Prologue
Inside one of the city’s largest banks, the two security guards lay on the ground clutching their shoulders as blood oozed out of the bullet wound as each had a bank robber pointing their AK-47 at their heads while two others watched the customers and bank tellers.

“Anyone who lowers their hands will get a bullet in their skull,” one of the bank robbers said. Five more where in the volt stuffing duffle bags. It was tough to see because of their Halloween masks. Outside the bank, a man stat in a minivan waiting for his companions, his right leg twitching as every car drove by.

“Come on, come on. Hurry up will you,” he muttered as his paranoia started to spike when a white car drove by. The five men in the safe hopped over the counter and rushed outside as the four in the lobby followed them into the minivan and sped off, nearly taking out an unmarked police car.

“Damn it Craig, try not to draw too much attention to us,” the bank robber in the passenger seat said. He had on a clown mask with blue jeans and a Christmas sweater.

“Sorry Jerry, I’m just a little nervous is all. We’ve talked about this for months but actually doing it is easier said than done,” Craig said. He wore a Michel Myers mask with a blue jump suit.

“As long as we can actually disappear and not get caught. I’m ok with it. This city owes it to me after everything the fucking governor has done,” one of the bank robber said in the back.

Soon the robbers heard the sound of police sirens as Craig punched the steering wheel and yelled, “Damn, I knew this was a bad idea. I should have listened to my wife and never gone through with this.”

“Calm down Craig, just turn down the next street and head to the docks. I’ve got a plan,” Jerry said. Craig hesitated as his paranoia started to grow. Everything that could happen went through his head, but his body made the decision for him as he turned down Silver Street and headed towards the docks as three cop cars followed them. The sun started to set as darkness fell on the city filled with red and blue flashing lights.
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One of the bank robbers, who had on a scream Halloween mask with grey ripped pants and a yellow shirt, looked out the window and snarled at all the police officers waiting for them.

“Damn it, look at all of them, how the hell are we going to get out alive,” he yelled. Jerry just sighed before he walked over to him and smacked him on the top of his head before saying, “Keep calm Dave. We have the warehouse workers as hostages.”

“I know Jerry, but I only agreed to this so I can help my kids. You promised me I wouldn’t have to worry about getting caught and being sent to jail. Now, I don’t know what to believe. I should have never done this, I should have never agreed to this. I’ll never see Jason grow up, I won’t be able to walk Amy down the aisle,” Dave said.

One of the robbers saw something out of the corner of his eye and pointed his AK-47 at a dark corner of the warehouse. He squinted to see in the darkness before three shurikens flew from the darkness and pierced into his chest making him pull the trigger as he fell. The other five bank robbers looked at their fallen comrade and started shooting in all directions before their clips were empty. While they were reloading another gunman was swept off his feet and dragged into the darkness before his screams where silenced. Those who remained struggled to reload their weapons, but a figure appeared and attacked another robber. Kicking and punching him furiously before his body fell to the ground and the figure disappeared into the darkness.

Two more were taken out by shurikens. Dave dropped his weapon and ran, leaving Jerry to fend for himself. His calm demeanor turned to terror as he threw his AK on the ground and raised his hands in defeat.

“I give, don’t kill me bro,” he yelled. The figure walked of the shadows in front of him. The figure had go-go black boots, plain white sweat pants, and hoodie. The figure said nothing before round house kicking Jerry in the back of the head. The figure then freed the hostages and disappeared into the darkness.

Chapter One

Serenity stood in the middle of the city watching it burn. Her body couldn’t move and she couldn’t scream for help. It was like she was a statue watching the city be reduced to ash. Her body was suddenly lifted up and taken to another part of the city. As she did, the fire started to slowly burn out and soon disappeared. She now floated in a dark city with an orange glow from all the windows but the dim lighting did little to help. Her body set down on the smoking blacktop. She saw two figures in the distance but where too far away to make out who or what they were. Her legs started to move on their own and as she got closer her eyes started to widen as fear and anger filled her body. Her sister lay on the ground, her eyes staring at her but showed nothing. No life, no gleam, nothingness. They seemed to be nothing but to empty hollow caves and standing over her was a dark figure with a sadistic crooked smile and glowing blood red eyes.

