Old man Jonah said he saw Billy down at downtown the first day they were reported missing, but people didn't take him serious. Old man Jonah had been "seeing" a lot of things lately Some people speculated that they may have had a quarrel and he out of anger murdered her and Skipped town. Others said that maybe the two of them had been abducted.

Brentwood was a quiet place. Two teenagers missing was plenty of big news to them. Everybody was talking about it. Everybody that is except Jason. He had burned his sheets again yesterday. This was the third time in the past two weeks. He didn't like the number three it felt wrong. 

He remembered the shrill voice of Brother Ignatius yelling that three was a holy number. The Sacred number of the Holy Trinity, the number of times of Jesus was tempted, the number of times peter denied Jesus. Brother Ignatius could go on and on about the sacredness of three. He's personal motto was "omnia quae agis, fac in tribus", and he took his motto seriously. The Sancta Maria home for Orphans chapel was open to the public on most days. The Marians the residents were expected to serve at mass, and Brother Ignatius expected nothing less of perfection from them. 

Jason wore a white cassock which was just a really long shirt, with a surplice that looked like a bib but really long, the Romans must have loved really long clothes, he thought. He had been chosen as one of the candle bearers. Their job was to, well carry the candle, which as he was learning was much more difficult than he thought. The hot candle wax kept sliding down and burning his fingers. Being burned didn't fit in with Brother Ignatius's idea of a perfect mass. He had already made two mistakes and he wasn't planning on making a third. Brother Ignatius said a mistake committed three times was a deliberate act and deserved to be punished severely.

They started the procession from the entrance to the altar. The candle bearers were immediately behind the crucifier. They were supposed to keep a distance of three steps between them. Not one step more or less, while keeping pace with the other candle bearer, without turning their heads to look at each other. All was going well until he noticed a big glob of melted wax sliding down towards his hand. He considered rotating the candle but the candle stands had a peculiar one sided design. If he rotated it Brother Ignatius would notice it, so he decided to do the brave thing. He would face the candle wax head on.

He braced himself while watching the wax slide down slowly. He could do this, it was just wax. They didn't hurt that much if you saw them coming.

Finally the wax met his fingers and it totally caught him off guard. He had expected the wax to be scalding at least. He hadn't expected it to be warm and hardly lukewarm at that. He would have given it more thought if he hadn't stepped on the cross bearers ridiculously long cassock. He had been so preoccupied by the wax that he had lost track of the procession and overstepped. Brother Ignatius stood up looking sad and shaking his head.

"Rubeum vir. God gave all his children wisdom but you have refused to use this gift, refusing to the God's will is a sin and the wages of sin is death." He walked up to Henry and took the cross from him. He flipped it with the cross facing down. Jason's heart skipped a beat, did Brother Ignatius really mean to hit him with that? 

"You committed the sin of disobedience, the vilest of all sins. You even went out of your way to disturb the holy procession." He walked slowly towards Jason. Jason noticed that the monk was sweating and his eyes were wild, he looked like a mad monk, which was exactly what he was. Everyone else had run to the other side of the Chapel. Far enough for safety but close enough that to watch the show that was unfolding.

"... But don't worry it's not your fault. The serpent has been whispering in your ear, but don't worry I shall cleanse you with this." He raised the crucifix "then you will be expunged of your sins and become pure as a lamb." Brother Ignatius was strict but there he was a silver lining. He never hit more than thrice, but as Jason looked at him he instinctively knew that Brother Ignatius wouldn't just hit him thrice or even five times, he probably wouldn't stop until he grew tired or until something in Jason broke. He felt the cold wall of the Chapel on his back. He had been backed in a corner. He tried to pray but he couldn't remember the words. So he swore that if God or Jesus or even the dove saved him he would stop being a nuisance.

That's when the miracle happened. Nobody really saw what happened since they were all watching brother Ignatius and Jason, but Ted said that the candle flames just went crazy. One moment they were normal the next moment they were ceiling high, literally. The decorations that the girls had spent all day on went up in flames. Brother Ignatius turned around and saw the flames.

"Padré ?" Jason saw his chance and took off. Later Brother Ignatius would meet him and apologize to him in his own way. Saying " He had been carried away with the fervour of the Lord" and that he "felt sad when he saw young people wallowing in sin". Jason was just grateful that he hadn't been hit. Later on brother Ignatius would develop a policy to weed out the weaklings. He would tip a candle over and pour wax over the back of the person's palm. He said only the strong could serve the lord.

They had science now. Their science teacher was a tall, gaunt man that always smiled, he had divided them into pairs and by some stroke of luck he got paired up with Alex. 

"Did you hear what happened to cecelia?"

"Yeah the girl that was found in the woods."

"It might be just what we've been looking for."

" A dead body?"

"No. Her body was found at the burn site and her boyfriend is missing. We never really checked out the entire woods, seeing Dave kinda sidetracked us."

"So your saying the fire didn't start from David's escape pod?"

"No I'm saying that maybe they both started simultaneously."

" and that the reason her boyfriend is missing is because the flea took over him."

"Exactly."

*

After school Chuck and Jason walked down the hall chuck was saying something about the English teacher Penelope. Jason wasn't really paying attention, all he needed to do was to make the right noises and chick would go on and on without noticing. Kevin walked up to them, hands in his pockets, Elite jacket strung over his shoulder. Kevin was a bit on the short side but he made up with muscles and the sleeveless shirt he wore made sure everyone knew. Jason wasn't sure since he always felt warm but he was pretty sure it was too cold for a sleeveless. Some girls were staring at him and giggling. Kevin noticed and smiled.

"Yo Jason I'm heading over to the dojo you coming?"

