Destiny's Wrath (Destiny Series - Book 3) (3 page)

“
I don’t know, something about an inheritance from Uncle Dan. She wanted to see you. You should go over and see what it was all about.” Jessie was a smart girl; she would know instantly that Noah and she were in trouble. They didn’t have an Uncle Dan. When they were younger “
Uncle Dan”
was a code between them, for covering for their mom when an adult inquired about their mother’s whereabouts. She was always with Uncle Dan getting groceries, or Uncle Dan was sick, so she was at his house checking on him. Telling an adult that their mother was at the bar getting blitzed was never an option.

Jimmy slid his hand from her shoulder to the back of her neck, holding her firmly in place. His gaze never left Noah when he asked, “Your mom called you today? When? I’ve been with you all day, bro.”

“
Right before you got here.”

Jimmy turned his attention to Jessie, “She’s waited ten years to contact you; she can wait a little longer. Noah’s going to do some of my Algebra homework for me. There’s something I want to show you in the other room.”

Noah lunged at Jimmy, but Jimmy had the reflexes of a cat, and punched him hard in the nose. Blood went everywhere. Jimmy kept his palm on the back of Jessie’s neck; when she let out a scream, Jimmy hardly seemed to notice. He reached in his pocket with his free hand, pulled out a folded-up piece of paper, and tossed it at Noah’s doubled-up body. “Here you go. Check the numbers for me. I want to talk to Jessie - alone.”

Noah took in a deep breath and with all his force yelled, “Jessie, ruuuun!” She couldn’t run if she wanted to: Jimmy pulled out the knife and held it to her chest. He looked at her with vacant eyes, “Noah’s having a rough time concentratin’. I think we should give him some privacy.” Jimmy’s knife was razor sharp. He eased it onto the button of her blouse and the edge sliced through the thread holding the top button. Jessie whimpered and Jimmy laughed.

Jessie began to shake uncontrollably. The knife that had just removed her button sliced the fabric of her blouse and pierced her skin. Crimson began oozing onto the fabric. Jimmy looked at Noah, “How much time you need? Jessie and I’ll be righ’ nex’ door. The longer you take, the worse it’ll be . . . for her.” With his last threat, Jimmy backed out of the room dragging Jessie with him.

Noah unfolded the piece of paper and looked at the scribbles on it. The paper had numbers on it, in what looked like a formula, but the numbers didn’t make any sense. It was a modified formula for a volume multiplied by a coefficient that didn’t seem to come from anywhere.

Not only did the formula not seem to make any sense, but the values were all skewed. Words were scribbled all over the paper:
kill, die, death, mutilation, explosion
and
boom
. Next to each word was a hand drawn violent cartoon. Noah couldn’t hear anything coming from the room next door, and he didn’t want to waste one more second than he needed to. He did as he was asked. He checked the calculation. The math was correct, but he modified the formula, reducing the volume. He scribbled the new calculation down and swung the door open to dash into the other room.

Noah stepped through the doorway and directly into Jimmy. Jessie was nowhere to be seen. Noah shouted, “Where is she? What’d you do with Jessie?!”

Jimmy answered almost absently, “She’s fine, Noah. She’s tied up in the other room. And out of respect for you, I didn’t do nothin’ to ‘er.”

Jimmy offered a smile, but Noah didn’t buy it for a second. He handed Jimmy the paper and said, “I found the problem with your equation. It’s fixed”.

Jimmy acted as if nothing outrageous had just happened. “You know, math isn’t as exact a science as everyone thinks it is.” Noah eyed him closely but didn’t try to find meaning in any more of his stupid rants.

Jimmy examined the sheet Noah had just given him and was excited to see Noah really had fixed the formula. Jimmy seemed almost cheerful when he said, “Here’s a good one - three guys go out on the town drinkin’ and decide to crash at a cheap motel to sleep it off so they don’t get a DUI. The manager tells ‘em the room is $30, so they each pitch in $10 bucks. But when they get to the room, it’s all nasty, and they call the front desk to bitch. So the manager tells the motel clerk to go ahead and give the three guys a partial refund and hands the clerk five $1 bills. The clerk knows he can’t divide $5 bucks three ways, so he gives each of ‘em a $1 refund and keeps a two dollar tip for his self. So, each of the guys didn’t pay $10, they only paid $9, right? The clerk kept the other two dollars. $9 times 3 guys = $27. $27 plus the $2 that the clerk kept is $29 not $30.” Jimmy looked at Noah as if he had just shared the most complicated mathematical problem of our time, and Noah only half understood what Jimmy had said.

