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Author's Note: As promised, here's Ch.3 one week later. I'm sorry about that. Some personal, very avoidable issues came up last week preventing me from writing. As I said in my blog last week, I like to have at least a chapter or two buffer before I post the next one. I finished Ch.4 a few days ago and hope to have Ch.5 finished in the next day or two. If I'm lucky, I might even get to Ch.6 this week. On a side note, I've decided to post pictures for the chapter based on the chapter. Its something I did with Whisper Pines and I think it turned out well. Thanks again for reading and your patience.

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3.

The Barbarian smashed his giant hammer into my face, slamming me to the ground. A second later, GAME OVER flashed across the screen. Charlie cheered. He was the Barbarian after all. Me, I’d been the little Elf girl he just smeared across the ground. I groaned. There was a reason I hated these kinds of games. To be honest, I wasn’t really fond of most games. Charlie always seemed to drag me into them though. Games were his thing. You could almost say he lived and breathed them. Like I said, we were complete opposites. I tried though. It was hard to enjoy something that you hated though. It was the same when I tried to get him to do some swimming with me.

I sighed, setting my controller down.

On the screen, his Barbarian was doing some crazy victory dance.

“You ok?” he asked, giving me a strange look.

I shrugged. “Same.”

He set down his controller. “We can stop if you want or play something else...”

I tuned him out.

Not that I was being rude, its just Charlie was talking games. Whenever he talked games, I felt like a complete idiot. The same could be said when I talked swimming I suppose. The difference between the two things though was that Charlie was supportive of my attempt at the sport. I was not supportive of the gaming though. If that made me a bad friend then so be it. There was no way I was going to enthusiastically cheer my friend on in his quest to be a perpetual couch potato.

“We can stop if you want?”

I shrugged again. “I think I might head home actually.”

Charlie didn’t look happy but he didn’t say anything either.

We were finding it harder and harder to hang out these days. I’d like to say it was because of my mother’s death but I would just be using that as an excuse. Our friendship had been strained for a while now. Its what happens when two people don’t really have anything in common. When we were younger, it was easier. We do the things that most kids that age would do. In small doses anyway. I didn’t mind games back then because I was young and didn’t have a lot I could do. When I wasn’t home in bed, I barely had the energy to do much else. As I got older and my heart condition was less severe, I was able to do more. Sadly, Charlie never took the initiative like me. He did try once but it never really stuck.

Now, I could barely get him to walk to the bus stop.

“You want me to ask Jay if he’ll drive you home?”

Jay was Charlie’s older brother. He like Charlie was a perpetual gamer but unlike Charlie, Jay had a social life. He had a job and car too.

“No, I’m good.”

Coming home with Jay would have just caused problems. It was Sunday, Dad would be home today. Whereas Dad was semi-miffed about my friendship with Charlie, he would have gone ballistic to see me with Jay. Charlie’s brother was a known pothead. He’d been in and out of county lockup for that and other small infractions. Usually petty crap but enough for my father. He made it pretty clear that I wasn’t allowed to hang out with Jay if he was around. Not that I ever would. Jay was usually high and usually too stoned out of his mind to even cobble two sentences together.

Charlie followed me out of his room and through the empty apartment. Like my Dad, Charlie’s Mom worked most of the time. Unlike my Dad, she had to take two jobs. One as a waitress on the weekends and one as a cleaner at one of the office buildings. Charlie’s Dad bailed a long time ago. He was a drunk, when he wasn’t slugging on a bottle, he was slugging at his family. That all stopped when Jay kicked his ass. Hey, the guy might be a stoner but when he was lucid, he apparently threw a mean right hook. Charlie’s old man bailed after that. Just as well. As much as I didn’t care for Jay, I really HATED their Dad.

Outside, my friend rubbed his arms.

“I’m sorry,” he said, apologizing for some slight he thought he did me.

“For what?”

He sighed. “Not being cooler.”

‘What are you talking about?”

Charlie looked at his feet, toeing the ground. “I’m grateful that you still hang with me even though you don’t want too. I get it. We used to be great friends but now...”

