The Adventures Of Ivory Arrow & Jackson Bale

Chapter VII

A lady in a vintage blue outfit came to us. It was three days before our little... 'accident. It'll be fun, she said. Quick and easy, she said. Well, let's start from the beginning, Friday. She wondered to our house, anything but quietly.
"Excuse me Mr. Bale and Ms. Arrow. I need your assistance please." She hollered from outside. We knew who she was, and while Ivory and I live without parental guidance, we were still minors, and the devil incarnate outside, was the headmistress of the local private school, NGL Academy.
We hid behind the bar in our kitchen with all of the lights off. "I don't think we can hide forever." I whispered. But only got shushed. The lady's shadow on our curtains faded. She left. But came back in the night to do the same thing. I opened the door finally, my hair a mess and tired as can be, I wasn't in my best mood.
"Ah, Mr. Bale I presume." The lady perked up, shaking in excitement before walking into our house without me even saying she could. She just walked under my arm. "Where's Miss. Arrow, I'd like to start right away." I called for Ivory at the bottom of our staircase, she slowly made her way down groggily. "Alrighty, now are you two looking for a job at the moment, I guess I should start by asking." We shook our heads, but we did have a few cases to choose from. Adding another to the large pile wouldn't hurt. "I have a problem among my students. I assume you know who I am judging by the way you're acting. One of my students are kidnapping my other kids, I have lost ma-"
"Let me stop you there Ma'am." Ivory held up her hand. "You know we're treasure hunters. Not babysitting child trackers." The lady nodded in understanding, but she insisted on continuing.
"You two are both too young to live alone, or do the things you do. So, I'm sorry to resort to this. I will contact child services if you will not help us out." I blinked, trying to figure out where this change in persona came from.
"Are you blackmailing us Ma'am?" Ivory squinted. The lady gulped and shifted in her seat. Obviously not used to this kind of conversation. "Very well. We'll go undercover in your silly little school and find your kidnapper. And when this is over, how much?" The lady dug through her bag and wrote down on a napkin, passed it to us. Ivory's eyes grew. I took one look at it and smiled at the lady.
"It will be our pleasure Ma'am to help you catch this fiend." Acting as polite as possible we escorted her out. I leaned my back against the door and slid down onto the floor. "Ten thousand is a lot for two kids." I chuckled. Ivory joined me on the floor chuckling too.
The school we were going to attend for a max amount of a week, was a little building surrounded by a brick bordered metal fence. The paint on it's walls was peeling away, along with the glass on the windows. And then, all we had to do was wait for Monday. "Eww, this reminds me tragically of school." I sighed sadly. "I just hope my grades in this amount of time doesn't matter."
"I however can't wait to go. I loved school. We should just make the most of it now, I mean. I kind of did deprive you of a graduation, huh?" Ivory graduated her high school early by like, six years, due to it's crappy educational system. When we met, I ditched school as offer as possible, eventually being suspended and thereafter expelled. I was always happy to stick to her side, even if that meant not suffering four years of agony and then many more of college years.
"Relax sister, I did that to myself. The only reason I EVER went was because you made me. Now," I sighed, looking up at the rundown school. "Shall we?" We filed in with the other kiddies. "When did high school get so peppy, I mean people are literally dancing down the hall." I watched a boy do a triple backwards cartwheel into his classroom, the same class we were assigned to for first period. "History." I nearly died inside seeing the disgusting decorations and globes everywhere.
We took our seats, three boys behind us where eyeing Ivory, but she was busy taking notes to actually notice them. I don't think they would survive if she did. But, listening to them, I heard them talking about a boy, "you think he'd like a girl this time? Why only boys?" This was too easy.
"It's cuz he's gay, guys." I yelled to them, alerting them that I was listening. I met them after class in the hall, Ivory trailing behind. "So, mind telling me who's been kidnapping all the kids that've been going missing? I'm pretty sure that's who you were talking about, right?" I looked up into their bloodshot eyes glaring. They smiled, shoved their hands in their pockets, and shrugged.
"We tend to have our private lives and our educational lives separated. So if you want to ask us ANYTHING, I'd suggest you talk after." They smiled snugly and walked away in a zig-zag fashion.
"Okay, so what now?" I was at a loss. "We don't really have any leads. I expected to be on to something by now." I sighed. Ivory patted my shoulder and pointed to two janitors chatting about something that I couldn't understand. "Excuse us." I walked up to them as friendly as I could. "The rumors of kids being kidnaped are kind of crazy, huh? Sounds kind of fake to me." They looked at each other.
"Well," the one leaning against his mop started, "I don't think you should get involved. You might be next." While he was talking, the other one tried slipping away. Ivory grabbed him buy his shoulders smirking, asking where he was off to. "Look, I have never seen you guys before. I don't think you belong here."
"I'm starting to get sick of people telling me that. You know the ones causing the trouble now don't you?" The one who tried pulling a disappearing act, started to shake.
"He'll kill us man. We can't say." But when he said that, he jolted forward. I lost my footing catching him and fell back. Ivory ran a off somewhere, leaving me with a bloodied body on me.
"I don't want to tell you how to do your job. But being discrete, I thought, would've been implied. Now half the school is buzzing about two officers hired by the school board to investigate our students." I saw a vein pop out from the headmistress's forehead. "I want you to lay low. Dressing like students would help. And can I ask why you were talking to my staff members. One good man has fallen today."
"You sound like your in a war ma'am. If that's the case, that you have a traitor amongst your ranks. And that traitor killed off his buddy, knowing he was about to tell us something about this fishy case. It just doesn't smell right, at all." I reasoned. Ivory was standing by the window, watching the students go by. After our little banter.
