Chapter 6 - Derik’s POV
If they weren’t suspicious before, they most definitely are now. The boss is going to kill me.
So why do I feel like this is a good thing? Maybe it’s because, unlike the people that surround me, I have a goddamn moral compass? Why is that so hard to find these days?
Good God, I’m fucked. Time to go see Mr. Boss, the almighty and royally fucked up man who governs my every move. As if that isn’t enough, the universe decided that HA HA HA he’s my dad, too.
The Heathrow line of psychics is one of the more powerful ones around here. That’s why he wants me to kill Sadie so badly.
Well, I’m sick of it. Do I have the courage to tell him that? No. But am I going to kill anyone else, no matter what they do to my mind? Hell no.
And I know there’s only one way to end this.
But it’s not time for that yet. Not until I’m sure Sadie and… what’s the ghost’s name? Heather or Lilac or something like that. Some weird flower name. And her friend, who almost ran me over twice. Man, I really wish he hadn’t stopped the car. Just ran me over and driven away without a second glance. I’d be dead, and they wouldn’t have to be running so much. Everyone knows I’m The Shadow Clan’s best tracker. That’s why (lucky me) I was chosen for this God forsaken job. I love how that’s what we call it. Job. Killing people just because they see ghosts and it’s just “job”.
No one ever stops to wonder why we kill. They just mindlessly follow orders.
I mean, how could they not? They’re fucking mind controlled for God’s sake.
I’ve been trained since… eight, I think… to hunt down people who see ghosts. To hunt psychics. That’s all I’ve known since eight, and I’m sixteen now. Half my life I’ve been trained to kill, and the other half I barely remember.
Other than one thing.
My mother. Not the stepmom I have now who hates my guts, the one that gave birth to me.
When I was eight, she went to the grocery store, and she never came back.
A psychic killed her.
My dad was… I don’t know, exactly. He got crazy. He cultivated in me a belief that psychics are evil. So it started small at first, right? But then he gained followers. People - you know the type, the kind that hate everyone who’s different - those people followed him.
And then some nutcase teacher joined up, Mrs. Yancy. She’s the one who really started the problem.
She’s the one who suggested we start killing. She’s the one who governs the mind control business, although I don’t know how. She’s the one who decided we use kids to kill. She’s the one who branded us with a red eye. And no, I never knew it was possible to change your eye color. But you can, and it hurts like Hell.
So now you have thirty or so kids with red eyes who kill people. That doesn’t sound easy to hide from the police.
Solution? Infiltrate the police, get them on our side.
God, sometimes I hate having a free mind. It hurts to think about my life too much.
I push open the door to our “secret base”, an abandoned shack passing for a house in the middle of a neighborhood.
It’s not really much of a house anymore. Moldy books pollute the floor, because everyone’s too lazy or disgusted to pick them up. And then we enter the living room, a.k.a. the throne room, and it’s spotless.
Okay, it would be spotless, if you ignore the loveseat in the corner, worn and faded, surrounded by empty bottles, and in it sits the worlds most crazy slob.
My dad. The boss. Mr. Crazy Ass Motherfucker. It doesn’t matter what you call him, he only answers to one name. Boss.
“Hi, Dad.”