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Serenity quickly sat up with cold sweat dripping from her brow. She was breathing heavily before she placed her hand over her face and sighed. That damn bastard. Serenity thought before she looked over at the clock. Three in the morning. She rolled over and tried to fall back asleep and finally after an hour of tossing and turning, she finally fell asleep. After her alarm clock went off at nine she was up and dressed in grey sneakers, ripped Blue jeans, and a red shirt that had the words, “Make like a hockey player and go puck yourself.”

She met her three friends, Trish, Trixie, and Jessie in the dining hall. All four had been best friends since kindergarten. Trixie was in to punk rock so she had on black attire with the skulls, spikes, and evil looking crosses. Trish was more the book worm with thick library glasses and a long tie-dye dress. Jessie was more the business type and wore business attire like a white blouse and black skirt.

When Serenity sat down, Trixie looked up and said, “Sup,” before going back to texting her new boyfriend.

“Could you stop texting Zack for five seconds to actually be sociable? It’s like you’re not even here when you two are texting each other,” Jessie said.

“His name is Base, not Zack,” Trixie yelled before going back to texting.

“Isn’t,” Serenity said before Trish interrupted, “His name’s Zack but he likes to be called Base.” Serenity nodded before yawning and almost falling asleep in her bowl of knockoff lucky charms.

“Hey, Serenity, you ok. You seem to be out of it today,” Trish said.

“Yeah, I just didn’t get enough sleep last night,” Serenity said before yawning again.

“Another nightmare?” Jessie asked. Serenity just nodded before Trixie said, “You should write a song about it. It might help soothe your soul.”

“That’s actually not a bad idea, many great writers us their tragedies in their books. Some became great sellers,” Trish said.

“I really don’t want to write something down just to remember it, I’ve already been to therapy because of it,” Serenity said.

“I know you miss Daisy, we all do, but suppressing your feelings isn’t good for you,” Jessie said.

“Besides, what you’re doing now won’t bring her back,” Trish said. Serenity looked at them confused. Trish just sighed before she whispered, “You’re little parading out at night in the city.”

“Why are you worrying so much, I graduated top of my class in Taekwondo, and know a little bit in Judo. What could possibly happen,” Serenity said.

“For one, you could be killed. What could possibly possess you to do something like that?” Jessie said.

“I’m going to get the bastard that killed my sister. The cops couldn’t catch him, so until I get him or kill him rather. I’ll never stop,” Serenity said.

After the four ate, they each went their separate ways to their classes. The campus was 150 acres of classrooms, dorms, and three different dining halls. The school was in the middle of the city. It was easy to get lost in it, but since this was Serenity’s second year there, she knew the place like the back of her hand.

After her last class ended at six, she left the college and walked home to her apartment which was barely five minutes away from the school. She walked past a large stone sign that said, “Cashwood Apartments” and proceed to apartment 24, opened the door, and placed her keys in a glass bowl next to the door. Her cat trotted over to her and meowed her greetings as she rubbed against Serenity’s legs. Serenity patted her on the head before walking over to the fridge and took out the rest of last night’s Chinese takeout. She sat down in front of the TV and watched what she had DVRed while she was at her classes.

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It was the same routine every morning; Serenity had the same nightmare that would shot her out of a sound sleep in a cold sweat. This particular morning was different, not because of the nightmare, she still had that. She actually slept through her alarm which was odd for her since her alarm clock was so loud it could wake the dead. She was rushing out the door and to the campus to get to her first class at noon. Her hair was in a mess, her black shirt with pink spray panted roses was wrinkled, and her blue jeans still had stains of last night’s dinner. Her first class was her most hated class in the world, Algebra. She would have missed it, if not for the fact that she was failing.