I cut him off there. “Charlie, I want to hang with you!”

He looked up at me, surprised. “But earlier...the game...”

I sighed.

So he noticed.

I was hoping I could hide the fact that I wasn’t really into it. It wasn’t that I was trying to be bored with the game, its just that well...I’m not really sure, to be honest. I’d been pretty distracted lately. The last few days had been the worst too. Before I thought it was just because I was so focused on making the team but now, it was as if nothing I did seemed to satisfy me anymore. There was this void in my life and I couldn’t fill it. I’d been feeling this way for a while now too. I thought maybe it was Mom’s death, that my grief was causing this overwhelming sense of loss. I’d been doing some research about it online, I knew depression did some nasty things to people.

It wasn’t that though.

Sure Mom being gone left a huge hole in my life but it was more than that.

It was almost as if there was something I should be doing but I couldn’t.

It wasn’t swimming either.

“It's not you, Charlie” I finally confessed. “I’ve just been feeling pretty empty lately. Like my life is going nowhere and there’s something out there for me but I just can’t get it...”

He put a hand on my shoulder. “Maybe you should talk to someone after all.”

I scoffed. “Like my father would ever allow that!”

Charlie didn’t say anything.

He didn’t have too.

It took a few seconds to say anything actually.

“Just...I’m not… dissing you, ok” I finally said. “We’re still friends, I’m just kinda dealing with some of my own crap on top of everything else.”
Charlie opened his mouth but wherever he was about to say was drowned out by sirens.

A moment later, two police cars blazed by us. They were followed quickly by a fire truck. I snapped my head in the direction they were going. There was a plume of smoke rising into the air. Shit. It wasn’t every day you saw a fire that big. Especially not in the city proper. Sometimes you heard about house fires and things. It happens. Something like that in the city though. The first cars were followed quickly by several more. Charlie and I watched in stun silence.

“What’s going on?” he finally asked.

I shook my head. “I better get home though, I bet Dad will be called in on this.”

I whipped out my cell and called for a cab.

Or tried too.

The line was busy.

Cursing, my phone rang a second later.

I didn’t even have to look to know who was on the other end:

“I know Dad,” I said, annoyed.

“I don’t have time for the tone,” said my equally annoyed father. “I need you home here to look after your sister.”

“I’m trying but the cab company is busy.”

I could almost see him rubbing his temples.

Its what he did when he was frustrated.

“Where are you?” he asked, a moment later.

“Charlie’s.”

I heard him groan. “I’ll send a patrolman to pick you up.”

Wow.

He didn’t usually do something like that unless something really bad happened.

Like when Mom died…

“Is it bad?” I asked, concerned and a bit scared.

I looked toward the smoke.

“Its...just...I need to get to the office.”

He left it at that.

Damn.

Dad never really talked about his work. He had a policy: Work was Work and Home was Home. That still didn’t stop him from making the passing comment here or there though. Usually about how tiring, hectic or even boring his day had been. Life had been a lot more exciting for him back when he was in a car and not behind the desk. At least that’s what he used to say. At nearly fifty, Dad wasn’t getting any younger. He was also behind a desk as long as I could remember. The Chief of Police thing was new. He’d only been promoted last year, a few months before Mom...well…

The thing was, I couldn’t remember the last time Dad insisted on going to the office on his day off.

Whatever this was, it must have been serious.

I turned and looked toward the smoke.

I could hear several sirens now.

“What did he say?” asked Charlie, after I ended the call.

I’d forgotten my friend was still standing there.

“He’s sending someone for me.”

“No shit!”

Yeah, my sentiments exactly.

The patrol car arrived about twenty minutes later.

Charlie and I had spent the time sitting on the front steps, pondering what was going on. We had some crazy theories from the more realistic terrorist attack to the far-fetched alien invasion. The aliens were his idea. Charlie was the less rational out of the two of us. Not that I didn’t believe in aliens, it's just that I was pretty certain they weren’t going to choose Greenfield as the top place to invade. Charlie didn’t agree. He said it was the best place. He tried to use movie logic on me, which I tuned out. To say I was grateful to see the car pull up was an understatement.

