Tale of a Protector

Chapter IV

It had been days since Kasey Warren had found Kylah Aquilas and taken her to the hospital and yet he still couldn’t get her out of his mind. She had known a lot more than she was going to say about what had happened. Kasey respected that but he still wanted to know and he couldn’t stop the nagging feeling in his gut that he needed to figure all of it out. He walked into his house and looked around, noticing that everything still seemed to be in its constant state of organized chaos. “Janelle?” he called. “Are you home?”

He heard no answer and looked at his watch. Janelle should have gotten home from school already. Dropping his bag off on the dining room table, he headed into the kitchen and started fixing himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. “Janey?” he called again as he finished the sandwich and tossed the knife in the sink. This time he heard a slight shuffling come from the living room. Picking up the sandwich, Kasey headed into the living room just in time to see Janelle pull away from the dark haired boy facing her. Kasey cleared his throat and Janelle looked over at him.

“Am I interrupting?” he asked, looking at his younger sister. They hadn’t had the easiest time adjusting after their mother’s death and their father running out on them. He knew sometimes that it was especially hard on Janelle, living without her mother. Kasey sighed, his sandwich practically forgotten.

“Kase…hey, I didn’t realize you were home,” Janelle said, biting her lip and scooting further away from her companion. She looked at her watch. “I guess I didn’t realize how much time had passed.”

It was then that the young man turned around. “Hey Micah,” Kasey said in greeting to him. The dark haired teen looked at Kasey and smiled, saying nothing. “Yeah, sorry Janey. I should have called after work.” He cleared his throat. “On the way home I stopped at the park.”

For a few moments Janelle just stared at her brother. She knew he worked really hard to keep life going as normal as possible but since that incident a week earlier he had been completely obsessed with figuring out what was going on. To do that though he needed to find Kylah Aquilas, the young woman he had saved that day, and get her to give him some information.

Then she sighed. “You were looking for her, again?” she asked.

“Yeah. I’m sorry, sis. It’s just bugging me. Something was going on and I don’t think that it was good. She may need help, even if she won’t ask for it.”

Janelle nodded. “You’re a good person, Kase. Just don’t invest so much time in finding this girl that you put everything else on hold.”

Micah looked from Janelle to Kasey and back again. “Who are you guys talking about?”

Kasey walked over and sat down in the chair sitting caddy-corner to the couch. “Last week I was driving by the park on my way home from work and I saw something…I don’t know what it was but I felt the need to find out. I pulled over and saw this man and it looked like he was going to kill this girl so I called out and I guess that scared him away. After that I took her to the hospital.”

He paused and let out a deep breath. “There’s something going on around here but I have no idea what. I think this Kylah girl is the only one who actually knows.”

Micah looked over at Kasey. “Kylah? Are you talking about Kylah Aquilas?”

Kasey’s eyes widened. “You know her?”

“Sure, we go to school together. Or we did up until she disappeared a couple weeks ago. She, uh, she just came back to school yesterday.”

Kasey stood up. “I need to talk with her.”

“You won’t get anything from her,” Micah said. “She doesn’t talk about what happened. It’s like she doesn’t remember any of it. She just said that she was in an accident and that she’s lucky to be alive.”

“No…that’s not right. I was with her after it happened. That’s not how she sounded at all. Kylah knew what had happened to her but she wouldn’t tell me because she wanted it all to stop. I need to find her. Please, Micah, this could be really important.”

Micah shook his head and stood up. “I’m sorry. I can’t tell you. Trust me when I tell you that it is in your best interest to just forget about all of this. You can’t do anything to help out. What’s done is done and it’s best if everyone just moves on.” He looked over at Janelle. “I’ll call you later, all right?”

She nodded and Micah turned to walk out of the home. Kasey turned to Janelle. “Would you like to tell me what’s going on?” he questioned.

“What do you want me to say Kasey?” she asked. “I’m not exactly a little girl anymore. Do you want me to just go to school and come home right afterwards and have no life? I’m seventeen years old!”

“I know that but you could have told me about you and Micah. This isn’t one of those things you need to hide from me like you probably would have from Mom or Dad…”

She looked away from him.

“Janey, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. Look, I’m your brother, not your parent. I understand what it’s like to be seventeen; I was just there a few years ago. Trust me, I know what it’s like to want to have a normal life, and have a person…like Micah in your life.” He sighed. “How long have you two been seeing each other?”

“A few weeks, okay? It’s really not a big deal. He’s been really nice to me, a complete angel, I swear.”

Kasey nodded. “Okay, I believe you. Just, be careful, all right?”

“I will. Don’t worry so much.”

Gabriel stood in front of the congregation of grim-faced Angelic Protectors. This long battle against the dark mages that sought to destroy them was weighing heavily on everyone. The humans really had no idea what happened on a daily basis to preserve their ways of life. It was a great burden, one the Protectors took seriously.

It had taken a great toll already. As he gazed around the group he noted many of the chairs that until recently had been filled by the teen Angelic Protectors, the ones that were able to be placed somewhere on Earth to watch over certain people and help when they could. The teen Protectors could blend in as students and not be suspected of anything.

At least that was what they had thought. Now that most of the teens were gone Gabriel doubted his decision to place them there. Zakari had found out about the teens and taken advantage of it.

Gabriel cleared his throat. “You are all aware of what we are currently facing. Our only hope of success is to find Zakari and his protégés and to eliminate them. I have spoken with our Father and he has agreed that we must deal with this quickly. To protect our mission we must destroy those that seek to eliminate us. Use whatever force is necessary to do the job. We cannot lose any more of the Protectors if we wish to survive this ordeal.”

One of the few remaining teen Protectors stood up. Gabriel knew him; it was the teen he had sent to wipe Kylah’s memory of all information pertaining to the Angelic Protectors. “Sir, I have something I need to say and it is best for all to know. We may have another situation to concern ourselves with. There is a man, a human, and he is searching for Kylah in order to get answers. If allowed to continue on his search I have a feeling that Zakari would seek him out and use him to get to us.”

Gabriel nodded. “Then perhaps you should watch over him, try and keep him from getting too deep into this matter. Keep him from finding out anything. If he finds Kylah then he will discover nothing.”

“Yes, sir.”