Sometimes, Anarchy Is Best ~~ Shadows

6.) Alastair

It wasn't until Alastair was halfway to the spot he was meant to hide the letter to Toby telling him to meet up with him that he realized he was being followed. 

Now, if you know what you're doing on the street -- which Alastair surely did considering he's had more years in hiding and being on Eastwalden's most wanted list than he ever had in school – it's extremely easy to know who you're being followed by.  

At least, the main things. Like, whether they were a hybrid or not, how good they were at tracking, and if they were also a criminal. 

Alastair got the short end of the stick on all three things. 

For one, no matter where he looked, walked, or turned, he couldn't spot his pursuer. Meaning that they were either something that could fly or go from rooftop to rooftop easily, like a bird or maybe a spider hybrid if they had experience, or they were a Kiophao. 

Judging from the way he'd been followed even as he went through every back alley he could and took every turn possible, no one ever showed themself to him, and he only had his intuition to go off of for the whole thing, he'd say it was the latter, and they were damn good at what they were doing.  

He went through his mental list of Kiophao hybrids he knew of, but could only come up with a couple people that it could be, and every one of them was someone he knew somewhat personally, no reason for them to hide from him or track him.  

Unless they were looking for something. Maybe someone else that Alastair had connections to. He knew Ewe had a few enemies made that hadn't been dealt with; Gray and Archer weren't public enough to really have enemies beyond the government.  

Maybe one of Ewe's enemies had hired someone to look for her, and they were tracking Alastair to try and find her. Yeah, that's what's happening. This could in no way have anything to do with the child in his living room. Nothing at all. 

Nothing is wrong. Just a semi-normal day with a minor inconvenience.  

Stop lying to yourself, his inner voice pleaded, sounding annoyingly like Gray when he tried to talk logic into Alastair's wild impulse.  

He ignored it in favor of the billion other thoughts spinning out in his head, using his mental map to track his way through the maze of alleys he'd gone through in a futile attempt to lose his pursuer.  

After what felt like an eternity of walking, he made it to their spot. They'd figured out long ago that it was easy to slide a piece of paper in one of the cracks in the old fountain that Carson kept promising to repair. It was another injustice to Alastair, just a wonderful structure shouldn't be tossed to the side like garbage. Didn't they have any morals at all? Ignoring their history was simply a way to make it repeat itself.  

Now, Alastair wasn't a moron. He knew very well he'd been followed, and wasn't simply going to leave after putting the note in place. So he walked away, far enough back to appear as if he was headed home, waiting for the eyes to leave him. But once they did, he was coming right back out of the alleys, watching.  

That note was discreet enough so it wouldn't have anything useful to his pursuer, and surely- 

Goddamn Kiophao hybrids.