#1-800-missing

“Mastriani! Mastriani! Mastriani. Hey, Mastriani.  Hey, are you alright?” “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” “Yeah?” “Yeah.” “Good.  Good.” “I don’t think I can stand though.” “Lock your knees.” “No, I, uh...Can I lean on you, sir?  Thank you, sir.” “It’s alright. Okay, Mastriani?” “Yes, sir?” “You don’t tell anyone about this?  It, uh, doesn’t help my image.” “Yes, sir.”

Jess was silent as she leaned against the counter in her kitchen. A long since cold cup of coffee was in her hands as she took the occasional sip. Her senses had all been dumbed down since she heard the words that crossed the lips of Colin. SHe hadn’t reacted much then; even if she knew what was coming, nothing could have prepared her for the words.

In the year since they broke up, Jess had thrown herself into her work. Her visions had been more frequent, helping solve cases faster, but at the cost of her emotions. It felt as if she had made a deal that took away a smidge more of real emotions every time she got a vision. The power she had didn’t seem like a gift anymore, it felt like a curse.

She had gotten a dog to help herself fight against the slipping emotions. A two-year-old Italian Wolf Dog named Rush that was rescued from a hoarder. Said dog was laying down on her feet.

Sprawled across the counter were drawings of the women from her visions made by one of the sketch artists Jess had secretly gone to from the Bureau. Papers that held every detail of the repeating visions of them were set in a crude mimicry of a stack.

“This is pointless,” she muttered as she grabbed the papers and put them in the respective folders. Each of the women had their own folder.

 Bartender (The big fish in the unexplored ocean)

Photographer (The closed book)

Punk (Rebel with a cause)

Gardener (The tree from which apples fall)

She didn’t know what made her put those changed idioms next to the titles. When she had been writing down the information, she had subconsciously wrote them down. It was clear what the changed sayings meant, but why they were accurate—if they were—wasn’t clear.

Glancing at the clock on her microwave, she noted that she still had about an hour until she had to start getting ready. She slid her feet out from under Rush, waking him up.

“Hey, pretty boy,” she cooed as she sat on the floor next to him. Her hands went up and down his back and scratched through the thick fur.

He plopped his head in her lap and seemed to smile up at her around the ball in his mouth. It was his favorite ball; a black ball with blue birds as the pattern. His stubby tail smacked against the ground and he dropped the ball in his human’s lap.

A small smile appeared on Jess’ lips as she grabbed it and rolled it across the floor to the other side of the apartment. He chased after the ball like he was training for the Olympics.

Jess sat in her car for a few minutes, gazing into the rearview mirror. Her eyelids were currently drooping and made her look like she was about to fall asleep. She forced her eyelids to open more and let the LED lights above give a small shine to her eyes. Her lips twitched upwards to show a relaxed smile.

She climbed out of her car, closed the door, and locked it. Most of her attention was focused on keeping her smile in the fixed position on her face.

Colin had taught her a few tricks on how to keep her cover if she were to ever be sent out undercover again. The main thing she remembered was to ignore how her FBI training wanted to act. Act how she wanted to be perceived.

The elevator opened up and she stepped out of it. She let her feet lead her over where her team currently stood; in front of the boards used to keep track of information during a case.

“Hey, guys,” she said, raising her hand up to greet them.

“Mastriani, you’re late,” Pollock said, striding out of his office with papers in his hand.

“I, uh, traffic was backed up on 3rd Street.” Jess lowered her hand and stood between Antonio and Nicole as Pollock put the papers on the board.

Nicole grinned playfully at Jess. “Was Rush keeping you behind?”

“Markus Owens, age 43, self-described as the ‘son of Mars’, thus the name change from Bobby Winters. Lives in Charles Village, Baltimore.” Pollock turned to face the three of them. “He used to be one of us, but was put on indefinite leave after suffering from a psychotic breakdown a few years ago.”

“What made him break down?” Nicole stepped forward and investigated the photo like it would start speaking and say where Markus was.

Pollock turned and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “An official report was never officially entered into the databases. Cortez work on getting us that report. Scott and Masriani, I want you questioning the neighboors—take the jet. Away with you, my underlings.”

Jess nodded and turned back around to headed to the elevator. She pulled her badge from her pocket and reached for the button.

Nicole grabbed her wrist and pulled her to the side out of the way. “Jess, we need to talk.”

Jess gave a confused look. “About what?” She pushed her hands into her back pockets as she looked at the other woman.

“Look, I know that a breakup can be hard—” Nicole glanced away for a moment— “but, please know that I’m here for you. All of us are, even Pollock.”

The hands in her pockets curled to fists. Jess was fine. Sure, she was a little bit sad, but who wouldn’t be?

“I know, and thank you.” With those words, the two of them stepped into the elevator together.

Jess grabbed her phone and put it up to her ear when it rang. “Mastriani.”

“‘Hey, Jess, I finally got a list of the neighboors,’” Antonio said as the clacking of computer keys became background noise. “‘You’d probably want to start with a woman named ‘Icarus Lazar’.”

Jess furrowed her brows as she put the phone on speaker. “‘Icarus Lazar’? That’s a strange name. What else can you tell us?”

“‘Used to live in Rionmas, but immigrated to the U.S. about 5 years ago. Bartender by night, street musician by day.’”

“Isn’t Rionmas the country that had their prince kidnapped a few years ago?” Nicole asked.

“‘He abdicated the throne, actually. That was a popular theory that never died down. Regardless, many didn’t like the next in line, so they left the country. Icarus was just one of many.’”

Jess peered out of the window to watch the land below slowly pass by. “Why should we start with her?”

A bartender bathed in purple light, pouring five dark drinks into glasses with ice shaped like skulls. A photographer swimming in blue light as bloody hands take pictures with a polaroid camera. A blue-haired punk with sharp teeth who floated in red light posing for the photo. A gardener burying a bundle of rags and caring for the blue flowers around the hole. All of them, and her, grabbing one of the drinks and draining it as white light blinded her.

That was the rather grim vision Jess got often after Colin and her broke up. No matter how much she searched for those four, nothing appeared in any of the places she looked. She couldn’t interpret the vision, even with the remainder of her support system trying to help her.

Icarus moved to D.C. to start her own life and be free to do whatever she wanted.

Max and Chloe moved to D.C. to leave behind the wreckage and escape the memories of the storm.

Florence moved to D.C. to plant her roots after moving around the country for over a decade with her family.

Five girls from entirely different walks of life all meet at once on one fateful night behind a bar. Each of them were carrying the weight of countless secrets on their backs as fate chose to push them ever closer.

Powers outside of imagination warn of something that can collide dozens of different worlds and have threats cross over to where they don’t belong. The only ones who could gather the defenders of worlds are four idiots with supernatural powers, the only one with common sense who gets high on drinking blood, and an immortal dog.

Even if they are unable to save dozens of worlds, they’ll be in for a hell of a ride.

Masterlist

CHAPTERS

Chapter 1: Little Miss Smile