ACT I: The Horseman
Present Day, Upstate New York
A glimmer caught Charlie's eye inside the dark cave for only a brief moment in time. He turned his head back while green eyes glanced over his shoulder at the back wall.
He tilted his head one way, nothing. He tilted his head the other way, the glimmer returned. Slowly, as if something could wake in the shadows, Charlie started to creep his way towards the wall.
The now twenty-seven year old prince grew up to stand around six foot two inches, with broad shoulders and large build thanks to his occupation; head ASA agent of the New York branch. He wore his face in a resting frown, a flicker of emotion rarely passing on it during the work day. On his head sat black hair, like most of the Fisher family, but his was thick with wide looping curls.
“What is it?” Brenner, second in command, buzzed through Charlie’s helmet from behind him. Brenner had noticed the change in his demeanor immediately and hope had bubbled up in his chest.
“Found something,” Charlie replied in a low tone. He lowered his gun to one arm before brushing away dirt from a hole in the wall. When he saw more of what looked like metal, he spoke up again, “Jenna, are you seeing this?”
Jenna, New York's top ASA criminal psychologist, was positioned way outside of the cave for her own safety. She moved to the team’s tech specialist’s side and focused on the larger screen, “Justin, switch to cam one for this screen.” The two, Jenna and Justin, studied the feed from Charlie's helmet camera as it cleared away more and more of the packed mud.
“It’s something alright,” Charlie was sure before he flicked his wrist, his elemental magic sending the dirt off what he was digging around and down to the floor. Sure enough, a concave metal door handle was embedded into the rock face.
“Looks like you were right to send the team here after all,” Jenna sounded relieved.
Charlie couldn’t help but spread the smallest hint of a smile on his stoic face at Jenna’s words. He took off his uniform glove and put the palm of his hand on the cave wall. He closed his eyes to concentrate and, using his magic, he did what he could to map out the other side of the fake door. It was smaller than the area they were currently in, he knew that much, but couldn’t get a good read of what could lay inside.
“There’s a room behind here,” he said as he opened his eyes. “Chelsea, Brenner,” Charlie kept his tone low to his teammates that could hear him through their own helmets, “come help with the door.”
On command, the two agents approached cautiously at the order of their leader. Brenner reached Charlie first before Chelsea, having been hovering around Charlie like he was watching his back instead of the surrounding area. He was a taller man than Charlie, his body often likened to a brick wall by the team. That sandy blond hair under his helmet was always kept short, only because it made getting ready in the morning easier. Where he stood strong and looked unstoppable, Brenner had a bad habit of worrying. So, it was no surprise that he looked at Chelsea with a look on his face that screamed he was wondering what, or who, just might be on the other side of the door.
The ASA team from New York had been tracking a high profile escaped convict to this very cave. It sat just beyond Manhattan's border into upstate New York with a quiet town that laid to the east. Given power signatures and camera sightings, Charlie was going out on what he called an ‘educated whim’ to bring their entire team out here, a whim that Jenna had just commended him for.
The convict, Zeken Freed, had been the subject of one of the longest games of cat and mouse in the team’s history. The case had started with bodies washing up against Manhattan’s docks, each with strange puncture marks at the base of their necks and down their backs. Besides the wounds, each one was branded with a crescent moon and cross symbol on their wrists or forearm. Jenna had likened it to marking cattle when she first saw it.
While Zeken had successfully hidden his identity for months, he was eventually identified the summer before his capture. Though, he wasn’t caught then. After his identification, it was a battle of tracking him which proved nearly impossible. Zeken, an earth elemental, seemed able to move through the shadows and left almost no trail that the ASA could track. It was clear to the team immediately that he was not using the legal transport pads and stations. How he was able to do this was lost on them to this day; transport magic without the aid of a pad was hard to control for even a Kulun, let alone a normal Nezulu. With no way to track him through the proper channels, they had nothing but eyewitness accounts and little power signatures to go off of.
It became a very publicized case rather quickly, with mass panic that a serial killer was on the loose in New York. Charlie had become obsessed with Zeken and it appeared to the team that Zeken had started to become equally as obsessed with Charlie.
He began to leave notes around the city in spray paint and phrases of poems on bodies in marker, anything to get into his head. The two had played their game for almost a year, with Zeken being one of the few criminals to outsmart the top ASA official. Charlie, who had a perfect score on every test he took, going so far as to correct a question on the ASA entrance exam, was Fisher’s smartest agent that they had ever produced. Being so publicly outsmarted was not something he had taken well.
