there was never an answer either of them could come up with that made any sense.

Peter was the only true friend Will had ever really had. A reserved, slightly nerdy type with a passion for technology, he was likely the sort of person young William would have become if he had grown up normally. They were both outcasts at school: Peter just didn't fit into the popular category, whilst Will had the stigma of being the gay kid with two dead parents to deal with. Whereas Peter was unsure of himself and lacked the people skills to fend off bullies, Will knew who he was and wasn't afraid to stand his ground. He'd accepted his sexuality at a young age, and the loss of his family had made him hardnosed enough to handle the kind of naïve abuse that the school yard had to offer. There was nothing any bully could say about his parents that he hadn't thought of himself at one point or another.

He'd take some punches and he'd learned to hold his own, but he wasn't a match for multiple kids at one time. He'd even take the punches for Peter. He could deal with it a lot better, because having him as his only true friend made him fiercely loyal. That loyalty was reciprocated: where Will had been dedicated to finding the truth, Peter had decided that until his friend had closure, he too would continue to help him. Will's quest may have taken over the life of someone close to him, but Peter could never be deterred. Being a part of all this made him feel needed and useful in a way that he didn't think he otherwise could be.

His involvement always concerned Will though. Peter wasn't having a life of his own and that was because of him. That's not to say there wasn't tragedy in his life too, Peter's parents were also killed when he was young; there was nothing sinister or mysterious when it came to their demise though, just a drunk driver who was arrested and sentenced relatively quickly. Will often thought his friend's vested interest in his life was a way of dealing with his own grief. Coming from a wealthy background, Peter was set up with a trust fund when he turned eighteen, he could have used it for anything, but he chose to use it to fund the investigation. It's a debt that Will could never hope to repay.

Having both been orphaned at a young age, they had a bond like no other; they could both share the same pain and could help one another through it. They often pondered whether they would be friends were it not for this. It didn't matter though, since they became as close as any brothers would be and remained so to this day.

As the years went by, the two of them, after running into dead end after dead end, came to think that maybe finding Charles was an impossible task. The first cleeth they came across was out in the countryside. They had got reports of a wild animal stalking the hills for prey and went to investigate, without the knowledge this creature was directly linked to the man they were searching for. They weren't able to kill it, but they did manage to scare it off with gunfire. There were no further sightings of it, so they just chalked it up to being another strange thing in a series of strange things they had come to learn about. The more events like this they stumbled upon, the more they began to think that whilst they were doing important work, they might never reach the goal they were seeking.

While Charles himself was hard to find, those he had come into contact with over the years were not. It was through them that they had begun to learn that there was much more to this world than they knew. The occult, demonic activity, ghosts - their eyes were opened up to so much that at times it was difficult to separate fact from fiction. They began to investigate cases that arose; some were so intense that something as simple as a beastly creature in the countryside seemed like a casual walk in the park.

They had previously become aware that there were supernatural elements in the world, though they hadn't considered the scope of it all being quite so grand. Eventually, however, they began to contemplate a regular life. Peter's money wouldn't last forever, no matter how cleverly it was invested and despite all they had seen, they were no closer to finding the person that they started this line of work to locate.

Will eventually got a job, nothing that could be considered a career, but enough to make him feel like he was contributing. They began their attempt at living normal lives. It was then that Will met Edward. The two hit it off almost instantly, meeting in a bar in a way that could almost be considered clichéd. For the first time since he was sat in front of a games console, Will felt normal, able to let go of his past to a degree. He would never have forgotten it, but he started to allow himself to move on. He even booked a holiday for them, Will's investigations may had taken him to places far and wide, but he was never there for pleasure, never able to take in the scenery. Now though, thanks to Edward, he felt able to let himself do just that, to relax and be a regular tourist, Venice seemed like the best place to start. It was five days into the trip when things went sour. What was now called a Cleeth became known to Will as the thing that killed his boyfriend.

Much like the couple stumbled upon in that alley, Will and Edward had just been to dinner. They were making their way along the Venetian streets back to the hotel, when they were attacked. Will had to watch as his lover was torn apart in front of him. The beast that did it made an attempt at killing Will too: it took a chunk out of his arm, but it was scared off by a noise and didn't kill him. Before it ran, it stood in front of him with Edward's flesh in its teeth, staring at him. Looking into its eyes, Will saw nothing but evil. There was no good in this creature to be found. Yet another person Will cared about had been taken from him and much like with those he had previously lost, Charles appeared to be responsible. Across the other side of the canal, Will saw him watching what had happened, he then stared in shock as he proceeded to slowly turn and walk away.

Will took a brief moment to close Edward's eyes and gave chase, and darting through the streets of this foreign city, he was able to keep Charles in sight. It wasn't easy, he nearly lost him a couple of times thanks to people getting in the way, but he was able to catch up and tackle him to the ground, punching him repeatedly until he was dragged off by people around them.

Charles placated the witnesses, assuring them that it was nothing but a misunderstanding and eventually the crowd dispersed, leaving the two men to have their first conversation in years. Charles had insisted he was not the cause of Edward's demise and that he was just as innocent in the case of his parents, but Will naturally didn't care for what he had to say. After all, for him to be there, in a different country, right when he lost someone else, it simply couldn't be a coincidence. Charles was quick to point out that he never claimed it was a coincidence, he simply said he wasn't responsible, he had assumed Will would have been the one attacked, not his lover.

Will demanded to know why he would want him dead. The anger inside him was boiling over; it would soon subside to desperate grief but in the initial moments, he was just filled with rage. Charles said it was a mere experiment, to see if the beasts would remember the smell of a former prey. It turned out they did, all too well, they just couldn't distinguish it from the actual target or somebody who had that person's scent all over them.

The tense reunion was interrupted by sirens. Somebody had called the police, either for the fight or for the possibly discovered Edward. Will had glanced to see where they were coming from and at that moment, Charles made his exit. He couldn't go after him again now, not with the police there, so he solemnly returned to Edward, then back to the hotel and eventually home.

After this, Will became withdrawn again, even with Peter who remained as loyal as ever and didn't take anything to heart. He was happy to be there for his best friend, even if it meant being on the receiving end of his grief every now and then. As for Charles, well seeing him in Venice allowed Will to get a track on where he was headed. Will and Peter began to get to know his aliases and where he was at any given time, and it was around this point they began linking vicious animal attacks to him. It was this lead that caused them to set up base in Langton in the first place.

About six months after Edward's death, they noticed there had been a few attacks in neighbouring towns. Langton was fairly central to them all so it made sense to relocate there, at least temporarily. It was a few weeks after when they heard about the deaths of Alexander and Abigail, and thanks to the local paper they also had the names of the two that discovered the bodies, Rick and Sophie. He tracked down their locations and decided to approach Rick, pretending he was a reporter. He hoped he might be able to discover something that was left out of the Langton Herald.

With his story told, Will scanned the room. It was a far more tragic story than any of them expected, but Sophie was quick to say the one thing that Will needed to hear after reliving his past. 'You haven't just got Peter anymore. We're going to help you.'

# Chapter 7 - The New Normal

Following on from talking about his past, Will took everyone to meet Peter. Walking into their home for the first time was an experience; a normal looking house on the outside was a cramped base of operations inside. There were whiteboards against each wall covered with notes, photos strewn across tables and the television was so small and dated that Rick and Tony felt uncomfortable in its presence.

'I've got a large monitor in my room,' Peter was quick to add, 'we just use that one just to watch the news.' Will didn't have one, his room was just books for research without anything in there for entertainment.

Peter was thrown by the mass visitors to the house. Before now, the only people to have even been at the front door had been those delivering various takeaway food, so to have four people all turn up was overwhelming. Yet he was excited by these new faces, although also nervous, not just because he hadn't had a group of friends in his life previously, but because of his doubts that Will would allow them to stay long. Perhaps this was a turning point and his best friend could start opening up again. Peter though was hesitant to get his hopes up.

'Television sizes aside then, I'm Rick, this is Sophie, Tony and Kim.' Rick could sense that this new face was a little intimidated, and it didn't help that Will didn't seem to be in a rush to make introductions.

'I'm Peter, Will's friend, or business partner if you like.' Peter was flustered, he had never referred to himself as a business partner before, and he had no idea why he did, but he knew that he would be in no rush to do so again. He really wasn't experienced with people on a social level, but luckily for him, Sophie was quick to make him feel a bit more comfortable.

'We've heard all about you.' Sophie stepped towards him and shook his hand. 'According to Will you've been quite the help to him. I hope you don't mind us getting involved?'

'No, no not at all, more the merrier. It gets quite lonely this whole monster hunting thing.' Peter glanced at Will. 'He's not been himself for quite some time.' Will wasn't listening, he was busy writing all the details of his latest Charles encounter on one of the white boards. 'Can I get any of you a drink? Tea? Coffee? Hot chocolate?

'Beer?' Tony's hope of this was quickly dashed.

'Sorry, come to think of it I'm fairly sure we don't have any of what I just offered. Water? We definitely have water.'

'Tony and I can head out and grab some things' said Kim.

'Including beer if anyone wants some' interjected Tony. Rick quickly raised his hand to support the idea.

'Just so you know, we have no sugar or milk' added Peter. Also, if you spot any mugs, that could come in handy, we only have the two. I can write you a list? Let me give you some money.'

'No, it's fine, thank you, Peter,' Kim replied with a smile. She could tell how nervous Peter was; he spoke fast and only made the slightest of eye contact with anyone he was speaking to. He was a clearly a sweet person who just lacked social skills. She instantly liked him, but then so did everyone else, since he was a hard person not to warm too.

As Kim and Tony headed out, Will declined any offer of beverages and continued making his notes. Rick approached him to see what he was writing. 'This is fairly thorough.'

'It has to be, I can't miss anything. It's all too important.'

Rick could tell that he had withdrawn into himself since telling them about his past. 'Are you alright? Reliving all that couldn't have been easy.'

'I'm fine, Rick. Thank you. Talking about that, about Edward, it's not exactly fun, but it reminds me why I do what I do. You could lose someone too. Have you thought about that?'

With Rick's silence, Will gathered some papers and headed out of the room.

Sophie approached Rick, giving him a hug as it was clear Will's words had got to him. 'We're doing the right thing here, Rick. I'm sure of it.'

'Do you get the feeling that even if we knew we weren't, it would be too late to get out?'

She didn't know how to respond to him, for she was so sure they were doing the right thing that any thoughts to the contrary hadn't crossed her mind. Instead of replying, she kissed him. It did take his mind off his concerns, at least for a moment.

Peter was quick to try and lighten the mood. 'Do you play Mortal Kombat? I have an Xbox, don't get much of a chance to play, but if you want a game?' Peter's social circle had mainly consisted of strangers he played games with online. This was certainly the first time in recent memory that he could enjoy something he loved with somebody else actually in the room with him.

'That sounds like a plan, go set it up,' he replied, pleased by the chance of a distraction. 'Do you mind?' Rick asked Sophie. She didn't, her only request was that she got to play the winner. Sophie started to scan Will's notes after they left the room, eager to see if there was more to this story she could learn.

Kim and Tony arrived at the shop, deep in conversation about their new direction in life. Tony in particular was back on the fence about getting further involved. He was fully aware that he had already agreed, but something about it all wasn't sitting right with him. 'Does this just not seem insane to you? Like too insane? I mean just last week the scariest thing I had to worry about was my overly touchy dentist, now we're dealing with demonic hell beasts.' He was wavering. He had come to realise this wasn't something they were going to walk away from and he understood why. However, whilst he was trying to remain engaged with it all, there was that part of him that wanted out, a part he was trying hard to quell.

'Yeah, it does seem a bit out there' responded Kim, 'but could we just walk away from this now? Could we just let them get on with it, knowing what we know?'

'There's just something I don't like about Will,' Tony said, knowing it may well be due to the fact the two of them didn't get off to the best of starts.

'Is it just that he doesn't have a proper TV?' Kim shared his concerns, but she also knew her boyfriend could be quick to judge people on the smallest of things.

'Honestly, I find that weirder than having to bury a monster in the woods.'

An almighty smash was heard behind them, followed by the screams of the other customers. A regular trip to the local shop had suddenly turned into the type of life and death situation they had just been discussing their involvement in. A cleeth had come crashing through the window and it had any number of victims to choose from. Spotting a mother with her baby in a pram to her right, Kim had no hesitation in dashing across the store to get to them, despite Tony's panicked call out for her to stop. She picked up a crate of fizzy drink cans and threw them through the window, allowing the people closest to it to get out.

'We're gonna get you out and then I'll hand you your baby, alright?' Kim was taking charge of the situation in a way she never expected to be able to.

'I can't leave her in here' the mother replied, terrified and distraught at the scenario presented to her.

'Just go' Kim yelled with force. She might have been thinking on her feet, but she was definitely giving the impression that she knew what she was doing. She was surprising herself.

The woman carefully climbed out as the cleeth fixed its eyes on them, Tony knew he had to throw himself into the fray. Unfortunately, when he called out to get its attention he was in the fruit aisle. He did the only thing he could, which was to throw fruit at it in the hope that it would turn around and shift its attention from Kim to him. A banana to the eye though was perhaps the thing that angered the cleeth more than anything, and it began to charge for him.

'Kim, it didn't take kindly to the banana,' he yelled in a state of panic.

Tony ran, knocking shelves down behind him in an attempt to slow it down whilst Kim, having handed the baby back to his mother, quickly sprinted in his direction. Slipping and crashing into a fridge, Tony found himself at its mercy. It stood in front of him, spit dripping from its fanged mouth, a snarl and posture indicating it was ready to pounce and tear him apart. The crash from the shelves next to it took both Tony and the creature by surprise, and the shelving unit came tumbling down onto the cleeth causing it to yelp out in pain. Kim stood above it having pushed it over, smiling to herself that she was quick enough to save Tony and to stop something that she was so afraid of.

Looking at each other, Tony and Kim knew instantly that any notion they may have considered about stepping away was no longer an option. Kim calmly walked around to the other shelves and pushed them down onto the cleeth for good measure, knocking it out cold. Tony breathed a sigh of relief and rested his head against the fridge, realising he was in fact next to the alcohol. He reached in to pull out a beer, opening it and taking a sip with the hope of calming his nerves.

The shopkeeper got to his feet after cowering behind his counter. 'You'll still need to pay for that, sir' he said, much to the bemusement of Tony.

After disposing of yet another body, they returned to the house. Telling the others what happened, they all came to realise they were now being hunted by the very things they were hunting. Will knew he had to make sure they were all ready for the challenge. Over the space of a few weeks, he trained them up on everything he could think of, all the things they thought to be works of fiction that were in fact true, from ghosts to witchcraft; he made sure they knew as much as possible. He had spared them from knowing all the ins and outs of the paranormal world when he thought they may just be involved in the short term, but there was no indication that Charles would be dealt with any time soon. They needed to be ready for anything.

What was at first a hunt for one strange creature became their new normal. As did research: they soon discovered that went hand in hand with the amount of evil that was showing itself in the world. Ghosts and witches aside, demonic beings existed, magic wasn't just something out of the works of fiction and they were still only just scratching the surface of what was out there. All these things that would have seemed like make believe were exposed to them as things that actually existed.

Some took to that better than others. It would be fair to say that Tony was perhaps not the most astute, but even he now after the shop incident was as on board as his patience level would allow. Quickly, the six of them became a team, although they hadn't gone out to actually see any of these things they had been told about yet. Will quite rightly didn't think they were ready straight away, but the bond between them all was growing and with that, the self-belief that they could quite possibly make a difference.

Peter watched all this unfold and more than anyone, he benefited the most from it. Having just had Will for so long, he now had five people in his life and he could happily call each of them friends. It allowed him to break free from his shell somewhat and to develop a degree of confidence that had otherwise eluded him. He was still a touch awkward around them all, but he felt more comfortable around them than he ever thought he could be.

As for Will, whilst he was happy to be there for his new friends, he constantly felt as if he were the outsider. It was of course his own doing. He couldn't allow himself to get close to these new people in his life, since his own history had taught him that those around him tended to meet an untimely end. It's why he was always so careful about not letting Peter get in harm's way, but now with a team around them, Peter was determined to be more than funding and research. He had long been the one to sit back, to watch Will walk out to fight whatever evil creature they were up against. Now though, in watching everyone evolve and learn the ropes, he had no intention of being the book man. If they were a team then he was going to have an active role, despite Will's reservations. The reading and the studying continued, but the time had come where they needed to be able to prove themselves out in the field. They needed a case to work on, something not related to Charles, something to give them an idea of how to operate as a team. Will had discovered just the very thing.

# Chapter 8 - Queen of the Track

The first case that the team worked on wasn't a run of the mill investigation, in fact initially it was something they thought would actually be nothing.

'So, what we got? Another devil dog? A kitten with a split personality? Angry parrot?' Tony's sarcasm was mixed with a dose of anticipation. After all the research, he was eager to actually get out and do something.

Will put a newspaper down in front of them, and there on the back page in the sports section was their case. 'Helen Chatsworth. Regular girl from the outset, nothing special and yet all of a sudden, she's winning races and representing Langton in events'

'Not sure I'm following the problem here, Will.' Rick's confusion was shared by the rest of the group.

Will continued. 'Well before now, she had tried out for track events at her college and finished dead last. Which is fine, it isn't something everyone can do. But a week after her latest failure, she came out and beat all other competition by five seconds. One week. No amount of practice in such a short space of time can cause a person to improve that much.'

'Wait, we're investigating college age drug users now? Because we're not the police. Although can we get a badge of some sort?' Tony was of course joking about the last part, although he couldn't help but get side tracked with his own thoughts about the potential design said badge could have.

'No, Tony. I don't believe this is drugs. She beat other youngsters that have trained all their lives for this type of event. She's representing the town in competitions against other places in the area, and all this has been achieved in the space of a month.'

Sophie asked the obvious question. 'I'm guessing you know how she's done it?'

'No' replied Will, 'I have my suspicions certainly, but I won't share them. This one is for the four of you to solve.' Will was relishing being in charge. He would never admit it though; he had spent so long investigating this sort of thing that part of him felt he deserved the chance to command a team.

'You're not even coming along for the ride?' Rick asked, apprehensive about the capabilities that he and the other three had for this, however small and insignificant it might turn out to be.

'I won't even be here. Peter and I are heading out of town for a few days, something we need to look into.'

'Can't we at least keep Peter?' Tony's words would have meant a lot to Peter, had he not been fully aware of why he wanted him to stay.

'You can help yourself to any game you like, Tony,' Peter said with a smile; by this point he had got to know Tony well enough to know what he was like. 'I've just got the latest Xbox too, feel free to have a go on that. All of you are welcome to.' He looked at Will, noticing the glare coming from his direction and remembering they were meant to be working on the case, not considering playing games.

'Thanks, Pete. We could have done with your expertise too' replied Tony, boosting Peter's confidence with his words. It was also the first time Peter had ever heard his name abbreviated, it was a small thing, almost insignificant, but it meant a lot to him. It was what a friend would call him, Will was always too well spoken to shorten his name, which was ironic considering he never went by William.

'Where are you guys going?' Kim asked, surprised they were heading off so soon and right when they might be needed.

'Just something we need to do' answered Will. 'We'll be back before you know it. I'm sure you'll all have quite the story to tell us when we return.'

'You heard posh boy, let's go put a dampener on someone's success story' exclaimed Tony, with overly apparent sarcasm.

'Do not call me posh boy' said Will sternly, prompting Tony to reply to him with a playful salute.

Will and Peter packed their things and headed off, leaving the remaining four alone and with no clue where to start. All they had was a blank whiteboard that Sophie had excitedly wheeled in for them to use. They all stared at it blankly for a while, until she decided to simply write down that they should talk to Helen. It seemed a logical place as any to start.

Since making her rise to local fame, Helen had begun training at the Anne Roper stadium. A stadium large enough for a town this big, it was to be found on the outskirts of Langton, about twenty minutes or so from the town centre on foot. It was the first port of call for the group to make. Watching from the stands, they spotted her on the field. She was a girl of average build, not the sort of physique you would expect from a champion runner, but two things stood out to them. One was her father, Henry. He had also taken on the mantle of coach to his budding young athlete daughter, yet he was hardly coming across like a supportive mentor. The other thing that was apparent was that whilst training, she wasn't making much of an impression at all.

'Are we sure that's her? She doesn't look like winning material,' was Rick's first impression and it was hard to argue with him. There was a girl that they had been told was running faster than she ought to, yet from their perspective, she was about as fast as anybody would have expected her to be.

'I swear, if this is a wind up I'm gonna hunt down a cleeth just to leave it on Will's coffee table' Tony added. The others certainly didn't see Will as the sort to play jokes, but it was hard not to think that maybe he had his wires crossed with Helen.

Sophie was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt though. Her determination to make a real go at this was continuing to drive her. 'We're here, we may as well do what we came to do.'

The four split up. Rick and Tony went further into the stands whilst Kim and Sophie headed down onto the field, hoping to get close enough to Helen and Henry to hear what they were discussing. The boys asked questions to other competitors about their new competition, convinced this was all a fuss over nothing. Tony merely asked what their star sign was or who they wanted to get the throne in Game of Thrones, so it was safe to say he wasn't taking it seriously. Rick attempted to steer the conversation back to more relevant questioning, but he too was having a hard time believing there was more here than meets the eye.

'She always used to want to be like me'

'I'm quick, but I always beat her, then one race she just went straight past me.'

'I don't know how she's doing it, it doesn't make any sense.'

These, or variations like these, were the general responses they were getting.

The girls though had a much more interesting time. Edging closer to Helen, they were just about in ear shot of the clearly high-tempered conversation she was having with her father. 'Do we jog or something?' asked Kim, eager to keep their cover whilst out on the track. Out of everyone, it was perhaps she that was enjoying the fun side of all of this the most, even if it did make her a little over excited.

Sophie smiled. 'No, I think we're fine walking, just pretend we're talking.'

'We are talking,' Kim pointed out.

'Yes, I know, but so we can hear what they're talking about. Mime or something.' Sophie wasn't annoyed at Kim's excitability, she just wanted to give this her all and she felt it was important that everyone took it seriously.

As Kim did the worst miming known to man, they were able to eavesdrop on the argument happening a few feet away from them. Thankfully, the track itself was quiet, there were only a few other people dotted around, which made listening in on this particular exchange quite easy.

'You're wasting your time, Helen' Henry sternly said to his daughter. 'Just get inside and stop drawing attention to yourself.'

'Dad, just stop hassling me, if anyone's drawing attention to me, it's you. Can't you just leave me alone?'

'You don't need to be out here doing this, you know that. All you're doing is arousing suspicion.'

Sophie and Kim immediately knew that Will was right, something was going on here. Why would a runner not need to train? More importantly, why would her own father not want her to? They may now have known something was amiss, but all they had were questions and no answers. Thankfully, what Henry said next at least gave them something to research when they got back to the house.

'Just be grateful for the gift your cousin gave you and be done with it.'

Gift? Cousin? There was every chance that Tony was right originally, the gift may have been nothing more than some super powerful drugs, though that wasn't the impression either of them got. Henry and Helen continued to argue for a minute or two before he eventually grew tired of the situation, angrily making his way inside.

'It's your life, Helen. You throw it away if that's what you want' was his parting shot. She shook it off and carried on regardless. There was definitely cause to investigate here and both girls knew it.

Sophie and Kim decided to approach her with an open mind, whatever she was involved in there was a chance that she may need help.

Sophie made the first move. 'Helen, can we have a word with you for a second?'

Helen looked at them confused, because even with her success nobody normally wanted to talk to her. She had hoped that being a winner would help her social status, but instead it was merely something to occupy her ample amount of free time with. 'Do I know you?' she tentatively asked.

'No, you don't. I'm Sophie, this is Kim. We were just wondering if you could tell us, well you've got really fast and I...'

'How did you do it?' Kim didn't mean to interrupt and cut to the chase quite so bluntly. 'I mean you were, well, is speedily challenged the right phrase?'

Sophie stared at Kim in disbelief. She meant well, but it seemed she didn't have the undercover prowess down as well as they had both hoped.

'I got where I am through hard work. How did I do it? How do you think?'

Sophie tried to get things back on track, but the damage was done by this point. Helen made a quick exit and Kim was left to contemplate why she said things the way she did. If there was something she might never live down with Sophie, then it was possible that referring to a girl as speedily challenged might well be it. This time Sophie was annoyed; she didn't say anything about it, but it was obvious. Rolling her eyes, she started making her way back inside, Kim following rather sheepishly. Kim felt bad about it, but more so she was concerned about whether this was a sign, an indication that this life wasn't for her. There was also Sophie. Kim had noticed a marked change in her friend since all this began. She understood that the shock of what she had seen had been the catalyst for her getting so involved in this, but she was becoming fixated with it all. She would never have rolled her eyes at her so seriously before all this.

Meeting up in the stadium cafeteria afterwards, the four shared stories. Rick and Tony had nothing of any value to add. 'The girl was useless, now she's not,' was the best contribution that Tony had to offer, but even he admitted to being intrigued by what the girls overheard.

'So, what now? Do we go and talk to her Dad? Let Tony accuse him of being complicit in drug use? asked Rick.

Tony was about to voice his approval of the idea when Sophie, who had been playing with her phone, chimed in. 'Anne Roper' The confused stares she got made her immediately explain. 'The stadium is called the Anne Roper stadium'.

'I love you, so don't get mad...' Rick knew he was best to cover himself before finishing the sentence 'but you've just figured out what the giant letters on the entrance gate told us all.'

'No, the girl herself. Anne Roper. I never really thought to check how the stadium got its name before now. Anne Roper was a star athlete, she amazed everyone she ran against and everyone who saw her in action. Britain's next big hope athletically. People called her the queen of the track.'

'She took some sort of speed drug, did she?' Tony wasn't letting the idea of his theory being correct go. 'Occam's razor people.' He glanced over to Kim to make sure that he had understood the term correctly, and she nodded with approval.

Ignoring Tony, Sophie continued. 'Anne died just before the biggest race of her career. She was also trained by Henry Chatsworth, a free high five going to anybody that can guess who her cousin is?'

'Helen!' Kim excitedly squealed, retrieving her high five from Sophie in the process.

Rick asked the logical question, even if he felt a bit strange asking it. 'So, are we saying that Helen is channelling the spirit of her dead cousin to help her run fast enough to win races? Because I hope I'm not the only one to realise how nuts that sounds.'

'Mate, not so long ago I had to defend myself from a feral dog by hurling bananas at it. We sailed far past nuts town many moons ago.' Tony made a good point. This was exactly the type of thing they should be considering now.

Each of them reminisced for a second, thinking back to a time when possession wasn't the obvious conclusion to make in something they were looking into, but at least they were all on the same page. Also, there was the satisfaction of knowing they might be a step closer to cracking this case without the help of either Will or Peter.

'Well, I was going to suggest that we all go to the pub but screw that, let's go back to the house and read up on possession' Tony said this with sarcasm, but that was exactly what they did.

Whilst everyone read through books, Tony decided to watch Evil Dead 2 which admittedly, given everything they now knew, could genuinely be considered as a viable research option. It was Kim who found the most worrying thing in one of Will's books though, something that turned the whole thing on its head.

'Guys, I think we have a serious problem.' Kim's voice trembled. Lack of undercover skills aside, she had been having fun for the most part up until now. That fun, however, was about to disappear quite quickly.

Rick and Sophie looked up from their reading and gave her their full attention. She was clearly rattled by something, and they were immediately concerned as to what she had discovered.

'If what I think is happening is actually happening, then this Helen girl is in some real danger.'

'How severe are we talking?' Sophie queried, sensing that she probably already knew the answer.

Kim's answer was as blunt as they could have imagined, but it hammered the point home. This wasn't a game they were playing anymore. This wasn't fun. This was real. 'She could be dead after her next race.'

# Chapter 9 - Homecoming

Will and Peter arrived at their destination at nightfall. Will hadn't kept the reason for the trip a secret for the sake of it; he simply thought he had shared enough with his new friends for now. Considering he was someone who keeps his personal life so guarded, it was taking some getting used to when it came to confiding in people. It was the anniversary of his father's death and for the first time in his life, he felt like he could finally do the one thing he had been putting off, returning home. He hadn't seen his childhood home since his mother died. The memories there were hardly happy ones, but given that things seemed to be progressing with getting to the bottom of what she and Charles were doing all those years ago, it seemed now was the perfect time to face it.

Peter had refused to let him go alone; he had stuck by him through everything so far and wasn't about to allow him do this by himself. When they arrived at the house though, they were both taken aback by what they found. Where the large property once stood lay burnt remains: the house had been gutted by fire and barely the frame of the structure was left standing. Around the house was just countryside, and while it was a peaceful surrounding, it was a sight that was disturbing. Will didn't know why this affected him so much, it felt as if he was losing another part of his youth. It looked to have been destroyed years ago, but for him it may as well be burning now right in front of his eyes.

'You didn't know?' Peter asked, surprised at how Will was taking this. He had seen him emotional before, but this was different, as if all his years of pain had come flooding back to him in an instant.

'No, but then, why would I? Until recently I'd vowed never to come back here.'

'Why now? It's just, well, I never thought I'd see the day you'd want to.' Peter was cautious not to pry too much, for he knew Will well enough to know what sort of questions to ask to see if he wanted to talk.

'We're closer than we have ever been, Peter. Charles is showing himself, cleeths are showing themselves more frequently. It feels like things are coming to a head.'

'You're worried this may be your last chance?'

Will stayed silent. He wasn't one to admit that he was worried; he had always been the brave one, or at least that's what his facade would seem to imply. Will left Peter by the car. He needed to look around what was left of his home and both men understood that it was something he needed to do on his own. It wasn't the experience that Will was expecting. He had planned to see his room, to see a part of his life from back when he was still hopeful. He thought his biggest problem would be persuading the new owners to let him in, it never occurred to him there would be barely anything left to go into. All he had was a recollection of where the staircase used to be, so he stood there for a while, eyes shut, trying to picture what it was like, but it did him no good. The shell of a home was a good representation on how he felt about his life, and it amused him for a second when he thought of that.

'This isn't my home anymore,' he solemnly said to himself, before making the decision to go.

Turning to leave, Will heard the creak of the floor. As he carried on, that creak turned to the sound of feet on dirt, and it was that noise that caught his attention. Why would there be one section of flooring when the rest was earth? He got to his knees and began scraping the dirt away. Peter saw him and came running over to help.

'I'm guessing you didn't bury a bone all those years ago, Will?' Peter said, amusing himself in the process.

Will replied, but didn't take his eyes off the task in the process. 'I didn't bury anything, but somebody did.'

He cleared the dirt away and found a wooden hatch, complete with a handle. It would seem that whilst Will was not able to take a nostalgic look back at his childhood, he might well have found something of even greater importance.

'You don't remember this?' Peter asked, not yet aware of its significance.

'No, it was never here. Or if it was I was certainly never privy to its existence. Give me a hand opening it.'

They pulled at the handle and gradually the door came loose, creaking as it lifted. The sheer noise of it made it clear this was something that hadn't been raised in many a year. Looking down, they could just about make out some stairs, but beyond that, it was pitch black. Peter hurried back to the car to get a torch while Will stared in wonder and trepidation at the discovery he had made. There was every reason to believe that there was nothing down there, yet he was sure this would give him answers. He couldn't explain why, but something had caused him to head out here now after all these years, to stand in that exact spot and to hear that exact noise. It couldn't just be a coincidence, surely not now with everything that was happening.

Peter would only be a minute, but Will couldn't wait. He edged down the steps despite the darkness that awaited him. Stairs that haven't been used in years aren't the most reliable of things though. They gave out as he used them and he went crashing down to the ground below, wood crumbling down on top of him as he lay, trying to get his bearings.

Peter came rushing back over, having heard the crash and the not very manly squeal Will had made on the way down. 'Will, are you ok?'

'Fine. I'm fine. Slightly embarrassed, but fine. I couldn't just wait for a torch, could I?'

Peter dropped the torch down to him, unfortunately the darkness made it difficult to know where Will was and it landed on his head.

'Sorry,' Peter called out, wincing as he realised where it had fell.

With it being dark, Will began to rummage around until he found it, thinking that it probably would have been helpful if Peter had turned it on before dropping it. With a stream of light, he was able to make out more of the hidden room. There were filing cabinets, notes strewn everywhere and a blinking red light behind him he had yet to notice. Peter lowered himself down rather clumsily, although more successfully than Will had managed. He attempted to shine some more light with his phone.

'Well, I'm guessing this could be something' Peter said, scanning what little he could see. 'Look at all this, there's so much here. I don't even think we can fit it all in the car.'

Will remained silent, in awe at what he had found and what it could mean.

The two began sifting through paperwork. It wasn't long before Peter found something that confirmed whatever it was they had stumbled upon: it was hugely relevant to the answers they were seeking. The paper was old, but there was a sketch on it, a drawing of what looked remarkably like the creature they had come to know as a cleeth. 'Will, is this what I think it is?'

Will took the paper and stared at it intently. If this really was a cleeth, then they were around long before he first discovered one. What worried him though was that his parents might have had something to do with them. As Peter looked towards Will to try and think of something reassuring to say, he noticed the light, red and flashing, a consistent rhythm. Given the lack of anything electrical around them, it was cause for concern. Alerting Will to its presence, they moved closer to it. Unable to work out what it was, Will realised they should try and make a hasty exit, just to be on the safe side.

'Grab as much as you can, Peter. Generally speaking, a red flashing light is something to be wary of.'

They began opening the filing cabinets and collecting paperwork. Peter climbed back up to the ground level so that Will could pass him things up, and their pace was hurried. The flashing light had unnerved them both, a warning sign that speed was of the essence.

Coming from the distance, Peter saw headlights. 'Will, someone's coming, there's a car. At least I think it's a car, it's definitely something though and it's nearly here.'

The ruins were not near any other house, there was no logical reason for anybody to be driving down that way, especially at that time of night. Stopping for a second to think, Will suddenly knew what that light was. Entering that room had triggered a sensor, people had been monitoring it from close by and now they were coming. They had to move, fast.

'Take that stuff and start the car, Peter. Now.'

'Who are they?' Peter asked, flustered.

'I don't know, just go start the car!' Will yelled.

Peter ran out across the field with papers in hand, a few slipping away as he ran. He got to the car and started the engine, but it was almost too late, the headlights were reflecting in the rear-view mirror. They were here. Will ran up to the car, getting in and yelling 'Drive.' He was panicked in a way that the normally calm man never usually was.

They drove off at high speed. Any ambiguity as to whether this car was here for them or not disappeared as it sped up to give chase, driving into the back of them in an attempt to force them off the road. Peter put his foot down, but his idea of an action packed drive was to have a coffee on the seat next to him with hope it wouldn't topple over. Needless to say, he wasn't cut out for this and Will's loud yells of encouragement to speed up certainly weren't helping. As they hit a long stretch of road, they were able to put some space between them.

