Late Saturday Evening, January 27th, 2018 (Two days before Flick and company confronted Fahsteth and Flick’s house was attacked by werewolves)

Most of the people at the Crossroads Academy believed that Jasmine Rhodes was a student from a normal Heretic family (inasmuch as Heretic families were ever normal). That wasn’t exactly true, since her true family was… well, as far from a ‘normal’ family of Crossroads Heretics as there could possibly be.

Actually, they weren’t even Crossroads Heretics at all. Not really. The family that Jazz had been born into was more of a clan of several interconnected families whose blood connections were so intertwined they were practically incestuous by that point, and were thoroughly impossible to untangle without involving higher-level math. As far as Jazz knew, they had started as about six separate Heretic families around the time of the American Revolution (and the same time as the whole war between Eden’s Garden and Crossroads). Those six Heretics and their families had chosen to walk away from both sides entirely, essentially telling Crossroads and Eden’s Garden to collectively go to hell while they focused on the important thing: protecting humanity. Collectively, the six families referred to themselves as Torchbearers. It was supposed to be a play off of taking the light from Crossroads' grand lighthouse (at that point a more primitive structure) and bringing it down into the real world as a torch. Because that was their point: to stay connected to humanity.

Over the years in the meantime, there had been certain concessions made, and traditions born. Most of their people would become natural Heretics by being taken out onto hunts with those who were already Heretics. Once an appropriate Stranger was taken, the initiate would be exposed to their blood and other parts, essentially being buried with the body in order to provoke the change. It didn’t always work, of course, and those who didn’t make the change that time had the choice of either trying again later or choosing to live a more ordinary life.

That was what would happen with most of their people, a choice between an ordinary life (and even then, they could choose to support the Torchbearers without actually fighting) and becoming a Natural Heretic, purposefully connected to some monster that they had killed.

But there was also another option. Over the years following the six families initial separation from both Crossroads and Eden’s Garden, a deal had eventually been made in order to avoid allowing the families to grow too weak. Once every five or six years, the Torchbearers would send one student each to Crossroads and to Eden’s Garden. One student for each organization. That student would go through the education and training, becoming a full-fledged Heretic, of the kind that could absorb powers from what they killed.

The Torchbearers celebrated those full Heretics. They were leaders, the most powerful of the six families. They were known as Lightwalkers (they definitely couldn’t be accused of abandoning their theme, that was for sure), and each Lightwalker essentially helped to lead the rest of the families as generals, with the Natural Heretics as their soldiers in the ongoing war against all of the monsters who hunted and killed humanity.

Suffice to say, the people who were chosen to represent the Torchbearers at Crossroads or Eden’s Garden were the best of the best. They were chosen only after a lengthy and exhaustive testing process, from groups of potentials who trained literally their entire lives up to the point of admission (roughly twelve for those joining Eden’s Garden and seventeen for those joining Crossroads) before finally being selected. Even those who weren’t selected to join one of the schools and eventually become Lightwalkers remained important, as they were the ones who became Natural Heretics and thus the Lightwalkers’ soldiers and hunters.

All of them, chosen or not, were the best that the six families had to offer. Those who were actually selected to become Lightwalkers were the top of everything. They were the smartest, the most powerful, the absolute strongest of the six families. They were literal champions.

And Jasmine was… not one of them.

She had never been intended to be one of them. While Jasmine did grow up within the six families, and was ostensibly a Torchbearer herself, she was never intended to become part of their war. She was not one of the potentials, not to become a Natural Heretic and definitely not to become one of the fabled Lightwalkers.

No, from a young age, Jasmine and her parents had both decided together that she would live a more normal life. She could help out where needed, but her true passion lay in the idea of making movies, of living within the Bystander world. And that had been okay with her parents. She wanted to be as normal as possible, and they accepted that. She wasn’t born to be a legend in their society, she wasn’t meant to be some grand hero who led their people. All she wanted to do was go into Hollywood so she could write and direct movies. That was her grand dream: to be a woman who made epic action movies.

Then the attack had happened. A group of Strangers, monsters, had somehow found a way to ambush the training facility of the potential Lightwalkers. Over a dozen children and teenagers ranging from eleven to the cusp of seventeen had been killed, slaughtered by the beasts they were supposed to train to fight. It had been a total and complete massacre. And when it was over, there were no potentials left, none of the youth who had trained throughout their lives for the honor of being sent either to Crossroads or to Eden’s Garden had survived. Of the children who were left, none were anywhere near the proper age to join Crossroads for at least another five years. None, that was… except for Jasmine.

She wasn’t the first choice. Or the second, or even a distant third. She was literally the only choice they had left, the only teenager who was the proper age, yet hadn’t been in that training facility because she had never intended to become a proper Heretic in the first place.