She couldn’t understand why she needed to know why X equaled the square root of pie or how negative twenty-two can become positive fourteen to be a veterinarian. None of this was necessary for it; she already knew how to count, Sesame Street and elementary school saw to that. If anyone came into the office saying their dog is a negative ten and they wanted it to be a positive four, then she would send them to a mental hospital and keep the dog.

She was able to get to her class room a minute before noon. She got to her seat and took out her notebook before the professor walked into the classroom and began the lesson.

The professor was a five foot three tall elderly woman that was covered in wrinkles. Serenity would always joke that she was proof positive that dinosaurs existed. She didn’t really like the professor in particular. Not because of her attitude, she was the sweetest person you would ever meet. If you asked her for a cup of sugar she’d gladly give you more then you asked, the cake mix, cream, and what good recipes her great aunt whatever made. It was her teaching style Serenity hated.

If you had a question about a particular problem or math equation, she would ask if you had read the chapter. Lying to her was futile because she was a living, breathing lie detector. She knew if you were lying and explained what pages to read to find the answer. If you did read, then she’d refer to an online article or another textbook that could help. Her tests were god awful and she always said, “Always use a number two pencil, never a pen. I’ll take points off if you use pen on anything!”

She also would refer to her old days like, “Back when I was a kid” or “When I was in school,” like anyone actually cared about what she did decades ago.

“Alright y’all, please Hand up last night’s homework, we’ll begin with chapter five, so take out your textbooks and begin with number five and work your way up to ten,” she said in a sweet southern voice. The class room filled with the sound of ruffled pages and the sound of pencils marking up papers. Serenity was hoping that if she just skimmed through the chapter before doing the work her calculator would do the rest. After an hour and fifteen minutes of the teacher going over the question, not answers questions, and assigning homework, she dismissed the class that piled out of the class room and out the building. Serenity noticed the time and walked over to the nearest dining hall. She stood outside and texted her friends saying, “Am at Sue Dining hall C U there.”

Twenty minutes later Trixie, Trish, and Jessie met her at the dining hall and sat down to eat lunch together.

“Fucking chemistry teacher said I should read the book, otherwise I might make something that could kill people,” Trixie said before taking a bite of her tuna with jalapeno peppers on potato bread. She took a sip of Pepsi before she added, “I looked at him and wanted to say good. There are a few assholes that need to be killed. If natural selection ain’t going to get rid of them, then I will. I just nodded my head and copied what the people around me did.”

“What was everyone making that could have killed people with the wrong chemicals,” Jessie asked.

“We were making fucking liquid rock candy that hardens after a while. Fucking Zack hardens faster than that shit,” Trixie yelled. Serenity almost burned herself fumbling with her spoonful of soup while Jessie started coughing after her soda nearly came bursting out her nose. Trish just stared at Trixie in disbelief that she would blurt out something that profound.

“What’s wrong with you guys,” Trixie said before consuming the rest of her sandwich.

“I don’t think you need to be projecting it to the entire campus,” Trish said before Jessie added, “So I guess you two should start studying more?”

“We study enough, but it isn’t any math or history. It’s more like physical education,” Trixie said. This time Serenity did spill a lite bit of her soup on her arm while Jessie coughed her half eaten chicken pierogi into her napkin to keep from choking on it. It didn’t take long for some of the people in the dining hall to look over at the commotion a try and ease drop on the conversation. The four soon realized this and quickly finished their meal and walked out without saying a word. The four said their goodbyes and proceeded to their next classes. Serenity walked into her next class and sat right in the front of the class. She really could care less about history and what person did what, but this class was better than any other history class to her because it was the history of medicine and today and all this week was about animal medicine.

The teacher was a retired doctor/veterinarian who had seen it all. After retirement, he went back to school to get his teaching degree and teach future doctors and veterinarians. He was a very skilled teacher because he could refer the material back to his experience and sometimes he actually argued that the textbook was wrong because as he quoted, “No textbook has ever preformed open heart surgery, nor has anyone who wrote a textbook.” After all her classes, she went back home and began working on her school work before she fell asleep at the table.

