Battle Mage Chapter 21 A

The day leading up to Carlos and Lukes meeting. Anna has a fateful encounter.

Jules was still in the hospital. They had begun to suspect he would be on his merry way out soon and everyone found an urgency to come back to their own lives and personal drama that followed. Anna forgot she needed to be distant from Carlos. She let her guard down for a moment when they were together as a team but it was a slippery slope to going back to fawning at his doorstep for a man who did not love her in return. Not after all that happened in the past.

    It was day time, Anna had a paper to run. She spent that early morning being fashionably late to work. At her somewhat luxorious house that she bought, a testament to her independent personality she liked to project for the world. A small voice in her head was worried they might tune in on her secret. She thought she played a good poker face on a daily basis and realized only Jessica of the group of friends was the one who truly knew her.

    Not completely true. Like any group of friends, there are alone times with others. Jules always had this passive gift to see her with her guard down. She remembered he was the first person she told when she started having sex with Carlos in high school. She remembered his eyes looking at her indifferent and non judgemental as she was the first of their click to engage in the adult world. He still treated her the same and she loved him for it. She could tell him she killed someone and he would still invite her to his birthday.

    They had been friends since grade school and she could see the group sitting around in the corner of the room talking about how they could actively use magic, like kids playing pretend. She saw Timothy there too.

    Anna was in her car, checking her lipstick, did it say “boss” enough? She smiled at the moment of nostalgia. Timothy as a child had the same effect Jules had.

    She didn’t tell anyone that she visited him in jail a couple months ago.

    He acted strange and different and for the life of her she couldn’t see why Carlos insisted on making a villian of him. The cautionary tale of when one turns the dark path of magic. But she could still see the scraggely hair kid that had been so sweet to her when they first decided to become friends. The adult, prison toughened, version of Timothy may have seem neutral, but she felt him still in there.

    “I have a dark secret.” She told him.

    The car passed into the meat and potatoes of the downtown district. She could see the precinct two blocks from her destination. Jules would not be there today for her to kidnap him for lunch. City hall was four blocks north. She felt anger at the thought of trying to act like her and Carlos could be a couple again. A dark thought popped into her head; one of bitterness and anger. She had to breathe in and not think about it or it would be all she would think on.

    The streets were getting condensed as the downtown district buildings were seemingly designed for people smaller in size and tight as possible. She found her allyway though. She turned into it and it opened into a massive five story parking lot. The parking guard, known as “The Parking God,” titled his hat as she flashed her press badge.

    “Boss lady, it is a pleasure to see you as always.” She looked at him and saw a man with grey hair, elegant, and in his fifties or such. She never really bothered learning his real name but she knew he was an institution. He had been working as the parking guard before she worked started as an intern and some how she knew he would outlive her career as the head of the paper. The building could have her name on it, but come a hurricane and her grave, The Parking God would still be working there.

    His name tag said “Hello my name is Steve.” She looked back at him and smiled and as she did on a daily basis, forgot his name immediately and went on with her life.
‘
    She parked her car and began her adventure of the day. It would be one thing to take the access door to the back of the building and work her way inside. She however found more joy walking the side route. The exit was a minute walk in the cold enclosed space of the parking structure. There was a gate that required a key to open from the outside. She flung it open without giving it much thought and continued on her path around the side of the building.

    The main road was filled with one way traffic and she could see the people lined up in the coffee shop next door. Some poor person panhandling outside the jewish deli that had the worst pastromi she ever had. They had better coffee though and was a regular there. She felt the jealousy of the coffee shop. She was too late to grab a bite and coffee. The shadow of the buildings sign and the second story that threatened to stretch over the street greeted her feet. She was now standing at the massive two door entrance.

    This is why on a daily basis she walked around to the front, for this view. She could feel the people walking past her in their own lives. Her job was to record their lives, find the story in them. The other view was being able to see the people shuffle around. The entire city, and even parts of the country were being summed up in thoughts and expressions right in front of her as her staff worked like ants around the reception area and beyond. To her, it was the joy of walking in the front gate to her kingdom, and being recognized by the receptionist. To have that world stop at a pin drop of her entering and to wait on her. She had a power in this world that was not just magic based and a small kingdom of her own that could send waves rippling endlessly among the millions of people in the city.

    “Chief! Welcome!” The receptionist Gale stood up. She immediately forgot what the proper protocol was and began to scuffle about.

