Inheritance

Chapter 2: Jack (Part 3)

Olive picked up the taser and examined it, "We'll have to ask your father about this. Go change out of your wet clothes and I'll put a shield spell on the house. Zephyr, wanna help?" 

Zephyr fluttered up and they hurried off. Jack looked down at the taser. Guilt washed over him. Just when Crow thought he might have a few years of peace and joy after sixty years of terror, Jack became the marked prey of some witch. Jack choked on a chip. What if the same witch, with the budding branch, who wanted him, also killed Derrick? What if the two incidents were related? Jack wondered how the hell he could prove it. And, he wanted to question Sundance. What did she know? Did she work for the witch too? Maybe. But she might be an innocent and annoying bystander.

Jack headed to his room, his mind swimming with more questions. He changed into some fitted jeans and a different thermal sweater. The rain left his hair sufficiently messy, but he felt chilled. He wrapped one of his scarves around his neck and went back to the kitchen. Olive turned the lamps on by the sofa and lit candles in the windows. The storm continued to bluster, but it grew softer and softer until Jack, as he cleaned up his dishes, realized the rain turned to snow.

"A little early for snow," he whispered, watching the white flakes overtake the gray rain. 

Crow and Fortunatus both got up as the sun sank invisibly into the west and the dark day became darker evening. Jack, Zephyr and Olive walked them through what had happened at the mall, as they gathered around the bar sipping coffee, blood and tea.

"This is unsettling," Fortunatus said.

"The cop said, 'she will get you in the end'?" Crow asked.

Jack nodded.

"And this is the taser he wanted to use on you, but turned on himself when he found you were a bigger fish than he could handle?"

"Yeah," Jack said with a smile.

"You are going to start living the night life so I can accompany you," Fortunatus said.

"I can't go to school at night, and I won't let her force me to live in a little box."

"You will be careful, though," Olive said.

"I'm always careful," Jack said.

Crow flipped the taser over and pried the back off. A loud pop, whirling, bang filled the room.

"Shit!" Crow jumped back, dropping the taser.

Jack rushed around the bar and groaned. The taser sat on the floor, a twisted melted lump. Clipper sniffed at it and the cats and skunks found places to hide.

"Some sort of self-destruct mechanism," Crow said.

"Glad that didn't happen while it was in your pocket," Zephyr said.

"Yeah, me too."

"This witch went out of her way to make sure we could not discover her identity if she was unsuccessful in capturing Jack." Fortunatus observed.

"Can't be good," Crow said, picking up the lump.

"Bring it to me," Olive said, "I wanna make sure it is really dead."

Crow set it on the bar in front of her. Olive held her hand over it with her eyebrows drawn quizzically together. The taser leapt up with an electrical shock. It hurled itself straight at Jack. Fortunatus snatched it out of the air and threw it up towards the ceiling. Jack palmed his gun and shot the taser as it fell. Everyone watched it disintegrate in silence. The echo of the gun reverberated in their ears and the smell of gunpowder and sulfur wafted by.