'Will, who are these people? What do they want?' Peter was out of his depth. He had helped his friend countless times over the years, but this was the first time he had been in actual danger himself. Things now felt real to him in a way they hadn't previously.

'I'm guessing they want whatever we took, at the very least they would rather we didn't have it. That means we have certainly found something worth keeping.' Looking behind him. Will couldn't believe what he was seeing, these people giving chase weren't just trying to stop them, they were trying to kill them. A passenger in the vehicle leaned out, assault rifle in hand and began shooting at the car. Peter swerved out of desperation, driving up an embankment and crashing through trees into some woodland, coming to an abrupt stop in a tree trunk.

Dazed, Peter stumbled out of the car and ran around to Will's side, pulling open the door to find his friend alive, awake and rummaging through documents. 'Will, we have to go, leave them, we need to go now.' There were tears in Peter's eyes and a tremble in his voice; he was completely shaken by the crash and terrified about those people finding them.

'I can't just leave all this, Peter. This could tell me everything I need to know. All the answers could be in these papers.'

Peter had to get through to his friend, the car giving chase had pulled up at the top of the hill and the doors had opened, voices could be heard headed in their direction.

'Answers are nothing if we're dead. Please, Will. I'm scared, please, let's go.'

Will looked at him, he was right of course, at the very least they knew there was definitely something related to his parents to discover. He grabbed a handful of notes and the two ran off into the night, with unknown enemies hot on their heels.

# Chapter 10 - One More Race

'Will's dealt with possession before, a case similar to this one. If I'm understanding it correctly, then Helen will reach a point where she is unable to control when she is taken over by Anne. Anne will then become dependent on living through Helen. The two will end up fighting for control of the one body. I think, maybe.' This wasn't the sort of conversation that Kim ever imagined having, and whilst she was understanding the severity of it, there was still a part of her that felt like this was a game. Even though she was the one saying these things, she found it hard to believe. She wasn't the only one. Nobody else in the room had quite come to accept that they were now living a life where ghosts and possession were actual things they had to contend with.

Tony was the first to speak up. 'So basically, humans can't handle being possessed for that long? That's what you're saying here?'

'Essentially, yeah. I have to emphasise the fact I said maybe. I'm just going off notes here.' Kim enjoyed the fact that Tony was seemingly taking it seriously now. She knew that was likely because she was the one doing the talking, but it was still a step in the right direction for him.

'Alright, so how long do we have?' Rick asked 'Are we talking one more time? Ten? More?'

Kim shrugged, she was doubtful there was a way to know for certain, even if Will and Peter were there to guide them.

'So, we treat it as one more then, stop her before she races again.' Sophie's idea was the logical approach, but of course it begged the question of how to help somebody that doesn't want to be helped.

Kim's suggestion of opening with 'Hi Helen. You don't know us, but we know you've been channelling the spirit of your dead cousin and if you don't stop you'll die' was perhaps a touch too direct. Nobody ruled that approach out, but it was certainly not going to be top of the list. Any research into how to banish a spirit proved unsuccessful too, as it all related to getting rid of an unwanted spirit and seeing as Helen was letting Anne in voluntarily, it wasn't really anything that applied to this particular situation.

'But we don't want it,' Tony noted. It was a valid point, not really the correct type of unwanted they needed it to be though. They needed to find another way.

'She's racing tomorrow at one.' Rick had done some research of his own.

'Right then, we form a plan, head down there and try to save her.' Sophie said, once again trying to take charge of the situation. 'As for what that plan is, I have zero ideas' she added. Zero ideas were the common factor, but with less than a day to go they needed one, quickly.

As night fell, the four concocted something that at least resembled a strategy; it wasn't, however, a particularly good one and consisted mainly of stopping the race. While it wouldn't solve the problem, it would at least give them a chance to come up with an idea that could. All they needed to do was run onto the field as the race was about to start and cause some sort of commotion, they would be hauled away before too long, but with a tight schedule of events, there is every chance the race would have to be postponed. That would give Will a chance to reply to their messages, and they were hopeful he knew a way they could take care of everything before the race was rescheduled later in the day. It was a long shot and they knew it. They could be taken away within minutes, and if that were to happen the race would just start with only a slight delay. At least they would know that they tried something; doing nothing wasn't an option for them.

Meeting outside the stadium the following day, they all knew what they had to do. They were aware they could get in trouble, but they were willing to risk it given the circumstances. It was two minutes before the race was to begin, so they psyched each other up, looked at one another and on Sophie's command, they ran. Sprinting through the entrance and charging through the ticket barriers, there was no stopping them. The adrenaline was racing through them as they darted out onto the field. They were so caught up in the moment that they failed to spot something quite significant, and not one of them paid any attention to their surroundings. Running out into the centre of the stadium they stopped, looked around and then it hit them, the stadium was empty. There was nobody there that day, with the exception of a very confused looking cleaner in the stands.

'Well, this isn't right' exclaimed Sophie, just as bemused as the rest of them. 'Are we early? We're early, right?'

Rick had already got his phone out and was straight on to the internet to see what the problem was, a problem that he knew had to be his fault. He was sure he had the time right that afternoon. It turns out he did. 'Alright, so I cocked up' he said sheepishly. His brain had spun around for a few seconds, trying to work out a way this wasn't his fault, but it was pointless,

it was all on him. 'I got the time right but I, well, I got the place wrong.'

Tony lasted about three seconds before making the kind of comment that one would expect him to make. 'Oh, I'm sorry, Rick. Here we were thinking you'd mastered the ability to read something.'

'It had been a long day. We'd been talking about possession and dead runners, it was easy not to pay full attention.' Rick hated being wrong about something. He and Sophie were both stubborn, it was the cause of any argument, neither wanting to admit they weren't in the right. Knowing that, Sophie tried to play the whole thing down, reassuring Rick that nobody, except maybe Tony, blamed him.

Realising there was nothing they could do today, the group headed home, fingers firmly crossed that Helen made it through that race. She didn't. At the correct stadium, Helen was lined up ready to start with the other competitors, Henry stood in the stands anxiously looking on. The starting pistol went off and the race began. Helen immediately started strong and soared straight into first place. It appeared her reputation was starting to precede her, she was getting some fans and people were cheering her on; it was exactly what she needed. It was her desire for popularity that caused her to resort to unusual methods in the first place. The race continued and Henry looked increasingly worried. Helen approached the finish line, but before she could get there she fell to the floor holding her chest. Henry raced out of the stands towards her as other runners gathered around. She lay motionless on the track.

The news spread around Langton at the rate it normally does. Helen was well known thanks to her recent success and nothing makes for newsworthy conversations more than failure. Will's lack of communication with the group had become a bit of a sore subject. They understood that he was testing them, but now with a girl's life on the line, it was hard to understand his silence. Rick and Tony in particular were none too pleased with how they presumed him to be treating them. Nobody was to know that Will had his own problems to contend with at the time.

Sophie and Kim decided all they could do was to try talking to Helen again, they knew she was in the hospital, but they had no idea of her condition. If she was awake and they could see her, then they at least had to give it a shot. Thankfully, she was conscious and taking visitors. They were sure they wouldn't get the warmest of welcomes from her, but they were determined to give it their best shot. This still seemed like a small case compared to everything they had heard from Will and Peter's adventures, and if they weren't able to save the day here, would they stand a chance of helping with the Charles situation?

As expected, Helen was not pleased to see them. 'What do you two want? If you couldn't tell, I've not had the best of days.'

'It could have been your last day, Helen' Sophie said sombrely, 'It very nearly was.' Sophie was much better at talking than Kim during difficult situations, and with her earlier attempts in mind, Kim decided she was better off leaving her to it. 'We know what you're doing, we're here to tell you to stop.'

'And what am I doing? What do you know?'

'Anne Roper.' With those two words, Helen sat up and took notice. She didn't know how, but these two girls knew what she was doing and there was no point in denying it. 'You're a larger girl than your average runner. Your body is not in the right shape to handle the physical exertion. That, on top of the fact you have been allowing yourself to get possessed, have all led to the fact your body is starting to shut itself down.' It was another extraordinary sentence, but now things were starting to click, Sophie felt comfortable saying the words. She actually began to think to herself that she could be cut out for all this. Despite the fact that a girl's life was at risk, she was feeling pride in the work she was doing.

Helen looked down to her feet. She was ashamed at what she had done and for the first time, Sophie and Kim saw a scared girl just longing for acceptance. She wasn't doing what she was doing just for glory, it was to be a part of something. Sadly, she needed this validation so much that even with the threat of death hanging over her, she couldn't stop.

'I just need to win these next few races and then the season is over. No more competitions for a few months.'

'And then what?' Kim asked. She had tried to stay silent, but the determination of Helen surprised her into speaking up.

'Then I spend the summer training to be this good without Anne's help. I can do this without her, I know I can, I just need her a few more times.' She looked Sophie right in the eye. 'It's my risk to take.'

There was no talking her out of this, and they both knew it. As they left the hospital, they were fully aware there was a strong chance their first case would end in tragedy.

Whilst the girls were having no luck, Rick and Tony were in the Langton Arms, both

feeling the weight of what they were involved in. For Rick, he felt guilty. It was an innocent mistake that he made, but it wasn't taking much for any of them to doubt themselves at the moment. Tony was trying to make him feel better about the whole thing, even though he wasn't too pleased that Rick had once again chosen this pub to drown his sorrows in.

'Look man, we're all new to this. Whatever it is we have got ourselves into, it's a challenge for all of us. The one thing we can say about you is that you won't back down from any of this. Stupid mistakes aside, you're the bravest one out of all of us.' It was a rare moment of genuine kindness from Tony that Rick really needed.

'You really mean that?'

'Yeah, except the bravest person part. I think Sophie's got you beat there.'

Rick couldn't argue. Sophie and Kim arrived and uttered the words nobody wanted to hear: 'We've still got a problem.' Rick thought those words were being uttered far too often of late.

'She's still going to race,' said Kim in a tone that firmly established her disbelief in the situation. 'I think the only way we can stop her is through force and, well I don't know how we'd go about that.'

It was a definite concern. Could they really harm a girl? Even if it was to save her life?

They weren't to know that back at the hospital, things were escalating. Henry had the same thoughts that the group did. There was no denying that allowing his only daughter to participate in something so dangerous was a terrible thing, but at least now he was trying to put a stop to it. He wasn't to know that he had no control over his daughter anymore. Henry tried to do the only thing he could, to reason with her and try and make her see that this wasn't worth risking her life over. He knew he should have done it earlier. He had tried to dissuade her, but he hadn't thought to make her realise how special she was, even without any additional help. It couldn't be too late, at least that's what he thought.

'Sweetheart, you're my only child. I'm not going to risk anything happening to you. I'm sorry I gave you a hard time before, but this has to end. I can't lose you.' It was an impassioned plea from Henry; he couldn't remember the last time he had called her sweetheart, so using such a term of endearment would have to have some effect.

'You won't lose her,' came the response, cold in tone, despite the words used. As for those words, it took Henry a moment to realise there was one that shouldn't be there. At this point, he was working out what to say next without actually paying too much attention to what she was saying. But the sentence replayed in his head and the out of place word dawned on him. 'Her.'

Henry looked up at Helen, a chill shooting down his spine as he looked into her eyes and saw that what was looking back at him wasn't his daughter. She may have been in body, but there was something about her that was different, sinister even. She stared at him with a blank expression and sat up in the bed.

'Helen?' he asked, the fear that had overtaken him reducing his voice to a trembled whisper.

'Sorry, Henry' came the blunt response.

Helen jumped out of the bed and grabbed her father by the throat, slamming his head into the wall and knocking him out cold. She calmly walked out of the room, closing the door behind her. This wasn't Helen anymore, this was Anne, and death had changed her.

The group were keeping tabs on Helen, and this new development meant that some tough decisions had to be made. At this point, Helen was harming people; if she could do that to her own father then she could hurt anybody. What started out as a simple case had escalated to the point where a girl could leave someone from her own family in a coma. She needed to be stopped. The story Helen had told was that Henry had collapsed, hit his head as he fell, but they weren't taken in by the tale. With Will and Peter still away, all they could do was guess at what was happening.

It seemed as though Helen and Anne both wanted the success in equal measures, but Anne wanting to regain her former glory was beginning to be the driving force in what was occurring. It was as if she knew they were both on borrowed time and just wanted her one last moment in the spotlight, even if it was in the guise of somebody else. Unfortunately, all they had to bring to the table was talking. Sophie and Kim at least got a conversation out of Helen last time, so it was at least worth another shot. She had refused to go back to hospital after walking out, and it didn't take a lot of guesswork to figure out where she was spending her time. Rick and Tony were both insistent on going too, albeit watching from a distance in the stands.

Entering the stadium, Helen was about to begin training so they took to their places. Sophie and Kim took a slow nervous walk onto the field, heading in her direction. There were others dotted about the track, but it was relatively quiet. Rick and Tony meanwhile waited in the cafeteria that overlooked the track. There was no event on that day, so they had the place to themselves and the best view they could get. As they stared out of the window, anxiously watching the women they loved walk towards danger, a figure stood behind them. It was Anne, tinted blue and with eyes transfixed intently on the two men in front of her.

'We're so out of our league here,' said Rick.

'But we're having fun though, two couples hanging out, fighting dead athletes. Most couples just go to dinner for double dates, we're thinking outside the box.' Tony's humour hid his worries, for he knew Kim could look after herself, but hated her being out there. Neither man knew that Anne was edging closer and closer to them.

'Just make sure you stay alert, the last thing we want is to be taken unaware' said Rick, gazing out to the track.

Tony looked behind him, Anne had vanished. 'Don't worry mate, I don't miss a thing.'

Out on the field, Sophie called out to Helen. 'We can't let you do this, Helen.'

'And what do you plan to do to stop me? Tell the police your ghost story?'

'Ghosts, steroids, either or. It'll be enough to cause you to miss the race. I was worried about you, Helen, I thought you were in deeper than you knew, didn't occur to me you were damaged goods from the start.' Sophie's frustrations were showing; Kim knew things weren't going well if she was the one better off doing the talking.

'Sophie, don't anger the crazy possessed girl, please.'

'I didn't hurt my Dad,' Helen claimed. She was probably telling the truth that she wasn't in control, but Sophie knew she was at least partially responsible.

'No, but you didn't try to help him either.'

Helen turned to face the girls, she stared at them both, unwavering. 'You don't know what you're getting yourselves into.'

'We can hold our own' Sophie replied, defiantly

'Maybe, but can your boyfriends?'

Kim stepped forward, concerned 'Against you?'

'Me, Anne, either or'

Kim immediately turned to the stands and looked up to the cafeteria window to see Rick and Tony, only they weren't there anymore. The window was empty apart from Anne, staring straight at them with a smile on her face. 'Sophie, we need to go, now.'

Sophie quickly turned to Helen, 'This isn't over.' Now she was angry, any concern for Helen had vanished, she simply wanted to stop her whatever it took. The two girls made a run for the stands; they didn't know what they would do when they got there, but they weren't thinking about that right now. They just wanted to save Rick and Tony.

Only Rick and Tony weren't in danger at that moment in time, deciding they didn't like being so far away from the girls, they were headed down to the track but had got lost on the way. In the irritatingly similar looking corridors, they did make a discovery, the stadium manager's unlocked office, complete with files, including one on Anne.

'Should we really be going through this stuff?' asked Rick, slightly concerned about the law breaking they were currently undertaking.

'Hey man, the door was unlocked, this is fine. Plus, it's all in the name of, what do we call ourselves?'

'Paranormal enforcement officers?' Rick was quite proud at how quickly that had come to him. Tony nodded with approval, and gave the kind of smile that indicated he was already planning on going ahead with making those badges, saying that exact thing.

'Here's everything on Anne, can't hurt to get to know her.' Tony went through some of the paperwork and found a photo. 'Turns out she was quite the hottie'

'Really? Let me see,' Rick quickly asked.

Tony turned to hand him the photo and saw Anne standing directly behind Rick. 'Bloody hell, she's right behind you' he said in a voice so panicked and high pitched that he shocked himself, unaware he could reach those notes.

Rick immediately jumped behind Tony, who in turn rolled his eyes that his best friend was using him as a human shield. 'Hello?' He thought it was at least worth trying to communicate.

Anne let out a scream so loud it caused them to step back, she hurled herself in their direction, punching them in their chests. The force of the impact meant they were sent flying back into the walls of the office. As they stood up and regained their composure, she was gone.

Tony was the first to speak. 'I don't know what's worse, the pain or the mind-numbing fear.'

Rick ushered them to the door and they attempted a hasty escape to find the girls. It was unfortunate that they didn't make it far. The two of them ran out into the corridor and heard a door swing open behind them. It was a utility cupboard, filled with various pieces of sports equipment. They stared at one another, confused as to what could possibly be important about a cupboard, then a sense of realisation swept over them, the room was actually full of potential weapons.

'Oh, this can't be good' Rick's defeated tone about as morose as one would expect.

Equipment came hurtling out of the cupboard towards them, weights smacking into them and knocking them both out cold. Dragged into the cupboard by Anne, they were laid there, the weights precariously placed above them, ready to drop down onto their skulls at any moment.

Sophie and Kim made their way into the corridors. The previous need to save someone they had just met had now been replaced with the worry they may not save the people they loved. There was no sign of them, their phones just went to voicemail and they weren't responding to the constant yells of their names. That sinking feeling you get in your stomach had hit them both. They were gripped with worry about where their other halves could be and what may have happened to them.

'Sophie, Helen might be able to save them, she might know where they are.' Kim was desperate: she knew full well that the chances of Helen doing anything to help was slim, but what other choice was there? Sophie decided to head back out to the field, leaving Kim to search for the boys. She knew she was putting herself at risk, but then she was aware before getting into all this that danger wasn't going to be rare. Besides, she didn't have the time to be scared.

Helen's mind was firmly on her training, it was as if she was transfixed on running laps, without a care in the world as to anything else that was occurring. There was no talking her out of racing, though at this point that was nobody's concern. She glared at Sophie as she approached her, but Sophie had a steely gaze about her. She wasn't afraid of her, she wasn't afraid of Anne, she was just angry.

'What have you done with them?' Sophie wasn't approaching this with care anymore, she was direct and to the point.

'I'm going to make this really simple for you, I have another race coming up and I will train for it. If I don't train now, then the guys you are looking for will die.'

'You know, I really believe you are capable of that.' Sophie felt real hatred for the first time in her life. She knew that Helen had been corrupted by what she was doing, but she'd harmed people she cared about, a line had been crossed, and her welfare wasn't a priority anymore. 'You can tell me where they are now, I haven't got the energy to stop you training, even if I wanted to. You do what you want Helen, you can race, you can die if that's what you want to happen. But unless you tell me where they are, I'll smack you down so hard that you won't be able to walk, let alone run. I don't care how many people scattered around this field see me do it.' Sophie surprised herself. She wasn't planning on lashing out, what scared her the most though is that she meant every single word. Her anger may have been justified, but it was as if everything she had been through of late was bubbling up, unleashing itself in a tirade against this girl. It seemed to do the trick.

'The cupboard next to the manager's office. Now get out of here.'

Sophie looked at her and had to ask one last question. 'Who am I talking to? Helen or Anne?'

Whichever girl it was, she didn't get a response. She turned and sprinted off around the track, while Sophie ran back to get Kim and find the others.

As they opened the door to the cupboard, the weights balanced began to rock, they quickly dragged the boys out. It was just in time: they came crashing down right after they were pulled away.

Rick started to wake up. 'Sophie. Anne, we saw her.'

'It's okay, I think I did too. There's nothing we can do now, she's already out there training.'

Tony began to wake up next; he and Rick were both extremely groggy, but they insisted the girls went back out to see what was happening with Helen.

As Sophie and Kim made it to the stands, they didn't see a girl training. Instead they saw a crowd of people gathered around the body of a girl, sprawled out on the ground as a woman tried to revive her. Conflicted, they weren't sure how to feel. Of course, they wanted her to pull through but, for Sophie in particular though, that anger was still there. It soon became clear that the first mission the four had attempted alone was a failure. Helen died there on that running track, just as they said she would. Maybe they could have done something different, said something else. It didn't matter now. They didn't save the girl and even if there was no way they could have, it didn't change anything. They were left with the feeling that maybe they weren't cut out for this life after all.

# Chapter 11 - Marked

Nobody really spoke on the way back to Will and Peter's house. What could they say? Someone died on their watch. Whilst it was hard to have sympathy for Helen after the type of person she became, it didn't change the fact that she was a lonely girl who just lost her way. Who knows if it was her or Anne that was causing the trouble. She could have been helpless, a pawn in the actions of a bitter spirit. There were a barrage of questions haunting all four of them, but they had each come to the same conclusion: they needed to get back to normality and as far away from their new lives as they possibly could.

They all still had jobs, they hadn't been putting in the best performances of late, but unlike Will and Peter, they had lives they could go back to. They were returning to Will's to get things they still had there, that was to be the end of it as far as they were concerned. It wasn't like Will had got back to them throughout all this anyway. None of them were expecting him and Peter to be home when they returned, yet there they were.

'Where the hell were you?' Sophie was furious. Out of everyone, she had been the one to take what happened with Helen the worst, and the source of her blame was Will. 'Thanks so much for just leaving us to it. Did it make you feel good? Getting to feel all superior, letting your students go out on a job?' Sophie couldn't help but think back to the last conversation she had with Helen, more specifically the vitriol in her voice as she told her to die if she wanted to.

'I'm sorry, Sophie.'

Will's reply wasn't cutting it and Sophie marched towards him in anger, Rick decided it would be best to gently hold her back, but that didn't stop her verbal attack. 'You're sorry? A girl is dead, Will. She died because you wouldn't help us. You wanted to test us? Fine, you did. We failed. You can stick your stupid life mission because we're done.' Not waiting around for him to respond, she turned and headed out the door, slamming it behind her with such force that the room felt like it shook.

Everyone turned to look at Rick; he told Tony and Kim he would see them later, but he couldn't not go after Sophie when she was so upset. 'Someone fill me in on what happens next, yeah?' Tony nodded at his friend as he too made a hasty exit.

'Well, you're a real people person aren't you, Will,' Tony quipped. 'They were the two that got us involved in this, we're here for them. Why should we stay?' Despite being the least invested in everything that was going on, he wasn't fully convinced they should leave. Even he expected to walk out the door after his friends, however something was telling him they at least owed Will the chance to give them an explanation.

Peter tried to intervene. 'Tony, Kim, if you could let me explain.'

'Peter, no offence, but it's Will we need an explanation from here.' Kim was never one to be antagonistic, Will already knew this about her, so to have her shut Peter down in such a way was a clear indicator that she too was just as furious. Peter sat down; he was upset that this group was falling apart and it was difficult for him not to try and intervene.

Will stood, went into the kitchen and poured himself a glass of water, before returning to Tony and Kim. 'Well, first of all, I do so love that you are all quick to assume that I just abandoned you, that I deliberately didn't return your calls. If you must know, Peter and I spent a lovely period of time in the charred remains of my childhood home. As if that wonderful sight wasn't enough, we then proceeded to be run off the road by a group of men with semi-automatic weapons. They then felt it would be delightful to chase us through the woods all night, until we eventually found civilization and the safety of a public area.'

Tony and Kim quickly came to the conclusion they had all acted a tad hastily, but neither of them knew how to respond. What could they say in this kind of situation?

'So, bad couple of days too then?' was the best Tony could think of.

'Oh, I'm almost forgetting the stacks of research I found that could well have been the answer to everything. Well, I'll never know though seeing as it all got lost in the chase along with our phones, so I'm back to having nothing. Again. Now please, don't let me stop you if you want to leave too. But for your own safety, do be careful, don't forget you're all marked as potential cleeth food. In or out, it's your choice. I won't try to sway you either way.'

'Well, you're not exactly back to having nothing.' Will turned to see what Peter meant and saw he was holding a piece of paper. 'I was able to keep hold of this, I dropped the rest.'

Peter handed the paper over and Will quickly opened it up and stared at it with a confused look etched across his face. Drawn across it was a simple sketch, two circles, one with 'evil' written in the middle of it and the other with 'good.' A line connected the two, above the line was one word, 'fracture.'

Kim looked at it and shared the same confused expression. 'Does this mean anything to either of you?'

'No.' Will said solemnly.

'Also, they are terribly drawn circles.' Kim glared at Tony and his timing for critiquing somebody's artistic skills. 'Come on, how hard is it to draw a circle?' As Tony sat down, he picked up a pen and paper and began drawing circles to prove his point, whilst the others dealt with the matter at hand.

'Are we sure it means something. It could be a random drawing, a doodle?'

'Kim, you didn't see the place' Peter said, 'I don't think anything was stored there randomly.' Peter was back to being a little nervous around them. He didn't like confrontations, nor did he know how to react when someone shut him down like Kim did. She knew she had upset him, but it wasn't intentional. She walked over to him and placed her hand on his shoulder, mouthing the word sorry. He shyly smiled.

'We?' Will looked up at Kim from his chair. 'I thought you were leaving.'

'Oh, I'm still angry, but I think you have a valid excuse. Plus, we're marked remember. I'm sure Sophie will come around. Either way, we're staying. If that's alright with you?'

Will realised he hadn't asked what happened to them. 'This Helen girl, not such a simple job, I assume?'

'No, she died earlier today.'

'Kim, I'm truly sorry. Honestly I wasn't even sure it was a case.' Will genuinely seemed remorseful. It was something that Kim needed to see to validate her decision to stay.

Tony was quick to raise a very good point however. 'Oh, about the whole Helen thing, I'm fairly sure there's an angry spirit still at the stadium looking for vengeance. We should probably look into that at some point.'

'I'll add it to my list' was Will's dry response as he looked at Tony, who was brandishing five reasonably well drawn circles on a piece of paper, a look of pride showing on his face.

It was a couple of days before Tony and Kim decided to pay a visit to Rick and Sophie. The two of them thought how strange it was that they were the couple who were now involved in this, when it was Rick and Sophie who started it all. They both felt a little awkward - would there be any animosity because they didn't leave with them? That was partly why they had kept their distance. The odd text had been exchanged here and there, but it would never be the easiest of catch ups, what with half of them now out of something the other half deemed important enough to stay for.

Sadly, any thoughts Tony and Kim had about getting their friends back on board seemed unlikely to come to fruition. Helen's death had quite the effect on Sophie. It wasn't that she felt responsible as such, it was more than it caused her to feel out of her depth, to feel like she wasn't good enough. Even after hearing Will's explanation through Kim, she still didn't want to go back. The idea that they were marked by the cleeths was just speculation, according to her. None of them had come across one since Tony and Kim fought one off; the evidence just wasn't there. Rick for his part didn't want to walk away, but for Sophie he did just that. She was his number one priority, as he was hers, so going back to it simply wasn't an option without her by his side.

'We don't want to do this without you two,' Kim said to them on more than one occasion, but their minds were made up.

Rick and Sophie began to focus on normality. Their friends continued to work with Will and Peter, while they focused on their jobs, on cinema trips and things everyday people do. Rick was still kept up to date with what was happening thanks to Tony, although the story about the demonic pigeons made him sceptical that he was actually missing anything at all. Regardless though, he was missing being a part of it and it was only a matter of time before that was going to cause tension between him and Sophie. Sure enough, tension came.

Sophie had sensed something wasn't right. It had only been two weeks, but Rick was already quieter than normal, distant, as if there was always somewhere else he would rather be. She was secure enough in their relationship to know that it wasn't her, it was clear that despite how much he was willing to stand by her, he wanted to be back with the others.

'You want to go back, don't you?' Sophie asked, hesitantly because the answer she was expecting wasn't one she wanted to hear.

'No, I'm good that we're out.'

'Rick, you can tell me the truth.'

Rick knew he could but then as soon as he did, that would change things. If he went without her then they would begin to drift apart. That was his thought process and it was why he wasn't going to be honest with her. 'I am telling you the truth.' Sophie rolled her eyes, she'd overheard his conversations with Tony and it was painfully clear what he wanted. 'What's with the eye roll?' Rick asked.

'Nothing.'

The word 'nothing' followed shortly after by her saying she was 'fine' was a clear indicator that something was indeed the matter. 'Well, I can't win here can I, Sophie? I go back to working with them and we'll drift apart. You know we will.'

'You can't know that.'

'I do, I thought you would have changed your mind by now and gone back anyway, you haven't and that's fine. If you don't, I don't.'

Rick was unaware he had said the wrong thing there, Sophie had always thought he shared her reasoning for leaving, but now in that sentence, he'd admitted he didn't.

'You never agreed with me, did you? Why I wanted to go, why I couldn't stay? You said you did, but clearly you don't.'

Rick looked at his feet, since there was nothing he could say to turn this conversation around. He could try and lie his way out of it, but there was little chance of him succeeding. Instead, he decided to retaliate. 'No, I don't. It was you that was so gung-ho about us doing this. You were the one making sure we all took it seriously, trying to take charge. You can't act like that and then just expect us to be totally cool with leaving, just because you've had enough.'

'Just save it, Rick, you want to go, just go. I want an early night anyway.' Rick had struck a nerve, Sophie was sure nothing would get resolved tonight, if he stayed the argument would just get worse.

'Sophie, I don't want to go.'

'Well, I would like you to, please.'

Rick looked at her, hoping she would change her mind, but after a few seconds he got the message. He grabbed his jacket and left. Sophie knew she was overreacting, Rick was trying to stand by her and certainly didn't deserve to be thrown out. While he may have lost his temper, it would be hard for her to argue that he wasn't speaking some sort of truth. She considered chasing after him, but it wasn't the time. He would still be riled up too, it would likely have made things worse.

Rick was indeed riled up, walking home by the river that was just off the road, he was on the phone to Tony, venting his frustrations. 'What was I supposed to do? I walked away for her, whether I agreed with her or not, I stood by her.'

On the other end of the phone, Tony tried to be as sympathetic as he could. 'Flowers mate, whatever the problem, your fault or hers, just buy her flowers and hope for the best.'

As Rick was about to reply, he heard a splash from behind him. 'Tony, I'm going to call you back.'

'Everything alright?'

'It sounded like someone just fell in the river. I'll ring you back in five.'

Rick hung up the phone and slowly approached the moonlit riverbank. As he got closer to the edge, thoughts began rushing through his mind. That noise did sound like it could have been a person, was he going to find another body? This time on his own? He regretted putting the phone down to Tony. It wasn't like he could have helped, but the comfort of somebody else's voice right now really would have been appreciated. But there he was, on his own, at the edge of a river, looking down for what was likely an animal taking a late-night swim. He aimed the torch from his phone down onto the water to see if he could make anything out. There were ripples on the surface, as if something had just been there, but whatever it was didn't appear to be there now. Realising it was likely nothing, he turned to leave, and as he did he saw a cleeth staring straight at him, water dripping from its fur and a menacing growl emitting from its mouth.

There was nowhere he could go. Behind him was the deep river, either side of him was thick shrubbery that he couldn't get through at any speed, and the route ahead of him was obviously out of the question. It didn't matter, he wasn't going to get the chance to make a decision. The cleeth lunged at Rick, taking flesh out of his chest. He screamed out in pain, but there was no one around. Falling backwards, he slammed onto the ground teetering above the water. It tore at his leg as Rick desperately tried to get free; he was no match for the beast though. It clawed at his face taking a chunk out of his cheek, Rick knew full well he was beaten. He began to lose consciousness because of the pain and slumped into the river. The Cleeth was about to jump in after him when a car came around the corner, its headlights caught it by surprise, causing it to charge off into the night. As for Rick, he was nowhere to be seen.

# Chapter 12 - Wakeup Call

Sophie woke up the following morning and Rick was her first thought. She checked her phone and was dismayed to see that he hadn't sent her a text. He always did that. Even if they had an argument and she was in the wrong, he would still worry enough to send her a message, but this time there was nothing. She was concerned, not for his safety as it turned out she should have been, but that she had done more damage to their relationship than she initially thought. Then her phone rang. The call itself was a blur, as soon as she heard it was the police, she just knew it was Rick. 'He was found by the riverbank.' Those words stuck with Sophie, and she didn't really hear the rest of the call, just where she needed to go. Frantically rushing around to find her car keys, she threw some clothes on and made her way to the hospital.

Upon arriving, she frantically asked where Rick was. Finding out the ward number, she raced to it and was met by a doctor, who stopped her from going any further.

'Just tell me how he is, please,' Sophie begged.

The doctor sat her down and poured her a cup of water, one of those plastic cups you get that just feel clinical. 'You're Mr Abbotts's girlfriend?'

Mr Abbott's. She wasn't used to hearing Rick's name so officially. 'Yes, I'm Sophie. Please, just tell me what's going on.'

'Rick has suffered some severe injuries. He was found this morning next to a riverbank. He's suffering from mild hypothermia from the cold and from being in the water, but it's the wounds to his body that give us the most cause for concern. There's damage to his leg and sizable gash down the side of his face. Most troubling is the lacerations to his chest. We're doing all we can for him.'

The doctor could have said anything, Sophie had no idea what he was saying. She was trying to listen, but she was just hearing sounds. Right now, she just wanted to know one thing. 'Will he be alright?'

'At this moment, we don't know. He's stable, but he hasn't regained consciousness as of yet. There may be some head trauma we don't know about. We'll be running tests. Is there anybody I can get the nurses to call for you?'

'No, I can do it. I need to call his parents, our friends too. They all should know.'

Sophie headed outside the hospital. She was dazed, confused and certainly couldn't handle telling Rick's parents. Aside from worry, she also felt guilt. If she hadn't left the group, hadn't made Rick go home, then he would have been fine. She wasn't to know that something like this would happen of course, how could she? It didn't change the fact that the man she loved was in hospital and her decision-making had led to him being there.

Kim and Tony eventually arrived. Visiting Rick's bedside, they were shocked to see the condition their friend was in. He had bandages covering half of his face and a machine that allowed him to breathe. It was quickly apparent that there was a high chance he might not pull through. It was hard for all three of them to deal with his parents, since they believed it to be an animal attack, which while technically correct, was obviously not the whole story. They couldn't tell them. What good would it have done for them to know the truth? It wouldn't change the fact that their only child was fighting for his life.

In the waiting room, Kim tried to comfort Sophie, but there was little she could do. There was also little she could say when Sophie tearfully said that she and Tony had tried to warn her.

'You said we were marked, you told me. I didn't listen.'

'Sophie, we weren't even sure. There was every chance that we weren't, there's no point second guessing yourself.'

'But you warned me, I ignored it, and now Rick may not even pull through.

'He'll pull through.' Kim sounded confident, but she wasn't. If any of them were going to be killed, she felt sure it would be her. While it was a pessimistic viewpoint to have, she lacked the self-confidence to think she could survive longer than anybody else. Rick though always seemed like one of the strongest, nobody could have predicted it would be him battling to survive.

