Hopeless Way

Oliver was at a loss for words after what he had heard. Joe and Oliver exchanged helpless glances. A dead man lay beside them, and in their hands, a pile of files they had no idea what to do with. A boy who had ripped off his own head. And a note threatening death. Joe, already shaken by what Evan had said about him, was now truly frightened upon seeing this letter. This situation, in ways he couldn't quite comprehend, seemed to be closing in on him. He had no idea how Mark knew him. Meanwhile, Oliver seemed to be piecing everything together.

“The accident from three years ago... Didn't you barely survive that car crash?”  Oliver asked.

“Yeah. But my sister told me I never had any serious problems because of it.”  Joe was trying to make sense of the situation.

“But you had surgery, didn't you?”  Oliver’s voice was very serious.

“What are you trying to say? Do I have that ridiculous substance in me too? Speak clearly, Oliver,”  Joe snapped.

“Evan’s words, this letter, your surgery... It all points to this, Joe. But we also have to consider that nothing has happened in three years. That might completely disprove my theory,”  Oliver replied.

“I don’t get it. I don’t understand any of this. We’ve only been back for, what, two hours? But look at this. The man is lying dead in the bed right now. I’m really about to lose my mind.”  Joe angrily sat on the edge of the bed.

Mumbling to himself, Oliver headed towards the living room. As the smell of the corpse filled the room, Joe got up and followed him. Oliver was in the living room, going through the reports. There were exactly 12 pages of reports. They sat down together and began to examine them. Almost all of the reports were either identical to what Henry had described or related to other similar cases. Except for everything after page 8...

Page 8 was about Evan. There were notes on the chemical values of the Eternum that had been used on Evan and injected into Mark, as well as the results of the case. Additionally, as Henry had predicted, the last note on Evan’s page suggested some sort of “escape.” But the most striking detail was the last and only unnamed case in the report. Unlike the other cases in the report, there was hardly any information on this one. It was just a two-page case that only mentioned Mark under a different name, ending with the sentence, “This is the blood I’ve been searching for.” There was also an address among the reports. The address pointed to a neighborhood in the city, located among derelict houses. It was a very dangerous area, and going there would be equally difficult. It seemed like they had found what they were looking for. That might be the house where Mark conducted his experiments. Oliver was suspicious of the last case.

“I think I’m actually right about this. An unnamed case, a different name, and a nonsensical phrase. How can we confirm this?”  Oliver asked.

“I don’t know. We can only find out by learning the name of the doctor who operated on me. My sister should know. I’ll call her,”  Joe said, now visibly scared.

Joe called his sister. When he asked her for the name of the doctor, Zoe was quite surprised, but she couldn't remember either. She said she could look through old hospital records and find the name. From a box she pulled out of the bedroom, she found the name of the doctor who had operated on Joe. The doctor’s name was Natas Sezar.

Joe thanked her and immediately hung up the phone. They turned on the computer in Henry’s room and searched through the departments of Newcastle Hospital. They found only one record. A doctor named N.T.S. had registered at the hospital about four years ago. However, there was no photo or information about any surgeries they had performed in the records. Only the doctor’s name was abbreviated, and the birthdate was listed. The birthdate was August 11, 1983. This date seemed familiar. August 11. Oliver remembered the date—it was Jason’s birthday. Jason, Mark’s son.

But Joe was sure that wasn't what he was remembering. This had to be a code for something else. Joe didn’t want to waste time trying to recall it, because they had a bigger problem on their hands. What were they going to do with Henry’s body? If they called the police, everything could be exposed. This could also eliminate the current danger. Oliver supported this idea. Why put themselves in danger? But Joe didn’t see it that way. If he also had Eternum in him, it could cause problems for him later on. When Joe brought this up, Oliver realized he couldn’t leave his best friend alone. That would be a betrayal.

They decided to throw Henry’s body into the house’s basement. Grabbing the body from both ends, they somehow dragged it into the basement. While doing this, their clothes got completely dirty. They went up to Lucas’s room, grabbed some plain, solid-colored clothes, and left with the reports and the letter. Joe had a detail in his mind that they should focus on.

“Sebastian... We need to go to Sebastian. Right now! We have to get to him before something happens to him,”  Joe said anxiously.

“You’re right. His house should be four blocks away. We need to hurry,”  Oliver replied.

Just then, a city bus passed in front of them. They quickly got on and headed towards Sebastian’s house. During the ride, Joe and Oliver were questioning everything that had happened over the past two days. Oliver was worried about Sebastian, but he had a plan in mind. He was ready to risk everything because if his plan worked, they could find Mark the easiest way possible. But there was one thing they hadn’t considered. What would they do if they found Mark? How could they defeat him? The reports didn’t directly mention anything that could disable Eternum. But Oliver remembered a line from an old case.

