FRIDAY 10:30 P.M.
They spent most of the next morning at the local Kinko's, designing and copying flyers. The papers were straightforward, including only a description of Wind, their phone number at the hotel, and a cash reward for information leading to Wind's discovery, calculated by Daria out of what she projected would be left over after the hotel bill and food for the week was subtracted from her cabin fund.
She hated parting with the fruits of years of saving, but after the events of the day and night before, finding out what Wind might know was looking less and less like an option and more like an absolute necessity.
Jane hadn't said a word about her outburst since, but she had been more quiet than usual, and Daria could tell that it was weighing heavily on her.
She had tossed off a comment that it would have been nice to have a picture of Wind to include on the flyer, and had even managed to make it sound casual, but the bitter undercurrent was plain to Daria's ears.
After tossing down another large pile of cash for the flyers, Daria and Jane proceeded to spend the early afternoon plastering them up all over downtown.
Separating would have been quicker, but Jane said that the kind of places in which Wind might have ended up were not the sorts of environments two young women should be alone in, even during the day.
So they walked along together, taping up paper to poles already covered in a thick layer of it, and commenting on the contents of those older advertisements. Once, Jane even thought she saw a fragment of the Mystik Spiral logo, but after a little digging they discovered it was a flyer for some goth-metal band named Mystikal Warriors; Jane commented that Baltimore was a bit out of the Spiral's league anyway.
Altogether, the afternoon was the closest they had come to forgetting, for a little while, the horrors that were pursuing them.
When they got back to the hotel, late that afternoon, several messages were already waiting for them. Jane pressed the button next to the blinking red light, and routed the calls through to the speakerphone.
Caller: Hey, dude, I saw your guy, man. He was comin' out of a monkey's ass!
The caller dissolved into coarse laughter, or at least as far as they could tell. The rowdy bar noises behind him made his voice a bit difficult to make out. Jane hit the skip forward button with unnecessary force, and the next message played. Unfortunately, it was of the same sort, as were the three that followed it.
Daria: I'm beginning to think that there might be a downside to getting information from people hanging out in bars in the middle of the day.
Jane: It's just a good thing that we aren't both using video phones. These guys are asses enough without actually having to see theirs.
Even among all the dreck, though, there were a few gems; a few callers reported what sounded like legitimate sightings, and free of charge, while a few others left their own numbers for them to call, just to make sure that money would be paid if everything panned out.
Jane contacted them, and within the hour they had a list of locations where men who looked like Wind had been spotted; of course, they would have preferred some confirmation of the possibility, but most of the callers didn't know what the man was wanted for, and so were hesitant to approach him. Still, it was a start, and better than nothing.
They had a quick bite to eat, and were walking through the streets of downtown by nightfall. The sun was setting, and the streets were filling up with Friday night revelers;
Daria soon wearied of dodging back and forth to avoid enthusiastic and inebriated pedestrians, and wished that they had timed their search better, maybe come on a Monday night when people were too depressed by the workweek ahead to crowd the sidewalk so inconveniently.
The mass of people was not helping her now-constant sense of being watched, and her nerves were starting to fray.
After what seemed an eternity, they reached the first establishment on their list; from the line of people moving in, it looked pretty popular. They were carding at the door, but hopefully that would not be an issue – both Daria and Jane had fake ID's, procured for them by Trent (who of course kept his source a secret, with vague mysterious hints of his "connections") so that they could get into McGrundy's Pup to see the Spiral play.
They were good enough to pass inspection there, though that wasn't a really high standard, and Daria was hoping that the bars here operated by the same principles. And she was right; the bouncer waved them in with only a cursory glance at their credentials.
Inside it was dark, crowded, and noisy, most of the light coming from the televisions that lined every wall, showing various sporting events. Idly, Daria wondered what would happen should a particularly sadistic person should slip the videotape into one of the broadcasts; how many people would see it, and how many would be able to handle the aftereffects. We don't even know if we've seen all the aftereffects yet.
Daria: Do you see anyone who could be Wind?"
Daria asked Jane; she had to yell to make her voice heard over the din. Jane looked around for a while, and then, saving her voice, wordlessly pointed to a man sitting on a barstool, his back to them.
