Knights v Hunters; The Return

Caleb poured himself a cup of coffee. He needed it – he had barely slept a wink after his brother’s revelation. He didn’t know what to make of it, but he had to speak to his father and Ethan. Rafe might have been behaving strangely the past few months, but now that Caleb understood the reason behind that, he couldn’t easily dismiss Rafe’s dream as another example of his strange behaviour. His brother’s abilities were never under question and now, he had to place his trust in them once again.

Caleb looked at his watch. It was still early, but he knew that his parents would have been up ages ago. His mother tended to meditate in the morning and his father always started the day with a run around the compound. They would both be home now and he wanted to call them, but not without Rafe. His brother was taking a quick shower, whilst Sera and Becca made breakfast. He knew that Becca was looking at him strangely, but he didn’t have any answers for her. He also wanted Rafe to share his perception with them.

Becca wondered if Caleb realised that he looked worn out. He couldn’t have slept much last night, for she had heard both him and Rafe speak in the early hours of the morning. She could not hear their exact words, but their conversation had continued for a long while, long after she had drifted off to sleep again. She worried about Caleb, knew that he was still angry with Matthew for cleaning Rafe’s memories, although he had set that aside for now. Rafe and Caleb were inseparable and an injury to Rafe was an injury to Caleb. She was worried about how all of this would end with the Knights.

Walking up to him, Becca gently placed her hand on his arm. It startled him. “You okay?” she asked, her gentle blue eyes focussed intently on his, knowing that he couldn’t lie to her when she looked at him that way.

Caleb looked at her hand against his arm. No one could imagine the strength in this petite woman who stood in front of him. She wore a thin scarf around her neck, ostensibly to mask the burn marks that covered her there. He wished he could tell her what was in his heart – that she would always be beautiful to him, even if her entire body was covered in those marks, for her beauty lay not in her looks, but in her heart. Instead, he choked back the words he wanted to say and replied, “Too little sleep, too much to do.” Becca smiled back, knowing that something else had played on his mind seconds before he had spoken.

Just then, Rafe came out of the bathroom, fully dressed and ready to face the day. He ate his breakfast in silence, his thoughts currently being ordered into parts he could handle. Caleb would place the call to Ethan and their father shortly. Would they think that he was losing his mind?

Jude switched off the phone and let his mind settle. What Rafe had shared mystified him. Rafe thought a Hunter was working with the Untouchables!

“All Hunters, young and old, are accounted for,” Ethan said, “and I can track where everyone has been recently. None of them have been in Knight town and apart from Sera and our children, no other Hunter is in New York.”

“I don’t understand,” Jude admitted. “Rafe doesn’t usually see wrong.”

“I don’t think he did. I think that he may have interpreted what he saw, incorrectly,” Ethan reasoned.

“You may be right,” Jude said. “He didn’t see a face, he just sensed the other person. He’s a good Sensor though, Ethan.”

Jude was right, Ethan thought. Rafe was one of the best. He wouldn’t have shared this with them if he thought that he could have been wrong. Caleb wouldn’t have let him either, which meant that Caleb believed that what Rafe had seen, was plausible. “I have an idea,” Ethan said, re-directing his old friend’s thoughts.

Sawyer drove in early to work. He hadn’t slept much the night before, with so much playing on his mind. Noel Emerson was still missing and he was determined to find the man alive; his partner was barely talking to him for some reason he hadn’t as yet identified and his brother, whom he hadn’t seen in months, had pitched up and immediately fallen for Lena. It didn’t help that Carter, who he loved dearly, had called him in the middle of the night to let him know that Lena had accepted his dinner invitation. Just great, Sawyer thought, shutting his car door with more aggression than was necessary. His day couldn’t surely get any worse!

An hour later, Lena walked to their desks. She wordlessly placed a cup of coffee on his desk before settling with tea behind hers. He thanked her, noticed the dark circles beneath her eyes. Seems as if he wasn’t the only one who had slept badly.

“Rafe and Caleb are back,” Lena announced suddenly. “I saw them last night.”