When the team caught him that winter, it was a huge victory that called for an even bigger celebration. While he wasn’t much of a drinker, Charlie ended up remembering the hangover more than the party itself.
However, it was a victory that didn’t last long as Zeken escaped on the exact anniversary of his capture. Charlie felt as if he had planned it that way. He left no trace they could track once again, as if he'd vanished in his sleep.
“No heartbeat inside,” Charlie confirmed to his team, mostly for Brenner, before glancing at the two standing beside him. After they both nodded, Charlie looked down and turned the handle slowly. The lock unleashed a noise that turned all three of their stomachs. A loud grind of metal echoed through the room that was finally followed by a soft click of the lock releasing. If there was anyone in the cave with them, the team was no longer hidden.
In one swift motion, Charlie pushed open the door. As the two rushed in, Charlie held his position, gun raised, standing guard in the doorway.
"Clear!" Chelsea called from her side of the room, the noise of the door throwing out any stealth they had anyway.
"Clear!" Brenner confirmed shortly after from his side.
Charlie stepped forward into the new space, his gaze sweeping across the room as he started to register where they were. Knowing Zeken, it should have been no surprise that it only appeared to be a simple study cluttered with books. That’s all they typically found of his during their initial case.
Charlie stayed on alert while Brenner and Chelsea began to look through the hidden room, something was not quite right in the back of his mind.
Brenner, wearing his uniformed gloves, picked up a few of the books on a bookshelf to the far left, Jenna and Justin focusing their attention on his camera feed as he went.
"College biology textbook?” Brenner muttered under his breath. “Not exactly light reading.”
"Same thing on this end.” Chelsea’s voice was in their comms as her eyes scanned the bookshelf. "Except..." She picked out a book with her gloved hand, revealing its title. "Frankenstein,” she scrunched up her face, “a man that likes his classics."
“A psycho that likes his classics,” Brenner replied.
Charlie kept a hand on his gun as a tight knot formed in his stomach. Something didn’t feel right. Moving toward Brenner, he looked over his shoulder at the new book.
Flipping it over, Brenner read the title aloud: “Power Sourcing, Nezulu Core Displacement Surgeries and Theories.”
"This guy's always given me the creeps. Since day one." Jenna said. "Power displacement was never tested because it would kill the source. If that’s what he was doing; those people didn’t die as quickly as we thought."
“Explains the love for mad scientists,” Chelsea chimed in.
Charlie nodded, that bad feeling sinking down, deeper into his gut. "Pages are torn out. Looks like he took what he needed and ditched the rest." He glanced at Brenner, who shut the book and set it back down.
They moved on, Charlie breaking away to run his hand along the wooden desk in the center of the room. He came around to where the seat was, pulling open a drawer that had a keyhole on it. When the drawer was only an inch pulled, a sharp click sounded and, without shifting his body, he glanced at Chelsea and Brenner to see if they had heard it too.
They did; both froze and instantly began listening intently to their surroundings.
A low growl rumbled from the seemingly empty corner of the room, a growl that could haunt your nightmares for years to come. One that held the pain of a thousand people burning in flames. Charlie recognized the sound instantly, even though something he had only heard in training recordings. You don’t forget a sound like that.
His voice rang out in warning, “Hellhound!”
Charlie raised his weapon and spun to face the corner but the creature was faster. It hit him hard, slamming Charlie backward into the old wooden desk. Charlie swore he heard it crack slightly. While he tried to regain the wind that was knocked out of him quickly, it wasn’t so easy with a 300 pound beast on top of him. With arms pinned beneath its weight, Charlie struggled to bring up his foot for a solid kick. He didn’t get enough room until Brenner lunged forward, trying to tear the beast away from his captain while his strength alone.
Charlie put his arm up as Brenner got the hound just barely away from him. He grit his teeth, pushing what he could under the beast’s jaw as it snapped at him. Its drool was like tar, leaking out of its mouth and dripping onto Charlie’s face in their struggle. It had gotten into the very corner of Charlie’s mouth, causing Charlie to spit forcefully to get it away. It tasted rotten, like old milk you accidentally put into your cereal and ate with full confidence.
Chelsea had her gun raised from where she was, ready to fire, but with the struggle and the dim light, she couldn’t get a clear shot.