He certainly looked like Wind, with his blonde hair to his shoulders and slight build, along with a slight slouch. They walked up behind him, and Jane tapped him on the shoulder. He turned around to reveal his face . . .
. . . and he had no face. His face looked warped, melted, very much like how she and Jane had looked in the security monitor. Daria gasped and jumped back, almost tripping on a stool. She blinked hard, and when she opened her eyes, everything was back to normal; the man's face was completely normal, but it wasn't Wind's.
Jane: (Thoughts) Damn nerves. Damn tape. Damn Wind.
Jane was already apologizing for disturbing the man; she didn't seem to have even noticed.
The next couple of stops were uneventful, then they encountered a wrinkle. When they passed over their ID's to the bouncer, he looked both of them up and down, and gave their cards back with a scowl.
Guard:!Well, I can believe her. (Gesturing at Jane, and then turned to Daria) But there's no way you're twenty-one. You'll have to stay out here.
Jane turned to leave, but Daria stopped her.
Daria: Wind could be in there, Jane and we can't afford to miss him. I'll be fine out here for a few minutes.
Jane didn't look too certain, but she assured Daria she would be out soon and then ducked inside. Daria wandered over to the side of the building; she knew exactly why she had been left out. It wasn't hard to guess that they were both underaged; that wasn't why Jane had been let in and she left out.
But even with her eccentric dress and deliberately-odd makeup, Jane was attractive.
Not a great beauty, but certainly enough to attract male interest; on the other hand, though Daria knew she could be that way if she put the effort into it, it had never seemed important to her, so she disdained it.
Usually, that was the way she liked it, and it had rarely caused what she considered to be problems; but when it did, such as now, it rankled her. She had been separated from her friend solely because the bouncer had been on the lookout for pretty girls, and she hated him for it.
Daria was so engrossed in her thoughts that she did not, at first, notice the approaching stranger. He was obviously drunk, swerving left and right on his feet, his face bearing the too-wide smile of the pleasantly intoxicated. Then he started to get just a little too close, and Daria became suddenly very aware indeed.
Man: Hey, gorgeous, you feeling lonely tonight?
At least, that was what she thought he said; the individual words were rather difficult to make out. Not that she wanted to make them out in the first place.
Daria: I was, (Replied coldly) but soon my muscular biker boyfriend Knuckles is going to be here, and if he finds another man talking to me, he'll fly into a homicidal rage.
Man: We'll just have to hurry then.
He reached out for her. Daria backed up out of his reach, but to her dismay found herself pressed up against the wall, with too many other people around to run very far to either side. His hand reached up to her neck.
And suddenly there was long, black hair covering her face, and she was being choked, but from behind. She could feel two strong hands wrapping around her windpipe, crushing the life from her body, the world growing fainter and fainter by the second. She wanted to scream, but couldn't get the air.
The hair covering her face got into her mouth; she tried to spit it out, but whenever she gasped for air she would get another mouthful. Panic rose until coherent thought became impossible, and all she could do was pant instinctively for air, but there was no air to be had . . .
Then it was over, and Daria found herself slumped against the wall, lungs heaving, as several people bent over her, asking if she was alright. Others were carrying off the man who had accosted her. Daria couldn't speak, but just kept searching the sea of worried faces until she finally found Jane's, pushing her way through the crowd.
Jane: My god, Daria! What happened?! I heard you screaming inside the bar.
Jane's eyes were wide with shock, and she quickly looked Daria up and down, searching for wounds. Finally, Daria found the air and the composure to speak.
Daria: It . . . it was another vision.
She whispered, not wanting to have this conversation go beyond the two of them. Her hands and her voice were shaking.
Daria: When he touched my neck, I felt like I was being strangled, but not by him. And it wasn't me, either.
She looked into Jane's eyes, and saw that her friend knew exactly what she meant. Jane slung Daria's arm over her shoulders, and helped her to her feet; they started to walk down the street, the crowd parting before them, connected together.
Jane: Come on, amiga. I think it's time for both of us to get some rest.