Secret of the Caretakers

The Trail

Ch - 3

The night was darker than usual. The new moon had favored my plan of snooping around on private property without fear of detection. But I still had to be stealthy and unpredictable for I didn't want Rosa to see me coming. It was guru Zen's hunch that Rosa may have gone to her ancestral home in the process of finding things out about her past and future. Hoping that I would find a fresh trail there I had also teleported to the stone manor, 500 miles to the north of the CC's, which Rosa used to call home. The place had been deserted for the past many years and nobody was allowed on the grounds, thanks to all the electric fencing done around the perimeter.

Darkness did not scare me, nor did the fact that I was in forbidden area. I had been out on many night time mis-adventures before in the woods surrounding the CC's but it had become a familiar territory and I was almost always accompanied by Rosa. Today however, I was all alone and the creepiness of this house was beyond comprehension. Think of the creepiest horror house you have seen (minus all the funny contraptions) and then multiply it with 100; that's what I was looking at!

Mustering all the courage that I had, I ran up to the main house and sneaked into its back yard. There was a faint light flickering in the window of the top storey. The hearth fire must be burning. One...two...three...four; four floors...climbing was out of the question, I would have to teleport! But then I may not be able to avoid any mishap if I would simply materialize in that room. So I decided to teleport to the third floor and then walk up the rest of the way.

If I said that the house was creepy beyond comprehension from the outside, it was even creepier from the inside. I had this strange tingling at the back of my neck the moment I materialized on the third floor landing. Thankfully I was wearing converse shoes and the dust on the floor was muffling any sound I was causing. Slowly, I moved up the stairs. The door to the room with the fire was closed shut and only a faint light was filtering out to the landing from the keyhole and cracks around the door.

I peeped into the keyhole trying to capture as much about the room as I could. A fire was burning feebly and in front of it was a single figure lying in a heap. I stared at the figure, it was disturbingly wet and it was barely moving. I waited with bated breath and listened hard for any kind of commotion inside the room. Few minutes passed and nothing happened. Suddenly the person in front of the fire turned around and to my disappointment as well as relief, it wasn't Rosa. But it definitely was some poor girl who needed help, as there was blood all over! I teleported myself into the room and the girl was shocked out of her depths at my entry.

"Hi there!" I said in a friendly tone, while approaching towards her.

"Who?...How?!" she croaked faintly.

"Let me help you first or you will not stay alive long enough to know the answers to your questions" I said bending over and trying to check her wounds.

But she wouldn't let me touch her; her hands were clenched into a tight fist clinging to her chest. I tried to pry them away but to no avail; where was she getting all this strength from?!

"Listen, I am not here to harm you...let me help!" but I could see mistrust in her eyes.

I was losing time and I may not be able to help her much if it was too late. And I had some questions of my own that needed answering.

So I simply picked her up and teleported back to the CC's.

In the mere seconds that I took to teleport back, the girl had fainted. Back at the CC's, I rushed to get guru Zen's help.

"Guru Zen! I need your help." I said walking into his office. And then I stopped in my tracks. There sat the only person I was jealous of in the whole world... Carl.

"What the...!" shouted Carl at the blood soaked sight of me.

"Spike, who is that?!" asked guru Zen calmly, but I could sense a tremor in his voice. May be he thought I was holding Rosa...

"It's not her. But I found her on the first step itself..." I was trying to be as discreet as I could be; given the fact that Carl was hanging on to every word uttered.

Guru Zen stared at me and then turned to Carl and said "Carl, please come back later, we will discuss your sessions tomorrow morning."

"But..."started Carl, but looking at guru Zen, he stopped short; "Yes, guru Zen. Good night." With that he left.

As soon as he was out of the room, I moved to the settee in the rear of the office and placed the girl upon it.

"Who is she?" asked guru Zen.

"I went to Rosa's ancestral home as you recommended and there on the fourth floor, I found her. She was bleeding heavily and had something clutched in her hands. When I tried to help her, she protested so I brought her here; hoping that she may know something about Rosa." I said.

He bent over the girl and tried to pry open her hands to see what she was holding so dearly. But even in unconsciousness, she would not let go so easily. Finally, when he managed to open that death grip of hers, there lay a thin gold chain and a long, bloody fang. Removing both the things from her hand, he started inspecting her wounds. There were deep gnashes in her shoulder from which she was still bleeding. Her arms and legs were heavily bruised and there was a bite-like wound on her upper thigh. I felt repulsed by all this blood and brutality and averted my eyes. If this girl knew about Rosa by any chance, I couldn't help but imagine what horrid experiences Rosa may be facing right this moment.

Guru Zen then summoned his healing powers and started focusing the energy on the girl. The intensity of his power was such that even I could feel a sense of well being coursing through me. As a child, I had always marveled as to why I had my powers and when I came to the CC's I was even more perplexed. People had such inexplicable powers that defied laws of physics. Oh yes, even at the age of 9, I was aware of something called physics because I had started trying to find answers for my condition at a very young age. It turned out I was in the right direction also. Our gurus at the CC's taught us the reasons and the basis of our powers by the most basic and logical medium possible.

Physics!

Molecular physics explained how I was able to teleport from one location and materialize in the other, almost simultaneously. The time-space continuum explained the nuances of Rosa's ability to look into the various possibilities of future and now, even past. Similarly, guru Zen's healing power had its explanation lying in Noetic science which states that thoughts are tangible in terms of sub-atomic particles with mass and have the ability to affect the outside physical world. Thus, when guru Zen focuses his thoughts of healing on some external entity, he could modify the physical state of the ailing person to such a degree that the person in question gets healed very fast.

It was only a matter of minutes that the wounds on the unconscious girl's body started healing and her bruises started fading. When she started gaining consciousness, guru Zen finally stopped and stepped back. She was still not completely healed but she was not in immediate danger anymore. As soon as she started making some sense of her surroundings, panic resurfaced in her eyes. She started searching for something desperately and when she couldn't find it she started getting frantic.

"What you are looking for is right here... relax!" said guru Zen, raising the chain and fang from a nearby table.

She relaxed a little but kept on staring at her belongings.

"We are your friends and we don't mean to harm you in any way. We found you bleeding to death and brought you here only to help you. However, we found you in suspicious circumstances in one of our properties and would like to know how you gained access there."

She stared at guru Zen for a few moments before she said in a whisper...

"I know it's not your property...She told me so herself!"