Flight of Life (Essence Series #1) (7 page)

Calloway rubbed his temple. “If this
has been going on since the beginning of time, the universe, and
everything else, why is this happening now? Why did I see a
Hara-Kir at a public library? If they are confined to the Anti-Life
why don’t they stay there?”

“
That’s exactly what the
problem is,” she said. “The breach between the worlds is
open.”

“
And what does that mean?”
Breccan asked.

“
Eternal
night.”

Fight or Flight

Breccan leaned back in his chair and
sighed. “I still don’t understand.”

“
I’m not sure either,”
Easton admitted.

“
So you’re wrong?” Breccan
said.

“
No,” she snapped. “I just
have a knowledge deficit. That doesn’t mean I’m
wrong
.”

Calloway knew where this conversation
was headed. “Keep reading and we’ll find out.”

Easton returned her gaze to the book
and flipped the page. She stared at the words for a long moment
before she looked back at Calloway. “I can’t decipher it,” she
said. “I know some of the symbols but not all.”

“
Well, that’s wonderful,”
Breccan said sarcastically.

“
I told you this from the
beginning—I never said I was fluent. I just need some time to
decode it,” she said.

“
Can you make anything
out?” Calloway asked.

Easton sighed and returned her gaze to
the page. Breccan sighed loudly, impatient for her to finish, and
Easton glared at him before she continued. She finished after a few
moments. “It’s difficult to make out, but it seems that the goal of
the Hara-Kirs is to end this Life by gathering the essence of
innocent souls from this mortal world. When they have enough they
will be able to end this Life as well as the Anti-Life, and both
worlds will cease to exist altogether.”

Calloway thought for a moment. “So they
want to commit suicide?”

Easton shrugged. “I guess.”

“
And why do they need
essence to achieve this?” Calloway asked. “Do only humans have
it?”

“
I don’t know.” She
sighed. “But they need to be stopped—for good. Eventually, they
will get what they want and send us into oblivion.”

“
And why do the Hara-Kirs
want this?” Breccan asked.

“
Apparently, they don’t
want to exist anymore,” Calloway said. “Life isn’t worth
living—it’s repetitive and meaningless—worthless.” The depression
sank into him when he thought about what he just learned; his Life
and After-Life could be taken from him. A part of him understood
why the Hara-Kir felt that way. Almost every patient in a
psychiatric ward wanted the same thing; for it to be over. Even if
he didn’t agree, Calloway could understand the need for the cycle
to end. It was difficult to find the good things in life worth
living for when there was so little to be found. He was teased on a
daily basis and felt isolated from the world, like no one cared for
him. There were days when he didn’t want to get out of bed or
continue living—he admitted it.

He thought of his father when he looked
at the orb and knife sitting on the table. Somehow his father had
these gifts but Calloway wasn’t sure why. Did he travel into the
Anti-Life and retrieve these them? And if so, why? Calloway assumed
his father met his end while he pursued the destruction of the
Hara-Kirs. It was the only explanation. He probably retrieved the
Kirin Book from the Anti-Life and hid it within the abandoned
library where it wouldn’t be found. His father never had an open
casket and Calloway never saw his body after he was killed. He was
just a boy. The knowledge that his father died trying to save the
world invigorated him with strength, replacing his fear, and
solidified his choice to continue down this path. His father never
commanded him to finish his work but Calloway was choosing to.
That’s how he sounded in his letter—he wanted to give his son the
option.

Breccan grabbed the orb from the table
and squeezed it in his palm. The light didn’t shine. He continued
to play with Calloway’s glowing orb. “How do you know how to read
these symbols?” he asked Easton.

“
I learned from my
sister,” she replied

“
And how does she know?”
Breccan asked. “How do you both know about the
Hara-Kirs?”

“
Well, my sister became
aware of it when she started taking college courses when she was
still in high school. I don’t know much more than that. She warned
me about the Hara-Kirs and told me to be careful. She would come
home with these books of symbols and I watched her decipher them
with a decoder. Eventually, I memorized some of the words.” Easton
crossed her arms over her chest and watched Breccan play with the
orb. “My sister doesn’t discuss it often, and if I bring up the
topic she ignores me.”

Easton played with her fingernails,
which were painted an oily black, and she scraped the paint off the
surface. She didn’t have any friends at school, choosing to spend
all her time in solitude, and the other students teased her at
every opportunity. They labeled her as a Satan worshiper and a
gothic, even though she never wore black despite her painted
fingernails, and she never challenged the names. She ignored
everyone. Calloway suspected that he and Breccan were her only
friends, even though they were just using her for her knowledge.
Calloway pitied her even more than he did before. He knew exactly
how she felt.

Calloway leaned forward over the table
and looked at Easton. “We have to do something,” he said. “The
Hara-Kirs need to be stopped.”

Easton stopped picking at
her nails and met his gaze. “
We
?” she asked incredulously. “How
do you propose we do that?”

He shrugged. “I don’t
know,” he said. “But it’s our duty to try—it’s
our
essence we are talking
about.”

Breccan dropped the orb.
“But what can
we
do?” he asked. “We barely know anything as it is. I don’t
think three high school students can make any difference. We’ll
just get ourselves killed.”

Calloway sighed. “We have the Kirin
Book and I’m sure it will give us all the information we need—once
we decode it—and then we’ll pursue this until we succeed or are
killed in the attempt. What kind of people would be if we just left
the world to its fate?”

“
We would be
smart
people,” Breccan
replied.

