59

Disclaimer/Warning: This work is not mine. Contacting the original author is impossible, but I like to think they would be okay with my posting it here for as many people to see as possible. This work is NOT complete and it will NEVER be complete. I'm sad too.

With that said, enjoy.

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Chapter 59 is the final chapter released by the original author, and as such there are no further chapters available. :(

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I sat up in bed when Doris Alex opened the door in the middle of the night.

"Brother," she said softly.

I turned to nod at her.

"There..." she started to say, but her voice caught.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"You need to come with me, David," she said.

She had dressed before entering my room and stood by the door while I put clothing on. Melisa sat on the couch in the living room but did not meet my eyes when I passed. Doris Alex led me to her car and got into the driver's seat. It did not take long to recognize where we were headed, the woman's house.

"Oh My God!" Doris Alex gasped when the horizon turned orange, as we got closer to the house.

We were a block away when the cops stopped us. Melisa's dad stepped out of the shadows to whisper in the ear of the uniformed officer that was coming to our window. He pointed Doris Alex to a parking spot.

"This way," Melisa's dad said when we stepped out of the car.

He walked to a point with a clear view of the house and the activity surrounding it. I took my place beside Dr. Ryan, Samantha, Robert, and Stephanie.

"Did she do this?" I asked.

The house was engulfed in flames. The fire had an unnatural hunger that seemed to be reaching out to burn everything near it, as if what fed it was not enough.

"I was watching the house in case those two did something surprising," Melisa's dad replied. "Your compeer hasn't arrived yet so this wasn't one of us."

"Katherine," Doris Alex said with tears burning rivulets down her face.

Her hair and eyes reflected the fire, bringing it closer to us without the heat. Only the quiet anger at the waste was missing from the picture of a reluctant Valkyrie looking down on a battlefield waiting to take the souls of the worthy to their reward; she had never looked more beautiful.

"How do you know?" Robert asked coldly.

"She's inside," Doris Alex announced.

"She opened every window and door," Melisa's dad said. "She stood on the porch and stared right at me. A few minutes later, flashover! You would've sworn she commanded the air to burn; everything fucking burst into flames. I should've known what she was up to."

"How could you have known?" Stephanie asked him.

"Opening the windows and doors," I answered for him. "She was creating as much airflow as possible. Fire needs air to breathe as much as you do."

"Why would she do this?" Dr. Ryan asked. "She had to know that it wouldn't be long before those two assholes were out of the picture. They couldn't be left behind once we had what we needed."

"Would it have mattered?" Doris Alex asked.

"What do you mean, Sibling?" Robert asked.

"Brothers decided, didn't they?" Doris Alex asked turning to stare at him. "You said that she was irreparably damaged. Not to be trusted, as if the intent of indoctrination was NOT to emulate the Ekaterina."

"Someone told Katherine that she would never wear a white ring," Stephanie said looking at Doris Alex hard. "Someone told a member of that Bloodline, bred to a ring, that she would never wear one!"

Everyone except me crowded closer to Doris Alex in anger.

"Who the fuck would do that?!?" Robert yelled.

"Iane," I replied. "At Melisa's instruction, I'm sure."

Doris Alex took a step away from me.

"I will..." Robert began.

"Do nothing," I interrupted and turned on him. "You've done nothing but allow the council their head on this. You should continue to do nothing, Robert."

"You can't allow your Crests to run rampant, David," Samantha said in a deadly tone of voice.

"Is Doris Alex lying?" I asked. "It was the Brotherhood's decision that the woman would never wear a white ring. My Crests simply delivered the message."

"We did not intend for her to know yet," Jeremy insisted.

"David's right," Stephanie said. "What could be expected? We left this to an unindoctrinated Crest, and three Bloodline Siblings to handle. Be glad that they didn't burn the city down!"

"Two Bloodline Siblings," Robert corrected.

"LOOK AT THAT!" Doris Alex screamed at him pointing at the house. "You're still spitting on her loyalty! Katherine has been one of us since the day she was born!"

She turned around and ran back to the car.

"Did they tell you that they were going to inform Katherine about our lack of trust?" Samantha asked me when they recovered from Doris Alex's accusation.

"The father and brother are inside?" I asked Melisa's dad.

He nodded.

"She sets a good fire!" I said looking at the house.

"Did Melisa tell you?" Robert asked in disgust.

"Don't say my little girl's name like that," Melisa's dad said stepping towards him. "What's between a Crest Sibling and her Brother is between them!"

"Overkill though," I said critically.

"What?" Stephanie asked.

"You said it burst," I said turning towards Melisa's dad.

He nodded without taking his eyes off Robert.

"She probably used two accelerants," I told them. "Charcoal lighter and gasoline. If she opened every gas line in the house, there'd be no hope."