“Yeah?” Sawyer asked, grateful that she was talking to him again. “Are they doing okay?”

“Seems like it. I only chatted with Caleb the other day, Rafe was out.” Lena paused and then spoke, “There was something I was supposed to ask Rafe, but for the life of me, I can’t remember,” Lena laughed. Sawyer didn’t seem amused; in fact, he looked at her with concern.

“You know, they say the memory is the first to go,” he said seriously and ducked as Lena threw her stress ball at him. “Well, at least you still have your reflexes!”

Their moment of insanity was interrupted by Captain Marquez who asked them for progress on the Emerson case.

“We have nothing, Captain,” Sawyer admitted, “Everything we’ve followed has led to a dead end.”

“We’re also checking whether there is any connection between Cawley and Emerson,” Lena added. She hadn’t exactly shared that information with Sawyer yet, noticing his raised eyebrows, but when she had stared at the ceiling at 2am, unable to close her tired eyes, she had thought that maybe the men might know each other. “They lived a few blocks from each other, so they may have run into each other at some point.”

“Good idea,” Marquez said, “Ask Cawley if he’s ever met Emerson before.”

When Marquez left, Lena turned towards Sawyer and said, “Look, I thought that it might be something worth checking out. I didn’t get to telling you yet so maybe you’re right, my memory is failing me!”

Sawyer waved away her apologies. “It’s a good idea,” he said. “In fact, let’s see what lies between Cawley and Emerson. Maybe they visited the same grocers?”

“Okay, I’ll call Cawley, see whether he has a few minutes to talk to us today,” Lena said.

Lena had an excited look on her face when she ended her call with David Cawley. “He knew Emerson,” she revealed to Sawyer. “He said that they had met a few times since they both were members at the same gym!”

Grace awoke in shock and for a moment, she thought she was back in Knight town. However, her eyes were still covered with a blindfold, her arms still tied behind her. If only she could remove her blindfold, she might get a sense of where she was. She sat down and brought her knees up, hoping to move her blindfold by rubbing her face against her knees. A dozen tries later and the blindfold had not even moved an inch.

Grace postponed that plan and decided to focus on untying her hands. She needed something sharp to cut through the ropes that bound her wrists. She stood up and tried to feel with her feet, for any objects on the ground. She stopped when she stepped on what felt like a stone and bending down and turning, she managed to pick up the stone. It was flat and had one side that could be used to work the ropes. It might take a while, but she obviously wasn’t going anywhere!

She ignored her hunger and thirst and continued to rub the stone against the rope on her wrists, all the while thinking about Gabe, the partner of her soul. She hoped that he was staying strong and taking care of the children. Gabe wasn’t good at loss. Apart from his parents who had passed when they were much older, he had lost his younger sister, his only sibling, a few decades ago. That had almost broken him. Delia had left Knight town due to a disagreement, but Gabe had been relieved when she decided to return a few months later. Grace could remember Delia clearly – she had a smile that could break a thousand hearts, but none of the Knights in the town appealed to her. Instead, she had fallen for someone she couldn’t have, who had passed on himself before he could hold his child in his arms. Gabe had watched his sister pass on, way before her time in his opinion, and he had never been the same since. For a long while, he clung to his own wife and children, never letting them out of his sight, always trying to ensure that they were safe, that they were close, until Grace had gently told him that as leader of the Knights, he needed to focus on the safety of all in Knight town and not just his family. That had certainly brought him back with a thud, she remembered. Now, she hoped that he remembered her words, for Knight town would need him like never before, no matter what happened to her!

Lena sat in the office of the manager at the gym that David Cawley and Noel Emerson both frequented. The manager had kindly offered them his office to view the security footage from the last two weeks. Sawyer had felt that it was possible that both these men were followed before they were taken. She only viewed the tapes from the days when Cawley and Emerson had both swiped in. She saw the two men who seemed to wave at each other, but none of the tapes showed them engaging in any conversation.

