Chapter Sixteen - I'm the bogeyman's worst nightmare!

Hanna surprisingly chose a horror film, Locke did not like that genre very much, before he even used to avoid this type of film. Hanna and Tia were extremely excited, Hanna seemed to be a fan of horror movies and Tia was delighted with the idea of ​​watching her first movie on the big screen.

Locke was not a big fan of cinema, he even liked watching movies but he had a tendency to analyze the films and criticize the holes in the script, the bad decisions and the forced plot, at least he had the decency to keep his opinions to himself. however the animation of the girls was contagious.

Locke's mind, however, kept going back to the two pursuers. 'Are they after me or after Hanna? Anyway, they will pay dearly for trying to disturb our night '.

Locke and Hanna went into the theater and looked for their seats, after sitting down Hanna started talking about how much she had waited to see this movie, Locke listened with a smile, absorbed in her passion. Tia devoured the popcorn, counting the seconds for the light to go out. Hanna took a sip of the soda.

"Hmm?"

"What's it?" asked Locke.

"They gave me the wrong flavour..."

'This is my chance,' thought Locke. "Here, take mine, we asked for the same thing, I'm going to change this quick"

"It is not necessary! Don't want you to miss the movie!" Hanna replied.

"Do not worry! I'll be back before the trailers are finished!"

Locke got up and walked to the door. 'Tia, how far can you stay from me?'

"Far enough!" replied Tia, understanding Locke's intention in the same time "I'll take care of her!"

Locke smiled, he entered a darkened area and disappeared.

***

The two men were in a alley, close of the cinema, both were in a corner watching the entrance, there was almost no one on the street.

"What movie did they choose?" the first man said, he was short and stocky.

"Something about a demon nun, the movie will last about an hour and a half." The second man was tall and thin, his face looked like a vile snake.

"Well, what do we do with the boy?" said the short man.

"They didn't say, I think you already know what we're going to do" The tall man smiled wickedly.

"Did you bring the car?" asked the short man.

"At the end of the alley" repied the tall man.

"What do they want the girl for?" asked the short man.

"Some rich little sh*t wants her as a toy, maybe can we have a go first!" the tall man licked his lips.

"You are disgusting, why do they pair me with you?" the short man spat on the floor.

"I agree with you, he is disgusting!" a third voice was heard, an angry voice.

Both men turned to find their male target watching them a little more than a foot away, the tall man tried to pull something from his waist but an extremely fast fist hit his chin and the tall man fell like a sack of potatoes.

'So fast!' Thought the short man, he tried to make some space with a jump but the target moved like a ghost grabbing his neck and hitting his head on the ground, depriving him of his consciousness.

"You guys are lucky that I can't be late, otherwise..." Locke took out a pair of handcuffs and two gags from the inventory, both created by Tia, the gags magically prevented any sound and the handcuffs could only be opened by anyone else Locke, he never thought that these would be the first magic items that they would create. He dragged the men to the top of a building and attached them to an iron rod, covering their mouths with the gags.

"I hope that no one finds you! behave!"

Locke went back to the cinema.

***

The night was fun, the movie itself was predictable, Locke was able to predict jump scares from a distance, but it was fun to watch Hanna jump and hold his arm in each of them, 'Nothing to do with the cleavage' Locke thought 'I am a gentleman, i swear!'

Tia was delighted, dipped into the popcorn jar, the fairy sometimes crouched down to hide from the scares, at first Locke was worried that Hanna would notice, but Tia explained that it was almost impossible for anyone to notice her magic without her letting, even if she was touched by a person, the human brain it would manage to automatically ignore her existence if she wanted.

The movie ended and Locke called a taxi, Locke accompanied Hanna to the entrance to her house, both commenting on the night for the entire trip.

"Ah, Mom called you to lunch with us on Saturday!" said the girl.

"Okay, count on me!" replied Locke.

He soon found himself in front of Hanna's house gate, with a kiss he said goodbye at the gate, Locke could see Hanna's father looking out the window in the house afar.

Locke watched the girl hop around the entrance to the house, he greeted Hanna's father with a slight nod and went back to the taxi.

"Here friend" Locke paid the taxi driver and gave a good tip "I'll walk from here."

The taxi left overnight and Locke started walking, he reached the place where he had found the boy and put a rose on the floor. "Rest in peace, Tim."

He took advantage of the darkness and activated the camouflage, running through the night he reached the top of the building where he had arrested the men.

The two men were frightened, their arms were trapped in a steel grid and their screams were completely silenced.

"Well well, Look who's already awake!" Locke's voice sounded, startling the two men, they both started looking for the source of the sound and couldn't find anything.

"You both don't know who you messed with..." the voice sounded closer, the short man found a strange transparent shape a few meters away from them, he tried to scream with all his might, but no sound came out of the gag.

"In a movie this would be the time for me to take the gag of one of you, make a series of threats and try to find out who you are and why you are after my girlfriend..." the transparent figure started to become visible, transforming into a man dressed in a dark hoodie jacket and a black dragon mask, his eyes shone a golden color. "Unfortunately for you this is not a movie, I don't need to go through either the threat or the interrogation, I can take everything I need from you"

Locke's cold, inhuman tone made the two men's backs sweat cold, his instincts telling both that the man was absurdly dangerous.

"I should thank you both, I've been waiting for a chance to test this on a living person" Locke touched the short man's forehead with his hand and closed his eyes.

'What is he doing?' The man wanted to ask, but a sudden sensation like that of a drill has invaded your brain, the man wanted to scream in pain but it was impossible, the only thing he could do was roll his eyes and shed tears of pain.