Oliver quickly opened a report. This case was one that even Henry hadn’t mentioned. During a time when Mark had withdrawn into himself, he found a boy severely injured in an alley behind their house. The boy had fallen off his bike, badly scraping both knees and breaking an arm. Mark told the boy he would help him and took him to his basement lab. There, he injected the boy with Eternum, allowing him to regenerate. However, the blood used to provide the Eternum had been drawn from a child with chronic illnesses. Mark’s goal was to test what would happen in such a situation. The boy who had been injected with Eternum suddenly went berserk and attacked Mark but crashed into the place where the test tubes were stored. The test tubes burst into flames, and the boy began to burn. As the boy started to melt, his body failed to regenerate, and he died there, burned to ashes. Shortly after, his body crumbled away.

Now they had a plan. They would burn Mark the first chance they got. But they still needed to figure out how to set the scene for it. As they discussed this, they arrived at Sebastian’s street. It made more sense to them to include Sebastian in the plan. After all, he was in danger too and now had no choice but to be involved.

When they arrived in front of Sebastian’s house, they felt an inexplicable unease. They knocked on the door, and Sebastian’s mother answered. When they asked for Sebastian, she said he had left the house for a walk in the forest just five minutes ago. Joe and Oliver realized the danger. Mark had lured Sebastian into the forest to kidnap him. They immediately headed towards the forest trail behind Sebastian’s house. During the run, Oliver’s mind went back to the plan they had devised. He decided to share it with Joe on the way.

“Joe,”  Oliver said, out of breath from running.

“What is it?”  Joe was also out of breath.

“We need to let Sebastian get kidnapped,”  Oliver said.

“Are you kidding me? There’s no way that’s happening,”  Joe replied angrily.

“If we try to stop this now, we’re likely to get caught by Mark. Especially since Evan said you might fall under his control. The only thing we should do right now is follow him,”  Oliver said seriously.

Joe realized the danger he was in and decided to listen to Oliver. As they ran along the forest path, Oliver spotted Sebastian and stopped Joe. They watched him silently. Sebastian was walking very slowly. Joe and Oliver were relatively far from him. Then, they heard the sound of a car approaching and immediately hid. The car that arrived had the license plate STN 0811, Mark’s car. When Joe saw the license plate again, something clicked. It was the thing he had noticed but couldn’t recall earlier when looking at the doctor’s records.

As Mark drove down the path, he began to feel stressed. In all the years of doing this, he had never felt this way before. His mind drifted back to his previous murders. He had lost focus entirely, which is why he stopped the car a bit farther from Sebastian than he had intended. He had momentarily forgotten about him. Quickly snapping out of it, he got out of the car, threw Sebastian into the back seat, and drove off towards his house in Terry’s District. While Mark was slowed down by the thoughts overwhelming him, Joe and Oliver were able to watch everything unfold clearly. As Mark drove off towards the experimental house, Oliver emerged from his hiding spot, intending to follow him. But after moving a little, he realized Joe wasn’t with him. When he turned back, he saw Joe slumped by a tree. Joe had figured it out. The doctor who had operated on him was Mark, and he had injected him with Eternum. Joe was the person Mark had referred to as “the blood I’ve been searching for.” The letter and Evan had confirmed this.

Seeing Joe in that state saddened Oliver. He sat down next to him and tried to get him to talk to calm him down.

“What’s upsetting you?”  Oliver asked gently.

“That license plate… The STN 0811 plate was in the hospital records of the doctor who operated on me. Natas and the date 11.08. They’re written backward. It’s unbelievable,”  Joe said, his voice sounding as if everything was over.

“Hey! Don’t be upset by this. You were right. We’re going to be the heroes of this story. I’m sure of it. You’re going to get your revenge. We won’t let him get away with this,” Oliver said.

But there were a few questions lingering in his mind. If he had been injected with Eternum, how had Mark not captured him despite being around for years? However, now was not the time for those questions. Oliver helped Joe up and took him to a café down the street. There, he got a cold, fizzy drink for both of them. As they sat at the table, Oliver realized it was time to act.

“Finish your drink. We’ll leave here, grab some gear from the wood storage at my house, and head to that neighborhood. We’re going to burn that bastard down to his veins. This story ends here,”  Oliver said with absolute confidence.

“I don’t know. I feel really strange. But you’re right. We’re at a make-or-break moment. Let’s go and finish him off. This has to end before he kills anyone else,”  Joe said, also getting pumped up.

The two left the café and went to Oliver’s house. In the basement, Oliver found some old hunting gear that had belonged to his father. They even found something like a fire torch for burning plants. They each took two axes. Joe wanted to use the fire torch, so Oliver handed it to him. Oliver also took a gun, in addition to the axe. They even had sound grenades. Joe was surprised that they had kept all this stuff. Oliver’s father had a wide range of hunting equipment because he had once been a professional hunter. 

Oliver also pulled out two bikes from the garage. The pair hopped on the bikes and set off for Terry. People they passed stared at them in shock, as if they were about to raid a place. After a roughly 15-minute ride, they were about to decide whether they would make or break it—whether they would become the heroes who ended it all. The mood they were in had now shifted as they stood in front of the house that had been mentioned, where Mark awaited. It was clear from the start who should really be afraid.

Was an immortal killer about to be defeated by two 14-year-olds?