The wind was musty and cold. The trees stood tall against the black night, their arms spread wide open and their leaves nodding invitingly at Death. The breeze whispered for them to wait, for Death was at work elsewhere…
Two figures combed the town, casting shadows as they passed every streetlamp. The man was alert, determined, dedicated. The woman weary, distracted, tense. Swallowing every few seconds and looking over her shoulder every now and then, she spent most of her energy trying to control her attention and maintain her calm facade. She would never hear the end of it otherwise. So focused she was on the task that she completely missed a curb. She waved her arms frantically as her centre of gravity began to tip her over. The man caught her sleeve in the nick of time.
"You okay?" he asked concernedly as he steadied her into balance.
"I'm… I'm fine, thanks," she gasped.
"No you're not. Tell me what's wrong, Jaydis, or we can't go on." His face hardened with severity.
"I said I'm fine."
"Tripping on a curb is not fine."
"Leo, it's just a curb."
"If you can't even watch out for a curb, that's it. Don't think I haven't noticed your uneasiness for the past hour, Jaydis. Something isn't right and you're admitting it now."
"Look!"
Her relief to find a distraction from the conversation soon turned to greater fear. An ominous bank of dense fog was creeping out from behind the office building, rendering everything in its path pitch-dark. Knowing fog, the steady crawl would turn into a mad chase as soon as they were surrounded. Readily, Leo reached for the flashlight in his back pocket and clicked it on.
"Let's do this," he said before heading straight towards the threat. Jaydis stood rooted to the ground and stared after him, unable to stop the chattering of her teeth. She expected Leo to look back at her, but no, he was already out there sweeping his light around, combatting the Darkness effortlessly. The fog dissipated wherever he shone the beam, making it look nothing more than a child colouring black paper with a white crayon. She wondered when she would ever be able to attain such levels of grit and skill. But the fog was growing at a rate faster than Leo could get rid of, and Jaydis knew he could not do this alone. With shaky hands she pulled out her own flashlight and flicked the switch on, but before she could even muster all her courage, another wave closed in stealthily from the other end of the street, cornering them.
"Leo!" she cried.
Leo turned around and did not look the least bit disheartened. "You do that side, I can handle this side." With that said, he left Jaydis on her own.
For another full minute, Jaydis stood there gripping the flashlight with both hands like it was a knife, waiting for the impending doom to come. It took too long and too quickly. She watched as the first wisp crawled within range of her light beam, followed by her flashlight which blinked once, then twice, then flickered for a few seconds and eventually died. She changed the batteries just yesterday, this could only confirm one thing: It was winning.
The fog surrounded her, and she could feel the Darkness seeping into her lungs. Her chest went tight and the dark was all she could see. She should have known. Just two hours ago she thought she could fake her way through the assignment and somehow manage to survive it. Now it was only twenty-minutes in and she could hardly breathe. She did not know how long she called out for her partner, but he appeared by her side in time. She felt him scoop her into his arms, and amidst the blur and the dusk she could see his face. On it was not worry or confusion, but strangely, regret. As if he knew it was over for her, and was preparing to watch her go. Regret was the one word written in his eyes.
"You know something, Jaydis," he said softly. "Please, tell me what it is."
Jaydis knew her reply wouldn't be of much help, but it was the first thing that came to her mind. "Somebody died here."
"We both know that," an edge of impatience crept into his gentle voice.
"Someone important…" Jaydis murmured, her eyes still fixed upon Leo's face. "Someone important died here… There was a funeral here last night. A grand one, a whole procession. Lots of resentment… The fog… that's what it represents. People were very unhappy…"
Leo considered her words, as they were not part of their briefing before the assignment. They seemed to make sense. He returned his attention to Jaydis and prompted, "There's still something you're not telling."
The tears in her eyes spilled over. "I know," her lip quivered.
"Know what?"
She closed her eyes and breathed, "That we're out of Francis' funds."
Leo's heart skipped a beat, and he thought he saw the fog thicken around them.
"Who told you this?"
"Word gets round," Jaydis said faintly. She knew it was information not meant for her ears, but now it was too late. She felt herself slipping away into unconsciousness, and she did not try to fight it. Mentally, she consented to the Darkness claiming her body and soul.
Leo could feel Jaydis drifting out beyond reach. He tightened his grip around her body and said urgently, "Jaydis, who told you this? I need to know."
The answer remained to be found, as Jaydis' eyes had lolled over and neck had gone limp. As a fleeting goodbye, Leo heard her soft, airy voice in his mind,
[Though I know I'm not worthy of you, I have always loved and admired you, Leo.]
The fog swept her body away in one mighty whiff, lifting the weight from his arms. For a moment Leo stared dazedly at his empty hands while the Darkness encircled him, waiting for him to follow Jaydis in her fate. But Leo knew better, and recovered from his stupor in the nick of time. He picked up the two flashlights from the ground and they turned on with his touch. He waved them about wildly in every direction. It was no longer regret in his eyes but silent fury, a burning rage that drove him further on than before. It was this very kind of rage that the Darkness despised. Parts of fog cleared with every motion of his arm; each thrust was a blow to the chest, each fling was a slap in the face. Soon, he could begin to see the street lamps. He did not stop until every wisp was not to be seen, every waft of grey not to be detected. At last, when the air was pure and his heart was content, he collapsed on his knees, physically and mentally drained.
