Death Dreams Dire Wolves: Part Ten

Chapter Nineteen: Hours and Nickels

The two groups split up. Linda goes with Beatrice and the two other kids that walked in with her. Vinessa and others separate into another group out to collect food blankets and supplies, and the essentials that they know they need in order to get Manzer a chance at avoiding sister Therin for more than a couple days. As the group leaves, Sister Therin sits at the base of a tree, watching all of them as they are off into the town and out to help a new member of their group.

Therin watches them, out of the view of a regular person, and totally hidden to the brush.

Manzer can sense something watching them, he can only try and make out what it is in the distance, but knows that it's something dark, sinister. It does not take much to surmise what the dice game is now, as AMnzers knows his choice to move might be the best that he has made so far, every inch of Manzers sense of danger is crawling with almost verbal direction, a begins to manifest inside him as a sort of smoke covered voice.

Where sister is, she picks a small device inside one of her pockets, and gets a message past into her circle of associates. " I have eyes on Target. Do I move in to take him out?"

"We need to know what he knows. Word is someone noticed a girl acting pretty weird at the mall, and now the underground is in a stir, this might be our chance to lure out a few bigger targets."

"Are you sure that is not too dangerous? I could gas grenade this entire group of kids and him out of there in a flash. No one would even Remember who Manzer Oblight is."

"No. We need to use him and them as bait. These kids are getting close, and that is going to end up with more of them dead. We need to take the witnesses, and bring manzer in under control."

"It looks like one of them is pinky promised Manzer, i can see the magic all over her, and it looks like she might be showing other abilities."

"A pinky promise? Damnit! Only need Manzer."

"Do I extract?"

"No- just keep an eye on them, I need to talk to the Phantom first Clock. Do not let them out of your sight. Over."

"Copy." Sister Therin says as she makes a cross over her shoulders. "God have mercy on them, and her."

The kids move through the streets rather silently until they come across someone's Van. Something a total skate head would use, if he planned on having a few nights out just to see what happens on the streets. They pile inside as the owner Linda, tries to turn the engine over, getting it to finally start after a few minutes of turning the key. "Darn expensive gasket." Linda says as she puts the Van into gear and get the thing rolling. The engine burned clean moving the rest of the heavy van forward, and into the open road.

They Try to delegate the place where they think that Manzers stuff might be, and fill in Manzer on the History of the Town they are in. "This place has had a few things happen in the past. Lots of kids go missing here, just vanish into thin air. We have all been trying to get a better sense of some of the happenings in town, but we have mostly no luck. We all know kids that have gone missing, real friendly kids too, and it's just like all this sudden. Poof- they have no contact, can't be called or messaged, and it's like they never existed."

"That seems like some sort of fairy tale guys. I mean, kids can't go missing that often." Manzer says as he works out the details.

"My sister went missing the night our house burned down." Linda says as she keeps her eyes on the road. She was nowhere to be found when I went to the room, not even in the closet. Fire department said it was a kitchen fire, and said someone had left the stove on with a rag on top of it. But what I saw showed that our house had been- attacked, an entire wall torn down."

"So your friends and family?"

"Yeah, my dad never came home."

"My mom just walked into the bathroom, and never came out." Says the other kids as they think about the tragedy of their lives, and the loss they had suffered at the strangest of times."

"I am sorry." Manzer says trying to cope with how rude he was.``

It is fine kid, you didn't know. But we formed this club trying to look for answers. Found a few interesting things here and there but nothing seems to add up. But now, we know a body was found. All of us are on pins and needles waiting to find out who it was.

"Why?"

"A few of our friends went missing a few weeks ago. And we are trying to catch them before they catch us. We suspect that it had something to do with something they found.

"What did they find?"

"I don't know, all we have is a bad voice recording that gives some really cryptic stuff. Not to mention the video we found in one of their mailboxes.

"Video?"

"Yeah, none of us can find the machine that plays it. Bad time to be out of the Video club that is for sure."

" Might not be able to ever make sense of those words. They still haunt me in my dreams."

