Phoenix Files: Missing Link

Book 3 of 6

Chapter 11

Whew! Made some great progress haven't we guys? I hope you are enjoying this as much as I am, but please don't forget to leave a review on what you think of the fan-fic so far! Anyway on with the chapter!

63 days

Seven days... Seven days of barely being able to stand. Now we sat here at Reeve's funeral, the man we caused the death of, with his son sitting weeping on his mother's lap... This is insanity, why does this have to happen why can't Shackleton realise how stupid he is? Ugh. Who cares, we lost that fight, but it's not over... I swear, I'll stop this, I don't care if the other's give up I'm stopping this bastard...

I looked up at Shackleton, the idiot of the hour, standing giving a speech about Reeve, Jordan was beside me, fists clenched on her lap, I put my head in my hands and slowly exhaled. I noticed Jordan shiver next to me, she was struggling not to burst out of her chair and throttle Shackleton. I glanced over at Luke and noticed he was in the exact same posistion as me, I sat up straight and looked into Shackleton's eyes as he spoke, not taking in what he was saying but taking in every single expression he made until...

BOOM!

The bush behind him erupted into flames as an explosion tore through the ground, people reacted quickly, some falling back in their chairs, other's getting up and running and other's dropping to the floor I sat and shielded my eyes, I didn't react at all to the explosion, to concentrated on Shackleton as he fell to the ground, I stood up and looked around, panic everywhere, people running to get away from the fire, Jordan stood on her chair and looked at where the explosion came from, Luke asked her something but I wasn't listening, I hadn't been listening much the past week. Not much worth listening to.

I looked at the fire as it grew. I stared for a few seconds then looked back to the cowd, I felt my hand jerk to the end of the row, Jordan had her hand wrapped around my arm and was pulling me out of the row, I followed the three of them, Jordan didn't let go of my arm, her hand just slid down to mine as we manouvered through the crowd, suddenly we were infront of the coffin, I looked down and saw a look of overwhelming guilt build on Jordan's face, I placed a hand on her shoulder.

Suddenly Jordan jumped back and a dark shape rose from behind the coffin, Shackleton... I stood my ground and looked right at him I had, he said something then moved aside and started calling orders, suddenly I started taking in words again," Come on you two, time to go." Officer Barnett, he had an orange goatee, and a face that made him look like he craved violence. He grabbed my arm and dragged me and Jordan away from the coffin, I saw Luke and Peter," Oi! Hands off!" He yelled at the sight of Barnett's hand wrapped around Jordan's arm, I noticed his grip get a little tighter on Jordan. Jordan looked frustrated, I wonder why...

I felt him pull me along, I just went along with it, no need to provoke him. As we left the bush I finally got fed up with him holding me and yanked my arm out of his grip and continued walking along with him, suddenly a woman with curly hair came running towards Barnett, she had a little girl in her arms," Is everything alright? Officer, what's going on out there? Do these three have something to do with it?" She said glaring at each of us, dumbass. I just ignored their stupid conversation, eventually he told us to go home and we followed Jordan until the guard turned and ran to a different job he had been called for," Freaking moron." Peter said with a frustrated look on his face," Which one?" Luke asked.

"All of them! This whole bloody town! If they had any idea of the crap we've been through trying to save their- Whoa! Jordan, no. Seriously. No." Peter said finally noticing that Jordan had veered off the path.

The next thing I bothered to listen to was," DOWN!" Luke yelled as he grabbed Jordan and Peter my the arms and yanked them to the ground, I got down with them, noticing the lights and engines as the SKID units rolled down the path to the fire.

" I swear Jordan, you get me killed tonight and I'm going to haunt you so freaking much." Peter said as he caught up with Jordan.
"Yeah because what you do now defiantly isn't haunting." I replied as I calmly walked alongside Jordan, we ended up sneaking around in a couched posistion as the skids started putting the fire out, suddenly I heard a loud crack and saw a flaming branch falling down towards Jordan, I tackled her out of the way as the branch smashed into the ground with a crash, sending sparks around the place," Thanks." Jordan mumbled as she got back on her feet.

