The Gate Keeper: updates on hold until further notice

3. Cat and Mouse

Trip turned with a sudden slowness, dramatic and purposeful. The girl had seen how fast he could move with out thinking, now it was time to show her his other side. He faced her without saying a single word, though his artic gaze spoke a thousand. It said everything he wanted her to know, she was in deep, deep trouble. The kind that was impossible to wade through. The kind where there was only one choice, to ride the turbulent current of glacial waters, as it thrashed at her with  heated aggression.

He knew who she was, he'd been the one to pick out her profile. Lucy-Anne Blakey was as troubled as they came. She had a history of arson attacks to say the least, unusual happenings that seemed to have only one pattern, Luce was somehow involved in them. She had spent her short life in and out of jail, narrowly escaping the grasping flames which desperately sought to hold her in their blistering palms. Trip realised what no one else had seen, what no one else could see, no judge or jury would have come to the same conclusion as he, although he had been too late for it to be at anyone's advantage. By the time he'd realised the connection between the fires Lucy-Anne was already serving out a sentence for manslaughter and Trip had wrote her off good as dead.

Someone was trying to poach her. Someone whom had gone to great efforts in their attamepts to capture her, and would continue to do so until they succeeded, that made her incredibly valuable to the Academy.

Trip continued to pierce her with his menacing stare, eyes the silvery blue of an ice storm, calous and cold. He could tell it made her uncomfortable but she remained stationary, hypnotised almost. Unable to move. Unable to talk. She may as well have been made of stone.

Trip's lips turned slowly in to a crooked smile, as he took a deliberate step forward. Every movement exajurated. He was toying with her just like a cat played with a mouse.

He could almost see the cogs turning within her mind, that churned and switched, opening wide earthy eyes, uncertainty and fear swimming amongst the flecks of green and brown. He could hear the questions run haphazardly through her mind in the frantic beating of her heart. What if Kye wasn't the prisioner? What if he, the man before her, the man who wasn't locked away, who toyed with her just to scare her, what if he was the one that should be locked away?

Trip loved nothing more than playing games, to scare and tease. If Lucy-Anne suspected he was the crazed maniac who belonged behind the steel door, then who was he to correct her. It had been along time since he'd gotten so deep under the skin of one of the girls, Joyce wouldn't allow it.

Stuff Joyce!

Joyce was happy playing the good guy. She was a good actress too, she made the girls feel safe. Trip despised hiding his true nature all the god damn time, it frustrated him that she would never allow him any fun. He felt like a recovering alcoholic trapped in a brewery cellar, and she never did appreciate the tremendous efforts it took for him to play his part. She deprived him to the point of insanity, pushing him to the edge constantly. He was surrounded with rich opportunity every which way, it was as easy as picking ripe juicy apples from a tree. Opportunity to feed off the fear, to play the dominant. He was so damn sick of being beta. Joyce felt it was enough to give him a fancy title so he felt like some big shot now he was Head of School. The girls thought he was the one in charge. But he wasn't running this show, he was merely a side act, and who wanted to be Head of a fake ass school anyway. Not Trip.

Luce rose steadily, pushing herself up on to a higher step.

"What are you doing down here little mouse?" He purred with a sadistic smirk, prowling closer. She scrambled to her feet climbing further up the staircase without breaking his gaze.

"Are you scared little mouse?" He asked, enjoying how his voice made her squirm, until suddenly she froze. Her eyes narrowed, suspiously questioning his intentions.