Trials - Chapter 24

Eric felt the bullets rip through his body, breaking bones and splitting his veins, sending blood spewing from his body.

He had been shot three times; twice in the back and once in the neck.

Everything turned black and he felt all of his strength leave his body.

Am I…dying? He thought as he slipped into darkness.

He fell forwards and Jasmine caught him, dragging him around the corner before more bullet started to fly at them. Jasmine leant against the corner and bullets smashed into the wall next to her, sending shivers down her spine that she hadn’t felt in years.

“His gun must have jammed, otherwise Eric would be dead,” Jasmine told herself, reaching for a pistol hidden behind her waist. “Sorry, Eric, but old habits die hard.”

Jasmine was at a massive disadvantage and T knew that.

He had a silenced pistol with a magazine which held fifteen bullets and no doubt lots of spare magazines and guns on his person. Jasmine’s gun however only held twelve rounds and she had only one magazine.

“Shit!” She whispered, her hands shaking madly and she ground her teeth together.

Calm down! You can do this! Remember your training. Count the bullets.

Eight. Nine. Ten.

“Five more,” She mumbled.

Fourteen. Fifteen.

Now!

Jasmine leapt out from around the corner and fired four shots at T. T was quick enough to duck behind cover before any of her shots could land. She clicked her tongue and hid back around the corner and T resumed his assault after reloading his gun.

Someone must have heard those shots, right? She thought. Please, tell me that someone’s called the police or the Guardians!

If help didn’t arrive, then she would be dead within a minute.

T kept firing at her as he marched towards her, constantly keeping up the pressure and pinning her to one spot.

She couldn’t run without abandoning Eric and both shooters knew that she wouldn’t do that.

Eric! Jasmine screamed, putting her hand on his wrist.

His body felt cold to the touch and blood was pouring at an incredible rate, his eyes were closed and no doubt some of his bones were broken. Jasmine was trained in first aid but she had nothing to patch up his wounds other than her dress which was too thin to use as a bandage.

If he didn’t receive medical attention or healing soon, Eric would be dead within minutes.

Jasmine needed an exit route, and fast.

There was nothing Jasmine could use where she was hiding to help in the fight and there wasn’t anything in the alleyway where T was that could change the fight either. Someone would have called the emergency services after hearing the gunshots and, given how heavily protected Imperial was, reinforcements should arrive any moment.

Jasmine heard T’s magazine click empty and she spun around the corner and shot at him as he was reloading his gun. She unloaded six rounds into his chest as it was an easier target to hit; he grunted and stumbled back a little, but the bullets didn’t wound him.

Jasmine snapped her aim at his head and fired her last bullets, but T jumped down into cover again, easily avoiding them.

Her gun clicked and she swore under her breath. T stood up from his cover and Jasmine felt her body freeze up completely, leaving her paralysed even as T slowly aimed his gun at her head, grinning maliciously at her.

An arrow landed in the ground between them and it exploded in a loud bright flash. Jasmine’s ears rang as her vision turned completely white and she stumbled back behind cover as T blind fired at her.

A flashbang?

Once her vision and hearing was restored, she nervously looked back into the alley but T was already gone.

“Where’d he go?” She asked meekly. Her eyes were then drawn to the arrow implanted in the asphalt. “Who fired the arrow?”

Jasmine heard the sounds of sirens coming closer and closer and she remembered that her priority right now had to be Eric.

She went back to him, checked for a pulse before running into the main street and screaming for someone to help her.

***

The Merchant smiled softly and swung his bow onto his back.

He watched as the police swarmed into the alleyway and paramedics tended to Eric. Jasmine stayed right beside him, holding his hand, even as he was lifted into the ambulance.

“Don’t worry, I won’t let you die,” He said, smiling softly. “However, what happens next is all down to you guys.”

***

The house phone rung and Connor scooped it up.

“Hello?” He asked.