"No worries." I replied as I noticed Peter roll his eyes like I was supposed to let the flaming branch fall ontop of her, potentially knocking her unconscious and setting her on fire. I heard a guard yell something and then a shower of ice cold mist blasted me in the face, I recoiled as the water soaked me, I recovered quickly enough and continued on.

Nothing happened until we were all sat up behind a charred and burned out tree trunk, Calvin and Shackleton having a chat a few metres infront of us.

"Report no unusual activity on the perimeter, no ait traffic either." Calvin stated

"Come now Bruce, do you really think that whatever did this came from the air?"

"... Sir, that's- The ground was supposed to be stable!"

"Indeed"

"What do we tell the people?"

"Rope off the area. Tell them it was arson."

"Arson? Committed by who?"

"Who do you think?" Shackleton finished with a chuckle.

I don't know how long we waited under that tree but we got away eventually and I got home and had a quick shower before getting into bed.

Day 62

I reached under my pillow and switched off my alarm, I pushed myself out of bed and walked out of the room, I heard footsteps running up the stairs and saw Oliver bounce up the last step.

"What are you doing up so early?" I asked as he bounced around.

"What are YOU doing up so early?" He said with a smirk. I rolled my eyes and went into the shower, I got changed and came back out, only for Oliver to attempt to tackle me to the ground," What's up with you?" I asked as he hugged my side.

"I wana say goodbye today!" He replied happily.

"Alright, wee mate, go ahead."

"BYE!" He yelled at the top of his lungs,there's always a twist, he can't just be calm in the mornings. I smirked as he released me and I left and made my way to Phoenix High. On my way I noticed a crowd surrounding someone, I got off my bike and walked over to the crowd, in the middle Jordan was hunched over, groaning.

"Hey, Jordan? You alright?" I asked as I extended a hand and pulled her to her feet.

"Uh, yeah... Fine, let's go..." She answered, picking her bike up and peddling away, I collected my bike and followed after her.

We got to school soon enough and went inside and found Luke and Peter talking by the lockers, Peter looked frustrated, Luke not so much, he had a much more calm expression, probably stopping Peter from tearing my head off my shoulders. Seriously Luke is the only person stopping Peter from lashing out. Not that it'll work, one of us is gonna end up with a knife in them, or something like that.

"Hey, what happened to you?" Luke asked noticing the grazes on her hands and knees, I couldn't get anything out of her, but I guessed it was one of those weird 'vision' things that have been happening, she said they were getting worse but I didn't think they involved full on fainting or what ever the hell happened.

"Nothing, just stacked it on the way here." She replied, nudging him aside to get to her locker.

"You okay?" Peter said not wanting to drop the topic.

"I'm fine." She replied grabbing her science textbook with both hands, trying to cover the grazes. The conversation continued not really getting anywhere aside from Luke asking Jordan to go to his house because Montag was going to have dinner there, he asked me too but I told him I had some things to deal with.

"NO! PLEASE!" gasped a high pitched voice from around the corner.

"Who needs a hero now?" I asked with a smirk as I turned to make my way to the scream.

"I DIDN'T MEAN IT! I DIDN'T MEAN IT!" the voice continued.

"Should've thought of that before you did it." I voice I recognised, Tank.

As we rounded the corner I saw Tank's fist colide with the kid's face, it was Jeremy. I jogged forward," Good 'ay mate!" I called as I made my way through the crowd, Tank instantly turned and glared at me for a minute before going back to beating Jeremy.

"Brandon, stay out of this..." Michael said from the left of tank, him and Cathryn were looking down, with stony faces at Jeremy and Tank.

"Nah, I wana stop this before you guys knock the kid out." I replied with a smirk, I walked up to Tank, who was still ignoring me and continuing to beat the crap out of Jeremy. The last punch he got in was square in Jeremy's chest, I grabbed the back of Tank's shirt and pulled him off of Jeremy. Tank stumbled to the floor, I walked over and pulled Jeremy to his feet," Go on, I doubt this meat stack will leave you for to long." I said as Jeremy looked at me, tears running down his cheeks, he turned and ran off. But Tank had already stood and was charging at me, I dived out of the way just in time to stop him from tackling me to the ground, I looked at Tank and smirked, Michael and Cathryn weren't trying to intervene, they thought Tank's brute force meant he could beat me. They were very, very wrong.

