The Lost

The Lost (Chapter 4)

Later than anticipated, but hey, that's life! Enjoy! Oh and don't forget to comment and vote! Ya'll know I love to hear what you think!!! :)

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

**Recap** "No, no child. I did not start the pretenses. Tom is just a vessel. You have been searching for me for a while now; can you really forget your own killer so easily? I thought I made better impressions than that.."

Chapter 4

ARI

My killer? Wait.. I had a killer? My mind was reeling. I thought my death was just that, a death. And however mysterious it was (as to the cause) no one suspected a homicide. What was he talking about?

He must have seen my confusion, because he said, "Ah, my little Ari, don't tell me you do not remember."

But the thing was, was that I didn't remember. My death was like a huge black pit. Each time I tried to pry out a memory, a sensation, any knowledge, I would be pushed into that hole, completely surrounded by darkness and it was one hell of a climb back out, I can assure you.

Once again, my face must have betrayed my thoughts, because he said with a little anger, "No?" then with a more composed tone he said, "That's okay, you will remember in time." Then what he did next was too quick for me to comprehend, much less block. He grabbed my forearm, with a grasp like that of steel, and whispered to me "We will meet again Detective Brooks." As soon as his dark, impending doom of a presence touched me, I felt a sharp burn that grew with intensity. It reached out in waves, consuming my body in its ebony fire. That's the last thing I heard as the dark, hollow well within my mind consumed me.

KIAN (Hours before..)

It's a wonder I finished my report. Throughout my dinner with Nina, my unconscious was reeling over my flashback, surfacing at the most random times, making the thoughts not so unconscious. It was just something was bugging me about the encounter, like there was something I wasn't catching... And for some reason, Ari's death was somehow connected to this gut reaction that was just under the surface, begging to be released. But apparently, I had lost the key.

On my way back home I stopped and got a new blackberry, but was too tired to set it up, so I just decided to leave it in the box. Why I even got one, I don't know. For some reason my unconscious took over again and the next thing I knew, I had pulled into a graveyard. The graveyard where Ari's body was buried.

Oddly enough, I didn't feel any ghosts in the area, not even the recently dead ones. I can usually feel a couple of them in a graveyard because they follow their body, almost like they are begging for remittance. And usually the longer they were 'dead', the weaker their ghost signal was to me. But even they were like a constant hum in a place like this, reminding me of the hundreds lost to war, disease, and brutality. The silence was eerie and put me at unease; it felt like a calm before a storm. Something just did not feel right..

As I got out of the car and slowly walked towards the graves of death, I felt a shiver, an unnatural shiver that had nothing to do with the cold. More like, something was watching me. Unable to shake off the itch, I looked around, but it didn't produce any nightmares and it didn't abate my fears.

I walked to Ari's grave and stood there, solemnly thinking about her and her near perfect body that lay six feet beneath my feet. And once again, the thoughts of her death toyed with my mind. She was just found dead, in her apartment, seemingly of natural causes. Even the Medical Examiner couldn't find a single thing to point to homicide. What he also couldn't find was a definite cause of death. He was leaning towards a heart attack. But for some reason, it just didn't add up.