Chapter 1
Also on Wattpad, as Spark of Flint
Janet
This is a dream. I know this is a dream. Well, at least I think it is. It feels like a memory. How can I see a memory I don’t remember having?
There is a weeping woman kneading a soul like clay. She is on her knees with her legs folded underneath her. She wears a pink petal pattern cotton gown. The soul is being moved around on the floor. Right next to the woman, there is a cold body of a man. He has a black gown on and his skin so pale that there is no doubt he is dead. Just before kneading the clay soul, she took the man’s soul out of his body. She was already sobbing when I started dreaming. Broke a piece of his black soul and had her hand go inside her body like a ghost. As she moves her hand across her body, she starts to scream at the top of her lungs like she is being stabbed with a red hot burning knife. Her other arm supports her weight but the extreme pain has her elbow bent where her head almost touches the wooden floors. I am on the side of her, so I see her ghost-like hand fall out of her body along with half of her pure white soul.
It takes her some time to recover, this is when she starts to put the 2 souls together and treat them like clay. As she comes across pitch black rocks or black sharp glass, they are set off to the side. Once the light grey clay ball was completely out of the black objects she started to form 3 separate balls.
The dream always stops there. I woke up in a cold sweat. I quickly get up out of my room that is in the basement and go to my brother’s room on the main floor. His bedroom door is always open. He is already awake waiting for me with the blanket. For we share that dream at the same time. We wake up from it when it ends. Every single time. Ever since our 5th birthday.
Rocket, our black pit-lab mix, climbs in bed with us. He must have heard me run up the stairs.
I wake up to being surrounded by my brother with his back to me and with all three dogs on the bed. I am on my side a bit over the edge of the bed. The only reason I don’t fall off is because of Mimi. She is laying on top of my waist. I am cramped as fuck here on the damn twin bed. Me being cramped on a twin bed with my twin. I smile at the thought. I stand up and fix my tank top and shorts.
Mimi is a pit-bull poodle mix. She has all the physical traits of a pit-bull with poodle hair. She is brown, white and gray. I head to the kitchen to stretch my sore muscles. I look at the clock. It’s 5. I am the first one up. Normally, I would be in my room in the basement fast asleep until I am told that they are leaving for work. Summer vacation started a week ago and my brother found 2 part time jobs to bring in extra money. The introvert that I am, refused to do that when mom asked me if I wanted to. It worked out because I could watch the house and keep thieves from getting in, plus take care of the doggies. Speaking of which, I unlock the back door, right next to the kitchen to let them out. They must have heard me do that since they are right by my legs. They all reach my knees. I slowly open the door as they race out. I don’t want to fall down the basement stairs.
I start making everyone’s daily dose of caffeine. I make coffee for mom and Kaiden. Then I make myself some hot green tea. I threw away the empty water bottles. I like coffee, too, but tea helps me after the nightmare. It gives me the sense that everything is fine. While I let my tea cool, I take mom’s coffee to her and wake her up. Next twiny gets his. His short reddish brown hair is a mess from sleep. Sitting up, his hazel eyes meet my eyes before he takes the coffee cup. Now, I can sit and enjoy my caffeine and sugar in the living room.
Mom comes out of the room wearing light green scrubs. She takes care of disabled people who cannot do it themselves. Me and her could be twins with our soft round faces and thick bright red orange hair with hazel eyes. Kaiden looks exactly like me but with sharp manly features.
“Janet honey, I need your help to find my keys. I think Swipe took them to your room.” Mom says.
With that said we go to my room. Swipe was a dog that lived on the streets and had to steal food and begged to stay alive. Swipe is a gray German pit mix. All of the dogs are rescued. Rocket and Mimi were abused in the backyard. In a place where you mind your own, you have to be careful. If they are willing to hurt a dog, then they are willing to hurt you for stopping them. We stole them in the middle of the night. Since they are rescues, we do not know their age. We all think Rocket is the oldest. Mimi and Rocket follow us down stairs.
Kaiden
While mom and my sister are gone, I enjoyed the coffee Janet made. I hate mornings. I had no choice but to need more money. My sister got tired when dealing with people for more than an hour when there was a crowd. She can have bad anxiety when something happens and she is not expecting it.