Tank reeled back his fist and swung it forward, trying to punch me, I narrowly avoided a broken nose and crouched down, I swung a leg out at Tank's legs while balancing myself with my hands, Tank fell to the floor with a sharp thud and I stood up straight, about to leave when suddenly.

"WHAT DO YOU TWO THINK YOU ARE DOING!" Hanger yelled.

"Sir, I was simply defending a seventh year that a certain someone had decided to beat up." I replied simply looking calmly at him.

"AND WHERE IS THIS SEVENTH YEAR?"

"I told him to leave before big guy over there decided to chase him." I replied again, Mr Hanger grumbled a little then barked at us to move along. I was about to turn away when I noticed a mark on my hand, I lifted it closer to my face and saw that part of my skin had turned a much paler white colour, it appeared to be in the shape of a hand, Jeremy's hand...

59 Days

Another two days of doing nothing, we need a way around these bloody suppressors! I left the house , skipping out on breakfast, I peddled down the bike path and rounded the corner and saw Jordan making her way down the busy 'street' I caught up easily enough," Hey, what did you see on friday?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well you fell of your bike and made it dramatic enough for a small crowd to gather, you had one of those vision things didn't you?"

"Yeah... We were leaving the Shackleton building, it was just after we got the suppressors, when my parents were going to the medical centre because there was something wrong with the baby, but I don't think any of it would really help." Joedan replied as we continued down the 'street' to school, 59 days left and we were still going to school, it just feels like a waste of time at this point... As we continued Jordan told me about how she spent the last two days and, the only real thing that stunned me was that the baby was due on day 0... I looked down at the ground before realising that we were already outside the school," I think it might mean something." I said calmly as I chained up my bike.

"I don't know, I just don't understand it."

"It might mean something, I mean surely if the baby is born on day 0 then it must mean something, I'm not really sure what but it HAS to mean something."

"Yeah, maybe but I'm not really sure either."

"I'll assume you're not going to tell Peter given his obviouse reaction to it, and basically everything ' just a coincidence' or whatever." I added as we walked across he quad, I saw look waiting by the industrial arts block, I changed direction to head towards him," Of course I'm not going to tell Peter."

"Well what about Luke?"

"Yeah, I'll probably tell him, he's less likely to think I'm crazy." She finished as we reached Luke. Jordan told Luke about her weekend and I drifted off into my own thoughts, thinking about the situation. We can't get anything done with these suppressors and Peter's getting worse and worse anger issues, I mean in the first few weeks he was always calm and near impossible to anger but now dropping a pencil would set him off. It made me feel like he was holding back our progress because most of our time is spent trying to calm him down, I noticed Luke and Jordan were silent so I took the opportunity to say," Have you noticed that it's become way easier to piss Peter off?"

"Yeah kind of." Luke answered.

"Definatly." Jordan replied a second later.

"Well at least we are on the same page. The thing is if he catches any of us talking without him he jumps to stupid and random conclusion, he just seems to react-" I said before I was interupted by an angry and familiar voice that said," HOW DO I REACT?" It was Peter, he stormed around the corner glaring at me.

"Badly, very, very badly. Like right now..." I said

"REACT BADLY? REACT BADLY?! HOW AM I REACTING BADLY, YOU'RE THE ONE CONVINCING THOSE TWO NOT TO TALK TO ME!"

"Yes, I'm the one reacting like a-" I said before he grabbed my shirt and pushed me against the wall.

"Oi! Pete, come on." Jordan said approaching Peter.

"Oh aye, I definatly said 'hey guys, we shouldn't talk to Peter anymore' seriously, I admit I hate your guts but ignoring you wouldn't get us anywhere. "

"OH SHUT UP AND STOP PULLING CRAP OUT OF YOUR ASS! THIS IS MY FIGHT TOO-" Peter said spitting everywhere as he spoke before he was interupted by Jordan.