"Why would you use lighter fluid, gasoline, and gas?" Stephanie asked me.

"Charcoal lighter is easier to buy and store," I told her. "You can empty a few supermarkets and hardware stores of the stuff without someone noticing. You can also keep a lot of it the trunk of your car, in the basement, even under the bed. Gasoline is tougher, but if you don't know, you get this idea in your head that it's heavier. It will burn better! She probably soaked big pieces of furniture with gasoline and used the charcoal stuff on everything else."

"She had a good plan," Melisa's dad interrupted. "She stored some of the gasoline in the basement. Believe me, it gave her a nice little pop that worried the firemen."

"The gas probably delayed them too," I said. "It's unnecessary but in her state of mind the more fuel for the fire, the better. You want everything to burn so you open anything that will spit out gas in the house, let it go for a few minutes... that's the kind of shit that will make the fire department worry about stopping the spread first."

"Is that why they're paying more attention to soaking the surrounding houses and area?" Stephanie asked.

There was one truck with its ladder leaning over the house with a fireman trying to smother the inferno. The attention he gave the other parts of the operation said he knew it was hopeless, for now. Every other hose was pointed at something other than the house.

"Surround and drown it," Melisa's dad said.

"Huh?" Stephanie grunted.

"The firemen can't beat the fire head on, not yet anyway," he replied. "They cut it off from the surrounding houses, and then drown it from all sides."

"But by then, there's nothing left of the house," I said. "Exactly like she intended. I've seen a house burn like this before. I did it with this much enthusiasm my first time. I wanted to make sure the monsters couldn't get out, and that no one would even think of going in to save them."

"Nobody was going into that house," Melisa's dad said shaking his head. "She made damn sure of that!"

"The Ekaterina were known for being thorough," Robert sighed putting a hand over his eyes.

"There's no way she could have set this up since you visited the first time, David," Stephanie told me.

"No," I agreed. "Doing something like this takes planning, not much, but some."

"Her daughter," Melisa's dad said. "Katherine must have thought this would be the only way to get the girl clear of the father and brother."

"She was going to do it anyway?" Robert asked.

"Undoubtedly," Melisa's dad replied. "She might have tried to survive it, but with her daughter safe in David's house..."

"She cleared the board," Robert finished.

"A very good fire," I said putting my hands behind my back and stepping towards the heat.

From that distance, I was the only one who could feel the fire's warm embrace.

"She chained them to the bed," Anna said as Roderigo guided her wheelchair beside me.

I stood in front of what remained of the porch. Nothing had been left standing by the blaze; there was only a large pile of blackened matter that used to be a house.

"She had to have drugged them to accomplish that," Stephanie said moving to stand next to me.

"The investigators said Katherine stayed in the room without restraints while it burned," Anna told me. "It takes strength to sit in hell."

"It takes will," I said. "But there would have been the satisfaction of hearing them scream and watching them burn."

"That would be pleasant," Stephanie agreed.

"I doubt she was like that," Roderigo told me.

"The woman sat in the same room and burned with them," I replied. "She was exactly like that."

"She made it easy for them," Anna said.

"Who?" Stephanie asked.

"There's barely going to be an investigation," Anna told her. "I'm surprised she didn't give the investigators a call first to ensure they wouldn't go down any path other than murder-suicide."

"Or paint them a sign," Stephanie said shaking her head.

"Oh, Katherine painted them a sign!" Anna said smirking. "Sometimes I wonder if the Bloodlines were a mistake."

The last came out in a voice that made her sound her age.

"We shouldn't be standing out here, David," Stephanie said looking around. "We're getting a lot of attention, and some of them have to be cops."

"They're going to want to talk to me... and others," I said. "I entered the woman's life, and two days later she sets her husband and stepson on fire. Not to mention herself. They're going to come with questions. There's no point in not asking some of our own, or showing what would be a natural curiosity given the situation."

"This shouldn't have been necessary," Anna said staring at the burnt remains.

"What was the fucking point?" Roderigo asked angrily. "She was out! She could have tried to gain our trust later."

"Katherine had nothing to prove," Stephanie said. "She wouldn't question our decision. That's the way that we made her, isn't it? She didn't question it when Iane told her, and she never would have. She did what she had to do to make everything right."

"What a fucking waste!" Roderigo said shaking his head.

"No, it's not," I said looking down the road that the coroner's van had gone a few hours earlier.

"She solved our problems," Roderigo said. "So what? We could have done the same without losing her."

"We gave her away," Stephanie corrected.

"This was about more than those two assholes or a white ring," I told Roderigo.

"What, David?" Stephanie asked.

"Redemption," I said.

