“Pepper? Is that you?” she asked, listening to the steady but unusual rhythms of his heart as she ignored her surroundings.

  “No, but it’s someone you’d love to see,” he said as he removed his mask and took off his hoodie, revealing his face.

  It was a skull, covered in charred and tiny bits of flesh. She wondered if the rest of him looked that way as she closely observed his well clothed body.

  “Sorry, but what are you?” she asked, correcting herself as the gentle horizon breeze blew on her face.

  “Oh you don’t remember? It’s me Devin,” he said, bits of flesh barely clinging to the surface of his head.

  “Devin?” Crow asked, studying him with her eyes as she wondered what had happened to him. He looked nothing like who she had killed earlier and the only thing she could recognize were his eyeballs which were still intact.

  “But I heard a heartbeat,” she muttered, still wondering how he was alive.

  “But I….”

  “Bu.. bu……bu….” he said, mocking her.

  “I heard a heartbeat!” she squealed, her voice barely coming out of her mouth.

  “And why did you bring me here?” she asked as her eyes carefully observed her environment. She was back in Astra 12, just a stone’s throw from the wall of the prison.

  “Well,” he said, as blood trickled down his face, dripping off his jaw and falling on his black hoodie.

  “As for my heart,” he said, slowly unzipping his hoodie. Mrs. Crow gulped in expectation of what he was about to reveal.

  He slowly unzipped the hoodie, causing Crow more anxiety with every passing second.

  She saw a bit of flesh as he dramatically pulled the zipper down, revealing more of what was in his chest.

  “It can’t be!” Mrs. Crow exclaimed, her eyes wide open and her hands trembling as she watched his healthy heart beat in his chest.

  Her mouth went dry and her heartbeat got so fast she was almost certain it was going to escape her chest.

  “I don’t care how you survived, but I’m going to put you back in the ground,” she said, as she shrugged her shoulders in an attempt to stop trembling.

  “Well, I have your brother to thank. He will be so proud I killed you,” the skeleton yelled as it charged at her, its legs clicking with every step it took.

  Mrs. Crow hadn’t quite decided what to do in that situation. It seemed like he could perform magic even in that lifeless state and she wasn’t sure what the outcome of the battle would have been if she stayed and fought.

  She stood her ground, conjuring two big red flames on her fists as she readied herself to fight.

  She screamed and hurled a flame at him, putting almost all her weight in that blow.

  “Whoa!” he yelled, as he easily dodged the flame, diving to the right and throwing a knife at her just before he fell on his side. The knife sank into her thigh, causing her to fall to the ground. She moaned, as she pulled out the knife with her right hand, still clenching her flaming left fist, propping her torso up with her left elbow.

  “That’s a lot of blood. Why don’t we spice things up a bit?” he said, rising to his feet. He watched Crow scream as she sealed up the wound on her thigh, a red mist coming out of the wound as it closed up.

  “You!” she yelled, standing up and charging at him. He threw another knife at her forehead, one she couldn’t dodge because she was already charging straight at him.

  Crow was about to die.

  Within that split second, she thought about different possible ways to escape but even if she came up with an idea, the knife was just too close. Nothing could be done.

  The knife was just about to sink into her forehead when suddenly, everything became slower.

  The wiggling of the tree branches seemed to be slower, the skeleton still retained the throwing posture it had assumed when it threw the knife, and the knife itself had almost come to a complete halt. Crow stood upright and looked around her, observing the birds which slowly soared through the skies. She walked over to a nearby tree and squinted, looking at a hummingbird which was on the verge of landing on a tree branch. TTTTHHHHHUUUUMMMMP She could hear the extremely slow heartbeat of the blue colored bird.

  “Is this Doom’s power?” Crow said, as she looked at the knife which she had walked away from and back at her clenched fists.

  Her body seemed to be working perfectly and she didn’t seem to be affected by the retardation in time. She seized that opportunity and grabbed the knife by the handle midair, the knife giving a slight scraping sound as her hand made contact with the metal handle.

