PRESENT DAY Despite threatening me with that particular bit of information about my immortal soul, he otherwise remained surprisingly close lipped on the subject. It did sound like a threat thought, the way that he said it, although I did doubt that was his original intention. To someone like him, it was probably no more than stating the way things were.
SEVERAL WEEKS AGO “You’ve seen him?” I could feel my heartbeat speeding up. I hadn’t realized how much hearing something like this would mean to me. It was validation. Someone else to share either the knowing or the madness with.
But she just shook her head. “No. So far as I can remember, I never have.”
SEVERAL WEEKS AGO The next several days passed in a blur. At time, I could almost convince myself that the events of that one crazy night hadn’t actually happened. And then I would go to my desk and pull out the piece of pottery and the plane tickets that the mysterious man had left me. It was hard to doubt yourself when you had two nice solid pieces of physical evidence to pick up.
SEVERAL WEEKS AGO “Who are you?” Mrs. Claire asked first. She looked as surprised as I felt.
“Don’t you know?” The man didn’t look confused at all. More amused than anything. He inclined his head towards the cards lying on the table:
SEVERAL YEARS AGO I made up the stairs with little trouble, but my heart was pounding the whole way. I was sure that at any moment the man from the cell was going to come through the door behind me and that would be it–despite the fact that I had a solid lead up the stairs.
PRESENT DAY If the figure standing there heard the name, he gave no sign. The memories of exactly what Michael had looked like the first time had mostly slipped away, but I had just enough left to be almost sure that I was right–and I have to admit, I wasn’t thrilled with the discovery.
SEVERAL WEEKS AGO In the end, it didn’t take nearly so long to explain things as I would have thought. I guess that’s the way things usually go, you always think that they were so very complicated and would take so long to explain until you actually try to do it. Then it turns out that there’s a simple way to say it.
SEVERAL YEARS AGO “I don’t have any artifacts.” Not only was it the truth, it seemed like it might even be something that he wanted to hear. “Pottery or otherwise.”
He just stared at me, not even so much as a blink in response.
SEVERAL WEEKS AGO At the moment, I was watching John Smith who was in turn watching his brother. No one was watching Mrs. Claire, so it came as a complete surprise to each of us when she suddenly started yelling in some angry kin to Latin. As I turned to look at her, there was a sizzling sound as a ring of some sort of powder in a rough circle around her started to light.
SEVERAL YEARS AGO The tone of the voice completely threw me for a loop. Even worse, I thought that I recognized it from somewhere, although I couldn’t quite place it.
Still, I replied calmly enough. “Oh, well enough I suppose. I took a nice jaunt out into the city, managed to get shot a few times, ended up here. Speaking of which, where is here, after all?” It was really all I could do to keep from screaming at the madness of the whole situation.