Being grateful to see a cop in this neighborhood was like an oxymoron.

“I’ll see you later,” I said to Charlie as I approached the car.

I smiled as I saw the driver.

“Hey Uncle Frank,” I said, to the gruff looking fellow peering out the open window.

He didn’t like the neighborhood either.

“Hey kid,” he said, smiling too.

I opened the passenger door and climbed inside.

Frank wasn’t really my uncle, he was, however, my father’s oldest friend. They went through the Academy together. Whereas Dad went all fast track with his career, Frank was perfectly happy on the streets. He never married, had no kids, so he never really had a reason to want more. He lived in a quaint apartment on the other side of town, kept mostly to himself and loved the hell out of the Yankees. Though Dad had brothers, Frank was more of an uncle to me than any of them. Dad and Aunt Grace were the only ones of his family still in the state. I loved my Dad’s brothers but they never around much.

Frank was the best and closest thing to a real uncle that I had.

Hence the reason why he let me sit in the front seat.

“What’s going on?” I asked as I buckled myself safely inside.

He sighed. “Some kind of gas leak I think”.

I nodded but I wasn’t sure if I believed him.

This neighborhood wasn’t exactly well populated.

I wouldn’t exactly call it the Slums but it definitely wasn’t all high rises and condos either. Not that we had stuff like that here in Greenfield. Regardless of that, I knew what was over there. Charlie’s apartment block was right on the edge of the old industrial district. At one time, most of this area was big factories. There used to be an auto parts factory over there. Now though, it was all old abandoned buildings. Mostly warehouses and the like. Lots of vagrants and junkies lived there. There was no way it could have been a “gas leak” because there was no gas. There was also all that smoke. Since when did gas leaks have smoke too?

I smirked.

Maybe there was a crazy conspiracy here after all.

Charlie was so hellbent on it being aliens.

He even claimed to have seen strange lights over there the other night.

Wasn’t a Gas Leak the company line for an invasion?

I laughed.

“Something funny?”

I shook my friend. “Charlie and I were trying to figure out what was going on. He’s convinced its aliens, even claims he saw lights in the sky.”

Frank gave me a look.

For a moment, I thought he might actually tell me Charlie wasn’t lying. It was one of those looks. Then he smiled. “You kids need to get out more.”

“He needs to get out more. I get out plenty.”

Swimming wasn’t my only exercise after all. I did a fair share of jogging too. I tried full blown running but I just didn’t have the stamina for it. I jogged every morning though. Well tried too. Some mornings---like today---I just didn’t feel like it. My failed attempt at swimming the other day was discouraging. For the last two days since I’d been lazing around, feeling sorry for myself. If Charlie hadn’t called this morning, I probably would have still been in bed. It was that empty feeling. Now it was keeping me from doing the things I liked to do.

“So was anyone hurt?” I asked.

“You’ll see soon enough,” said Frank, turning the car in that direction. “Your Dad asked me to check in.”

Dad was there?

A moment or two later, Frank pulled the car up to the roadblock where two uniforms were stationed. He rolled down the window, causing one of them to wander over.

The officer looked into the car with a laugh. “Hey Franko, aren’t the perps supposed to be in the back?”

He and Frank shared a laugh.

“Not the Chief’s kid, Skip.”

The officer---Skip---quickly stopped laughing.

I gave Officer Henderson a cold hard look. I was trying to mimic my Dad but failed miserably. Instead, I burst into laughter instead. The Officer looked scared for a moment but sighed when he heard me laugh.

“Let me call it in,” said Officer Skip a second later.

He took a step back, speaking into his shoulder mic. I couldn’t hear what was being said but he waved us past. I was surprised by that. If this place was so dangerous then why were they letting a civvie like me through? Frank didn’t bat an eye though and drove around the little barricade. He didn’t go very far though. There were a couple of squad cars off to the side. He pulled alongside one of them. From this angle, I could get a better view of what was going on. I couldn’t see much through all the smoke but there were more than a dozen police cars there. I saw at least three fire trucks too. All of them putting water on one of the warehouses. The smoke was billowing from its windows.