"ENOUGH!" she yelled grabbing Peter and pulling him away from me. I sighed and looked at Peter, we need to find a way to deal with this twat...

"Ok, I'm just going to shut up before Peter rips my head off." I stated raising my hands as if I was surrendering.

Eventually Peter-hulk calmed down and we went inside and headed to the lockers. Suddenly Peter put a hand out and stopped us from going any further, he looked around the corner and his head instantly shot back, I heard some voices but couldn't hear them properly. Then suddenly Peter went round the corner and walked towards the voices and we followed, as I rounded the corner I saw Cathryn, Michael and Tank huddled around a locker, Michael was clutching an envelope and suddenly something clicked in my head. Peter used to be good mates with these guys, especially Cathryn (cough, cough), but slowly they started drifting apart and eventually they just stopped talking altogether, with that I noticed the three of them acting considerably more weird than usual as they drifted from Peter. I also remembered Cathryn looking in the same locker until she saw us walking down the corridor at which point she slamed the locker and walked off maybe she was looking for the letter Michael got out of the locker now... Oh, they have got involved in some sort of cult... I nearly laughed at the thought but felt this wasn't exactly the time to laugh...

" 'Ello lads!" I said as the four of us approached them, Peter shot me an annoyed look. Aw lil' Peter wanted to speak first... We walked up

"What've you got there Mike?" Peter said gesturing towards Michael's pocket, he probably stuffed the letter in there when he saw us.

"It's personal..." Michael said

"Yeah, I bet it is." Peter finished before he lunged at Michael and knocked him into the open locker. Peter made a grab for the envelope.

"Ey - Weir - C'mon -" Mike grunted as he stuck a hand up to Peter's face, Peter turned he head with his teeth clenched, still trying to tear Michael's pocket off.

"Tank! You want to do something about this?" Mike said in a suggestive tone. In response Tank walked up behind Peter and yanked him away and restrained him.

"Oi! Let go!" Peter called kicking and struggling in Tank's grasp.

"Aye, go on Tank waste your time, I mean there definatly aren't four of us, one of which beat you in a fight, technically." I said as I stood infront of the locker Michael was stuck in, I bent down and pushed his chest against the back of the locker, his tryed to tear my hand away giving me a chance to rip the letter out of his pocket, in the proccess I ripped the pocket a good bit but I still got the letter, surprisingly Cathryn dashed over and tryed to grab the letter but I reacted in time to push her away. Suddenly Tank released Peter and charged at me, I was about to dive but he was already pretty close when I took notice. He smashed me up against a locker and raised a fist and sent it crashing down into my face, I yelled in pain but still kept a grip on the letter. I swung a knee up into Tank's crotch and he instantly recoiled dropping to the floor in complete agony. I groaned and looked back at the letter," Now then, what 'secret cult letter' have you got." I said smirking a little I looked. I looked at the envelope, black seal keeping it closed, that's rare. I was about to open it but noticed Michael had dislogded himself and he lunged at me, he was much faster than Tank so he tore the letter out of my hands before I could react, Peter tried to lunge at Michael again but Tank managed to grab him. Suddenly a huge clatter bounced off the walls, I looked over to the locker, Jordan was standing with her foot inside it, I walked over and saw that there was no floor (Jordan probably dislodged it, and it was probably what made the huge clattering noise).

*BANG!*

Suddenly Tank smashed Jordan aside, nearly knocking her to the ground and slammed the locker shut.

"You're dead, all four of your are dead. Come anywhere near us again-" Tank said

"-Or Mr. Mocho Man will come beat the shit out of us?" I replied with a smirk, taking the piss is one of my hobbies...

Then the conversation went from death threats to hang-outs. The conversation ended with Peter agreeing to go hang out with the three of them, good don't have to deal with his shit for a while...

Hello! Hope you enoyed chapter 11, and I hope you'll enjoy chapter 12, don't forget to leave your reviews if you have anything to say, I've asked this question before, I think back in chapter 2 but what do you think of Brandon, personality and character progression, stuff like that :) Thanks!
-Ben