Sophie headed off to get a coffee, leaving Kim and Tony to wait for her. They both gave each other a worried look; they didn't need to say anything to know what the other was thinking. They both knew there was a very real chance that Rick wouldn't make it. Time passed and Sophie still hadn't returned. Heading off to track her down, she was nowhere to be found: not in the cafeteria, not by Rick's bed. She had gone. She had made the decision to go and see Will, it wasn't to talk and it wasn't to seek help: Sophie was overcome with anger and had revenge on her mind.

Barging through the door without knocking, she walked straight past Will and Peter, not remembering that the two of them were not yet up to speed on what happened to Rick.

'Sophie, would you mind telling me why you're here?' Will was surprised to see her. The two of them hadn't spoken since she last walked out of the house. Sophie didn't answer, she headed straight to Will's weapon cabinet and took a gun, immediately turning to leave. Will quickly stepped in front of her to stop her from going anywhere with a loaded weapon. 'Sophie, stop. Whatever you are doing, why ever you are doing it, I can't let you walk out the door with that gun.'

Peter cautiously walked over to them. 'Sophie, what's happened? You can talk to me if you don't want to talk to Will.' He knew that Will wasn't the best person to handle an emotional situation. He also knew he himself wasn't exactly the ideal candidate for such a moment either, regardless of the fact that he needed to find out what had occurred and if he could help.

Sophie though was not in the mood to talk, because she was blinded by her need for vengeance and didn't care how reckless she was being. That became evident when she pointed the gun at Will, her finger precariously close to the trigger. 'Get out of my way.'

Will had never taken kindly to threats. It was clear to him that something terrible had happened to cause Sophie to act out like this, but instantly there was an anger in him growing. 'I'm going to ask you one more time to give me the gun.'

'And I'll say no. Move.'

Peter moved next to Will, putting himself in the line of fire. He wasn't thinking about himself, he was thinking of both Will and Sophie, about how this was a situation that needed to be diffused quickly. 'Sophie, please, please just tell us what's happened. Is it Rick? Is he okay? Can I make you a tea?' He realised offering tea wasn't going to help as soon as he said it.

'No, I don't want tea. Rick is far from okay, he's fighting for his life in hospital.' She began to get emotional as she spoke, the anger was beginning to mix with an unbearable sadness. 'He's cut, he's beaten, he's hurt and I don't know if he'll make it.'

Will composed his own anger, putting it aside at the sight of how devastated she seemed. 'Sophie, I'm so sorry' he said, hoping that with the right tone and the right choice of words, he could talk her down.

'I'm taking this gun and I'm going. Please get out of the way, Will.'

It was a delicate moment. Sophie was clearly irrational and understandably so, but she needed to be stopped for her own safety, as well as the safety of others.

'Where are you planning on going with it?' Will asked, direct and to the point.

'To find the thing that did this to him and put it down. Or I'll find this Charles guy. He's linked to them, right? That makes him responsible.'

Sophie still had the gun pointed at Will's head, while Peter stood nervously next to him. He knew that there was a temper hidden in his friend and he was concerned that he was on the verge of seeing red. Thankfully, he was in control. 'Rick is fighting for his life, yes?'

Sophie nodded, her eyes filled with tears and her face red with rage.

'Then he has a chance. He may pull through this. Edward won't. My parents won't. I have lost so much because of whatever Charles is involved in, you think I haven't thought about just killing him? I think about it every single day. But we are not him, Sophie. We cannot become him, and that is exactly what will happen if we do something like this. If I had no choice, I would pull the trigger without any hesitation, but there is another way and we have to find it. We need answers as to why these things have happened so we can stop them. Please Sophie, just put down the gun and help me end this the right way. If we become killers, we do not come back from that.'

It was impassioned speech that impressed Peter, and it also proved to be what Sophie needed to hear. She put the gun down and collapsed to her knees in tears, with Will kneeling beside her to comfort her. Peter was still too socially awkward to help with the comforting aspect; he wasn't capable of handling crying. 'I'll go make tea,' he said in a slightly too upbeat tone. He couldn't help the choice of tone though; he was just relieved the situation had resolved itself.

As the days went by, Rick did pull through, but not without a lasting effect. The damage to his chest was mercifully something that was fixed in surgery; however the wound to his face was to leave a scar that wasn't exactly discreet. Despite some fears about the cut to his leg, that was also something that thankfully wasn't to cause any long-term problems. It would be a while before he could run for any reason again, but all things considered, it could have been far worse.

Despite him not blaming Sophie for any of it, she remained convinced she was responsible and it was the wakeup call that she needed. She had let the failure with Helen and the harm that they were at risk of scare her. Leaving wasn't about making a point, it wasn't about not feeling good enough, it was about fear. Now she knew that she couldn't be afraid. No matter what happened, this was all as personal to them now as it was to Will and Peter. It was their mission too and there was one person they were desperate to stop by any means necessary, and that was Charles.

# Chapter 13 - Home Again

Two circles, good, evil and fracture. No matter how many times the group studied that same piece of paper, nothing made sense about it. Kim likened it to having a small percentage of a jigsaw puzzle, but the only pieces you have are of the clear blue sky. They quickly realised what they had to do: they needed to go back to Will's family home and hope that some of what they saw was still there.

It was unlikely of course, but there was a chance that whoever chased Will and Peter away had assumed they wouldn't be foolish enough to return. This however was a group with a mind to be foolish. They didn't have many more options. They were close to something, but hoping answers just happened to come to them wasn't a plan they deemed worthy of consideration. What happened to Rick was an indicator that waiting around was just as likely to get them into trouble as seeking it out for themselves.

As for Rick, whatever the next plan of action was, he certainly wasn't going to be a part of it. He was finally out of hospital, but not even close to being able to help. While he was adamant that he wanted to be a part of the next step, he needed time to recover.

'You need to go, because I don't want this newly found determination to go to waste,' Rick joked to Sophie. She had no intention of heading off across the country when he needed her, but he was insistent that she went. He was just going to be at home watching 'manly action films' anyway. The Blu-Ray case of Titanic sitting next to his TV indicated that whilst his genre of movie watching may have been a lie, he was making a valid point. 'I'll be fine, honestly- if anything I'll just be worried about you. Which will actually stop me worrying about how deformed my face will look, so you'll be doing me a favour.'

'Don't joke about it, Rick.'

'I have to,' he replied, since thinking about the severity of what happened to him wasn't something he had been dealing with all that well.

Sophie knew the reality of what happened to Rick was going to hit him sooner or later, and it was for that reason she didn't want to go. She needed to be there for him when it did. Regardless, Rick wasn't giving her the option. He had already said he would pack a bag for her if she didn't go, so she made plans to join the others.

Two cars were needed for the trip. They couldn't all drive up together, it would be far too big of a coincidence if the people monitoring the place weren't connected to Charles. Will wouldn't put it past him keeping tabs on what they were up to. Suggesting staggering their departures seemed like the wisest move. Will and Peter headed up first in one car, while Kim, Tony and Sophie followed in the other. Once they arrived, Will and Peter would enter the house and lead the chasers away when they turned up; the others would keep surveillance from a distance. When the coast was clear, they would then enter and gather up as much as they possibly could before getting back in the car and driving home. A fool proof plan it was not; it was, however, the best one they had and with Cleeths now clearly baying for their blood, they couldn't afford to sit back and not at least attempt something.

On the drive things were tense. This was always going to be a dangerous thing to be involved in, but after Rick's misfortune and the fact they were potentially headed towards armed enemies, there was no way of making light of the situation.

Even Tony, who could quip his way through the worst of things, was feeling more subdued. 'I spy with my little eye, something beginning with armed thugs shooting at us' was the best he came up with the whole way there. But whilst they may not be having any fun, the three of them felt strangely content with what they were doing. Dying wasn't on anybody's to do list, yet there was something to be said for knowing if they did, it would be in an attempt to protect harm coming to other people. Then there was the excitement at what they might find; that one drawing had become something of a symbol for what they were fighting for. Except for Tony, he was constantly thinking how embarrassing it would be if it were just the random sketches of a mad man.

In the other car, things were no livelier. Peter was noticing changes in Will though and now seemed as good a time as any to discuss it with him. 'You seem different lately.'

'Do I? How so?'

'Well, you're still solemn, brooding and not one to tell a joke, but having the others around, you enjoy it, don't you?'

'It's nice to have other people involved,' he conceded. 'Not that you haven't been the best friend a person could ask for over the years of course. Despite everything, it feels like we have a team. Don't ask me why, but it allows me a feeling of hope. That there may be an end in sight.'

Peter smiled 'Well it's good to hear. I share your hope. My hope is of course mixed with terror, but there's hope nonetheless.'

It had been just the two of them for so long that they both needed to adjust to new faces being around. For Peter, he had an almost childlike enthusiasm for making new friends, Will on the other hand didn't, but he was slowly beginning to welcome the idea.

Upon arriving back at the remains of the house, the tension was palpable. Returning to the place you were shot at was hardly going to be a joyous experience. Even with others waiting in the wings, Will and Peter were frayed with nerves.

Seeing Will so on edge was making Peter feel even worse. 'So, what do we do, jog in, jog out, drive like crazy people? Because if driving at speed is needed, you're better off behind the wheel. Don't want to lose another car to a tree trunk.'

'Peter, calm down. Everything will be fine. For starters, I had no plans on jogging, as for the driving like we're crazy, well you're quite right, we've already lost one car. Let's just try and keep our heads, and with any luck we'll make it out of this in one piece.'

Peter couldn't help but think that wasn't exactly the best pep talk he could have been given.

Across the field, Sophie, Tony and Kim had pulled up. They turned the car headlights off and exited the vehicle, crouching behind some trees with a view of the former home. They didn't, however, have an overly clear view of Will and Peter, who were entering the remains in darkness, whilst wearing black. It made sense for them to wear dark colours as they would likely need to escape the scene, but it didn't help the other three keep tabs on whereabouts they were. In hindsight, Will's night vision equipment would have been a good thing to bring with them.

'So, this feels awfully like the point in a movie where the people keeping watch get sneaked up on instead doesn't it?' Kim said, in a way that failed to make any of them feel better about what they were doing.

Sophie and Tony looked at each other and Kim proceeded to turn and face the other way, just to be on the safe side.

'Just to be clear, our cue is them driving off whilst being shot at?' Kim asked, trying to wrap her head around the situation. She was finding it helpful to talk, since the nerves were getting to her the most and talking provided a nice distraction from her fear. 'Tony, does this feel like one of your Xbox games?'

'It does, but here I can't press pause and grab some biscuits from the cupboard. Computer game violence really is taken for granted.' He looked at his phone to see the time. 'You also don't see bored soldiers in Call of Duty needing the toilet.'

'They've gone in the house,' Sophie said, just about making out their shadows in the distance. She wasn't joining in on the conversation her friends were having; she remained fully focused on what was happening. Kim turned to look, before quickly turning back to make sure they were safe themselves.

Back in the stoned remains, Will dropped down into the basement whilst Peter remained on the ground floor to keep an eye out. As he landed below, he saw that same red light begin to flash. He was however amazed at what else he saw, a lot of what was down there was gone, but they hadn't finished. There were still boxes of paperwork to take. He quickly sent a text to Sophie, alerting them to the fact they were needed once they had gone, and he then climbed back up to Peter.

'There's still things down there, for whatever reason they haven't taken it all yet.'

'That's great, Will. But we need to move' Peter said, a panic in his voice as he gestured towards the oncoming headlights that were speeding down the road towards them. The response time was far quicker than the last time they were here.

They both made a dash for the car, but what they didn't know was that, while they had their friends on one side of the field, these people also had backup on the other. A gun shot rang out, echoing across the surrounding countryside and Peter dropped to the ground. Will turned to look behind him to see Peter clutching his leg and writhing on the floor in pain. It was a split decision that will likely stay with Will for the rest of his life, but with no time to think, he did the only thing he thought of in the moment. He carried on running. He made it to the car and sped away as quickly as he could.

The others watched from afar, the approaching headlights shining light on the scene. They saw Peter reach his hand out towards Will for help, only to be abandoned. None of them could believe they were watching Will leave him behind. Tony went to run towards Peter, forcing Sophie to pull him back down again, stopping him from going to help.

'What are you doing? We can't leave him' Tony snapped, furious at what he had just witnessed.

'If you go over there, they'll shoot you too,' Sophie replied sternly.

The armed men picked up a pained Peter and a van drove over; they bundled him inside, driving off as another car drove past chasing Will. Sophie received another text message, it was from Will and it simply said 'stick to plan.'

'Come on, we've got to get in there.'

'Sophie, we're not still doing this, are we?' Kim was confused, her faith in Will and their task was shaken by the events she had seen.

'We came here for a reason, let's get it done.' She was trying not to think about what had happened. Instead, she focused on the job they were there to do; it may have been the correct decision to make, but it was a shift in her personality that didn't go unnoticed by Kim and Tony.

Sophie ran across the field towards the house and Tony turned to Kim, unsure of what they should do. 'Up to you, if you still want to do this, we will.'

She nodded back at him, they ran after Sophie into the house. Dropping into the basement, they began picking up boxes. It didn't take long for Tony to speak up. 'Are we not talking about what just happened there? Will just left Peter, his most loyal trusted friend, for dead.'

'We'll talk later,' Sophie curtly responded 'For now, we need to grab what we can and get the hell out of here.'

'I'm sorry, Sophie. Since when were you in charge?' snapped Tony. He was so angry, and Sophie telling him what to do was not helping the situation.

'Sophie's right.' Kim was still shocked. She was quiet and withdrawn in her words, but she was focused on their safety. 'They could come back at any minute.'

'Fine, let's grab this junk and go.' Tony replied bluntly. He hadn't had a great deal of time to bond too much with Peter, but he liked him. More than that, he prized himself on his loyalty, for all the humour and off the cuff comments he made, he'd do anything for his friends. To see someone betrayed in such a manner made him angrier than he could remember ever being. Kim knew Tony well enough to be concerned: when he ran into Will again, it was likely he was going to make sure his feelings were known. It wasn't something she had time to worry about though, because they needed to make sure they got to safety before thinking about anything else.

On the road, Will pulled into a layby and shut off his lights and engine, the car giving chase drove past a few seconds later, not knowing he was there. He stared blankly out into the field in front of him, stunned by his own actions. He may have been able to justify them given enough thought, but the chances of him forgiving himself were remote. He knew he had crossed a line there may be no coming back from. He had deemed his closest friend worth sacrificing and that was something he never thought himself capable of.

# Chapter 14 - Meet the Parents

Rick had been putting on a brave face. To everyone around him he was doing fine, Sophie and his friends had seen him in good spirits despite his injuries, but there were people that he couldn't hide his true feelings from, his parents. Since he was injured, they had insisted that he stay with them until he was better. Whilst having people to look after him and being back in his childhood home was nice, he found it hard to disguise the fact he wasn't coping overly well with things. He couldn't just hide himself away and deal with it; he loved both his parents, but he wasn't going to get away with shutting himself off while he was around them.

'Rick, can I get you anything? Sandwich? Drink?'

It was a question his mother Janet would ask at least three times a day, and given he wasn't allowed a beer due to his medication, the answer was almost always 'No, thanks.'

Rick's father Derek was much less switched on when it came to dealing with how people felt; a nice yet gruff man, he followed the thought process that if there was something wrong he'd talk to them about it. Rick felt Derek was a lot easier to be around because of that.

When Sophie came to tell him that everyone was heading away for a couple of days, he put on a brave face, he told her to go, but deep down he didn't want her to. He'd never tell her that of course, since his injury had had an effect on her too and she needed to be kept busy; all he wanted to do though was stay at home. He played it cool, told her that he was enjoying staying in and catching up on missed television shows, but there was a truth that he was keeping from her, from everyone, that he was terrified to go outside.

Fear was starting to take him over, a fear of what could happen to him were he to leave the relative safety of his room. There was also the concern regarding what his face would look like when he took that bandage off, combined with a worry of something happening to Sophie because he told her to go. Then there were the flashbacks. Every time he closed his eyes, he would relive that moment by the river and the same terror would consume him all over again. It was easier to simply not sleep. When he did drift off, due to physically not being able to stay awake any longer, he would wake up in a cold sweat having just relived it all again in his dreams. He was struggling. With Sophie away it was worse. The stress he was feeling that something might happen to her too was almost unbearable. He'd be constantly checking his phone for messages, and even after receiving one, he would be just as concerned within half an hour that something may have gone wrong.

The morning after Sophie and the others left, Rick decided he had had enough. Another night of broken sleep had left him in a particularly miserable mood, and he knew that something would have to be done to pull himself out of it.

'Rick, can I get you anything? Sandwich? Drink?' It was the first call up the stairs of the day from Janet. With Rick and his brother both having left home, she was enjoying having one of her children under her roof again, even though the circumstances weren't ideal. She was used to the response she got whenever she asked that question by now, but today she got a different answer, one that filled her with hope her boy may be starting to feel more like himself again.

'Bacon sandwich, not crispy, white bread with ketchup please.' Rick was determined to sort out his problems now, but the first thing he had to do was to face up to them, and that meant taking the bandage off and seeing what his inevitable scar looked like. He thought to himself that no matter how bad it was, at least he had bacon cooking.

'We haven't got bacon, dear. How about a nice bowl of muesli?' came the ill-timed reply up the stairs.

Rick wasn't going to deterred, breakfast be damned. He even thought about heading out into town to get some bacon himself, but first things first, the bandage had to come off. He nervously headed into the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror, as soon as he saw what his scar was like he wouldn't have the security of ignorance anymore. It would be a real, legitimate part of his life, that's why he had put it off for so long. Five days had already passed since it was safe to take it off, but he felt that if he didn't do it now, then he could well keep putting it off forever. This was the time.

He carefully removed the bandage, but couldn't stop himself from looking away: he spent around a minute staring at the floor, contemplating looking up, before he finally found the courage to do so. While the wound itself hadn't fully healed, it was certainly going to remain noticeable even when it did. After not being able to even look before, he now found he was unable to take his eyes off it. This new part of him that he didn't ask for was here to stay, stretching from just under his eye to right above his jawline. He thought back to Tony's comment on the subject. 'Whatever it looks like, tell anyone that asks about it that you were defending someone. Add that there were at least twelve of them to fight off.' For a second, that allowed him to smile.

As he continued to be transfixed by this alteration to the right side of his face, he was suddenly jolted back to life by a crashing sound downstairs. It was the back door flying open, followed by the scream of his mother from the kitchen. Instinct took over for Rick. It could have been anything really, a gust of wind that caused the door to blow open and startle her perhaps, but for him, there was only one possibility. He immediately ran straight to his room and reached under the bed. He pulled out a large knife he had been keeping under there and proceeded to run downstairs into the path of Janet, who was running towards him, panicking.

'Rick, get upstairs now. There's something in the kitchen' she screamed, terror in her voice.

Rick ignored her request, breezed past her and there it was, a cleeth. There was every chance it was the same cleeth that did this to him in the first place, but if it was then it had picked the wrong day to try and finish the job. Rick felt more than ready to take it on. He didn't even stop to stare at it. Upon seeing it growling at him, he didn't flinch, didn't pause, he just marched up to it and stabbed it through the eye. The cleeth screamed out, but Rick wasn't stopping, he continued to stab it in the head over and over again until there was no life left in the creature. The blood was up his arm, up the cupboards, across the floor, yet still he didn't stop. This wasn't simply about killing it, it was about unleashing all the anger and fear that it had caused him. Despite the sheer brutality of the moment, he felt good in what he was doing.

As he finally stopped, he turned to see his stunned mother staring at him and the cleeth in horror. 'Rick, what is going on?' she muttered in stunned confusion. Given that in her eyes he had just butchered an animal to death, there was only one explanation that he could give, the truth.

'Ok, so this all started in an alley after Sophie and I went for dinner.'

Rick may have thought that his mother didn't take the story well; that was nothing compared to how Derek responded though. Rick was long past the age of being told off by his parents, yet here he was, in his twenties and feeling like he was about to be grounded. It was difficult to be annoyed at them for their reactions though. They had been worried sick about how he was doing after he found the bodies of Alexander and Abigail; their youngest son seeing that was something they wished they could have protected him from. With that in mind, Rick understood that discovering he and his friends were out looking for the thing that did it wasn't exactly the best news they had received all week.

They tried the heavy-handed approach, telling him that he wasn't to see Will again, that he wasn't to go anywhere near the others while they were doing something they deemed to be so immature, but it did no good. They seemed to forget that Rick was a grown up now. They had no control over what he did or who he saw, and all they could do was advise him. That's where the second approach came into play. Janet made an impassioned plea to him to think about his actions, to consider the danger that he was putting himself and everybody around him in. Rick though reminded them of why he was attacked in the first place, that he was already involved too much to get out. He explained that he loved them and he understood their worries, but there was nothing they could do to talk him out of it. This was the right thing to do.

'Well, I'll just call the police then' Derek said, exhausted with trying to convince Rick to do what he thought to be the sensible thing.

'If that's what you want to do, Dad,' Rick said, asking whether he really thought they would believe the story, especially as the cleeth was already long buried before he returned home.

'I know what I'm doing' he added. 'We all do.'

It wasn't going to make any difference though: no amount of going around in circles was going to change the fact this wasn't something they were going to be able to agree on. Rick should have predicted what would come next.

'I'm not having you put your mother in danger,' Derek said. 'If you're planning on doing this, then you can go back to your own house. You aren't welcome here.'

Janet protested and tried to calm the situation down but really, he was right. Rick was putting them at risk. Now that he had saved his mother, he no longer felt the need to lock himself away. He still had a lot to work through, but the best thing he could do was to get back into it. Telling his parents there was no hard feelings, he grabbed his things and left, eager to meet up with the others when they returned and to see what they had discovered while they were away.

# Chapter 15 - Taking One for the Team

Will had sent Sophie a message saying he was headed home. None of them would even know where to begin looking for Peter, so they had no choice but to follow him. The drive back was tense. Tony was silent the whole way, aside from the odd word to Kim who wasn't exactly in the mood for talking herself. Sophie was deep in her own thoughts; she was all about the mission when Peter was taken and it had surprised her. There was nothing she could have done to help him, she knew that, but now she had time to think though, it made her question her attitude to the whole thing. Will must have a trick up his sleeve she thought; perhaps Peter getting taken was all part of his plan and it was meant to play out like that all along. Clearly, she was clutching at straws, but sometimes denial can be a useful and much needed tool. There was one thing they all had in common though: nobody was looking forward to what would happen when they reunited with Will.

When they returned, Will was already there. They walked in on him sitting in silence at his desk, staring at the mobile phone that was placed in front of him. Upon seeing them all, it was clear by their faces that he would immediately have to explain himself. One of the three wasn't ready to hear it though. As Will stood and attempted to start talking, Tony immediately charged towards him, he proceeded to punch him to the ground in a rage that had been brewing since the incident with Peter first happened.

'Are you happy, Will? We've got like five boxes of your stuff in the car. That seem like a good exchange for the guy that's stood by you for years?' Tony was certainly angry, but there was a calmness to his words despite the violence of the situation. He had time to think about what he was going to do and in his mind, Will was firmly deserving of taking a punch.

It seemed like Will agreed. He got back to his feet and despite his normal approach to something like this happening, he just looked at Tony, knowing full well that he was owed his anger. He scanned the room and saw Kim and Sophie, but neither of them could make eye contact with him. They had put their trust in him and then watched him do something that was unthinkable.

'You're right, Tony. You're right. I put getting information ahead of Peter's safety and I am ashamed of myself for doing so.'

'I'd hoped this was some elaborate plan,' Sophie said, disappointed that the theory she had hoped to be true held no water.

'There is no plan, it was a split-second decision' Will replied, the guilt clearly sounding in his words. 'It's a choice I made that I am not remotely proud of.'

Tony was calmed somewhat by his admission of guilt, so he took a step back, still having more to say though. 'But you'd do the same thing again, wouldn't you? If you could go back and have the chance for things to play out differently, you wouldn't change a thing.'

Will could have lied. He could have pretended that he would have put Peter first, but it wasn't even something that he could have convinced himself of, let alone the others. 'No, I would have done exactly the same thing.'

Tony went to have another go at him, but Kim held his hand to calm him down. She wasn't about to let Will think she wasn't just as upset though. 'He's our friend, how could you?' she asked, looking at him in disgust.

'Because we need what is in those boxes. Rick was nearly killed. The people I love were killed. Each and every one of you are in danger. The only way I could make sure you had a chance to get what we needed from that basement, was to get out of there and lead them away.'

'So, he just took one for the team, did he?' Tony asked, sarcasm plainly conveyed in his voice.

Sophie began to see things from Will's point of view. She didn't feel great about herself for it, but Will was looking at the bigger picture and it was hard not to see that he had a point. Maybe it was because she came so close to losing Rick that she so desperately wanted all this cleeth business over with that it was causing her to begin to understand that sometimes, hard choices have to be made. She knew that Tony and Kim wouldn't be quite on her level; if she spoke up to defend Will, then she was likely to inflame the situation. The best thing to do was to try and move things along to what was coming next. 'Whatever the reasons, the outcome would be the same. These people have Peter, so we need to work out how to get him back.

Will hadn't stopped thinking about this since it happened, but he was confident that the best thing they could do would be nothing. 'I imagine that my phone will ring before long, it will either be Charles or one of the people that took him. I would have thought that with all the interfering we have been doing, he will want me out of the picture. It would be safe to assume that I have become something of a nuisance to him. More so than I normally am.'

'You mean a trade?' Sophie asked hesitantly. As much as she wanted Peter back, would it be wise to hand over the person who had the most knowledge about what is happening?

'Yes, me for him.' Will turned to Tony 'Before you ask, yes, of course I will go.'

Tony immediately pointed out a different scenario. 'Wouldn't they just want the stuff we took back?'

Will realised that Tony's notion of how events might pan out was actually far likelier than his the more he thought about it. 'Well, yes, I suppose that could be what they would want.'

'Excellent, so let's get busy reading as much of this as we can, then get him back when they call.' Tony's less angry tone made Will think that maybe they were seeing why he did what he did, and knowing that they understood helped to alleviate his guilt somewhat, even if he was worried that Peter himself might never forgive him. Tony, however, was just focused on saving Peter, a point that he was quick to make clear. 'Before we start though, all three of us need a gun, Rick too when he's back.'

'Tony, I'm not giving you guns, we've spoken about this before.'

'Yeah, well I need to make something clear. You're not in charge. You're not our boss, not our parent, in fact right now you're not even worthy of being called a drunk uncle. We need to protect ourselves, from Cleeths, from the people that took Peter, and from you.'

'Tony, the last time one of you had a gun, Sophie ended up pointing it at my head.'

Tony turned to Sophie, 'Yeah, well she's a smart girl.' He turned back to Will and walked towards him, stopping right in front of his face with a determined steely gaze set right on him. 'Now you either go get them, or I drive away with your precious boxes of intel yelling Charles's name out of the window until I find him. Then I hand the lot over. Your choice, but make it quick. That option is sounding pretty good to me right now.'

Will knew he was beaten, that they had no reason to trust him and that he had proven he may not be able to look after them. He had no choice but to comply. Wearily, he headed to his safe and removed the guns, handing them over one at a time, whilst giving them all a look that made it clear he was opposed to it.

At that moment, Rick arrived, unaware of the situation, but quick to notice how armed each of his friends were. 'Does Scarface over here get one of those?' he asked. He didn't know it wasn't a time for jokes, even if they were at his expense. Sophie immediately hugged him, and stopped for a second to look at Rick's scar before smiling, reassuring him that it didn't change how she felt about him. Rick had been worried about her seeing it, but those concerns vanished with that one smile. She told him that they needed to talk about what he had missed but before they could go, Tony had already gone to the safe to hand Rick a gun of his own. Will was struggling with having the control taken away from him, but there was nothing he could do. He had just armed a group of people that weren't exactly his biggest fans at the moment; it was a worry he had no choice but to live with.

As Sophie took Rick to another room to give him the rundown on what happened on their fateful trip, the others were left to deal with the awkward silence they were faced with. After a few seconds of looking at the guns and then each other, somebody just had to say something. It was going to be a while before Tony and Will were exchanging small talk, so it was left to Kim. 'Let's get these boxes in then.' The two men nodded in agreement and they went out to start unloading the car.

'He did what?' came Rick's shocked voice from the kitchen as they walked out the front door.

The friction and animosity that existed between them all now wasn't helped by the worry of where Peter was, or more importantly, how he was. Peter himself was none the wiser. He had woken up in complete darkness with his gunshot wound merely wrapped in a bandage. The room he was in was cold but other than that, he knew nothing about his surroundings, other than the fact he was tied down to a bed. He tried calling for help, even though he knew that wherever he was, there was nobody around to assist him. Someone did however respond to his calls. As the door opened, the bright clinical lights from outside his cell door dazzled him. He couldn't make out who was there, just a blurred silhouette moving towards him, a silhouette that had the decency to make itself known.

'All these years with you looking into me, into my whereabouts, it's funny to think we've never met before now, isn't it, Peter?'

Peter's eyes adjusted to the light and the face became clear: he was in a room with Charles. He had seen pictures of him, but the two had never had cause to meet. Until recently, he had conducted all the work he needed to do from a safe distance, something he was now regretting deviating from.

'All those years being such a loyal pet to William, yet he leaves you for dead to further his own gains,' Charles continued. 'I would love to know how that makes you feel.'

Peter was determined not to break. Seeing Will leave him like that was a crushing blow, but he knew deep down that he did it for the right reasons. He was also sure that he would do anything he could to come and rescue him. Peter wasn't one for witty comebacks, the smart retorts; all he could think to do was to stay silent for as long as possible, to hold out until rescue came for him. He was terrified though, the tears welling up his eyes not going unnoticed by Charles.

'It's fine, Peter. You don't have to say anything. I know how you feel, deep down you're angry. You might not even know it yet, but you're furious, you want revenge. You want him to pay for leaving you behind.'

'No, no I don't.' Peter's resolve to be silent was already being tested.

'I'll ask you the same question this time tomorrow, we'll see what your answer is then, won't we.'

'You'll get the same response. He did what he had to do.'

Charles smiled. It was a calm smile, one that portrayed a level of confidence in what he was saying that disturbed Peter even more than his current predicament did. Charles reached into his inner jacket pocket and he pulled out a device, about the size of a remote control with a blinking antenna on top of it. Aiming it, he pointed towards two metal objects in the corner of the room and pressed down on a button. Whatever these objects were, they were now powered and a bright glowing light began to emit from them. Peter had never seen anything like it before. Despite not having a clue what was happening, his fear grew.

'What is this, Charles? What is that thing? Just tell me, talk to me and explain what it is, please.'

'It's another world. Talk to you tomorrow, Peter.'

Charles then left, closing the door behind him. Peter found himself alone again, with the giant bright light between these two machines his only company. He had no idea what it was, no idea whether the shapes he could see inside it were real or a side effect of staring at it for too long. Either way, he was trapped there. Trapped and left alone to ponder those words 'another world' that Charles had left him with and what they could possibly mean. Perhaps worst of all, he was trapped with his confidence that help was on the way diminishing, with a feeling that perhaps Will didn't really care about him after all.

# Chapter 16 - Bygones

The next day, after some much-needed sleep, they started looking through what they had taken. Most of what was found in the boxes they had risked their lives for was worthless, or at least that's how it seemed at the time. Whilst Tony was thrilled at the box of bubble wrap he had found to play with, nobody else really felt like the escapade to retrieve it all was worth it. There were however lots of newspaper clippings, detailing various atrocities from around the world, they ranged from solitary murders to large scale bombings that stretched across history. Other than Charles and Margaret potentially having a disturbing fetish for violence, it didn't give them any ideas as to what Charles was doing, or how this information could help them. They did find a photo though: there were three people in it, Margaret, Charles and a man named Albert Wallace. The names were written on the back and dated. Will couldn't remember ever meeting someone by that name; if this man was close to his mother, it seemed strange to him that he never would have.

Albert didn't show up anywhere else on the items they had recovered, but it turned out he was a lot easier to track down than Charles ever had been. He was a professor at a university a couple of hours away, they all knew that this may have been the most fortunate discovery they had made yet.

'You're not going, Will,' Tony was quick to say. Will had mentally already started packing a bag, so to be told that came as a shock.

'Excuse me?'

'Rick and I need a road trip, we'll take this.'

This was somebody that knew his mother, somebody that could give him definitive answers, and to be told that he couldn't go wasn't something he was going to accept.

It took Sophie to say some sensible words to convince him it was the right call. 'You need to focus on getting Peter back, on fixing your mistake. They can do this.' Sophie was trying to take charge of the situation, to stop it all turning into another argument by making the decision herself.

'We'll ask the right questions,' added Rick, 'if there are answers there we'll get them. Tony's right, you don't get to jaunt off and leave Peter wherever the hell he is.'

Will knew there was no response he could give to that. As he looked around the room, he could see that every face looking at him was in agreement at what was just said. He agreed himself, the more he thought about it. Will's thoughts turned to Peter, to his arm stretched out and begging for help; he shouldn't be trying to change their minds, they were right. He prepped them of course, gave them a list of things that simply had to be asked and the two headed off. There were still three boxes that needed sorting through, and he knew that it was only a matter of time before Charles made contact, so he, Kim and Sophie needed to get as much from them as they could, before it was too late. As soon as they began though, the front door opened. Expecting to see Charles, or one of his armed thugs, everyone was shocked to see that it was Peter, he appeared to be alive and well.

'Peter'?

'Hi guys.'

Kim immediately ran towards Peter and hugged him. Sophie looked on smiling, whilst Will didn't know what to do. Was the person who had returned still his friend? Had he understood why he did what he did? Or was the friendship damaged beyond repair by this point?

'Peter, are you ok?' Will hesitantly asked, apprehensive and nervous about the answer he could be about to get.

'I'm fine, Charles let me go. He said it was a sign of good faith from him.'

Sophie was confused. She hadn't met Charles, but from what she knew of him, he didn't seem like the sort to give away leverage quite so easily. 'He just let you go? Just like that?'

'Apparently, you don't have anything. Whatever you took was just his personal documents, nothing on the Cleeths, nothing you could use. He had no reason to keep me around. At least that's what he told me.'

Kim had fetched him a glass of water and ushered him to sit down. 'We're just glad you're back, how's your leg?'

'Fine, well it hurts a little. I got dropped at the hospital, they fixed me up, flesh wound apparently. Kim, Sophie, do you mind if I have a minute with Will?'

'Of course,' Kim replied. She and Sophie picked up some of the paperwork and headed into the kitchen to continue reading through it.

Will cautiously approached Peter. 'Peter, I am so sorry, I acted irrationally and I did the wrong thing. I just thought we had found something so important, I thought I could get you back.'

'Will, it's fine, I understand, I really do. You did what you had to do in the heat of the moment. What's that saying? Bygones be bygones?'

Will was surprised to say the least, he hadn't forgiven himself, and Peter trying to put this in the past so quickly wasn't something he thought was going to happen. But then that was Peter, always loyal, even to a fault. He should have known that he would have understood.