“Hello, is this the residence of Mr Eric Agrim?”

“Yes, why?” Connor felt goose bumps rise over his body. “Did something happen to him?”

“Are you a relative or friend-?”

“What happened to him?”

Kiara and Evony walked into the kitchen from the living room and they saw the worried look on Connor’s face.

“I’m sorry to say that I have some bad news,” The operator said. “Earlier this evening, Mr Agrim was shot and has been taken to-”

The phone slipped through his fingers as a cold shiver shot down his spine.

“Eric’s…been…shot?”

***

Groggily, Eric slowly opened his eyes and his body felt much heavier than normal.

His throat was dry, his body felt cold and his back felt numb from where he had been shot.

I…I’m alive… He thought, trying to sit up and look around the room.

He couldn’t lift himself off the bed and his vision struggled to adjust to the bright lights that were above him. Eric could only just make out two people talking on the other side of the room.

“How is he? He’s going to be okay, right?”

Jasmine? He thought and he felt a little relieved. She’s…okay.

“For now, he’s stable but unless he receives healing from a mage-”

“Then why isn’t the healer here now?” Jasmine demanded. “Why aren’t they here saving his life?”

“Unfortunately, it will be a while because-”

“How long?”

“…A few hours but-”

Jasmine’s face twisted in rage upon hearing that.

She grabbed a nearby chair and threw it onto the floor. “That’s not good enough!”

“Miss Dalena, please calm down,” The doctor softly requested. “He’s stable for the moment and with no signs of getting worse, so there’s a high chance that he’ll be fine until she gets here.”

“But he could die before that happens!” Jasmine’s voice began to break and tears poured from her eyes. “Why?” She clenched her fists tightly. “Why did this happen?”

“Miss Dalena, I want you to know that-”

“Get out.”

“Miss…”

“Get out!” She screamed.

The doctor nodded quickly before swiftly departing from the room, realising that if he stayed there any longer, then he would only make things worse.

“Why?” Jasmine whispered, collapsing onto her knees. “Why did this have to happen today? Why did he have to come back?”

Eric let out a small groan as he pulled himself into a sitting position, but he quickly fell back down when his body screamed at him in agony.

“Eric!” Jasmine cried, wiping her eyes and running to his side. She pushed him gently back down and forced a small smile. “Take it easy for now, okay?

“Jasmine…” Eric croaked before he coughed violently; his throat felt like it was on fire.

She took his hand in hers and stroked it gently. “I’m right here.”

“Are you…okay?”

Jasmine closed her eyes and shook her head a little, smiling softly. “You were shot and that’s the first thing you ask me?”

“I…was shot, right?”

“Yeah.”

“How…bad?”

“You lost three pints of blood but they’ve been giving you transfusions and the healer will be here soon, so you don’t need to worry about a thing.”

Eric closed his eyes and nodded. “I feel…heavy.”

Jasmine frowned and her grip on Eric’s hand tightened.

“I’m so sorry,” She whispered.

She realised what she was doing and let go on his hand, before stroking Eric’s hair and smiling at him. “I’ll be right back. I’m going to see if Connor and the others have gotten here yet.”

“Okay.” As she stood up, he gripped her hand tightly and put on a small smile. “Please…don’t be too long.”

Jasmine felt like she could cry after hearing that, but she put on a warm smile, before saying, “Of course.”

She then quickly left the room, closing the door silently behind her. Jasmine leant her head back against it and shut her eyes before the tears started to flow again.

“I’m so sorry, everyone,” Jasmine whispered. She collected herself, smacked her fist into the pillar beside her and her expression became a scowl. “T…”

***

Connor and the rest of Eric’s team ran as fast as they could through the streets of Imperial, pushing through people and ignoring their angry shouts.

“Wait, what happened exactly?” Kaida demanded hysterically.

“I don’t know, I don’t know!” He shouted back.

“Will he be okay?” Elthia asked.

“I don’t know!”