"She did what she had to do with you," Roderigo argued. "You might not care, but she was too young. There was nothing she needed to redeem herself for."

"You can redeem someone else's life with your death," I said.

"Who did Katherine want to redeem?" Anna asked softly.

"My younger sister," I whispered.

"At least we can still trust an Ekaterina to do things right," Anna said with a nod, settling back in her chair.

"Your mother just killed herself!" Roderigo said looking at me in frustration. "Don't you feel anything?"

I studied the blackened remains of the house again.

"Twenty-two," Stephanie said.

"What?" Roderigo asked surprised.

"David will have to kill twenty-two people to get out with no witnesses," Stephanie replied looking around. "That's a lot of people you might have just killed, Rod."

"Twenty-four," Anna sighed. "There's two at windows across the street."

"Twenty-five," I said. "The woman at the window is pregnant."

"You can't tell that from here," Roderigo said.

"Believe what you want," I said shrugging. "She was outside yesterday anyway. She's in the last month of her pregnancy."

He looked at Anna.

"The monsters burned Jason's conscience out of him," I said to no one in particular. "There really was nothing in his world except me, but I know I'm worse than he could have ever been. As he lay dying in my arms, Jason asked me to get the team out for the sake of their children. Only two guys had kids, but he said the whole team. I think that was the only way he could force me to survive, but he redeemed innocence with his words. You'll live today, Roderigo, because the woman's child deserves a chance."

"Don't," Anna said before her grandchild could speak. "If you're going to do it, this is not the time."

"There's no chance, Roderigo," Stephanie told him. "Someday, with an entire Foot handpicked by David, we might have a chance, but not today."

"It would be a pity for all of your planning to end here, Roderigo," Anna said smiling.

"Someday then, David," Roderigo said gritting his teeth.

"I'm glad you had a happy childhood," I told him. "But keep this woman's example in mind for that someday. Look around you, and understand what it really means for someone to stand in hell willingly, just to make sure it gets done right. We're not very different, this woman and I. We did our first murders the same way."

Roderigo took one last look around, nodded, and guided his grandmother's wheelchair away.

"Not the same way, David," Stephanie said. "You survived."

"Jason didn't like the part of the plan where I got to watch the monsters burn from inside their funeral pyre," I told her.

"I can see why," she snorted.

She studied the area and shook her head.

"I can understand Roderigo's passion about this," she said. "It is a complete waste, and we allowed it. Over what?"

"You're going to have to ask the council," I told her. "Regardless, Roderigo seems a little out of his element."

"What do you expect?" she asked. "He's got the right vision for the future, but we'll cut him down for even trying to shove it down our throats, and it has to be shoved because none of us are going to swallow it willingly. Now, there's you, the ultimate return of the prodigal son. The Bloodlines are our mythology, and the Ekaterina is, without question, our favorite story."

"It's a bloody story," I said kicking a loose piece of the black stuff back on the pile.

"Those are the best," she said. "I didn't believe most of the stories about your family. In the entire history of Siblings, not a single Ekaterina turned away from the ring? There's no way that could be true. Yet Katherine was decades separated from us and... It's hard not to believe all of those stories standing in front of her declaration of loyalty."

"What does that have to do with Roderigo?"

"You ordered the death of the selection committee," she said. "Roderigo would have died for that. He's a fixer, and none of them like having to walk behind a destroyer to get things done."

"Nobody is supposed to know that I killed the committee," I told her.

"Your Foot has seven members," she said. "It has broken up into groups of five and two. Those two idiots think that they're the ones that chose not to have anything to do with the rest of us. You're a blackhole, David. Any Brother that looks without blinders on knows what's going on here."

I turned to stare at her.

"The ones that can see, want it," she told me. "That's what Roderigo hates; we'll let you make us live by the sword. He also knows that the Brotherhood needs to be burned down to its foundation if we're going to survive. He can't do it, and not because we won't let him either. The council was right, he needs you."

"You seem to have become very knowledgeable in a short time," I said.

"Did you know that Anna was one of the last Brothers given her ring by an Ekaterina?" she asked.

"I did not know that," I replied.

"I meant it, David," she said. "You and young Katherine are our mythology. The fact that you gave me the ring and killed anyone that tried to refute my right to wear it has already made me the de facto leader of the Foot."

I raised an eyebrow at that.

"Robert won't trust Samantha, and she won't trust him," she said smiling widely. "The only people those two know aren't Robert's little fish are you and me."

"Robert probably suspects himself," I said nodding.

She snickered.

"We need Roderigo as much as we need you," she said with a sigh. "But you're the sword of judgment forged by our hands and our blood, and he's..."

She shrugged and looked at the black pile again.