As Locke suspected using Memory Seek on a living person was totally different than using on a ghost, breaking the man's mental defenses proved a little more difficult, but he didn't feel in a whirlwind of information this time, on the contrary, everything what Locke wanted to know was shown clearly, it was like downloading a data packet.

"I see... so you work for a gang and your boss told you to take Hanna... Let's confirm if the other knows anything else..."

Locke repeated the process with the tall man, this time when he finished he was furious.

"Bast*rd!" Locke kicked the man hard, breaking one of his ribs. Locke continued to beat the man.

'What's going on?' Thought the short man. 'Who the hell is this boy?'

"Calm down, Locke! He's going to die like that!" Tia shouted, inaudible to others besides Locke "If you are going to kill him do it in a place where no one can find the body!"

"You are right!" replied Locke, "But this motherf*cker is going to die!"

'Who is this guy talking to? What the f*ck did I get myself into this time?' The short man was desperate.

Locke grabbed the unconscious tall man and lifted him as if weighed nothing, he went back to the short man.

"Good night!"

A kick hit the short man in his head and he lost consciousness again.

***

The short man was called Andre, he worked as 'freelancer' for some of the city's gangs. Andre was not very fond of his work, but someone had to put bread on the table, and it's easy money.

Andre did the most diverse jobs, collected money from debts, gave someone a shake when necessary or took packages from side to side, anything that could earn him some cash, nothing to heavy.

His boss gave him his first big job, some rich guy wanted a certain girl, they would pick this girl up, they had the place where she worked and the time she left, they watched her for a while and thought it would be easy, everything seemed easy on paper. The problem started when they put Ivan to work with him.

Ivan was a miserable son of a b*tch.

He was violent, out of control and couldn't see a woman. Bringing sh*t like that to the mission was a recipe for trouble.

On the night that they planned to attack the girl, she was accompanied by a guy, Andre had to restrain Ivan so that he would not attract attention, the bastard wanted to attack the moment the two left the clothing store, but Andre convinced him that it was better to wait. When they discovered that the two would go to the cinema they planned to attack as soon as the two left the movie.

The plan was simple, wait for the two of them to leave at the entrance to the cinema, touch the barrel on the boy's waist and make them both go to the alley, take the boy down and carry the girl.

His plans went down the sink.

Andre woke up in an unknown place, he found himself trapped in a chair by a strange black substance, hard as metal, he was in the middle of a ruined room, with the moonlight coming in through a hole in the roof.

"Wakey-Wakey!" said a voice that Andre did not want to hear.

Locke was in front of Andre, sitting in the darkness, his eyes began to shine with a golden light, filling Andre with the sensation of a prey being looked at by a predator.

"Who are you?" asked Andre.

"Are you sure you want to know Andre?" replied Locke.

"How- how do you know my name?" Andre asked, startled.

"I know a lot, Andre" the sparkle in his eyes increased "I know who you are, and I know who gave you the service, I'm sure who ordered it too... I also know about your daughter"

Andre shivered. "You... you..."

"Calm down Andre, there is no reason for threats... Do you know, you put me in a very complicated situation..." Locke stood up and walked to the side of the room. "With your friend it was so easy, he was a trash, a r*pist and a misanthrope, so I did the world a little favor... But you, you are also a trash, but a not so low trash, this is the first time you have got involved with this level of sh*t... Do you even know who the girl you were trying to kidnap?"

Andre shook his head in negation.

"I already know that you don't know, if you knew who the parents of that girl are, you would realize that what they paid you was so little for all shit that was on your way, but your great problem is worse, you know..."

Locke approached Andre, The dark aura he was emitting enveloped Andre completely, Andre couldn't even breathe.

"Do you remenber the stories you tell your daughter? the same stories that your late grandmother told you before you went to sleep! Those stories that made you sleep with the lamp on! Those stories said that if you weren't a good boy, bad things in the dark would come and get you! Guess what! I'm the thing that kills bad things in the dark, I'm the bogeyman's worst nightmare! And you tried to kidnap my girl!"

A hot liquid ran down Andre's leg.

"You are lucky, very lucky… I'll tell you what you're going to do… you'll take your daughter and leave town, you'll take the money you've saved so far and you'll start a new life, you'll raise your little girl right and you will never get involved with any crime again! AND YOU WILL NEVER TELL ABOUT THIS NIGHT TO ANYONE! DO YOU UNDERSTAND?"

Andre nodded his head.

"Well, don't worry about your boss going after you, there won't be anyone left to go after you" Locke smiled, the black bonds evaporated and Andre was free. Andre ran out of the building

"You have thank your daughter Andre, you are only alive because of her" came the voice, closer than Andre expected.

Andre ran as if hell was on his trail.

"Dude, That was really badass!" Tia said excitedly, "I'm the bogeyman's worst nightmare!" she imitated Locke with a comical tone.

"That was f*cking shameful!" replied Locke "I hope this works!"

"Are you sure it was a good idea to let him go like this?" asked Tia.

"What could I do? Kill the guy? He had a daughter! And this was going to be the first real sh*t he was going to get involved in! The other... "

Locke looked toward the rift entrance, where he had gotten rid of the tall man's body. The mere thought of the information he had obtained from the man's mind filled him with disgust. "Are you sure that no one will find him?"

"Of course, that place was full of goblins, they will finish the body quickly" replied Tia, "And now, Are we going straight to the gang boss or we will get the asshole who made the request?"

Locke looked at his cell phone watch, two in the morning.

"Let's see if there is time for both of them before dawn."