Jimmy saw that Noah didn’t follow him, so he repeated, “You know what I’m saying, right? 10x3=30. 30-5=25. If a simple math problem like 9x3=27 and 27+2=29 when it should be 30 – then math flat out don’t work, am I right?”

Noah didn’t understand what Jimmy was getting at, and he very nearly asked him to repeat the math problem a third time when he felt the blade plunge into his lung and knew he would drown in his own blood. He reached out to Jimmy and asked one thing, “Why?”

“
Don’t take offense, bro – I have a mission and don’t want you gettin’ in the way. Besides if you’re a religious guy, Miss Abbey and Jessie are waitin’ for you in the light.” Noah felt the sting of the blade a second, third, fourth, fifth time. He collapsed to the floor, watching the blood escape from his body.

Jimmy looked at his watch, it was just before 6 p.m. Noah had been one of Jimmy’s closest friends for almost two years, which probably wasn’t saying much. The two rarely spent time together outside of school. Jimmy had heard all about Miss Abbey but hadn’t spent that much time around her. He could tell from the first second that she didn’t like him; he knew it. When Jimmy first met Jessie, Jimmy thought she was cute, but lately he had noticed she had transformed from cute to hot.

Jimmy looked deep inside his soul and tried to find remorse for what he had done this afternoon. It wasn’t there. He wasn’t mentally ill: he should be remorseful. He had just killed three people who had been kind to him. Noah had treated him well, even offering to help him with his “mission,” without fully understanding what it was. Jimmy hadn’t let anyone in on his plan until today.

No regret, “I must really be a monster just like Samael says I am,” he thought to himself. Samael – Jimmy thought he had hit the lottery the day when Samael was put into his body. He had ridden to a remote farm house several hours away, on the promise that he could have an ancient demon with indomitable powers stay with him for a time. He could learn from this demon. Samael had been a disappointment, until just recently. The first four months that Jimmy had shared his body with Samael had been nothing but an onslaught of badgering about balance in the universe, about good versus evil, and how the two needed to co-exist. Something finally changed two months ago.

It had been the middle of the night when Jimmy awoke from a dream. It didn’t seem all that exceptional; Jimmy wouldn’t have given it an errant thought, but the dream did something to Samael. There was almost an audible click in their collective cognizance. The dream was of a young woman. She was hiding in bushes in the rain; she attempted to shoot a teenager. The teenager turned into a bear and then into a bird, escaping into the darkness. When Jimmy asked about the dream, Samael went into a tirade. That night was a turning point. Samael never again spoke to Jimmy about balance; instead, their conversations were centered on dark topics. Jimmy was bombarded with vile images, unable to tell which were planted in his mind for Samael’s enjoyment, and which ones were memories that Samael wanted to share.

Samael and Jimmy hatched several plans, each more elaborate than the next. Each time the plan was ready, it was Jimmy who couldn’t go through with it. Bombing the school the day that report cards came out was the latest. Jimmy didn’t consider it juvenile; he thought it was brilliant. His mother wouldn’t care that he was failing all subjects if he were one of the few who survived a school blast. The alternative was fresh in his mind: his mother had warned him if he dropped out of school, he was on his own - she would cut him off. Jimmy reasoned that Noah and Jessie probably would have been killed by the bomb anyway, that this had been a more merciful death.

Jimmy looked down at his hands, which were stained a bright crimson; he had blood all over his shirt and pants. Jimmy walked to the front door and locked it, then walked to the back door and locked it as well. He went to Noah’s bedroom, found a pair of jeans and a shirt that would fit him, walked to the linen closet for a towel, then took a shower.

As he stepped into the shower, it struck him that by now regret should have set in, but all he felt was hollow, like he was somehow disconnected from his own actions. He knew what he had done was wrong, but he reasoned that it had to be done, so he didn’t care. As the hot water washed the blood from him, he had an epiphany: maybe instead of trying to make a bomb, it would be easier just to buy one from someone who knew how to make them. But how much would that cost and where would he find the money in two days?