And yet, after everything that had happened, she couldn’t just turn her back on her people. Hollywood, movies, her dreams… she had to set them aside. There was no other choice. Coming here, coming to Crossroads to maintain that tradition, it was the only thing she could do. Even if most of the leadership of the six families did see her as mostly a write-off, a placeholder of sorts until the next generation. They knew she hadn’t trained the way the others had. They knew that her heart hadn’t been in monster fighting. They knew she didn’t have some soul of a hero or anything like that. She was just doing what she had to do because there was no one else left who could. She hadn’t been selected by some grand and revered process, she wasn’t chosen for any strength of her own. She was just the only one left.

And now, well, now the only real female friend that she’d made in this school was missing. Just like the way all her friends back in the Torchbearers had either gone away or been… been killed by those monsters. She had been left all alone in the room that she had shared with Roxa, the same way that she’d been left alone back home.

This time, however, she didn’t have to put up with it. This time, Roxa could still be found, could still be saved. Jazz would find out the truth of what had really happened to her roommate. And, if possible, bring her back to where she belonged. She couldn’t do anything for everyone who had died in the massacre. But this? This she could do something about.

Maybe that was why she hadn’t slept much over the past couple of days. Because it felt like they were finally doing something about what had happened. There was some kind of energy in the air that made Jazz believe that they were about to find answers, maybe even rescue Roxa herself. One way or another, they would know what was really going on with Felicity Chambers. And they would know just who the bad guys in this whole situation were.

“Let me guess, you’re thinking about me again, aren’t you?”

Turning away from the railing of the second floor walkway that surrounded the motel parking lot, Jazz blinked at Isaac Acosta before rolling her eyes. “Yes, Isaac, I can’t possibly keep you off my mind. You know I’ve always had a thing for clowns who don’t know how to take anything seriously. Please, ravish me now.”

The Hispanic boy gave her a lopsided grin, winking. “Careful what you ask for, babe.”

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Snorting, Jasmine folded her arms, leaning against the railing just outside of the motel room. “What’re you doing anyway? I thought you were supposed to be sleeping while Rudolph and Gordon are on watch.”

Shrugging, Isaac replied easily, “You know how it is, couldn’t sleep.” A sly smile touched his face then as he gestured toward her. “And uh, at the moment I’m just enjoying the view.”

Again, Jazz rolled her eyes, shaking her head. “I’d say to stop trying such a pathetic line, but don’t. Because someday, somehow, that line will work on someone. And the person it finally works on will be just the right person for you. But that person is not, and will never be me."

The boy gave her a wide smile. “Oh, you never know. Maybe I’ll wear you down someday.”

“Just as soon as whales fly,” she retorted before amending, “And by that, I mean completely ordinary whales, not Strangers. Normal, average whales that live in the ocean, flying under their own power without any magic or outside assistance and god the world is weird.”

Before Isaac could give any response to that, the door of the motel room behind him quietly opened, and Douglas slipped out, clearly trying to be as silent and quick as possible so that he didn’t wake up Paul, who was still fast asleep inside.

“Time to go?” Jazz asked, raising an eyebrow toward the boy once he had closed the door.

He nodded, waving his cell phone briefly to show her the clock on it before whispering quietly, “Five minutes to midnight, we gotta go relieve Rudolph and Gordon.”

“Right.” Jazz gestured to Isaac. “Guess we’ve got actual work to do now. But you keep working on those pick-up lines of yours.” Pausing, she added with a little smile. “I saw one of those big clown statues in the playground area you might stand a chance with.”

The boy’s response was a wink. “Oh, don’t you worry about me, Jazzy. Someday I’ll get you. I don’t give up that easily.”

Snorting, Jasmine turned to start for the stairs at the end of the walkway. “C’mon, Doug. Let’s go before he starts practicing more lines. I don’t think I could stand all the lame.”

Together, she and Doug went down the stairs and headed out of the lot on their way to relieve the other two, leaving Isaac to… whatever he was going to end up doing. Hopefully getting some actual sleep before it would eventually be time for him and Paul to relieve them.

On the way, Doug glanced to her curiously. “You think we’ll ever tell Marina about this?”

Jazz blanched at the reminder of their team mentor. The sophomore girl seemed to have bought completely into the line about where Roxa was, and she’d shut the rest of them down whenever they brought it up. Eventually it had gotten to the point that they just stopped talking about it with her. Not that she was a bad mentor, she just thought that talking about Roxa all the time was getting in the way of their training. Marina believed the official word, and thought that they should too. So, obviously, they hadn’t told her anything about this plan. She, like Professor Carfried and all the rest of the teachers, believed that the team was spending the weekend at Paul’s father’s place in Montana. For the moment, anyway.

Shaking off those thoughts, Jazz gave a short nod. “I hope so. Because if we tell her about it, it’s because we’re rubbing how right we were about everything in her face. And that’ll probably mean that Roxa’s back with us and everything can go back to the way it…”

As she trailed off into silence, Doug looked at her, frowning a little bit. “What’s wrong?”

She bit her lip, hesitating before giving a soft sigh. “I was just thinking about how I kinda like having Rudolph around. The guy’s been growing on me, even if he does keep believing the best when it comes to Chambers. But if Roxa comes back, what’s gonna happen to him? Will he stay or go back to his other team? I mean, it’ll be uneven numbers either way.”

