Hidden Darkness

Chapter 10

           The police took me to the station too and started questioning me after finding out Eric's identity. They asked me how I knew him, if I knew about the murders. If I knew about his abilities and his identity. I lied. I knew him from school, but I said no to the rest of the questions.
    Eventually my dad came to the station when he had just got home and picked me up in his squad car. He asked me what had happened and I had to lie again. Eric and I started becoming friends but I barely knew about him and didn't know about his abilities or murders or identity. That was the story I had to live by. The next day, the school was abuzz with talk about Eric and his identity and his 'weapons' used in the murders.
    People kept their distance from me for some reason. Aside from Amelia and Bobby, who remained by my side with worryful words from Amelia and an I told you so from Bobby. I decided since Eric's secret was out, might as well tell the people who I trust most. I asked them both to come to my house after school. They both agreed and I started preparing how I was going to tell them.
    Once they came to my house I invited them in. My sister was there, sadly. I received one heck of a mocking from her. "Who's here?" she asked while watching TV as I walked and led Amelia and Bobby to the back yard. "Bobby and-"
    "Ooh, who's that?" she said while looking back at me and Amelia. "This is Amelia. Carrie not now okay? I really need some time alone."
    "With her?" she said smiling a wicked and angering smile. "With both of them."
    "Gross!" I wiped my face with my hand and continued leading them to the backyard. Once I closed the back door, I heard Amelia snicker. I turn around to see what was funny. Amelia was trying to hold in a laugh.
"What's so funny?"
"Your sister is hilarious," Amelia said while laughing. I rolled my eyes and said, "Anyways." I took a seat on the wooden stairs on the porch and so did they. "What I'm about to tell you needs to stay between us three. It's about Eric."
"Okay," they both said at the same time. I began to explain what I actually saw when I encountered the serial murder a couple months ago. Then I explain what happened after the date, why I asked about the man with white eyes back in the library that Bobby can't seem to remember, how I followed Eric out and how he caught me and then decided to show me why he did what he did. I left out the more gruesome details and told them that he was hunting child abusers, rapists, and pedophiles. I then told them my idea for making him into a vigilante and to stop him from killing and it had worked.
"And then that leads us here. And I can't help but wonder what he meant by what he had said to me."
"What did he say?" Bobby asked. "He said 'Look after my sister'."
"I didn't know Eric has a sister," Amelia said. "Neither did I. But he has been getting really angry for a while now and has been skipping school before he was arrested. It could mean something is going on with his sister," I said while thinking. "I have to go talk to Eric."
"How? I don't think he will be allowed to talk to anybody with those charges."
"I don't know. I'll try to find a way but if I can't then I'll have to find his sister myself."