    “Contact my secretary immediately. I need an investigative piece compiled before the day is over.”

    “Contact Laura in the top office? Got it! Is there anything else ma’am?”

    “Any important calls?”

    “We have been told that you have an important guest coming in at an hours time. More than that, there is nothing worth your time.”

    “Good job Gale.” Anna smiled to herself as she made her way upstairs.

    Her first stop was the fancy elevator in the lobby next to the two shabby elevators. Her special one was a left over of the building designer. They felt a strait up to the main floor would be a great centerpiece. Anna liked to think it was her idea retroactively. She would pat herself on the back as she got inside.

    Vintage jazz played her in and the door closed around her. As she turned around, she could see the outside, the city alive. It was not as pretty of a view as it was at night. The sun seemed to dull the colors and take any mistique away from her as it begun its ascent. She felt the floor of the elevator want to push to her chest for a moment but then the ride became smooth.

    A womans voice came over the elevator speakers. “This is Alicia Banhara of City News. Last night…”

    They already updated their daily pod cast it looked like. Every morning at nine in the morning, Alicia Banhara, some exotic attraction of a voice would come in and ready the early morning headlines. It was their way of keeping the work place organized and up to speed on the developments in the town. Plus two of her staffers stated they actually looked forward to Alicia’s daily sound bites more than anything at work. She could see past the buildings in the distance and to the historic houses, and the horizon of the rest of the city that followed. The bell would ring any second stating she had reached her destination.

    The door opened with a ring.

    Project confidence. She told herself as she strode forward like the girl arriving to her prom in a scene stealing dress for the first kiss scene. She forgot that her left bangs went a bit wild and found herself trying to replace them. She was hopiong no one was noticing.

    “Morning Chief!” An annoying voice said.

    S**t.


    Anna had spent the last ten minutes scrolling the local news and checking the pulse to see if there was any mention of anything about the fallout of the Museum. Silence. Good. When she had to personally go out of her way to cover up stories of their group activities and keep them off the radar, she felt she was a cleaner and Carlos was calling the shots. They did run a story on a break in at the musuem. She kept it on page eight. The fun details were gone.

    There was a satisfaction of running the story right under the towns nose. See what we just did? I bet you don’t even notice. Carlos could get over his own ego. She was important too, her work was important.

    “Chief?” The voice from the intercom came on. It was Laura, her secretary.

    “How comes today’s issue?” Was the response to the intercom.

    “We hit a snag ma’am.”

    “I am not a fan of that word. The last time we hit a set of snags, the person who kept hitting them was let go and they havent found work in town again.”

    “Our front page story is short on interviews and sources. Jon wont make deadline about the electrical grid fraud.”

    Anna let her mind wander for two seconds as iff she was allowing her braint to fall asleep. She was collecting the head of Jon James, her star reporter. She had recruited him from the only other major news magazine in the state. Lately he had found a new girl and whiskey was taking him.

    “Run something political, something easy. I am sure Terry and Nathaniel would like a front page story. Give it to them. Tell Jon we are going to need to have a talk about his slipping the soap at around three. That is when I will be free.”

    “Yes ma’am.”

    “Anything else before I start to play solitaire on my computer for the next hour or so?”

    “Your meeting scheduled with Canada Corp…”

    She had forgotten about them.

Thirty minutes passed before she even bothered opening solotaire on her computer. She had found herself glancing through emails of endless drivel, office drama, and who was sleeping with whom. Two kids downstairs apparently thought they could be next to take her job and she sent the editor of the sports section to nip that insurection in the bud, There was a message from Jules. This was days old but with him still in the hospital she found herself reading it one more time. It was a light update of the serial killer case. Anna had managed to dig up lost family and relatives to the Garner case but no matter what digging they did… there was a void.

    The way these murders were done did suggest that there was an audience in mind and then a silence came over the town. He had stopped apparently. If he was a true journalist, that muscle in the back of her mind was telling her that the truth was things were about to get weirder. Enter two dead state senators.

    Senator Harkins was a loyal democrat. He ran on a platform to build new youth centers and renovate the downtown district, again. It had already been renovated when the rich people started to move in and skyrocket value. The impoverished stood their ground and the rich to poor, posh to squalor ratios was like a checkerboard. All he did was vote against the mayor. Anna met him a couple times when he was insisting on getting a ringing endoursement from the paper. She threw wine on his elitist suit.