“Give me room!” she ordered Brenner, who immediately stepped back. Charlie grit his teeth and waited for the right time for one final shove. Chelsea pulled the trigger not long after Brenner had stepped away, and, when shot struck, Charlie gave a hearty push, knocking the beast to the floor.
Charlie wasted no time. Grabbing his gun, Charlie fired once, then again as the creature staggered to its feet. Charlie yanked Brenner back toward him and Chelsea as the hellhound prowled the other side of the desk.
“Any ideas?” Brenner asked, his eyes locked on the creature.
Charlie answered, “one of us has to get it with a blade.”
He knew one of their blades was made out of iron for this very occasion. They had a few strapped to their chest along their uniform for any occurrence that needed a special material.
“On it,” Chelsea replied, unbuckling the knife from her vest.
The hound snarled from the shadows, watching and waiting to make its next move towards the trio. As Chelsea took her weapon in hand, it barked sharply, but it wasn’t until Brenner moved toward the side of the desk that it charged.
Brenner thrust a hand forward, sending a gust of wind that hurled the beast through the air as it ran at him. It landed against the wall and pounded to the floor with a hard thud. Charlie stomped his foot shortly after it landed, locking the creature’s paws to the ground with earth.
“Heart! I need its heart!” Chelsea reminded them.
Charlie shifted his hands, forcing the creature upward against the wall with a surge of power. In one fluid motion as the creator lifted, Chelsea hurled her blade.
With a final, guttural cry that caused all three to grimace, the beast dissolved into a dark and gooey substance. It leaked along the wall down to the floor, sounding like boiling water and filling the air with the stench of freshly laid asphalt.
“What the hell was a hellhound doing here?” Brenner asked as they regained their composure.
“I wouldn’t even know how he could get one.” Charlie stepped toward the drawer and pulled it open again.
Only, it was empty.
Charlie slammed it shut in frustration, the desk shaking with the force. “Whatever was in here before, he clearly didn’t want anyone else getting their hands on it.”
“It’s alright,” Brenner attempted to dispel the negative feelings, “we’ll find something.”
Their comms crackled to life with Jenna’s voice once again. “Everyone alright?”
Chelsea responded as she gave a glance over the room, “all clear in terms of hellhounds.”
“Open the rest of everything, don’t let anyone in here until we see if anything else triggers a trap.” Charlie demanded, his eyebrows pinched up in frustration.
The team of three immediately began working on overturning everything. Opening all they could to try and trigger anything, but they found nothing. It was only the one drawer that had been a trap.
After removing his gloves, Charlie firmly pressed his hand against the wall to attempt to read the cave completely. He was almost relieved when another room made itself known to him.
“Another room,” he spoke and the energy shifted between the three.
“Where?” Brenner asked.
Charlie jabbed his head to the wall to the left of the doorway they had come in from.
Immediately, Brenner went over to feel up the wall for a lever. There was nothing embedded into the wall, like how they had come into this room. Brenner’s deep brown eyes glanced at the bookcase before doing a double take back to a small golden statue of a ram’s head. Before he was able to even grab it, Charlie cut in and yanked it down with his one again gloved hand.
With a click, the door popped open ajar. Brenner pushed it open slowly with Charlie and Chelsea at his back, guns ready over Brenner’s shoulders.
Chelsea had to hold back a gag at the smell alone; she flicked on her helmet's filtration immediately. The other two agents were not far behind her actions, unable to stand it. Without much hesitation, Brenner reached out and pulled the chain for the light to show them what sight came with the sewage smell.
In the middle of the room sat a metal table shaped like a human body. Spikes came up out of the sides and created a cage to keep whoever was on the table still. To the side of the nightmarish table were used tools on a small tray propped up on a stool, rotting flesh stuck onto each tool from the last victim.
On the floor below the table was a pool of old brown blood while the cabinets held rubbing alcohol, wires, and power tools. As Brenner and Chelsea's eyes scanned around, what caught their attention the most were the buckets lined along the walls. Carefully organized, they were filled with bits of what Brenner could tell were multiple different victims, Intestines, multiple pairs of feet, fingers, nothing worth much in the black market yet it was carefully kept and organized.
“Guess he figured washing the bodies up in the Hudson wasn’t a great idea to try again,” Brenner choked out his theory. He turned his head to Charlie, but noticed his eyes were firmly planted on the back wall.
Charlie stepped deeper into the room as Chelsea chimed in at the horror before them, “we need to figure out how many different people saw the inside of this room.”
Jenna’s voice crackled back into their helmets, “I’ll alert the correct team for that.” She kept it short. If she was being honest, she was sick to her stomach over seeing the feed.