'Bygones sounds good to me. But I promise, I won't put anything above you, or any of the others again. You have my word.'

Peter smiled, got up out of the chair and picked up his water. 'I know it's early, but I really need some sleep. In the morning, I'll go through all of this with you, see if it's as worthless as Charles says it is.'

'Sounds like a good idea to me. Go rest, do let me know if you need anything, I'm right here.'

Peter went to his room while Will sat down, relieved that Peter was safe and that they were able to move on from what happened. He thought to himself that he couldn't have asked for a better friend. If what they stole did amount to nothing, then at least they hadn't lost anything getting it.

Peter stayed in bed for the rest of the day; everyone thought it was best to let him rest for as long as he needed. As night fell, it wasn't long before the others went to sleep, Will went up to his room whilst Sophie and Kim drifted off on the sofas. They had thought about heading home, but it was a Friday night and already late, so they had no reason to. One person wasn't sleeping though, the person who went to bed first, Peter. He hadn't slept at all, just lain there staring at the ceiling, awaiting everybody else falling asleep. He was wide awake and it was almost time for him to make his move.

Peter hadn't returned with the intention of making any kind of move, but he was consumed by an anger that was reaching levels he hadn't known existed. Talking to Will and pretending that he was fine was torturous for him; they may have been friends in the past, but now there was a deep-seated hatred there. Peter just wanted his former best friend to suffer. He was going to make sure he felt the same kind of betrayal that was inflicted on him. He calmly got out of bed and headed out the back door. He returned with two cans of petrol from the garden and proceeded to pour them all around the house. He covered the place, around where the girls were sleeping, around Will's bed, and he made sure the bulk of it was on the research that they had recently stolen. After he had poured as much as he had, he proceeded to throw the last jerry can to one side, waking Will up in the process.

Will immediately jumped out of bed, landing in the soaked carpet. The smell was overwhelming and it was instantly clear they were under some form of attack; he just wasn't aware of who the perpetrator was. It soon became very apparent though. As Will exited his bedroom, he was greeted with the sight of Peter, standing there with a blank look on his face, in his hand was a lighter and he was ready to strike a flame.

'Peter, what the hell are you doing?' Will asked, confusion and shock almost overwhelming him.

'I paid for all this, I can burn it all down if I want to.'

Will was taken aback, he hadn't even seen Peter throw a punch before, let alone act out in such a violent manner. He didn't have time to work out what had happened to him though, he needed to get him and the girls out of the house. He called to Kim and Sophie in the other room, urging them to get outside; they of course did the opposite and came running towards them to see what was happening.

'Hey, Peter. Why do you look like an arsonist?' Kim's question was straight to the point, but there didn't seem to be any reason to beat around the bush at that moment in time.

'Kim, Sophie, you need to get out of here now. This is between me and him.'

Sophie was quick to realise that if Will hadn't woke them up, they would have been burned alive had the house gone up in flames. The petrol was everywhere, including right around the sofa's that they were both sleeping on. 'Peter, you were going to set this place on fire with us in it? What is going on?'

'Well, now you're awake. If you want to get out of here in one piece, here's your chance.' Peter didn't care about any of them, he was so overcome by this rage. Even he knew deep down that he wasn't acting like himself, but he couldn't stop. He hadn't lit the flame yet, he was, however, fully prepared to.

Will stepped towards him. 'Peter, come on please. Talk to me. What happened to you?'

'You' Peter coldly replied. 'You happened to me, you and your stupid mission.'

'Peter, we are friends, you do not want to do this.'

Peter flicked the lighter igniting the flame, he held it in his hands and stared Will directly in the eyes. 'No, we were friends. I really do want to do this.' He dropped the lighter to the ground and immediately everything began setting ablaze. Will dived into Peter, knocking him to the ground whilst yelling at the girls to get out of the building. Sophie and Kim ran towards the back door, but the flames were catching up with them too quickly, they rose so high they couldn't even attempt to escape that way. They quickly turned towards the front of the house. Peter may have doused the house with petrol, but there were patches he had missed, and if those had not been there, the whole building would have gone up in an instant. It was fortunate, but it still didn't leave them with much time at all to get free.

The front door was locked and with the flames moving quickly towards them, Kim frantically grabbed the keys off the side. They were able to get out onto the street. Running to safety, Sophie called the emergency services whilst Kim looked back to see there was no sign of Will and Peter. They had barricaded themselves in Peter's room with Peter in no hurry to leave. Will was left with one option, he punched Peter to the ground, knocking him out cold. Turning to the bedroom door and without thinking, he grabbed the handle, the heat of the metal caused him to yell out in pain. He quickly realised they weren't getting out that way.

Sophie and Kim waited outside the house, while neighbours began leaving their homes to see what was happening. Looking up to the window, they saw Will, he was doing the only thing he could do, lowering the unconscious Peter out as far as he could before he would inevitably need to drop him. He called out for help. Several people gathered outside to catch Peter as he fell; they laid him on the grass and looked up to Will to somehow offer him assistance. Will though was out of time.

The door behind him that was keeping the flames out set alight, flames came rushing towards him and he had no choice but to jump. He was able to control his fall, rolling upon landing and somehow avoiding injury. Slowly getting up off the ground, he composed himself and checked everyone else was ok. Staring up at the burning house, he realised that all the research they had was burning along with it. More than that, he had lost another home to fire.

'We need to get out of here, now' Will urgently said to Sophie and Kim. 'More importantly, we need to get Peter out of here, before the police start asking questions.'

'I have a key to Tony's place.' Kim knew that Tony wouldn't be thrilled with everyone going back there without him, but it wasn't as if they had an abundance of choices.

Will picked Peter up, explaining to the confused onlookers that they were taking him to hospital. He gave someone a false contact number for when the emergency services arrived. They took him to the car and drove off, aware of all they had lost, but equally aware of how close they were to being killed themselves. The question remained though, was this Peter acting based on his own free will? Or was there more to what they were investigating than they ever thought possible?

Arriving at Tony's, they had no choice but to tie Peter up, since he was a danger to them and to himself. The bath seemed as good a place as any. Grabbing some rope, they tied his hands and placed him in the tub, barricading the door so as to prevent him escaping. Will volunteered to keep watch first so the girls could get some sleep. It was he after all that was the root of Peter's anger, so it made sense for him to have first watch.

As he sat, staring at the bathroom door in silence, he had nothing to do but ponder, to think about the danger that people are in just by being around him. Peter was always the nicest person that anybody could meet, yet here he was, tied up to prevent him for being responsible for the deaths of the people he cared about. Whether Rick and Tony found anything out on their trip or not, he knew what he had to do, he would have to face Charles himself, and alone. His thoughts turned to all the people that had been harmed just by him being in their lives. One thing became clear to him: this needed to end. One way or another, all this needed to be over and it needed to be soon.

# Chapter 17 - Old People Love to Talk

Rick and Tony's drive took them a while. Admittedly that was because they were intent on playing the 'stop for pastries at every opportunity' game they liked to play, but to them that was an extra couple of hours well spent. Really, they were just glad to be away for a while, even if Tony was already getting bored of driving. Things had been crazed for so long now that this seemed like a good chance to relax, even though it did involve asking an old man a series of questions about his potentially evil work.

'I've eaten so much that I'm worried I'll fall asleep when this guy starts talking,' Tony said, legitimately concerned that perhaps they had taken the pastry game as far as it should be allowed to go.

Will had given them a Dictaphone to capture what was said. 'It's a backup if we do drift off,' Rick pointed out.

Tony decided now was a good time to find out how his friend was really doing. They hadn't had a chance to really catch up since the attack and Rick was a great deal quieter than he usually was. 'So, how's the face?' he asked, thinking it was as good an opening line as any to get Rick talking.

'Fine, well sore still, happy the limp has gone. I'm more worried about my parents to be honest, it's not every day you see your son butchering a dog to death in the kitchen.'

'They didn't take it well then?'

'About as well as you'd think. They didn't take too kindly to me heading out afterwards, probably shouldn't have told them the whole story in retrospect.' In truth, Rick had tried to put his parents out of his mind; he wanted to get right back into the thick of things in order to try and hide away from what happened. Dealing with his parents felt a bit too mundane, a bit too much like the real world for his liking. He might be feeling brave enough to get out of the house again, but if he was caught in a quiet moment, his insecurities would come flooding back.

As the two continued to discuss everything that had happened so far, they were both left feeling a sense of uncertainty. If they found out what Charles was doing and put a stop to it, would they be able to return to their normal lives? Both of them had found that going to work was becoming a grind, a chore, when previously it had just been a nuisance. The notion of going back to desk jobs, after they had been risking their lives to do something so important, was something that troubled them even more than the possibility of facing further inevitable danger. Even Rick, with his injury and extended time away, couldn't think of anything worse than dealing with members of the public, let alone the trivial things his manager found to be so important.

Pulling up to the university, they proceeded to head inside. Being a university, there was a lot of ground to cover. Tony was sure to ask the most attractive girls in the place for directions to where Albert Wallace may be, not that he would try and do anything with them, he just loved to flirt. When they did find him, he wasn't what they thought they would see. He was an elderly man who must surely be on the verge of a late retirement, an unassuming sort; he was well-spoken and not even close to being the kind of person they would have expected to be caught up with Charles.

'Mr Wallace? Albert Wallace?' Rick hesitantly asked.

'That's me,' replied Albert in an upbeat tone. He was clearly the kind of man that loved company and welcomed the idea of two people wanting to talk to him. 'How can I help you, boys?'

'We're not from the university, but we have a few questions for you, if that's alright?'

'Of course, please sit down. Do you study in my field then?'

'Not exactly,' Rick replied, realising they needed to cut to the chase. 'We're here to ask you about someone, a man named Charles Daniels.'

Albert smiled. It wasn't exactly a happy one, but a knowing one. He had known this conversation was coming his way at some point. 'So, today would be the day then.'  
'The day?' questioned Tony.

'If you've found me, then that means I'm a risk to him. It means Charles will be on his way. Surprised you got here before him, truth be told.'

'What can you tell us about him?' Tony pushed. If Charles was indeed coming, then time was of the essence and they couldn't afford to waste any.

'Anything you can remember would be helpful,' added Rick.

'Anything I can remember? I remember it all. That, boys, has been the problem. What I wouldn't give to forget my time with those people. But certain things you simply cannot forget. You can distance yourself from them and hope it all goes away, but even that's a long shot. They never do.'

Rick realised they needed to explain their interest, to emphasise why they were asking and how important answers were. 'We've met him, well our friends have. We have met the things that he seems to control, he's tried to kill us and he's taken our friend.' Peter's current situation wasn't known to them, but the words were enough for Albert to realise that he needed to start talking.

Your face?' Albert noticed the still not fully healed mark that Rick now bore.

'One of those things, the dog-like things. We call them cleeths, because of the sharp claws...'

'and teeth.' Albert finished the sentence for him and smiled at the name they had been given. He never had a name for them, nobody did. They were just dogs, or beasts, or monsters, whatever they decided to call them on any given day. 'I'll tell you my story, it's quite the tale. If I do, you need to promise to stop him, if the cleeths as you call them are attacking people, then he is close to finishing what we started. That can't happen.' The more Albert spoke, the frailer his voice sounded. Dredging up this part of his past was a painful experience and he knew that he himself was in great danger. Above all though, Albert just liked telling stories, having an audience. He'd lost his wife many years ago; they never did have children, and it was his biggest regret and one of the reasons he hadn't retired yet. He didn't want to lose having people to talk to, no matter how small the group. 'Well let's begin, shall we?'

Albert took a deep breath and began. Rick pressed record on the dictaphone as the old man proceeded to tell them everything. What Rick and Tony heard was nothing like they had expected. In their heads, they had envisioned possible genetic mutation, work done on animals to turn them into Cleeths. That was most certainly not the case though, not even close. What they were hearing was so fantastical they were beginning to think they were listening to the delusions of an old man, rather than any factual tale. But Albert said his words with such conviction, and the story may have been extraordinary, but it was hard not to be taken in by it.

Of course, it all came to down to what Will thought about it all, since Rick and Tony didn't know enough to make a choice one way or the other as to whether they were hearing the truth. If this was all indeed fact, then everything they ever knew had been thrown into question. That normal life they may have had to get back to was seeming less and less likely to be a problem.

As Albert finished his story, he looked at both Rick and Tony for any kind of reaction. Instead he was greeted by two blank faces, both of which were unsure of what they could possibly say after hearing such things.

Naturally, Tony went first. 'You're aware how mental that sounded right? Because I'm about to Google what you've said as I'm fairly confident you've quoted a film of some kind.'

Albert got to his feet and looked towards the door, he breathed a deep sigh and looked at Tony and Rick. 'You have what you came for, please find a way to use it.'

'But we have like a million more questions,' Rick quickly pointed out.

'No time I'm afraid, gentlemen. Those windows open fairly wide, I suggest you make your way through them as quickly as possible.'

Rick and Tony slowly turned to where Albert's stare was fixed and were greeted by the arrival of a man, striding into the classroom with three cleeths in front of him. They began to growl and inch forward whilst the man, Charles, smiled at the three of them standing before him. He had them on leashes long enough that he was safe from their bites, but he also knew how they operated. Once they set their eyes on a target, they wouldn't stop until they had them, and right now they were eyeing up Rick, Tony and Albert with intent.

'So, you'd be Charles then? How's things?' Tony quipped. He knew the situation was dire, but trying to bide time through talking seemed like the only option.

'Go, now,' Albert sternly said.

Charles walked forward with his violent pets, closing the open door behind him. 'Rick, Tony, our stories have been connected for a while now. We finally meet and you plan to run? Where's the respect?'

Rick stepped forward, held back by Tony. 'One of your things nearly killed me, messed up my face, where's the respect? Where's my gun?' Rick pulled out his gun at pointed it directly at Charles, it was disconcerting how unconcerned Charles was by having a weapon pointed at him.

'You think you can kill me? Please try. I guess the real question would be, can you kill me and these three, I believe you call them cleeths, before they tear your throats out?

Albert was old, but that doesn't mean he wasn't brave. He walked in between Rick and Charles and lowered Rick's weapon himself. He turned to Rick and Tony and simply said 'Go.'

Tony understood they had no choice but to do just that. 'Come on, Rick, let's go, now.'

The two hurried to the window and climbed through. Charles yelled after them, 'Don't go far. I'm not finished with either of you yet.' He knelt beside the cleeths and gestured towards Albert, who made no attempt to run. This was a moment he had seen coming for some time. In a way, he was relieved that the day had finally arrived.

'To think, you actually wondered why I left, Charles' were his final words. He was torn apart as Rick and Tony watched from the window, horrified by the sight of the elderly man's life ending in such a barbaric fashion.

Tony grabbed Rick, forcing him to run, and the two took off to the car. They weren't safe outside though, two cleeths came charging towards them, past students who ran screaming at the sight of them. They jumped into the car and slammed the door shut, they were so close to being caught that a cleeths paw was trapped in the door. They sped off with the cleeth dragging along beside them until its leg snapped off. There wasn't even time to think of throwing it out the window. The only focus they had was on getting home, and there wasn't even a thought of playing the pastry game this time.

Back at Tony's flat, there had been a change of guard in who made sure Peter didn't escape. Will had gone to sleep, whilst Kim had taken her turn to keep an eye on the locked bathroom door. She went outside to the back garden for some air, they had inhaled some smoke escaping from the burning house, and it was at times a little more difficult to breathe than usual. She heard what sounded like Peter snoring, so she figured that two minutes wouldn't hurt. It was an error. As she stepped outside, it coincided with Tony and Rick getting home.

They were still feeling the effects of the pastry game, job number one was getting to the toilet as quickly as possible. They hadn't wanted to stop on the way home for fear of being followed, but they couldn't last the extra few minutes it would take to get to Will's. A quick game of rock, paper, scissors decided that it would be Tony who would get the good fortune of going first.

Walking up to the bathroom door, he had no idea why there were bits of furniture dragged in front of it, normally that sort of thing would cause him to stop and think, but it had been a long day. He was tired and desperately needed to get in there. He moved everything to one side and walked in, immediately dropping his trousers and sitting on the toilet, he breathed a sigh of relief that he had actually made it. Whilst he was thinking about taking as long as possible, just to annoy Rick, he noticed something to his left. He slowly turned his head to see Peter in the bath, staring straight at him. Tony screamed and jumped off the toilet, running out the bathroom, pants and trousers around his ankles. He got to his feet as Will and Sophie came running out of their respective rooms to see what the trouble was. Tony screamed again as he turned to see them both standing there, at which point Rick and Kim came running towards him. Tony quickly pulled his trousers up and exclaimed a panicked yet defeated 'what is going on?'

Tony and Rick were quickly filled in on what they had missed, although the fact that everyone had left their phones in the burning house wasn't a good enough excuse for not getting in touch and letting them know what was going on. As Tony put it, there were many ways to get in contact with them, he of course proceeded to list them all before adding 'hash tag we have a prisoner in your bath' to show that even Twitter was a way of making contact.

'Truthfully, we just knew that you'd both come rushing back,' Sophie admitted, 'we needed to hear what this Albert guy told you.'

'Did you find him?' Will quickly asked. He was keen to get back to the matter at hand, not just so he could get that image he now had of Tony out of his mind as quickly as possible.

'We found him,' said Rick, a sombre tone in his voice. 'He was killed pretty savagely by three cleeths not long after.'

'Hey, we met Charles too,' added Tony. 'He's a gent, isn't he?'

'Oh, my God. Are you guys ok?' Kim asked, hugging Tony as she spoke.

'We're fine, we've got a cleeth leg in the car if anyone wants it?' Tony kissed Kim; he'd been worried about not getting back to her and had been thinking of kissing her the whole way home.

Will was keen to stay on the topic of Albert. 'Did you get anything from him? Anything at all?'

'Oh, I'm sorry, Will. We'll just breeze past watching an old guy get mauled to death, shall we?' The girls may have found some common ground with Will after the fire, but Tony was still angry with him. He had no problem with him knowing it either.

Rick felt that maybe he should take over the conversation. 'We got a lot, it's all recorded and to be honest, we thought he was talking rubbish. Everything he said was so over the top, so out there, that we didn't think it could be true. Until we got home anyway.'

'What happened once you got home? Other than Tony's toilet disaster,' asked Sophie, hugging Rick, whom she had worried about a lot while he was gone. She received a stern glance from Tony that indicated he wasn't at the stage where he found his homecoming incident funny yet.

'We heard about Peter,' was Rick's response. 'Suddenly what sounded balls to the wall ridiculous didn't seem so crazy.'

'So, you know what happened to him?' asked Will, eager to learn whether there was a way of helping his friend.

'Yeah, I think we do.' Rick pulled out the dictaphone and placed it on the table in front of everyone. 'There's a good chance that Charles is on his way here now, you might want to listen to this before he gets here.'

Will sat down and pressed play, hopeful that finally after all these years, he just might be about to get the answers he'd been so desperately searching for.

# Chapter 18 - Albert and Exposition

Albert was around 15 years older than Charles. They had met at a technology conference back in the 70s and struck up a friendship; they quickly began to think they were kindred spirits. They shared the same interests, the same religious beliefs and at the time, it seemed as if they were destined to be lifelong friends. They would also do anything for each other. Charles back then was one of the nicest people you could meet, a charming, honest and sweet- natured guy.

Albert and his wife Penelope would often have Charles over for dinner. Charles himself was never married; he was too busy for that. Whereas Albert always put his wife first, Charles was too focused on whatever he was researching at the time to form too many attachments. The kind of commitment that marriage required was certainly something he was never going to be able to manage. 'Maybe you'll find a woman with the same interests?' Albert often used to say to him. Neither man ever thought that was on the cards, even though years later that's exactly what happened when Margaret appeared on the scene, however unrequited that turned out to be.

The work they did wasn't exactly ground breaking at first, the odd experiment here, the odd invention there, but there was nothing that was going to give them the level of infamy both men desired. It's why Albert took his teaching job so seriously; it wasn't that he was afraid to dream, he was just a realist and a man very keen to play things safe. It was the big difference between them both, Charles, for better or worse, was never afraid to take risks. Albert always admired that about him.

There was one conversation that led to things changing for them, and it all stemmed from one simple question: what makes someone evil? The debate about that single subject ran for years: it wasn't at the forefront of their conversations, but it cropped up repeatedly with many possible answers bought to the table. Was it genetics? Were certain people just evil by design? Was it all in the upbringing? There was certainly an argument to be made that who you are as an adult links directly to how you were raised as a child. But what if it was something else? What if people who have done unthinkable things, people that were outright evil, were influenced by something they were not even aware of?

It was a tantalising notion and the two men became obsessed with just the idea of it. Albert even joked it could make a good movie one day and they should explore the possibility, just in case either of them ever fancied turning their hand to scriptwriting at some point in the future. In short, it was something they looked into for fun, but neither of them had any idea that not only were they on to something, and it was about to change everything they ever knew. At this moment in time though, an idea was all that it was, or at least that's what Albert was led to believe. He had no idea of the voices that Charles had started hearing in his dreams. The voices that fed these ideas to him eventually came to him when he was wide awake, going about his daily business. If he had, then perhaps he would have had a different thought process about getting involved in researching this in the first place.

Investigating evil required them to pick a person who was unquestionably evil themselves, and the most logical choice of individual was Adolf Hitler. Looking at recent history, he was certainly high up on the list of people to start with. By this point, the idea of writing a screenplay had become a reality to Albert. He thought they had something that could be a great premise for a story, but that's all it was to him, a work of fiction and nothing more. Charles became more obsessive though. He didn't explain why, didn't reveal the voices that he was hearing, but the more theories he came up with to back up this idea, the more he began to believe them. It wasn't a concern for Albert though, he just thought that the more Charles rationalised his thoughts on it, the more material he would have to write down, and the more ideas he would get for his side project.

Heading out to Austria in the winter of 1978, they wanted to visit the places that Hitler had frequented, to see where he grew up and where he was at pivotal points in his life. Eventually they stopped by the site of what was once known as The Brown House. It was previously an office of Hitler as he was rising to power, but the building itself was destroyed during the war and what stood at the location when they visited bore no resemblance to it; but Charles was insistent they at least visited the place. It was here, at 45 Brienner Straße, that Albert first realised Charles's theory wasn't just an interesting idea -he had more information than he had initially let on and had been hiding it for quite some time.

One of the inventions they had made years earlier was a device that was used for picking up energy readings. It could pick up almost anything if there was something around giving off power. Again, it was just something done for fun; they hadn't submitted it anywhere, but one of its features was to be able to switch between differing sorts of power. If they didn't want it to pick up common electricity for example, they would just flick a switch and it would stop registering it. Unbeknownst to Albert, his friend had one of these devices with him.

As he pulled it out and began playing with the settings, Albert was confused. What was Charles hoping to find and why had he thought to bring it in the first place? When he asked the question, the only response he got was a simple 'trust me.' When it began to emit a noise that indicated it had found something, Charles was not quick to provide answers as to why he was so excited by the results he was getting.

Shortly after returning home, the pair grew apart. Albert began focusing on his teaching again, having abandoned his writing idea. It was always something that he had hoped Charles would have helped him with, since on his own it just didn't have the same kind of appeal. It would be quite some time before the two would have anything to do with each other again. Charles dropped off the radar and in truth, Albert had no reason to get in contact with him. When they next spoke, almost a decade had passed. It was 1987 and the man he knew was now a very different person, and he had also learned a great deal about what was previously just a fantastical idea.

By this point, Charles had become close with Margaret Adams; he hadn't met her son William yet, but he had met her husband Jeremy, a man who loved his family, almost as much as he loved alcohol. What he and Margaret were working on was kept a secret from her family, at first purely because she wanted a distraction from her alcoholic husband and a life that didn't involve him. Charles told Albert that she had long given up on her marriage. Secretly, he had fallen in love with her, but he wasn't going to make a move until she was ready, until Jeremy was no longer an obstacle.

What Albert noticed about his old friend was that on the surface, he hadn't really changed all that much. The offer to come out and see his work had come out of the blue, but there didn't appear to be an ulterior motive; he still seemed like the nice man he had always known. He was soon to discover that appearances could indeed be deceptive. Charles had got himself involved in something that deeply corrupted him, he had dragged Margaret down with him and wanted to do the same to Albert. Perhaps most concerning was that Charles didn't even know it. Even as he explained to Albert what was happening, he did so with a smile on his face, a smile that had no place being there given the subject matter.

'When we spoke about evil, the source of it, what makes a person that way, I wasn't entirely honest with you about how that conversation started.'

Albert wasn't surprised. It became clear to him at the time there was more to it, but his friend was being so suspicious that he wouldn't have got a straight answer, though he did regret never attempting to ask.

'There is something, Albert. Something does affect people, it changes them. I know what it is, I've known for a while. I just haven't had the proof, until now.'

It was a conversation Albert would never forget, and it would of course be one that would eventually lead to his death. Had he not gone to meet him, had he not been too curious to let it go, he would have been in no danger, or at least in no more danger than anyone else. He wouldn't have been awaiting the day when death came knocking.

Charles went onto explain all he claimed to know, every last fantastical detail. There was another world, very much like this one, but everything that existed there was evil. 'Good can't exist without evil,' Charles stated, but the world they live in was originally devoid of it. It was pure light, it was good, with nothing around to corrupt it. The two worlds, two polar opposites, balanced each other out. At least they used to, but then the fractures started happening.

His story went that the two worlds were separate for a long while, but the walls, for a lack of a better term, had begun to degrade. Energy from that world was seeping through at various points on the planet, and anyone who came into contact with it was changed. They were filled with a darkness that risked taking them over. Sometimes it was just a small effect, sometimes it could take over someone so completely they were never the same again and occasionally, it would be a large enough fracture to affect thousands. Albert thought the interest in Hitler made a lot more sense now. To further his point and back up what he was saying, Charles said that throughout history there had been examples of fractures, notorious crimes, acts of terror and the like. He also predicted there would be many more in the years to come; the fractures were becoming so frequent that the walls between the worlds would eventually crumble. The fractures themselves were invisible to the naked eye: in order to know one was there, a device was needed, such as the one that registered energy readings they had invented together years before.

As Albert considered how ridiculous it all sounded, he began to realise it made a frightening amount of sense. How often had he looked at the news, heard about an act of terrorism and pondered what could make someone behave in such a way? What he didn't understand though, was how Charles could possibly know all this. When he asked that very question, the response he got took him by surprise.

'They told me.'

'Who told you, Charles?'

'The people on the other side.'

Charles told Albert that he had found a fracture himself, but through it came words. He briefly explained the voices from his past, but said that this was different, he was able to communicate with someone specific through it. Now he was working on building a device that would open a permanent window, maybe even for travel between the two worlds. Pushed further to find out who exactly he was talking to, Charles admitted that he didn't know who, or what, it was. All he had was a name, Narvod.

He further explained the basics of what he knew about how this dual world worked. Good from our side was leaking into theirs in much the same way they were leaking evil into ours; it was also causing them similar problems to the ones that we faced here. 'When everyone and everything is evil, I guess you find a bizarre sense of stability,' is how he put it. As for what this Narvod wanted? He wanted to create a fracture large and stable enough for him to cross over. When on this side, Narvod claimed to be able to close the fractures, bringing Narvod here was what Charles, and now Margaret, were working on.

After learning all this, Albert continued to stay with them, mainly out of concern. He claimed to be wanting to help them with the research, but after witnessing the fractures in action and seeing his first demonic dog-like creature, he was increasingly suspicious of this Narvod and the work he was getting Charles to do.

Perhaps his biggest concern though was what Narvod had taught Charles. He learned of a way to harness the energy of a fracture and use it to turn someone, no matter how kind in nature, into a vicious, anger-filled person, into somebody full of hatred. The effect of the energy was temporary, a short burst that would last for varying lengths depending on how long someone was exposed. It wasn't the same as prolonged exposure, but it was an alarming revelation. When the first hound appeared, it had been chalked up to misfortune, an unfortunate side effect of playing with the barriers between worlds. But this? It just confirmed what Albert had long suspected, Charles and Margaret had been consumed by this evil themselves, and any talk of doing good work was merely a charade.

Things between them came to a head around the time Jeremy died. Will's father passed away through no fault of anyone else; it was simply the alcohol. Albert and Charles had been working late in the lab when an incensed Jeremy turned up, as he had long suspected that something was going on between his wife and her lab partner. After a particularly heavy night at a local pub, he had decided a talk, man to man, was long overdue. It was how uninvolved Charles was that got to Jeremy the most. He was too focused on his work to really get into an argument over something that barely even registered to him as a problem. Eventually, Jeremy stormed out of the lab and got back into his car. He never made it home.

Margaret made the decision not to tell William any of it; she made it clear that it was just an accident, since after all her son had never noticed his father's drinking problem, so there didn't seem much need for him to learn about it after his death. She did however need to make sure he couldn't ever find this out for himself. Using her wealth, she ensured the coroner had a relaxing, well-paid luxury holiday, and in return there was no mention of alcohol on Jeremy's death certificate.

It was around this time that Albert was able to sense the changes in them both even more. Something traumatic had happened and yet they carried on as normal; even the next day it was as if nothing had even occurred. Margaret showed moderate concern for her son, hearing how she described the conversation with him was particularly difficult for Albert to hear, yet she was at work as opposed to being at home with him. She clearly loved him, but as best as Albert could work out, she just began to lose the ability to show it.

Despite his worry, Albert had no choice but to remove himself from the work. He was afraid that he might get corrupted too, despite his best efforts to prevent himself from direct exposure to a fracture, but more importantly, his wife was ill and needed him. As he cared for her in her final days, he tried to forget what he had seen with Charles, to put the dangers out of his mind. When she eventually passed away, he had nothing to occupy himself with. What Charles was doing could be his purpose, and he thought to himself that he could be destined to stop whatever was going on. Four years had passed since he had last seen them; a lot of work had been done in that time and none of it was good.

There was an atmosphere to the place when he returned: he couldn't explain it, but the lab itself felt evil. It was a horrible feeling to experience and he noticed it the moment he arrived. The next thing he noticed were those hounds, one accidentally came through before, now though there were at least a dozen. What's more, Charles may as well have not been Charles anymore, he was not even close to the person he was when they first met.

Albert wasn't invited this time. He turned up of his own accord and it would be fair to say that he wasn't exactly welcomed. It didn't take him long though to learn everything he needed to about the work being done, the real reasons for the experiments and the truth behind Narvod and his plans. The alarming thing was that there was no real attempt to hide it.

Walking into the lab, he saw Charles talking through one of the fractures, a soaring bright light that was even sharper in detail than it was the last time he saw one. There was only one word that he needed to hear to confirm that Charles wasn't working on a solution. Invasion. Charles had always told him he was so committed to the work because it could be a way of ridding the world of evil, that he was working on achieving world peace, but that word didn't go along with that way of thinking. Confronting him, he asked for the truth and this time he got it.

The goal was indeed to save a world, only the world in question wasn't the one they lived in. Narvod, actually General Narvod, a leader on the other side, wanted to come here to rid the world of everything that made it good. Everything that made it pure. The technology they had was said to outweigh ours considerably. Charles didn't know to what extent, but they had the power to do some serious damage if their armies made it here. Bringing them over was exactly what Charles and Margaret were working on.

Narvod had found a way to make himself a conductor for the persuasive evil energy that came through the fractures, to use the energy so that he himself could affect people with just a simple touch. He would come through the portal as part of the first wave, then his armies would then follow. Nothing humanoid had ever gone through the portal before. Narvod was cold, calculated and determined, but he was also dangerously intelligent. He wasn't going to try it himself. Someone else needed to be the guinea pig and he wasn't going to risk one of his own. Upon learning this, Albert immediately noticed that someone was missing. 'Where's Margaret?' he asked, nervous as he was afraid he already knew the answer.

She was the test subject; she went through to the other side. 'She didn't survive,' Charles coldly said. 'Neither did the equipment that allowed her to step through. It's not time for him to come yet.'

It had happened recently. Charles knew that he couldn't have a missing woman linked to him, the lab would be searched and his work would be discovered, the only thing he could do was burn it all to the ground and he wanted Albert's help to do so.

Albert didn't know why Charles let him live. He liked to think it was because there was a little humanity left in him, that their long history kept that alive but truthfully, it could have been for any number of reasons. He helped Charles destroy it all, he helped cover up what happened to Margaret and for all those years, he allowed a boy to believe his mother had died in a freak accident. It was something he could never forgive himself for, but he was scared. He knew that Charles' and Narvod's plan was years from coming to fruition now, the equipment needing to be rebuilt from scratch. He also knew he likely wouldn't live long enough to see it, and he was all too aware of how selfish that was.

The last time he saw Charles, he had told him that it would take him years to replicate his work, to get the funding and the equipment, but he warned him that if he ever spoke to anyone about it, he would be killed. The last thing they did together was to start another fire, they watched as Margaret's home, where Charles had lived the last two years, was gutted with flames and sat back as they watched the fire brigade fail to save it. As the emergency services departed the scene, they proceeded to store all paperwork and research they needed in the still intact cellar and buried it. Charles placed a sensor inside just in case it was ever broken into. He had considered just destroying it all, but he didn't know if one day that research could come in handy. The location of the house and the condition it was in made it unlikely it would ever be touched, it would just remain there, become that burnt out building in the countryside that people spoke about every now and then. The two men went their separate ways, but they would of course still meet one last time in a classroom, just after this story had been told.

The recording stopped at the sounds of Rick and Tony climbing through the window and the horror of Albert's screams; it was a haunting moment and not one of them knew what to say. There was the relief that at least Peter would be okay, but the worry they had was Will, and how was he going to react to what he had discovered. They wouldn't be finding that out for a while: without uttering a single word, Will stood up, grabbed his jacket and car keys, then he left, his car skidding out of the drive as he went.

# Chapter 19 - Truth Hurts

Everything had changed for Will. He thought that getting the answers he so desperately sought would give him closure, that it would allow him to move on, but instead he found himself forced into a reality he didn't want. He had always believed that Charles had killed his parents, whilst he was complicit in his mother's demise; he now had the knowledge that she was involved in something so horrible that he couldn't help but think she deserved to die. That was a thought he was struggling to come to terms with.

Then there was his father: he and Margaret had grown distant over the final few years of his life, yet his memories of Jeremy were of a kind and loving man, the perfect father. Now he had to get used to the fact that he wasn't the man he had remembered, he was a troubled person with alcohol problems that led to his death. His father loved him, of that Will was sure, but to have been so convinced of foul play, to dedicate his life to finding out what happened, only to discover this? It made Will hate him for allowing himself to become such a drunken mess.

He wondered, if he was feeling hate, does that mean he had been near a fracture? Was his hate a side effect of that or a perfectly reasonable reaction to what he had been through? He didn't know, the fact that he was now feeling so helpless and uncertain about everything terrified him in a way that he didn't think possible.