"Yeah, things are getting pretty serious alright. We all might be in danger of what Sister Therin is doing, or what she is involved in. We all have tried to make her out to be some sort of Satanic cutest looking for kids too steel, for their dark rights. Who knows."

"Why do you say that?"

"She always shows up before the police do. It's kind of really weird. At every disaster, and disappearance she is always there- always. Most of the time she ends up talking to the police, or giving them some sort of message. So we think that the cops are in on it. Maybe this might go as far as whitehouse."

"The white house?"

"Yeah man. Some deep government stuff."

"Oh great, so you have completely cracked into the full conspiracy then?"

"What do you mean?" Says one of the other kids.

Manzer decided to let the kids listen to what he heard. "I was at school and I overheard something. Sister Therin and some guy talking about what was going on. They said- that this was some sort of, omen- or start of a lot of bad things to come."

"What really? Manzer, you ninjad up on Sister Therin and some deep dark secret? How? I have been trying to sneak up on my sister therin unnoticed for 3 years. She always notices, always. She is like those people in those movies."

"Well, I guess I did. Was not that hard actually. Did you hear who the person was that they found?"

"Her name was something like Telania Beltrice, or something."

Linda stops the car. "Telania Belrtrice are you serious?"

"Yeah, why?"

"That is the police Chief's daughter. His only daughter. How in the- what the heck is going on?"

"You sound surprised? I thought police families ended up dead all the time."

"Telania was different from Manzer, her mom is a billionaire. Some sort of tycoon with the military. No one would ever touch Telania, not if they didn't want a satellite hitting them from space."

"What really?"

"Yeah man, her mom was into some pretty serious military contracts. This is not good. This is very bad. This town is about to be on a lock down like it has never been in before. Especially after this. We need to tell the others, everyone needs to know."

"Oh, crap oh crap oh crap." Says another one of the kids as he thinks about what is about to happen to this small town.

Beatrice hears this,, but can still look past the creature that Manzer is hiding behind. "Of course he knows what is going on," She thinks. " He is probably the monster who helped kill that poor girl. Helped the other kids disappear. All these monsters get what they deserve, all of them."

"Manzer, we need to get you back to the wreck center. Our radios are out of range, it seems weird." Says Linda as she tries to get onto the Signal that everyone is supposed to be on.

Beatrice senses danger, and all those who cannot sense the problem at hand do not understand her torment.

Manzer can sense it too, something is very wrong and maybe everyone is in a lot of trouble.

They find the spot that Manzer had run too, trying to remain incognito as they pull off to the cul de sac and examine the path that they said Manzer had taken. As they walk, Manzer can't help but try and quiet the light up shoes he is wearing, and how novelty it seems that these shoes light up. But all small details aside, the group approaches the water spot after a few moments of backtracking the spot.

What they find is no less disturbing, as Manzers backpack, and all the things inside it have been torn to shreds.

Manzers Spirits sink. His new backpack and his board, both lost on the same day, and all things seem to be coming to a focus far past that or just some small town scare.

"Man, torn to shreds, what are the chances of that?" Someone says as they look at the remains of the bag.

Mountain lions come through here all the time, they must have been after your sack lunch or something."

"What did you pack, a leg of ham in there?" Says one of the kids finding an entire dictionary torn apart.

"Hey, that's weird, This book seems to be totally fine. "One of the kids says finding the assigned book that the English teacher had left for him, but only after the group had time to look through the remains. "That's crazy, it landed on this giant Mushroom."

"Must have fallen out when the bag was being ripped apart. Lucky break huh Manzer."

"Yeah lucky?"

Beatrice can see the magic around the book, it burns with an immense light that keeps her from making full eye contact with it. "What book is that?"

"Some old fairytale Book." Manzer says. "Never even heard of it before."

"I wasn't asking you." Beatrice says becoming stern.

Manzer feels hurt by this, as why Beatrice is being so bossy and stern all of the sudden.

"Okay, well, mission success if I can guess."

"Hey guys, come over here!" Shouts one of the kids as they look through the brush.