At their silence, Chelsea looked at Brenner who was now staring at what Charlie had been looking at since the light was turned on. She followed both their gaze to the back wall and in small lettering, written in the old brown blood, was the phrase:
You’re Next, Charlie
Chelsea’s voice got caught in her throat with a small gasp while Brenner finally looked from the wall back to Charlie.
The room remained silent, nothing but their breaths could be heard in their comms as Charlie only stood there with furrowed brows. He tried to remain stoic but he was annoyed that such a message was left to taunt him.
In fear for their mental states, Jenna decided to pull them. “Come on out. We should reset the cave and get the correct teams in.”
Brenner walked up to their entranced captain and urged him to follow Jenna’s instructions. He gave him a slight push to send Charlie out the way they came with Chelsea was not far behind.
Upon emerging and putting that smell of death behind them, sunlight beamed into their eyes causing the three to squint. Immediately, Brenner yanked off his helmet to take a deep breath of the fresh air. He closed his eyes and tried to collect his thoughts of what they had all seen in the back room. He already didn’t like caves to begin with, the air so stale and stagnant inside them.
“Does anyone need medical care?” Jenna said once her and Justin were within reach of the trio.
“Just a possible bruise,” Charlie shook his head, his mind elsewhere as he yanked his helmet off. “The hellhound didn’t get through the vest.”
Jenna nodded and looked at the other two that shook their heads no. She looked back to Charlie, “I’m going to make you an appointment for our therapists.”
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”I’m fine, do not make that appointment,” Charlie quickly came back at her. He couldn’t stand any sessions she made him go to. “Any work hours away from my desk means he gets further and further out of reach. That room meant one thing only, it’s that he’s only going to unravel faster. We don’t need a killing spree.”
Chelsea put up her hand to Jenna, silently asking the woman if she could speak. Having been in the room with Charlie, having seen everything for herself with her own eyes, she hoped that there was a chance he would listen to her.
Jenna gave her a hopeful nod and the blonde looked at the prince with concern. “Charlie, that was an active threat on your life. You should see someone and think about starting a watch around you and your sister.”
Charlie shook his head, not caving in the slightest. “Who can better protect me than me? Besides, if he comes for me that means Zeken would be within grasp. We continue forward.”
Chelsea and Jenna gave a long helpless sigh while Brenner shook his head to their captain. Jenna reluctantly moved on, knowing she’d press him to go tomorrow even if he usually refused. “Let’s reset the cave so that we can let in the cataloguing teams.”
Justin held out a pair of gloves with embedded wires, offering them to Charlie. Justin was a younger and newer member of the team, but he was wicked sharp when it came to technology. He was not built like Charlie or Brenner, almost never picking up a gun a day in his career. He was thin, shorter, with dark skin and neatly braided hair.
However, it was Charlie’s turn to sigh as he looked down at the gloves being offered to him. His eyebrows twitched in the same anger he felt before, that anger that came with the feeling of failure.
“Do you want to try without them this time?” Jenna asked, watching Charlie carefully.
Without answering her, Charlie took them and strapped the gloves in place. They were far too tight on his hands for his liking, they barely strapped in every time he put them on.
“It’s not going to work. I haven’t made any progress,” Charlie finally answered Jenna, but left the group before she could say anything back to him. He didn’t want to hear any false encouragement, it usually only made him feel worse.
For the past two years, Charlie had been struggling with his newly inherited Kulun of Time abilities. The old Kulun of Time, Matthew, worked closely with them to reset crime scenes or even show snippets of memories during trials. When he passed so suddenly and at such a young age, it was of great concern to the entire agency worldwide, as he was such an asset to their larger cases.
While the thought of Charlie receiving these abilities was a relief to those who knew, he couldn’t master it as quickly as other Kuluns. No matter how hard he tried or how many countless training hours he endured, he couldn’t do anything linked to his abilities. With that failure to perform, the agency thought that the announcement of the transition should be left up to Charlie. They wanted that much to at least be on his own terms.
It was by the grace of the universe that, while sorting through the former Kulun’s belongings, Justin had discovered the gloves in an old box in the basement. With them on, resetting things was effortless; returning the space to how it had been before could be done in mere minutes now. It relieved some of the stress Charlie had for himself, but did not silence the disappointment. Wearing them was like waving a white flag in his mind; pathetic.