“Couldn’t we have taken a taxi?” Kiara suggested, flying next to Connor.

“At this time of night, the traffic’s in gridlock so it’s quicker to run it,” Connor replied. “We shouldn’t be too far-”

Three steel canisters rolled in between them and green gas burst from the top, quickly surrounding them in the mist.

“What the-?” Connor blurted out before he began coughing madly.

“What is…this…?” Kaida began to ask before she passed out.

“Poi…son,” Evony said, before falling onto the street face first.

Ajax had deployed his helmet over his head but he had already inhaled the gas and began to lose consciousness.

Laila had begun holding her breath the minute the cannisters had rolled to them but even she was struggling to keep it out. A dart hit her shoulder and she reflexively let out a small cry of pain, allowing more gas to enter into her system.

Within seconds, Connor and the rest of Eric’s team were lying face down on an empty street, unconscious and vulnerable.

T emerged from a side street, wearing a gas mask, and he looked over them, confirming that they were all unconscious.

“The blonde one, huh?” He whispered, walking over to her and lifting her into his arms. “Don’t worry. You’ll all wake up in a few hours. Well.” He grinned maliciously. “Some of you will.”

***

Jasmine was beginning to get anxious.

Connor had called her an hour ago to say that they would be at the hospital as soon as possible and she had been waiting in the lobby for the last half an hour for them to arrive, but they hadn’t turned up yet, nor had they contacted her since.

“Where are they?” She whispered, pacing up and down, arms crossed and her phone in her hands.

Surely they couldn’t have…Jasmine considered, a strong feeling of dread rising in her chest.

Her phone began vibrating in her hand and she felt relieved when she saw that she had a text from Connor.

However, all the message said was 58 Lancaster Way.

It was an address that wasn’t too far from where she was but she was confused, and scared, as to why she’d been only sent that.

“Did T…?” She started to ask, but she was too scared to finish that thought.

Jasmine quickly grabbed her coat and ran out of the hospital.

He couldn’t have, She told herself. There’s no way he could have!

She broke into a sprint and forced her way through the busy, rainy streets, and quickly made her way to a damp alleyway where 58 Lancaster Way was located.

The only thing of note in the alleyway was a mobile phone resting on a bin, unlocked and it was angled so that the camera could clearly see her.

“T,” She spat, a scowl on her face.

She slowly walked towards it, checking every single inch of the alley for places that T could be hiding or watching her from, but there was nowhere he could hide. Jasmine walked to the phone and looked up and found a small camera watching her from above.

The phone began to ring and Jasmine didn’t hesitate to answer it.

“Hello, Jasmine,” An all too familiar voice said.

“T…” She whispered.

Her entire body shivered at the very sound of his voice.

On the other end of the phone was the man who had made her who she was, who had tried to kill her, and the fact that T had Connor’s phone meant that something must have happened to the others.

“Why do you have this phone?” Jasmine asked, her voice shaking.

She grabbed her arm and dug her nails into her skin, trying to calm herself down quickly.

“Jasmine, we both know the answer to that already, don’t we?” T asked. “Don’t worry though, I haven’t hurt any of them. Well, except for one.”

Jasmine’s face lost all of its colour and she bit her lip hard. “T, don’t…”

“I can see why you dote on her so much. She is a very cute little girl, isn’t she?”

“You bastard!”

“I haven’t done a thing to her, yet.”

“…Yet?”

T let out a low, gleeful laugh. “Jasmine, let’s play a game, shall we? Just like we used to.”

“Why would I do that?” Jasmine demanded, clenching her fists. “You might think you’ve back me into a corner, but I’m a Guardian member in training and I can easily call-”

“Except you can’t, not without being prepared to suffer the consequences.” Jasmine’s body tensed up. “That seems to have gotten your attention. If you leave that alleyway or try to do anything to contact the Guardians, or the police, know this: by the time I’m done with Elthia, there won’t be a piece of skin left on her bones.”