Doug shrugged at that. “I dunno,” he admitted. “Maybe they’ll give him a choice. You any good at baking? Maybe we can give him some bribery cookies to stick around.”

Grimacing at the thought, Jasmine shook her head. “Let’s uhh, outsource for our bakery bribes.”

Before long, they reached the van. Rudolph and Gordon had already been watching for them, stepping out as they approached.

“You guys see anything?” Jazz asked the boys in a whisper before glancing that way. She could barely see the house from where the van was parked. They wanted to be far enough away that if there was a vampire in there, she wouldn’t sense them.

Rudolph shook his head. “Nothing specific. There’s people in there, but we haven’t been able to get a close enough look to… you know, pick anything out.”

“In other words,” Gordon added for him, “whoever’s in there with Flick’s father, we haven’t seen if she’s a Stranger or not.”

“Pretty sure she’s been out though,” Rudolph put in while gesturing that way. “Seen someone moving around the backyard. Just glimpses, and by the time we find a way to get over there, they’re gone. We’d get closer, but… you know.”

Jazz nodded. “Yeah. The second you’re close enough to tell if she’s a Stranger, she’ll be able to tell that you’re Heretics. And then we’re all in trouble.”

“Right.” Gordon folded his arms over his chest. “Better to take the time and watch for the best opening. She’ll make a mistake at some point. She’ll come out into plain sight. Or Chambers’s dad’ll leave during the day so we can get into the house.”

That was the main break they were waiting for. It was either get a good look at the supposed vampire when she came out at night, or wait for the man himself to give them an opening to get into the house while he was gone during the day. But if that opening came, they’d all agreed that whoever was on watch duty would call the others. If they were going to get into a house that a vampire might be sleeping in, it would have to be together.

Jazz gestured back the way they’d come. “You guys go ahead, we’ll take over. You did leave enough soda and junk, right?”

Rudolph nodded. “Still most of a twelve pack in there, and all those chips. I think we’ve still got a couple sandwiches in the cooler too.”

“If not, we’ll make a run to the store,” Jazz replied before waving them off. “Now scoot. Gonna do a quick walk through, since I can get closer than you boys.”

The other two took off, leaving Jazz and Doug. She gestured to the other boy. “You wanna walk with me, or wait here?”

He seemed to consider it for a moment, weighing the options. “If something happens, probably better to have someone hanging back to watch,” the boy pointed out eventually. “Don’t go anywhere that I wouldn’t be able to see if you turn visible again, okay?”

Jazz nodded before focusing on her power. After a second, she faded from sight. And from that point, it was simply a matter of… walking very slowly.

Yeah, that was the downside of this power. To use it effectively, she either had to stand still, or move incredibly slowly to the point of barely moving at all. It took a simple ten minute walk and turned it into about about half an hour instead. But she didn’t dare move any faster, just in case the vampire happened to be watching.

At least it also dampened things like sound and smell, so the vamp’s other enhanced senses shouldn’t pick her up.

Like the other times that she’d made her way past the house like this in the past day or so, the place was mostly dark, except for one light on upstairs and the flicker of what looked like a television. Once in awhile, they would see a light go on downstairs, likely in the kitchen. But mostly it was just like this, quiet and mostly dark.

This time, however, she had just passed the edge of the front yard when the sound of the backdoor opening caught Jasmine’s attention. There was movement in the shadows, and then she heard a female voice say, “Sorry, didn’t want to wake up Lincoln.”

Lincoln. Right, Lincoln Chambers. Flick’s dad. Frowning, Jazz listened while straining to see through the darkness that engulfed the backyard. Whoever was back there didn’t need to use any kind of light to see, that was for sure.

“Yeah,” the girl’s voice continued after a few seconds where she was apparently listening to someone, likely on a phone, “believe me, I know. Flick’s worried about it too. But as far as I can tell, we’re steering him away from Fossor.”

Fossor? Jasmine knew that name. But what did that monster have to do with Flick or her father? Maybe the others would know, or at least have ideas.

Before she could think anymore about that, the backdoor opened once more. “That the big lady?” another voice asked. Wait, how many girls were in Flick’s house, anyway?

“Yeah,” the first voice replied before adding, “Didn’t wake you up, did I?”

“Nah, I’m up anyway. I’ll lay down in a bit. She got anything interesting to say? And where’s the light switch out here?”

“Hold on.” A pause, then, “I’m putting you on speaker. Say hi to Twister.”

“Hello, Twister,” a third voice spoke, clearly coming from the phone as it was set into speaker mode. “I trust you’re keeping Felicity’s father out of trouble?”

A light went on then, illuminating a side porch where two girls were standing. As Jazz stared that way, one thing became perfectly clear: the older of the two girls, the one who had been talking first, was definitely a vampire. The second she saw her, Jazz’s Stranger-sense started going nuts.

But even having that confirmed was almost nothing. It barely registered in the back of her mind. Because far more important was the voice on that phone, the one talking so casually to the vampire.

Headmistress Sinclaire.