Charlie watched as everything shifted back into how they found it. That cracking sound he thought he heard from the desk sounded once again. He focused on the pain in his lower side, maybe it was more hurt than he originally admitted to Jenna.
He blinked once, lowering his hands to his side where he stood in the cave alone. Nothing but the buzz of the poor wired lights sounded in his ears while his thoughts ran wild. Tracking Zeken was practically all he had known for the past two and a half years. Even when he was locked away, Charlie went over the case almost nightly to see if he could figure out any of the gaps they had no answers to. Now, here they were again in the same spot and with even less answers. That disappointment clouded his brain even here.
Charlie took in a large breath and turned, exiting the cave to rejoin his team.
“Zeken would have gone into town for groceries,” Jenna reasoned with the rest of the team as Charlie approached them silently. “We can start asking around, see if anyone’s seen him. If he left all this behind, maybe he wouldn't have gone far.”
“Or he only took what he needed like we theorized inside,” Brenner countered as he handed his helmet off to someone on the equipment team. “The trapped drawer was emptied. Those pages were gone. Maybe that was all he wanted out of this place.”
“All this junk for a couple pages and whatever was in a small drawer?” Jenna countered.
Charlie finally spoke up as he took off the gloves, taking Brenner’s side. “He wrote that message for me to find. He won’t be returning now after leaving something like that on the wall.”
Justin shrugged, knowing it was no problem to keep an eye on the place. “We should keep an eye on the entire town in case he comes back or passes through. I’ll have my team watch the town’s cameras and set up more for any blind spots.”
“I’m not opposed to that,” Charlie agreed even though he knew there would be no return for Zeken. He wasn’t willing to leave a large gap in their search. “Let’s do it.”
Charlie handed back the gloves to Justin, happy to have them away from him. Justin treated them with more care than Charlie, taking them as if they were made out of easily breakable crystals.
“Can someone give me the time?” Charlie cut their silence.
Brenner glanced at his watch, “You won’t make it in time by driving.”
“Dinner with the little princess again?” Chelsea smirked, referring to Winnie, Charlie’s younger sister.
Charlie didn’t let her teasing get to him. They did it far too often and they were all too comfortable with each other for it to get into his head. “Winnie invited me to dinner and this took far longer than I intended.”
“Because of the wall of blood?” Justin tried to make light of the situation as he placed the gloves carefully into their case. He knew he was getting a death stare from Jenna behind him, but he didn’t mind. He always said that laughing about something was better than crying about it.
“Yes; because of the wall of blood, but mostly the fact that we should have been here hours before we actually arrived.” Charlie answered, slowly turning his head to Brenner.
Brenner put his hands on the straps of his vest. “Who knew cave permits were that hard to get?”
“You should’ve,” Charlie countered.
Brenner unhooked his hands and put them up in defense, “it’s a cave, not someone’s home. I would’ve thought it would take half the time.”
Chelsea, though, went right back to teasing their captain. “The real question is; how does someone half Charlie’s height make him worry more than a hellhound did?”
“Winnie doesn’t like eating alone, and I don’t mind seeing her while she’s still living in the city. I’m not afraid of her.” He was very afraid of her. She once sat on his back for an hour until he agreed to go with her to Fisher for a visit.
He cleared his throat, shifting back to business. “Besides, nothing left to do here, anyway. Not until everything is documented by the teams. They won’t be ready for review until tomorrow.”
“Tell her we said hi,” Brenner said with a smile. He never teased Winnie, he and Charlie had known each other since the first year of the ASA academy. They had been selected to room together based on a questionnaire and, while Brenner had to get over the fact he was rooming with a very well known prince at first, they hit it off. Brenner knew how precious the younger sibling was to him, and that the fear was warranted.
“I will.” Charlie was happy to pass along the message. “See you all tomorrow.”
“See you,” was the collective response from the team.
Charlie raised a hand in farewell as he made his way to his parked sports car, ducking under the caution tape as he went. He stopped short once as someone rushed by him with a dusting kit, but ultimately got to his car rather quickly.
As he got to the vehicle, opening the door and getting inside, his phone buzzed. He dug it out of his pocket and saw he had one unread message from the resting head of the entire ASA. In the text, Abe had wondered what Charlie was up to tonight and, if he was free, cared to grab dinner in the city somewhere since he was around. Charlie declined politely in a message back, not having seen his mentor since the escape of Zeken. Afterall, he did have a prior engagement that he was now silently thanking his sister for having.