Jasmine closed her eyes, desperate to hold back her tears and suppress her fear.

“Ah, how long I’ve wanted to see you make that face?” T wondered in a sooth voice. “Now, shall we begin?”

“I want to ask you something first,” Jasmine replied. “Are the others safe?”

“They’ll be unconscious for the next twelve hours and are currently on their way to a hospital. By then, our business will have been resolved and I will be long gone.”

“If it’s me you want, then let Elthia go. I’ll do whatever you want, so just don’t harm-”

“Jasmine, how many years have you known me? Did you really think I would listen to such desperate pleas, or have you become that weak since we last met?” He let out a disappointed sigh. “Let’s begin.”

Jasmine slowly nodded and looked at the ground.

“Raise your head or I’ll rip her fingernails out!” T cried and Jasmine snapped to comply causing him to snicker. “Good girl. Do you still like puzzles, Jasmine? Open the bin that is in front of you and you will find a collection of boxes with numbers on them from one to ten. Open them in order and solve the puzzles inside. Do that, and I will tell you my location. If you get one wrong or fail to answer within the time limit and I will remove one of Elthia’s fingers. Is that understood?”

Jasmine gasped and covered her mouth with her hand, tears falling from her eyes and she nodded weakly.

Why? She asked. Why is this happening? Why did it have to happen today? Why…why do my friends have to suffer because of me? Eric…Elthia…I’m so sorry…

“Good,” T said. “Your time limit is three minutes per puzzle and they are all able to be done within that time frame. I have never cheated in our games and I won’t even now. Jasmine, once you open the box, the time limit begins and I give you my word that I will not do a thing to Elthia than what I have said, and only when you fail to complete my puzzles.

“Now, begin.”

Without hesitation and fighting through her emotions, Jasmine tore open the first box.

Inside was a brand new Rubik’s Cube and quickly examined it, checking to see if there was anything wrong with it.

“I haven’t tampered with it or modified it,” T told her. “Solve it.”

She eyed it suspiciously and began to twist the cube in the method she had learnt a long time ago and she easily completed the cube in under three minutes.

“It’s done,” She said, slamming it onto the bin.

“Hmm, well done, Jasmine,” T said. “You were always good with puzzles, locks and all sorts of infiltrations, weren’t you?”

“Don’t remind me.”

T laughed sadistically. “If that bothers you, I can’t wait to see what kind of face you’ll make later.”

“What do you-?”

“Open the next box.”

She clicked her tongue and did so.

All that was inside was a laminated piece of paper.

On the front, it had bold text and the back was completely blank. The text read: If you were to spell out numbers, how far would you need to count to find the first letter ‘A’?

“What the hell is this?” Jasmine demanded.

“A riddle, my dear,” T replied. “Solve it or I’ll take her finger.”

Jasmine shook her head, closed her eyes and thought only about the riddle.

She didn’t have time to write out all of the numbers in the world and she needed a sorting method of some sort. The first ten numbers and zero didn’t have a letter A in them, and thus the two digit numbers couldn’t have it either. Jasmine did a quick check to be sure of that and then moved into the hundreds.

One hundred and one? She considered but she shook the idea from her mind. It can’t be that simple. It’s a riddle we’re talking about and T wouldn’t accept something like that. What complete number, without any extra bits, has a letter A in it? Two hundred? Six hundred? No! Am I thinking too small? The thousands perhaps?

The answer dawned on her and she frowned. “One thousand.”

“Correct,” T said, applauding her. “Do you remember, Jasmine, what significance that number holds for us? One thousand seconds. That’s how long it took you on average to complete your missions. Back then, you were so skilled and our teamwork together was flawless. I was pleased to see that you’re just as strong as ever in your tournament fights?”

“Don’t worry, I’m stronger than I was back then.”

T chuckled. “We both know that isn’t true. Open the third box.”

