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The Luminary / Scorpion Fire
« on: April 03, 2020, 02:46:32 PM »
The night after he had met with Sam and Remi he had to have his class in the Luminary anyway, so if Sam did want to meet up later in preparation for whatever Remi would find tonight, he was in close quarters and could be there quickly if needed. Tonight he did wear a long sleeve undershirt and a vest, mostly because he felt it a bit chilly out but didn't want to bother with a jacket, so he put on more and warmer layers. His class was mostly uneventful, he taught, answered questions, held a discussion with the class, assigned homework as appropriate, it was a fairly typical night except his worry that loomed in the back of his thoughts.
After he dismissed the class, he went to his office in this building to grade the classwork for the day, then from there he had plans to head to the library to read around like he always did. Even with his worries, he was determined to treat this day like any other and while he did plan to spend a longer time in the Library tonight than he normally did, just in case he was needed, he was prepared for that lack of sleep before his morning job. After all he had tomorrow night off from his night job so he could just catch up on sleep then if needed.
He decided to leave the building for a little bit, get something to eat since he didn't eat anything after his morning job, which was a little unusual but he was busy with the school band after school practice for that job and it didn't end until 5:30pm as they were preparing for one of the weekend football games. He walked over a couple of blocks from The Luminary building to a local convenience store. When he went in and talked with one of the clerks, explaining that he needed help picking out some food from the frozen section, explaining exactly what he wanted. While waiting at the counter for the clerk to come back, he felt like something was off, as if someone was looking at him and turned his head to look behind him. He didn't see anything out of place or weird and the clerk had come back with his frozen french bread pizza and a bottle of tea. He shrugged off the feeling as he paid for his stuff and walked out.
He was on his way back to The Luminary, knowing he could eat while grading classwork from today's class before heading to the Library to spend most of the night in case, wondering what he should read into tonight, part of him wanted to read more into Dark Angels but he wasn't sure if that was a good idea given what happened the night before. Mostly he wanted to find out info to help Remi out, but didn't want to be accused of possibly being interested in the strange Angel's offer. He was to an extent, but he was concerned about what the offer entailed, and if it did entail going down a dark path.
He was snapped out of his thoughts after hearing a pair of hurried footsteps behind him. He moved off to the side, walking as close to the buildings as he could, to allow this person to hurry by him but curiously the person slowed down and started to walk next to Dreki
"Professor Arach?" had asked a younger male voice, "Wasn't expecting to see you out here" Dreki had known the student as Mark Daniels, a 23 year old fire demon whom had a mom, dad, and older brother that Mark had looked up to greatly, and hated how humans thought of demons just based off of his interactions in class discussions. He wasn't in class today, and while he was curious about it, also knew it was none of his business in the end.
"Yeah?" Dreki responded, "I still have some work I need to get done before I head home, and I wanted something to eat." He didn't think it was that unusual that he would be around this area in general. He visits the library more often than the days he works in that building, and he knew Mark would have known that class was held at this location. "I personally find it more unexpected to run into you out here." Mark looked away from Dreki, knowing exactly that his absence was being referenced. He was unable to enter the building today, and was unsure why.
"Yeah, overslept," Mark said sheepishly, "hey I've actually been meaning to talk to you about something."
"Oh?" Dreki asked raising an eyebrow. Mark didn't have bad grades, he participated in class, he couldn't think as to why Mark wanted to talk to him. "What about?"
"Look, I know you generally don't talk to us about your past or family, but you have us talk about ourselves all the time," Mark had started, the nervousness was even palatable in his voice. Dreki's face went from one of concern to one of a much more serious tone. He didn't like where Mark was going with this.