Everyone looks to see what is being looked at and they all stumble across a large track left in the soft dirt of the forest.

"What is that?" Says one of the kids.

"Not like anything i have ever seen."

"And look, theri are clothes over here?" Says another kid as they look at a pile of neatly placed clothes.

"You think people are running around naked in the forest?"

"Not with whatever this is running around."

"They left everything, a skirt, a shirt, all their jewelry."

"It was a female person whoever it was."

"Man, things just keep getting weirder and weirder." Linda says as she looks over the evidence.

Beatrice looks at the stream, and is aghast with the strange vision that looked back at her. The water ghost is standing there, pointing at Manzer, just pointing at him with one of the saddest, and most horrifying of expressions. She does not move, she just stands on the surface of the water, pointing.

"Does anyone know who lives in these houses?" Says one of the kids, trying to do a decent job or sleuthing through the evidence.

"Everyone looks over at the semi circle of houses that sit in their pristine purch, or a neighborhood. undester bed and far away from the main part of the town.

" No, I have never been to this part of town before, these houses must be new."

"New houses? More people moving into town?"

"Maybe. Or people from town that have made money. Man Manzer, you sure did find a nice place to run to."

"I just ran dude. I just wanted to get as Far away from that place as possible as fast As I could."

"Well it seems like you ended up in a really odd part of town. Didn't even know this place was out here and I have lived in this town for 5 years."

Everyone looks around and has a hard time believing that in all of their sleuthing, that this place was somehow hidden from all of them. Manzer however ran right to it and nothing else seemed to stop him from finding it. "We might not want to stick around here too much guys. Things are probably getting crazy in town as things are." Says Linda as she tries to wrangle in the group. "We all might be tied up into this group for some time if things really are about to get bad, and we all might be in the deep end, if you know what I am saying."

Is there anything else that you need for Manzer? Anything else you might be able to recover from this mess?"

"Nah man, that's it, nothing else but a bunch of rags and pieces of paper."

"Then we need to be smart about this. We need to strategize around the situation and find out what is really going on. We should get back to the van guys, keep our steps as quiet as possible."

Everyone nods their heads. Then they start backtracking through the brush, in order to get to the pale where they entered from. Beatrice seems always distracted by the Ghosts and Phantoms that she sees popping up in the forest and pointing at Manzer. Beatrice catches a glimpse of an odd black tree standing in the center of a clearing and nothing much is known to Beatrice other than how freaked out she is. They are surrounded by ghosts that seem to be coming out of the woods to find them, and all of them point out the odd blue cat boy as some sort of monster.

Beatrice has a hard time figuring a few things out however. If Manzer was really a monster out to eat anyone or cause havoc, then he has had several chances to do so in the hind sight of where these people have brought him and how often they turn their back to the little kid who seemed so unassuming. The bunch of these kids have been looking for supernatural proof most of their lives, and now that it is so close, it seems like more than some sort of song [playing in the background to everyone in an elevator. However, what worried Manzer the most was the constant attraction that he had to so many other things, that dwell with the same countenance of thought as the odd blue monster, and the vision that Beatrice keeps having.

Beatrice is having more than a hard time focussing herself past her own emotional distress and resolve, and the constant restlessness that she feels, in her position of being so helpless. Beatrice has always feared being totally helpless, all things that she built herself up to be, only being the downfall of her own self assurance.

Beatrice speaks out to everyone before they get onto the bus. "Hey Manzer, what about that board you had earlier, what happened to that?"

"Oh, my skateboard, oh yeah. Maybe we should wait."

"Well chances are the police are going to look through all of the lockers, and might put you on a list of suspects."

"Oh shit yeah." Manzer says as he thinks about the consequences of leaving something so personal at the scene of a crime. Manzer knows that getting his board would be a smart move, but risky.

"Are we sure it's safe to go over to the school? Won't there be police all over that place."