She did so and found another piece of laminated paper inside it. It read: Whoever makes it, tells it not. Whoever takes it, knows it not. And whoever knows it, wants it not. What is it?

Whoever makes it, tells it not? She repeated in her head. What does that mean? The person who makes it doesn’t call it what it is, or does the maker not tell the object itself what it is?

Jasmine’s head began to hurt; she couldn’t make sense of it.

Even though she knew that she had to, even though she felt like she could solve it, Jasmine couldn’t find the right answer no matter how hard she tried.

What would someone make that they don’t want anyone else to know what it is? She shook her head. No, that’s not how I should be thinking about this. Given how the previous answers related to my time with T, then it stands to reason that this one must relate to back then…something from when we were partners, but…what?

Counterfeits?

Forgery?

Killing?

Stealing?

What is it?

She did her best to dig up the long buried memories of those days which she had tried her best to forget, but there were over ten years worth of memories to sort through. In the past, they had stolen and forged false documents, created replicas of items and sold the originals on the black market, and they had even replaced real bodies with fake ones.

Jasmine took a deep breath, threw caution to the wind, and said, “Counterfeits.”

T paused for a moment before replying. “Counterfeit what?”

Jasmine bit her lip and swallowed the warm blood that flowed. She had a small chance of getting it right, if indeed it was counterfeit something. The question was counterfeit what?

I’ve got to say something!

She exhaled. “Counterfeit documents.”

T didn’t reply.

“T?” Jasmine weakly asked.

“Right index finger,” T replied.

Jasmine gasped and the tears fell from her eyes. “No…No, you can’t. You can’t!”

She heard him walk away from the phone, his boots slamming hard on the ground. He picked up something metallic and continued walking.

Then, she heard faint squeals from Elthia.

“T, please…” Jasmine begged.

She heard the crack of a bone, the tearing of flesh and Elthia’s blood curdling scream.

“No!” Jasmine shrieked. “T, stop!”

No matter how much she begged, T didn’t stop.

He ripped Elthia’s off her finger and tossed it onto the floor. Elthia was crying and screaming as loudly as she could in agony, powerless to stop the bleeding.

Jasmine wanted to crawl into a corner and weep. She couldn’t bear the thought of Elthia being tortured by that man’s hand.

“I’m so sorry,” She whispered.

A blow torch hissed and Elthia’s cries became louder and louder.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Jasmine screamed.

The blow torch stopped and she heard him walk back over to the phone.

“I was merely cauterising the wound,” T explained. “Poor girl, losing such a pretty finger.” He let out a small sigh and she could feel him grinning at her on the other end. “I would hate it if she suffered any more.”

“You bastard!”

“Now you know that I’m completely serious about hurting her, don’t you? Two fingers saved, one lost, and five fingers and two thumbs left. I wonder how many of them she’ll have left when this is all over. Oh, the answer to my last riddle by the way was counterfeit money; the kind of money that I paid you in.”

Jasmine felt her throat close up. “What...do you mean?”

“Huh, you didn’t know? Since we were partners, I haven’t paid you with a single real piece of money since the beginning. You’ve killed people for fake money.”

Jasmine refused to give him the satisfaction of a reply and opened the next box.

I’ve got to hold back my emotions or else something worse could happen to Elthia, She told herself.

The fourth box had yet another piece of laminated paper and read the riddle: A man was outside taking a walk when it began to rain. He did not have an umbrella and he wasn’t wearing a hat. His clothes were soaked, yet not a single hair on his head got wet. How could this happen?

“The man is bald, thus there isn’t any hair that can get wet,” Jasmine said quickly.

T chuckled. “As I expected, you do remember that man.” Jasmine tensed and he continued. “I would have been heartbroken if you’d forgotten the face of the last man we ever killed together. Do you remember that moment? When you tried to kill me and I shot you. I hope you haven’t forgotten that because I will never forget it. You broke my heart that day, Jasmine.”