Abe Octavia was very close with the team when they originally were formed, but he had moved out to the Long Island area after Zeken’s arrest in order to attempt retirement. While he still made the large big-picture decisions, the day to day in New York was now up to Charlie.
Abe had played a major part in each of the three field agents’ decisions to join. He had personally picked Brenner to receive a full scholarship to the academy, an award only given to one kid a year in Laven. It was Laven’s way of ensuring some of its citizens were part of the ASA and Brenner’s heart was dead set on getting it since he was a child. He saw the determination in his essay, met with him during his interview, and felt like he was the perfect fit for the academy.
For Chelsea, she was set on going forward in sports. With eyes set on the Cloenia Cup for Pileball, a mix of soccer and elemental magic, she hadn’t even thought of the ASA until Abe had spoken to her after one of her games.To this day she won’t relay what he said to her, believing it to be private between the two of them, but it did entirely change the trajectory of her life. Chelsea was fierce from the beginning, she came into the accident with already having the strength most built in their first to second year. She was tall, around six feet, but narrow enough where she could fit in places Charlie and Brenner definitely couldn’t.
For Charlie, Abe took a risk approaching the crowned prince. They had never had a royal in their organization before, but he wanted to show that the islands and the ASA were a unified front. There had been some tension between the organization and people that had been born on the islands and stayed their whole lives there. They truly believed that the ASA should be dismantled and all of the Nezulu be forced into the islands for their own protection. Abe wanted to show that island-born political figures supported the ASA and their work. He saw Charlie as the best option out of all the royals, and he spent more than one evening convincing Yandy it would be an excellent way to help shape his son into a strong ruler. Charlie even was on board once he found out and he eventually poured everything he had into the program the second the offer was accepted by his father.
Charlie started the engine of his sports car, his mind calming at the sound of her roar. Winnie often told him to ditch the car and take the subway, but something about owning it, about the way it made him feel like he’d truly made it, kept him holding on. He would gladly sit in traffic than in a dirty subway car, especially on a hot summer’s day.
On the way into the city, Charlie kept glancing between the time on the car’s screen and the sluggish vehicle ahead of him. He grew more worried of his sister's wrath but, if things cleared once he got through the tunnel, he would make it just in time.
Halfway through the drive, just before the tunnel, his phone rang and his father’s name flashed across the screen. Charlie’s finger hovered over the answer button, like it was instinct to pick it up right away, but then changed direction, hitting ignore instead.
This time there was no guilt, unlike how he had felt with Abe.
By the time he reached Winnie’s street, parking had made him officially late. He jogged up the steps in a desperate attempt to be a little less late, but before he could even knock on the door, it opened just enough for Winnie to peek her head out.
Winnie was much smaller than her brother, though only two years younger. Her long black hair was as pristine and shiny as always, bits of it framing out her still youthful and soft face. Winnie’s striking green eyes that contrasted against her pale skin, skin that was always cold to the touch, made her almost the spitting image of Yandy. She really didn’t mind looking like their father, she was the only one out of his children that still had hope for him to be a great dad.
“C’mon,” Charlie pleaded with the princess, “I was on time until I had to find parking.”
A moment of silence passed, as if she was carefully thinking her decisions over, before she finally spoke.
“I forgive you.” She opened the door all the way for Charlie to enter. “Only because Rodgers isn’t here yet.”
“He’s not coming,” Charlie bluntly said back to her. He shook his head as he stepped inside, kicking off his shoes in a bit of anger at the mere mention of their brother. As he did so, a small Pomeranian immediately began to yap at his feet. He crouched down to pat the fluffy ball of energy, even though the two of them didn’t get along well.
“There, there, Pip,” Charlie mumbled to the dog that tried to bite his hand.
Winnie quickly disappeared into the kitchen while her brother settled into the house. “I don’t know why you doubt him. He would’ve texted if he couldn’t make it.”
Charlie rolled his eyes from where he was hidden in the entry way, even opening and closing his mouth to mimic what she had said. Her optimism was exhausting most of the time when it came to Rodgers. It didn’t help that Charlie didn’t get along with him and that the topic of his twin brother was a constant battle between thin and his sister. He decided to hold his tongue on what she said, not wanting to add to the stress of the day.
Charlie rounded the corner into the kitchen, fully expecting Winnie to somehow know that he mocked her and begin scolding him for it. Instead, he saw her staring at her phone.
“Rodgers isn’t coming,” she said shortly before clicking the screen off and lifting her nose in the air. She didn’t want to give Charlie too much satisfaction that he ended up being right.