Sawyer leaned over her, watching the tapes for people who might appear across them. “Here,” he said, pointing at the screen. “This guy seems to be in a few of the videos. Look how he checks out Cawley and Emerson.”

“You’re right,” Lena admitted, trying to ignore Sawyer’s warm breath against her neck. “He’s also looking at someone other than these two men. See, here,” she pointed, “he makes eye contact and nods. Maybe there were two guys watching these men.”

They made copies of the tapes and would pass it through facial recognition software later to determine if those men were on the system, but from what they had seen, it was evident that Emerson and Cawley had definitely been watched for a while. In the meantime, Lena suggested that they go back to Emerson’s apartment. There had to be something there that they had missed.

Leo Zolfar went in search of his wife. He had been working on a few plans since early morning, but Harper had called him excitedly a few minutes ago and asked him to meet her at her office. He hadn’t hesitated and had picked up his jacket and immediately walked out of his building. He eventually found Harper in the kitchen, filling her cup with coffee. She saw him and her eyes lit up, never failing to touch his heart. He went to her and gathered her in his arms. She might be strong and powerful, but she was still his to protect.

Harper wrapped her arms around Leo. She felt him tremble, knew that he was worried about her. “Hey,” she said softly, “once this is over, we can go on with the lives we planned to have.”

Leo drew back and looked at her. She really believed that, he realised. “So, what was so urgent?” he asked her. She indicated that he should join her in her office and once there, she closed the door behind them.

“Mrs Ginello called me and told me that her leader was ready to see us. I’m assuming that she’s referring to Seth, since we know he’s here now,” Harper began.

“Yes, she’s referring to Seth, but there’s someone else with them, someone more dangerous than Ginello. Listen, I had a vision coming over. Ginello has recruited at least twenty members to her team. She doesn’t yet have a Healer and I saw her reaching out for John Adams again. She knows where he is. She can’t track the Cawleys, thanks to the Hunters, but John Adams is a risk,” Leo shared.

“We’ll ask Jude’s boys to get someone over to John. What else did you see?” She could see the faraway look in her husband’s eyes, see that it was troubling him.

“They will attack the Hunters first,” Leo said. “They have someone with them who knows the compound, who thinks that they can stage an attack successfully. He’s the one who is dangerous. Then they will go after the Knights, because they have something that the Untouchables want. They plan on staying there longer.”

“How much time do we have?” Harper asked.

“Not too long,” Leo said and then he seemed to be brought back to the present. “We have a bigger problem now. Remember the detective from the other day? Well she and her partner are getting closer.”

Seth sat across from Lucia Ginello, mapping out their plan. “You need to get a Healer as soon as possible, Lucia. We can’t afford to let any of our people get injured,” he ordered.

“Yes, Seth,” Lucia said. “One of my team will take care of it and we should have a Healer on our team by this afternoon. Now, what do you think about the Zolfars?”

“I don’t trust them,” the man who stood looking out the window into Lucia Ginello’s garden responded. “You shouldn’t have assumed that they would help us, Seth. You should have cleaned them of their abilities before they left Knight town all those years ago.”

“Why?” Seth asked.

“You know how difficult it is to turn a Guardian? Even if Leo Zolfar is genuine, his wife would never take orders from anyone other than the leader of the Knights. Which you aren’t,” the man said gruffly.

“Yet. Harper is loyal to her husband, first and foremost and he is the one who is most interested in our mission. He misses his family, wishes that he could see them again, but that is against the covenants. He would do anything to help us and Harper would do anything for him.”

“As you wish, Seth. I will have to trust your judgement on this since you know your people better, but remember that I warned you about the Zolfars,” said the man.

“Gentlemen,” Lucia Ginello said in an attempt to break the tension in the room. “Almost everything is in place for our mission. The Zolfars will be good resources. I’ve checked them out and they can help us in taking over Knight town.”

“Okay,” the other man reluctantly agreed. “Any news on Emerson?”

“He won’t join,” Lucia said sadly. “He would have been a great addition to our team since he knows Knight town well, but he has to go. And if we have the Zolfars, we don’t need him.”