  “Well, let’s try this shall we?” She walked over to the skeleton, and slowly pushed the blade into its heart, pulled it out and quickly stabbed the red heart repeatedly, smiling as she did. That could have been her only chance to kill that thing so she couldn’t waste it. Since time slowed down, she noticed a blue liquid slowly seep out of the stabbed areas of the heart as she stabbed more and more.

  “I wonder what is happening to him in real time,” she said, as she took a few steps back and threw the knife at its eyeball.

  The knife paused midair, only a few inches away from its eyeball and almost seeming not to be moving at all. “Well, how do I get back in real time?” she asked herself, just before everything went back to normal.

  The knife sank into his eye and his heart burst into many pieces, preventing him from feeling the pain of the knife in his head before his death.

  Mrs. Crow stood there and watched as the skeleton disintegrated into dust, leaving his black clothing behind.

  “That was insane,” she muttered to herself as she opened up a portal and majestically walked through it back to her office, not noticing her brother had observed the entire fight.

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  Annabelle got home that day, tired and a bit frustrated because of the classes that day.

  “Good evening dad, good evening mom,” she said as she lazily walked up the stairs. Her parents had noticed she was tired so they didn’t bother to ask her if she wanted anything to eat.

  She got to her door, opened it and dragged her feet across the rug as she walked to her bed, staining the pink rug with sand.

  All she wanted to do at that moment was sleep and nothing was more important to her at that time.

  “Hello dream world. Hmm, I wonder what James is doing right now,” she muttered as she fell asleep.

  Meanwhile, in a quiet and sparsely populated neighborhood, James was caught up in a first person shooter video game he usually played every night.

  The walls in his room were painted black and decorated with paintings of half-naked women. He was seated at his well-polished wooden desk with his clothes scattered all over the room as he hit the buttons of the gamepad using his thumbs.

  “Come on,” he said, as he bit his lip, struggling to take down an enemy. He had his sleeping lamp turned on, to avoid attracting his parents’ attention. He was an only child and had been held back a year because of his terrible performance in his academics due to his bad video gaming habits.

  “Yes,” he whispered, after passing the level he was playing.

  He pushed himself away from the desk, stood from his chair and stretched, his legs and butt cheeks vibrating.

  “Well, time to sleep,” he said, slapping the clean clothes on his bed to the ground.

  He had barely fallen asleep, when he could hear soft knocking sounds on his bathroom door.

  He peered at the door, thinking it was one of his friends who came to prank him, considering the numerous pranks he had pulled.

  “Come on Roland,” he said as he slowly approached the door, unsure about what to make of the tapping.

  TAP TAP TAP…the sounds got louder as he progressed towards the door, stepping on the clothes which were scattered all over the room.

  “Come on Roland, it’s not funny. I told you to stop climbing through my window,” He said as he gently pushed the door open. He jumped into the bathroom and, “Aaaarh!” he screamed in an attempt to scare the person he thought was pranking him, but no one was there.

  “Ok now this got creepy really fast,” he said to himself, his voice echoing through the bathroom after which he felt a presence behind him.

  Could it have been the danger Crow had talked about? Was he safe? He thought, too scared to turn around.

  “Well, I’ll be taking you,” someone whispered into his ear, grabbed him, muffled his screams with a cloth and vanished into thin air alongside James.

  The following morning, Annabelle carried out her early morning routine, enjoying herself as she did. She arrived at the school premises alongside her brother to meet something unexpected.

  Policemen were everywhere. The parking lot was filled with patrol cars which still had their red and blue sirens flashing all around. Could there have been a murder? Was there a robbery? Anna didn’t quite know what to make of the numerous policemen that had arrived at her school. She looked around, trying to keep her calm as she noticed a policewoman questioning Joanna just a stone’s throw from where she was standing.