"The cops are probably out getting warrants to search the lockers. If you go in now, you might be able to get it back and keep yourself off of the wanted list." Beatrice says as she tries to get MAnzer away from the Group and alone. "Common-, we can stop really quickly, maybe put a few of those cat ninja skills to use." THis sentence is something of a miracle to Beatrice, as it's the closest thing to describing what Manzer is to anyone through this entire experience.

"Okay-" Manzer says in understanding. "Might be worth it. So let's go."

Manzer says, picking up his other board out of the van, "We will meet you guys back at The spot." He says.

"Yeah you guys, be careful." You never know when Sister Therin might pop up, she is all over the place sometimes."

"Okay" Manzer says.

"Then he and Beatrice Skate off."

J'mar Tarafa is the real author of this book. He gets harassed daily by zombies and witches always trying to steal ideas for themselves from him. Please like and support me!

Chapter Twenty: Fifth Wheel

It does not Take long for Beatrice and Manzer to skate down to the school, The place where Manzer ran to was mostly up hill, and it most of the streets where relatively knew and well paved, and most of the streets were already clear with traffic, due to the ever growing news that someone was found dead in the the school grounds, and around the part of the school where most of the lowlives like to hang out. The ever creeping notion that the town was becoming something of a holding cell for anyone who has seen or heard anything of what had happened was being made ever more prevalent, by the cold ambiance that seemed to be influencing the town.

Manzer could barely think past it, making some of his better and more ironclad judgments where all being thrown to the wind, as a number of problems resolutions where being given shape in the form of so many people willing to be his friends, and in such a strange circumstance. More often than not, skate marks were filled with some pretty grungy people of all sorts, often they were places to find drugs, or bad times, or get mixed up into gangs, but the influence of these people was something Manzer did not expect. It seemed a number of individuals were all involved in this, and it was something that Manzer took comfort in.

The more manzer Thought about it the less confusing it became at times, but nothing made less sense then the strange fact of what he heard in that office. As all things become organized, so too must the effort of some things that would want to stay hidden, adn Manzer can feel that there is something very dark working in the background, in the alley ways, lurking in the bushes.

Manzer knows that Sister Therin is not the only one out lurking, maybe she is just the distraction from what is really happening.

Manzer and Beatrice stop a few blocks from the school, looking down at the empty lots, and the yellow police tape surrounding the better property of the school. They take their time to make sure that no police officers are cruising around the grounds, or sweeping the grass and football fields looking for clues. The over achieved nature of what this investigation seems to pertain to is a strange sort, as if the Victim were truly the police chief's daughter then certain restrictions in the law would prevent him from taking a main position in the investigation, leaving the grunt work up to someone close to or near his position as a police officer. With that in Mind, MAnzer thinks the absence of police is a little strange. It is like all the police just put up their police tape, and then left somewhere else, and left the school alone as soon as possible.

"That is weird." MAnzer says out loud. " No cops.

Beatrice responds to the lose phrase as her heart sinks, she was hoping that the police would catch Manzer so she could finally explain to someone what he is. "Yeah, they must be off getting coffee or exchanging notes. I guess they work pretty fast these days."

The position of the sun was almost night time, as the kids had spent most of the day skating and talking about what was going on in this strange little town of thick forest and hard to see houses. All things set up in such an odd factor are all the old buildings around town that crawl with a certain disdain or a history of dark things that have happened in the town. Things were getting stranger and stranger, and manzer knew they would only get farther from normal, the longer he tried to pry at the door.

Manzer was not looking for some supernatural adventure, to be totally honest, he was terrified of what he had seen already, and wanted to stay as far away from ghosts and goblins as much as he could. Graveyards were not a happy place for manzer, and neither was the idea of thinking that so many opsicous forces could just pop into his life and move him miles across town, without him being able to defend himself. The scary part is Manzer knew that he wasn't crazy for what he saw, and this is what got to him the most, as he could never look at a stream of water the same again.

"It looks like we might be able to just walk up an-"

"No, no. The police might be absent but they are not stupid. They probably have some undercover car snooping around, trying to see if anyone tries to interfere with the crime scene, and catch a glimpse of what they take. We are going to have to be carefull, and make sure we avoid all of the cars with the darkest tinted windows."