Driving to Charles was reckless and Will knew it. He had lost all reason at this point. Everything he ever knew was a lie: what he thought he was fighting turned out to be just the tip of the iceberg and the man he thought was messing with genetics was actually capable of ending life as he knew it. The enormity of it all hadn't really sunk in, and it was just a mess of thoughts and emotions, repeating in his head, clouding his judgements. He wanted to cry, he wanted to scream, but right now what he wanted more than anything else was vengeance. He was completely clear on the fact that Charles needed to be stopped, killing him was something he felt he simply had to do, whether he could come back from that or not.

Returning to his childhood home once again, Will grabbed two guns from the car, taped one to his ankle and held tightly onto the other. He dropped down into the basement and sat, staring at one spot on the wall, awaiting the arrival of the men that had previously chased him away. He hadn't formulated a smart plan, he hoped to be able to shoot enough of them that eventually Charles himself would show up. He hadn't even given thought to the people that he would be shooting. Were they just under an influence like Peter? Charles seemed like he had funding, so were they mercenaries? It would make it easier on him if they were. He tried to stop himself from thinking about it, because the important thing here was getting Charles. If people had to be sacrificed for it, then in the grand scheme of things it would be worth it.

Will waited. The blinking red light flashed and nobody came. Hours passed and still nobody arrived for him. There was nothing there to guard anymore, so maybe it was no longer being monitored. It was entirely possible that now they all knew what Charles was doing, he had gone into hiding, finishing his work as quickly as he could before they could find him.

Eventually, Will made the decision to leave. As he climbed out the basement and headed towards his car, he heard the clicks of guns behind him. He turned to see five armed men walking slowly towards him, suddenly he felt a sharp pain in his neck, he reached and removed the dart that was lodged in him and dropped to the floor. Unable to keep his eyes open, he began to lose consciousness, and the last thing he saw was Charles walking up to him and staring down.

'It's about time we have a talk, don't you think, William?'

With that, Will blacked out.

The first thing he remembered when he came to was the sound of electricity; it sounded like it was everywhere, surrounding him in every direction. As he slowly opened his eyes, he got a sense of where he was, tied to a chair in a laboratory. The room he was in had two levels, and he was placed on the upper section, the area that looked to be the main work station in the building. Then his memories started returning: it was the same type of feeling you get when you wake up in a strange bed, and it takes a while to get your bearings; only this time it was a place he had never seen before. It took a few seconds to remember what happened, to remember Charles appearing as he passed out. He had found the person that he was out looking for, but his rash decision to go it alone had backfired. He was entirely at the mercy of the man he hated.

'I have to say, William, I'm a little disappointed it took you so long to get to the bottom of all this,' came Charles's voice from behind him. Charles walked around with a chair and sat down directly opposite. It appeared that despite doing everything he could to stop Will, he was strangely looking forward to the conversation they were about to have.

'Well I do have to hand it to you, Charles, I never gave you the amount of credit you deserved. Trying to end the world? You have reached new heights, haven't you?'

'I don't know what old Albert told your friends, but I'm not trying to end the world. I'm trying to cleanse it.'

Will was scanning the lab, trying to look for anything he could use as a weapon should he get free from his confines. It was optimistic, since he was securely tied to that chair and he could see the gun that Charles had ready to use. 'Cleanse it? By removing everything good about it? By allowing evil to take it over?'

'I'm doing good work here, William, I was hoping you'd come to see that.'

'It's Will, not William, and you know the only way you have a chance of getting me on your side is to do to me what you did to Peter. That's why I'm here and still alive, isn't it?'

Charles smiled. 'No Will, you seem to be under the impression I want you on my side. I hoped you would see why I'm doing this, that you'd see the potential for what we could be, if we thought like they do on the other side. But I knew you wouldn't. No, I just want you to watch as I succeed, since it was your mother's work too after all. Come on, I want to show you something.'

Charles untied Will and stood him up, cuffing his hands, he proceeded to take him out of the lab and towards a large heavy looking steel door, the sort of door you would expect to see in a bank vault. It clearly had something that Will didn't want to see locked behind it.

'Where are you taking me, Charles?'

'To show you something. To show you how far I've come.'  
Will was growing tired. As they were walking down the hallway, they passed at least five people, all armed. He knew that he didn't stand much chance of getting out of this, for all he knew, behind that door could lay his death. He was ready for it. With the truth about his parents weighing down on him, with Charles having him right where he wanted, he was close to losing the will to fight altogether. He was also dealing with the painful realisation of how much Charles liked the sound of his own voice. For Charles, that's exactly what he wanted, to break down the man who had been hunting him, to take satisfaction in making him watch as the new world order took place, with him at the helm.

'I would have thought you'd be thanking me,' Charles said, a smug look on his face as he continued to enjoy watching Will lose hope.

'Thanking you? Well, this will be interesting. Why exactly would I thank you?'

'Well, if it were not for me, you wouldn't be the man you are. You might have had a boring desk job, working through the week with no sense of purpose. Instead, here you are, fighting for good like a wannabe hero. The things you've seen over the years because you were investigating me, the things you've learned about. Ghosts, magic, I hear you even had a run in with a witch once. You live the life that people dream of.'

Will thought about that for a moment. He had saved people over the years from the things that Charles mentioned and he was right, he would likely have no idea of this life if it hadn't been forced upon him. But then he thought back to his childhood, sitting in his room playing his computer games, waiting for his parents to come home. As selfish as it was, he would have given everything up, not saved any of those people, just to go back to that point in his life and stop any of this from ever happening.

Charles opened the door, the weight of which had trapped the sounds inside from being heard, but what Will did hear was unmistakable. There were Cleeths in there, the growling and the snapping of the teeth were noises that he had definitely heard before, although he had never heard quite so many of them. Charles led him to the edge of a pit and stepped back. Looking down, Will was terrified by the sight that presented itself to him. There were not just a few Cleeths down there, there were dozens, all trapped in a pen that took up a large amount of the space that the area had. He frantically tried to count them, but he couldn't; there were just too many.

'Why are you showing me these, Charles?'

'To make sure you know that I can't be stopped. Because when you're locked away in a cell and I tell you the things that are happening to this world, you believe me. You and your band of amateurs can't stop what's happening here. Narvod is coming. When he does, it's all going to change.'

Will had no retort: he could handle a cleeth or two, but against this many he would have no chance. The pit appeared to lead outside, just past the pen was a van and upon spotting that, Will noticed what was happening. He watched as several of them were led into the van and driven off. He didn't know where they were going, and he didn't want to know. There was nothing he could do.

'One other thing, William. I didn't know much about the world of magic myself until a while ago,' Charles said with an ominous tone. 'It's quite the eye opener. I know a little now, not enough to cause any real damage though. Thankfully, I have someone that's quite the expert. It was quite refreshing to have someone do my bidding without the need to expose him to a fracture. This man was happy to help, since he has a real love for chaos.'

'Get to the point, Charles,' Will wearily replied.

'Well, you may be hoping your friends are going to be coming to the rescue at some point soon. Those beasts you saw being driven away by my magician friend, let's just say your gang is going to be kept a tad too busy to come and help you.'

Will lunged towards Charles, who was quick to knock him to the ground. Charles calmly ordered one of the armed men to take Will away whilst he stood looking down at the pit, a smile beaming across his face. It was almost time, all the years he had spent preparing and dreaming of what would happen had led to this. He was almost ready to open the door for Narvod's arrival.

# Chapter 20 - The Cloud

It was a sunny afternoon in Langton. The time was around 4pm, with the children all slowly returning from school, and there was one young girl who was more eager to get home than most. The day before, Emily had celebrated her eighth birthday. This was one she would always remember as the birthday where she got that bike she had been asking her parents, Fergus and Amanda, for since she turned seven. She remembered seeing this bike the day after that birthday and asking if she could trade all her presents in exchange for it, but needless to say she was very quickly told that she couldn't.

Riding a new bike was such an exciting experience for her. She had practically made Amanda sprint home from school that day so she could get straight out on it, riding around her small street with the hope that one of her friends would see her and notice how lucky she was.

Straight in the door and straight back out again, she did just that. She rode around the street in circles, not caring that she wasn't going anywhere; an eight-year-old is very good at making that simple circuit feel like the biggest adventure ever. Sure enough, out came one of her friends, Murphy, a ten-year-old who was just about to get to the age where hanging out with a girl two years younger than him was a bit uncool, but he found himself instantly impressed. He was quick to ask her where she got it and whether he could have a go. Albeit reluctantly, it was her bike after all, she allowed him to.

Keeping a watchful eye, she was quick to call after him not to leave the street. She got instantly worried, what if he rode away? What if he fell off and scratched the frame? She was however about to be distracted from young Murphy and her shiny new toy.

Out of the corner of her eye, Emily noticed a small yellow light. It was glistening at her and as she turned to look at it, she saw it evolve into a mist, a cloud of yellow. She didn't know why, but it seemed to be inviting her. It gave off a warm feeling that compelled her to walk towards it. She instantly felt even happier than she already was, and that continued to grow the closer she and this cloud got to one another. As she got as close as she could, she reached her hand out towards it, unsure of what the cloud would feel like but eager to find out.

'Murphy,' she called out, 'there's a cloud over here, a yellow cloud.'

As she made contact, it expanded and flew towards her, circling her and knocking her to the ground. She immediately lost consciousness. Murphy came running over to help her, but she wouldn't wake up. He panicked and ran to her house, screaming at her parents to come and help.

The tragedy that befell Emily would soon make the papers and would quickly become the focus of the group's attention; that and trying to work out where Will had gone. First though, they had something else to deal with. A day had passed since Will left and Peter had begun to feel like his old self again, but understandably, he was struggling to come to terms with the things he had done. Much like Will with Charles, he too was tied to a chair, but that was partly due to his own insistence, since he hated the thought of putting his friends' lives in danger again.

'Well at least it was your own place you burned down, Pete. We'd have been having a different conversation if it was mine,' Tony said. He didn't blame Peter now they knew what had happened to him, but like everyone else, they were dubious as to whether the effects of the fracture had worn off or not.

'Peter, what do you remember?' asked Sophie. They had been quick to tie him up, but nobody had asked any of the important questions yet, or had a long enough conversation with him to deduce whether he really was back to his old self.

'All of it,' came his sullen response. Peter went on to explain about the light he saw when he was being held prisoner by Charles, how after being trapped with it, he couldn't control his anger. He described it like it had triggered something within him and he could only fight against it for so long. He was also open and honest about what was going through his mind when he set the house ablaze: he genuinely wanted to kill Will, not caring who else got hurt in the process.

There was definite remorse though, and he seemed like the Peter they knew and not this crazed version of the man. It tracked with what they learned from Albert too, the effect of a short burst from the fracture like this was meant to only be temporary. The four of them knew that above all else, they didn't have a choice but to trust him, because they needed his help now more than ever with Will out of the picture. They decided to untie him. Things remained awkward certainly, but they had enough going on to distract them from that. Peter needed to be filled in on everything he missed; watching his reactions to all of the Albert revelations was quite the sight. Like everyone else, he had no idea what they had really got themselves into and he too was concerned about Will. One of his worries was what his missing friend might do now that he was armed with the truth about Charles and his parents.

The problem was they had nothing to go on, for it had only been a day and Peter had known Will to vanish for days at a time before, particularly after going through a tough time. They tried calling him on numerous occasions, but it always went to voicemail. Will wasn't the sort of person to be active on social media, so they couldn't try that either. All they could do was wait. Sophie suggested they go back to his old house, but after the danger faced the last two times, it didn't seem like the best of plans. It turned out they were about to be kept busy anyway.

Work had become an issue for the group at this stage. With Will missing, each of them had called in sick and planned to for the week. They were being dragged further and further from their normal everyday lives; nobody was considering the long-term complications that could entail. All that mattered was the mission.

'A girl's in a coma, young girl called Emily. I know her family,' Sophie told everyone after scouring the internet for news stories.

They all thought it was really sad, but that it wasn't anything they should be investigating. At least that's what they thought. One piece of the article certainly caught Peter's eye. Young Murphy had been interviewed by the local news and had told them about the yellow cloud that he claimed was responsible for her condition. Peter had heard of this before, or at least something similar.

'Will and I were working a case a while back, and we stumbled upon it by accident looking for Charles. A man who said he might be able to help us slipped into a coma. He's still in one now, but the nurses said he would occasionally wake in the night, screaming about a cloud.'

'Alright, if we're going down the route that clouds are evil, I quit,' Tony sarcastically said. 'Plus, if the sun follows suit, we're all screwed,' he added.

Peter explained that he and Will didn't read much into it, they didn't really know Dale and whilst what had happened to him was sad, it just seemed like an unfortunate turn of events. Neither of them suspected his words to actually hold some significance, but for this to happen now? When they would be making a play to go after Charles? It couldn't be a coincidence.

'Are we saying that Charles has hurt an eight-year-old girl because of us?' Kim asked, with a nervous tremble in her voice. They all knew they were into something huge now, but to have a small child harmed because of their involvement was unthinkable.

'Don't get me wrong, that's horrible,' Tony interjected 'But are we really saying that he did it with a cloud?'

'I believe it's a magic cloud,' Peter quickly added, before realising he had just made the whole premise sound even more ridiculous. 'This Murphy boy, he said it was glowing yellow and surrounded Emily when she touched it. Tony, if it makes you feel any better, I don't think this is a simple cloud from the sky. We need to talk to Murphy.'

'We do,' Sophie agreed, 'But you can't. We still don't know if you're completely you yet, the last thing we need is you going nuclear around a kid. I'm sorry, but you're sitting this one out, Peter.' This was one of those times where Sophie didn't like her choice to try and be in charge; it was the right call, everyone knew it, but it wasn't a nice feeling to admit that she didn't fully trust her friend yet.

Peter nodded silently. He wasn't in any position to defend himself and for all he knew Sophie might have been right. He knew nothing about what happened to him, other than third hand information he'd been given, and there was a possibility he could switch again at any moment. Kim felt for him. She could see how upset he was over what happened and despite her own concerns, she gave him a hug before they left. None of them had known Peter a huge amount of time, but each of them could see that not only was he a genuinely nice person, but he was hurting. He put on a brave face and told them he would try and research anything that may help them. Sophie headed off to the hospital, a place they all agreed they had spent too much time lately, while the rest of them went to visit Murphy and the street where Emily lived.

Arriving at the hospital, Sophie went to Emily's room. She knew her parents fairly well and made up a story about being there to visit a friend. Emily's ward was located right next to where Helen had stayed, and she hoped that walking past the bed of the girl they failed to save was not a bad omen for whatever was going on here.

Seeing her lying in the hospital bed showing no signs of life was tough for Sophie, not least because there was that very real possibility she was lying there because of Charles, because of them. She knew she had to keep it together though, to find out anything she could to give Peter something to go on while he looked for a solution. Sadly, there was nothing she could see that would be useful, just a young girl clinging to life and not waking up for reasons the doctors couldn't explain. Her parents were, as expected, distraught; not having any answers just made things worse for them. It wasn't long ago that she was their happy daughter, full of life and so excited about her new bike, and now she might never get the chance to ride it again.

The others arrived at her street and immediately headed to Murphy's house. They had got the name of the man who had suffered a similar fate from Peter, and they figured that approaching Murphy's family with that story would give them a better chance at being able to talk to him. It did the trick. Murphy had been quiet and despondent since seeing Emily collapse, and his parents were hopeful that talking about it and possibly helping somebody might make him feel better.

'The yellow cloud did it,' he kept saying. He explained what happened to her, how she was drawn towards it and how quickly she fell to the floor after touching it. He took them out to the spot where it happened. Murphy's father went with them. He was concerned there might be something there that could hurt him, just like it hurt her, but there was nothing. They were all beginning to worry that yet again, this may be a case they would not be able to win.

'The man you knew...' Murphy took Kim by the hand as they were about to leave, 'is he okay?'

Kim looked at Rick and Tony, unsure of what she should answer. She wanted to tell him the truth, but the poor boy was already worried enough. 'He's getting better,' she said to him, kneeling down to his level, 'so will Emily, trust me.' Kim's warm smile helped to put young Murphy at ease and he smiled back. She had given him hope, and now she and the others were more determined than ever to help save Emily. They had to work out what was going on, even if meant going to Charles and begging him to save her. They weren't to know that things were about to get a lot worse for all of them and that Charles was only getting warmed up.

'We didn't find anything at the scene.' Rick was on the phone to Sophie to give her an update on the worrying lack of information they had found. 'Just a really sad kid who wants his friend to be alright. Anything at the hospital?'

Sophie had just walked out the main entrance to go to her car. She stopped to talk to Rick before continuing. 'No, nothing. Rick, it was so horrible to see her like that. We have to do something to help, whatever it takes.'

'We will, we've all said the same thing. If Charles is behind this, we may need to get in contact with him. Obviously, that's like plan z, but we can't rule it out.' Rick paused awaiting Sophie's response, but the line was silent aside from background noise at the hospital. 'Sophie? Sophie, are you there?'

Tony and Kim were alerted by the change in Rick's voice, his calm tone was quickly turning to deep concern.

'Sophie?'

Back at the hospital, Sophie's phone was lying unattended on the floor, with Rick's panicked voice faintly heard coming out of it. Sophie had walked away and left it there. She was slowly heading towards a yellow cloud that was floating in front of her. Reaching out to it like Emily did, she was consumed by it and collapsed on the ground. As a crowd of people rushed towards her to help, the cloud vanished, leaving only her lifeless body on the floor.

Langton wasn't the only town that was facing jeopardy. About twenty miles away, there was a small village in the countryside called Riverton. A peaceful place with a small population, it existed almost in its own little bubble. If you could pick an idyllic place to retire, this would be it, particularly one small part of the village, a mere ten houses just outside the centre that were almost separate from Riverton itself. A river ran just alongside these houses that were built in a circle, it was essentially a cul-de-sac out in the country and it looked as beautiful as it sounded.

Its residents were mainly families, and a wealthy elderly couple, Jamie and Naomi, lived in the largest of the houses. Their daughter Rosie had long since grown up and left home, but the multitude of play equipment they had set up in their garden ensured they were never left alone for too long. They both loved the company of their neighbours and they were the focal point of an extremely close community. The village, in particular this part of the village, had a visitor, on the same day that Sophie had been struck down to be exact.

A van had pulled up just by the river, hiding behind some trees; nobody had spotted it parked there and it remained out of sight for the entire day. Two men were in the front of it, looking out at the houses, waiting for the phone to ring. When it did, that would be their signal to follow through on what they were there for. It was the same van that Will had seen earlier that day. In the back were cleeths. They were waiting for the chance to kill everyone and everything they could get their claws on.

# Chapter 21 - Test Subject #2

Will lay in his cell. He had been given a dry sandwich and a dirty glass of water, but other than that, the room was empty and cold. He hadn't even been given pillows and a blanket. Whilst he had only been in there a few hours, it felt like days; he had nothing to distract himself with, other than his own thoughts. He was genuinely concerned that he might lose his mind if he were to be kept in there for much longer.

As more time passed, the door eventually opened. He was led out by two armed men and escorted back to Charles, who was running tests on a machine. He casually explained that he was testing how much power it would be able to receive without overheating.

'I could use some help if you could spare the time,' Charles sarcastically said to Will, as he stood not far away from him, guns aimed squarely at him by his men so that he wouldn't attempt an attack. 'Not that I imagine you would, I was hoping you'd be starting to think along the route of can't beat them join them.'

Will stared at him unimpressed. 'Can I go back to my cell? I already prefer it.'

Charles put down his tools and walked towards Will. He had an air of arrogance about him that was even higher than usual, like he had something important to say but was savouring the feeling of getting to it. 'We have more to talk about. Help, don't help, it's up to you. It won't change anything.'

'Then why am I out of my new home, Charles?'

Charles took great delight in telling Will all the havoc that he was causing for his friends. That he had a magical toxin unleashed on Langton and how he infected a young girl, knowing that the group would be compelled to help her. He made sure to add that they were all at risk of becoming infected too. He'd got word that one of them already had been, but wouldn't tell Will who. Furthermore, the cleeths he saw being loaded into a van were now poised to attack a small village and they would tear every single resident apart.

Will was actually taken aback by the things his enemy was doing, but he was also looking at him in a different light since finding out that he was himself corrupted by the other world. It was too late to save him though. He knew he had to be stopped whatever it took, although he was rapidly losing faith he would be the one to do it.

'So, what exactly is your play here?' Will asked, 'I help you and you won't release those things on that village? You cure that girl and my friend? Tell me, Charles. What exactly do I need to do?'

The smug and overly pleased look on Charles's face intensified. 'You don't need to do anything. I just wanted you to know, to know that your friends are too busy to help you. That there is every chance they won't make it through the next twenty-four hours.'

He handed Will his own phone and made him unlock it, when he complied he made a phone call, and all Will could do was watch. There was no point in him calling out to whoever he was about to speak to, nothing he could say would be able to help them.

'Is that Rick? Rick, it's Charles.'

Will listened as Charles continued on the phone call, dealing with some angry abuse from Rick on the other end of the line.

'There's a village called Riverton,' Charles continued, 'and the residents there will be facing a pretty serious attack in exactly two hours. I suggest you lend a hand, there's a lot of children living there. I don't think I need to say no police do I? Things will get much worse if you try that. Oh, sorry about your girlfriend, I had hoped it would have been Tony. If I had to choose out of the lot of you, he seems to be the more irritating.'

As Charles ended the call, Will couldn't take his eyes off him. He couldn't understand how someone could be so cruel, could do such hideous things and revel in the excitement of it.

'You used to be a good man by all accounts,' Will said to him. He wasn't expecting anything to come of it, more curious to hear what somebody so deranged would say to being told that.

Charles wasn't fazed by it though. 'I still am, William. Narvod will do great things for this world. You may think of it as evil, I think of it as cleansing. Sometimes people must be sacrificed to achieve that.'

'Even children?' There was a bitterness to Will's voice as he asked the question. To hear the murder of families, of children, sugar coated by a need for a fabricated greater good sickened him.

'Yes, even children. We do what needs to be done.'

Will had pride, he had a lot of pride and that would sometimes stop him from doing the right thing. He knew that he should be pleading now, begging for his friends to be left alone, doing whatever it took to save the lives of the families that were in danger. He didn't do it though. He himself wasn't really sure why; it could well have been that he was too proud, but he rationalised it being because it would do no good. The reason Charles was doing this was to stop any distractions from his work, and the others would surely come for him if they weren't tied up with all this. There was nothing he could say, there was no amount of begging that would change the fact that it was all up to them to save everyone, including Sophie.

Will sat for a while just watching Charles work. He wasn't allowed to go anywhere so he had no choice. He had to marvel at the technology being used; there were machines there he didn't recognise. They looked like something out of a science fiction movie and even though Charles had a great deal of help from Narvod, it still showed his brilliance. If only he was someone who was fighting for good, he would be an asset to the world.

Will began to be fed proper food as the day went on, he was allowed trips to the toilet, with armed guards of course, he even had the occasional cup of tea. It was at times easy for him to forget he was a prisoner; the guns pointed at him were a constant reminder of course, but he was actually being made to feel comfortable. That put him more on edge than he had been previously, since it felt like something was about to happen and he was just being lulled into a very false sense of security, one that was imminently about to come crashing down.

'I think we're ready to go,' Charles suddenly said out of nowhere. It had been so long of neither of them speaking that Will had almost forgotten he was there.

If this was it, if Charles really was ready, then it was game over. Narvod, a being who could create evil just through touch, would be unstoppable. Will stood up and walked towards Charles and the machine, guns no more than two feet away from him at all times.

'This is it then,' Will said, 'What do we do when Narvod gets here? Have you got tea ready for him?'

Charles laughed. Will had never seen him laugh before, and it was quite disconcerting. 'No, William, Narvod isn't coming now. This is all new equipment since the last test, and we need to make sure that travel between the two worlds is safe. I have the right amount of power now for somebody to go through. It took me a while to get it, perfect timing really.' Will suddenly knew the real reason he was being kept alive. 'Your mother was first. You're test subject number two.'

For the first time since he got there, Will lashed out. He wasn't going to be used as some sort of guinea pig for Charles and Narvod, at least not without a fight. He lunged at Charles, head butting him and sending him tumbling backwards, it was a fast move that took everyone by surprise, but it was to no avail. Within seconds, Will was knocked down to the ground by the men behind him and guns were instantly cocked, aimed directly at him.

Charles stood, angry but impressed that he had shown enough backbone to try and stand up for himself. 'William, I was beginning to think you didn't have it in you anymore.' Charles picked Will up and threw him against the cold metal railings that lined the laboratory platform. 'You lay a finger on me again, I will make sure that everybody left you care about dies slowly and painfully. I will also make sure they know it was because you chose that fate for them. Do you understand me?'

Charles showed a level of anger that Will hadn't seen from him before: he was furious, yet calm and collected, and it took him by surprise.

'Do you hear me?'

Will nodded. He felt defeated, yet determined not to step through the bright white fracture that had opened up in front of them. 'I won't do it, Charles. I won't go through there, no matter what you do.'

'I'll kill them all, William, you know I will.'

Will remained defiant as he wiped the fresh blood from his lip. 'I know, sometimes people must be sacrificed. That is what you said, isn't it, Charles? We do what needs to be done.'

Will knew that using Charles's own words against him was a bold move, since it would likely just aggravate him more. He also knew that whilst he might be standing up to him, it would ultimately do no good. Charles wanted it to be him that stepped through, just because he would take some perverse pleasure in it, but really it could be anyone. He figured that would be what would happen next, that Charles would order somebody else to be the test subject. He was hopeful this would at least buy him some time, because it should take him a while to get the power to do so again if Will didn't comply now. He wasn't counting on how much Charles wanted things to play out his way, but he had a desire for things to go exactly how he had pictured them. It's why he wasn't just throwing him through; it was seeing Will defeated enough to walk through of his own accord that was the goal here.

'William, I admire you, I really do. You're so far out of your depth but still so brave, or foolish, maybe both. You really think I don't have a way to make you do this?'

Charles went back to his machine and began adjusting the dials and settings. Will had no idea what he was doing, but watching him go about his business with intent made him apprehensive about what was next. Once he had finished doing what he was doing, Charles turned to Will and said nothing; he just looked at him, waiting for something to happen. Then something did.

A voice came from within the light, a female voice from out of the fracture and it sounded so clear, as if it were in the room with them. It just said one word: 'William?'

Will recognised it instantly. It had been many years since he last heard his mother's voice, and he had no recordings of her, no way of hearing it again since he was told she had died, but this was unmistakably her. He could feel his eyes filling with tears, a mixture of fear, happiness and sadness, when Charles saw it, he instantly thought he had won. What else could get a person to do something, other than the love of someone for their mother?

'William? Is that you? Are you there?' came Margaret's voice again.

'What is this?' Will asked, his words spitting out in anger as he stared at Charles, noticing the smirk that was strewn across his face.

'I loved your mother, William. Even if she never felt the same for me, I still truly did. I couldn't have carried on if she had died.'

Will demanded to know how long Charles knew she was still alive, that she survived the trip to the other side. Charles admitted that he knew pretty much the whole time, it was only a couple of weeks after he burnt the lab that Narvod made contact to tell him. It transpired that Margaret hadn't arrived in Narvod's world where she should have. By the time she was found, word had already filtered back she hadn't made it, and Charles and Albert had already destroyed everything by then. She therefore couldn't do step two of the test, to return from the other side and ensure it was safe both ways: that was a job lined up for Will to undertake now. Margaret had been there for so long, they weren't convinced that her coming back through after all these years was a reliable enough way to test it. It needed to be someone new that made the round trip, straight there, straight back.

Will was of course furious, but his mind turned back to the kind of person Margaret was when she was last in his life. She was like Charles, maybe not as far gone, she knew what she was doing though, the kind of work they were both involved in. Even if she was alive, he needed to stay strong and remember that she didn't deserve saving.

Charles of course knew he would be thinking that. Narvod knew it too, and they had taken steps to make sure it wouldn't be a factor.

'The evil, as you call it, that seeps through to this world changes people. You know that, don't you?' Charles asked.

Will nodded, still in shock by what he had heard.

'Well, it works the other way too, good for want of a better word, affects people there. I'm sure Albert told you, it's what causes the problems on their side.'

Will dropped to his knees, he knew what was coming.

'She's as good and pure as you could possibly want her to be. The best version of Margaret, of your mother.'

Will was broken. At that moment as he thought about her, he remembered her as she was when they were happy. He couldn't help but think that Charles had played the winning hand. 'You son of a bitch, how could you use her like this?'

'Sacrifices, William. I don't just kill children.'

'William, talk to me' pleaded Margaret, her voice still sounded so very present coming out of the fracture. 'Are you alright? Have they hurt you?'

'Is it really you?' Will was struggling to talk through the tears, for he was praying that it wasn't her, but the voice couldn't have been anyone else.

'It's me, William, it's me. I am so sorry. I am so sorry I had to leave you.'

Will stood. He couldn't see her, just the bright light that her voice was coming from.

'Don't do it, please don't come here. Whatever he tries to do, whatever happens to me, don't do it.' Margaret's cries were enough for Will to know without question that it was her. She was being the mother he always wanted her to be, doing whatever she could to protect her son, even if it was years too late.

Will regained his composure and turned to Charles, who had the face of somebody victorious. There wasn't a chance Will wouldn't give into his demands now, or so he thought. 'Nice try, Charles, you almost had me. But my answer is no.'

It wasn't Charles who responded to Will's tough stance; he was about to, but he was beaten to it. The response came from the fracture, only the voice this time didn't belong to Margaret. It was a deep, gravely yet booming voice, one that demanded attention, elicited fear and was unmistakable as something that was most certainly not from this world. It was Narvod. 'I have a weapon. It is pointed at your mother's head. You have five seconds from when I finish talking to step through and join me, or she will die.'

Will looked at Charles, hoping he would stop what was about to happen. 'Stop this, Charles.' Will began to raise his voice. 'Charles, you can end this. You don't have to let her die, you must have a way to stop it.' Will got no response. 'Charles, listen to me. If you ever truly loved her, then save her. Please.'

Charles was in shock himself, because it hadn't occurred to him for one second that events would have played out this way. The look of dismay on his face told Will all he needed to know, that Charles was nothing more than a lackey. He wasn't the mastermind in this, he was the pawn in Narvod's game and nothing more.

The five seconds were up.

'William.' Margaret's voice was shaking with fear. Will turned to the fracture, tears streaming down his face as the enormity of his decision became clear. 'William, listen to me, you need to stay strong, you need...'

The next noise Will heard was a gunshot, immediately followed by the sound of a body dropping to the floor. As he stood in silence, unable to process what had happened, Margaret's body came through the fracture, slumping to the ground in front of them both. Charles grabbed Will, shaking him violently in a fit of rage, screaming at him for allowing that to happen.

He was taken back to a cell with Charles yelling after him. 'You just killed your mother, you killed her. You did that, not me.'

Will didn't have anything left. Watching this man scream at him whilst his mother's body lay there left him with no energy to respond. He just wanted it all over now.

# Chapter 22 - Langton Falls

Arriving at Sophie's bedside, the group were at that point unaware of what had happened to her. It didn't, however, take long for them to put the pieces together. Peter had gone too, he didn't care whether he should stay at home at this point. He cared for Sophie and needed to be out there getting as much information as he could; he wasn't getting anything from the internet that was useful. Whilst the others were at her bedside, he was trying to track down the people who were there when she collapsed. As she fell outside a hospital, there wasn't much suspicion from the general public that anything was amiss, so questions needed to be asked. He only found one person, a man named Reuben who was visiting his grandfather, and he told him something that he saw, something that he thought he imagined, a yellow mist surrounding Sophie and disappearing as she fell to the floor.

'It was the same thing that got Emily,' he solemnly told the others. 'I'm sorry, but I've found nothing that can help. Not yet anyway.'

'Then we find Charles,' was Rick's response. 'That monster thinks distracting us by trying to kill my girlfriend will keep us away? We prove him wrong, we go straight at him.'

Tony and Kim knew they had to tread carefully. If they were in Rick's situation, they would probably react in the same way, but they were still able to be rational and they needed to make him think a little more calmly.

'Rick, we will absolutely back your play,' Tony said. 'But going after Charles now will just get us killed, we can't help Sophie if we're dead, or if we're the filling for a cleeth sandwich.'

'We can't help her now, Tony.' Rick wasn't thinking straight. He was still dealing with his own injuries, with how much the attack had an effect on him, so to have Sophie at risk too was something he was really struggling to cope with. 'Peter said it himself, he has nothing. I'll go alone if I have to, I'll get him to trade me for her I have to do something, I can't just sit here.'

Kim put her hand on his shoulder, 'We can't let you do that, Rick. Sophie needs you here. We need you here.'

Rick understood, and he knew he needed to try and keep his composure, but seeing Sophie lying there motionless was a sight that just filled him with a hard to control mixture of anger and sadness. Being back at the hospital also had him reflecting on his stay there, how helpless he felt when he was attacked. He was having difficulties controlling his emotions as there were too many different ones swirling around in his head.

The four of them tried to decide on what their next move should be and to Peter's dismay, they all turned to him, all expecting him to have the answers or a place to start. He had nothing. It pained him to admit it to himself, but he had no idea how to save Sophie or Emily. He knew that Will wouldn't know what to do either; he may have been involved in this sort of thing for many years now, yet when something like this came along, Peter couldn't help but think how amateurish they all really were, despite their best efforts.

'I don't know. I don't know what to do, I really wish I did. I am certain that going to Charles isn't the answer though. He won't help any of us.'

Peter was right, and everyone knew it, but the idea that there was nothing they could do to help Sophie, to help Emily, was unthinkable to them.

As they sat around Sophie's bedside, staring at their lifeless friend, they were jolted back to reality by the sound of Rick's phone. As he quickly answered without even checking who was calling, it became immediately clear who was on the line. It was Charles.

Rick immediately launched into a tirade against him, with Tony and Kim having to calm him down. They knew that if he was making the effort to call them, it must be important. It was also clear that if he was contacting them, then it meant he had Will, since he would always have gone to him first. Sure enough, Rick quickly looked down at his phone and saw the name of the person who's number it was, Will's.

Rick tried to remain calm and to listen to what he was being told. The others listened intently to the only side of the conversation they could hear. 'Riverton? Where's that?'

Kim knew of the place, she and Tony had been looking at renting out a cottage there for a weekend away. Rick's responses were concerning, because without even hearing Charles's end of it they knew whatever this yellow cloud was, it wasn't the only thing he had planned for them.

After Rick hung up the phone, he told them what was happening. How the village was about to be attacked, how they couldn't allow the police to get involved and about the families that lived there. Suddenly the lives that were at stake had increased, it wasn't just Sophie and Emily that needed saving, it was a whole community of people. The most worrying thing was that once again, they had no idea how to save any of them.