Charlie raised an eyebrow and barely held back a laugh. Before he could even say anything in the form of an I-told-you-so, she pointed a fork at him in warning.
“I didn’t say a word.” Charlie protested, mouth agape.
“You were thinking it.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes,” she lowered the fork but kept her eyes on him, “I do.”
They stared each other down for a little bit before Winnie turned to the takeout bag on the counter, unloading it.
She muttered as she set the table with some containers, “He only fails because he knows we expect him to.”
Charlie scoffed. He found that very hard to believe.
“More like he’s probably drunk somewhere and forgot all about us. Has nothing to do with our,” he paused, exaggerating his voice into his best imitation of her, “expectations.”
“Shut up and grab your food,” Winnie said, settling into her seat and scooting closer to the table. Charlie rifled through the takeout bag after she purposefully didn’t set his stuff out. It was his fault, he was late and making fun of her precious charity case.
Winnie, because of her ice abilities, wasn’t much of a cook. Though some ice elementals had made names for themselves in the culinary world, it was just mostly with frozen at-home foods sold on the islands and in aisles humans didn’t even see in the supermarket.
“I love your cooking.” Charlie knew that maybe he shouldn’t tease her about it, especially since he was already on thin ice tonight, but he had to let at least one comment slip.
“Thank you.” She took the fake compliment without hesitation.
They ate in relative silence at first, Charlie scrolling through his phone while Winnie picked at her food. He had expected her to dig in like she always does but instead, she seemed distracted.
“He’s sober now,” she said suddenly and harshly. “Rodgers told me last time he came by.”
Charlie barely looked up, not willing to play this game. “Did he ask you for subway money?”
She twitched her nose in his retort. “Well… yes, but he doesn’t make much in tips at the bar-“
Charlie barely tilted his head and met her gaze with an unamused face.
“Then no, my dear. He’s not sober.”
“He is.” She mumbled under her breath and looked down at her plate.
Charlie didn’t argue further, he didn’t have the energy to after today. He certainly didn’t tell her that just two weeks ago, he had gotten a call from Rodgers on a bad trip by the abandoned docks on the west side. Charlie had to hoist himself out of bed in the middle of the night to go and get him. Not wanting to further inconvenience himself by driving him home, Rodgers was forced to spend the night but was long gone by the time Charlie came home from work. He rarely gave Charlie an opportunity to lecture him, or gave himself time to thank Charlie.
Charlie never kept her updated of those late nights, he didn’t think her heart could handle it. He would usually head into work the next morning needing an energy drink instead of just coffee. Coffee came too, and it was always partnered with a second energy drink by nine. Brenner was always able to spot the signs and would silently take up some extra work that had to be done those days, which he was grateful for. He mostly tried to keep his brother’s reappearance a secret, at least until he got himself cleaned up. Whenever that would be, at this point.
“Maybe you should stop by more often,” Winnie broke their silence.
Charlie frowned. “I come over once a week for dinner.”
She gave him a pointed look. “I meant with him.”
“He left us, Winnie. We don’t owe him anything.”
Anger pricked at Charlie, not full hatred, but definitely at least a lingering resentment. Rodgers had left in the middle of the night shortly after their tenth birthday. No warning. No explanation.
Charlie had spent years trying to piece together why. His best guess? Rodgers couldn’t handle the weight of expectation. Unlike Charlie, he had never put forth any effort into his education. Rodgers had never tried to prepare for any part of his future and when he was faced with it, Charlie believed that he crumbled and ran.
To make matters worse, after Rodgers had left, their mother withdrew. Charlie and Winnie had only each other after that day, not including their occasional dealings with their father. That bond had made them inseparable and was part of the excuse Winnie used to follow him to the city as soon as she was old enough.
They both told each other that they would be there, no matter what, after that day.
Then, after nearly a decade, Rodgers had suddenly appeared on Winnie’s doorstep. She hadn’t recognized him at first, but Charlie had known instantly. Charlie had walked up behind her, his hands still wet from washing dishes, only to freeze at the sight of his fraternal twin for the first time in ten years. They had grown to look nothing alike, barely even looking related. Charlie was well filled in, tall, great posture with curlier hair. Rodgers was average height but skinny, pin straight hair that engulfed his head, with sharp features. The only soft part to him were his eyes, Charlie recalled them looking full, but deeply saddened.