Jimmy got dressed, sat at the computer, and started doing internet searches. He found several websites that had step-by-step instructions – one even had a phone number to call for help. He began to dial the phone when there was a knock at the door. Jimmy peeked through the curtain and saw his other friend Miles standing there. He couldn’t understand what Miles would be doing here at 7 p.m. – he normally worked on school nights until 8. Jimmy started to get up, but sat back down trying to reason that there was no reason for Miles to suspect anything. He couldn’t possibly know that Jimmy was even in the house. Jimmy could hear Miles trying to turn the door handle. It was uncharacteristic for Miss Abbey’s house to be locked, even at night. He watched with wide eyes as Miles reached under a potted plant on the front porch and pulled out a key to the front door. The security system for the house was never armed and everyone knew where Miss Abbey kept the spare key. She wanted the kids that needed a place to be able to come to hers whenever they needed to.

Jimmy let out a deep breath, “Crap, I guess I don’t have a choice now.”

Miles stepped through the door and saw Jimmy sitting at the computer. “Didn’t you hear me knocking?”

Jimmy shook his head. Miles stepped into the room, “Where’s Noah?”

“
He’s in his room finishing up his homework,” Jimmy said absently.

Miles sat down beside Jimmy, looking at the instructions on the screen. “You better watch out; you’re going to get Miss Abbey in trouble. The FBI tracks all the people who go to those sites. She’ll get a visit from ‘Johnny-Law’ in a couple days, and she won’t let you back in the house.” Jimmy just shrugged but made no move to close the instruction page he had been studying.

Jimmy noticed Miles was looking in all directions. The house was eerily quiet. Miles had been to Miss Abbey’s house enough times to know that it was usually filled with noise. Miles spent a lot of time here, so he knew there should have been happy voices, music, the sounds of teenagers. As he sat with Jimmy in the dark room, there wasn’t another sound in the whole house.

Miles stood up, “I’m going to get a drink. You want anything?” Jimmy shook his head; he sat silently, wondering if there was any way to keep from killing Miles, too. He ran through the possibilities: there shouldn’t be any reason for him to go into the living room, so he wouldn’t see Miss Abbey; Jessie’s room was off limits to boys, so that would be safe. As long as Miles didn’t try to go check on Noah, it would be fine; he just had to play it cool a little bit longer.

Jimmy listened in the silent house; he could hear Miles’ footsteps in the kitchen, the cupboard opening, the refrigerator door open and close. Jimmy realized he was holding his breath listening for Miles’ footsteps to re-enter the room. He counted one thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three….when he hit fourteen, he heard the words that sealed Miles’ fate, “Holy Shit!!” came from down the hall.

Jimmy leapt from his seat at the computer, stepped to the front door and locked it again, then made his way to Noah’s room. He saw Miles holding Noah in his arms. Miles was too stunned to say anything, Jimmy knew what he had to do. He didn’t feign surprise or even put forth the effort to look shocked.

Miles, as if he had not yet grasped what had happened, choked out, “I just found him like this, he’s dead…” Those were Miles’ last words.

Jimmy made no attempt to hide the bodies, but he did reach in Miles’ pocket and fished out his cell phone. He checked the call log. He knew Miles hadn’t had enough time to phone the police, but he looked anyway. Jimmy scrolled through the contacts, found the one that said, “Mom,” and sent a text to her:

“
At Noah’s, studying for test late. Miss Abbey can take me to school tomorrow. Ok to stay over?”

It was now after 8 p.m. and Jimmy knew this wouldn’t send off any warning bells with Miles’ mother. Jimmy didn’t wait for a reply. Even if Miles’ mom said “no,” he’d be long gone before she came to check on him. He went back to the computer, printed instructions from a few more websites, then shut down the computer. Jimmy had looked out the front window to make sure the street was empty before he stepped outside. He put his hoodie up, reached down to the potted plant to retrieve the key to lock the door. He was four steps from the door when he saw Miles’ mother pull up in front of the house. Shit! It wasn’t just her; she had Miles’ little brother and sister with her.