Five Deaths to Trigger – Add Two

The realization that you are wrong can be hard to take. The realization that you have absolutely no idea as to what is going on is even more devastating.

During one of their hits, a TV had caught Felix’s attention due to the outlandish nature of the killing being reported. Sitting down in front of the TV while Faye and Penny organised the body of their own victim in front of the door to ensure that his wife sees the second she walks in.

                ‘Hey guys!’ he called as the cameras suddenly jolted over to the entrance of the warehouse to show the NCIS team leaving with the body.

                ‘What –’ Penny started as she half came through the door.

                ‘Pen, you okay?’ he asked as she stood frozen.

                ‘She’s fine,’ Tom assured from behind him.

                ‘What do you want?’ Felix questioned.

                ‘Two things, one is to just say that you are going overboard with trying to send messages.’

                ‘We don’t have a choice!’ Felix snapped. ‘Every time we kill one, another three crawl out of the wood work. By killing those closest to them we should be able to halt the passage of knowledge. Second thing.’

                ‘They think that is you,’ he pointed at the TV screen. ‘They think you drained that poor person of every ounce of blood in her body.’

                ‘And you?’ he questioned.

                ‘What do you think?’ Tom snapped. ‘But I have a big mouth. They know that I can find you and bring you in.’

                ‘Correction, they know that you can find me, not bring me in,’ Felix taunted.

                ‘Felix,’ Tom groaned. ‘You’re not getting this. These murders aren’t going to stop, you know that. Easiest way to get the entirety of the American federal system off your case is to let me take you in. Eventually what ever is sick enough to murder someone in that way will show themselves, and you’ll be cleared.’

                ‘Yeah, of those “Vampire Killings”,’ Felix complained. ‘What about everyone else I’ve killed? They’ll execute me immediately, I get to skip the line.’

                ‘Not exactly,’ Tom smiled. ‘With the exception of Faye’s little Port to Port fiasco, all of your kills have been hits ordered by me. They’ve got nothing.’

                ‘And Faye? I dragged her into this world, the least I can do is protect her from the consequences. Your plan works for me and Penny, but for her, she’s killed so many people without being told to. Too many for either of us to fix. You can’t take her in or they’ll kill her,’ Felix explained.

‘Can’t not take her in because they won’t look for any other suspect without you all being cleared,’ Tom countered.

‘So we reach a stalemate,’ Felix summarized as Tom’s phone began to ring.

‘Angee,’ Tom stated simply. ‘I should take this,’

‘Yes, you should,’ Felix stated, turning to look at the door where Faye and Penny stood frozen. ‘Why couldn’t you leave well enough alone…?’

‘Woah, woah Angee. Slow down,’ Tom calmed down over the phone. ‘What did you find?’

‘Two more bodies,’ she responded in a panic. ‘Tom, whatever this is. It isn’t human or protector. I’m not even sure it is alien.’

‘You saw it?’ Tom asked quickly. ‘What did it look like?’

‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘I saw it briefly running out the back down. But it was wide enough to take out the wall on either side.’

‘Right, I need you to do something for me,’ he instructed. ‘Go over to the bodies and I want you to tell me how long they have been dead for.’

‘That’s Ducky’s job,’ she objected. ‘Why do I have to do it?’

‘Because you are normally calm and composed. What ever that thing was, it is causing you to feel exactly the same as I did when I came across the first body,’ Tom explained. ‘Therefore you should be able to see what happened and when it happened by concentrating on their bodies.’

‘I’ll try,’ she sighed as she knelt down next to the bodies and closed her eyes, which caused her to see nothing but black for a few seconds before the room suddenly burst to life within her mind, only with the bodies still alive. ‘It worked!’ she cried in amazement and shock.

‘Stay calm, too much energy will shatter the entrance to the vision as well as the vision itself,’ Tom warned. ‘Are they there?’

‘Yes,’ she confirmed. ‘They’re hooked up to some kind of device. It looks like a blood transfuser.’

‘Can you see where the blood is going?’ Tom questioned while getting up and walking to the kitchen window and freezing Felix’s victim’s wife in place outside.

‘I don’t know what it’s going to,’ Angee noted. ‘There is no one else here.’

‘Angee…don’t move, in either reality,’ Tom warned.

‘Why not?’

‘Because you said what instead of where,’ Tom explained. ‘In one of the realities, you are not alone. Get me the time of death and get out of there.’

‘Why the urgency?’ she questioned while Felix began to flick through various TV channels until he landed on the show: How to Get Away with Murder.

‘Because, this thing that everyone keeps running into appears to have some ability over time,’ Tom described. ‘And I don’t know how much. If he is in the vision and he sees you then he could lash out. It won’t physically hurt you. But mentally…’

‘Okay, um, the time is a little blurry…Oh wait, no I got it! Seven thirty this morning,’ she explained.

‘Get out now Angee,’ Tom ordered as he quickly calculated the time distance between the Eastern American Coast and the UK, once he had he quickly headed out to the hall way and sat the dead man up against a wall comfortably.

Placing his hand on the man’s chest, Tom began pumping some of his life energy into the man causing his eyes to suddenly dart open. ‘Where am I?’ he yelled, startled by all of the people around him.

                ‘You’re at home,’ Tom soothed. ‘You had just gotten home from work and turned on the TV before you were jumped, remember?’

                ‘No…yes,’ he realised. ‘I was turning on the TV when I heard something in the kitchen, so I got off the sofa and went towards the noise.’

                ‘What time was that?’

                ‘Oh my god, those people killed me,’ he exclaimed in horror as he realised the truth.

                ‘Hey, hey,’ Tom stated, snapping his fingers to bring the man back to attention. ‘I need to know what time that was at. It is the only way to catch your killers.’

                ‘Four,’ the man stated, the panic in his voice slowly taking over again. ‘I was dead, I was dead,’ he began to repeat over and over again.

                ‘Half an hour between them,’ Tom muttered. ‘And Felix was here around the same time that Angee saw the thing.’

Tom pulled his phone to his ear while waving his other hand over the man, causing him cease breathing. ‘Angee, you out of that vision yet?’

                ‘I can’t feel my arm,’ she whined.

                ‘Okay, stay calm, I’m on my way,’ Tom calmed.

                ‘With Felix?’ she questioned.

                ‘No,’ Tom admitted. ‘He was here with me at the same time as you saw the thing run through the door, not to mention that their hit that is in front of me died half an hour after your two, which is impressive considering that they are in the UK.’

                ‘And the other murders?’ she pushed.

                ‘Felix is the only one here, and Faye was responsible for those murders. I’m going to try and track her down,’ Tom explained.

                ‘Okay,’ she agreed. ‘How long do you reckon you’ll be?’

                ‘Half an hour,’ Tom promised before hanging up the phone and unfreezing Faye. ‘Run,’ he ordered.

                ‘Why?’ she asked, startled by Tom’s seemingly instantaneous appearance.

                ‘Because everyone is now after you,’ Tom explained. ‘Including me. I’m just giving you a head start. Now go.’

                ‘Okay,’ she nodded in agreement before running for the door.

                ‘Felix, finish up here and get out. The wife will unfreeze in five minutes,’ Tom ordered.

                ‘Where’s Faye?’ Penny asked as she slowly returned to normal.

                ‘Gone,’ Felix sighed. ‘Thank you for helping with the wife. I’ll see what I can find out on the murders you’re investigating.’

                ‘That would be great, thanks,’ Tom smiled before using his superspeed to rush through the Portal in his home in order to get to Angee and help her with her arm.