Emotionless: (Prototype: Zero book 1) Page 33

  Chapter 32.

  Eileen – tormented.

  It was the sound of bell chimes that were ringing delicately in the garden.

  Stop.

  Laugh lines stretched, as the brow creased and happiness exploded in the heated summer air.

  Stop.

  Racing around, no exhaustion, as water droplets fell from the sky from the hose. A little mage made a rainbow that delicately wavered in and out of existence as all three played happily.

  Stop.

  It was the gleam in her eyes that seemed to bother me. As she danced around the garden at the front, Donte and Nixon were chasing each other with the hose while Hopper watched on with a warm smile. I realised something about this imposter me. She was very expressive outwardly, however, the gleam in her eyes, it wasn’t there. It was as if I was looking at dead space.

  “Stop it,” I whispered, however, as many times that I have said that and wanting nothing more for the nightmare to end, it carry’s on forward. My never-ending torment continuous, as I repeated the words, “Stop it,” over and over again.

  I was losing a part of myself with every breath I took.

  Chapter 33.

  Nixon – Rokk meets paper.

  “Aye, Donte, I steered another admirer away from you,” slamming a full textbook down on the wooden oak table in the library, I jump crouched on the chair and leant forward. I was grinning at Donte who was absorbed in his study.

  “Who was it this time and what did you tell them?” he asked.

  “Well,” I shuffled into a sitting position and snickered, “It was Charlie, and I said you weren’t his type.”

  “Ha, how cliché,” Donte smiled. “You could have come up with a better excuse or offered a love potion so we could make money.”

  Yeah, I kind of agree I could have come up with something better. I could have said he was gay or even played the incest card. That always creeps people out.

  Rolling my eyes, I opened the textbook and tipped some yellow liquid on it. The answers that I needed for my assignment questions highlighted in yellow. All I have to do was write it in my own words that probably will make little sense but get a passing grade in illegal magic.

  Anything that doesn’t have potions in it was boring to me. I am not good at anything else. I only do them to get a passing grade and survive high school. Mum and Dad want us to go into the organisation, and that always makes me want to back away more. That is too much work and has many restrictions I don’t like. For instance, the fact that everything we do and say has to be evaluated. Also, they run tests to see if, you know, there isn’t anything wrong with me as well as a memory scan to see if I haven’t done anything illegal. Of course, there are ways to hide such things. Mum and Dad happen to do that on a daily basis with Eileen. Except I don’t want to hide them, I want to flaunt them with a wide grin on my face and a swift nod, thinking, yeah, I did explode slime in my kindergarten class, what of it? Probably get my parents in trouble for letting us condone such behaviours.

  Heaving a sigh, I flicked my pen around fingertips while I looked around. It is empty. Who comes to the library anymore unless you are weird mages like Eileen and Lawliet or old farts like Head Mage? This is boring, so bothering Donte seemed fun as he pretended to study. He wasn’t studying. He was playing detective without any prying eyes. I am not good with map layouts on the phone from sky view. It bothers me because it was confusing. I have to wait until he is done so I am bored.

  Drumming fingers on the table, I blew air out of my mouth and rocked backwards and forwards on the seat. This is as boring as that time Donte and I decided not to pull pranks. This is my definition of torture.

  “Sir, this is a library, can you keep it down please.”

  I looked up at the librarian. Her squared glasses were pressed high on the ridge of her nose. Looking around, I wonder if I was bothering anyone. When I confirmed that it was still empty, word vomit wanted to come out when Donte grabbed the sleeve of my jumper and slammed all four legs back down on the ground. Librarian woman nodded, turned on her clicking heels and went to place some more books back on the shelves. Angry with Donte, I wanted to hiss violent words to him. Rule #27 is not to stop one another from tormenting and annoying others. Except he was smirking, amused that I was in trouble, so I relaxed a little and slumped head down on the book and poked Donte’s cheek as he read.