They placed me in prison. I've been in here for about two and a half weeks now. I'm not allowed to see or talk to anyone outside. The judge said I must wait for five months of jail time then I will be put on death row. I share a cell with some spindly man with long hair and a goatee.
He isn't that bad. He's quiet sometimes. Minds his own business too. The others are noisy and arrogant. The first time I came here I was yelled at and laughed at.
The other prisoners don't scare me. I can kill them all easily. But I won't. No reason to. A buzzer rang and the cell door slid open.
My cellmate merely said, "Lunch," and left the cell. I followed behind my cellmate pretty closely as the other prisoners walked beside us, talking away. I got my food and went to go sit with my cellmate. The food was bitter but it was more than I eat in two days, so I scarfed it down. My cellmate stared at me.
"What?" I asked. "You enjoy that stuff, dude?" I shrugged. "The taste is bitter but I haven't eaten this much in one sitting."
"Don't have many food often before you came here?"
"Nope. My family isn't exactly rich by any means. Sometimes we had to steal food or clothes."
"That what got you here?"
"What? No."
"Ah, okay. I was about to say, dude, they wouldn't send you here for stealing."
"Yeah, I know." We sat in silence for the next ten minutes or so. "So what did you do?" asked my cellmate. I looked at him. "You sure you want to know?"
"I guess, yeah." I breathed in and out. "I killed over a hundred people."
"You're shitting me."
"Nope."
"Kid, you don't look like a killer," came a voice to my right. I looked to see a muscular black man sit down with a rather friendly smile. "You barely even look like you fight."
"What are you here for?" The man's smile faded a bit. "I killed someone."
"And you don't even look like you would harm someone without reason."
"Whatchu mean?"
"You're friendly. Many people don't see friendliness mixing with killers. So they misjudge. Don't judge the person by their outward appearance. I learned that the hard way." The man nodded and turned to my cellmate. "What about you? Whatcha in for?"
"Drugs," said my cellmate. "Had cocaine, crack, and weed throughout my house. I was badly addicted."
"Was?" I ask. "Being in here got me through the addictions. Of course with the help of my doctor, I eventually got through them and now I'm clean. But I still serve my time."
"Impressive, man. Seriously, that's quite a story," said the man who recently sat down. "What's your names, by the way?" asked my cellmate. "Trevor," said the man who had sat down next to me. "Eric," I said while taking one last bite of my food. "I'm Ren. It's a pleasure to meet you two."
"Likewise," said Trevor. I simply nodded. We sat there for a few more minutes in silence, Ren still eating, Trevor just sitting and looking around, and me just staring at my empty tray.  "You guys have any family outside?" I look up to see them both shake their heads sadly.
"What about you, Eric?" asked Trevor. "Yeah. A little sister. Only seven years old. She means everything to me, but..." I kept staring at my tray, fighting back any form of tears. "I lived with my dad. We both did. He's a monster and she's living with him alone." I couldn't believe that I was opening up to two people who are not only inmates, but also people I have just met.
I guess the shock of being arrested and being kept even further away from my sister brought it out of me. I blinked when I noticed something small and wet drop in front of me. A small drop of  water, but I figured it wasn't water. I felt a hand on my shoulder and I looked up. It was Trevor's.
"I'm sorry, Eric. I truly am. I still don't believe you killed a hundred people, and I hope I'm right, too. Cause a lot of killers like that get desensitized by it and stop caring about anything. And it seems you still feel. I'm glad that, if you had killed so many people, you at least kept your humanity."
"Humanity? I'm not human. I'm a monster. Simple as that."
"A monster wouldn't worry about his sister. A monster wouldn't care about the feelings of others. A monster just does what they do just because it makes them feel superior or better. A monster doesn't wallow in their sadness, they wallow in their evil acts. And a monster wouldn't become a strange hero with strange abilities and save many people." I look up at him and we make eye contact. How did he know I was that guy? That I was the Eric who took on the Black Widow Crow alias? "Woah, wait. You were THAT guy? Black Widow Crow?" asked Ren.
I turn to him and nod a little and then look back at Trevor. "How did you know I was that Eric?"
"We have TV's here. We play the news a lot and even more when the famous Black Widow Crow started popping up. Everyone gathered around the TV's just to see what amazing deeds you had done, Eric. We were amazed that there was a real life superhero out there." I just sat in disbelief. "Dude, I have been wanting to meet you for almost two months now!" I just sat, amazed by the sudden praise from these people even though they heard of my charge. "Dude, you gotta tell me, man. Are those tentacle things real or were they just weapons?"
I thought for a moment, thinking if I should show them or not. Then I realized that everyone has seen them so, why not. I allowed one tendril on my upper left shoulder to form and had it sit on the table, making it smaller than its normal size as well. Trevor looked at my back, one leg straight on the floor and the other bent at the knee and resting on the table seat. Ren was too busy looking at the tendril.
"Dude, what's it made of?" asked Ren, "I dunno. Never found out, it just happened one day and I was different."
"It looks like you're bleeding on the spot where it's coming out," Trevor said, while getting a closer look. "Like, literally?"
"Yeah. Pull it back." I did as he asked and retracted the tendril. "Yeah, it seems to bleed and the blood goes back into your skin when the tentacle goes back. Maybe it's made out of your blood."
"Some strange blood I have. They're extremely dark red. even more than regular blood. I have been cut before and I have normal blood but those tendrils, if they are blood, are something else entirely." Trevor sat back down. "I don't know, man."
"I'm wondering how you got that, dude. Were you born with it?"
"Yeah, I believe so. Nothing big happened to me in between my birth and when I got these tentacle things."
"What about your parents?" I look at Trevor. I actually haven't thought of that. And the thought of it scared me. "My mother died a year after my sister was born. We don't know how or why but she died. It could be her."
Trevor strongly stared at me. I knew what he really meant. Who he was referring to. "Eric, I was thinking more towards your dad." I just nodded.
"I know. I was hoping that you weren't but then I started thinking about it. I've never seen him have those tentacle things, but...he is a very cruel and disgusting man. I'm scared of him." A buzzer rang that signalled the end of lunch and we headed back to our cells. Trevor left while patting my back while me and Ren walked to our cells. Our beds were across from each other on bottom bunks of the bunk beds. "He did something bad to you, I'm guessing," said Ren. I don't even look at him.
"Yeah. He did."
"I'm sorry, man. I really am."
"Yeah," I say while turning over onto my side, facing away from Ren. "Me too."