Monday, June 4, 2007

Tabula Rasa

Chapter 14

“Sorry guys, but that's classified information!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“WHAT?! Are you sure?”

“Yup! I even wrote a note!”

“Why didn’t you wake me up?!”

“I don’t want to die again.”

Cursing.

“Fine. Where is that stupid note?”

“Here!” Katja stuffs the note to Malice and disappears again.

I really don’t like the look on Malice’s face. She finishes the note.

“I’ll put it simply rookie: we’ll be busy for a while.”

“Why?”

“Demons are popping up almost everywhere. Just like that.” She snaps her fingers. “So we’ve got a lot of work after we’re through this case.”

Katja pops up from behind me and I jump.

“Speaking of your case, I think we’ve found your bad boy!”

“Where?”

“It’s at- where was it again…”

“KATJA!”

“Okay, okay…it’s in Tarina’s school. One of the students.”

“Who?”

“…we don’t know.”

“You don’t know?! Are you saying that we have to go through all the students?! There must be at least 400 brats in that place!”

“I know.” For some reason she’s smiling.

“And how do we do that fast enough?”

“You’re getting some backup!”

“Oh great. Who?”

Katja points at herself.

“Me!”

“Fu-”

“Okay, okay let’s focus on the case and not on cursing each other.”

Malice glares at Katja who doesn’t seem to even notice. She jumps around happily.

~*~*~*~*~

“So who is she?”

“The nutcase of the country, a.k.a. Katja.”

“Oh she’s Finnish?”

“Joo!” (Yeah!)

“IHANAA!” (WONDERFUL!) To our surprise, Tarina hugs Katja. “Viimeinkin joku selväjärkinen!” (Finally someone who’s sane!)

”Yeah, yeah, cut the chit-chat, we’ve got work to do.”

“Oh right. The demon.”

“Speaking of the demon, how well do you know the kids in your school?”

“Pretty well I guess.”

“Well that should help.”

“What do you mean?”

“Our bad boy is a student in your school.”

“Somehow I guessed so.”

“OK. What kind of student are we looking for?”

“Any transfer students lately?”

“No.”

“Then we’re looking for someone who’s always looking for attention but doesn’t blabber about everything.”

“Popular?”

“I’d say yes.”

“Or then it’s the student who seems invisible most of the time.”

“We only have a popularity-freak.”

“Great! Let’s start with that!”

“Oh with Laura? Go ahead, punch her for me!”

“No. We just observe for a while.”

~*~*~*~*~

“-ja siis iha tosi, kukaan ei käytä sellasii vaatteita, ei siis kukaan!” (…and I mean seriously, no one wears clothes like that, I mean no one!)

Laura really seems to be the queen bee. She wears the latest fashion (grey clothes, colorful scarf and a pink bag) and wears too much make-up.

“Let me guess: that’s Laura?”

“Bingo.”

“Wow looks just like one bitch I knew a long time ago!”

Katja’s looking around the canteen. For some reason she has an umbrella with her (a small one, red with white dots) and she seems to enjoy herself. We’re on lunch break. Only Tarina has food that she’s currently eating.

“So what do we do now?”

“Look out for odd behavior.”

“She’s the queen of the school. All the popular kids are odd in some way.”

“Like how?”

“They listen to Antti Tuisku.”

Katja hisses and shivers.

”Who’s Antti Tuisku?”

”A popstar. That’s all you need to know.”

I don’t like pop music, at least not much. And Katja is a goth (according to Malice) so the reaction is understandable.

“Okay, but more odd behavior. Does she meet up with strangers after school?”

“How should I know? I don’t care if she gets run over by a truck!”

“Okay so you don’t like her.” Tarina makes a strange noise. I take it as a yes.

“So do you know anything about her. Except that she’s a bitch?”

“Go ask her, she’ll be more than happy to tell you herself!”

“Okay, I will!”

Malice gets up from the table and walks over to Laura. They chat for a while and then Malice comes back.

“Okay, she’s the queen bitch, spoiled and an idiot. Unfortunately that doesn’t make her evil.”

“Did you read her mind?” Malice scoffs.

“Didn’t need to, the girl’s so full of herself that she tells everything.”

“We all know that. But try and tell her that.”

“I think I know the reaction.”

“Yup.”

“Katja, what are you doing?”

“I’ll talk to her!”

“Katja, sit down!”

