"It's with regret that we start today's broadcast like this. Yesterday night in Lincoln City, Delaware. There was a large gas leak originating from the Fifth Street Avenue, all the way to the main city. It took several thousand lives." A news reporter spoke, holding a stack of documents.
"No one wants to start the morning broadcast like this, Grace. But it's an unsettling truth." The second reporter spoke. "Yesterday, the Orienda gas station suffered a massive leak during their importation of gasoline. It created a combustion that destroyed the entirety of Lincoln City and half of Staffshire."
Grace sighed, covering her eyes with her hands. "That will be all we have for now. We'll be back with more news after the break."
...
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
He jolted up.
'Where am I?' He wondered but he didn't say a word, he looked around him. The entire room was white, from the walls to the curtains. He glanced toward his left and next to him was a large camera. He looked at it slowly before trying to get up.
"Hold up there, kid." A figure muttered as he entered the room.
"What am I doing here." Theodore grabbed his head. "I remember getting swallowed... no? I remember being questioned--"
"It doesn't matter what you remember. Your life starts over from today anyways." The figure said again.
"What does that mean?"
"It means. You've been taken over by a curse, your case is extremely complicated but that's more or less it."
"A curse? What are you even talking about?" Theodore looked around his bed, taking off the patches on his arm and pushing himself off his bed.
"Don't move too quickly, you gotta give your body time to adjust to its new form." The figure spoke before remembering he had forgotten one key element. "Where are my manners, what's your name again?"
"I'm Theodore. Theodore Roosevelt." He responded, only because he was slightly interested in hearing what the man had to say and whether or not he had information on his family.
"I'm Colt Faraday. I'm kinda of a big shot around here so you're gonna treat me with respect." Colt leaned in his chair, folding his arms in comical pride.
"Where's my sister... my brother," Theodore asked, memories of his brother flashing in his mind. "Fuck..."
"You're remembering right?" Colt stood up, heading toward Theodore and grabbing him, putting his arm over his shoulder in an attempt to help him walk. "I'm gonna show you something."
They stepped out of the door and into a hallway, where they approached the edge of a large space that descended below. Walking toward the railing that prevented people from falling, Theodore peered over.
"What is that?" He muttered.
Below him, inside the white space, was a giant beast tethered to the wall, facing off against a man wielding a sword.
"That is a curse."
"That's impossible, those aren't real..."
"You've had first-hand experience with one already, your memory might be hazy but you know this is real. Curses are real."
"How?"
"I don't know, hell nobody does, but we do know that one day a portal appeared above the Pacific. That's where we believe they came from, everything points toward that portal being the catalyst but there's no way to know for certain."
"This is all so fast." Using his other arm, he held his eyes, brushing past them and squinting at the curse once again.
Colt began walking away from the railing, going down the hallway and toward a set of stairs. "What are curses anyways and what did you mean earlier?"
"Curses are exactly as the sound, they're demonic and evil however they're also parasitic creatures and they can't be seen by the naked eye until they've preyed on a human," Colt explained. "Just like me, you and I were preyed on by curses, however, we were stronger than their grasp and we overpowered them. Creating a symbiotic bond with them instead."
"So you're telling right now, I have a curse within me... The same curse that killed all those people... My brother?"
"Unfortunately, yes," Colt responded. "There are some positives, I guess, but none of them will ever outweigh the bad. That's our cross to bear."
"Cross?" Theodore backed away from Colt, now able to stand by himself. "Look, I'm not doing this shit okay, I don't know what exactly is happening here but I'm not going to live with the monster that killed my little brother, now if you show me the way out, I have to go look for my sister."
"That is where the job gets hard." Colt sighed, gently resting his hand on the sheath of his katana. "There's no physical way to unbound a curse from its host, the only way to end the curse in question is to kill it."
"So? Kill it then, I don't care about any positives this gives me. Just take it."
"The only way to kill a curse bound to a host is to kill the curse and if the curse dies, so do you," Colt explained. "Do you still want to go ahead with it?"
"..."
"What happened to the fire in your eyes? Your morals, your ethics?" Colt spoke, walking down the stairs. "That's the hardest part of the job pal, you gotta live with the bricks thrown at you. We all do."
"You don't understand what that creature did, it killed thousands... It was gruesome... I remember it as if I had done it." Theodore muttered, goosebumps appearing on his skin.
"Did you hear about the Denver explosion a few years ago? The one that claimed the lives of half the population?"
"I remember that story... it was pretty big back then, I lost my aunt to that."
"Well, that wasn't an explosion. It was a curse on a rampage, and lo and behold, I have that curse within me." Colt spoke, fully descending the steps, stopping. "I hear their voices every day, not a night goes by where I don't, fuck it feels like I did it."
"..."
"There are several people like you in our ranks. They had a chance, dying or using their power to save more lives than they had taken. I'm glad a lot of them took the latter." Colt watched as Theodore began descending the steps.
"What am I even supposed to do..." Theodore stopped behind Colt. "I lost my brother... this curse within me killed him and I have to live with that forever?"
"Life's a bitch pal. Get a scythe and harvest some fruit." Colt began walking and Theodore followed behind him.
"So what now? What happens if I decide to stay." Theodore muttered. "I turn out like you? Or that guy downstairs? I grab a blade and start killing everything in sight?"