They all knew they had to do something about Riverton, even if it was just to head down there and try to warn people. They also strongly debated whether they should go against Charles's orders and contact the police anyway; it would certainly help to save the people there but when he threatened worse ramifications, they knew he wasn't bluffing. Of course, if things were to spiral out of control in this village, one of the people that lived there would call for help anyway, and they needed to make sure that didn't happen. At least one of them needed to get there quickly to try and protect them from whatever onslaught was on the way, and the only option was to try and manage the situation the best way they could.

Rick wasn't going anywhere. He felt for the people of Riverton, but Sophie was his priority and he wanted Peter to stay too. As it turned out, both Tony and Kim were thinking the same thing. They essentially had two jobs that needed taking care of now and an even split seemed like the smartest thing to do. That's not to say that either of them were thrilled about heading out to a small village about to be overrun with Cleeths. They had fought one off before but they had no idea how many they were facing, or how they would begin to protect people against them. But it needed to be done, since doing nothing wasn't an option.

They each only had the one gun, thanks to the rest currently lying in Peter and Will's burnt out house, but regardless of that, they were ready to go. It was a strange goodbye between them all, each of them knew Tony and Kim were facing pretty steep odds and there was a high chance they weren't coming back from it. Rather than address that depressing thought head on, they decided to side step the issue. Rick and Tony scheduled their annual watch of Die Hard for when they got home, while Kim made sure that she made a note to schedule in drinks as far away as possible from them with Sophie at the same time. It was an optimistic thing to do and they were well aware of it, but with everything going on they needed a bit of hope, even if it was something small like a movie and some drinks. They also made sure to let Peter know that he was welcome to attend either. The two then departed, stopping at Tony's to grab some things for the road on the way.

'If we're about to die, we're stopping for donuts,' was Tony's only request for the journey up there. Kim was very much in agreement.

As their friends left, all Rick and Peter could do was sit in the hospital and hope for a some much needed inspiration. Peter scoured the web looking for anything that could help while Rick, needing some air, stepped outside. Out the front of the hospital he began to get a sense of what exactly Charles was doing. There was a great deal more people being brought in than when they arrived. All these new patients had one thing in common: they weren't conscious. Eavesdropping on what the paramedics of one victim were saying, he heard that witnesses had said there was some sort of yellow light just before they collapsed. The problem wasn't just with Sophie and Emily, it was spreading right across Langton.

Rushing back to Sophie's hospital room, Rick was quick to alert Peter. 'So, we've got a problem.'

'Another one? Or are you talking about this one? Peter asked. 'I really hope it's just this one, I don't think I can take anymore. There isn't enough tea in the world that can calm my nerves.'

'Well, it's related to this one.' As Rick went onto explain that the problem was going way beyond just the two cases in the area they knew of, they both shared the same worry they couldn't stop it. There was a whole town now at risk with more and more people falling ill and it was all down to Charles, all down to their involvement in him and his plans.

'Whether we got involved or not, the world was still in trouble,' Peter was quick to point out, trying his best to reassure Rick, and himself, that the threat from Charles stretched far beyond the town they resided in. He was right of course, but previously Charles and the story of the two worlds didn't seem real to them, since it wasn't like they had seen it first-hand. This, however, was certainly real and it was happening now.

As the day rolled by, the number of victims continued to grow. More and more reports were coming in on the news of people succumbing to this mystery illness. Langton had gone from a sleepy town to a location that was making the national news, and all they could do was sit back and watch as things continued to deteriorate. The hospital they were in was nearing its capacity and the staff were helpless, unable to offer any friends or family members comfort or reassurance about the fates of their loved ones. It didn't take long for travel in and out of Langton to be prohibited; the town found itself locked down. Rick and Peter could do nothing but wait for whatever it was to get them too.

Eventually, night fell and Peter drifted off to sleep. He awoke to hear Rick saying words that immediately made him get to his feet. 'I see it.'

Peter saw it too. There it was, this mystical yellow cloud, luring them both towards it. All their fear subsided when it appeared. Just like everyone else before them, they too were drawn to it, it was giving off an energy that was warm, inviting and impossible to resist. Getting up and walking around Sophie's bed, they reached out to touch it as it settled by the window. Before they could though, they were interrupted.

A mystery voice that came from behind them snapped them both out of their trance. He yelled a word at them, praesidium, just in time for them to pull their hands away from danger. They turned to see a man who had long hair, a patchy beard and would be best described as scruffy. If they were picturing someone coming to their rescue, he certainly wouldn't be close to what they imagined.

He walked towards them and put his hand out to the cloud, and touching it he muttered words under his breath, none of which Rick or Peter could understand. Peter could however make out the language at least. When the stranger finished, the cloud vanished.

'I have no idea what you just said, but thank you' Rick quickly said, the mysterious stranger certainly saved them from ending up like everyone else admitted to that hospital.

'Was that Latin?' Peter asked.

'Good ear,' came the response. 'You're safe for a while, that protection spell should hold for a day or so. By then, we should hopefully have all this under control.'

Rick and Peter were bemused. They had been seconds away from succumbing to the cloud's power, but here they were, safe, all thanks to a man who timed his arrival to perfection. They were certainly grateful, but with that gratitude came a lot of questions they wanted to ask.

'Who are you?' asked Rick, feeling hopeful that finally they had a pretty powerful ally on their side.

'Dustin. You two must be Rick and Peter and I'm guessing Sleeping Beauty here is Sophie. It's awesome to meet you both.'

There was something about Dustin, a cheerful optimism that was as welcoming as it was reassuring. The situation was dire and he seemed to know it, but he was able to maintain an aura of happiness that instantly put others at ease. Peter asked him where he came from and how he saved them. Dustin's reply was intriguing to say the least.

'My boss sent me; she said you might need my help. Of course, that was before nearly a quarter of your town nodded off. Now she's saying you definitely need my help. Although she wouldn't use quite as many words as I'm using, I do tend to natter. I get excitable.'

Rick asked who his boss was and where they both worked to be involved in something like this, but Dustin wouldn't say, or as he put it, he couldn't say. He told them they would find out in time, that the trouble they had got themselves in had been noted, and that he would be for the chopping block if he gave anything away though. 'I signed a form, can't talk about any of it without written permission,' he said, a smile beaming across his face. Everyone else in that hospital was miserable and scared, yet here was Dustin, seemingly content and enjoying himself. He reassured them he was there for one job, to save Langton, adding that he knew exactly what needed to be done in order to do it.

# Chapter 23 - Riverton

Evening fell as Kim and Tony pulled into Riverton. It wasn't dark yet, but the light was leaving the sky. It had been an extremely humid day and it didn't seem as though it would cool down as the night set in. It was however a beautiful and peaceful place to be.

'If this was a trick, I think Charles might be my new best friend,' Tony joked. After the stress and horror of the last few weeks, it was easy to forget that there are such beautiful places in the country they could escape to. Kim had to remind him that this wasn't a relaxing holiday, and that they were there for a very dangerous reason. He knew that too, but he asked her to let him pretend anyway.

Leaving the car behind and walking through the neighbourhood, they came to the set of houses, the inhabitants blissfully unaware of what was awaiting them. Again, Tony tried to take his mind off the problem. 'You know, if we don't get torn to pieces and we get married, this is somewhere I could picture us living.'

Kim agreed, and she indulged him in his fantasy, even if it was just for a moment. She suggested the dog they could get and name Malcolm, the fat grandchildren they would eventually have that could play down by the river on a sunny day. They had spoken about their future before but only in the short term, dream holidays they should save for and her moving in with him at some point; neither of them had discussed marriage before though. Of course, there was every possibility they assumed they were safe to do so, as their impending doom would prevent them for ever walking down the aisle, but fear or not, it was a discussion that both of them were interested in having again, survival pending of course.

They were greeted by an elderly lady, Naomi. She had come out of her house after seeing them walking down the road. They don't often get visitors to their part of the village, so she assumed they must be lost, but they explained they were merely just taking in how beautiful it all looked. Their cover story was that they were looking to buy a property in the main village and were just having a look around the area, she was happy to give them lots of reasons why they should move there. Naomi and her husband Jamie really did love to talk and they loved visitors.

She invited them to sit out in the front garden whilst she made them tea, which after the drive and the day they'd had, they were happy to accept. It helped that their house was central to the neighbourhood; they were able to get a good look at everything around them by sitting there. Jamie joined them all and the couple explained they had lived there for thirty years. They discussed everything they possibly could, as elderly people love to do, including how their daughter Rosie had long since left home, how Jamie was really called James, but he thought Jamie made him sound a little younger than he actually was. They hadn't seen Rosie in quite some time, but she was due to be visiting them at the end of the week, they were both already planning what to do and what to cook for her first night home. As they spoke, Kim noticed something out of the corner of her eye: she was staring down at the river, picturing those fat grandchildren she and Tony had been discussing, when she saw a van, parked behind the trees as if it were trying to remain inconspicuous.

'Is there always a van there?' she asked her new friends.

They said what she was worried she would hear, that no, there isn't a van that sets up down by the river and they had never seen it before. To make matters worse, there were two children playing metres away from it.

'Jamie, Naomi, you need to get inside and lock the door, right now,' Kim said, fear exuding from her voice as she spoke.

The two were taken aback by the sharp turn in tone that Kim exhibited. Questioning her as to what she meant and why they should, she pleaded with them to get inside to safety. Taking charge in a way she hadn't expected to, she then directed Tony's attention to the children who were nearby. He immediately ran off towards them, leaving Kim with the couple who were now extremely confused and unsure whether the two newcomers to their little part of paradise could be trusted. They watched as Tony, in the distance, ran in front of the two children and ushered them back towards the houses. The commotion wasn't lost on the other neighbours and they, including the young children's parents, came running out of their homes.

One of the boy's fathers, Eric, headed straight for Tony and pushed him out of the way. Kim couldn't hear what was being said, but it was evident that her boyfriend wasn't faring too well. She reiterated to Jamie and Naomi that they needed to go inside before heading over to help. As she started to make her way there though she saw the van doors open, cleeth after cleeth beginning to pour out. Screaming at Tony to run, panic ensued. Naomi yelled at everyone to get into her home and sure enough, everyone made a panicked beeline for it. Tony fired a couple of shots at the Cleeths, hoping to at least be able to slow them down enough for the others to get away. He edged backwards, waiting until he was sure they had all made it, at which point he himself started to run. Kim too fired her gun in an effort to distract the beasts as Tony ran back to join her at the end of the garden. The two quickly came to the conclusion that they were no match for the number of enemies they had to face. As they watched the van drive off they made a dash for Naomi and Jamie's home, slamming the door closed behind them as they got inside.

Tony and Kim were in a state of panic. They suddenly had three household's worth of people all in one home, at least a dozen cleeths outside and a concerning lack of confidence they would be able to get them all through this in one piece. They had to think on their feet. Ordering everybody to the front room, they barricaded the lounge door shut and made everyone move furniture in front of the windows. Eric, a man who clearly had a fiery temper, was not ready to start taking orders from two strangers who showed up right when they were all attacked.

'Before I do anything, I want to know what the hell those things are. Also, who the bloody hell you two are for that matter.'

Tony, not in the mood for someone with a chip on their shoulder, decided he would take this one. 'I'm Tony, this is Kim, and those things out there are Cleeths. That's unlikely to be their real names if I'm honest, if anyone has a better idea of what we should call them, I'll certainly consider it.'

'Bad fluffies' came the voice of six-year-old Mellissa from the corner of the room.

'Like that for instance,' replied Tony.

In the room, they had Mellissa and her mother Susan; her husband was away on business. Eric, his wife Julia and son Patrick were the second family whilst Jamie and Naomi rounded out the bunch. That still left two houses in the immediate area, one they were told was empty, the family on holiday in Cornwall, whilst the switched-on lights and faces at the window would confirm the other was certainly occupied. Abbie, Claire and their son Oliver lived there, and they were unaware just how dangerous the situation was.

'Naomi, can you ring them?' asked Kim. 'Tell them not to move, not to call anyone and to stay where they are until we can figure out a way to get to them.' Naomi knew she had to trust them both; she had watched them risk their own lives in order to save them, and in her mind, they had definitely earned that trust.

Tony meanwhile had to calm Eric down. He gave the briefest of explanations, that there was a man who had set out to harm them, that the dog like creatures outside were most certainly not your average household pet and, most importantly, that they would tear his and everyone else's throats out without any hesitation whatsoever. It wasn't the most inspiring of moments, but it did the trick. Eric didn't exactly have full faith in Tony and Kim, because he was extremely sceptical that their arrival had coincided exactly with the danger heaped upon them, but he was willing to at least go along with them, for now. Not without asking a question that was going to be difficult for the pair to answer though. 'If you two were aware this was going to happen to us, why didn't you call the police?'

They had to think quickly. They knew if the police arrived then there would be far worse consequences than an attack on a small village. They tried to explain that by giving everyone a brief explanation on Charles and what he had threatened them with. On any other day, it would have been unlikely to have persuaded them but seeing the cleeths, and how unearthly they looked, had at least allowed them, and even Eric, to give them the benefit of the doubt.

The cleeths were intelligent, even more so when working in a pack. Tony and Kim had seen how smart one could be, but watching a large number of them was revealing. They seemed to know where the bulk of the people were held up, but more worrying was that they also knew where the weakest people were, and that title fell to those across the road. There was safety in numbers and the cleeths seemed to know that.

'They're circling their house,' Kim pointed out, 'This could be a good time for us to think of something to do.'

The silence that followed was a good indication they were both short on ideas. They had to think of something, quickly. All the cleeths had now moved their attention to the isolated couple's home; none of them was paying any attention to the house the rest of them were held up in.

'I don't know if what I'm about to do is heroic or just ridiculously stupid,' said Tony, not impressed by the idea he had come up with.

'Tony, what are you thinking?' Kim asked, extremely concerned.

'Brief evening jog' came the laconic response.

Knowing someone had to act, knowing he could never let Kim be the one to do it, Tony addressed the room. He instructed Naomi, still on the phone to Abbie over the road, to open her front door the second she saw him running towards it. They needed someone over there, they needed a weapon and it was only a matter of time before the beasts smashed their way through to them. His plan was to get over there, protect them and then come up with another plan, or another mental plan as he actually put it, to get them back across the road and reunited with everyone else. As for how he was going to navigate his way through the twelve or so cleeths that would be instantly after him? Well, he hoped he would be fast enough to lead them away, that way he could get back round to the house before they got him. He wasn't optimistic.

'I have to try, Kim.'

It was a difficult moment for Kim, but of course he had to try and make it over there. Neither of them would be able to live with themselves if a couple and their young child died without them trying to help. Like Tony though, she wasn't confident of his chances at making it. Refusing to acknowledge the danger, they made the choice to get it over with. Kim kissed him good luck, they told one another they loved each other and she headed upstairs, telling Eric to close the room off again while she was gone. If Tony was putting his life on the line, she was at least going to help even the odds a little. From upstairs, she had a good view of his path and could shoot anything that got too close to him. The fact she had never fired a gun before tonight wasn't lost on her, she hoped that she could have a remarkable case of beginner's luck.

Tony stood by the front door, hand on the handle, ready to go. He thought back to all the times he had needed to run before and all the times he had considered joining a gym. He wished he hadn't chosen to eat a sandwich each time instead; that was a choice he regretted now. 'Let's be heroic then,' he said as he opened the door. The cleeths turned all their attention to him as soon as he stepped outside, giving him no chance to get a bit of a head start. They darted towards him, fangs on display and a deep hunger in their eyes. He ran. He ran faster than he knew he could, but they were quicker. Within seconds they were rapidly gaining ground on him.

# Chapter 24 - Blue

Emily was the key. As the first person to be struck down with the illness that had swept up Langton and now its neighbouring areas, it was she who was instrumental in stopping it. The first thing that needed to be done was to wake her up.

'Can you explain, even slightly?' Rick asked Dustin, as he told them of Emily's importance. Rick felt like everything was happening around him and he was just a bystander. With Sophie's life on the line, he at least wanted to make sense of what was going on.

Dustin had a reputation for being excitable, so happy to be doing what he did, that he often got lost in the moment, too carried away to explain to those around him the smaller details that are actually the most important. He had been told that many times before. When it came to magic, he was one of the best around, equal to only one other person that he knew of. But he got so caught up in what was going on that he often forgot those he is working with weren't as up to speed as he was. There was a part of him that enjoyed being the smart one; he loved impressing people, for that was all part of him wanting to be liked and wanting to be respected, that and his love for showmanship. 'Well, she was first down. The spell started with her and that's all this is, a spell, just a pretty big one.'

'A spell?' Rick asked. 'Peter, you guys told us about magic, but this is way beyond what I expected. Should I be considering the possibility that Hogwarts is an actual school?' He and the others had learned about a lot and magic had been touched upon, but a spell like this? The Latin incantations? It all just seemed too fantastical to be true.

'I don't think it's a real school,' Dustin said, seeming to get lost in his own thoughts as to how great it would be if it was. 'We've never really looked into it.'

Peter did explain it wasn't quite like the stories, nobody could be turned into a rat for example, but the basic principles of magic they would have seen in movies do stem from real events. He then felt the need to check with Dustin about the rat thing. Dustin answered that it was something he had often researched, though he hadn't found a way to do it. Rick and Peter were unsure whether to be relieved by that, or slightly apprehensive that this stranger had contemplated how to turn people into rodents.

Getting back to matter at hand, Dustin revealed he had seen something similar to this before, but on a much smaller scale. Three people had been struck by it and curing the first person broke the spell, which apparently caused a chain reaction that in turn cured the other two. With Emily, he needed to create his own cloud, one that countered the original and followed its path, that then should begin to revive all those it had claimed in the order they fell.

'How do you know so much about this cloud?' Peter asked.

'My brother created it,' came the response. Dustin said this in such a flippant way, anybody else would have thought information such as this would be best left hidden, but he was so keen on being trustworthy that he didn't consider telling anything but the truth.

Being asked about his brother made Dustin uneasy. It was difficult for him to stop talking normally, but this was a subject he clammed up over. All he would say was that he and Dusty were on different paths: he worked for good, whereas his wayward sibling chose a different route for his talents.

'Your parents named you Dusty and Dustin?' Rick asked, realising this probably wasn't the most relevant question he could have asked given the current circumstances. Still, the name Dusty was a strange choice.

Dustin didn't reply; instead he chose to move the conversation away from his personal life. He hadn't seen Dusty for a long time, he had just heard about the horrible things he was involved in. He always thought their lack of contact was for the best, being on opposite sides in the battle between good and evil would just lead to awkward conversations if they ever got together for a catch up. As for whether Dusty worked for Charles now was a question he couldn't answer. He had generally just gone to do whatever work paid him the most. With everything he had heard about Charles, it had previously seemed most likely that that was where he would be. Dusty did love chaos.

Now this was happening, he had the confirmation he needed that the two were currently working together, even if it was just for this one job. Dustin knew it didn't really matter one way or another though; he was here to do a task and to save lives. How Dusty was doing or where he was these days was of no concern to him; he just wanted to clean up his mess.

Before they could test Dustin's theory, they needed to wake Emily up just long enough for the new cloud to be created and for it to have an effect.

'What colour will it be? Yellow, like the other one? Rick asked.

'The colour can be anything you like. What's your favourite?'

'It can be any colour and the man working for the forces of evil chose yellow? Can you make it blue?' The colour was irrelevant of course, but Rick was not fully sold on Dustin's power or his plan. He may have saved them before, but what they were involved in had escalated so much now that he didn't know what to think or what to believe. In short, he was humouring Dustin, whilst hoping beyond all hope that he was as good as he claimed.

'Blue it is,' Dustin replied, his upbeat tone combined with a degree of excitement. 'I'm thinking a light sky blue, should cheer us all up a bit don't you think?'

The evening had now set in. Peter and Dustin went to Emily's room while Rick stayed at Sophie's side. If Dustin was right, then she would be next in line to wake up and there was no way he wasn't going to be there when she did. He had no idea how long it was going to take or when he should expect to see something happen, so he just planned to sit there and wait. He knew his parents were okay, because he had called them earlier in the day and managed to dodge any argument that was likely to stem from the last time he spoke to them. Despite them not being on the best of terms, he was relieved that so far, they were fine. If they had been struck down too he really may have lost all reason and the ability to stay composed. His thoughts turned back to Charles, the man who had nearly killed several people close to him, had nearly killed him and left him permanently scarred. As soon as Langton was safe, he knew their next step had to be to take the fight to him. Rick for one was eager for that time to come.

In Emily's room, Peter and Dustin were having a difficult time persuading Emily's parents they needed to perform a ritualistic spell with their young daughter at the centre of it. Admittedly, wording it quite like that wasn't the best idea, so Peter had suggested trying a different tack. Dustin's argument was that it was better to just be honest and to the point about the whole thing. With the way things were in the town though, Amanda and Fergus were a little more open-minded than they otherwise might have been. All anyone was talking about was the mysterious yellow cloud, the comatose residents and the sporadic animal attacks, so at this point it would have been remiss not to hear the two men out.

Dustin explained that he had two tasks: the first involved waking Emily up, while the second was bringing in his mystical antidote. He assured everyone that neither would put her in any more danger than she was already in, and both parents were invited to stay in the room while he did it. His calming nature came to good use here. Dealing with worried parents, he made sure he spelt everything out to them more than he normally would, and he did so with a charming enthusiasm that, at one point, made Amanda smile for the first time since she watched her daughter on that bike. Spell number one was quite simple, since he could wake her up by breaking the spell, but that break would only last a few minutes, and after that the cloud would take control again and they would be back to where they started. It was the second that would be trickier.

'Magic uses a lot of energy; it can be draining, especially on the larger spells,' he said. He vaguely referenced one particular spell, one from his early days at his mysterious job that left him bedridden for days. When Peter asked what he was trying to do that time, Dustin said it didn't matter, deflecting the question and getting back to what he was saying. Continuing, he stressed that if he failed, it would be some time before he could give it another try, and by that point, he himself could even have succumbed to it without his own spell to protect him. He was also wary that Dusty would be ready to fight back. 'He's extremely protective over his work but more than that, he's very much a fan of getting paid.' If the spell didn't work out how Charles had requested, there was a high chance he wouldn't get his money. Dusty wouldn't stand for that.

With regards to the first spell, Peter was surprised to see it was performed very close to how he had pictured this sort of thing in his head. Candles were set up around the hospital room, everyone formed a circle around Emily's bed and it was a case of chanting the words. He was a little disappointed there wasn't more to it, well at least with the first; the second was certainly different. He didn't understand the words spoken, but once again he recognised them as Latin. But other than the odd word he didn't know what was being said.

Peter did however find it all extremely compelling, to the point where he spent most of the time thinking how he would want to learn things like this himself. It would certainly help with any future problems the group might come across, assuming they survived this one. The world of magic had always interested Peter, but his lack of confidence in social circles had meant he didn't have the confidence to pursue it. He had looked up certain aspects on the internet over the years, though he knew better than to try something that could be potentially dangerous based purely on things he had learned online.

After a few minutes, Emily began to regain consciousness. She was weary and confused, but awake. Whilst that was a positive sign, Dustin reminded them all that she was not close to being saved, and he also made sure that her frantic parents didn't touch her. He couldn't allow anything to interrupt the spell and not being able to hold their daughter was something that was extremely tough for both Amanda and Fergus, especially when the scared little girl began crying out for them.

'I'm sorry, you can't touch her, not yet, not until we get through the next stage. No matter what happens, no matter what you may see happening around her, you must not touch her. If you try, you leave the room.' Dustin was so focused on the task at hand, he was like a different person when he was doing things like this. He was blunt and to the point but never intentionally nasty; driven and focused was the better way to describe him. When he was in the middle of his work, he commanded the attention of the room and those there would give it to him purely because of how authoritative he became. 'Right then, let's see how this goes, shall we?'

Much like the spell before, there were the lit candles, there was chanting, but this time there was a dark atmosphere in the room that made everyone feel decidedly uneasy. The rattling of objects around Emily's bed and the blowing of the curtains caused alarm, despite Dustin trying to assure them they were things he had expected to happen. None of them were as terrified as little Emily though: she had just woken up to this, to something that anybody would find disconcerting and she couldn't understand why her parents were not helping her. She was hysterically screaming out to them, and it was a horrible thing for them all to watch. Fergus nearly broke down on occasion, leaving it to Amanda to hold him back. She had seen enough now to know that Dustin and Peter were legitimate, and that the pain their daughter was experiencing now was worthwhile if it saved her. Things were about to get worse before they could get better though.

As Dustin neared the end of his spell, he was distracted by the candles in the room suddenly blowing out. Everyone assumed that was part of the ritual, until they saw his face and realised he was just as alarmed by it as they were. Undeterred, the spell was finished and a deathly silence took over as they waited to see if it had worked. The silence caused time to drag; it felt like an eternity and it seemed like nothing was going to happen. There was no blue cloud appearing and hope was fading in the room, Dustin knew what was wrong though. As he went to tell them what was happening, the door behind them blew open with such a force it nearly blew off its hinges. There in the doorway was a cloud, only this one wasn't blue, it was yellow, three times bigger than any seen before. It practically filled the doorway. Worse still, it was strong enough to counter any protection spell that Dustin had previously used.

'Repellam' Dustin yelled and threw his arm out towards it, telling Peter to keep repeating the last line of the spell until he saw something happen.

'Will that work?' Peter asked in a panic.

'If it doesn't, we're all taking an extremely long coma, so do it.' Dustin was struggling, because the power that it was taking to keep the cloud away from them was getting too much for him to cope with. His only hope was that he had done enough that Peter repeating the final phrase would give his spell the extra push that it needed.

Peter called out that last line, mispronouncing almost all the words and yelling like he was the priest from the Exorcist.

Dustin was quick to correct him and tell him he didn't have to be quite so dramatic.

Peter continued with a little less flair and eventually the candles began to reignite one by one. It was working.

The light in the room began to change; it got brighter, and for a moment it almost looked as though it was daylight. There was a tint to the brightness, a blue tint.

'Keep going Peter, you're doing it,' urged Dustin as he dropped to his knees, blood beginning to run from his nose. He was seconds away from losing control, and he found himself shocked and frightened by how strong Dusty's powers had become. Peter continued, and there was a sudden explosion of blue light that engulfed the room. It swarmed over Emily and then flew towards its yellow enemy, knocking it backwards and causing it to vanish. Dustin collapsed face down on the floor, rolling over and staring up to the ceiling, exhausted but relieved.

'Can we go to her now?' Amanda asked, confused and amazed at what she had seen. Dustin nodded and both parents ran towards their terrified daughter.

'She'll be fine,' Dustin said. 'Get her a bike or something, I think she'll need some cheering up after this.' He turned to Peter. 'Nice work, buddy.'

Peter knew he just read some words out; the nice work was Dustin's doing and he had no idea how he could thank him. 'Are you gonna be okay?' he asked, noticing how drained he looked. 'Fine, I'll be fine. Could just use a good few day's sleep, that was a heck of a battle. He's got stronger.' Dustin did have a request, a pillow, blanket and a bottle of whiskey. Peter was able to help with two of the items; he promised the third would be delivered at some point down the line.

A few rooms down, Sophie awoke. For her, she had no memory of what happened, just leaving Emily's room and calling Rick.

'Sophie, I'm worried. Even after a normal night's sleep you aren't a morning person.' Rick joked as she came to.

'What happened?' she asked, oblivious to anything that had been going on.

Rick explained briefly and promised to fill her in on the rest later; he was just happy that she was alright. He told her he loved her and asked how she was feeling, and she assured him she was fine, and that it was just like she had woken from a deep sleep. Rick was relieved, not just because she was okay, but because she needed to be fit, they didn't have time to celebrate. Charles needed to be stopped. First of all, they needed to get to Riverton. Tony and Kim would likely be needing their help.

The colour blue spread all over Langton, people began waking up in the hospital, then in their homes, in the streets and in the random places where they had fallen. The neighbouring towns that had also began to fall under its effect soon awoke too. Whatever happened to the world after this, at least this was something that could be considered a victory. Sophie, Rick and Peter had no time to stop and enjoy the moment though. Saying thank you and goodbye to an exhausted Dustin, they immediately left the hospital and took to the road, taking a rural route to avoid any still in place road blocks. The three of them had no idea if Tony and Kim were handling the cleeths, since they weren't answering their phones, which was a cause for concern. They also had no idea whether Charles had kept Will alive. What they did know though was this could be the last time they saw Langton. After Riverton, they were all in agreement about having to face Charles; win or lose it was a confrontation that was necessary and long overdue.

# Chapter 25 - You Can't Save Everyone

Tony saw a bullet hit a tree directly in front of him. It was evident the beginner's luck that Kim was hoping she would experience was not on the cards. Her yelling 'sorry' out of the window wasn't overly reassuring to him either. Kim's horribly itchy trigger finger was the least of his worries. The cleeths that were baying for his blood and much faster than he anticipated were the bigger issue he was facing as he ran for his life.

Darting over a moderately sized wooden fence, he was able to gain a bit of ground, though not as much as he would have liked. They were quick to jump over it, barely slowing down, but it did the trick just long enough for him to be able to formulate a plan. Spotting his car and being delighted to discover he had the keys in his pocket, he headed straight for it. In his head, he was planning to do a dramatic dive out of the moving vehicle and through the open door of Abbie and Claire's home. The reality though wasn't quite so well executed.

He did make it to the car, managing to get the door closed in order for him to drive away without getting hurt. Abbie was able to open the door with precision timing as he drove up to it. Tony unfortunately wasn't quite as successful when it came to making the jump. He missed the open doorway, not elaborately diving through it into the hallway like he hoped. Instead, he jumped into the wall of the house next to the door, before tumbling backwards into the path and laying there, dazed and confused. Instead of him heroically coming to the rescue, Abbie had to save him, running outside and dragging him inside, slamming the door shut as the Cleeths got to it.

'I'm here to save you,' a dazed Tony said, as the unconvinced women stared at him, unimpressed. Kim, watching all this from the other side of the road, was relieved her boyfriend was safe, but a little bewildered at how he seemed to be in one piece given how disastrous that ended up being.

Tony, after composing himself and testing for concussion, now needed to think of a way of getting the four of them back over to the other house. He wasn't happy with Kim being over there without him, and having everyone all together was definitely the best chance they had at getting out alive. Looking outside through the window, he could see the car. It had crashed into a tree but looked like it would still drive; the only issue was that the cleeths had split their focus on that and the house he had just run into. He did however feel relieved they hadn't turned their attention to where everyone else was held up across the road.

'Right, we need to get ourselves from this house and over the road to that one. I'm open to ideas,' Tony said, hoping beyond all hope that one of the people he was with would come up with a genius plan, one that would work out better than his did.

'My car is in the garage' Abbie calmly said. 'We could drive it over the road.'

Tony was torn. On the one hand, he wanted to breathe a sigh of relief that they had a fairly good chance of getting across intact. But on the other, he was burying a rage that had been brought on by nobody thinking to mention to him they had a way of getting across the street that was far simpler than how he did it. 'You couldn't have told us you had a car in the garage before I ran over here?' he asked, stifling his frustration under his breath.

'Well, nobody asked,' Abbie replied. 'You just started running over here.'

It was a risky move anyway. In their defence, they weren't just thinking of themselves, they had their young son to consider in all this.

'Right then' Tony said, determined. 'Let's talk this plan through.'

Back over the road, things were tense. Two cleeths were making their way back over, as if they had remembered there were other potential victims awaiting a visit from them.

'They're coming back,' Jamie said, his worried look towards Naomi indicating he was worried for her, far more than he was for himself.

'Just get away from the windows. They can't get in, unless they have worked out how to pick locks.' Kim was trying to lighten the mood in the best way she thought she could, but it was an impossible task. Tensions were extremely high with everyone. Eric was getting more and more frustrated, whilst the children had begun to cry. They too knew they were in danger. Kim was beginning to feel out of her depth.

She had been doing all she could to keep everything calm, but now she was beginning to really feel the pressure. She had been relatively happy with her life before this all started. Her friends seemed to be wanting something more from life than the daily grind, but Kim mostly enjoyed it. She had actually missed her job since she had been off. She knew she was doing something that was bigger than her, bigger than all of them, but whereas her friends had been enjoying doing something different, she would have been fine with things never changing. Looking back, she never in a million years thought heading into an alley to search for a dog would end up being such a life-altering thing. Nor could she have ever pictured herself in a perilous situation such as this one.

'We need to get out of here, now. We make a run to a car and go' said Eric. He was beginning to think things may be going better if he was in charge of everyone's survival.

'I think we should stick with the young lady,' Jamie said, smiling at her in a reassuring way. It was a boost in confidence that Kim sorely needed. 'The both of them have protected us so far,' he added.

Naomi agreed with him, even standing up to Eric and telling him he was welcome to leave if he wanted to, but that his young scared son would certainly be staying with them. Eric was a loose cannon, and it was only a matter of time before his temper got the better of him. Kim, Jamie and Naomi were increasingly worried that he would put them all at risk when it did.

'Can we do anything' asked Naomi to Kim, eager to help in any way she could. 'A nice cup of tea, perhaps?'

Kim thought for a moment about how amazing a nice cup of tea sounded. 'No, thank you though. If we survive I'll come back and make you one' she replied. Naomi appreciated the gesture and looked sure to take her up on the offer.

There was a sudden thud on the door, Kim peered out the window to take a look, darkness had well and truly set in now. There she saw one of the cleeths, running at the door again and again. It was as if it had come up with the plan to weaken it until it gave way. It didn't have a chance though, it was a sturdy front door. The concern was if the other cleeths saw what it was doing, would they be smart enough to join in? If that happened, they could have themselves a serious problem.

'Don't worry' said Kim, 'it will never break through.' She didn't sound nearly as confident about that as she hoped she would when she started speaking.

'Is this what you do, dear?' Naomi asked her. 'Do you save people?'

Kim didn't know how to respond. She could have just said that was exactly what she did. It would have put Naomi at ease, but there was something about this lady that Kim connected with, and it made her want to open up a little more.

'I work in the city,' Kim replied. 'I do marketing for a fairly big company. This? I don't really know what this is. I guess it's a hobby gone wrong.'

'Well, you're very good at it.' Naomi held Kim's hand and smiled at her. It was a warm smile that really resonated with Kim. It made her realise that even if she wasn't as committed to this being something she would do going forward like her friends were, she was still, at this moment, helping people.

The bang of the door had continued throughout their conversation and it wasn't easing up. There were a few seconds between each thud, and everyone kept their eyes on the door, awaiting everything going wrong and it giving way. They were distracted from it by a different sound, a car engine starting up and the sound of the garage door at Abbie and Claire's opening. Realising that Tony was on his way back, Kim immediately made her way to the front door. Jamie went with her and offered to open it, whilst she got ready to fire at any Cleeth that made a beeline for them, or for those making their way across the street to get to the house. As the car sped towards them. she gave Jamie the nod to open the door, knowing that a cleeth was just on the other side of it, waiting to get through and attack.