“Good, then get rid of him. We leave no witnesses behind,” the man ordered.

Harper clapped her hands in excitement. “Let’s go,” she said. Lucia had called to let her know that they were now part of her team, part of the mission.

“Yes, but first we need to make a pit stop,” Leo said, checking his gun before he holstered it. He’d never used a gun before and didn’t plan on firing one now, but he needed it to take care of some business.

“Oh, by the way, I’ve spoken to the Hunters. They have someone on John Adams, so at least he is safe now. I also told them about us being included on the team. They will track us, so they know when the Untouchables make the big move,” Harper informed him.

“Doesn’t it bother you though that we don’t know why Seth and Lucia are doing this? I mean, I can almost understand them taking revenge on Knight town after Seth’s son was banished and Lucia lost the opportunity of growing up there when her parents left, but why would they go after the Hunters? This has nothing to do with Lucas, it was decided decades ago.”

“What do you mean?” Harper asked. Leo was on a different train of thought.

“I see that they planned this attack on the Hunters’ compound not long after Lucas was banished, when he was still alive. So, this attack on the Hunters couldn’t be revenge for Lucas’ termination.”

“That’s strange. Maybe we’ll find out later who is the third person. It might make more sense then.”

“Yes, let’s go,” Leo said.

Sawyer and Lena were both in Noel Emerson’s apartment. There had to be a few clues here, something that they hadn’t picked up on earlier. They were both literally crawling on their hands and knees, checking under the beds, the sofas for any evidence that might lead them to Emerson.

Lena stood up, her back aching. She stretched and looked around the apartment. Emerson seemed to love photographs of nature. He had quite a few on his walls – lions, cheetah, elephants, but she also saw a photo of flowers, which didn’t fit in with his decorating style.

“Hey Channing,” she called, “does anything look out of place with this photo?” Sawyer stood next to her, looking at the photo.

“It’s not like the others, but it’s still a photo of nature,” he said. “Wait a minute, what’s that?” he asked, peering closer. He took the frame off the wall, flipped it over and found a camera so small, that it fitted neatly into the petal of a flower.

“He installed his own security system!” Lena exclaimed. Did Noel Emerson know that he was in danger?

“I think I know where he has his recorder,” Sawyer said, lifting the frame of the elephants off the wall. He was correct – nestled in the wall, was the recording equipment. “Let’s see if we can get something off this.”

Lena was excited. This was the first clue that they had found. Please let him have recorded his kidnapping, she pleaded.

Sawyer switched on the television and reviewed the tape from the day that Emerson had been taken. They watched Emerson walk into his apartment. He was a big man and looked strong, but not strong enough to take on the two men who were already waiting for him. There was a major scuffle and Emerson seemed to be holding his own. Lena could see how the apartment got trashed in the process. Emerson had punched one of the men who had fallen to his knees. The other man had Emerson by the neck, but Emerson elbowed him, dislodging him in the process. However, the first man had recovered and had knocked Emerson in the head with what looked like an ashtray, momentarily disorienting him. That was when the second man punctured Emerson with what appeared to be a syringe, rendering him motionless. The men had rested for a few seconds, trying to get their breath back and then carried Emerson and placed him into a wheelchair that they had obviously brought with them, and took him out of the apartment. Lena was shocked at how audacious the men were. She stepped closer to the screen and peered at the two men who had eventually turned towards the camera before they exited the apartment.

“Do you recognise them?” she asked Sawyer.

“Yeah,” he said, “these are the same two men who had staked out the gym.”

“Exactly,” Lena confirmed, “and I recognise one of them. Remember when we interviewed Gentry at the bakery? This guy on the right worked with him – he was one of the guys to whom Gentry passed Missy Adams’ photo.”

Sawyer crinkled his nose, trying to remember. Lena definitely had a better memory of faces than him – he mostly remembered what people said. “I can’t be sure, but I’ll go with your memory. What do you say we make our way to Ginello’s Bakery?”

