Light of Dawn

Chapter 1 - Dark Messages

It was a gorgeous day out in Los Angeles, the sun was out, traffic was only moderately backed up, the air was semi-clean, and Jake had only seen-and stopped-one mugging. All and all it was a pretty slow day in the City of Angels, but it was the perfect day for a walk rather than take his bike to his Aunt Carol's. He reached down to his sweatshirt pocket just to make sure that the envelope he'd gotten was still there. It was his letter of acceptance into UCLA, at first Jake wasn't even going to apply but ever since last spring his aunt had been on him about furthering his education.

Oh if only she knew that an education in this world did little to nothing for him in his line of work. But Jake didn't mind it really, going to school gave him something to do during the day other than putting his body through some psychotic training regimen that Father Matthew had cooked up. No school and no excuse not to train was a big reason why he hated summer. But those days were gone now, at least the part where Father Matthew made up some new exercise, the training still happened but now it was of Jake's on doing.

Ever since he'd ascended to the rank of Saint Shield and was more or less charged with keeping all the Beings in LA in check he'd had to make sure he was in the best shape that he could be. As of now he'd been assigned to 'deal with' a grand total of 16 Beings who had gotten a little bold in the wake of LA losing it's Saint Shield governance. But once Jake was put to work the Beings have been pretty quiet. Sure there was the typical vampire who thought he could steal a few people for his food, or a werewolf run amok during the full moon but Jake left those to the new kid on the block.

Ever since he moved out of the church and into an apartment with Lance, deciding who would replace his mentors the Proctors was the topic of some very heated discussion back in Aeria. As of now Wallace's second in command Cynthia Marystol was manning the church and bringing up some new kid. Jake and Lance had met the new kid a few times and it was almost funny how little the kid could actually do right now. But Jake knew better than to laugh because he was probably the same way when he was that young and green. And besides, who was he to pass judgment on someone who was probably having the same issues that he was.

Jake was turning the corner of the block where his aunt lived. They lived in the suburbs which Jake had to admit he kind of liked because even though he grew up in the city itself, it was still nice to get away from all the flashing lights and car horns once and a while. He nodded to an old couple getting their daily exercise as he neared his aunt's little two story house. She had a big dog with a bit of a biting problem where new people were concerned which he thought was a good idea because in this town you never know what might come knocking.

Will, his little brother that he never knew he had, was still at school right now but would be coming home soon. The nanny was with his little sister Abby right now, she normally stuck around until his Aunt Carol came home from work but there were rare instances in which Jake had to watch Abby. He came to visit them all every day at 3:00, because he just liked having this whole other family that was separate from the life he grew up with. He brought it up to Lance who actually agreed with him, though Lance's own family were as much apart of this life as he was since his twin was a werewolf and his mother being very much aware of their 'conditions.' Despite her knowledge of Beings in the world Lance told his brother Pierce that it was best she didn't know about the Saint Shields. That being said Jake was very careful about what he told his Aunt about. She knew that he knew his way around a gun even better than she did but she didn't press him for answers which Jake was glad for.

He walked up to the small one story house that his aunt lived in and knocked on the door. He heard his baby sister crying inside and not too long after his knock did the nanny Gwen appear. She was a middle aged woman that Jake figured had been friends with his aunt for a while. It didn't take her long at all though to figure out that Jake was who he said he was. Evidently he really did look like his father who was a bit of a douche bag if what his aunt Carol told him could be believed. Either way he wasn't in his life nor was he in Will's or Abby's and as long as it stayed that way Jake couldn't be paid to care about him.