    Fun fact, Anna was a democrat. Fun fact, Senator Harkins was an chauvinist a*****e who didn’t want to pay taxes.

    Senator Thomas was a republican with no personality of his own. He looked like he was the jock Carlos would get competitive with but decided once he wore the suit, any free will of his own disappeared. The republican senator had daddy issues. She listened to the psychatrist’s tapes. Family came first on Thomas’s platform. He also humped anything that moved. His wife left him a year ago right after election when he had been found with a scar on him. A prostitute had cut him after he overplayed his hand. The problem might have gone away but daddy wasn’t alive to bury this skeleton. He likely wasn’t going to win re-election anyway.

    The two had no connection other than occupation and their constant fighting each other in debate and votes downtown. She saw their pictures of the bodies. They had both defensive bruising. The story would blow up over night, she knew it. She just wasn’t sure, knowing Carlos and her own thoughts on the matter, just how deep Jules would need to probe as their detective enforcer. With the Celebrity Hunter still out there, discretion would be very important.

    “We have nothing on them.” Laura handed her a file.

    They were getting ready for war. Anna had rarely been wrong in these instances. A shady company buying up land that belongs to the state, then asks for a meeting with the head of the local paper. They may as well buy West Park and turn it into a hotel.

    Linda nodded as if thinking what her boss was, “They were first heard of a week ago. That is all we know of them. I don’t know where they have gained access to their war chest but digging shows they have set up a massive account. Our business would make enemies of them at our peril.”

    “Never met a fatted calf I didn’t want to slaughter.” Anna was signaling that their job was not to humble before the new wave of money coming in the city.

    “We found evidence that three state legislators and senators are already in their pocket.”

    “Can we publish?”

    “The source isn’t valid enough to print.”

    “Then this is war my friend.”

    “A pleasure serving with you general.” Linda looked honestly at her boss. The truth was they had made a lot of enemies over the majority of the past decade. Anna had earned a bull reputation that made her respected and feared among the upper crust.

    The lone figure knocked on the door. It did not care that it was a fish out of water. There was a boldness in her coming alone to face the dragons. Or perhaps it thought it was a dragon itself. Anna closed her eyes and sensed a quiet spirit. That was the aura it was giving off. The voice in her head however told her that a mortal enemy was walking in the gates.

    The door knob began its twist and sound as the shadow stopped in front of the door.

    She seemed unassuming at first, almost petite. She walked in and turned around to close the door behind her. The folders she was carying were bigger than her for arms. Anna gauged that meant she was trying to make her business look bigger with massive folders. Cute.

    It was when Chelsea Close and Anna locked eyes that Anna realized she was off on her first impression.

    “You must be Chelsea Close, of Canada Corp?” Anna stood up and smiled, she held out her hand.

    “I am, it is a pleasure to meet you Mrs,,,”
    
    She felt the jab. It was a cheap shot but it was out from the gate and delibrate.

    “Just call me Anna. If we are going to have a working relationship I would like us to go by first names. Can we do that for the remainder of the meeting?” Anna opened her arms a bit as if to signifying an ease of tension in the room. The b***h responded by smiling.

    “I am Linda. I am Ms…”

    “So lets get strait to business.”

    Chelsea sat down and began putting her folders down on the big meeting room table. There was the image in Anna’s mind of just the three of them in the meeting room, a long round table with three seats in proximity occupied while most of the lights dim and the sun coming in was blocked. There was more quiet available than their presence.

    “Yes, that is a good idea. Do you mind if I start, before we go with this conversation, what exactly is CanaCor?

    “We are a group of exectuives with fresh eyes that are looking to invest in renovation in areas that a re filled with massive potential and growth.”

    “That is a very strait forward answer. But I mean I always look into who I am going to be talking with and you seemed to make this meeting very important. So I notice that only a week ago, you guys never existed. What is a company from another country, with a massively unoriginal name, doing in the south west coast of America?”

    “We have been around for some time. You probably only heard of us recently as we have been trying to keep a low profile. We feel that if we were to make loud annnouncements and out intentions known, competitiors might want to rise to the occasion and corner us out of the market.”

    “Corner the market? Right now, you are trying to gobble up land that doesn’t exist and you worry they will corner you?”

    “I am sure you know what it is like. Men. They have their toys and their fancies. But with the board mostly men, they felt a great way to show their solidarity to this city, their commitment to this city, would be to build a foundation in the old castle off the highway.”

