The Shadow Author. 3

You can find the prologue and ensuing chapters here!

Chapter Three

The shadow author strolls leisurely towards the ticket barrier, pausing briefly when he spots a pair of armed policemen standing at the junction of the ticket office and the station’s concourse. The split-second stoppage is enough time for him to be mutteringly admonished by a few commuters who flow around him as if he were a sunken log in a stream. He carries on, calmly, knowing that armed police are often at the station and are nothing to do with him. Equilibrium. Far from appearing intimidatory to the rushing masses about them, expressions of boredom are draped across their faces as they vacantly watch the commuters queuing for their tickets or for newspapers that come with a free, large bottle of mineral water with varying levels of patience and the resignation at their day in, day out routine.

His smile widens as he walks on. In his many rambling, unending thoughts he believes that one day there may well be technology in place that can alert nearby authorities that the likes of him– an imminent murderer – is in the vicinity.

But here and now, not yet twenty years into the century, not a single person in this entire station… not a single person in this world… armed or not, is able to discern anything about him apart from the fact that he is seems to be a relaxed, happy-looking young man setting off on a holiday.

He joins a small mass of people as they jostle into the train sheds. He has over ten minutes until his train departs and can see on his train app that it is on time. When he reaches the head of the queue he swipes his smart ticket against the barrier’s reader and passes through. Makes his way to the escalator and over to platform seven. The orb of energy is bumping along pleasantly behind him, like a balloon on the end of a piece of string that occasionally bumps softly, reassuringly against the nape of the child that it is held by.

He steps on the down escalator down to platform seven. Row after row of linked carriages of the 8:17 am train to London Kings Cross come into his line of vision as he descends. Like him, they are ready for their adventure. Their duty.

He finds his carriage and searches along its aisle for his booked seat. Having been worried that someone would be sat in it and unwilling to give it up, he is pleased to find it empty. As a bonus, the seat next to it is also empty. For now; a ticket wedged into the back of the seat proclaims that it is booked between Wakefield Westgate and Peterborough. Not ideal but acceptable.

He has chosen a seat at the far end of the carriage, near the luggage hold. His suitcase is far too unwieldy to stow in the racking above the seats and he cannot abide the terrifying thought that it could be stolen or that an absent-minded fool may mistake it for being theirs.

The contents were far too precious to risk.

The Shadow Author places the suitcase in the luggage rack so that it is easy to spot within his line of vision removes a bottle from its side compartment and sits back down. The bottle is sweating cold beads of condensation; he had placed it in the freezer for an hour before leaving the house. Being late autumn in Yorkshire, it is far from being a warm day but he has known the energy to make his blood simmer on the occasions when it has swarmed through his veins and forced him into action.

Inside his coat pockets are a packet of peanuts and a chocolate bar; both of which he has refrigerated overnight. He pats these now to ensure that they are still in place.

And then he is unable to relax. The train presently fills to around two-thirds capacity before the doors’ cranking mechanism has them jumping shut and a whistle is blown. The train silently noses out of the train shed, past the hundreds of humans standing upon each platform, looking at their phones, holding their coffee.

Awaiting another day of non-adventure.

The shadow author believes he has compassion and he tries to feel it now by shifting to the window seat and focusing on a man in a dark blue suit wearing a skinny dark blue tie and thumbing the screen of a white smartphone. His haircut is of the regulation, sharply coiffured variety adorned by the majority of the man’s age group, whilst a tangled, tattooed vine is growing out of his shirt collar and winding up his neck to his jaw.

The man seems to feel his gaze – the power of which has been augmented by the orb of energy, perhaps, he thinks excitedly- and looks up at the carriage window. The Shadow Author, in his effort to feel a connection with the stranger, has unknowingly pressed his nose firmly against the glass. The man meets his eye and frowns. What the fuck are you looking at?

The shadow suthor pulls back from the window but continues to stare. The man pulls an abrupt wanker hand gesture at him, rattling his composure. goading him into launching a thick wad of spit against the window.

Fucking freak, the man mouths clearly before raising the finger and turning to the opposite side of the platform, where a train is pulling in. The Shadow Author shakes with anger then chastises himself not for the first time that day. His composure has been lost too many times, too easily this morning. He darts a look around the carriage to see if his actions have got him noticed. Not a single person is looking his way. He feels a sudden, white-hot jab of pain around the back of his neck. The energy. It may be giving him more of a say in how he goes about things but it can still control and punish him should the need arise.

The shadow author pulls a tissue from a pack in his back pocket and wipes away his phlegm as it slides slowly down the window pane.

He must do better. He will be in London in two hours and the chances of him – or the energy- finding provocation there are high. The tube holds a particularly strong buzz of worry and he has details of how to cross London without heading into the underground. He also has his credit card should the need arise to catch another taxi today; however, this adventure has already proven to be expensive and the encounter he endured with the shabby driver already today has led him to think that the less talking he has to do, the better. The driver had asked another, probably innocent question about his holiday to Spain.

"Which airport’re y’flying from, bud?"

"Manchester."

He had delivered his lie of an answer in a mutter that he hoped sounded absent and disinterested. The energy was delivering instructions via urgent pulses from its orb directly into his mind: abandon this conversation. Happily, this tactic worked perfectly and the last of the journey had been spent listening to Sting declare his falsetto'd desire to have his MTV.

The shadow author knew that he would feel better when he has reached the day’s final destination, 3,269 miles west of Gatwick Airport.

The city of Boston, Massachusetts.

And he will feel even better when he has made his way upstate to the small town of Oakington, population, 1474, according to the 2003 census.

But the best feeling will be when the energy and he have found their quarry.

Oakington’s most famous resident. The best-selling crimewriter—and the inadvertent, unknowing, talent-wasting creator of the Shadow Author.

A certain L.J. Denholm.

And destroyed him.