"How do you know how to sneak past the cops so well Manzer?" Beatrice says trying to understand why Manzer has such a dark set of skills. Analysing every bit of evidence to the fact that he might be some type of evil thing.

"I spent a lot of my time avoiding going home. I learned to look at things through the eyes of a cop, studied a few books on criminal psychology, just so I could stay out later."

"You read a lot, I take it."

"All the time, it's one of my favorite things to do." Mnzer says, thinking about all the moments he spent in the library rather than making friends.

Beatrice has so many things that she would want to ask Manzer, get a sense of what he was really like on the inside despite his blue fur, without meeting anyone else he has eaten as the odd blue cat creature, he seems to fool everyone into thinking that he is not. But manser does not have the eyes or the mannerisms of a cold killer, only the hurt eyes of someone who is trying to be tuff, despite being more scared than anyone else. Beatrice is starting to get into the deeper concept of what Manzers world must be like, as someone who has no idea what he Is or what that means for everyone else in his life. The blue fur is starting to grow on Beatrice, despite the fact that it's a rather shocking color for anyone to be colored, it seems as though the idea of having a monster as a real friend, might be something possible, but if only she knew more about who Manzer was, and what danger she might be able to anticipate. Looking at Manzer For Beatrice is like looking into the depth of an acid drop into a twelve foot bowl. Something that she knows where if she is not ready, she might not come back from.

Manzer would rather be more well prepared for this than what they have on hand. His hoodie had been torn to shreds by whatever it was that had decided to go through his clothes, and nothing was left of the much needed black hoodie, that would have made it a bit easier to sneak around the camp. However Manzers Plan was simple, stay out of sight, stay low, and stay out of trouble. Manzer tries to get a glimpse of any of the police officers sitting around, and spots a few of them sitting in their cars, listening to the radio over an earpiece, and keeping constant vigilance over the crime scene. The only Hole that Manzer can see is the Creek, and the tunnels that run under the streets, and over to where the water passes on the school grounds.

"Common" Manzer says as they move to where the opening might come out at, hopefully on a block over. Manzer would rather avoid the water, but all things to consider, the water might be his only friend in this trying time, as Manzers board would lead straight to him, considering it had his name, and his information placed on a sticker on it, just in case it ever got lost or stolen.

Beatrice just watches, and follows, trying to get a few more details on the shyness that Manzer seems to exude. She would have never thought to duck through a tunnel, and would have resorted to distraction tactics for sure, but Manser seemed to have a better understanding of stealth, and what it would mean for his freedoms.

They move over a few blocks, and find the opening to the tunnel, making sure to duck and keep hidden between cars as they watch for the police. Manzer always spotted openings in their attention. " A police officer manages to become distracted by something he dropped on the floor, and Manzer grabs Beatrice's hand and pulls her to the tunnel hidden in a slight indent of a grassy hill in between separating roads.

They move quickly, dredging into the water as they move on towards the dark in the tunnel, trying to fight the need of daylight as they make a break for what it is that they are trying to get to.

"Wow, it's dark in here." Beatrice says as she moves down the tunnel.

"You are telling me." Manzer says as they walk through the ankle high water, getting MAnzers new pink shoes totally wet and soggy. "We need to keep our voices down, the echo amplifies father down the tunnel." Manzer says I whisper.

"Wait, did you see that?" Beatrice says seeing an odd light starting to imbue the tunnel wall , after they have traveled a few yards. To Beatrice it looks like some sort of enchantment, the same magic or something similar that would be akin to the warding at The Spot.

"See what?" Manser says, unable to sense anything. "You know you have been acting really weird Beatrice, are you sure you are alright."

This is yet another chance for Beatrice to explain to Manzer what is going on, and let him know what is really taking place behind the stalwart curtain of Bearices concerns, and with so much to keep her from making more of the moment, she tries to speak, but cannot. Manzer Crosses over one of the magic lines, and it is like her words are once again being stolen.

