Fifth Avenue

The car remained in an uncomfortable silence, nobody in the mood to speak. Justin would every now and then speak up to try and cheer everyone up but all attempts fell short. “So, are we going to keep our hideout in the car?” Justin ask yawning “because it seems that the oh so feared Fifth Avenue just can’t keep a hideout” Bullet leans forward and hits him on the back of the head as hard as she could.

“Ow!” he whines angrily rubbing his sore head.

Doc pulls the car under an old abandoned bridge and cuts the ignition. “Follow me” he says bluntly before getting out of the car and quickly disappearing into the dark night’s sky. Kit jumps out his hand tightly holding Hartley’s and he leads everyone in the direction that Doc went.

Soon the group stops in front of an old abandoned looking storage crate, rust seemingly covering the old green paint. “Kit, where are we?” Bullet whispers, but he doesn’t reply instead he tries to pull the large door open. Shooter steps out front and helps Kit, the door groaning awkwardly as it opens revealing a pitch-black room, a horrid smell leaking out into the night.

“Oh, my god that stinks” Justin gags, Bullet goes to hit him again but he dodges just in time. “Ha missed me” he says smugly. Shooter leads Bullet inside behind Kit and Hartley leaving Justin standing alone in the dark.

“Um there should be something-” Kit wonders his hands wandering the room “Ah found it!” he cheers happily before flicking a switch, the lights above them flicker slightly before remaining stable.

Hartley looks around the room in amazement before her eyes land on the long staircase that descends into the ground “What’s down there?” Hartley asks and Kit smiles up to her.

“That’s where we’re staying silly” he states walking down them. Hartley slightly surprised followed him down, not wanting to get lost. “Now this place is still under construction, actually to tell you the truth it stopped being in construction about ten years ago, this is the major crisis hideout, I guess we’ve finally hit the major crisis stage” Bullet and Shooter whisper something between themselves.

Justin followed slowly behind, muttering ‘not so pleasant’ things under his breath, most likely over the continuous hits he was getting from is sister.

“Okay rooms” Doc announces appearing out of nowhere “Shooter and Bullet your room is the last one down the hall, Kit you sleep on the second last one on the left, Justin second last to the right and Hartley your room is the one beside Justin’s” everyone nods and just as soon as Doc appeared he disappeared.

Everyone but Hartley walked straight towards their rooms, as she decided that she wants to explore the new hideout a little bit; she spun around and walked down the pitch-black hall, her only light slowly dimming away as she walked further and further away from it.

She looked around the hall; the only thing she could see was the light outline of the objects around her. She took shallow breaths to minimise the amount of dust she inhaled, and kept her steps quiet, not trusting any of the dark corners.

Reaching out, Hartley runs her hand against the half-done wall, the feeling of the broken bricks hurting against her gentle skin, but she didn’t move it.

She stopped as reached a wall and just stood staring at it, a dead end, and no way to turn other than where she had come from. But in her heart, she knew she didn’t want to go back, an eerie feeling crept over her, a feeling like she knew serious pain was coming her way.

A stab of pain stabs into her head and she falls back onto the wall behind her.

Sister Hannah stood in the centre of where the orphanage once stood. It was now left as nothing but flames and rubble “Ya lied to us” she screams pointing her finger into the darkness.

A figure smiles, their white teeth shining in the dark that surrounded them “I did nothing of the sort” the voice taunted.

“Ya told us dat if we helped ya, ya wood only take a few of da gals and dat devil child” she sobbed “but ya took em all and den burned downed da house of god”

The figure in the darkness leant back in a humourless chuckle “Two things” it growls “Firstly, this is not and never has been the house of god, not with evil women like you willing to kill innocent little orphans for a little bit of profit” it smiles again “and two, Hartley is not the devil”

Hartley looks behind Sister Hannah shocked, a tall skinny man wearing a hood which covered his face snuck up behind the overweight Sister, sticking a needle into her rather large thigh. “I am” the voice whispers.

Sister Hannah’s hand reaches back to her leg as her skin begins to go grey and black veins start becoming visible.

Everything around Hartley flashes white and soon she was standing in an empty street.

Flames dance across the city, the howls of pain had long since been silenced, “You and me, we can have everything” a voice whispers into Hartley’s ear “Just take my hand” a male hand reaches out for Hartley, she goes to take it, but everything fades into darkness.

Hartley slid down the wall until she is sitting on the floor, her eyes close and she is soon taken into a deep sleep.

“How long do you think she had been here?” a voice whispers.

“Probably slept here, poor gal” Hartley opens her heavy eyes and sees Kit and Shooter standing in front of her. “Morning sunshine” Shooter says happily, she simply replies with a tired groan.

Her muscles hurt from sleeping on the floor, and they basically screamed as she stood up. “How come you slept down here? Actually, why did you even come down here?” Shooter questions scratching his short blonde hair.

Hartley shrugs “wanted to look around, got dizzy and sat down for a bit, must have just drifted off” she states normally before walking past both boys and down the hall, thankfully there were minimal turns and even less rooms for he to walk into, so she made it into her room quickly.

She changed into a proper workout attire and stepped back into the main room, something she hadn’t noticed last night were the many lounge chairs that were spread across the room, the small chimney which seemed untouched, and the small coffee table which looked black due to the amount of dust that covered it.