As it opened, the cleeth lunged towards Kim and she opened fire, being at point blank range allowed her to put it down with relative ease, but bullets were scarce. Jamie tried his best to drag it inside so it wouldn't block the door, the elderly man was struggling on his own though. They called out to Eric for help, but he ignored them both, and it was left to Naomi to leave the safety of the lounge and help her husband clear the doorway.

The car screamed to a halt and the four of them got out. Tony stayed back shooting as many cleeths as he could, but he also wasn't exactly a crack shot. Thankfully, between he and Kim they were able to do enough for Abbie, Claire and Alexander to get in the house. They followed just behind, slamming the door shut as cleeths ran into it. The two of them realised how lucky they were to be able to keep everyone alive. Unfortunately, it wouldn't be long before they would come to realise that saving everyone is sometimes an impossible task.

Kim promptly marched back to where everyone else was and proceeded to berate Eric for doing nothing to help them, for leaving an elderly couple to do the heavy lifting whilst he stood back and cowered. He tried to defend himself, even trying to use his son as an excuse, saying he was protecting him, but she wasn't buying it. Instead, she made the point that he was actually putting him in more danger by being a coward. Kim wasn't the sort to lash out like this, but Eric had tried her patience and was seeing a side of her that nobody ever really had witnessed. Eric's already frayed temper reached breaking point. He walked up to Kim and threatened her, warning her not to push him, that she had no idea what he was capable of. He had clearly forgotten that Tony had returned.

Tony wanted to remain calm and fully intended to be, but it had been a long day already. Walking into the room, he aimed his gun directly at Eric. He knew that Eric's young son was in the room, but in Tony's eyes, his actions were justifiable, Eric was someone that was putting everyone, his own family included, in danger. 'I see you've not calmed yourself down,' Tony said, glaring at the man with intent. 'I'm not too good with this gun, but I'd wager I could shoot you at least somewhere. I suggest you sit down and shut your mouth, or I'll be marching you out there to be an appetising distraction.'

Tony wasn't exactly proud of his actions, since he had seen the looks that Julia and Patrick had given him, and they were looks that made it seem they were beginning to think of him as the villain. He also knew that in reality, Eric was just scared and was acting out as a reaction to it. It didn't however change the fact that what he did was something that needed to be done. He was at least relieved to see a knowing look from Kim that indicated she agreed with him. This was a moment that he replayed in his head many times after though, as he wondered if this was the person he had become now, the man who would threaten someone in front of their family and be fine with doing it.

The thudding against the door restarted, the same amount of time between each crash as they had previously heard.

'It's the cleeths,' Kim explained to Tony. 'They're trying to get in.'

'Well, that's wonderfully sinister' was Tony's concerned reply. That concern was about to shift up a level as the thuds got louder. Was it a bigger cleeth they hadn't noticed? Was it even a cleeth at all? Peering out the window, it became clear what was happening. The cleeths were working in unison, five of them, ramming the door together with more and more joining the pack. Kim ran to look at the door to see if it was holding, it was, but only just. It was beginning to shake and the hinges were starting to loosen. One terrifying fact was starting to become very clear: if all of them made a joint attack on the door, it didn't stand a chance of holding. Within moments, it seemed the cleeths had worked that out.

'We've got a problem. Well, yet another in a long line of problems,' Kim announced, turning to the room who were staring at her in fear.

'What? What's happening? Julia asked, looking down at Patrick's tear filled eyes, not knowing how to help reassure her terrified son.

'The door's going to come down.'

Eric pulled his phone out and went to dial the police. At this point, all he cared about was his family; he didn't care about a larger scale attack or who would get hurt as a result of it, he just wanted to protect those he loved. Kim was able to shut him down quickly though, simply telling him it was pointless, the door was going to give way and it was coming down imminently.

'What do we do?' Jamie asked, hugging Naomi, hoping that Kim and Tony had a backup plan, some way of getting them to safety. The lack of response and the concern on their faces was all the confirmation he needed to know that they didn't.

'It looks like they're all out the front' said Tony, 'We head out the back door and we run. Get to the main village.'

'That's your plan?' Eric yelled, 'all this time cooped up in here and your plan is for us to run?'

'You can stay,' Tony glibly replied.

The argument was cut short before it really had the chance to get going. An almighty smash came from the hallway and that could only have meant one thing: the door had fallen, the cleeths were in.

'Go, now' Kim yelled.

Everyone hurriedly made their way to the porch doors at the back of the lounge. Tony and Eric moved the blockade they had placed there out of the way and headed out first, Tony was ready to fire his gun at anything that got close. As everyone poured into the garden, the cleeths smashed their way into the front room, it looked to be all of them working as a team and they were ready to kill every single one of them. One member of the group sombrely realised something, the only way everybody had a chance of escaping was if the cleeths had something to distract them, someone to buy everyone a minute or so to run and get a head start.

Jamie turned to Naomi and pulled her close. 'Run my dear, run, tell our daughter I'll be checking in on you both.' He held her hand for a second and turned towards the room they had escaped from. Nobody else knew what was happening: the parents were grabbing hold of their children, Tony and Kim were scanning the back garden for cleeths, so it hadn't occurred to anyone that somebody was about to sacrifice themselves. Naomi called out to her husband as he let go of her hand, he wanted to turn back to her, to give her one final kiss, but there was no time to do so. Saving the woman he had loved for over four decades was far more important than saying a proper goodbye. He calmly walked back into the lounge and closed the patio doors behind him. Naomi continued to scream out for him, but he couldn't hear her anymore, the overwhelming sound of the cleeth growls drowning everything else out.

Tony and Kim turned to see what was happening and were stunned by what he had done. They instantly knew he had given them a fighting chance to escape and had to act on it. Kim grabbed Naomi, telling her they had to leave. She didn't want to of course, she wanted to stay with him until the end, like she had always planned to, but Kim wasn't giving her the choice. She reminded her of their daughter and how much she would need her, and that was the persuasion needed for her to leave. At that moment, Jamie was set upon by the room full of cleeths, they proceeded to rip him apart in full view of everyone through the patio doors.

'Everyone move, now!' Tony ushered them all through the back gates, the parents of the children shielding them from seeing the horror of what was happening in the house, much like Kim was doing to Naomi as they quickly left the garden.

Heading out onto the street, they were not even close to being safe yet, feasting on Jamie wouldn't take them long and they would be hot on their heels again in no time at all.

'Anyone, we need a safe building, somewhere secure?' Kim could only think of holing up somewhere else until they thought of a new plan.

'There's a pub, it's like two minutes down the road.' Eric said, terror in his voice.

'Right, that's where we're going.'

'Have a nice pint and wait for all this to blow over?' joked Tony. As horrible as things were, even he couldn't pass up a Shaun of the Dead reference.

Before they could make it there though, three vans came hurtling around the corner and into the street. Tony and Kim thought this was it, if those vans were filled with more cleeths then it was game over, they would have no chance of escaping them. Only it wasn't cleeths that got out as the back doors to them opened, it was people, wearing all black and carrying weaponry that was far superior to the pistols they had at their disposal. Three of them headed straight for the group and proceeded to gather them together, ordering them into the back of one of the vans at gun point. Tony, Kim and even Eric knew better than to argue with them, so everyone did as they were told and climbed inside, the doors shutting behind them. The engine started and they were quickly driven away.

As they left, they heard gunfire, lots of gunfire; they were killing the cleeths. Claire asked if they knew who these people were or where they came from, but Tony and Kim had no idea, they were just as surprised as the rest of them. They were however definitely concerned. Everyone else thought they had been rescued, yet for all they knew, these people could have been connected to Charles, and if that was the case, they were almost certainly in even more trouble. They put on a brave face, since everyone was worried enough. Looking at Naomi, it was clear she was in shock; she and the others needed to think they had been saved, even if it was for the briefest of moments.

After a tense couple of minutes, the van came to a stop and footsteps were heard coming towards it. The doors opened and they were ushered back out onto the street. A man approached them, gun pointed at the floor and a calm demeanour that made them think that, just maybe, this wasn't another threat after all.

'Kim, Tony?' he said, offering a hand to shake in the process. 'We're here to help, well done on keeping these people alive.'

Kim shook his hand, 'Not everyone' she said, watching as a man led Naomi away and sat her down by an ambulance that was waiting to treat everyone.

'We'll look after her' the man said, introducing himself with the name Kennedy.

'Where did you all come from?' Tony asked. He was quick to point out that he was grateful for their arrival but puzzled, considering nobody they knew of had called for any help.

'I'm afraid for the moment, I can't tell you that. You'll find out soon enough.'

Before Tony could challenge Kennedy, another car came into view, it was flagged down by an armed guard controlling people entering Riverton. They heard him from a distance say that the village was closed, but Kim and Tony recognised the vehicle, it was Rick's car.

'Are you able to let them in?' Kim asked. 'They're with us'

They were waved through. The group, minus Will, were reunited. There were a million questions they had for each other. How was Sophie up and about? How did they save Langton? How was Riverton saved? Who were all these armed people? They were questions for the journey to find Will, right now they needed to get going.

Kim went to check on Naomi before they departed, whilst the rest of them enjoyed the reunion. They had only known each other for the space of one evening, yet she felt close to her, and she needed to see how she was coping and also to assure her she would be back for that cup of tea as soon as she could. Naomi was grateful, through the tears she thanked Kim for her bravery and for doing everything she could to save them. 'Your husband saved us all,' Kim said, reminding her of who the real hero was. 'We owe you both for that.'

As everyone else was taken away to be checked over, they all offered knowing glances towards the two who had risked their lives to help them, even Eric. He nodded in Kim's direction but she, kneeling beside Naomi, wasn't in the mood to sweep everything under the carpet. Instead, she raised a middle finger to him and laughed. Naomi repeated the gesture, both girls sharing a smile as they did it. It was least he deserved, they both thought. Before she left, Kim gave her a hug, telling her to call her daughter as soon as she could. Naomi agreed and thanked her once again.

'Who's Kim swearing at?' Rick asked Tony, feeling this was one of the more interesting parts of the story he needed to hear.

'That was Eric, Eric's a douche. I'll tell you more later,' Tony responded, a sound of exhaustion in his voice.

Kim re-joined the others, asking what their next plan of action was.

'We head out, we find a hotel and we grab some sleep,' said Sophie, who had clearly been planning what to do for the whole journey to Riverton. 'Then we head north, Peter has an idea of whereabouts he was kept. We break in, we free Will, we somehow save the world.'

Everybody agreed the plan would have worked better without the word 'somehow' thrown in there, but it was as good a plan as any.

Before they could set off, all in Rick's car as Tony's was currently resting in a tree trunk, Kennedy walked back to them, handing them a card. He told them that when they found Charles, when they went to take him down, they needed to call him and he would be there to offer support. The group was a bit dubious, as once again he refused to reveal where he came from or who he worked for, and he also avoided Peter's question as to whether he knew Dustin, but it was a call they weren't going to rule out making. Despite having had some significant help, they were still able to save Langton and Riverton. They knew the stakes though; they knew how dangerous things were and the offer of help was one they were grateful for, despite their shared scepticism. They got in the car and drove away, off to a fight that would be bigger than anything they had faced so far.

# Chapter 26 - How Did We Get Here?

Arriving at the hotel, the girls and Peter waited by the car whilst Rick and Tony went and checked them in. They had requested two rooms, but the plan was for them all to bunk in together. Safety in numbers seemed like the smartest move what with everything that was going on.

Sophie noticed that Peter was quiet, despondent even. Questioning him as to what was wrong, he explained he was worried about Will, if he was still alive, and how he would feel if the last time Will ever saw him, it was as he was trying to kill him. He understood that Will knew he wasn't to blame, and he agreed with Sophie and Kim as they reminded him; but it didn't change anything. It was an overwhelming sense of guilt that he was struggling to shift. Now that the threat to Langton was over, it was all he could think about.

'I'm glad I have you guys,' Peter said, reminding them once again about how lonely he used to be, and how he didn't take his expanding friendship circle for granted.

'We're glad we have you too.' Kim smiled and gave Peter a hug, it was a hug that he really needed.

As the boys returned, they noticed how pleased Rick looked with himself. As Tony put it when they joined them, he was giggling like a school girl. He was, in fact he was giggling so much that he couldn't explain why.

'Chuckles here, thought we needed aliases for our stay' Tony explained. 'Something about Charles not being able to find us before we find him.'

'Why's that funny?' Sophie asked. 'Seems smart.'

Tony went on to tell them that whilst Rick had given himself the name of Arnold Bauer, the owner of the cheap and slightly questionable hotel they were staying in now thought his name was Marcus Mangina. 'He's been laughing like that for five minutes,' Tony said of Rick, who was practically crying from laughing so much, laughter that was sorely needed after everything he had been through of late. Tony wasn't really annoyed, just irritated he hadn't thought of it first, but Rick had been much more subdued since his injury, and seeing his best friend laugh was long overdue.

Heading to the hotel room, they all had one thing in mind, they needed sleep. Even Sophie, for although she thought that after her long magical coma she wouldn't need sleep for a while, she too was feeling the need for a rest. Sadly, they hadn't accounted for how wired they would all be. After an hour of lying there, making frustrated noises that indicated none of them could drift off, they one by one gave up.

'How long until we have to get up?' Tony asked, with an air of sadness.

'Alarm is set for eight,' Sophie replied, not seeing Rick mime to Tony that he had actually changed it to ten. He couldn't handle an early start and had decided getting a telling off was worth the extra sleep they would get.

'How did we get here?' asked Kim.

'We drove' wasn't quite what she meant, but Tony said it anyway.

'No I mean here, using aliases to protect ourselves. Fighting a mad scientist and his quest to screw the world over. Battling demonic dogs that we have to make a name up for. Dealing with magic and fractures to other worlds that can turn us evil.'

After a long period of silence, Tony had the answer. 'Rick and Sophie went for dinner.'

He wasn't even joking, he was right. They all thought how funny life was. If they had decided to get a takeaway, if they had gone to a different restaurant, if they had left just a few minutes later and somebody else found those bodies, they would all be living the same old lives they used to have before it all changed.

They each discussed how they felt about the possibility of going back to that life. Tony and Sophie were both adamant it wasn't what they wanted: they both felt trapped in their jobs, like it was a mundane daily ritual that was gradually wearing them down. Of course, neither of them expected to escape from that. Tony commented how he would rather have a lottery win than a fight against evil as a means of escaping the daily grind, to which Sophie agreed but still, it was a cause they could get behind.

For Tony, he was surprised by how much he was enjoying doing something so worthwhile. He wasn't exactly on board from the get go and it was only an epiphany whilst burying Reg the cleeth that made him open his mind up to getting involved. But now? He hadn't admitted it to anyone, but he had no plans on Charles being the end of the road for his involvement in this new aspect of the world he previously didn't know existed. As for Rick, he was torn. He imagined that had he not been hurt, he would have thought like they did, but now he was cautious. He was worried for himself, for his girlfriend and for his friends, as the odds seem to be permanently stacked against them.

Kim was right at the other end; she didn't have the best job in the world, but she was progressing. She was on a good wage and she got on well with her colleagues. She could see herself staying in the company for years to come, and the thought of that didn't upset her. That's not to say she wasn't proud of what they were all doing, she was just happy with her lot. Then of course, there was Peter. He had been living this life, albeit with far less at stake, for years now. He didn't know what he wanted either, whether he would want to swap to a normal life when all this was over, or whether this was so engrained in who he was now that he couldn't. He told them he would like to do something involving research or computers, find a nice like-minded girl and maybe live a life that didn't always involve the paranormal, but it felt like he wasn't destined for that.

'Just to be clear, I really wanted to stay home, get a pizza and watch Con Air', Rick joked.

'Was it Con Air or Hairspray? Because my memory's fuzzy,' Sophie quickly added.

Rick quickly changed the subject, thinking that a discussion on their impending doom was a much better thing to focus on than the love he has for musicals. He had kept that a secret from Tony for the duration of their friendship and it would have been a shame for him to find out about it now.

They began coming up with different things they could do to get to Will and stop Charles. Sophie was in favour of the stealth approach, sneaking in and trying to do as much damage as possible before they were caught, and that was something that Kim and Peter were very much in agreement with.

'When we play games and there's the choice between stealth and guns blazing, we always choose guns blazing,' said Tony, with Rick nodding, backing him up. They knew they didn't have a great deal of ammo left, but it was enough to put Charles down, providing they were able to get to him first. Or at least that's what they hoped.

There was also the option of doing both, having two of them take the all-out assault approach, which would be a distraction for the others to get in and get the job done. As crazy as Rick's suggestion to take this approach seemed, it actually made the most sense, although it did pose the biggest risk for the two that did the former. That led to perhaps the most troubling conversation the group had had yet. As important as their roles were, would each of them be willing to die for it? For that matter, could they allow the ones they loved to die for it? When it came to them as individuals, they each answered yes; it was bigger than them and if they were to die saving countless people, they would let it happen without hesitation. The speed at which they answered surprised them.

Of course, they had thought about their mortality before and some of them in the room had come close to being killed already. This felt different though, as if they were preparing for the worst because the worst was indeed coming. As for that other part, well that was a trickier conversation. Of course, if it saved the world it should be a no brainer, but nobody wanted to say that, because none of them truly knew if they would be able to do it. They were just hopeful that they would never have to find out if they could.

Rick and Tony were quick to volunteer for the guns blazing diversion roles, they each made it clear there was nothing that either of their girlfriends could do to talk them into letting them take that on. They all also agreed that when the time came, there would be no goodbyes, no emotional moments and nothing that would indicate they wouldn't see one another again. They all agreed, albeit reluctantly, and took some comfort in the fact they had at least formulated a plan. It was one that was unlikely to succeed, but it was a plan nonetheless.

But then they didn't truly think they would save the residents of Langton from the cloud either; Tony and Kim certainly didn't think they stood much of a chance at surviving the siege of Riverton, as Tony was now calling it, but they all came through. Plus, they had the added help of Kennedy and the mysterious armed soldiers by their side too, or at least they hoped they did. They still knew nothing about them. Plus, if Charles saw armed soldier-like people pull up outside, he would likely accelerate his plans. If Narvod and his armies got through, they would be left fighting an unwinnable war and they couldn't risk that happening. They had to leave this possible back up as a last resort, only if they had no other choice. At least to begin with, this was something they needed to do alone.

'What if Charles has already done it? Kim asked. 'What if Narvod's already here?'

There wasn't any response to that question that would be helpful; all they could do was hope for the best, and that it hadn't happened and they weren't too late. One thing was for certain: they were definitely not going to be winning any battle without any sleep. They all once again tried to get some rest and thankfully, after about forty minutes of tossing and turning, they managed it. It was perhaps the most needed six and a half hours of sleep any of them had ever had.

Once morning came and Sophie had finished having a go at Rick for changing her alarm setting, they decided breakfast was in order. As they were about to take on a mad man with armed enemies and a plethora of cleeths, they figured they at least owed themselves the best breakfast they could possibly get. Kim had already researched this and seen a place that served steak as part of a fry up, and that got a resounding yes from everyone so it became the plan.

They got ready as quickly as they could, the thought of food being a reason for each of them to get ready in record time. As they left their room to head off, they got a shock that none of them saw coming. A car pulled up by the reception and out stepped Will. He smiled and walked towards them, telling them they needed to talk and directing them back into the hotel room. He had clearly been involved in something: he was walking with a limp, clutching his side and had a deep cut down the side of his head. Needless to say, he had looked better.

'We could talk over breakfast, couldn't we?' Rick asked in desperation, thinking of the breakfast steak that was quickly slipping out of his eager hungry reach.

As they got in the hotel room, Tony closed the door and immediately pulled out his gun, aiming it at Will.

'What is it with you people pointing guns at me?' Will asked, surprised to see this was the welcome he was getting.

'No offence, posh boy,' said Tony. 'The last person to miraculously appear after spending some quality time with Charles tried to kill a bunch of us.'

'You think I'm evil?' Will asked, looking at the concerned faces that each of them, Peter included, had fixed on him.

'Sit down,' Tony ordered. 'Let's find out.'

# Chapter 27 - In Her Memory

Charles had left Will in his cell, with no food, no water and no sign he was going to be keeping him alive when he came back. In his own twisted way, it was clear that Charles loved Margaret; even when he became more and more detached from reality, he still cared deeply for her. In his eyes, Will was responsible for her death. Any sane person would point the blame at Narvod himself, and it should have opened Charles's eyes that this thing he served was not to be trusted, but he was too far gone. For Will though, it didn't matter; he was broken. He too was aware that it was Narvod that ended his mother's life, but he knew that he made the choice for him to do it. It had been too much of an emotional rollercoaster for him to know how to function.

For years, he believed his mother to be dead and in the space of five minutes, he not only found out she was alive the whole time, but then had to deal with her death first hand. He was struggling to remember what he was fighting for as he'd lost too much. The confines of the empty cell were certainly not helping of course. All he had were his own thoughts and the sound of Margaret's death replaying over and over in his head. He'd appreciated Peter and the others being around in his own way, but it was now more than ever he realised how valuable they were to him. If he could just talk to them about how he was feeling, it might help him get his fight back. As that wasn't an option, all he could do was wait for Charles to decide what to do with him. He wouldn't be waiting long.

There was no sense of time where he was, no windows to give him an indication of whether it was night or day. As it turned out, it was the early hours. It was now that Charles thought was the best moment to get someone to drag Will back out into his lab, since he was ready to make him pay for what he had done. The lights from the hallways hurt Will's eyes as he was slowly walked to what he felt sure would be his death; any talk about wanting him around to see Narvod's arrival was surely a thing of the past now, he thought. He did, however, pay close attention to his surroundings, to the winding halls that led him to Charles and to that large metal door he had seen earlier that was still open. The sound of all the cleeths residing in the pit inside rang out as he moved past it.

As he walked up the stairs to the main area where Charles works, the place where he just made that fateful decision, he found that it wasn't Charles waiting for him. There was just a chair and a television, complete with a VCR. Being a bit dazed, the first thing Will thought was how long it had been since he had seen a video player. Then he looked next to it. There was his mother's body, still lying where it had been left.

He was sat and tied to the chair, whilst one of the guards who escorted him walked over to the television, switching it on. It began to dawn on Will what he was being forced to watch. It was a video of Charles's old lab. He had CCTV everywhere in it to capture his research and anything he had wanted to preserve for posterity. But Charles wasn't in this video; the only person caught on camera was Margaret. This was Will's mother as he remembered her; it was early days in her work with Charles, when she was still the loving mother who cared deeply about her son.

The video showed her on the phone to Jeremy, being very much the caring wife and at a time, however fleeting it may have been by this point, when they were happy, talking to each other like any other married couple. Will was fixated on what he was watching, longing to be able to go back to that time and do something, do anything, to try and make it so this was the way they stayed. The real heartache for him was just about to start though, because it wasn't just Jeremy she spoke to on the phone.

'Can I talk to him? Is he up?' Margaret asked, eager to speak to the young child standing by the phone, anxious to talk to his mother.

'Hi, William. How are you honey?' she said to her son, a loving tone in her voice as she spoke. 'You completed it? Well done, I'm really proud of you, but you really should be going to bed. It's definitely your sleep time.'

Will's eyes filled with tears, for he remembered this phone call. He could only have been about four years old at the time but hearing the other side of this, he could remember what he said. He could remember the game he had completed and could remember his father joking that he was going to be in trouble for letting him stay up, way past the time he was meant to have gone to sleep. Then he looked down at her body, staring at it intently, as if he was willing her to wake up and be the woman he was watching. Her voice on the video pulled his misty gaze back to the screen.

'I'll be home soon. I just have a little work to do here and then I'll be back,' Margaret continued. 'I love you too, more than anything. Sleep well, William. Goodnight.'

The screen went blank, only for a few seconds, before it started up again, from the same point as it did before, and it played through to the end and once again repeated. It was clear that Charles wanted to break Will, to make him feel as much pain and sadness as he possibly could. It was cruel and it was calculated, but it was working. Will thought he had nothing left before, but this was close to pushing him right over the edge.

This short five-minute video played on repeat for half an hour, though for Will it felt far longer. As it finished for the final time, Charles appeared from the shadows, walking from behind Will and stopping in front of him.

'You killed her, William,' he said, a sinister calm in his voice that was deeply unsettling. The last time Will saw him, he was furious, spitting words out like venom as Will was dragged away. Somehow now, a much calmer Charles was standing before him, and it made him even scarier than he was before. 'How does it feel? Tell me, how does it feel to see the woman who gave you your life, so that you could take hers away?'

'I didn't kill her, Charles. If anybody can lay claim to that it would be you. You know that, don't you? It's why you're doing this, to try and shift your guilt onto me.' Will wanted Charles to hurt too, as far as he was concerned, he wasn't getting out of this room alive. If he could hurt Charles, even just a little, he would at least get some satisfaction. 'You loved her, didn't you? My mother, you loved her, yet you used her as bait so that your puppet master could make his play. You're spineless and you never would have had her, you never deserved her.'

It seemed his words did hurt him. Charles lashed out, punching Will so hard that he and the chair he was tied too tumbled to the edge of the second level floor he was placed on. Staring at the ground below, Will saw a guard place his gun on the table and walk up the stairs towards him. He was lifted back upright to see Charles once again standing in front of him.

'I did love your mother, William. Because of that, you will stay alive to watch this new world order begin. It will be done in her memory.'

Will made a snap decision, and it was a decision that could well have backfired on him horribly, but those words, in her memory, snapped him back to life, made him remember that what was happening was far bigger than him. He also thought that no matter what Margaret had become, no matter how corrupted by the fractures she had been, he could not let her memory be a part of something so horrific. With that in mind, he followed through with his decision. He pushed himself and the chair off the second level and sent it crashing to the floor below. Landing side on, he hit his head and instantly felt the blood rushing down his face. He had however smashed the chair with his landing and with that, found himself free and right next to the gun that had been left on the table. Against all odds, he now had a fighting chance to either kill Charles, or to at least find a way to escape.

Grabbing the gun and getting to his feet, Will was dazed. His vison was blurry and it took him a couple of seconds to get his balance, but he instantly held the gun out in front of him, hoping to catch sight of Charles and pull the trigger. All he could make out was the same guard who gifted him the weapon running towards him. Will didn't have long to think. He could have shot him and killed him, even though he didn't know anything about this man. He could just be a hired gun, in which case he deserved it, but then again, he could just as easily be under the influence of the same device that changed Peter.

With his sight returning to normal, he aimed for the knee, hitting the target and sending the guard toppling down the stairs he was running towards him from. With him out the way, he ran back up to the second platform to get Charles, but sadly, he was greeted with the sight of him running out of the lab and closing an automatic locking door behind him. Will was trapped, or so he thought, until he remembered the door he was led past, the same one that he was walked through to see how many cleeths Charles had at his disposal. Now he had a choice, he could try getting through the locked door to Charles and attempt to take him out, or he could make an attempt at escaping, reuniting with his friends and coming back with more people by his side. He wisely chose the latter.

Running towards the large metal door and the sound of the cleeths, the panic risked consuming him. He had no idea how he would get past them and to the exit by which he saw the van parked; he knew though that he wouldn't have time to stop and think of ideas when he got there. As if to compound the pressure, an alarm began to sound all over the building. Charles had no intention of letting Will escape and now there were as many armed people as he had on site all coming for him, ready to stop him from going anywhere. When he made it through the door, he was presented with the pit and it somehow seemed worse than he remembered. That was largely due to the fact that last time, he wasn't thinking about having to get past it. Now, here he was, a large drop, at least thirty cleeths below and a large metal fence separating him from an exit that might be closed anyway. The odds were certainly stacked against him.

Will pushed the heavy metal door closed, not because it would slow down his enemies but so that when someone turned up, he would have at least a warning, since the dull shrieking noise it made when it opened and shut would certainly be an alert that he was out of time. He walked nervously to the edge, wiping more blood away from his eye; the wound on his head was showing no sign of improvement. Looking down, he saw what might be his only hope of having a chance of getting out of this. The pen that the cleeths were in took up most of the pit below, but not all of it: a sturdy metal fence ran around it and right up to the ledge he was precariously close to the edge of. All he could do was pray he could jump far enough to clear it.

It was quite the distance though, and even with a run up he wasn't sure he could make it and even if he did, it was definitely going to hurt him. He wasn't in the best of conditions as it was. The push to try though was the van, the same van that had recently dropped off some unwelcome visitors at Riverton. It had returned and parked in the same place, reflecting off its windscreen was what appeared to be moonlight. This was the sign that Will needed to take his chance, that and the loud shriek of the door that was opening behind him.

Will didn't have much of a run up to his jump, so he quickly took a few steps back and ran; he ran faster in that short space of time than he could ever remember running, then he jumped. The jump itself felt like it slowed time. It would only have lasted a couple of seconds, but it was long enough for him to look down and see the snapping teeth and the hungry eyes of the cleeths below him. Unfortunately for Will, he hadn't jumped quite far enough. Landing on top of the fence, he immediately felt the pain of the impact on his ribs, a shooting pain that went right through him. Perhaps worse though was that he could feel himself losing his grip and slipping in the wrong direction, precariously close to dropping down into the pit.

He instinctively held on, for had he not he would have been killed within seconds as the cleeths were clamouring to get to him, jumping up from the pit they lived in, snapping their teeth inches from his foot. Will looked down at them, then up from where he had jumped where there were now three guards, guns pointed at him, ready to open fire. He pulled himself up and dropped down the correct side to safety, just as a bullet bounced off the part of the fence he had just been clinging to. He immediately got to his feet and ran, not stopping for cover or to return fire with the weapon he had somehow managed to keep hold of.

Miraculously, he made it to the van, using the base of the gun to smash open the window and open the door. Climbing inside, he began to hotwire the car, a skill he had picked up many years back. Back then, he thought it would come in handy, but never in a million years did he expect it to be something that would pay off in such a critical high stakes moment. There were bullets hitting the van, the sound of the guards yelling, the growls and barks of the cleeths all aimed squarely at Will and yet somehow, he kept his cool. Despite the pain he was in and the pressure he was under, he got the van started, only then noticing the keys in plain view on the dashboard. Rolling his eyes at the sight of them, he put his foot on the pedal and drove out of the open doors ahead of him and into the night, knowing full well he would have to make his way back there far sooner than he would have liked to.

He checked the rear-view mirror to see what the building he was in looked like from the outside. It appeared to be a rundown factory; there was nothing remarkable about it at all. Nobody would look at it and think it was so important.

After an hour or so driving, Will ditched the van. He hadn't had his wallet taken off him so he was able to hire a car and drive to a motel. He wasn't planning on sleeping, just getting use of a computer at the reception. He was able to track Peter's mobile via GPS and it led him to the hotel they were all in. Will was eager to be reunited with them and back in the relative safety of the group. He headed straight back out in the car and made the drive down to see them.

Arriving mid-morning and pulling up in the car park, he was delighted to see them all emerge from their hotel room. Getting out of the car, he smiled and walked towards them. After everything he had been through, he was just pleased to be back with them all, to see Peter well and back to his old self and to come up with a plan, together, as a team, to beat Charles. That happiness was short lived however: being led into a hotel room and having a gun drawn on him wasn't exactly the reunion he was hoping to have with them all.

# Chapter 28 - Steak for Breakfast

The huge cut, covered in dry blood, along with the severe bruising on his ribs, made everyone inclined to think that Will was telling the truth regarding his escape. Of course, that didn't stop Rick from questioning whether the blood was actually blood as opposed to ketchup, nor did it prevent Tony from poking him in the ribs and making him yelp in pain, just on the off chance the bruising was very well applied make up. The lowering of the gun was certainly a relief for Will, as was the hug from Kim who was pleased to see him. He didn't even mind the fact she had forgotten he was in pain when she hugged him a bit too vigorously.

'We need to get back to that laboratory,' Will said, eager to get straight back to business now that he had the rest of the group by his side.

'That's exactly where we're going,' Sophie said. 'Half of the plan was to rescue you, so really the job just got a little bit simpler.'

'After steak for breakfast,' Rick added, keen to not let the best breakfast idea ever slip from everybody else's minds 'Maybe a hospital visit for you, Will.'

'Yeah, your ribs could be broken,' said Kim, concerned about what kind of effect that could have on him.

'Breakfast sounds like a mighty fine plan,' said Will. 'If we survive today, I will go to the hospital, but we need to do this first.'

Sophie agreed with him. 'We shouldn't even be taking time out for breakfast really; we can't put it off any longer than that.'

As everybody left the hotel room, Will asked Peter if he could stay back for a moment. Rick gave them a five-minute warning, since by this point he was so hungry he was starting to worry if he could even last the drive.

As the door closed and it was just the two of them, Peter immediately spoke. He had been working on what to say to Will since he left, but all he could think to say in the moment now was 'sorry.'

'Don't be, Peter, I do not blame you in the slightest, I promise you.' Will's words were exactly what Peter needed to hear. 'After everything I have seen, what I have been through, well let's just say that I know you were not yourself.'

'I'm sorry about Margaret,' Peter said, unsure of how Will was feeling or what he could really say to him that would be of any comfort after something like that.

'Thank you. But you are my family now, you're a brother to me, Peter. I should have said that to you many years ago.' Will had been given plenty of time to ponder what he would say to Peter when they were reunited, and now he was making sure he said everything he needed to. 'I should never have left you like I did. I just can't apologise to you enough.'

Peter understood. He knew why Will did it and given how dire things were, and still were, it was absolutely the right call for him to make. After everything that had happened, both of them were relieved to be able to move past it all, closer than ever.

'So, steak breakfast I hear?' Will asked as the two of them left the hotel room to join the others. 'Interesting choice, if not the healthiest option.'

At the restaurant as their breakfasts were delivered, Rick made the connection that the last time he had steak, it was the fateful night that started all this. For he, Sophie, Kim and Tony at least.

'Has it put you off it?' Sophie asked, realising she knew the answer before she even asked the question. Rick hadn't heard her ask it anyway, he had put an amount so large in his mouth that even Tony was staring at him in disbelief.

It was a breakfast where, for the most part, nobody discussed anything to do with Charles. Cleeths weren't mentioned and it was just a time, however short, for them to relax, like they were six normal friends out for a normal breakfast. At the back of their minds, they knew they didn't have long, for at any moment Charles could bring Narvod into the world. Maybe they should already be on the road, but they needed this, especially given the risks they were facing.

Among the topics of conversation were things like how everybody met. Rick and Tony recounted their initial meeting, being the only two people to get up and dance to Who Let the Dogs Out at a school party. They had known of each other prior to that, but this was the moment that solidified their friendship for years to come. As for Sophie and Kim, they had been friends since college, joining the same class and bonding over Leonardo DiCaprio when they should have been studying. It was Kim that introduced Sophie to Rick after she had begun dating Tony. The first time all four of them hung out together it was bowling, a double date that Rick and Tony had longed to forget considering they were both beaten by the girls, by quite an embarrassing margin.

