Skylar Jenkins's Story

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Light from the bay window cast shadows about the room, illuminating on the cobwebs and dust particles that swam freely through the air. It was clear that the room had not been used in some time. A central placed dining table covered in a fine layer of dust took up most of the room. Surface laden with a full set of finely cracked china and fake silver utensils. Opposite the table, against the mahogany wood panel wall rested a bookcase spanning the length of the room. Filled to the brim with book after book, each sporting its own signs of wear and tear. Among the most damaged a red leather journal, its spine painted with fine gold filigree. It was this book that Mayor Bourne promptly plucked from the shelf.

The man in question walked a wide arc around the table to the adjoining room, hidden in a place where the light didn't quite touch. He marched in solemn silence to the singular table in that room. A circular monstrosity that takes up nearly all of the available space. He sat at the head, King Arthur and his Court. He lays the journal heavy upon the table, setting his grim gaze to the occupants of the room. Men and Women alike, wearing masks to obscure every aspect of their identity. Not many of them actually needed to obscurity, but most opted for it as a tradition. For years now the masks, simple clay creations stretched tight over skin before molding just right to its wearer, have been an integral part of these meetings.

"So tell me," Bourne booms, his own masks lips pulling into a taut snarl. Emotion reflected over the surface, "Why it is nobody has stopped these broadcasts!?" His anger swept the room into stony silence. After a beat of timid silence an answer comes, from whispering lips. "We tried sir, its just -" "Its just nothing, we have the best goddamn tech in this forsaken city!" Bourne interrupts, seemingly more interested in causing a scene than discussing anything civilly. The members of the council would be lying had they said their meetings usually went better than this. Bourne was a force to be reckoned with, and this latest slip up was clearly stressing him out.

Bourne's hands slam against the table as he stands once more, crossing quickly to the far wall, where three large monitors hang haphazardly. Yet to be fully installed, or perhaps purposefully hung askew. He flicks on all three, gritting his teeth at the words emblazoned across every single damn one. The strangers are here.

"I want all agents working on this, who ever this message is intended for - no, whoever sent this message is going to be shackled. Do you hear me?!" Barking orders left and right, the Mayor calls the Council to a quick close. With his final words to find out what everything they could. With the extra bodies gone from the room he turns once more, and stares at the monitors listlessly. Turning to his journal from before, he flips through page after page until reaching the final. A page directly in the middle of the book, as if the author had never got the chance to finish.

He scans the page in grim silence, until finally, mercilessly his eyes settle on those damning words.

---

At the farthest point from the Council Building, in the slums of the City, there lies a place that has been home and haven for many of its wronged citizens. A looming tower, six floors made up of apartments, shops, and most notably a bar. Known as The Den, a place where anyone can go to have sanctuary or safe haven. Guarded by a plethora of wards. Its sprawling visage has been a sign of hope for many of the citizens for years now; Even more so at the founding of the Wicked Six - the Slums resident superheros (or police force if you will.)

Monday nights were rarely packed at the Den, its usual patrons either too tired from the beginning of the week or still hungover from the sunday night parties. Still, workers filed in like flies, buzzing around here and there to serve what little customers they did have. Others filtered down into the basement where their more secretive members liked to stay. All except for Tom, who stood tall and proud against the backdrop of a stage. Microphone in hand, his words garbled and slurred but just barely understandable. It was not unusual for him to be drunk so early, but nonetheless he was.

Many of the patrons in fact were...strangely drunk already. Yet the night had just barely started. It didn't make sense really, not until the workers began to slow down. Foggy brained, feeling sluggish, slumping down into the nearby booths and tables. Some falling to the floor where their heads would clack against the concrete, hard.

Slowly, slowly, and then all at once every single person within the bar collapsed. All except for one little girl, Sonny, neither a patron nor a worker. But a Poltergeist whom had taken up residence there for several millennia. No less than a few seconds later the power shuts down. Curious. Sonny steps through the bars threshold, out into the street. Darkness slowly enveloping the city, building by building. Sonny frowns, watching the pedestrians around her slow to a stop and pass out in much the same way as the bar patrons. Confusion turns to Panic when she notes that even the drivers, though few, have begun to lose control of their cars. Hitting each other, buildings, anything in their way. Sonny turns away, feeling sick at the sound of one car crunching over a fallen pedestrian.

She returns to the bar.

---

Skylar had her head down, buried in her arms, dead asleep. She woke with a soft groan, rolling her head across her arms. She sat up slowly, her muscles sore as she blinked the sleep from her eyes and glanced around, trying to figure out where the hell she was. She didn't recognize anything around her. She appeared to be in a bar, but it wasn't one she recognized, and she knew a lot of bars. She sighed, her head pounding badly as she tried to make sense of what was going on. Despite waking up in completely unfamiliar surroundings, Skye was calm as she flagged down the bartender and glanced around her.

A lot of people might panic or worry, but not Skylar. She was used to waking up in strange locations with huge gaps in her memory. There had been times where she'd woken up and not been able to recall the last several weeks. As the bartender brought her a drink, she did her best to figure out where the hell she was and how she'd gotten there. She tried to think back as far as she could, but she kept drawing a blank, unable to remember anything. It was honestly a little scary, because usually, her black outs were accompanied by flashes of memory at the very least, but she honestly couldn't seem to remember anything.