She burst open the next box and there was another riddle.

Is it possible for half of twelve to be seven?

Jasmine didn’t know the answer but she understood the reference immediately. The bald man’s daughter, Isabella Stone, was seven years old when T killed her.

Jasmine dug her nails into her palms and focused on the riddle.

Even if she understood what T was referencing, she still needed to give T an answer.

How can seven be half of twelve? She wondered. The logical answer would be to answer that it is physically impossible for seven to be half of twelve, because half of twelve is six and not seven.

Jasmine cleared her mind; she couldn’t have been dealing with ordinary numbers in this riddle. Although, that did make her wonder what number system ever had it so that seven was half of twelve? The Greeks? Maybe. Romans?

Romans… Jasmine considered in her mind. They used numerals for numbers. Roman numerals, huh? Twelve in Roman numerals is XII and seven is VII.

“T, the answer is yes it can be,” She said.

“How?”

“When it’s Roman numerals. It’s not to do with the numbers or any equations, but it’s to do with how the numbers are written. Twelve in Roman numerals is XII and, if you literally cut it in half, you’re left with VII. So, seven can be half of twelve!”

T grunted. “Don’t get too cocky, and I’m guessing that you understood the reference the moment you saw the riddle, yes? Poor little Izzy. To think that she saw her father killed before-”

Jasmine ripped open the next box.

You can draw me, fire me or fill me in. What am I?

Jasmine stopped thinking about the riddle as a riddle; the way to solving T’s game was to keep thinking about how they all related to her past; specifically, their last mission together.

What had happened on that final mission that could answer the question?

He started off with a Rubik’s cube, similar to how we started with an encrypted data file. Then, he revealed that what he was paying me with was counterfeit money…Richard Stone, the Bald Merchant as we called him. Despite his immense wealth, he poured a lot of it into charities around the world; someone in his family wanted that money so we were sent to kill him. What else did T mention in this game?

The bald merchant, Richard Stone himself was next in T’s game. Then his daughter. I…I yelled at T; told him I didn’t want to do this anymore, that I couldn’t kill children like he wanted me to. I tried to…

A light bulb turned on in Jasmine’s head. “Blanks! That day, when I tried to kill you…You had already loaded my gun with blanks. You’d demanded that I use my knife specifically so that if I did try to shoot you, I couldn’t.”

“Correct,” T replied.

Jasmine picked up the next box before dropping it back into the bin.

“Why aren’t you continuing?” T asked.

“Because I already know what the next answer’s going to be,” Jasmine said. “It’s river, isn’t it? The very thing that you dropped me into as I was bled out in your arms.”

T didn’t speak for a few moments.

“I guess there isn’t any point in continuing this game if you already know what’s coming next. I assume that you figured out that the next one was about Elthia and then the one after that was about her family.”

“Her family?” Jasmine repeated. “What do you mean?” Silence. “T?”

He laughed softly. “Oh, you never heard about it?”

“What?”

“Who makes it, has no need of it. Who buys it, has no use for it. Who uses it can neither see nor feel it. What am I?”

“T, what the hell did you do?”

“The answer is coffin.”

“You…you didn’t-!”

“Oh, but I did. I broke into that house, tied up the people inside and then I burnt it down with every single member of her family inside. Do you know what that smell reminded me off? It was like the first day we met.”

“I’m going to kill you!” Jasmine shouted.

T laughed softly. “There’s a hidden camera in the street Jasmine; find it and you will find out where I am. The location I’m at is written on the bottom of it. We’ll see you soon, won’t we, Elthia?”

Jasmine heard a faint whimpering before the call disconnected. It didn’t take her long to find the camera and she knew exactly where T was.

“Warehouse Thirteen, by the docks.”

T, you might think that you’ve got me here and that I won’t ever surpass you, but, today is the last day that I live in your shadow. I will kill you, save Elthia and become a Guardian and leave my past behind me forever.