"But I think I found out something. You were in the news when you were a teenager, weren't you? Ran away from your foster home because of abuse?" Mark asked, Dreki shifted in his chair as if he was uncomfortable, but didn't respond. "Well your adoption papers were easy to find. Seems as if someone already dug those up, but your adoptive father, Jonathan Hofflan, He worked in a," the next words seemed hard for Mark to say for some reason, almost like it had caused him pain, "Medical Facility, outside of town didn't he?" Dreki had stopped walking forward, looking none too pleased about this situation, and was more focused on the fact that Mark even found any of this out, rather than the hint of pain that was given when talking about the facility itself.
"Look, I have my reasons for not talking about this stuff and would appreciate it if you kept all of that information to yourself," Dreki started when Mark had made a noise much like a congested choke, causing Dreki to look at Mark, to find him with his hands covering half of his face. "Hey, Mark are you ok?" Dreki asked, with his tone of voice changing from serious to concern.
"Uhh yeah, just a nosebleed." Mark responded turning away facing the alleyway that they were currently walking by. Dreki's face had a small look of panic as he put his hands in his pocket trying to see if he had a spare napkin or something. He remembered his receipt, it was useless to him but better than nothing. He pulled it out of the plastic bag and he moved to be next to Mark, ended up putting his hand with the bag around his wrist on Mark's back, and his other hand holding the receipt and he tried handing the receipt to Mark.
"Lean your head forward, here, it's not the best thing, but it's all I have and better than nothing." He said offering what help he could, and being this close to Mark he could very clearly see what Mark looked like for the first time, rather than the vague appearance he could gather from where Mark sat in the classroom. The features were familiar to Dreki, but before he could think as to why Mark seemed familiar he felt a sharp burning pain in his lower abdomen as he felt himself being pushed deeper into the alleyway, away from prying eyes until he was pushed into a wall. He looked downwards towards where the pain was coming from, and saw a hand, holding onto a a handle. His eyes followed up the arm, to the shoulder, and to Mark's face. He could see the outline of of blood coming from Mark's nose so he knew that wasn't a lie. Looking down at Mark's mouth, he saw the the corners of that mouth upturned and all he couldn't figure out was why?
"You remember my brother, don't you?" Mark asked looking up at Dreki, smirking. "I know its been, what? 10 years now?" Dreki was trying to rack his brain of memories, but there was so much to go through he was having a hard time trying to think of everything that happened that year. He would have been 19, a full year after his first augmentation, and a lot happened that year. He connected the fact that Mark knew about the Facility not through researching his past, but he was likely apart of it all.
"Oh come on Dreki, you can't tell me you don't remember your first kill?" Mark asked, there was a sense of contempt but also happiness in his tone. There was a sense of shock that happened upon Dreki's face. No wonder why Mark looked familiar that up close, which lead him to realize that Mark was likely altered just like he was, and not a flat out full fire demon.
"Oh so you do remember him. Good, because I know he hasn't forgotten you," Mark said while giving the knife a quick small turn, Dreki winced and grabbed Mark's hand and wrist that were attached to the knife.
"L-look it was an accident," Dreki tried to explain, his voice shaking from the pain of the recent twist of the knife but Mark was quick to shut him down.
"Shut up, I'm not looking for an excuse," Mark's tone was incredibly harsh, but not loud. It was clear he wasn't trying to bring attention to all of this. "I was instructed by your dad to watch you, and it wasn't that hard to. He paid for my tuition up front, and promised that I would be paid handsomely for this, whether it be through money and backing from the Facility, or through revenge. This knife was also a gift from him in case it was revenge I got, its special you know. I was told to be careful with it, that it can make someone really sick. I was told to use it if your dad didn't contact me for 3 weeks in a row. I know that I won't be hard to find after all of this, but by the time they get to me, I'll already be in hell, waiting to greet you. Wish Seth could be there too, but maybe he can watch from heaven. Goodbye Dreki. It's a shame that the other students you have speak highly of you. I'm sure they will miss you."
With that Mark pulled his hand away from Dreki, leaving the knife behind and walked out wiping the blood from his nose off on his sleeve.