  “Ok, call this number,” Donte handed me his phone with the number already up and then a potion bottle with lavender liquid. “Mum’s voice sounds firmer and demanding so I grabbed that one instead of Dads.”

  “Cool,” I downed the drink and cleared my voice a few times.

  The croaky voice of a teenage male going through hormones, rugged appeared softer, cleaner and clearer. I pressed the phone to my ear, and the dial tone came three times before someone answered.

  “Coastal ice rink, how may I help you?” a male voice, this will be easy.

  “Hello, my name is Hanan Frost. I assume you know who I am and why I am calling?”

  “Y-yes ma'am!” he said in a squeaking frightened voice. “Is this about the missing student from Mage Academy?”

  “Affirmative. I would like you to send me the list of mages and humans who signed into the ice rink around 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm. Send it to the number I am calling off as well as any recordings you have to this phone directly within the next hour that was between 2:00 to 2:45. You understand how important these circumstances are. This does not affect the school but your business as well. If you do not forward them to me as soon as possible, I can easily degrade your business, the island and make sure you won’t get any income for as long as you have withheld this information from the school. Understand?”

  “Yes mam, I will send them immediately.”

  “I thank you for your cooperation. Goodbye.”

  Clicking the phone and handing it back to Donte, I leant towards him as he told me what he figured out as well.

  “Ok, so the reason I wanted you to call them is that there was a large group of students there. One person signing into ice skate can easily slip back out near the toilets unnoticed after being seen. Lawliet was near the rune store. Eileen confirmed that. The mage who well I am assuming killed Rokk would avoid that whole region just in case they were spotted. Spenc told us that he was walking around with Eileen almost all day around the shopping area where there were many people. They wouldn’t go there, easily spotted. Rebecca said she was at the lighthouse by herself and we were sleeping so they would have avoided the hotel to sneak out of just in case they were seen by staff or us earlier on. Avoid,” he tapped the screen, and random circles lit up everywhere besides the back of the ice rink that had many clustered trees. “This is only a theory, but if it were a mage from our school who set us up, they would have left in a group from the hotel. A group isn’t suspicious, but leaving by yourself is. They have connections, knowing where we all were at the time so they would know areas to avoid being seen alone. If one stays behind at the ice rink, if someone asks where he or she went, the mage could come up with a viable excuse for the time being. One stays behind while the other sneaks around the back and kills Rokk and gets rid of the body with illegal magic, come back around and pretend nothing happened.”

  “Yeah, I remember the radius of where he went missing and where the specks of his blood were. It isn’t that far from the ice rink but secluded.” Stretching arms, I grinned and said, “We were lucky to find that information sitting on Eileen’s side table while she and Lawliet were soundly sleeping in a romantic embrace.”

  I find it humorous, sneaking into Eileen’s room only to see her curled up in his arms. How that happens, I have no clue, but I certainly didn’t want to stay any longer just in case they woke. Tormenting and bribing him about what we saw seemed more entertaining.

  “Yeah,” Donte said with a twinge of a smile. “Now all we need is to wait for . . .” before he could finish his sentence, his phone vibrated. “Ok, here’s the list and here is the ta
pe. Let’s see who is on the list.”

  “Daniel, Holly, Charlie, Lolli, Kent, Kieran, Anthony, Jacob, Rebecca’s minions, Zander and Jeff were from our school along with other names I am guessing are from that area or basically unimportant mages and humans.”

  “Right,” I agreed. “Video?”

  Donte played the video. It was some of the soccer team along with our group who sit at our table. We watched them parade around and scanned all of their faces. Donte only focused on the back exit and was waiting for someone to sneak away, but nothing happened. Donte swore as well as me. We were frustrated because the person who killed Rokk can potentially be the one who has opened up Eileen’s memories suddenly. That is the only answer we can think of right now for it to come on so forcefully when I recall her happily . . . Well as happy as she could and relieved for us to be home before trotting off and going to bed. I am sure of it. If someone can sneak and kill someone unnoticed, even from the organisation, they can sneak into Eileen’s room without the sensors going off and do anything to her while she slept. Even jump through her memories, go on a memory spree, and happen to leave every door wide open for her to see.

