Never the Black Girl

Chapter 23

Tabitha was too worried to memorize the license plate numbers, so she would have to drive to Mrs. Black's house. 

Tabitha ran outside of the restaurant and ran to the car. She pulled out her spare keys, and drove Lionel's car to his mother and father's house. 

~

When she arrived, she was so anxious to see his parents, that she tried to get out of the car without unbuckling her seatbelt. She flew back into her seat, unbuckled her seatbelt, and ran to the door, ringing it twice. 

Lionel's mother came to the door and Tabitha realized that this was the first time she had seen his mom. Usually they came to his parent's house, she would stay in the car, and he would go in to quickly discuss matters with his father. 

"Are you Tabitha?" Lionel's mother asked, looking hopeful. 

"Yes, Ma'am. I would love to have met you properly. But these series of events does not permit that." Tabitha said, biting her lip. 

"What is it dear?" Lionel's mom asked. 

"Lionel's been kidnapped." Tabitha said, looking into his mother's eyes. 

She looked so much like Lionel. The same dark, jet black hair, the same round eyes. All these things made the fact that he was her son, unmistakable. 

"Did you see who took him?" She asked, trying not to tear up at the thought of her little boy being missing. 

"No, I didn't. There were these people who asked him for his autograph. I think it might be them." Tabitha said, trying to remember exactly how everything happened. 

"Okay. Downstairs, we can see if you can identify who they were." His mother said, opening the door wide and staring daggers into Tabitha. 

Tabitha stepped over the threshold, looking back at her with a questioned look. When Tabitha walked over the threshold, Mrs. Black seemed to relac. She opened the door and walked downstairs, into the basement. It was unfinished, cold, and damp. It was dark, the only source of illumination was the light for the right side of the room. Mrs. Black walked to the right, where several large monitors were set up on the wall. 

Mrs. Black walked over to the one in the center and turned it on, turning the white screen, to a screen with the words "Hello" printed on it. 

"Hello Agnes. Show records of Black Eagle Werewolf Clan." She spoke, looking directly at the computer. 

"Pulling up 'Records of the Black Eagle Werewolf Clan'." Agnes said, pulling up a list of holographic people, beginning with Lionel. 

"These are a bit old. Some people have changed a bit since this time, but the faces are still the same." She assured. Tabitha looked at the hologram of Lionel, secretly impressed. This showed a shirtless, holographic image of Lionel, which proved to be a bit more enjoyable than the real thing. 

"Yeah, Lionel had more muscle back when he was on the foraging team." Mrs. Black said, admiring her son's holographic file. "Anyway, here are some of the likeliest suspects from the Black Eagle Clan."

“We’ll use these holograms to see if you can recognize any of the people as the kidnapper.”

Lionel’s mother said, swiping past her son, to the first person. “This man’s name is Windhill, he works on our electricity tram, to help keep everything on and working right. Lately though, he’s been taking off quite early for different reasons.” Lionel’s mother explained. “Is this the man you saw?” She asked, looking intently.

“No, ma’am” She replied, squinting at the bulky man.

After tons of searching through literally every file ever recorded in the village, Mrs. Black and Tabitha sat in chairs, lazily going through the files over and over again. But, after going through them countless numbers of times, Tabitha and Mrs. Black began to give up.