"Shit," Dreki muttered to himself realizing that he was in deep trouble if he didn't act fast. He had dropped the receipt and his bag of food at some point during the whole thing but he wasn't sure when. He knew it was likely that this was the last time his past would haunt him, for either the better in regards to that would have been the last person that would have wanted revenge against him, or for worse in that he'd die. Although he wasn't aware that the person he had killed all those years ago was named Seth, nor that he had a younger brother. In this situation, he was actually thankful for his training at the facility, even if it was also at fault for him having been in this situation. He was able to keep level headed enough to think through the pain, to at least do what he needed to do to survive.
He slid down the wall he was currently leaning up against. He needed to remove the knife, he knew he could heal if he just got it out. Then from there, he could figure out a solution as to what Mark had meant while not slowly bleeding to death. He put his hand on the handle of blade and pulled, only for the blade to barely even make an appearance outside of him. He could feel it pulling on his insides as he pulled and he nearly screamed. This wasn't like when he was stabbed protecting Ash, that knife had slid right out when he had pulled on it. He looked down at the handle, and used his hands to feel what he could of the tiny bit of blade he did manage to get out. Instead of there being one sharp edge like a knife used for food, or two sharp edges like most blades used for injury, this one had 3 sharp edges, and the triangle formed blades were curved almost as if this blade was specifically made to be difficult to remove.
He knew what he had to do, he unbuttoned his vest, and his shirt. He knew the less fabric in the way, the easier this was going to be. For his undershirt, he got his fingers under the hole made by the blade and ripped the shirt downwards completely, and a little upwards to give himself a little room. He put both hands on the handle of the blade, he took a deep painful breath inwards and with his exhale he pulled and twisted with the curve of the blade and it budged a lot easier. Enough that he could remove the blade without pulling out his insides, but it hurt enough that he has let out a pained gasp that was barely audible as he bit through his lip when his teeth clenched together.
He set the blade in the plastic bag he was carrying, it wasn't even that large of a blade, maybe an inch in length, in fact the handle looked much longer and it looked sort of ridiculous. That sharp burning pain he felt when stabbed, stayed even after he removed the blade. His lip healed like it was nothing. This wound however, while healing, took longer than usual likely due to the 3 pronged blade. That burning feeling remained, and he wondered what Mark meant by it could make people ill. Was it a poison, illness, or something else? He knew his ability to heal was useful, but also knew that before he was healed by Remi, his immune system was running amok so it wasn't impossible that something had coated that knife that could be harmful to him, but he wasn't sure what.
He knew that he couldn't just go into a hospital and say he may have been poisoned, or had something put into him via a stabbing wound that was no longer there. They would look at him as if he was crazy, and wouldn't be able to help him. He was thinking over his interactions with Hofflan, trying to see if there was anything in his memory, on top of also thinking about what he had learned in the hard drives that had been collected. He figured that the Library might have some answers as well. While he sat there, taking his physical break, thinking of his next moves, past memories, and gained information, an idea hit him. He pulled out his phone. He knew Remi was busy tonight, and thus went to his next best source.
'Hey Sam, sorry if this is a bother, but I have a question for you. I'm assuming you've read a lot of books in your life, considering how excited you were when you got this job, and how we first met in a library. Did you read any on poisons or illnesses or anything negative that can affect supernatural beings after it having entered a bloodstream? I'm ok, but please respond asap.'
He sent the text. Technically he didn't lie. Right now he is ok, at least beyond the burning feeling in his abdomen. He had buttoned up his shirt and vest again, lucky that really only his undershirt had gotten blood on it. He stood up and began to walk back to the building itself not thinking of how odd exactly that things may have looked. The knife covered in his brassy-coppery colored blood in a plastic bag. The receipt slowly moving around in the light breeze on the ground, and drops of Mark's blood had trailed from the alleyway to the way opposite of The Luminary. Dreki's hands had some of his own blood on them from when he removed the knife, but it quickly dried and he hadn't noticed.