Lena nodded and they secured the camera and the footage as evidence. They were startled by a knock on the door. Sawyer looked at Lena and she shrugged – they had only informed their captain that they would check out Emerson’s apartment again. Sawyer opened the door and was faced with two masked gunmen, one of whom pushed him back into the apartment, whilst the other trained their gun on Lena. “Do what we say and no one will be harmed,” the person said.

“What do you want?” Lena asked, still startled. She was trying to take in as much detail of the men as possible, for later, if there was one. The men were both tall, over six feet, and very slender. One of them had a feminine look about him – could it be a woman? She tried to look closer, but the gun in her face distracted her.

“I want you to throw your weapons on the floor. Both of you, now!” the man bellowed. Lena and Sawyer did just that. “Remove your ankle holsters as well,” he directed. Sawyer cursed as he obeyed, knowing that he and Lena were now unarmed and hence vulnerable.

“What do you want?” Sawyer repeated, noticing that the other man, close to Lena, was now collecting the weapons that they had just placed on the floor.

“We don’t plan on harming you,” the man said, “but we will use our weapons if you disobey us. We need you out of the way for a bit while we fix things,” the man said mysteriously.

“What things?” Lena asked. This didn’t make sense to her – why would these people come to attack them in Emerson’s apartment? Suddenly, she had a realisation. “Did you kidnap Noel Emerson?” she asked. Sawyer looked at her, eyebrow raised.

The man who had done all the talking since they had entered the apartment, laughed and said, “No, we didn’t, but you know who did. We just need time to end some unfinished business before you arrest the people who took Emerson.”

The man then turned to his partner and instructed him to tie up Lena, which she objected to, which resulted in the gun being rammed at the base of Sawyer’s skull. “Just do it,” the man ordered. Lena obeyed and once tied with her hands behind her back, she was forced to sit on the floor. Sawyer was next, his hands tied tighter.

“We’re going to leave this building now,” the man said, “and we’ll make our way to my car. If either of you do anything to raise an alarm, we won’t hesitate to put a bullet through your brain.” The man looked at Sawyer and then Lena, “Got it?” he asked. Both Sawyer and Lena nodded.

Sawyer wasn’t sure where they were going, but he knew that he and Lena were in the boot of a car, their hands tied, their mouths gagged. He hadn’t yet reached a state of panic – this situation had never happened to them before. Lena seemed to be calm as well.

The car stopped half an hour later and before the detectives were hauled out of the car, they had pillow cases pulled over their faces. They were made to walk up a few flights of stairs before they were lightly shoved into a room.

“You’re going to be our guests for a short while,” the man announced. “We’ll be watching you very closely during this time, so don’t do anything stupid. And no shouting,” the man added, “there’s no one here to hear you.”

Lena didn’t know whether to be alarmed or mystified when she and Sawyer were moved to another, much smaller room where the pillow cases and gags were removed. The room was very dark and they couldn’t make out much in there.

“There’s nothing in this room that can aid your escape,” the man said. “But you will be comfortable here. There’s water and snack bars and a few blankets.” He looked at the two detectives, knew that they were resourceful enough to escape. “Unfortunately, I have to make you a bit more immobile,” he said, using a metal chain to tie Sawyer’s ankles and then Lena’s to a metal pole which was anchored to the floor and extended to the ceiling. This ensured that they had limited movement within the room and had to move together in order not to hurt the other. The man paused as he reached the door to the room and turning back, he said, “I’ve loosened the rope around your wrist, detective,” he said, looking at Lena, “when I’m gone, you can untie your wrists and then your partner’s. You might not believe me right now, but you two will be in each other’s lives for a long time.” With that, he left Lena and Sawyer to tussle with their ropes to no avail.

Pulling off his mask, Leo Zolfar turned to his wife and said with a smile, “Those two remind me of us, when we didn’t know better and had less of an appreciation for fate!”

Harper grinned. Those two detectives were giving off some serious signals when they were being held up. They were terrified, not for themselves, but for each other, like you would be if you cared very deeply for someone. “Let’s hope they find their way quicker than we did,” Harper said.

