Amatis

Chapter Two

I sat on the curb of a four way street with stop signs on all four corners. It was dark out. I could see the silhouette of trees and bushes with a faint indigo color filling in the sky behind them. A street light across the road flickered in a sporadic pattern. It was twenty minutes past my due time; I was starting to become concerned. I pulled out my communicator (which looked like a cellphone but much, much cooler) from my right shoe and dialed my assigned Fater, Chelsea. A Fater tells a Vita when, where, and how a human is going to die, so that a Vita can collect the soul immediately after the death. I held my communicator in front of my face like I was about to take a self portrait picture. A dark skinned face with black, untamed curls, showed up on my screen.

“Hi Hanon. Is everything going alright?” Chelsea asked me.

“You tell me. My due time was over twenty minutes ago and there hasn’t been an accident yet. Is there still going to be one?”

“Yes. I don’t know what the holdup is. Can you scan your location?”

“Yes. Give me a minute.” I hit a button on the side of the communicator and a light beamed off of the side facing away from me. The light moved up and down two times then vanished back into my communicator.

“I’m receiving feedback,” Chelsea sounded startled and then informed me, “Watch out! There’s a Letum nearby! He is about two blocks away from you!”

“Thanks! I’ll get back to you!” I hung up the call and placed my communicator on the curb next to where I was sitting.

It wasn’t until five minutes later when I heard a rustling from some bushes across the street. I squinted my eyes to try and look harder to see if it was the Letum. I stood up but remained stationary. A few seconds passed without any noise or movement.

“Boo,” whispered a voice behind me. I freaked out and elbowed the voice coming from behind. I turned around and saw a slouched figure holding it’s side. I kicked my left leg across the figure’s cheek which brought him to the ground. He was wearing a striped blazer with a matching pair of pants. His face was painted with Aztec tribal designs rather than the Vita traditional makeup. Without a doubt, I knew he was a Letum.

I blinked and imagined a defensive weapon to stall him long enough for me to get my job done. A glow came from the back of my hands and about fourteen inches above them. In a flash, two blades appeared from the indents on both sides on my middle finger, on both hands. I could easily be mistaken as the Wolverine from X-Men. The Letum stood up and made a sword appear in each of its hands in return to my defensive gesture.

“You know sweetheart, it’s best to not fight fire with fire,” said the Letum with a hint of annoyance in his tone. He charged toward me and I ducked inches from the ground, sticking my right leg out a split second before he tried to slice me with his silver blades. He tripped and stumbled before he turned around and looked me over. Why the hell is he checking me out?Is he trying to decode my disguise?

Then I heard it. The car accident happening behind me. The pearl! I stopped everything I was doing I closed my eyes to make my blades disappear. When I opened my eyes I saw the Letum running away from the intersection. I turned around and perused the accident. A Cherokee Jeep T-boned a Mercedes Benz. The drivers side of the Mercedes was totaled; most likely a corpse in that car because I felt sick to my stomach when I glanced over. The driver in the jeep was conscious but trapped in his car. I just have to check in with Chelsea to make sure that I don’t take the Jeep driver’s soul if he was meant to continue living. Now’s my chance! I went back to go grab my communicator that was sitting on the curb. Or not... I tossed my head looking for it. It was gone. Damn Letum! He stole it!

Time to do things the old fashioned way. Back when there was no technology for communicators, Vita would have to sense a dying by the way the Vita felt; sick and lethargic. I ran up to the passenger side of the Mercedes and tried to break the window with my elbow. I cracked the glass and finished it off by punching it with my right hand. It shattered but my hand suffered from a few shards inside my flesh. It stung so bad but it was manageable. At the sight of things, the human died from the impact of the crash. There were no other passengers in the vehicle. I reached in the car with my other hand that wasn’t injured and touched the corpse’s heart with my index finger. I closed my eyes and imagined a thread the color of power, success, and leadership: red. I opened my eyes and started to pull the soul out of the body. The first tug was full of all the good memories. The second tug was of the worst. I took a moment before the third tug to look at my injured hand. I can’t do it. But I must try anyways. I pulled the thread and out came the corpse’s soul. I cupped my left hand over my injured hand and tried to manipulate the soul. My energy was running super low, especially with my blood loss.

