The Departed (Working Title)

Chapter Five

My nerves were getting the best of me for the remainder of the day. I couldn't sit still and I couldn't focus on anything except the fact that come night time, I was going to be going on my first shadow rounds. When we had returned to the camp and finished a breakfast of maple and brown sugar oatmeal and bacon, Les dragged me back to our cabin and drilled me on what had happened once the team left us at the bottom of that cliff. I gave her the cliff notes version of things, which ended with Les shrieking because I got to hug Jax.

"What was it like?!" She grilled me.

"Awkward? I don't know. I essentially just hugged my boss, which is.. I don't know, it's weird, right?"

Les plopped her hands on my shoulders and shook me violently, "Um... have you seen the man? He's got muscles on his muscles, and those eyes... don't even get me started."

"I mean I guess he's good looking," I agreed.

Les was in the middle of changing from one pair of black clothing to a clean pair of black clothing. "You guess?! Gosh Shawn you must be crazy, I would love to just dip that man in chocolate and eat him for dessert."

"Les!" I shouted at my wildly inappropriate friend.

As she threw her dirty clothes into a corner of the room, Les gave me one of her award winning pouty faces with the bottom lip jutting out.

"Can we change the subject please?" I asked. I was thinking Les probably had a good idea in changing, and began to change into my own set of new fresh clothing. "Gosh, why do we have to wear all black clothing all the time?"

Les giggled at me as she spread out onto the bottom bunk of her bed, settling into our Book of Reapers. "It's neutral. It doesn't draw anyones attention," she explained to me as she flipped open the book to a page on the most recent creature we were learning about. We were finally graduating to the B's today.

"That makes sense," I said as I glanced over her shoulder looking at the page on Banshees she was reading over.

A little while after we joined the crew for our daily lecture from Jax before tucking into a lunch of ham and Swiss cheese sandwiches. Once everyone finished their lunch we worked through our combat session without any event. Before we knew it, we had plowed through our dinner of shredded chicken tacos, rice, and beans and were enjoying the warmth of the crackling fire.

I was getting lost in Kyle's rendition of I Will Follow You Into the Dark, when Jax finally approached me. "You ready?"

Savoring one last moment of the radiating warmth from the fire, I nodded and got up. With each step that warmth slowly seeped away. We walked over by the cabins away from prying eyes.

"There's a couple things we need to go over before we start your shadow rounds," Jax finally said, "First, you are not to interfere with anything. Don't touch anything, don't say anything, don't even think anything outside the realm of observing me. Second, you will have questions... leave them for after we're done. I have a list I have to get through, and if I don't get through it there are severe consequences. Got it?"

I wasn't sure I heard everything because my heart was pounding in my ears, but I still nodded in agreement. Satisfied with my less-than-answer, Jax held out his hand. I swallowed hard, my nerves leaching through every ounce of my body. Okay, we were doing this. We were going to do this. We were going on his rounds.  I delicately placed my hands in his rough callused ones, and closed my eyes. The familiar sensation of getting hooked behind the belly button overtook me, and I was almost certain I was going to throw up.

"Open your eyes," Jax said gently, "We're at our first stop."

When I opened my eyes, I was hit with a full battery of sights and smells. I knew in an instant we were in a hospital - we were in a dark room with beeping machines and a bed lay before us with a rotund sleeping occupant. The smell of all sorts of chemicals and disinfectant assaulted my nose. The occupant's hair was balding at the top, and he had a large droopy nose where a pair of glasses rest. A newspaper lay face down on his chest. Jax slowly crept towards the man, "This is Howard Clemens. 62 years old. He just had a heart attack, and surgery to boot. He has two adult children, and a wife," he said softly.