"Yeah sure." And with that Jason walked away with Kevin. If he had looked back he would have seen Chuck looking at him sadly but he didn't.

Again they were standing loosely in a semi circle under the dojo, and again David was badly dressed in a black turtleneck. Jason vaguely wondered where he was getting his cloths from.

"So after much thought I've decided on the best way to train you all." He looked at Jess.

" Back on the home world the best way to train a vita was to keep on injuring them. Pretty effective if you ask me soon you'll be able to heal in your sleep." Jason immediately stepped in front of Jess.

"Hell no." David was smiling. Jason had no problem seeing David doing it and enjoying it.

"W-w-with that sword ?" Jess asked. Looked at his katana by the corner.

"Oh that? Of course not. At least not yet. At your level you would probably die horribly." He walked towards the corner and lifted the katana.

"This is an Izane blade. They are left overs from an ancient civilization, way older than the Xeterrans. Each Izane blade is unique but they do have a few things in common." He threw the sword at Jason and Jason caught it. Immediately he held it he felt an intense pain in his left hand were he was holding the sword. What he saw shocked him immensely. The skin on his palm had peeled away he looked like his hand had some kind of terminal illness. The veins around it were black and the exposed tissue under his skin didn't look right either.

"Jessica?" David said, bringing Jess out of shock and to Jason's aid. She held his hand concentrated. After a few seconds his hand was as good as new but the experience had still shaken him up.

"That's the first rule of Izane blades, they don't let anyone touch them except the owners. If you try that happens, or worse."

"So their basically theft proof?" Kevin asked. David looked at him blankly.

"Like he means it can't be stolen." Mia clarified.

"Oh no they can be stolen, just kill the owner and first person to touch it becomes the owner. Or the owner can relinquish ownership, but nobody ever does that."

" The second thing is that Izane blades are made out of a metal called benonide. It's super rare and nobody knows how to use it because it's oblivious to temperature, pressure and even force. So it's practically invincible, not that's out of the way let's get to the main business of the day. David then proceeded to separate them and put them in separate them. He gave Jason a lit candle, what he had to do was simple enough just control the flame and that would be enough for today. Theoritically it was easy that is, but in reality it was impossible. It turned out Jason could control fore as much as a, well as much as a normal human.

He ended up leaving after a few hours and more than a few candles. He skipped dinner and lay down on his bed dead tired. After a few hours he had the strangest dream ever, and that was saying a lot for a person who had the same nightmare for about ten years now.

He felt heat on his skin, which was weird he hadn't felt actual heat for a long time or cold for that matter either. He opened his eyes and saw hell. At least that was what he thought it was, if it wasn't then it was a pretty good imitation. 

They was life or trees or even grass for that matter. Lava flowed over the most ground and sharp rocks jutted from everywhere. There were no clouds in the sky instead were three suns. 

Out of the corner of his eye he saw movement. Huge doglike creatures ran towards him. Apart from their physique they had not in common with any other thing he had ever seen before. Their skin was covered in a black material that looked tough. It had cracks round its joints probably to help movement. He turned around and tried to run around and tried but the landscape wasn't built for two legs. He fell down and cut his arm on a piece of rock that looked like it could have pierced through his gut if he had fallen the wrong way. The huge dogs ran past him and continued on. His looked at his arm and saw that he was bleeding.

Some dream

He felt a faint tremor and looked up.

He remembered when he and his class had gone for a school trip at the empire state building. The tour guide had spoken with awe about the building as if it was a loved one. He said that the empire state building had been the tallest building in the world till 1971 when some other building that Jason had long forgotten took over. But he could remember looking up at the building and thinking that that was a freaking tall building. 

He bet that if that tour guide was here he would have shit his pants. The creature that walked up to him was easier taller than the empire state building. 



It easily walked over the hills that were speckled this wasteland. It was thin and covered in wicked looking spikes, his ribs were outside and we're his guts were supposed to be a bright yellow light pulsed. He thought about running but concluded it was useless. Those long legs wouldn't take long to catch up with him. The giant made it to him in no time. Jason hoped against all odds that the giant would ignore him and walk past. The behavior of those dogs had filled him with fear but he tried to have hope. The giant was so tall that he probably wouldn't be able to see him. The giant stopped and looked down at Jason, dashing all his hopes. A dry raspy deep voice filled his head.

Mortal? 

He bent down and picked up Jason between what passed for his thumb and his index finger and placed him on his palm. The skin, if that was what it was was hot and so tough it felt like metal. His eyes teared up, all this was too real for a dream. He had injured his arm did that mean he could also die here? How did he get here? Was this hell? If it was then he was screwed, the giant would probably make him suffer more for ignoring all the teachings of the clergy back at Sancta Maria.

Yes definitely a mortal 

Jason thought that the giant sounded like someone making a minor discovery.

But it smells weak, diluted 

the giant brought his palm closer to his face or what passed for one, his head was a skull with pulsing with light. As he came closer Jason realized that the pulsing light were actually flames. The flames leapt out from his mouth like a flow of water and hit him.

You will thank me later, mortal.

Jason felt it all over his skin, his skin would melt. No, it was already melting.

He woke up on the top of his bunk bed relieved, but his skin was still burning. He pulled the sheets, jumped down and rushed to the bathroom. He put on the tap and the water steamed where it his his skin. His arms were okay but the rest of his body still burnt. He put off the taps and tried to take off his clothes. That turned out to be a mistake and a terrible one at that. The burning feeling came back hotter than it had been before. He tried to reach the sink but his arms burst into flames, the rest of his body soon followed. Out of his mind with pain he ran into the shower and put it on. He immediately felt better steam rapidly filled the bathroom. The relief overcame him and he slipped into a doze.

A startled voice woke him up.

"Jesus! Jason!!".