Ashes of Vile

03

CHAPTER THREE
Scarier Than Scary

The noise broke loose in the air and Maeve grew irritated at the group of people that was far from orderly. They argued, talked, embraced each other, and did all sorts of human interactions possible in just a span of three minutes. "Silence!" She roared. They simultaneously fell into silence with just her bare-weighted words. What she says seemed to be of the utmost importance and what she has to say is deemed to be more worthy than others.

"Your concern is my concern. I will address each and every one of you but I know you're all dying to hear why we have gathered today. Chase claims he had witnessed with his own eyes that the beast is awake." This alone sent the crowd to break into a spiral of questions and booming remarks and insults. Chase cleared his throat and said, "There were another pair of eyes, Maeve."

"What do you mean?" A raspy voice butt in. Chase's eyes fell on the short, extremely pale, and old money-dressed woman. "Bo? You came?"

"Of course I came, I wouldn't miss it for the world." She smiled beautifully, and even something so ordinary looked like royalty on her face. Abourne Blaque was a delicate beauty and she was of grace yet bloomed in youthful qualities at the ripe age of nineteen. "Who was the other pair of eyes, Chase?" Abourne repeated, and this time it was no longer just her who caught on. Everyone looked at Chase with a questioning look, waiting for him to reveal who.

He lead them to the interrogation room where everyone stared at the wandering eyes of the young girl sat weakly on the chair. "Oh Vermithis, Chase! Are you serious right now?" Lilac Evergreens, a tanned strawberry-blonde hair burst in the interrogation room to Cassidy. Chase, confused, entered the interrogation room in a hurry. "What are you doing, Lilac?"

"She's my friend, Chase! What have you done to her?"

Before Chase could respond, Cassidy noticed her friend's presence. "Lilac? What are you doing here?" She said while adjusting her eyes to the bright light. The noise of chatter from outside the room became louder and the mess of a situation escalated. "You saw the beast, Cassidy? What were you thinking?" Lilac threw her millions of questions while Cassidy continued to struggle with the intense light. Everything seemed more difficult to handle with the substance in her body.

Suddenly all the noise that surrounded her died out along with the bright lights. Her vision finally properly adjusted and her ears rang with a painful silence, a stillness of quiet fell. She then noticed that everyone had all their eyes on a figure that was by the door next to the light switch, arms crossed, face flat, and looked even more heartless than Chase which Cassidy thought to be impossible. The tall girl with plump lips put down her black hooded coat and revealed her dark hair tied up into a long ponytail. Her intimidating presence forced everyone to force their eyes on anyone and anything but her. Even Maeve and Chase stayed silent, not living up to the standard of what Cassidy imagined to be the authoritative figures among the group. Cassidy Idgen made the mistake of staring at her for too long as the mysterious girl's eyes shifted toward hers.

Her back pushed up from the wall, arms uncrossed, slowly approaching Cassidy. Cassidy instinctively held her breath as the girl stood and surveyed her with hostile eyes. Cassidy Idgen was hit with the traumatic memory as she pulled out a yellow syringe which swiftly made its way to her bruised neck. Lilac hesitated and just watched while Chase had an annoyed expression. "And she arrives," Chase bravely said. She turned to look at him with fiery eyes, "Do not make the weak weaker, Chase." And she simply left the interrogation room, leaving them speechless.

Cassidy looked at Lilac with pleading eyes but she only returned a smile, "Don't worry, it was the antidote." The dull of tension slowly but surely transformed back to the previous noise fest as August was no longer present; "Who was she?". Lilac then shortly explained to her that it was an intimidating year older girl, August Vile, also known as Ashgrim's famous mystery assassin. She was a traitor to her blood purity and inheritance, the daughter of the Valkyrie herself. Oceanna Murray Vile, I want to hate her just as much as she does, but that bond's between a mother and her daughter, don't you think? It was only between Oceanna, August, and God Vermithis in settling their mysterious hatred and feud. It was nothing something that could be made known and fixed.

Afterall, no one could truly find out anyway. Who in the right mind would ask Ashgrim's greatest assassin why she hated her mother? That would be sending oneself to their own death. And who would question the Valkyrie herself? That would be double suicide.

August Vile was the most skilled and most expensive bounty hunter to chase the chased, Chase Creed. Her expertise was mesmeric and undoubtedly quick and precise. It shocked Chase to the core that the fact she was paid to kill him slipped his mind and stopped in the middle of a resistance to ask her to join his cause. The only thing that saved his life that day was that he luckily mentioned it was a cause the Valkyrie would severely dislike. That day, his life was spared.

Abourne entered the room with a first aid kit followed behind by Maeve. She pulled out a bandage and placed it gently on Cassidy's bruised neck. The commotion settled within time and Cassidy was able to sleep throughout the night despite being her arms being uncomfortably tied together and sleeping on the cold ground with nothing but a thin blanket.

There had been a whimsical destain in balance. The world of kindness is a world of darkness, finding the source of light is a difficult journey and once you reach it, you will only find infectious overgrowing moss of disappointment. To flee it is a much more difficult return, some would get lost on the way, or some would get too sucked in to purposely go back to a world of darkness and unkindness. The next morning, Abourne Blaque, faced the dallies of destruction in her own world of make believe kindness. She was sick, terribly sick, and the cause was unknown. She would wake up in the middle of her sleep, distressed and in pain, but there were no signs of physical pain anywhere on her body. Her temperature was normal, she had been fed warm soup, and took fever pills, yet nothing helped. It then became two consecutive days of the same routine. She would go to sleep slightly better and comfortable enough to close her eyes and fall into slumber, then later on in the middle of the cold night, she would wake up crying, coughing, and throwing a tantrum.

Abourne was human and it was only natural she had fevers in the past. "I don't think I've ever seen her this sick before," Lilac said in a tired voice, scratching her head and slowly opening her other eye open, embracing the stinginess and tiredness of the night. The rest had gone home and bid their usual doings while Lilac was forced to stay behind and have a close watch on Chase as he refused to let Cassidy go. However the two had become responsible for the heavy burden of being awake at night and having to take care of a sick young woman. It was mental, and they so much wished they could do something to ease it, but even in the futuristic city of Ashgrim of advanced devices that could possibly rid her undetected pain, they had no trust.

The morning Abourne's felt slightly better, her back was laid on the wall and Lilac fed ever last bit of soup to Abourne and then patted the pillow for her to lay back down on. They stayed in the same basement of operations that were not taken care of for quite some time, obvious as the lights had gone dim, the floor not swept, and papers sprawled all over tables and on the bar counter. The place looked like an old abandoned underground bar which they claimed as their own property. Abourne laid down on the cold floor with pillows and thick cloth that prevent her back from hurting.

"Did you hear anything from August?" Lilac asked Chase. "Apparently the watchmen are tracking a break-in. The orb is safe and sound. I took it a week ago, which means the break-in isn't us. I guess we aren't the only ones who hate the system."

Lilac nodded and inhaled deeply. "Zakeen will be here tomorrow to take care of Abourne. The plan's still on, right? I'll drop by the post office tomorrow." She said.

"Sure," he dryly said. "Cassidy is innocent, you know. Sometimes she can just be a little—"

"Stupid?" Chase interrupted.

"Yeah," she scoffed. "But she's just a kid, Chase. You don't need to lock her in days of confinement. She shouldn't be exposed to this. I've hidden it from her for so long, she probably feels so betrayed right now." Lilac sighed. "She's young, but no child, though it would be definitely childish of her to feel betrayed. Our cause is so much bigger than such weakness, you know that, Lilac."

"There's really no winning with you."