She'd been sober for a while, that much she could remember. She'd been doing a great job for months. Her little sister had been so proud of her. She'd been sober for longer then she had in a long time, so what the hell had happened? She must have flown right off the handle and lost it completely. God, her sister was going to be pissed when she finally dragged herself back in the door and had to explain to her that she'd fallen off the wagon again.

She couldn't help herself. All it took was one drink, and she fell into a black hole of drugs and drinking that she couldn't seem to pull herself out of on her own. It was ruining her and she knew it, but for some reason, she couldn't help but let it just because it felt good. She was way too good at destroying everything around her and all it ever took to tear her world to pieces was one little drink.

The bartender placed her drink in front of her. A shot of tequila. Skye sighed as she ran her fingertip around the rim of the shot glass and stared at it for a minute, trying her hardest to resist the temptation, knowing if she picked up the glass, there was no going back. She'd be drunk within the hour. It was like the devil himself was staring up at her from the bottom of that shot glass and she was doing everything in her power to pull away and break the spell.

After sitting there for what felt like forever, trying to resist, Skylar finally let out a deep sigh and picked up the glass. She brought it to her lips, feeling a wave of guilt overtake her as she did so, but knowing, the second that liquid fire hit her tongue, it would be washed away, replaced with euphoria. Her head ache would cease to exist and her misery and shame at waking up disorientated in yet another bar would dissipate instantly.

Something strange happened though. A powerful wave of exhaustion washed over her, sucking the energy right out of her body. She lowered the hand holding the shot to rub the grogginess from her eyes, but she couldn't seem to make her other hand move no matter how hard she tried. Eventually, Skye gave up. Whatever was happening to her was too powerful to fight. She closed her eyes and lowered her head to rest on her arms again, blinking slowly, using up the last of her energy pushing back the blackness until finally, she closed her eyes and didn't open them again. The last thing she remembered seeing before passing out cold was the bartender, dropping to the floor.


Alex was busy doing "ghost things". Being a ghost with no job and only one friend who was busy doing other things, she had a lot of free time on her hands. It got awfully boring sometimes. Sure, she was lucky enough to have a physical form, but she couldn't use it too much. So she had to improvise in order to entertain herself. She'd spent about an hour in her physical form that morning getting drunk as hell before changing back to her "ghostly" self and spending the rest of the day doing what she liked to call drunk haunting.

Haunting was fun sometimes, but drunk haunting was always entertaining. Sure, some might see it as cruel to torment innocent humans all day, but she was far past caring. When you can live forever and yet, are barely able to change the TV channel without extreme effort, you get pretty damn bored. Besides, she wasn't really hurting anyone. She just liked to play harmless tricks on people to scare them a little. Sometimes she didn't even do that, sometimes she just liked to follow people around and watch them live their lives. The living were so interesting to her. She was dead and had been for a long time, but if she was being honest, she hadn't come to terms with it yet.

She couldn't make herself pass on if she tried. She just didn't feel like she was ready to give up her time on earth yet. So she just spent her days haunting humans, or following them around, or maybe using her physical form to interact with them. Anything she could do to maintain a connection with the living, she did. She just wanted to be alive again and maybe get the hell out of Crown City for good, but even though she was in denial, she knew that would never happen. She was stuck as she was for the rest of her life, a lonely ghost. How could you blame her for wanting to get fucked up and laugh at the fear of the living?

Alex was starting to bore, however. She was beginning to sober up and she was starting to feel a little bad about scaring some innocent lady out of her mind almost all day. She hadn't hurt her, but still. The woman wasn't going to sleep without nightmares of ghosts for a while. Alex sighed and placed her hand on the woman's arm. This instantly caused her to start screaming, as she couldn't see Alex, but could feel her icy cold touch. In fact, her touch was so cold, that her teeth started to chatter.

She was about to calm the woman down and manipulate her memories a little to make her forget most of the scary events of the day. After all, Alex liked to play fucked up jokes sometimes, but she wasn't ruthless. She had a little bit of mercy in her. However, before she had the chance to dip into her mind and change alleviate her fear, something strange happened. As Alex reached for the woman's subconscious, she felt it slipping away from her. Almost like she was dying, but not quite.

As she watched, the woman simply fell asleep while she grasped her. She took a step back and looked her over in confusion. What the hell?, was all she could think. No one had ever fallen asleep while she was touching them before. That was definitely unexpected. Alex just sighed and rolled her eyes. She'd seen a lot in her many years as a ghost, but even she was still surprised sometimes. She shook it off and made her way through the house into the kitchen. She did the woman a quick favor by using a lot of concentration to flip her oven off for her before closing her eyes and doing what she loved most about being a ghost: teleporting.

When she opened her eyes, she was out in the street, walking back towards the little apartment she shared with Haven. The two of them certainly made interesting room mates, a ghost and a robot, but Haven seemed to be one of the few people Alex found tolerable. More importantly, Haven was on of the few beings that could find Alex tolerable as well so they actually made rather good friends. While Alex wasn't one to get attached emotionally, she couldn't help but love Haven a little. She was so lonely most of the time, it was good to have company.

As she walked down the center of the street, cars drove right through her, having no effect on her. Standing in the street letting cars pass through her was yet another thing she liked to do as a ghost. Every time something or someone drifted through her, it sent a strange sensation though her that she kind of liked. As she walked and yet another zoomed through her, she watched, perplexed, as it veered suddenly off the road and went right into the side of a house, making her raise a brow. She teleported over to the wreckage to find the driver passed out cold at the wheel. Damn. Something freaky was definitely going on in Crown City. Being curious, naturally, she wanted to know just what the fuck was up.