  “Wait,” I grabbed Donte’s arm as he rewound the tape and made him pause. “That jacket.”

  “What?” Donte asked, confused.

  “The other tape. One of the shops along the strip near where Rokk went missing.”

  Donte, excited now, opened the other one and my eyes narrowed into a figure that was walking down an empty street and had their head away from the camera and alone.

  “Screenshot it and go back to the other one,” I demanded. My heart was pounding in my chest. Doing so, I pointed to the two and said, “Don’t you see the resemblance?”

  “Yeah, but it could be a popular jacket, you know. It doesn’t mean anything.”

  “Idiot,” I smacked Donte on the forehead and hissed. “Lawliet Clarintine has that exact same jacket. I remember seeing him wearing it when we dragged Eileen off to talk to her that next day!”

  Donte’s eyes widened, and he moved back to look at both the screens. We set up the mage at the ice rink and the unidentifiable character on the other display. “Then why does Charlie have the exact same jacket?”

  “What does she excel in with mage magic?” Donte asked.

  Fucked if I know.

  Drumming fingers on the book, Donte was the one who tore the book from underneath me and tore the pages apart as he flicked through furiously. Slamming to a random page on rune work, he dug his finger at a rune, an illegal rune.

  “That’s right. She bested me on the first day of school!” I recalled excitedly. “This rune. To duplicate yourself and make the second you holographic. However, you can do everything a mage can do but only for a limited amount of time. Oh, I know this one. Eileen used to do this to get out of dinners without being in trouble. She would place a mimic of herself there. It took us months to figure out it wasn’t her. I didn’t know it was illegal.”

  “Because everything we do is illegal, idiot,” Donte laughed, but it was bitter. “There we have it, our killer.”

  “Makes sense with Eileen I suppose. Getting close to her straight away just to tear her apart. If she was the one who snuck in to see Eileen’s memories, what would her motive be?”

  “That’s easy. Remember grandfather said that . . . That mage had a child that went into foster care after the accident,” Donte raised his hand and rested his case. “Frame Lawliet because he hated Rokk the most.”

  “Why kill Rokk, that part doesn’t make sense. If she has had a grudge on Eileen because of what happened, wouldn’t sneaking in and unlocking her memories thing she would have done?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose if Charlie did have a subordinate who hated Lawliet and Eileen enough to create Charlie with an alibi so she wouldn’t be caught silently killing Eileen in the most protected place on earth, sorcerer city, Mage Academy. I guess then they both would have killed two birds with one stone. Eileen is tormented by overwhelming memories, making her increasingly sick and Lawliet would be sentenced to trial in the Organisation. Except it backfired because they didn’t expect Lawliet to be in a rune shop. Therefore, him being physically seen for an extended period of time roaming a store by a mage who would know if he was a duplicate would trump Charlie sneaking off to kill Rokk while pretending to be Lawliet on behalf of her ally. He is a secluded mage who blatantly dislikes Lowborn’s. No one would have thought of him actually to be somewhere.” Donte shrugged. “Everyone hates Lawliet as well so pinpointing who she is working with would be hard.”

  “Yeah. Figuring out if Charlie is the foster child should come first.”

  “Raid Mum and Dad’s documents?” Donte and I asked each other at the same time with broadened grins on our faces.

  “If you two do not keep it quiet in here, I will have to ask you to leave.”

  “I am sorry. I promise we will keep it down,” I said with a broad smile.

  Her eyes widened, and she stepped back, shocked before she walked off shaking her head. Her eyes kept going back towards us as she stacked books.

  “Ha-ha, you still have Mums voice,” Donte chuckled.