We left the office, Ivory stepped in front, "We need the files on the missing kids. Ask around about them, become them. If we can't get ourselves to the enemy, we'll have them come to us."
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Sure enough. Each kid that was taken, were either straight A students, letter Athletes, or very pretty a/or handsome. "Well, we have three to choose from doll. Which would you choose. Even if you already are all three." I put that one out there unintentionally, but I pretended like I knew what I was saying. Ivory rolled her eyes. But she was already straight A, is about the join the last sport team available after signing up for all the rest, and it's safe to say that she's not ugly.
"That's very indignant of you Jackson. But I think I'm already the next target. I'm sure they're just waiting for you and I to part ways. Like that'll happen. So, I need to to let them capture me, then follow us to wherever we go." She was serious and dead set on getting herself kidnapped. Who am I to stop her then. We did indeed walk down a perfectly darkened alley scene. And I disappeared long enough to see her be dragged into a bright blue van, similarly shaped to an ice cream truck.
"Whatever happened to 'parters' Jackson? Why'd you make me do all the work, Jackson!? If she says one word to me. I think I'll blow a fuse. She always did this. Getting herself captured, breaking free right before I get there. But. Jokes on her, I am clinging to the underbelly of this mode of transportation, when she gets out, so will I.
But we just kept on driving. Past the city's border, and out into the desert. For a few moments I thought I would suffocate having all that sand blown into my mouth. Disgusting.
But we pulled over to a warehouse, practically covered entirely in sand. Ivory was dragged out of the car tied up and being pulled by her hair. I came from under the car and kicked a man in the nuts, he released Ivory after that. I threw my dagger past her ropes slicing the heavy material for her to go free. But the other five men pulled out machine guns and a flamethrower.
"Into the garage kiddies." The flamethrower carrier directed us inside. And he slammed the door behind us. The room was dark and the air was musty.
"Really Jackson?" Ivory grabbed a flare from the inside pocket of her vest. It light up the large room in a faint red glow. A dozen eyes glistened when the light came on. We realized they were kids, "Hey," Ivory cooed. She dropped her hands and squatted on the floor. "Hi, my name is Ivory. This is Jackson, we're here to help you." I saw the eyes grow big. And a few toddlers came into the light to latch onto my pant legs and to hug Ivory.
"Where are the high school attendees. Shouldn't they be here too?" I looked around. A small child looked up at me with her sad brown eyes and dirtied pale skin.
"The big kids are out there sir. They are playing in the pit." The kid pointed at a small black window on the far right wall. I walked over to it. It was hard scraping off the grime to see anything, but I was not expecting to find those kids, lying in a large pile, at the bottom of the pit.
An older boy showed up too. He said, "those bad men made them work Sir. They didn't work as hard as they liked. So... the kids thought they were only fireworks." The kid looked away. His eyes said he was traumatized, but his body and face said he was more brave than traumatized. I reached a hand out.
"I am Jackson, you can call me that. What is your name?" He searched for the answer.
"Don't know," he replied sadly. "I was born here. My parents are gone. These kids don't speak enough to name me any." I could see that Ivory's heart shattered.
"Let's get you out of here, then we'll discuss this." She grabbed my shoulder. "Can these kids understand us?" I looked around at them all. There were a few, older than this boy, but not by much. And this boy looks to be about four.
"Yes, mostly." He answered. I wondered how he could talk so well, yet never wanted to call himself a decent name. "It's not the same, giving it to myself. I learned language from the men who go outside talking." Smart and adorable, well done whoever spawned this angel. A man came through the doors, more like busted through the doors. He was large and was entirely covered in hair. He smirked.
"Well, students of NGL Academy I presume. I am... well, that's none of your concern. I would like to kill you now, but boss says I need to get information first. Like, why you've been snooping around our business, and how you knew about our little secrets." He waved to the boy who was hiding behind me, shaking.
"We know how dirty you've been acting lately and we were sent by OUR boss to reprimand that. Now, would you care to explain, everybody?" Ivory was referring to the some fifteen children in the room who were far smaller than the healthy weight and size.
"Why do I have to answer anything from you?" The big man was a henchmen. And if I've learned anything in the dealings of henchman, they are not to bright.
"Because, we come from the King's side to deal with his little pain in his ass. He demands that you give us a vehicle and to let these children come with us to his secure base." She was doing well for the most part. But the big man was all but convinced. He pulled a string that I didn't notice was there until now. The entire warehouse lit up. It was a few blocks long and fifty of so feet across. It was muck covered and run down. The boy slowly crept to Ivory's side.
"Is it true?" He tugged the hem of her shirt. "Do you work for them?" He looked like he was getting angry but only seemed sad to the naked eye. We said we'd explain later. The big man bought it, after we had to 'confess' to the child. We got a large truck and started to load the prisoners onboard, until we became surrounded by men only holding daggers and machetes though. Ivory and I shared a smirk and went in to attack them.
Simply taken down by a few moves, the entire group was KO'd before I even got warmed up. And we hoped into the truck, the kid was sitting between us. "No we don't work for them. We were hired by the local school district to find the missing high school students. But now, here we are, rescuing you. What a miracle that we found you. I was afraid you'd melt away if we didn't get you out of there." Ivory was driving and talking. Looking out her mirror every other second to make sure we aren't being followed.
"What will happen now?" The boy asked me, leaning against me.
"We'll take you and your friends to the city. Go to an agency that specializes in getting children with nothing, a family and a future." I looked at Ivory pleading. She sighed in defeat and nodded. "But, we we're wondering if you'd like to go there. Or... come with us?" The boy's eyes grew three times the size they were. He smiled widely, and nodded happily hugging me as tight as his meatless bones could muster. I looked at Ivory, thanking her silently. She understood though, now we had a son, we named him Valor.