But she’s already heading towards the queen bitch. The girls in the table turn to Katja when she starts to chat with Laura. She looks at us and starts laughing. Katja returns.

“Little miss perfect. That’s what she is.”

“So what do we do?”

“We keep an eye on her with this.” She pulls out a small ball from her pocket. “Katja, you know what to do with this, right?”

“Right! Leave it to me!” She gets up, walks past Laura and disappears to the hallway. Laura giggles with her little group.

“What was that?”

“We can track her with that. Katja let it get away near Laura so it attached itself in her head.”

“And she doesn’t notice it?!”

“Nope, which is perfect, since we don’t want to be discovered, right?”

“…who makes this stuff for us anyway?”

“There’s a team for that in the Office.”

“Figures.”

“So let’s get going, we have English class to attend.”

~*~*~*~*~

After the last lesson we go to Tarina’s place. Her parents aren’t home.

“So how do we track Laura?”

“Piece of cake. We’ve got you rookie.”

“Me? What can I do?”

Malice walks to the kitchen and opens the faucet.

“Make us a mirror. It’s easier to see with a clear screen.”

“So I…”

“Focus and make us a screen.”

I do as I’m told and close my eyes. A bit of focus and I can already form objects out of water. Though there needs to be water close, in some form, otherwise I can’t do anything. I return to reality when I hear Malice shutting the faucet.

“Great! You can stop now.”

I open my eyes and watch as the wall of water comes to life. Looks like I’m watching a TV-show.

“Okay now where is she?”

Speak of the devil, that’s Laura and that girl with her is…

“DINAH?!”

“Oh you two know each other? Well it looks like our bad boy is actually a bad girl…”

I’m too shocked to response. But there she was, the sick girl from my life. A life I thought I already got rid of.

“Oh what are they doing?” Katja doesn’t seem to notice my anxiety.

“Talking…let’s turn up the volume.” I have no idea how, but suddenly we hear clearly what they’re talking about.

“-so what are we going to do now?” Laura’s pronouncing is causing me a headache.

“Did you do what I asked you to do?”

“I put the blue balls in the forest.”

“And?”

“What?”

“What happened to the spiders that were supposed to come out of those eggs I gave you?!”

“I didn’t see any! Spiders! Yuck!”

Dinah sighs.

“Let a human do the job and go clean the mess afterwards.”

“What?”

“Do you know what I want you to do next?”

“What?”

“Stand right there and close your eyes.”

“Okay!” She doesn’t suspect anything. I don’t know if I should laugh or cry.

“Good girl.” Dinah grab Laura’s face with her left hand. Laura’s eyes open, she screams and then falls down like a puppet. Dinah is holding a glowing soul in her hand.

“Stupid girl. You never really had brains, did you?” The soul doesn’t react, just stares into nothing. Dinah sighs. “Well now you’re in better use than getting on my nerves with your whining.” The soul disappears.

Dinah turns right to the tracker and smiles widely. She waves.

“Hi! I suppose you’re from the Office, aren’t you? Nice to meet you, even though not face-to-face…”

Malice’s eyes grow wide.

“No way! She can’t see the tracker! That must be just good luck!”

As to answer to her comment, Dinah talks again.

“Oh you though I wouldn’t see that pathetic attempt of following that stupid girl? Well I’m more than I look like.”

She looks at Laura’s corpse.

“She was pretty useless. Couldn’t do anything properly. But she was cheap and didn’t think of her own good. And she wasn't that strong, just a stone around my neck!” She spits on the corpse. Then she turns back to the tracker. “I guess you’re wondering what I’m doing here?” She nods to herself as if she’s answering her own question.

“Sorry guys, but that's classified information!” She laughs. “Aww, don’t look like that, if you manage to be clever enough, you’ll figure it out!” She seems to be picking the tracker between her fingers because that’s what it looks like now.

“But I have a schedule to follow, so this is bye-bye for a while. Nice chatting with you! Bye!” The screen cuts off.

Everyone’s quiet.

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A/N: A new chapter! Took longer than usual, didn't it? -.-' I'm not proud of that.

I've got some new inspiration now! ^^ That should be good.

And in case you're wondering, Antti Tuisku is a Finnish popstar. He came in 3rd place in the Finnish Idols. He's doing really great. I hate his music. -.-''' It destroys my ears. He's like...Justin Timberlake.

That's all for now.


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