  “I know,” I laughed breathlessly as well. It made us go into stitches because ironically, Mum doesn’t laugh, so hearing it was hilarious.

  Finally, Donte and I are back. Working as we always have been and that is as a team.

  Staring at the dull, lifeless house reminds me of one of those haunted house movies. Strange enough, I was disappointed when I looked at the upstairs hallway window and didn’t see a ghostly face. It would have been fun, playing Ghostbusters for a day.

  Running up and then down and then back up the brick stairs, we both barged through the front door and shook off the drops of rain that were pounding on us when we got out of the rabbit holes. We walked in, and our boots squeaked loudly. I hadn’t realised it was going to be this lifeless. Usually, on a daily basis, Eileen would be home well before us. She would often find that school was draining.

  It looks as it did when we left. Walking down the hallway, we passed the kitchen that is spotless and a lounge room that was darkened with blinds closed and went up the stairs.

  Our instincts should be going to Mum and Dads room first to break open where they keep there, we assume illegal documents, which would have what happened to Eileen in there. Instead, we went down the hallway and into our room. Hopper, the sneaky hare, decided he wanted all the potions we use on a daily basis that isn't so good to have. Meaning, the potions he took are very, very dangerous. The strong love potions as well as strong giant, and our favourite ones are the crazy potions. Give it to someone to drink. They will have random outbursts, dance chaotically, mimics others around them. We had to vote which one we loved more. Outburst crazy potion or the honest potion. Giving them to the girl was amusing. Giving them to boys caused fights that were absolutely hilarious. We would slip them into drinks when we went out to the shopping centre and sit back eating junk and laughing at stupid o-d-h that don’t have a clue as to what was happening to them.

  Sighing dramatically, I dropped to knees and wavered hands in front of me, beholding our most prized possession that didn’t make it to Mage Academy. When the fridge opened, frost came out, and I tugged on the top shelf rack. Endless amounts of potion bottles were stacked randomly. I recall Eileen one time came into the room for a sleeping potion. Not bothered if she looks at our stash, considering she doesn’t really care, she ended up sitting there for hours to alphabetise them. Eileen didn’t have to go to school the next day while Donte and I got in trouble from Isilies.

  “He left all of the good ones here,” Donte said with a shake of his head. “We should punish him when we get home.”

  “Turning into baby sister would be great if we could get a hair, skin and saliva sample.”

  “She is very hygienic.”

  “She makes it very hard,” I agreed. “Alright, let’s do what we were supposed to do here.”


  Mum and Dad’s bedroom is downstairs before our little hallway and library. As empty as it looks going in, we opened up the walk-in wardrobe and pushed the clothes that hung on a rack at the back to the side. Donte crouched to the ground, wiggled fingers underneath the edge of the carpet and peeled it backwards. Handing him a potion, he tipped it into the palm of his hands and rubbed.

  Donte’s hands slipped through the carpet, and the floor wavered and sloshed like water. Tensing arms, he lifted up the steel safe. There was a pin code at the front of the lid. Unlike Isilies, who believes pin pads for handprints and fingerprints will keep us from opening safes, he really doesn’t know what screws us up is codes. We’re not decoders. Donte on his phone already was tapping away. After a moment, the red light turned green, and my grin broadened. Viruses can open anything. Thank you, Donte’s killer phone, that is riddled with tics.

  Reaching for them, we both stiffened at the same time, as an arm moved between us and grabbed for the documents first. Lifting them up, we turned to the middle at silvery eyes that narrowed suspiciously.

  “Follow me,” she demanded.

  In the lounge room, Mum and Dad on the opposite sofa were staring at us. Donte and I couldn’t look them in the eyes. Defying our parents is hard because they are scary as shit. They can give us a blank stare, and it sends shivers. Donte apparently feels the same, as we both stared down at our feet. We were waiting for a lecture that will stay with us for a lifetime.