Manzer stands there looking at Beatrice and her odd Behavior, and the thought passes. He continues to walk, and Beatrice is inclined to follow, guided by some sort of mysterious force. They continue down the tunnel, and eventually pass all for the magic lines, and letters that seem to totally cover the tunnel, as if someone knew this would be where a number of magic things would plan to try and sneak into the school grounds.

They come out on the other side, and Manzer ducks down, motioning Beatrice to the same thing. They both crouch, and move forward through the water, trying to stay out of sight. This is where the tunnel separated but only for a small distance, before it went into the tunnel that Manzer had used to evade the other kids earlier.

They move through the school yard, trying to stay behind the wall of tall grass that has them both pretty well covered and from a number of prying eyes. This is however where Beatrice sees something, shining in one of the glassrooms. It looks like someone is casting some sort of spell, or using some sort of enchantment in one of the rooms. Beatrice cannot speak, but she gets Manzers attention by grabbing him by the shoulder and pointing him at what she sees. And for a moment, Manzer is able to catch a glimpse of some sort of odd happenstance taking place in the school.

"Wha- what is that?" Manzer says looking at the lights as they shine through the upper level window in the building that is otherwise blocked from view from the people who would see the school from street view.

"The light flashes, and something flies out of the window, breaking the glass, and landing hard on the grass below it.

A voice can be heard, in the echo of a relm only heard in magic. "I only wanted to talk. I just wanted to know what you saw?"

"I didn't see nothing." Says the creature as it struggles to recover from the various wounds that cover its body.``

"And I told you, I know that you saw something." A man comes to the window, he wears a cloak and has a mask made out of some sort of metal. He looks like a scarecrow, or some sort of awful creature, and his shadow seems to have a life of its own. HE walks out of the window, stepping down off a staircase that no one else seems to be able to see. His cloak was like a cloud of shadow, as it wrapped around him, in so many sinister ways, making him seem more than just a man, but a monster.

The interrogation is something vicious, and violent, as the man with the cloak is not playing games or screwing around with any loose ends. He is here for the business end of a dagger, and that dagger has monsters written all over it.

"I tell you, I didn't see anything."

"I know you did, you saw something! You are the watcher of these grounds, you watch everything. Tell me what you saw."

"No!"

"Why!!!"

"Because it scares the hell out of me."

"More than me?"

"More than you, yes!"

"The man in the cloak stops for a second, Then out of the hole in his chest, he pulls out a small book.

The monster on the ground becomes more fearful, trying to crawl itself away, but is unable to escape. "No, please don't."

"Just tell me what you saw, and this ends here." The cloak man says.

"I cant?"

"Why!!! Not!!!!"

"Because she will come, she will come after me."

"Who?"

"The Mother, the mother man."

The scarecrow sits there for a moment, thinking about what this ghoul had just told him. However this does not stop him from opening his little book, which causes a sort of gateway to appear. " You are going to tell me, or I'll open this door."

"No, no the door, Please. Anything but that."

"What the hell!" Manser says out of sudden surprise, as something grabs him by the leg. Looking back he can see that it is the ghost that had helped him to escape before.

Manzers yelp creates a moment of distraction that throws off the scarecrow man, and in a blink the other creature is gone.

"Aah!"" The Scarecrow yells, then punches the place where this other monster is fading out of view. "Another monster has spoken inside my warding. My interrogation has been compromised." He says outloud. A mysterious voice comes out of nowhere. "Must be a powerful monster indeed. Capture him, he might know something."

"Understood. The Scarecrow man says, leaping over to where Manzers voice was heard, but finding only nothing. As it is, Manzer And Beatrice have both been pulled to the other end of the tunnel, and dropped right at the mouth. The ghost said one thing. "Get your board and help me." but only right before disappearing into a mist.

Manzer and Beatrice are looking through the locker frantically, as they try to find Manzers skateboard, in a panic. It is, however, Beatrice who is guided straight to it by some sort of string. As she opens the locker, she finds something else sitting under Manzers Skateboard, it looks to be some sort of very intricately carved wooden sword, that glows with light unlike anything Beatrice has seen.