He made his way inside of The Luminary and started to walk down towards his office, where his laptop and bag were currently. He wanted to pack up and head directly for the library, to maybe do some research on his own of the things he had asked Sam. While he hoped Sam would get back to him quickly, he couldn't rely on that, and hoped that there would be some material on such a subject. While pretty much all of them weren't as fragile as humans, he wondered if they even had anything comparable to such a thing.
After he dismissed the class, he went to his office in this building to grade the classwork for the day, then from there he had plans to head to the library to read around like he always did. Even with his worries, he was determined to treat this day like any other and while he did plan to spend a longer time in the Library tonight than he normally did, just in case he was needed, he was prepared for that lack of sleep before his morning job. After all he had tomorrow night off from his night job so he could just catch up on sleep then if needed.
He decided to leave the building for a little bit, get something to eat since he didn't eat anything after his morning job, which was a little unusual but he was busy with the school band after school practice for that job and it didn't end until 5:30pm as they were preparing for one of the weekend football games. He walked over a couple of blocks from The Luminary building to a local convenience store. When he went in and talked with one of the clerks, explaining that he needed help picking out some food from the frozen section, explaining exactly what he wanted. While waiting at the counter for the clerk to come back, he felt like something was off, as if someone was looking at him and turned his head to look behind him. He didn't see anything out of place or weird and the clerk had come back with his frozen french bread pizza and a bottle of tea. He shrugged off the feeling as he paid for his stuff and walked out.
He was on his way back to The Luminary, knowing he could eat while grading classwork from today's class before heading to the Library to spend most of the night in case, wondering what he should read into tonight, part of him wanted to read more into Dark Angels but he wasn't sure if that was a good idea given what happened the night before. Mostly he wanted to find out info to help Remi out, but didn't want to be accused of possibly being interested in the strange Angel's offer. He was to an extent, but he was concerned about what the offer entailed, and if it did entail going down a dark path.
He was snapped out of his thoughts after hearing a pair of hurried footsteps behind him. He moved off to the side, walking as close to the buildings as he could, to allow this person to hurry by him but curiously the person slowed down and started to walk next to Dreki
"Professor Arach?" had asked a younger male voice, "Wasn't expecting to see you out here" Dreki had known the student as Mark Daniels, a 23 year old fire demon whom had a mom, dad, and older brother that Mark had looked up to greatly, and hated how humans thought of demons just based off of his interactions in class discussions. He wasn't in class today, and while he was curious about it, also knew it was none of his business in the end.
"Yeah?" Dreki responded, "I still have some work I need to get done before I head home, and I wanted something to eat." He didn't think it was that unusual that he would be around this area in general. He visits the library more often than the days he works in that building, and he knew Mark would have known that class was held at this location. "I personally find it more unexpected to run into you out here." Mark looked away from Dreki, knowing exactly that his absence was being referenced. He was unable to enter the building today, and was unsure why.
"Yeah, overslept," Mark said sheepishly, "hey I've actually been meaning to talk to you about something."
"Oh?" Dreki asked raising an eyebrow. Mark didn't have bad grades, he participated in class, he couldn't think as to why Mark wanted to talk to him. "What about?"
"Look, I know you generally don't talk to us about your past or family, but you have us talk about ourselves all the time," Mark had started, the nervousness was even palatable in his voice. Dreki's face went from one of concern to one of a much more serious tone. He didn't like where Mark was going with this.
"But I think I found out something. You were in the news when you were a teenager, weren't you? Ran away from your foster home because of abuse?" Mark asked, Dreki shifted in his chair as if he was uncomfortable, but didn't respond. "Well your adoption papers were easy to find. Seems as if someone already dug those up, but your adoptive father, Jonathan Hofflan, He worked in a," the next words seemed hard for Mark to say for some reason, almost like it had caused him pain, "Medical Facility, outside of town didn't he?" Dreki had stopped walking forward, looking none too pleased about this situation, and was more focused on the fact that Mark even found any of this out, rather than the hint of pain that was given when talking about the facility itself.