Rodgers was a grown man standing before them that day, sunken in on himself with those hollow eyes. He was someone they didn’t know anymore and probably still didn’t know to this day.
“Maybe he went through something,” Winnie said softly. “We don’t know the full story.”
Charlie leaned back, rubbing his face as if that would push the frustration away. “If he wanted to tell us the full story, he would’ve. Now can I please just enjoy my meal?”
Winnie sighed, looking down at her napkin. “Fine.”
“Thank you.” Charlie’s phone began to buzz and he looked down. Quickly, he flipped his phone over as his father’s name popped up again. He didn’t want Winnie to see the screen but she caught a glance anyway.
“Aren’t you going to answer that?” She prodded.
“I’m perfectly fine not answering.”
This wasn’t how their dinners usually went and he hoped next week would be better. Charlie thought seeing his sister would help raise his spirits after what he saw today, little did he know she had some sort of agenda for him this evening.
“When was the last time you went home? To Fisher?” Not knowing of her brother’s stress, Winnie’s curiosity got the better of her.
Charlie thought for a moment, not entirely sure when he had last stepped foot in his homeland. “Two? Maybe three years ago, whenever you last forced me to go. I’ve been too busy.”
“You should go back more. It’d be good for the people to see that we both still take pride in our home. Plus, it would be nice to have some fun with you outside my house.”
“When was the last time you went?” But he already knew the answer.
“Last weekend,” she said proudly.
Winnie loved Fisher. She had only left for school and to spend more time with Charlie. Even then, she never stopped talking about it, the salty ocean air, the cobblestone streets that, if you drove just right, weren’t as bumpy as they looked. The grand parties, the food, the rolling hills outside the capital city. The castle town looked like it jumped straight out of a fantasy book. She loved it all, which is why Charlie thought she was perfect for the throne.
Charlie, on the other hand, had no attachment to Fisher. Their father’s coldness, Rodgers’ disappearance, he had escaped as soon as he was allowed and never looked back. Only then had his life really begun. When he had become a Kulun, a failed one, he announced that he was declining the throne. It wasn’t the final deciding factor, but it made it easier for their father to agree with him.
It was almost a relief. The one good thing those abilities ever brought him.
“I said my peace, there’s no question about me,” Charlie said.
“You never know,” Winnie countered. “I could decline and send it back to you or something.”
Charlie stared at her. “You wouldn’t do that.”
“I could,” she let a smile creep across her face. “Maybe I have other things I was planning on doing in my life; just like you.”
“You know, this wouldn’t be an issue if Rodgers just stayed and did what he was supposed to do. Instead he just decided to run, like a coward,” he added, trying to wiggle some hatred not his sister’s heart.
“It was a lot of pressure,” Winnie defended him, like always. Charlie should’ve known better. “And we don’t know for sure that’s why he left. He could’ve declined it just like you, if that was the case.”
“Well, either way, I think it’s fine that you go to all the events. Rodgers is banned, and I just… don’t want to. Don’t force me to come.” Charlie scoffed.
“I’m not forcing you,” Charlie was pretty sure she was, “it’s just that I wouldn’t mind some company now and then.”
“Yandy not enough for you?” Charlie had stopped calling their father ‘Dad’ years ago.
“He is,” she admitted. “But he’s not exactly fun company and you know Mom doesn’t get out much.”
Charlie often wasn’t sure if their mother’s isolation was by choice because of their brother or by force because of their father. All he knew is that it definitely started with that night. “Maybe you could break that habit for her.”
“Come with me next time. Release some stress and take a break, let’s go to all of our favorite spots.” Winnie’s voice softened. “Please?”
Charlie met her wide, pleading eyes. One of the only parts of Fisher that he adored was right in the chair next to him. He wanted to say no, but he just couldn’t. Besides, maybe she was right in needing to release some stress. It would have to be after this case was cracked, of course.
“Fine. Next time, I’ll go.”
“Great! I’m going two weeks from now.”
Charlie practically choked on his next bite, “Two weeks? You just went! That’s not nearly enough time to close my cases.”
“You already said yes.” She grinned. She felt satisfaction from what she considered as winning this round.
Charlie slumped back in his chair, resigned. He’d try again in a week to get out of it but he knew there was a high chance he was locked into this one unless something terrible happened.
She decided to add in a hidden part of his agreement, “And make sure you stop by to see Rodgers.”
Hands went out to Charlie’s side before he threw his head back and groaned in annoyance. This was probably one of the worst days he’d had in a while.
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