Mom had to cut ties with her family. They were toxic. So, she had us because of a one night stand. It was a couple months before she knew she was pregnant. No dad in the picture.
I hear the jingle of my keys and look up to see The four legged thief disappear down the stairs. I quickly get up after him and rush down there. Swipe stashes all the things he takes in my sister’s room for some reason. As soon as I reach her room a sound goes off making us fall to the ground.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
A gun goes off really close to us. That set the dogs off. My heart is in my throat. Mom makes sure we are okay then tries to calm the dogs down. Not long after, you hear sirens head this way. Janet has tears run down her. Mom helps her in bed. It’s her safe place. The dogs get on the bed making a cocoon around her. Once she calms down enough for me and mom to go up stairs. There is a hard knock on the door as soon as mom is on the main floor. There is no mistaking that knock.
Mom opens the door to a cop. They talk a bit. I zoned out and went to sit back in my spot. I freeze. I just had to put my heart back in its place from my throat, it now moves to my stomach. Whether it was dumb luck, coincidence or Swipe’s instinct that made him take my keys; it makes me grateful. Right where my head was, there is a bullet hole there. I now see why Janet likes the basement. I hear the front door shut.
“Kaiden dear, are you okay?” asks mom.
She saw the look on my face.
“Mom, I almost died. Swipe took my keys in time.” I tell her as I point to the bullet hole in the wall.
Mom comes and hugs me tightly. I hugged her back. Being 5′10, I tower over Mom and Janet who are 5′5. I can’t believe I almost got shot by a stray bullet. We let go and I got ready for work.
After me and Mom were done we checked on my sister. When we were reassured she was good we started to head out. We stepped out onto the closed porch with blue and red flashing lights. The street is filled with cop cars. There is yellow tape in the yard across the street with the sidewalk included. The houses on this street are mainly one story that has one or 2 bedrooms. Then a couple houses with a second story. Some of the houses have bars on the outside. This run down neighborhood is not a good place to live. Yet, where is a good place to live when you are poor? Mom goes to someone, about us getting to work and moving their police vehicles out of the way. She must have used her charming attitude because they were out of our way in no time.
“Boss, a police informant reported that an innocent human was almost killed.”
“What? How?” I asked the man that entered the office.
“A stray bullet from a gun went through a house wall.” was his reply.
“At least they didn’t rip their prey apart. I can get in a lot of shit for that. Not that I care too much about that. We can’t have too many human beings ripped apart or we will get hell from the royals. Now, where did this happen?”
“On the East side and on the border of our territory. It happens to be across the street from the girl you have been watching.”
“Who was it?” I ask.
“A fresh one Boss. Cleaning up a mess he made. A hole was discovered after the woman and her son left for work. They tried to knock on the door but all they heard were dogs barking and there were no lights on. They assumed no one was home.” The man said.
So, not high enough to know that I am watching someone over there. Stray bullets that go through a house are rare. Not unheard of for people to be injured or killed by them.
“A fresh hybrid?”
“Yes, sir”
“Which house was it?”
He is silent. That alone tells me. They almost killed her or someone in her family at least.
“You are dismissed” I wave my hand as I say it.
I am a leader of a gang but the look of our HQ we look more like the mob. No matter the fact that we deal in drugs, illegal weapons and prostitutes. The first time I saw her was when she was five. I saw her somehow save her brother from the edge of death. It was the 4th of July and the fireworks were going off. I was walking down the street and heard a little girl scream “No!“. Next thing there is a bright light. Then it’s gone. Due to the fireworks I doubt anyone heard her. I look over to see 2 children. The boy lying on the ground passed out and a small girl kneeling over him crying. I can see a decent scar on him. I am not sure what happened but one thing is certain, those kids have one strong bond for her to access power to save him like that.
A human with a hidden power is a perfect hiding spot for it. Since they are siblings on the same wave link, the boy will be a good shield for her. They were in the back of the house. I carefully got close to them without being sensed, hiding around the corner of the house. By the way the house smelled, it seemed like they lived there. I put the girl to sleep and took the kids in the house. Mom passed out on the couch in what looked like work clothes. The back door is wide open. I bet from the kids. I tuck the kids in. I put the item inside the girl for safe keeping. My life depends on it.
