Path of the Damned: Consequences

Chapter 1: Judge, Jury, and....

"I DON'T THINK YOU UNDERSTAND!"

Josh let out a long sigh and let his head swing towards the ground. Shane was up on his feet yelling at Jimmy, who was now backing away from him with his hands in the air. 

Cesar was soon in between the pair, pushing his arms out to spread the distance between the two. Cole was on the scene as well, a half-eaten Slim Jim in his mouth as he tried to break up the hostility. 

Times were tough for the group of friends. It was now the last week of May, six months since Emily went missing and they first encountered the "Shimmer Man". Everyone was desperate for answers, but very few were being found. Josh was sick of the arguing and bickering that had become so prominent at not only their meetings, but their weekly training sessions as well. It seemed that they couldn't go a single day without a fight emerging anymore. 

"ENOUGH!" Rose yelled out, causing the entire room's attention to turn to her. 

Her messy black and orange hair had just finished bouncing off of her face from her exclamation. She exhaled heavily while closing her eyes before speaking once more.

"We aren't even supposed to be talking about the search party schedule for next week right now. We need to be talking and voting on Tabby." Rose's eyes shifted towards each member of the group as she said this.

Josh sighed again and sunk deeper into the chair he was sitting in. As much as he knew Rose was right, he really did not want to speak about Tabby with the others. The group needed to take a vote of confidence in her, for the sake of bringing her in and training her to be one of their own. 

"Fine. Robin." Shane turned away from the previous altercation and sat himself down next to Josh on the floor by the chair. 

Robin darted into the center of the room by their makeshift war-room style table. She started to mess with her hair and check her reflection in her phone. She began to pick at her teeth before Cole yelled in her direction:

"Some time today please!" 

Robin gave him an ugly look before sticking her nose in the air and putting her phone in the back pocket of her jeans.

Cole fist-bumped a laughing Jojo before Robin was finally ready to speak.

"So. Tabs is a pretty dope girl." Robin began.

"Did she just call her Tabs?" Josiah asked in Dillans direction.

"Yeah, I wanna vom." He responded.

"I think she would be a great friend to us all and she's so confident in herself, I think it's contagious, we could really use a pick me up around here!" She continued.

"She already knows about all the super power nonsense so asking her to join us wouldn't shock her, and besides we don't want those creeps going after her if she's alone. We all have each other to rely on, but who does she have?" Robin finished up.

"That was surprisingly convincing." Jojo was the first to speak up, while nodding his head.

"Nah, shut the Hell up ass-kisser." Cole jeered towards him.

"How do we know she isn't with the creeps themselves? We still never confirmed if she is..." He continued.

"She's not." Josh said, still looking at the ground.

All the eyes in the room were now on him. He looked up to see the gazes of his closest friends. He focused on each individually for a moment. Cole's eyes were sunken in and tired, he had been searching for Emily a lot at night. Jojo seemed stressed, he had been forced to master his healing ability quickly, healing the group almost daily at this point. Cesar's face had multiple popped blood vessels and bruises, he had quit his job at the diner to train every waking moment he could. Ash's eyes were puffy and pink, she seemed to have been crying....again. Josiah and Dillan seemed alright, but they might just be putting on a strong front. Jimmy seemed to be in a constant state of nerves and panic these days, he spent majority of his time scouring the deep-web again, trying to find more answers about the crystals and what the bigger picture of this all was still. Shane....Josh could not bear to look him in the eyes for more than a second. It seemed that everyday Shane was losing himself, more and more. Robin was giddy as ever, she was really trying to remain positive as much as she could, Josh admired that.