Strangely I saw no fire though.

Dad appeared a few seconds later. He was dressed in his sharp gray suit but I noticed his tie was missing. He was sweating too. Well, it was a hot day. I was sweating a bit myself. I looked at him as he approached. Dad cut quite the figure, six foot three and just as menacing. Age hasn't slowed him in the least either. The man ate like a health nut and exercised constantly. The back half of our garage was even converted into a work out room.

He ran a hand through his sweat-drenched buzz cut as he approached the car.

He leaned down to speak to Frank.

“He give you any problems?”

“No, sir.”

When Dad was on the job, I didn’t exist. It was the same with my sisters. When he spoke to us it was official. That was even when he did. Most times, he referred to us in the third person.

I was actually surprised when he looked at me.

I saw a worn and haggard man look back.

I was shocked.

I just got off the phone with him less than an hour ago.

How was he so beat already?

“I want you to head home immediately. No stops. When you get there, make sure you and your sister stay inside. Set the alarm too.”

Shit, this was serious.

Dad never told us to set the alarm during the day.

“What’s going on?” I asked, concerned.

He turned away from me. “I want you to stick around the house for a bit. Just to be on the safe side.”

“Sure, no problem, boss.”

He looked at me again. “I’ll be home when I can.”

With that, he turned and walked away. I watched him go. At the perimeter of the smoke, he stopped to talk to one of the firemen there. I watched for a moment before something else caught my eye. No, not something, someone.

A person.

I only saw them for a minute though.

They were on the other side of the road, watching from the shadows between two warehouses. For a moment, I wasn’t even sure what I was seeing until they moved. It was strange because they were tall and moved incredibly fast. One minute they were there then the next they were gone.

“What the hell,” I said softly to myself.

“You see something, kid?”

I shook my head. “I don’t think so.”

Wait, why didn’t I tell him?

Uncle Frank didn’t say anything more. He started the car back up and turned it around. The rest of the ride was in relative silence, which was fine by me because it gave me a moment to think. Did I see someone or not and if I did, what were they doing there? How did they even get there? The police had the whole area on lockdown. I found it pretty hard to believe that someone could just slip through that and not get noticed. Especially someone as tall as the person I thought I saw.

I tried not to think about it anymore.

Just as well because it only took about ten minutes to get home.

Frank dropped me off in the driveway.

“I’m going to sit here for a couple of hours, per your father’s wishes.”

I nodded. “You need anything, like a drink or something to eat, you know where to find it."

He gave me a nod before I climbed out of the car and walked slowly to the house. Inside, I found Carrie already sprawled out on the couch, watching TV.

“Dad’s on the News.”

“I’ve seen him.”

She was still at that enthusiastic and impressionable age.

I walked over anyway. I stood behind the couch and looked at the TV. It was one of those large 50 inch flat screens, Dad insisted on it. Sure enough, my father was on the news. I noticed he put his tie back on. He was being interviewed by the girl from Channel 4. They must have arrived after I left. It didn’t matter. What mattered was what my father was saying. Apparently, they ruled out a gas leak and now they believed it was an act of arson. I suppose that finally explained the smoke.

“Do you have any leads, Chief Matthews?”

“One,” said Dad, surprising me.

What surprised me, even more, was the sketch that appeared on the screen:

It was her.

The tall girl from a couple of days ago.

“Eyewitnesses put this young lady at the scene,” said Dad, the sketch was up in the corner of the screen.

It was a good likeness.

“Anyone who has any information about this girl” my father continued “are asked to call the Greenfield police department.”

The reporter started to end the broadcast but I was already making my way to my room.

Carrie shouted something about food but I ignored her.

What were the odds?

I walked into my room, flopping down on my bed as I did so. I lay there, staring up at the ceiling. As I did so, I absently started fingering the necklace around my neck.

Author’s note: As I’m sure all of you know, comments are life blood to an author. I’m not begging or demanding, but I certainly would appreciate anything you have to say (or ask). It doesn’t have to be long and involved, just give me your reaction to the story. Thanks in advance...EOF