"Look, I have my reasons for not talking about this stuff and would appreciate it if you kept all of that information to yourself," Dreki started when Mark had made a noise much like a congested choke, causing Dreki to look at Mark, to find him with his hands covering half of his face. "Hey, Mark are you ok?" Dreki asked, with his tone of voice changing from serious to concern.
"Uhh yeah, just a nosebleed." Mark responded turning away facing the alleyway that they were currently walking by. Dreki's face had a small look of panic as he put his hands in his pocket trying to see if he had a spare napkin or something. He remembered his receipt, it was useless to him but better than nothing. He pulled it out of the plastic bag and he moved to be next to Mark, ended up putting his hand with the bag around his wrist on Mark's back, and his other hand holding the receipt and he tried handing the receipt to Mark.
"Lean your head forward, here, it's not the best thing, but it's all I have and better than nothing." He said offering what help he could, and being this close to Mark he could very clearly see what Mark looked like for the first time, rather than the vague appearance he could gather from where Mark sat in the classroom. The features were familiar to Dreki, but before he could think as to why Mark seemed familiar he felt a sharp burning pain in his lower abdomen as he felt himself being pushed deeper into the alleyway, away from prying eyes until he was pushed into a wall. He looked downwards towards where the pain was coming from, and saw a hand, holding onto a a handle. His eyes followed up the arm, to the shoulder, and to Mark's face. He could see the outline of of blood coming from Mark's nose so he knew that wasn't a lie. Looking down at Mark's mouth, he saw the the corners of that mouth upturned and all he couldn't figure out was why?
"You remember my brother, don't you?" Mark asked looking up at Dreki, smirking. "I know its been, what? 10 years now?" Dreki was trying to rack his brain of memories, but there was so much to go through he was having a hard time trying to think of everything that happened that year. He would have been 19, a full year after his first augmentation, and a lot happened that year. He connected the fact that Mark knew about the Facility not through researching his past, but he was likely apart of it all.
"Oh come on Dreki, you can't tell me you don't remember your first kill?" Mark asked, there was a sense of contempt but also happiness in his tone. There was a sense of shock that happened upon Dreki's face. No wonder why Mark looked familiar that up close, which lead him to realize that Mark was likely altered just like he was, and not a flat out full fire demon.
"Oh so you do remember him. Good, because I know he hasn't forgotten you," Mark said while giving the knife a quick small turn, Dreki winced and grabbed Mark's hand and wrist that were attached to the knife.
"L-look it was an accident," Dreki tried to explain, his voice shaking from the pain of the recent twist of the knife but Mark was quick to shut him down.
"Shut up, I'm not looking for an excuse," Mark's tone was incredibly harsh, but not loud. It was clear he wasn't trying to bring attention to all of this. "I was instructed by your dad to watch you, and it wasn't that hard to. He paid for my tuition up front, and promised that I would be paid handsomely for this, whether it be through money and backing from the Facility, or through revenge. This knife was also a gift from him in case it was revenge I got, its special you know. I was told to be careful with it, that it can make someone really sick. I was told to use it if your dad didn't contact me for 3 weeks in a row. I know that I won't be hard to find after all of this, but by the time they get to me, I'll already be in hell, waiting to greet you. Wish Seth could be there too, but maybe he can watch from heaven. Goodbye Dreki. It's a shame that the other students you have speak highly of you. I'm sure they will miss you."
With that Mark pulled his hand away from Dreki, leaving the knife behind and walked out wiping the blood from his nose off on his sleeve.
"Shit," Dreki muttered to himself realizing that he was in deep trouble if he didn't act fast. He had dropped the receipt and his bag of food at some point during the whole thing but he wasn't sure when. He knew it was likely that this was the last time his past would haunt him, for either the better in regards to that would have been the last person that would have wanted revenge against him, or for worse in that he'd die. Although he wasn't aware that the person he had killed all those years ago was named Seth, nor that he had a younger brother. In this situation, he was actually thankful for his training at the facility, even if it was also at fault for him having been in this situation. He was able to keep level headed enough to think through the pain, to at least do what he needed to do to survive.
