Four: Not Murdered

*thanks to Pat77 and biandpetty. for your support 😊*

***

Thankfully, it seemed like Sage’s diversion worked. He heard the man open a door somewhere down the hall and hoped that that would stall him for a few minutes. If he ended up checking each door that Sage had closed, then it would take even longer, giving Sage some time to think of what to do. Realistically, however, Sage was pretty sure the man was going to figure out his ruse after one room, and then probably immediately search the room he’d hidden in like a goddamn moth to a flame.

So Sage had maybe two minutes to figure out how to not die.

Maybe he could jump out the window? It was kind of a small window, though, and the drop to the ground would at the very least lead to a sprain, maybe a full break if he landed the wrong way. There were some heroes and villains out there that could make that jump no problem. Unfortunately, Sage’s power was great for stealth, not so great for helping him withstand an impact like that. Injuring himself would not only be a bitch, but it would also slow him down, and the man would catch him anyway.

Aside from hiding, which was only a temporary solution, Sage could only fight him. But he couldn’t do it with his bare hands, so Sage quickly moved to the edge of the bed and peeked out from under the cover, scanning the room for something he could use as a weapon.

And then, like the heavens were blessing him, in a stream of moonlight, Sage saw a metal baseball bat leaning against the wall by the nightstand – probably there in case there were intruders that got past the alarms. Or maybe this family just liked playing baseball, hard to say.

Like a snake, Sage slid halfway out from under the bed to snatch it, pulling it back with him. There. Now he was armed. Unless the man had a knife or a gun on him, the playing field was a little more even now. Hopefully.

But now that Sage had some hope of surviving this situation, he was eager to use everything at his disposal to disorient the man. Now that he had the bat and his only way out of this was to fight, it wasn’t as imperative to hear where the man was. If Sage saw him look under the bed, he was going to poke him in the eye with the bat hard enough to blind him. So, why not use his power and make it harder for the man to find him?

When Sage used his power at full strength, those closest to it could almost feel as if they had gone deaf. That alone might confuse his attacker enough to make him leave.

And it wasn’t a moment too soon, because just as Sage had the thought to use his power, he heard extremely light footsteps pressing into the plush carpet of the room he was in. The man had, as expected, figured out Sage’s misdirection.

Just like before, Sage heard the footsteps making a beeline to Sage’s hiding spot, as if the man had x-ray vision. Sage concentrated, allowing his power to flow free, and then everything went unnaturally quiet. Sage couldn’t hear his breathing anymore, couldn’t hear the footsteps. The distant chirp of crickets outside the house vanished. The rushing of air in the house’s heating vents cut off as if someone had turned off the power. Even the occasional whoosh of a car passing by on the street outside was gone.

Sage concentrated his gaze on the bedspread, vigilant for any sign of movement. There was the teeniest little gap between the bedspread and the floor, so Sage watched for movement in the small bit of light that seeped through. There wasn’t any movement, but after looking for a moment, Sage thought he saw two black boots standing about two feet away from the bed and unconsciously held his breath, though it would make no difference.

With utter silence enveloping them, Sage felt a bead of sweat rolling down his neck. Why wasn’t the man moving? Sure, experiencing Sage’s power for the first time would be shocking. Definitely concerning if you didn’t know what was causing it. You would legitimately think something was wrong with your hearing. This very phenomenon had given Sage openings he would never have had normally when he was pulling heists. He had once robbed a high security bank uptown and the only reason he was able to get into the vault was because the guard on duty was so worried that he’d suddenly gone deaf that he abandoned his post to go see a doctor.

Most people didn’t realize how important their hearing was until they lost it. While sight is the sense people rely upon most heavily, hearing is just as vital, not only for communication, but also for safety – you’re more likely to hear a threat before you see it, and intuitively, when people lose their hearing, they feel more in danger, even if they’re not in a particularly dangerous environment.

So Sage understood why the man was suddenly giving pause. Now Sage just had to wait and see if losing his hearing freaked the man out enough to make him leave.

Sage was watching those boots unblinkingly, so he saw the moment one took a small step closer to the bed, and then, as if rethinking it, it pulled back. Finally, Sage saw the boots flex – as if the person wearing them was crouching, which, not gonna lie, kind of freaked Sage out. He gripped the bat tighter, pulling it up slightly. The second that bedcover even twitched, Sage would be ready for it.

But a full minute passed, and there was no movement. So what was the man doing out there? Waiting for Sage to come out himself? Fuck that. Sage was staying under here, where he had some semblance of protection.

But then, alarmingly, the boots un-flexed, and then turned around, leaving Sage’s limited view.

Was…was he gone? Maybe he was just looking somewhere else. Sage waited, and kept his power going, just in case.

He waited a full half hour, just to be safe. Eventually, the waiting was starting to drive Sage crazy, and so, still holding the bat, he slowly clambered out from under the bed. The man was no longer in the room, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t still in the house.

Sage crept down the stairs to the first floor, pointing the bat at every shifty-looking shadow, paranoid. But it seemed that the man had really left. And, after checking the grandfather clock in the den, Sage knew he had to leave too – the family that owned the house was due to get back in the next few minutes. Damn. Sage hadn’t even had time to steal anything. He still couldn’t be found in here. Getting caught on breaking and entering and not theft would be a blow to Sage’s pride, personally, so without a moment to spare, he slipped out the front door and slinked into the shadows between this house and the neighbor’s house. Not a moment too soon – headlights flashed across the lawn as the family’s car pulled into the driveway.

It wasn’t until he got home and stripped out of his disguise that Sage had time to think about what in the goddamn hell had happened tonight.

It didn’t make any sense. If that man had been there to stop Sage from stealing, he would have just chased Sage away from the property. Sage had tried to flee. But then the man practically pushed him into the house. Whatever his goal, it couldn’t have been just to stop Sage, right? So then, why? Just what was the purpose of all that?

Sage’s only thought was murder. That dude was probably a serial killer or some shit. He must have enjoyed chasing Sage around the house, watching Sage panic.

But that didn’t feel totally right to Sage either, and it was bugging him. He couldn’t sleep after all that adrenaline anyway, so he Googled. He wasn’t likely to find anything, but it couldn’t hurt to check. Or so he thought.

After typing in “Fairview,” and “cloaked man,” he got an immediate hit. It was a news article, and the picture they used for it was definitely the guy who’d been chasing him. There was no doubt about it.

Sage read the whole article. Then he read another article, and another. And with every word, his blood pressure rose more and more.

It was a goddamn hero. A real asshole one, by the sounds of it.

Despite figuring out just who he’d been playing hide and seek with tonight, Sage still had no answers for why this hero, Lich, thought that he needed to trap Sage in that house and hunt him down like an animal. That was fucked up.

Sage was pissed, sure, but he went to sleep that night comforting himself with the knowledge that he would probably never see that Lich guy again.

Two days later, Sage was proven wrong about that.