Chapter Two

It was the same thing every morning; she had the same nightmare that woke her up early in the morning. She would sit in the dark trying to collect her thoughts before laying back down and going back to sleep.
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She sat in the dining hall with her friends, but along with them was Trixie’s new boyfriend Zack. He looked like the typical punk rocker with his buzz cut hair, ear rings and nose rings, black shirt with skull printed designs, arm bands with spikes, and skinny black pants. The two were all hugging and kissing each other.

“No dignity in their love, just make out right in front of everyone,” Trish said. Some of the dining hall had started to stare at the table while the two continued.

“Trixie, Trixie! Everyone’s staring,” Jessie whispered. Trixie looked at the three before sighing and the two stopped their little show and started eating their lunch.

“So this is Zack huh,” Serenity said.

“His name’s Base,” Trixie snarled.

“Don’t worry about it babe, it really doesn’t bother me. That’s my stage name for the band,” Zack said. It wasn’t a very thrilling conversation because when Trish, Jessie or Serenity tried to spark a conversation, Zack would change it to his band and what they’re doing or Trixie would change it to what Zack was doing. In the end, all the three got out of Zack was that his band was either trying to find a record deal or trying to find a gig to become famous.

By the time all of them left the dining hall and headed for their classes, Serenity was already sick of any mention of Zack’s band, “Car Crash on the Scenic Route.” She headed to her next class which was Business Law 102, a class she enjoyed because of the fact that all the tests were take home and open book. Also, the teacher didn’t just bore the class with business and law lingo. He would give easy examples and definitions to the topics so everyone could understand them. When she sat down in the back of the class, the Professor walked in and placed his laptop on the desk and plugged it into the projector and went to YouTube and opened a video titled, “Disorder in the court: 20 more shocking outbreaks in the court”

“Today, we’ll watch a TruTV show that will help you all understand some unique things that could happen in the court room. Usually, these will only happen in criminal court but the knowledge is still good to know,” he said before he started the video. For forty minutes the class watched criminals trying to attack their attorneys, the judge, family members of the victims attacking the criminals and so forth. When the class ended at 4:30, most of the sidewalks were clear of student and only had a few walking around with food from the campus store or those rushing to get to class even though they were already 30 minutes late.

She walked home and did the same thing she always did: Placed her keys in the bowl next to the door, petted the cat, took out a snack (usually whatever she had for supper last night), and listened to the police scanner. Usually it was nothing out of the ordinary. An officer calling in that they pulled over a car for some reason or reporting to a noise complaint. The city rarely had any huge incident were cops had to use their weapons or deadly force. The only big incident that actually happened was a bank robbery a few days ago and the news stations haven’t stopped talking about it.

Even though it seemed there was nothing happening on the surface of the city, under its metallic skin, there were drug dealers, smugglers, and the city’s biggest, yet secretive problem: Gangs. Most of the gangs were just street thugs that would threaten but never back up their threats. They usually used their numbers just to intimidate people and rarely got into fights but there were a select few gangs that actually backed up there threats to the point of murder. The police department tried their best to catch and lock up the gang members but it seems many of them have high officials backing them up because within 24 hours anonymous people seem to come from no were and pay their bonds and all their records seem to disappear.

That’s partly the reason why Serenity did what she did. She hated to see the city she grew up in turn down this path and wanted to correct all that’s wrong with it. She wanted to see the city she use to know were a person could walk home every night and not fear getting jumped or killed. The other reason was because she wanted to find the person that killed her sister. Just thinking about it made Serenity angry. She knew he was part of a gang and even went so far as to assume he was a leader of a gang. There were so many that she couldn’t pinpoint the gang he could have belonged to.

She heard someone knocking at the door and walked over and looked through the peep hole and smiled as she swung open the door and quickly hugged the man on the other side.