"Katherine lived like a Sibling, and she died one," Stephanie said. "Susan has a Crest for me; Katherine will be buried with it."

"What's your Crest?"

"A Phoenix rising out of the ashes of its rebirth," she said with the hint of a proud blush on her cheeks.

I tried not to smile for the sake of her feelings.

"Appropriate," I said. "And obviously, the perfect first Crested Sibling for you."

"Katherine deserves that much," she said. "Do you ever wonder why she gave you up?"

"No."

She shook her head at me.

"What are you going to do now?" she asked.

"Someone has to tell my sister," I said. "She's my responsibility, so it will have to be me."

"Good luck with her," she told me. "If my Crest Sibling was any indication, you're going to need it."

"Where is she?" I asked when I walked into my living room.

"She's in your room," Melisa answered.

I looked at the doors and back at her.

"I put her in there," she said. "It's... she's going to need..."

I nodded and sat down.

"Something else you decided not to tell me, Melisa," I said.

"I didn't decide not to tell you," she replied. "Katherine's mother needed to know that Brothers had condemned her to a life without the pretty house, the white picket fence, the dog, and the two point five Sibling kids that she always dreamed of."

I stared at her.

"It wasn't about you, David," she said. "It was about her. Whatever you're going to do to me, she had the right to know and the right to make the decision that was best for her family."

"Are you going to tell me that you didn't know what she would do?" I asked.

"If someone walked through that front door and told me that I couldn't be with you anymore, they would die," she said meeting my eyes. "If you said I couldn't be with you anymore, I would die."

I looked at my bedroom doors.

"It's over, except picking up the pieces," she said finally.

"She's not a piece to be picked up," I replied.

"You're right," she said getting up. "She's a girl that needs her family."

She walked over to stand between my feet and look down at me.

"Doris Alex needs me now," she said.

"Tell her, it was your decision," I said.

Melisa's eyes widened.

"You're going to tell Iane the same thing," I instructed. "You're going to repeat it, and repeat it, and then repeat it again, until any thought of blame that they have gets put squarely on your shoulders. You'll carry all their guilt, Melisa."

"David!" she protested with tears in her eyes.

I stood up and wiped the tears off with a thumb before they could fall down her face.

"No tears, Melisa," I said. "They deserve to know it was the right thing to do."

"I can't do that, David," she sobbed.

I wiped her tears off again.

"No tears, Melisa," I reminded her. "That's what I'm going to do to you for this."

She bit her lip painfully until a drop of blood was freed. She nodded and walked around me towards the steps. I sat down and stared at my bedroom doors.

I was ten years old when we met; he was twelve.

"Hi," he said kneeling down in front of me.

There was nothing that I wanted more than for him to go away. I tried to make my eyes express the strength of that desire while I glared at him.

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Go away," I said.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Go away!"

"I like it here," he said sitting down. "I'll go away later."

I felt the rage building again, burning everything away except the desire to destroy. I had become familiar with it in the last six months. My head ached from it, but they had gotten me out one night too soon.

"They put you in a bad house," he said.

"They sent me away too soon," I told him.

"It's better that they got you out," he told me. "It gets really bad."

He said the words in a flat, uninterested tone of voice that made me wary of him.

"It was going to get better," I replied.

"What?" he asked in surprise.

I opened my hands and showed him the blade of the steak knife I had stolen, and the screwdriver that I had sharpened.

"It was going to get better," I said. "But they sent me away before I could get them back for what they did."

He stared at the contents of my hands in awe, as if they were completely unfamiliar to him. He reached out reverently and touched the blade.

"Where's the rest of the knife?" he asked me.

"It was too big to hide," I replied. "I only need this part anyway."

"It wouldn't have worked," he told me. "They're too big."

"They sleep, more than I did in their house," I said. "Can I get out of here?"

"Why?" he asked, pulling his hand back slowly.

"I miss them," I told him.

He looked into my eyes for a minute before shaking his head.

"Can I have one of those?" he asked.

I reached out with both hands and dumped the contents into his. He looked from the screwdriver to me, to the knife, and then at me again.

"I don't need both," he said holding the screwdriver out to me.

"I'm going to light them on fire," I said. "It'll hurt more."

"You can't get out of here," he said looking around the room.

His hands closed around what I had given him, grasping them tightly as if they were a newly won freedom.

"I'll wait," I told him.

"My name's Jason," he said moving to sit beside me.

"David," I whispered. "My name is David."

She was sitting in the papa-san chair when I opened my bedroom doors. The book in her lap fell to the floor as she straightened. I waved her back into a sitting position. She settled down, but her eyes followed me as I moved to sit down on the side of my bed closest to her.

We stared at each other for a few seconds before she gave me a weak smile.

"Hello, Katherine," I said.