He slid down the wall he was currently leaning up against. He needed to remove the knife, he knew he could heal if he just got it out. Then from there, he could figure out a solution as to what Mark had meant while not slowly bleeding to death. He put his hand on the handle of blade and pulled, only for the blade to barely even make an appearance outside of him. He could feel it pulling on his insides as he pulled and he nearly screamed. This wasn't like when he was stabbed protecting Ash, that knife had slid right out when he had pulled on it. He looked down at the handle, and used his hands to feel what he could of the tiny bit of blade he did manage to get out. Instead of there being one sharp edge like a knife used for food, or two sharp edges like most blades used for injury, this one had 3 sharp edges, and the triangle formed blades were curved almost as if this blade was specifically made to be difficult to remove.
He knew what he had to do, he unbuttoned his vest, and his shirt. He knew the less fabric in the way, the easier this was going to be. For his undershirt, he got his fingers under the hole made by the blade and ripped the shirt downwards completely, and a little upwards to give himself a little room. He put both hands on the handle of the blade, he took a deep painful breath inwards and with his exhale he pulled and twisted with the curve of the blade and it budged a lot easier. Enough that he could remove the blade without pulling out his insides, but it hurt enough that he has let out a pained gasp that was barely audible as he bit through his lip when his teeth clenched together.
He set the blade in the plastic bag he was carrying, it wasn't even that large of a blade, maybe an inch in length, in fact the handle looked much longer and it looked sort of ridiculous. That sharp burning pain he felt when stabbed, stayed even after he removed the blade. His lip healed like it was nothing. This wound however, while healing, took longer than usual likely due to the 3 pronged blade. That burning feeling remained, and he wondered what Mark meant by it could make people ill. Was it a poison, illness, or something else? He knew his ability to heal was useful, but also knew that before he was healed by Remi, his immune system was running amok so it wasn't impossible that something had coated that knife that could be harmful to him, but he wasn't sure what.
He knew that he couldn't just go into a hospital and say he may have been poisoned, or had something put into him via a stabbing wound that was no longer there. They would look at him as if he was crazy, and wouldn't be able to help him. He was thinking over his interactions with Hofflan, trying to see if there was anything in his memory, on top of also thinking about what he had learned in the hard drives that had been collected. He figured that the Library might have some answers as well. While he sat there, taking his physical break, thinking of his next moves, past memories, and gained information, an idea hit him. He pulled out his phone. He knew Remi was busy tonight, and thus went to his next best source.
'Hey Sam, sorry if this is a bother, but I have a question for you. I'm assuming you've read a lot of books in your life, considering how excited you were when you got this job, and how we first met in a library. Did you read any on poisons or illnesses or anything negative that can affect supernatural beings after it having entered a bloodstream? I'm ok, but please respond asap.'
He sent the text. Technically he didn't lie. Right now he is ok, at least beyond the burning feeling in his abdomen. He had buttoned up his shirt and vest again, lucky that really only his undershirt had gotten blood on it. He stood up and began to walk back to the building itself not thinking of how odd exactly that things may have looked. The knife covered in his brassy-coppery colored blood in a plastic bag. The receipt slowly moving around in the light breeze on the ground, and drops of Mark's blood had trailed from the alleyway to the way opposite of The Luminary. Dreki's hands had some of his own blood on them from when he removed the knife, but it quickly dried and he hadn't noticed.
He made his way inside of The Luminary and started to walk down towards his office, where his laptop and bag were currently. He wanted to pack up and head directly for the library, to maybe do some research on his own of the things he had asked Sam. While he hoped Sam would get back to him quickly, he couldn't rely on that, and hoped that there would be some material on such a subject. While pretty much all of them weren't as fragile as humans, he wondered if they even had anything comparable to such a thing.