So tired he was, he did not notice the dark grey clouds descending onto him from the sky until he felt the cold on the back of his neck. Startled, he raised one of his flashlights, but the clouds remained intact. He tried the other flashlight and waved them both together, only to have the same effect- nothing. Leo shivered, from the cold or from the fear did not matter. To the Darkness it was one and the same. Leo stood up on his feet and tried to navigate, rather hopelessly, through the clouds. But so much of it had sunk, it was now impossible.
He ran.
Distance made no impact. There was fog in his breath, fog in his eyes. Something inside him wanted badly to give in, and the fact that it had never existed before frightened him more. Giving in had never been an option he considered, and it wasn't. It was an impulse. An urge. One that he could not control. He fell to his knees, and though his eyes were wide open, he could not make out the two outstretched hands in front of him. There was only one thing left for him to do:
Call her.
Almost immediately he saw the light. He cursed under his breath in relief, as it grew and expanded across the darkness like the Big Bang. The source spread her arms open and bravely let the fog touch her fingertips. Upon contact, it cleared off, faster than what a dozen flashlights could do. The closest analogy, he thought, was probably dust being sucked away by a vacuum. He couldn't help but curl his lip embarrassedly when he saw the powerful serenity in her smile and the radiant calm in her eyes. Once all of the Darkness had finally been eliminated, she brought her hands down and held one out to Leo, who took it gladly.
"You make it look so easy," he said after getting up and straightening his suit.
"Because it's meant to be easy," Clarisa said humbly. "We just make it harder than it has to be."
Leo scoffed and her smile broadened. "Where's Jaydis?"
Leo shot Clarisa one pained look and all was conveyed.
"What?"
"It's true."
"But… but how could she know?" her voice quavered. "I thought Jonas said-"
"Exactly. I don't know."
Clarisa immediately regretted her cheery disposition. She looked around aimlessly as she struggled to take in the news, then finally held her fingers to her lips to contain her grief.
"You do know what this means, don't you?" Leo reminded her quietly.
Clarisa's brow furrowed. "Of course I do." It was she above all who knew what Jaydis' death would evoke, the discord it would bring about in their organisation, and most significantly, the fear. She knew much more than Leo did, in fact. But the worst part of it all was that the depletion of funds was no longer a secret; someone had leaked the information before they were supposed to, and it was proven not to be for the best of intentions. Jonas was a last suspect, but they had to question him nonetheless. If it wasn't him, it had to be someone above him, which could only mean an even bigger complication. She made a conscious effort not to use the word 'crisis' while sharing her thoughts with Leo, just to ensure that they were on the same page. Leo nodded in affirmation.
"I'm really sorry," Clarisa whispered. Though neither of them were close to Jaydis, she knew that Jaydis harboured deep feelings for Leo, even without her having to show it. Leo, who had never been fond of Jaydis, did not know how to respond to the commiseration. So instead he suggested,
"Do we go to see Jonas now?"
Clarisa was about to agree when she felt something nag at the back of her mind. She turned sharply to Leo and said,
"We're not finished here."
Leo frowned as he followed Clarisa across the street into one of the grey office buildings. "I thought we were done," he said impatiently, pulling out his flashlight once more. Clarisa led the way up a flight of old stairs and told him without looking back, "There's no need for that. We're going to find the source."
"But we don't do sources, we normally leave that to-"
"Me," Clarisa finished.
Leo's eyes widened in astonishment. "You do the sources?"
Clarisa gave a modest smile and nod as she opened the door to a large function room at the top floor. The chairs were stacked neatly at the back and the room was mostly empty. She circled the marble floor in her high-heeled boots as she explained, "Finding the source is rather straight-forward if you have keen intuition. This is where the service was held. Two-hundred and sixty-seven guests were invited. Most of the negative feelings should be coming from here."
Leo cleared his throat and interrupted, "But there is nothing here."
Clarisa stopped in her tracks for dramatic effect. "Precisely. Which means my intuition is wrong."
With that, she headed out of the function room and Leo hastily followed. He thought to himself how he appreciated the way Clarisa handled assignments. She was calm and logical, cool and analytical, but not unsentimental and still responded to things with an emotive touch. He liked that.
He liked her.
"Where to, then?"
Clarisa didn't answer until they had reached the bottom of the stairs and stopped at the lift lobby, which looked equally aged and poorly-maintained. She pushed the 'up' button and they waited.
"I feel it coming from in there."
Leo looked at her incredulously. "What, you mean someone started a fight in the elevator?"
"Most probably," was the casual reply.
"Why didn't we just take the elevator from the start?" Leo asked, disgruntled from having to climb nine floors.
"Elevators are usually a last resort. You'll see why," she simply said. Leo checked her expression to see if she was being quippy again, but not this time. Soon enough, the lift doors trembled opened, and out gushed a strong, choking stench, accompanied by a mass of atramentous slime that covered their feet in seconds. Without any forewarning, Clarisa dived head first into the smoke-filled elevator. Leo opened his mouth to protest, but was blinded by a gleam of blue light which signified that things were going as planned. The sludge was splashing onto him in huge waves and they soaked him from head to toe. He could hear Clarisa gasp from inside the lift, and he would have gone in to help if he wasn't coughing and spluttering himself. It only stopped when the bright glow faded out and when he felt the slime trickle away. Slowly he opened his eyes, and the lift as well as the entire lobby was as dry as before, in fact, cleaner.
Clarisa leaned against the wall of the lift, breathing heavily and clutching the metal bars for support. Leo cast her a look of concern.
"So you do the sources," he repeated breathlessly.
Clarisa closed her eyes and managed an airy laugh before resting her head against the wall again.