"Every curse, yes," Colt acknowledged. He walked toward a door, returning and settling into a chair that was affixed to the wall. "But it's not that simple. As I mentioned earlier, your case is far more complex than any we've encountered before."
"Why is that the case?"
"Because everyone that eventually becomes a Wraith; the term used to describe people who overpowered their curses. Were taken over by a curse who hadn't yet found a host, however, you were taken over or rather... you took over a curse with a host."
"Why does it make a difference if it has a host or not?" Theodore inquired, looking a the door in front of him. He could hear a woman's voice from behind it.
"In our cases, the curse took over us and began wreaking havoc, the longer that went on, the more we bonded to the curse, and on the rare occasion, you can break out of the curse, creating a Wraith," Colt crossed his leg. "But in your case, you took over an already strengthened curse as well as its host. Currently? Your biology is all fucked up."
Theodore looked down at his hand, not only was he controlling the curse that killed his brother but he also forcefully stole the life of another person.
"But all of that doesn't matter if you don't formally join us."
"What?" Theodore asked.
"Behind that door is the manager of our little organization. Andreas Smith, she's still completely human so you don't have to worry about anything." Colt addressed, pointing at the door.
"So you're telling me, I can still decline the invitation."
"You can. Wouldn't be the smart choice, but hey, go for it."
Theodore glanced at the door, gulping as he walked toward it. He knocked before grabbing the handle and stepping inside.
The room contained a single desk and two chairs, one on each side, with a woman seated on one, facing the door. The decor was minimal, featuring just a single plant on a shelf and a small book collection beside it.
"Umm..."
"Sit." She muttered, still typing on her computer.
"..."
Theodore obeyed, sitting down with his hands resting on his lap. The woman's presence was intense, a sensation he couldn't shake. He glanced at her desk and noticed a picture of her and Colt, looking much younger and... they were in Texas?
"He's your brother?" Theodore blurted out without thinking.
She looked up at him, grabbing the frame and placing it facedown, doing the same to her computer. She then turned her attention back to him. "Before we start our conversation, Theodore-"
She tapped a button on her desk, and metal frames began descending around the room. Theodore wondered what was happening, but he soon realized he couldn't hear Colt's hums anymore. In fact, he couldn't hear anything, and it seemed likely that it was mutual.
"Now we can have a bit of privacy, away from that snooping shit-head," She muttered. "Where are my manners? I'm Andreas Smith."
"I'm Theodore... but you already know that. I thought Colt's last name was Faraday."
"I'm married." Andreas showed her ring finger.
"Oh, sorry."
Andreas smiled, opening back her computer. "So, I'm guessing my brother briefed you on the entire situation."
"It was confusing but I more or less understood it all."
"And your decision?" She asked, glancing at him from above her laptop.
"I don't know." Theodore looked at his hands. "I don't want to die, but I don't want to keep living like this. It's torture."
"I'm guessing Colt told you about how we grew up in Texas and how he killed almost everyone right?"
"Yeah..."
"You aren't the only one suffering. I know it doesn't count for much but isn't it better if you have people that share your sentiment? Because that's exactly what Siege is... A haven, a group for Wraiths that seek to help the world."
"But... what about the people? Their loved ones that were murdered, some of their bodies can't even be recovered." Theodore muttered, almost gagging.
"Let me show you something," Andreas said, getting up and opening a secret panel in the ground.
Theodore followed her down a flight of steps into a similar encased space as he had seen with Colt, but within this one, several people stood, holding accessories and bloodied pieces of clothing.
"What's happening?" Theodore asked.
"Just wait," Andreas replied.
A door opened, and several people walked out in lines. Theodore recognized some of them, including the pizza store owner from the tenth, who had tears in his eyes.
"We're backed by the government, and to prevent a nationwide panic, we lie to the public. Your little rampage? It was called a gas leak, same as Colt's. However, some people have seen curses and they reach out to us," Andreas explained.
"You killed my son!" A woman screamed out as she slapped a man dressed in all black. He didn't respond or change expressions, he merely stood there as she continued to insult him before eventually taking a bloodied shoe from him.
"You're allowing them to talk to their relatives' killer?" Theodore muttered.
"Closure is important. If not, they'll merely get themselves in more danger." Andreas replied.
"But why are they taking the blame for me... they didn't do anything, that was the Curses... My fault."
"We all bear the same sins, nobody is alone here." Andreas responded, "They couldn't save the lives that were taken before they were, and that's how it is."
"..."
"Even Colt," Andreas laughed. "He was in Germany at the time of your rampage. He used his powers to get there as fast as he could... even though I keep warning him about it."
"What do you mean? Isn't that what Wraith's do?"
Andreas glanced at Theodore as if he had spouted taboo but quickly realized he wasn't just informed.
"The more a Wraith uses his curse power. The faster the timer clicks."
"No..."
"When that timer runs out, the curse will take over you once more. This time permanently, that's another job of the Wraith's division; eventually killing their curse-eaten teammates."
"So what I saw downstairs... that curse..."
"That was probably a Wraith being killed." Andreas turned away from him.
Theodore glanced toward the window once more, watching as all the civilians left, leaving the Wraiths in the room. He could see their faces... they were shattered and now eventually, trying to make up for the lives they took would kill them. "What a fucked up cycle."