As for Will and Peter, their story wasn't exactly along the same lines. Peter was getting bullied in the school yard. It had been the same group of kids tormenting him as it had been for weeks, Will had often seen them stealing his lunch and pushing him about. Previously, he'd ignored it; he didn't know any of them and it wasn't his responsibility to help. One lunch time it got too bad for him to ignore and so he stepped in, landing some punches and getting hurt himself in the process. All things considered, it was worth it given the friendship they had now.

'Post steak nap, who's in?' asked Rick, hopeful that he could tempt everyone with his standard post-steak ritual.

'I'm afraid we really have to make a move,' Will said with a tinge of regret. He could have done with at least a whole day's worth of sleep, let alone a nap, but they had already wasted enough time.

'He's right,' Sophie agreed. 'Let's get going.'

'Ah yeah, Charles, Narvod and impending doom. I was sort of hoping we'd all forgotten,' Rick joked, gesturing to the waiter for the bill.

As they left the restaurant, they headed to their cars. Peter left with Will, whilst the others went separately. They got in their respective vehicles and gave each other a knowing look; the next time they were all going to see each other, it would be at Charles's factory.

'At least we have an army to call upon,' Rick joked, yelling out of the window to Peter and Will as they drove away. He had forgotten that nobody had thought to tell Will about any of the potential allies they had met whilst he was locked up.

'What army?' Will asked Peter, not planning on driving anywhere until he got an answer.

Peter explained about Dustin and Kennedy, how they may well be from the same organisation and that both of them had saved their lives, saved Riverton and Langton from separate attacks. Yet neither of them would give any straight answers as to where they were from. Will didn't have a clue either; he'd never come across a group in all his time of investigating these types of situations that had come to his aid.

If something like that did exist, he had no idea why they would have kept their existence a secret. More to the point, if they were fighting on the same side, then he was angry. All the help he had needed, the life he had given up, all that time and there was a whole armed and funded unit out there seemingly doing nothing? He would be grateful for their help now certainly, but he was definitely sceptical. He had already begun forming a whole list of questions he demanded answers to. Realising now wasn't the time, he started the car and drove off, asking Peter a lot of things about Dustin and Kennedy in the process.

Will had given the others the name of a road just around the corner from where Charles was based. When he arrived, they were already there, all crouched in the car out of worry there may be people about keeping an eye out for them. He pulled up a few cars behind them, parked up and he and Peter walked over to join them.

'We're hiding,' Tony announced as they approached the car.

'He wanted a disguise' added Kim, 'but then we couldn't agree on a theme, so we just stayed in the car.'

They got out and looked around the corner at the building Charles was in. What would usually be a normal-looking abandoned factory now looked very ominous.

'I was expecting like, you know, an actual laboratory,' Sophie said, taken aback a bit by how industrial it looked.

'It's the real deal inside' Peter explained. 'At least from what I saw. Can't say I'm overly excited about going in there again to tell you the truth.'

Will gave them the rundown of what he had seen of it, a mostly empty large structure with rooms turned into cells. The cleeth pit and the exit around the back was a possible escape route if they needed it, but not one that he would recommend. As for the lab itself, it was central to the complex and likely even more guarded than it was before he had escaped.

'So, this will be tricky then,' Sophie said, the reality of what they were about to do sinking in.

They had all been thinking about the plan on the way there, and with Will now back with them it added someone else to the mix. As for Will, he had his own thoughts about how they were going to do it, but he knew that he had to trust his friends, since they had earned it and were certainly just as capable now as he was in making the decisions. It was a humbling moment for him to hand over the reins. He did have one suggestion to make though.

'I should go in first,' Will said, 'I think it would be the best approach. Once I'm there, in place as a distraction, you can all do your thing, however you wish to do it.'

'He could kill you,' Sophie pointed out.

Will knew she was right, but given how many times he could have done it before, he doubted it. Plus, if he went inside on the premise that he was surrendering, he suspected Charles would be too smug to suspect anything else was coming.

'You know, if you're just going to walk in there and be held captive again, it was a bit of a waste of time escaping in the first place,' Tony pointed out. Will pondered that for a moment, before deciding it wasn't a statement he wanted to respond to.

'Right then,' Will said. 'See you all in there. Let's go save the world, shall we?'

Will slowly walked towards the building, and he began to think that maybe he wasn't going to make it out of this, and that maybe he wasn't meant to. His whole life had been built around finding out what really happened to his parents, and now that he had, it would be fitting for it to end now. Could there be a better way for him to die? Dying whilst helping to save the world would certainly have given his existence and his quest meaning, so maybe it wouldn't be the worst thing that could happen to him. As he approached the large door, he paused, reached out for the handle and muttered a determined 'here we go' under his breath. He opened the door to the building and calmly headed inside.

# Chapter 29 - Thirty Minutes

As soon as Will entered the building, he was apprehended. He had barely made it five feet through the first corridor before he saw the three men walking towards him, guns pointed firmly in his direction.

'We've got him, sir, he just walked right through the front door.'

'Bring him to me.'

Will had only heard Charles's voice on the radio, but he could already tell he was distracted, as if he didn't care too much that he had returned at all. That was something he found extremely worrying. If he was distracted, that meant he was working, and there was of course only one job he had left to do. Bringing Narvod across to this world was all he was working on, and he must be very close to doing just that.

Will was led back towards the lab, insisting to the armed men threatening him that he knew the way. Before he could enter, they searched him, taking his gun and his phone away. They then opened the door and Will saw Charles, playing with the machine and readying himself for the arrival. Charles looked up briefly to see Will enter the room, but he didn't acknowledge him. He just gestured to the man escorting him to keep an eye on him.

'You're normally far chattier than this, Charles,' said Will sarcastically, 'I do hope I didn't offend you with that whole escaping palaver?'

'I'm just happy to see you back, William,' Charles replied. 'Just in time too.'

'Find another test subject to go through, did you? One of your lackeys? Will asked. He turned to the armed man standing next to him. 'Not a friend of yours, was it?'

'No test' said Charles, still tinkering away at his machine and the laptop rigged up to it. 'He's tired of waiting, decided he should take his chances coming through anyway. Your mother's body made it through in one piece after all.' He flicked a switch and turned to Will. 'Just waiting for the power to build up -should be about thirty minutes, then everything changes. While we wait, why don't you tell me why you came back.'

Will wanted to tell him he was here to stop him, and that he wasn't alone, that he was going to make sure his plan didn't succeed and that all his work would be for nothing, but he had to resist the urge. Instead, he told him he knew he couldn't beat him, and that if he couldn't stop him, he could at least indulge his own curiosity and watch what happened. He could meet Narvod for himself. It was easy for Will to tell this story as there really was a part of him that was curious -after all, who wouldn't be? There was a whole other world out there, and it was hard not to imagine what it would be like, the type of things that lived there and what someone like Narvod would look like.

'What do you think, William?' Charles asked.

'About what?'

'These two worlds, I guess God made them both. I was never really sure whether I believed in God to tell you the truth, but what else would have the power to divide good and evil in such a way, other than a God?'

Will was in no mood to discuss religion with Charles. Two worlds, one world, however many there were, the fact that any were created always proved to be a difficult concept for him to get his head around. This didn't do anything to alter his beliefs one way or another.

'No idea, Charles. Is the thirty minutes up yet? I'm starting to get bored of all the waiting.'

Outside, the others were gearing up to make their move and true to their word, they were skipping any moments between them that could indicate they were saying goodbye. Instead, they just got straight down to it. Rick and Tony headed for the door that Will walked through, whilst Sophie, Kim and Peter hung back, waiting for them to get inside. They had all agreed they wouldn't kill anyone unless they had absolutely no choice but to do so, like Will, they couldn't be sure if the person they were shooting at was in control of their own actions. If they could take them down without killing them, they would.

Once inside, it became clear quite quickly this was not like the games they played. Two men came straight for them with their guns out and whilst they were able to shoot them first, it was still a close call. They both aimed for the knees and while Rick made his shot, Tony missed entirely. Thankfully, he got the man in the arm causing him to drop the gun, which he would be the first to admit was blind luck.

They knocked both men out and took their weapons before heading further inside. Turning the corner, they walked straight into the barrels of more guns, another two guards were waiting for them and this time they had no opportunity to try and fight their way through. One of the guards again got on the radio to Charles.

'We've got another two,' she said. 'Do we kill them?'

'What are their names?' Charles asked, sounding a little surprised that more people had the gall to try and stop him.

The guard put the radio in front of Tony who thought it best to reply with 'Marcus Mangina, I'm here with Arnold Bauer.'

'Bring them in,' Charles said, happy that when Narvod came through he had the first two people there for him to convert or kill.

As Rick and Tony were led off, the others used the moment to sneak through. They had a few moments to make their way into the building as the guards watching the entrance were either unconscious, or heading towards the lab. They needed to move quickly though.

'Well at least it's not Rick and Tony lying here,' Peter pointed out, looking at the people motionless on the ground.

'They must have been taken to Charles,' said Sophie, trying to hide the concern from her voice. She noticed how quiet Kim was; she'd put on a brave face throughout all of this, but now she was struggling with it. Here she was, hunting someone while carrying a gun, and all she wanted was to go back to how things were. 'You alright, Kim?' she asked, worried that her best friend wasn't coping.

'I'm fine, let's just get this done.' Kim was definitely scared, but she was also driven to get it over with, her urge to go back to her old life propelling her forward.

The three of them made their way further into the building and spotted some vents above them: they seemed to be the safest way to get around the building and to the lab without being spotted. Unfortunately, none of them were keen on the idea of climbing into an enclosed space. Sophie thought how Rick and Tony's love for Die Hard would have had them climbing up there without hesitation, and she wished she'd paid more attention to that movie the countless number of times she had been with Rick while he watched it.

Sophie climbed onto the table against the wall and reached up to the vent cover; it came off with relative ease. Taking a deep breath, she climbed up and looked to see how much room they would have to move about: 'not much' was the best way she could describe it to her two friends waiting anxiously below.

Peter gestured to Kim to go next, but she needed a moment, telling him to go first instead. She pretended she wanted him to help pull her up, but in reality, she had frozen, her brain racing with too many thoughts for her to be able to move. Peter climbed up and joined Sophie, and looking down the ventilation shaft he was a little taken aback by how small it was. 'They somehow look bigger in the movies, don't they?' he said. Sophie agreed. He reached down to Kim to take her hand, but she was in a daze, seemingly unaware of where she was for a moment. Eventually, after some persuasion, she shook herself out of it and climbed onto the table to join them, but it was too late.

'Someone's coming,' Kim whispered.

The footsteps were getting closer: someone had heard her and was heading her way.

'Kim, come on, quickly,' whispered Sophie. Kim knew there was no time. She closed the vent cover, leaving Sophie and Peter up there, whilst she stepped off the table to await the person arriving.

Sophie panicked, trying to open the cover despite it being impossible from her side. Peter stopped her, because there was nothing they could do for Kim now.

The guard turned the corner and spotted Kim standing there, ordering her to put her hands above her head and to drop to her knees, which she nervously did.

'Another one here,' the guard reported to Charles.

'Like flies, aren't they?' came Charles's voice back. He was starting to sound irritated that there were more people turning up. 'Male or female?' he asked.

The guard reached into Kim's pocket, pulling out her purse and checking her driver's licence. 'Woman, Kimberly Heaton.'

'That leaves two of them,' said Charles, 'bring her here and search for the others. I want as many people looking for them as possible.'

Kim was led away, leaving Sophie and Peter in the ventilation shafts; all they could do was carry on with just the two of them. Their goal was to find a way to reach a vent above the lab that gave them an angle to take Charles out.

Kim was led into the lab, and once she entered she saw Tony, Rick and Will on their knees in a line. This was the first time she had seen all the technology that Charles had and it was an eye-opening moment. The machine he was standing by was buzzing with electricity now and the look of worry on the others' faces indicated they were almost out of time.

'Welcome, on your knees next to your friends, please,' Charles said.

Charles was getting excited. He was minutes away from finally meeting Narvod and so confident there was nobody that could stop him. In truth, it would be difficult, there could only be about fifteen minutes left until there was enough power for him to step through.

'We're missing two people,' Charles said, eager to find out where they were. 'Let's see if we can find them, shall we?' He activated the PA system and spoke through it, the smugness in his voice was grating and Tony in particular was struggling with not reacting to it.

'Sophie, Peter, I'm sure you can hear me wherever you are. I would quite like you both to join us. We have about twelve minutes until a very important guest arrives. I would hate for you to miss out on all the fun.'

Sophie and Peter could hear him, his loud voice booming through the ventilation shafts and what Charles said next made them realise how out of their depth they were.

'If you aren't here in the next five minutes, I will start putting bullets in the heads of each of your friends. Young Kim here first, then Tony, then Rick. William, well he has to meet Narvod, so I guess it's his lucky day.'

Sophie heard Rick's voice yelling at her not to come, to carry on with what they were doing, but she couldn't bring herself to do it.

'Sophie, we can't, this is bigger than us,' Peter reminded her. She couldn't sit back and let her friends die though. When push came to shove, she wasn't strong enough for that and no doubt they wouldn't be either. She pulled out her phone and sent a text to Kennedy, telling him to come as quickly as he could. She knew he wouldn't make it to save them, but it was all she could think to do. If they had known how little time they had, they would have told them to come straight away but now, there wasn't a chance they would get there to help.

'What's it to be?' Charles asked. 'Well, you have four and a half minutes to make up your minds.'

Kneeling on the ground, the four of them scanned the room to see if there was anything they could do, a way of getting free to try and fight. It was impossible. It was so close to Narvod arriving that Charles was taking no chances. Not even counting the two guards behind them, there were at least another six in the room. If they made a move they would be killed instantly. They looked at each other, but they didn't have to say anything, since it was clear from the looks in their eyes this was the time to say the goodbyes they had put off when they first walked into the building. Those few minutes felt like an eternity, but eventually that time passed. Sophie and Peter were nowhere to be seen. They had tried to get there, scrambling through the ventilation shafts in the hope of finding an open hatch that would allow them to get free, but with only five minutes, it was a hope that quickly faded.

'Interesting,' said Charles, 'I felt sure at least one of them would have handed themselves over to save you.' He gestured to the guard standing behind Kim and said the two words they had all been terrified of hearing since he issued his threat.

'Kill her.'

# Chapter 30 - Worlds Collide

A shot rang out, echoing around the building and leaving everyone disorientated. Tony screamed out for Kim and got to his feet. He had warning that Charles was going to order Kim's death, but there was no time for him to react or try and do something to prevent it. Between time running out and the bullet being fired, it all went so quickly. Not that he would have had much success anyway; he himself was the next in line to take a bullet. When he looked at Kim though, he was just as shocked as she was to realise she was still alive.

The sound of the gun shot wasn't from the man standing behind her, it originated from elsewhere and it was in fact he who was lying dead on the ground. Tony and Kim immediately hugged whilst everyone else stood around confused. Realising this was their chance to get to safety, Will yelled at them to move and they hurried across the room, taking shelter behind some machinery.

As for Charles, he was just as taken aback by the mystery shot as anyone else. Yelling out for his guards to find where it came from, he realised the three minutes remaining until he had enough power might no longer be enough time. He was in a state of panic. He turned back to his machine and began adjusting the power, increasing it to the point where it began to shake violently. Will got out from behind the relative safety of the cover they were crouched behind and ran towards Charles; if he was panicking and adjusting the power it could only mean he was speeding up the process of getting Narvod here, regardless of the risk that doing so could overpower it.

As he made his run, the doors to the lab flew open and people began pouring in, all armed. Leading the charge was Kennedy, ordering the men and women under his command to only kill those they were fighting against if there was no other choice. Realising he only had one last chance to carry out his plan, Charles turned up the power as high as it could go, screaming at his guards to kill everyone in the room.

As the fire fight ensued, Rick ran out of the lab to try and find Sophie and Peter, whilst Tony and Kim attempted to navigate their way to Kennedy. Will meanwhile had made it to Charles, running towards him to get him away from the machine.

'It's over, Charles. It's finished!' Will yelled as he punched his foe to the ground. He hadn't counted on the resolve of the man. Charles was willing to sacrifice himself in order to ensure Narvod made it here and so he got back to his feet, knocked Will out of the way and held onto the power lever, keeping it turned up full. The power proved too much for the machine to take: its vibrations became more violent and the growing white light to the other world began to flicker.

Charles screamed out in anger. It was appearing as if all his work and so-called sacrifices were for nothing; he couldn't fathom the possibility that he wouldn't succeed. Will could tell the machine was going to blow, but he hardly knew what any of the buttons on it did; however, it was as plain as day to anybody that it couldn't take the power surge. He had a few seconds to consider his options. He could be the bigger person and save Charles, dragging him out of harm's way, or he could just run and let the man die, taking solace that not only was the world safe, but this person trying to harm it would no longer be a threat. He chose the latter: he wasn't going to risk his own life for a man who had taken so much pleasure in causing him pain.

'Move, everybody get behind something,' Will yelled to Kennedy and his team, running and jumping behind a metal cabinet, clutching his side in pain as he landed. Everybody took cover. Tony and Kim ran out of an opened door into the hallway whilst Kennedy, his team, and the people they were fighting, dropped to the ground.

The machine, as predicted, could not handle the power, but it did not explode in the traditional sense. It erupted into a ball of light, a bright white light that engulfed the whole laboratory and left everyone unable to see for a few seconds. After that, it was a shell, just a useless piece of equipment blowing out smoke. Dazed, people began to get back to their feet. There was initial unease, because had this been like the light they had heard of, then everyone could have been corrupted by the fracture; but once nervous glances had been exchanged, it became clear they were not affected.

Believing everything to be lost, Charles angrily began firing his gun, taking out not only some of Kennedy's people. but also, his own. Something inside him had broken as a result of his perceived failure. He then ran out of the room. Will and Kennedy followed him whilst Tony and Kim peered back into the lab from the doorway, unsure of what to make of the light they had seen blasting out of it.

Rick meanwhile was running through the halls, calling out for Sophie and Peter, worried they had been found and executed just as he was about to be. Walking through a hallway that was without power, he stopped, hearing something creaking from the ceiling above him. The vent gate opened and down dropped Sophie, causing him to shriek in shock at such a high pitch he hurt his own ears, along of course with his pride.

'You were in the ceiling?' Rick asked, surprised, as that was the last place he would have expected them to be.

'Is everyone okay? Kim, is she ok?' Sophie was frantic and she hugged Rick tightly out of relief to see him alive and well. The last thing she and Peter had heard was Charles's kill order and they had no way of knowing who made it and who didn't, and all they had heard since was the sound of gunfire and muffled yelling.

'We're all fine,' Rick said, giving her a kiss and hugging her back.

Peter then jumped down from the vent, also making Rick jump. Rick cautiously looked up into the vents, asking if there was anyone else up there ready to scare him again.

'What's going on in there?' Peter asked.

'Kennedy and his people turned up, I've no idea how,' Rick said.

Sophie told him that she had asked them to come, that she had sent them a message but never expected them to get there in time. She explained the reply she got was that they were already there, and that they had been following them since Riverton.

'Well, considering they've saved our lives and possibly the world, I'm willing to skip past how creepy that is,' Rick said, just as eager as Sophie and Peter to find out who these people were. The three of them decided to head back to the lab, since they needed to see if everyone else was okay. The fact that the sound of gunfire had now stopped altogether was more disconcerting than hearing more of it. Arriving back in the lab, they saw relative calm, Charles shooting his own men had been enough for them to lay down arms and Kennedy's team were rounding them up. With them were Tony and Kim. They were all relieved to see one another, albeit concerned that Will was nowhere to be seen.

'He went chasing after Charles with Kennedy,' Kim said.

'Well at least they've met now,' came Sophie's response.

Sophie told Kennedy's team about the pit full of cleeths that Will had told them about; they were apparently already aware and had people on the way to take care of them, and it shouldn't be long before they arrived. They debated going after Will, but with a few people obviously far more skilled than they were already heading out, they figured they would be better staying put.

Rick approached what was left of the machine. 'This was it?' he said, unimpressed. 'The thing that was threatening to alter all life as we knew it was this? No wonder it didn't work.'

'I'm Weller' said one of the team, offering her hand out for Sophie to shake, to which she gratefully accepted. 'We need to get you guys out of here, debrief you on what you've seen.'

'As soon as Will gets back, we'll come with you' Sophie replied. 'He's one of us, we're not going without him.' This was one decision she had made for the team that she was sure they would all agree with.

Weller didn't argue, since after all she had heard about what this group had done, the things they had been through, and she didn't want to come across as the enemy by trying to force their hand.

'You guys fancy telling us who you are yet?' Tony asked, getting straight to the point now he had another name to put to a face. 'You with this magician guy Pete told us about?'

'Dustin,' Peter added.

'We are,' conceded Weller. 'As for the rest, you'll find out soon.'

'How soon?' Rick asked.

'The boss is on her way here now, she really wants to talk to all of you.'

Whilst the others were making friends, Will and Kennedy weren't exactly becoming the best of buddies. Charles was still in the building - he had to be as Kennedy had his people surrounding it, but he certainly wasn't making himself known.

'You alright there, Will?' Kennedy asked. He had noticed the increasing pain that Will was in. He didn't know about the damage to his ribs, but he had seen him struggling to catch his breath, along with the wound on his head that was painfully apparent.

'I'm fine.'

Kennedy wasn't convinced. 'You sure? Because I can't help but notice how you're struggling to stop yourself keeling over.'

Will wasn't in the mood to be dealing with him. He didn't know Kennedy, and he resented the fact that he assumed they were on first name terms, that he was insisting on tagging along for a fight that Will deemed to be an entirely personal one. There was also the fact that he didn't know who these strangers were, or why they were refusing to tell anyone. Kennedy had repeated what he said to the others, that it wasn't his place to disclose anything and that he would find out soon, but that wasn't good enough in Will's eyes. As far as he was concerned, if this group of people had the means to fight evil, then they should be doing a lot more than just showing up at the last minute. Kennedy's response was that he just went where he was ordered, that he didn't choose what battles he fought. He also made sure Will knew that just because he was fighting a war, it didn't mean it was the only war going on. There was far more to the supernatural world than even he knew.

'Something bigger than this? Bigger than what Charles tried to do?' Will asked, with a sarcastic tone in his voice. He of course was aware it didn't get much bigger than what they just narrowly averted.

'Well, in our defence we weren't aware just how badly this Charles guy was gonna try and screw things up. We thought it was all devil dogs and fancy talking, so it was only when things went to hell in Langton and Riverton that we got clued in.'

That made things a little better for Will; now they were just ignorant rather than negligent, but it hadn't done anything to win him over. Not that there was a lot of time for that anyway, for as they turned the corner into another long dark hallway, Charles made his move, shooting Kennedy in the chest and turning the gun to Will.

'You, you destroyed everything' yelled Charles to Will, seething with rage.

Will immediately attacked Charles, fighting through his own pain to try and take him down, but with his ribs so badly hurt, he was no match for him. Charles pinned Will to the floor and wrapped his hands around his throat, squeezing the life out of him and grinning down at him as he did it. Out of the corner of his eye, Charles noticed Kennedy reaching for his gun, he had no choice but to release Will and run off.

Will turned to the badly winded Kennedy. 'You're alive?' he said in shock, not making the rather obvious connection that of course he would have body armour on. The armour saved his life, but Kennedy wasn't able to get back up just yet, so he gestured at him to go after Charles. Will did just that, sprinting down the hallway to catch up with him. Kennedy got on the radio, calling for back up and giving them the direction they had headed off to.

As he made his way through the building, Will caught sight of that same large metal door from earlier, the place where all the cleeths were and really the only place Charles could have gone with the direction he went in; if he had continued any further, he would have ended up back in the lab. He slowly opened the door, walking in with his gun outstretched in front of him. 'Charles? Charles, I know you're here.'

'Going to shoot an unarmed man are you, William?'

As Will entered, he saw Charles standing there, minus his gun that he left back by Kennedy. He hadn't had time to pick it up so he truly was unarmed. This was Will's chance. Finally, it was here, the moment he could take down the man who had caused him so much trouble for so many years.

'I should, Charles,' Will said. He was still trying to work out whether or not he had it in him to pull the trigger. It's one thing to kill a man in the heat of the moment but like this, it would feel like an assassination. Even if it was a man like Charles, it was a line that Will didn't know whether he would be able to cross.

There was an awkward silence that followed; neither man knew what to say and all that was heard was the growling of the cleeths locked up in the pit below.

Eventually Charles spoke. 'It was my work, work I spent my life doing, to travel between worlds, to bring Narvod here and cleanse this planet.'

Will wasn't planning on listening to him. Charles had no right to try and elicit sympathy from anybody, least of all him. 'I don't think you were always a bad man, Charles,' Will said to him, almost with pity in his voice. 'I think you were brilliant, one of the smartest people around, but you are too far gone now. Too corrupted by the fractures, by Narvod, or by your own need for power. I will not gun you down, I will not become that person. I will however watch with a smile on my face as you are led away and locked up by, by whoever these people are.'

Charles smiled at Will. He admired him and his moral code, however murky it might be. But he knew, they both knew, that he wasn't going to simply turn himself in. He wanted revenge, because his work failing caused him to think of himself as a failure, and the blame for that was squarely at Will's feet. He ran at Will, knocking him to the ground but this time, Will was determined not to give him the upper hand.

The fight was dirty, each of them knowing they wouldn't both be walking away at the end of it. For Will, this was the green light he needed to kill him. He couldn't do it when he was just standing there; of course he contemplated it, but there was no way he could be that person. But with Charles attacking him, all bets were off. Unfortunately for Will, his pain was getting worse and that allowed Charles to gain the advantage, knocking him to the floor and kicking him to the edge of the steep ledge. The cleeths below were alerted, waiting for him to fall right in front of them.

'Your mother's gone,' Charles hissed at him, ready to kick him over. 'Your father's gone, your boyfriend's gone. Tell me, William, just what is it you still have left to fight for?'

At that moment, a gunshot sounded and a bullet went through Charles's shoulder. Will looked up to see where it came from and there stood Sophie, her gun still stretched out in front of her and a smile on her face that made her thoughts very clear; despite her doubts, she really was cut out for this way of life and she couldn't be happier to realise it.

What did Will have left to fight for? Now he had an answer. 'My friends,' Will said to Charles, defiantly. 'All five of them.' He kicked Charles in the stomach, sending him tumbling backwards, giving him enough time to stand and get away from the precarious edge he was teetering over. 'Even Tony,' he added. Sophie lowered her gun, because she knew that Will had to do this himself.

'I'll be sure to kill them next,' Charles responded. He was operating on pure anger now. Deep down, he knew he wasn't getting out of this, and he knew he would be unable to get to the others, but now his goal was just killing Will, since that would at least make him feel like he achieved something. As Will ran towards him, Charles noticed him holding his side and that immediately highlighted his weak spot, the one way he could be sure he could put him down, at least for long enough to finish the job, and it was a chance he took straight away. He sidestepped Will's punch and delivered a short, sharp blow right to his rib cage. Will screamed out in pain and dropped to his knees, the pain made him lose his breath and caused his eyes to involuntarily well with tears. Charles then stood over him, ready to stamp on his throat, to deliver the fatal blow that would give him a victory, no matter how small it was. Sophie raised her gun again, ready to help, but Will gestured at her not to.

'Say hi to your mother for me,' Charles said, smiling down at him, but he hadn't counted on the extent of Will's resolve.

Will grabbed Charles's foot, inches before it came down on his wind pipe and pushed him away; he staggered to his feet and stormed towards him. Will knew that if he was going to beat him, it had to be now. He couldn't take another hit like that, he wasn't even sure if he could make it through the next few seconds, so he was going to give it his all.

As Sophie ran out to call for help, Charles got back up and swung at him, aiming for his ribs but Will blocked it, causing his foe to stumble. Will didn't even realise how close Charles was to the edge, but as he watched him trying to get his balance, he knew this was it. Charles fell backwards but Will dropped down at the edge to grab hold of him. He didn't know why he tried to save him; he assumed it must have been instinct. There he was, holding onto the person he hated the most in the world and all he had to do to end it, was to let him go.

'Is this where you give me a choice?' Charles asked, laughing at the absurdity of Will being the one to hold onto him. 'There is no choice, William, this was supposed to be the start of something, the start of a brand-new world. You took that away from me.'

Will was agonising over what he should do, the pain of holding onto him was becoming unbearable, but this felt too much like an easy kill, like it would be murder rather than self-defence.

'You don't get your brave new world, Charles.'

Charles then did something strange, something that stuck with Will long after the event. He looked over Will's shoulder, as if he was staring at someone standing behind him. He then smiled. 'Maybe I do, maybe that new world is already here' he said, an air of satisfaction in his voice.

Will looked behind him, but there was nobody there, nobody he could see at any rate.

'What do you mean?' Will asked, the worry in his voice so very apparent. 'What were you looking at? Who was there?' Will had hoped it was a trick, the last-ditch attempt at gaining the upper hand from a mad man, but the look of happiness that Charles displayed was so genuine.

'Pull me up and I'll tell you,' Charles said, laughing as he spat the words out.

Will knew that even if there was something there, he would never get any straight answers. If he were to save Charles, he would find a way to escape, find a way to harm them all again. It was time for him to cross that line he had wanted to avoid stepping over. 'No' he said, staring Charles straight in the eyes. Will didn't look away as he let go, allowing him to fall into the pit below.

Charles hit the ground with a thud and laid there shocked. He hadn't expected Will to actually drop him; he hadn't considered for one second that he was capable of it, even after everything he had put him through. The cleeths slowly made their way towards him, hunger in their eyes and the scent of human flesh drawing them in. 'You're a murderer, William,' Charles yelled, looking up at him with terror strewn across his face, 'I win after all.' The cleeths then immediately pounced on him, biting into his flesh and ripping him apart as he screamed out. Will watched it all happen. He heard the screams and didn't avert his eyes; he just stared, smiling down as Charles was torn to pieces by the same beasts he was arrogant enough to think he was able to control.

Will rolled away from the edge. He knew that he would feel differently about his actions over time, but for now, he was just relieved to have Charles gone. He wanted to revel in that moment and worry about the consequences later. Kennedy and two of his people entered the room and saw Will on the floor. Kennedy walked over to the edge and looked down, grimacing at the horrific feast that was taking place.

'So, that's Charles gone then,' Kennedy said. 'Did he have anything to say before he, I assume, tripped and fell to his death?'

'Just the ramblings of a mad man,' replied an exhausted Will, trying to convince himself as well as the people with him.

Kennedy got on the radio asking for a stretcher. Will assured him he could walk but wasn't given the option. Kennedy pointed out that with the damage he had sustained, he was lucky to be alive, that he needed to go to hospital and Will, for all his bravado, agreed.

'Let's get you back to your friends,' Kennedy said, 'they're pretty worried about you.'

Minutes later, Will was carried through the lab, the others walked over to him, hugging him and asking how he was.

'I hear the cleeths had a tasty Charles-flavoured snack' quipped Tony, 'nothing like a bit of poetic justice to brighten up a blood bath. I'm glad you're alright, Mr Posh.' Tony smiled at Will; while they would likely never be the best of friends, he had grown fond of him. Even if it annoyed him a little to admit it to himself.

Kim went to hug Will, but he was quick to ask her not to. She had hurt him enough doing that last time when he just had suspected broken ribs; now he almost certainly did, the power of her hugs scared him more than a crazed Charles ever could.

'So, what now?' Rick asked. 'There's still fractures out there, no doubt Narvod will try and find someone else to bring him over. It'll take him a while though I guess.'

Will kept his worries to himself. Was that Narvod standing behind him before he dropped Charles? It couldn't be, because they would have seen him come through. The ramblings of a mad man, he once again repeated in his head. It gave him a degree of comfort to believe that.

'Let's take a while off, shall we? Will said with a smile. 'We've earned it, plus, you four really need to get back to work while you still have jobs,' he added.

'About that...' came a voice from the entrance to the lab. A woman walked in. She gave off a strong vibe of importance and not just because of her fancy suit. It was like she commanded the attention of a room just by entering it.

'Would this be your boss'? Sophie asked Kennedy.

'Meet Elaine Standen,' he replied.

Elaine walked up to the group and introduced herself, saying that she was impressed by everything they had done and the bravery they had shown.

'Well, we would have failed miserably without you lot,' Rick replied.

'That's true,' admitted Elaine, 'but you've shown more courage than most people would have, in fact all six of you are just the type of people I've been looking for.'

'For what?' Sophie asked. It was the question that each of them were about to ask.

'To come to work for us.'

Elaine gave them the choice: they could either go back to their old lives, or in the case of Will and Peter, forge new ones based in normality. Alternatively, they could join the organisation that she ran. They could leave their old lives behind them and fight evil full time, be paid for it, and, to answer Tony's question, get company cars and many other perks in the process. It wasn't all or nothing. Not everyone had to join; it was down to each individual to decide if this was the life they wanted to lead, but she wanted an answer, now. If they needed time to think, then they clearly didn't want it enough and as a result, she wouldn't want them.

'Well?' asked Elaine, looking at each of them to try and work out what they were thinking. 'What's it going to be?'

The six of them looked at each other, waiting for someone else to answer first. They knew saying yes would be a rash decision, for they didn't even know what this place they worked at was called, or what their jobs would be. For that matter, they still didn't know who these people even were. But then saying no would mean they would have to go back to their old lives, at least for the four new to this. What about their friendships too? They were so close, but if somebody said no and the others said yes, that would put them on different paths. They would inevitably grow apart even if they tried not to. After a pause, someone spoke up. Nobody wanted to go first, but Sophie knew what she wanted and she hoped the others would follow her lead.

'I'm in,' she said, smiling at Elaine.

'Good,' she replied. 'Now, what about the rest of you?'

# Forces: The Cult of Fifty

The story will continue.

Whilst some members of the group have taken up employment with The Agency, others are trying to live a normal life that is free from the dangers they have seen. It soon becomes clear that no matter where they are now, the decisions they have made and the mission to stop Charles will continue to have serious ramifications for all of them.

With the threat from the other side continuing, and a group of fifty individuals determined to cause as much damage as possible, the stakes have never been higher. By the time this second chapter of the Forces saga draws to a close, things will never be the same again for those that survive.

#

#  Acknowledgements

For Mel Cox. Who not only designed the cover, but continues to believe in me far more than I ever could. I can't love or thank you enough.

Thanks to each of my testers, those who went through the whole book and told me what didn't work so I could change it. Nicky Bright, Jamie Hardy, Terri Julians, Jamie Parr, Esther Gosden, Karen Clemons and Rob Wade, you're each first in line to do the same again when the second book's first draft is done. Thanks too to my editor, Peter Harvey. Without you this book would be a mess. You've taught me how terrible I can be with commas and how much I need to embrace the semi colon. I will definitely be using you again.

And last but not least, for Bert.