Easton sighed. “Calloway
is right,” she said. “We have to do something. We would be cowards
if we did anything else—and I am definitely
not
a coward.” Calloway sighed,
relieved by her commitment to the task. He didn’t want to do this
alone—he needed her. “We can gather followers as we move
forward—people that we trust—and eventually we’ll have the means to
accomplish this.”

“
But what do we do until
then?” Calloway asked. “We can’t just wait for help.”

“
Well, we could take down
every Hara-Kir we find,” she suggested. “It doesn’t sound like much
but at least that’s one Hara-Kir less in the world.”

“
And how do we expect to
do that?” Breccan asked. “We don’t know anything about these things
and you think we should try to kill one?”

“
We can do it if we
combine our efforts,” Calloway said. “It’ll be three against
one.”

“
But we still don’t know
how to kill it,” Breccan said. “We can’t just experiment until we
get it right. By then it will take our essence and be
gone.”

“
The Kirin Book will
detail their vulnerabilities,” Easton said. “We’ll figure this
out.”

Breccan sighed. “I have a bad a feeling
about this.”

“
We’ll be fine,” Calloway
said.

“
So are we Hara-Kir
hunters now?” Breccan asked incredulously. “We just search the
nighttime streets until we find one and kill it?”

“
Of course not,” Calloway
said quickly. “But if we come across one we don’t run—we fight. I
suspect I’ll have an encounter with one soon.”

Easton stared at Calloway. “We have to
promise each other that we’ll never pursue a Hara-Kir on our own—we
have to be together.” She was directing her message to Calloway. He
was amused by her intuition. She was right.

“
I promise,” Breccan said
quickly. “I’m not stupid.”

“
Calloway,” Easton
pressed.

Calloway sighed. “Okay.”

“
So, how do we attack
these things?” Breccan asked. “Are we just punching it?”

“
I think we should pursue
it with a knife,” Calloway said. “They are easy to hide in our
clothing and are deadly. I suspect a gun wouldn’t work—even if we
could get one.”

“
So, we’re really doing
this?” Breccan asked.

Easton nodded. “Yes.”

Breccan looked at Calloway. “I’m going
to be pissed if I die.”

Calloway smiled. “There are worse
things than dying,” he said. “We aren’t just fighting for Life, but
the After-Life.”

“
My parents don’t care
about that,” Breccan said. “They would be angry if I
died.”

“
I know,” Calloway said.
“I don’t think they’d be happy if something happened to either of
us, but I also think they would be extremely proud.”

“
Or just think we’re
stupid.” Breccan laughed.

“
I’m sure they think that
already,” Easton jabbed.

Breccan looked at her and was about to
speak when Calloway intervened. “Just five minutes,” he said.
“That’s all I’m asking for.” Breccan shut his mouth and turned
away. Easton smiled as she watched him back down.

Easton looked at the book and flipped
through the pages, looking for anything that she could decipher on
her own. She stopped when she saw a chapter that detailed their
attributes and she skimmed through the lines.

Calloway caught her look. “What is it?”
he asked.

“
It says something about
their physiology but I can’t decode it properly, and it mentions a
stab through the heart and a paragraph about sections,” she said as
she shook her head. She squinted her eyes like she couldn’t read
the text. “I’m not sure of it, but it sounds like the heart needs
to be severed into parts or something.”

Calloway nodded. “Then the knives will
work,” he said. “One of us will stab it through the heart while the
other two hold it back—that can be me and Breccan. Easton, you can
do the stabbing.”

She didn’t look up from the book. “It
would be my pleasure.”

The sound of footsteps from above made
them all flinch. Easton shoved the book into her backpack just as
the basement door opened. Calloway grabbed his orb and knife and
placed them back into his pockets as Easton’s sister descended the
staircase. She reached the bottom and smiled at them all. She had
brown hair that was identical to Easton’s except it was longer and
reached past her shoulders. She was also taller than her younger
sister and almost reached Calloway’s height. Her persona seemed
upbeat and vibrant—exactly the opposite of her younger sister. She
was beautiful—attractive. Perhaps it was because she was an older
woman, but Calloway and Breccan immediately noticed her
charms.

She stepped toward them and extended
her hand to Calloway. “Hello.” She smiled as she shook Calloway’s
hand. “I’m Weston—Easton’s sister.”

“
It’s nice to meet you,”
he said. “I’m Calloway.”

She nodded and turned to Breccan, who
was staring at her with a dumbfounded expression. Weston took his
hand and shook it. “Hi,” she said with a smile.

Breccan found his bearings. “You’re
normal,” he blurted.

“
Thanks for the
compliment—I guess,” she said with a laugh.

Easton glared at Breccan for a moment.
“I’m not weird—you’re just insanely boring.”

Weston ignored them. “So you two are
friends with Easton?”

Breccan said no and Calloway said yes
at the same time. Calloway looked at Breccan then back at Weston.
“Yes, we’re her friends.”

Weston nodded. “That’s great,” she
said. “Easton doesn’t bring people around very often. I was worried
she completely isolated herself.”

“
Shut up,” Easton
snapped.

Weston looked at her sister. “You’re
using my house, aren’t you?” she said. “I suggest you be a little
nicer to me.”

Easton sighed but didn’t say
anything.

“
So do you go to the
university?” Calloway asked.

“
Yes,” Weston said. “This
is my first year.”

“
What are you studying?”
Calloway asked.

“
History,” she said. “But
my concentration is on women’s studies.”

Calloway and Breccan didn’t know what
that meant but they both nodded like they were interested. Calloway
leaned forward in his chair. “Do you like the
university?”

“
Yes.” She nodded. “It’s
so much better than high school—a completely different
world.”