The pearl turned out to be seven millimeters. The smaller the pearl, the more lack of good character in the human’s personality. I reached my hand out of the car and grasped the pearl to my chest. I could feel that I was about to faint because of my loss of energy. I tumbled to the asphalt and collapsed on the ground, still holding the pearl.

I blacked out for a moment when I woke up I found myself in someone’s arms. I looked up and recognized that it was the same Letum from before. It took me a second to realize that we were in park not too far from the intersection where the accident took place. I rose up from his arms as if I were waking up from a bad dream; all startled and heavy breathing.

“What do you think you’re doing?” I questioned him as I shifted from sitting to standing up.

“It looked like you were in trouble,” he replied calmly, “What did you do to your hand?” I looked down at my right hand and noticed it still had the shards of glass in it. A few of my veins were sliced open. My entire forearm was swollen, purple and oozing blood. Thick red streams dripped off of my fingers to the grass beneath my feet, at the pace of rainstorm starting up. The loss of blood was massive because I felt faint, not lethargic. It was not a dead soul causing my pain, but my arm. I tried walking away from the Letum but I collapsed to the ground again because I was feeling dizzy. The atmosphere surrounding me were spinning like I was on a ride at a carnival. I couldn’t handle it.

The Letum came up from behind me and rested his hand around my waist and helped me up. He guided me over to a bench and sat down with me. We stayed there in silence for a few moments until he finally stood up and started to walk away when he stopped and turned his head over his shoulder.

“Two things,” he started ,”One. Stay out of trouble. I’d like to see you around for a while.” I was kind of shocked. The Vita and Letum were supposed to be enemies. There has to be some catch. “And two,” the Letum reached into a pocket of his, “Thanks for this.” He was holding the red pearl I had just created! I stood up but then fell down again. I felt absolutely powerless. How dare he abuse my workmanship!

“Stop! Don’t take that! Stop! Please just stop!” I cried after him. He kept walking away into the night. I gave up on calling after him. I whimpered at the pain in my arm. It felt like I was getting stung by a thousand bees all in one second. I couldn’t take it anymore. Eventually positioned myself on the park bench in fetal position and blacked out again.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I woke up to the beeping of my communicator. I sat up on the bench and reached down in my right shoe, but it wasn’t there. I reached into my left shoe and found it. That’s right. That damn Letum stole it. But why did he return it? After all, he did save me. Maybe he has a guilty conscious.

I looked down at my communicator which had stopped beeping. I looked at the time on it. 10:43. By that time, showing up to school this late would be pointless. I looked down at my right arm. Being a Vita, injuries heal quickly, but the day after an injury is always when it feels the worst. Since the healing process is quick, the pain doubles. I can go to a hospital but... I’ll just go to Barton Springs today. At Barton Springs the water temperature is 64 degrees. It would feel great on my wound, it might even numb the vicious pain.

It wasn’t until a man walking his dog strolled past me and gave me a weird look as he continued down the sidewalk. I growled at him and he booked it. That’s right! I’m still in uniform and STILL at the park. No wonder I feel lousy.I stood up and walked over to a nearby tree and looked all around to see if anyone was watching me. I concluded that there wasn’t really anybody around.

In the blink of an eye, I was in a plain white T-shirt and Hollister shorts, carrying pink tote of towels, sunscreen, sunglasses, a bottle of water, and a bandaging kit for my arm. The distance from the park and Barton Springs was about 17 miles. I needed transportation. I could drive, but my car is nowhere near where I am. Looks like I’ll be taking the city bus.

After a long bus ride and having to walk two blocks, I arrived at Barton Springs East entrance. I paid three dollars to get in for the whole day. There was a tree offering plenty of shade from the heat of the sun, so I laid my two pink towels beneath it. Since it was a Tuesday, there were only adults at the springs. They were swimming laps from the center of the springs to the “7 feet” marker. I spent the rest of my free time wrapping my arm in bandages, and hanging out until it was evening. This time that Letum won’t steal my pearl. I’ll be sure of it.