  “What do you think happened?” she asked Joshua, as she looked to her side and noticed he was long gone. He never liked policemen one bit and had a habit of clenching his fists every time he found himself around one.

  “Oh great,” Annabelle said, as she gazed at Joanna from a distance. She was about to turn around and sneak past them when, “Hey! Annabelle Peterson?” a man called out to her from behind. Was she a suspect for a crime she didn’t know of? Had they found out about Crow? Did James’s parents charge them for assault? She thought as she froze and slowly turned around.

  He wore a black suit with an unbuttoned jacket and she could catch glimpses of his badge and gun as he progressed towards her.

  “What’s a detective doing here?” Anna conclusively mumbled to herself as her heart rate increased considerably.

  “Annabelle Peterson?” he asked again, this time standing right in front of her. He had smooth skin, which looked like it was well taken care of, his eyes were dark and so was his hair.

  “Yes I’m Anna,” she said in a hoarse voice, bracing herself for what was to come next.

  “I’d like to ask you a few questions about the abduction of James Bludovitch,” he said.

  What did he mean? Abduction? Could it be the sorcerers? So many questions ran through her head as she felt a knot in her abdomen.

  “Okay,” she said softly, as she glanced at Joanna who clearly wasn’t interested in being interrogated.

  “How is he related to you?” the detective asked, pulling out a small notebook from the inner pocket of his suit coat.

  “Um,” she said as she gazed at the hard cover jotter in his hand. Her head began to throb as some drops of sweat trickled down her face.

  “Are you okay?” The detective asked, still expecting an answer about James.

  “Yes I am,” she said as she pulled out her face towel and dabbed the sweat on her forehead.

  “James was a bully, he wasn’t reall…….”

  “Wait, what do you mean by was? Are you trying to say he’s dead?” the detective asked, as he peered at her, his eyes full of suspicion.

  “I’m sorry, I mean is,” she said, quickly correcting herself. Her mouth began to feel dry and the sun felt a bit hotter on her skin than usual. She knew if that conversation dragged on, she would have been arrested, and she was about to run when

  “She’s in shock, could you leave her be?” Crow said, as she approached them. Annabelle wanted nothing more at that moment and she felt like a damsel in distress who had been rescued, Crow being her knight in shining armor.

  “I’m sorry, who are you?” the detective asked, just as Mrs. Crow closed the distance between them, gave his hands a gentle squeeze and looked him straight in the eyes for about two seconds.

  “I love it when you do that,” Annabelle muttered to herself, after which she heaved a sigh of relief.

  “Well, I’ll be back when you are ready to talk,” he said, as he pocketed his tiny notebook, bid them farewell and departed, alongside all the policemen in the school.

  “No, he won’t be back,” Crow said, as they both burst into laughter, Anna’s laugh being fake.

  “What really happened?” Annabelle asked, still confused about the whole situation.

  “It seems he was abducted,” Mrs. Crow said, as Joanna arrived in their midst.

  “Talk about a hot seat,” Joanna said, fanning her face with her right hand, the other hand on her waist and her backpack strapped on her shoulders.

  “Why were those guys here?” she asked Crow, as she pulled out her smartphone and began texting Jacob.

  “I wonder where Hittcroff is,” she said, scowling, trying to keep calm as she tapped her smartphone screen. She hadn’t quite forgiven him for pushing her into the pool on her 10th birthday even though he repeatedly claimed it was an accident.

  “I wonder where James is,” Mrs. Crow said, thinking of no one but her brother.

  “Do you have anyone in mind,” Anna asked. She had a hunch that it was Pepper Crow who had abducted him.

  “Well, I wasn’t questioned but I think it’s my brother that’s responsible. It has to be,” Mrs. Crow said, clenching her fists.

  “But what does he want with James?” Joanna asked, as she pressed the send button on her phone.

  “I don’t know but it can’t be good,” Mrs. Crow said as she felt uneasy in her stomach.

  “Something is wrong,” she said, staring into space and clenching her fists even tighter.