“Maybe this will help them. Okay, now that we have them out of the way, let’s go over to Ginello’s and maybe we can get an idea of where to find Noel.”

“Did they just do, what I think they did?” Becca asked, looking out her car window.

“Yeah, the Zolfars kidnapped our favourite detectives,” Caleb said, casually.

“Why would they do that?” Eden asked.

“Probably to keep them safe. These detectives have no idea what they are getting into this time around. If they go looking for Emerson, they might get more than they bargained for,” Caleb said. “Let’s just say that I don’t agree with the Zolfar’s methods, but I sure understand it. You don’t want Normals getting caught in the middle of a fight between our two societies.”

“I spoke to James earlier,” Becca informed the Knights. “He’s eager to help us. He said that there’s been quite a bit of activity at the bakery since Seth turned up. Apparently, Mrs Ginello had a meeting in her office last night with members of her team. They’ve a formidable bunch and given James’ particular skills, he managed to capture their images without being seen. I’ve made copies for us,” Becca said, passing on the photos of the Untouchables.

“I don’t recognise any one of them,” Eden said hopelessly.

“That would be because most of them were banished before we were even born,” Josh said.

“Send them to your father,” Becca suggested, “he should know who they are. We’ve just sent these photos to our compound so that we know who to look out for.”

“Thank you,” Eden said, grateful for the help once again being so generously offered by the Hunters.

“Okay, we’re leaving,” Caleb announced. “The Zolfars are on the move.”

Rafe, Sera and Matthew were staking out Ginello’s Bakery, the place designated to host the gathering of the Untouchables. Lucia Ginello had driven in not too long ago, with Seth in the passenger seat. Rafe could hear Matthew grinding his teeth in anger.

“If I get close enough to Seth, I might see where he’s hiding your mother,” Rafe said.

Matthew felt hopeful, and thought of ways of getting Rafe in close proximity to Seth. He knew that Mrs Ginello had seen Rafe before, so she would immediately recognise him, which made things difficult.

“It won’t help sending Sera in,” Rafe said, as if reading Matthew’s mind. “I don’t have a connection with her.” Although he meant that he didn’t have a telepathic link with her, he realised, as he said it, that it was very true of his relationship with Sera. He liked her, enjoyed her company and yet he had a stronger connection with Eden, whom he had only met yesterday.

“That may be true, but I can get a sense of what’s happening in there, maybe understand who’s there and what they are up to,” Sera offered.

Rafe thought for a moment, and then realised that Sera’s ability as a Sensor could be invaluable today. “Okay, but be careful. If you have to use your arrows on the Untouchables, do so. If you feel unsafe, walk out.” Sera nodded. She had been on missions before, obviously none which could have such a major impact on their lives.

Caleb drove into the parking lot of the mall in which the bakery was housed. Rafe was a few parking spaces away, waiting for Sera who had gone into the bakery.

Caleb used the opportunity to communicate with his brother. “The Zolfars are at the bakery as well. They are now officially part of the team and should meet the third partner.”

“Great,” Rafe said and then grimaced. “What are you not telling me?”

“Only that the Zolfars kidnapped Lena and Sawyer.” He heard Rafe’s thoughts going through his mind. “Before you go nuts, the detectives were going to get in the way of our mission, so Leo took them out of the way. Emerson was taken by two of the Untouchables who also work at the bakery and the good detectives were coming over to question them.”

“Are Lena and Sawyer okay?” Rafe asked, concerned.

“Yeah, we’ll let them go once we’re done here,” Caleb promised.

Just then Sera walked out of the bakery, bakery box in hand. She got into the car, still shaken. She took a moment to recover before she said, a bit breathless, “There’s about twenty people on that team, including the Zolfars. They’re meeting in the back room with the Blocker. She came out for a moment to help behind the counter and she was all smiles. I sensed a lot of energy there and not the good kind. I heard one of them discuss plans to take out the Hunters. Rafe, I think that they are planning on invading our compound tonight!”