Unbroken Origin of the Curse

CHAPTER 04 Cursed Ones

"Dude, I love Echo." Flay whispers into Roger's ear.

Looking at him unamused I asked, "What are you talking about? You got annoyed with him, like three times in as many minutes."

"Man being cursed is amazing." I just stared blankly at his nonsense. Then he continued, "You do know that if we are like cursed. I'm going to haunt you after I die. I Venom, Vessel of Curiosity, am happy about these gifts, how bout you, Vessel of Hope?" Flay laughs completely forgetting that we were currently in class.

Joining in on his fun I gave my best Echo imitation. "Venom, if you die you will know if you are cursed, Vessel of Curiosity." I laughed with Flay before Mr. Walker came by and gave us a grim look. We both smiled and looked down at are assignments. My brain began to think, it had been a week since we've seen Echo. Nothing more than a mere shadow on a wall caused such a fright. At first, I was afraid to even step foot in my own home but things seemed to be back to normal. For the most part.

Then Flay and I realized after the first day, we were different. After school that next day we were walking home, when Flay picked up on a scent radiating off my body. The scent was so delightful it drove his senses mad. Then I noticed that he smelled different as well. After smelling the sweet scent coming off of him, we became use to it. That all changed the next day when I saw Valentina. Her smell was intoxicating, near hallucinogenic, it filled my body with pleasures and thoughts I never fathomed before. It was madding, I didn't understand why she's was so arousing to be around. I thought I was over the fear of being love struck but the scent made it as if we met, for the first time again. I could barely look her in her face that entire week. Then there was Ryder, his scent was so fowl I cringed to even think about it. From there I decide to look up this 'scent' everyone has all of a sudden. I found the subject to be quite fascinating.

Aura was the word he was looking for, only after an hour of searching did the word aura come up. Life essences is perceived through aura. The weakest auras are perceived by scent and the strongest by presences. The book had many pictures of martial artist focusing their auras to do things such as set something on fire, but the fact remained it was just a theory. After sharing my discovery with Flay, we decided to discover more about our so-called curse.

We stayed up late every night waiting for the Echo to return, but it was useless. It never showed itself again. This grew frustrating we didn't know anything about our "curse" nor did we have any leads or anyone to ask, just some stupid aura. I decided that it was best that Flay moved into my house and slept in my room now since we were determined to discover the truth about the Shadows. After a week, we didn't give up hope but we still had zero results, things were getting humiliating.

School started to change for Flay and the rest of the us. After we made a pact to not tell anyone, so we wouldn't get thrown into a mental ward, everyone's popularity suspiciously rose. The school had split into its own clicks. Even Ryder had a following of dedicated friends.

Something was really different with the school. The rumors around the classroom started to talk about the Jade Skulls. The once peaceful local gang that runs this area of town. They were under attack for no reason and they began to patrol the streets and schools more violently now. More trouble ran our way when people started to leave and not show up for class. Grant was always missing now and Philip had missed two days out of the last week. The classes grew colder since the atmosphere began to change as well. Flay's jokes weren't enough to change the mood for the better anymore.

I thought about how in a week, everything changed and mentioned it to Flay who didn't seem to notice at all. I nudged his shoulder "Did you see that?"