    “Ah yes, speaking of men. Why are you here alone? Where is, oh what was his name, your boss. Mr. Chester Smith?”

    “My boss currently is scheduled to meet with the Mayor to look over certain plans containing our expansion into the city.”

    Anna leaned in, “You make it sound like an invasion.”

    “We are only bringing in our money to stimulate your economy.”

    Anna felt the room change. It was her intuition talking to her.

    “Linda, my frined, I appear to need to have some coffee from next door. Can you please run across the street and grab me my usual. I did not have time this morning to partake in my daily joy.”

    Words were about to get more intense in the room and Linda, understood that her boss was asking for the floor to herself.

    “Ill get it right away.”

    Linda walked out of the room.

    “Well that was a bit harsh.” Chelsea seemed to act surprised as Linda left.

    “Do you believe in magic?”

    “I am afraid I don’t follow.”

    Anna  leaned in and placed her hands together under her nose in contemplation.

    “I am serious, do you believe in magic?”

    “I still…”

    “I have met a lot of people that have come and go through these doors. They look like you or me. And every time I meet someone knew, in order to understand them I ask them this one basic question. Do you believe in magic?”

    Chelsea had taken her hands away from her folders. She moved them aside. It was a battle stance.

    “Yes.”

    “Would you care to eleborate?”

    There was silence but Anna understood their was a thickening in the air.

    “I have asked this question of so many people,” Anna continued. “And of these people most say ‘no.’ Some talk about God and his power. Every once in awhile someone crazy reveals their true self when you ask them if they believe and they just wont stop talking. Those are the people you need to cut out immediately and lock the door after them. You on the other hand are as sane as can be. And you answered yes. So let me ask, what are you doing in my paper. Why do you want a meeting with me?”

    “In the coming days, my boss and I will be making some moves around town.”

    “What kind of…”

    “You don’t get to know that. That is not your business.”

    “It is literally, my business.”

    “No it is not. Your business is to sell papers and stay afloat. I will sue you and destroy this entire s**t operation you have here if you so much give us a passing mention.”

    Anna was not expecting this level of resistance. This was worse than war.

    “I have here your salary’s worth as a non profit donation to this glorious company of yours. Refuse it, and I am sure we can discuss with your parent company how badly you dropped the ball during this meeting and we decided to take our donation else where.”

    “I take it the donation comes with stipuilations.”

    “Or we could go after your job and take and this paper down. You really have no say in any of this.”

    “I don’t take black mail well.”

    “I could also tell them about that other thing.”

    The pulsating air turned into a quiet pause.

    “What thing?”

    “I am pretty decent and doing some digging at my own. Like how you have f**k history staff members and a person who is currently advisor to the mayor. Massive conflict of interest. And that is not even the thing.”

    “What thin…”

    “Maurice.” It was a name. Just a name. It was a threat that made Anna remember the time she almost killed herself. In this word, she saw the Grim Reaper smiling at her.

    Anna wanted to recoil into a ball but then another voice came from her own lips. This voice only responded with agression. “If you know that name, are you sure you should be threatening me?”

    “My conditions are simple. Accept our money, keep your nose out of our business and you and your company might survive to see the next fall edition. I do not believe in prolonging our game. I will take my leave.”

    The b***h stood up like nothing of any importance happened. She left the files on the desk. Anna walked closer to the files to look at them, she turned back to her departing guest, “Until next time Chelsea.”

    Chelsea met her gaze in defiance. “It is Ms. Close to you. I am not your friend.”


    He had thought Luke was his friend. His house was on fire. He had just lost everthing but instead of fighting back, all Carlos could do was ask for it all to stop. Luke yelled but Carlos couldn’t understand what he was saying as the next fist cracked into his nose.

    In a moment of clarity, Carlos put his hand out, and dug into the void to summon his armor. He needed something heavy to sustain him from the constant physical attack that seemed to have no direction or end. Before the armor could manifest, Luke sent a firm kick right into Carlos’s sternum. He felt the crack give into the weight.

    The shock stopped his lungs. Carlos couldn’t breath.

Author's Note

So I hit a pacing snag. Because of how I pictured the chapter as three scenes I figured it would be an injustice to not have Chapter 22 not be Jules centric. As such this chapter is to be split in two parts. Let me know what you think.