“Want to train?” Bullet asks walking into the room, she was sweating and her chest heaved tirelessly “I just got back from a jog, come on we can train together, you need to work on your defence” Bullet began to walk up to the stairs and Hartley followed behind.

“Okay now you’re pretty good at attacking, but I’ve seen your attack and you’re definitely slacking in that area, you need to think that your attacker could get a hit in and you need to be ready” Hartley nods and gets into the fighting stance which Justin had taught her.

Bullet does the same, they stare at each other with a look of seriousness before Bullet lunges at Hartley trying to hit her stomach but Hartley quickly deflects it but as she does Bullet’s leg comes around and hits her across the head.

“You need to be ready, you can’t think your attacker is only going to hit you once at a time, be aware of what is going to happen” Bullet yells and Hartley takes in a shaky breath spitting the small amount of blood which had pooled into her mouth “They’re not always going to play fair, so just don’t remember, you don’t need to either” closing her eyes Hartley harnessed her anger before giving Bullet another nod.

Hartley was the first one to attack this time, she hits Bullets shoulder, making her hiss, but Bullet reaches her leg under in attempt to trip Hartley only just missing. “Good!” Hartley’s eyes flicker with the colour red and her fist comes into contact with Bullet’s cheek.

Bullet stumbles back, her head facing down. Slowly she looks back up with a smile “Okay, let’s do this then” with a slow breath Bullet once again charges for Hartley but this time dodges her fist and pushes her back slightly, Hartley quickly turns to her left and plants her foot into Bullet’s stomach kicking her back with all the force that she could muster causing her to fly back and roll onto the ground.

Hartley turns to Bullet’s side, worried for her wellbeing but as she does Bullet flips her onto the ground and straddles her “Never show mercy, no matter how much you want to, never assume your target is down, ever” Bullet’s eyes harden as she talks and Hartley gulps nodding.

“You girls can kick butt” Shooter laughs clapping his hands while picking his wife up from on top of Hartley, linking his hand with hers as he does. “Remind me never to annoy you” Hartley pulls herself up and rubs her grazed elbows.

Hartley nods to the couple “I’m going to go and out some ointment on these” she says in a low whisper before walking back into the storage box and heading towards her room.

Justin was standing outside her door; he was leaning against the doorframe with one foot pressed against the door and the other on the ground. “Ah Hartley” he grins and she rolls her eyes “Wan to go out some place maybe?” he asks and Hartley groans.

“I’m tired, so tired and I just got my butt handed to me” she sighs “Can we do that later?” she asks sweetly and he sighs in false annoyance before smirking down to her.

“Whatever you say ma’am” he says mock bowing in her honour. Hartley chuckles and walks into her room almost immediately falling onto her bed and falling asleep.

Justin although, wanted to leave the base so he teleported out to the park where he and Hartley had gone at the old base. “Justin!” he heard a voice squeak and he turned to see Candice running towards him with a giant smile.

He tilted his head slightly and watched as she ran towards him, he didn’t find her to be overly attractive, her blue eyes were dull and her blonde hair was too bright, but something about her made him feel drawn to her. “It’s me remember, Candice” she giggles but tenses slightly as she moved her still bruised and swollen nose before she clasped her hand around his forearm “I missed you” she pouts.

Back in the storage box Hartley was now awake and lying in her bed, she could feel the pressure of a headache coming on but she tried to ignore it. “Hey Hartley” Kit calls from her door and she looks to him forcing the best smile she could “Um, I just wanted to let you know Justin is out, Bullet and Shooter are leaving to investigate, I’ll be joining them and Doc, well he just needs to be left alone for now” Hartley nods “do you want to come with us?” he asks.

“No thank you, cutie” she says, “I’ve got a bit of a headache I think I might just lie down for a bit” he nods and leaves her room and she looked back up to the roof.

It was cracked, and reminded her of when she was back in the orphanage. Hartley had asked Kit about the orphanage and Kit accidently let slip that the sickness killed the girls in the orphanage and had now spread to the entire town, she guessed this was what the pastor used to call, the reckoning.

The pressure in her head began to become stronger and she groans rolling onto her stomach “please no” she begs knowing what was coming, a wave of dizziness hits her and everything around her goes white.

A little girls giggle echoes and soon the darkness disappears and Hartley is standing in a dining room, the table was set with Dinner and 3 children sat laughing and eating at the end, a man’s chuckle made Hartley look to him, although he was much younger and his face was burn free it was clearly Doc.

He looked happy, not the fake happy he is with Fifth Avenue, genuinely happy. “Honey don’t laugh with your mouth full” a woman scowls and Hartley looks across from Doc seeing a beautiful woman sitting down, she was smiling widely, obviously not minding her husband’s antics.

The woman had long brown hair, she seemed tall and obviously had a figure to die for, it took Hartley a little bit but soon enough her eyes turned to giant orbs.

It was Wisdom...

With a flash of white Hartley was now in a darkened room, moonlight beamed through the open window and revealed Doc sleeping alone in a king-sized bed, he tossed around before sitting up “Alana?” he yawns looking around, after a little he pulls himself up and walks from the room.

Without even moving Hartley followed Doc, he walked down the hall and pushed open the door which was covered in hand drawn pictures, three names were listed in the middle of it, Joseph, Allen and Farrah. Wisdom stood over the little girl’s bed, a pillow was pressed against the child’s face.

“Alana!” Doc screamed running to his wife and pulling her away from his daughter “What are you doing?” he says panicking as he tried to shake the little girl awake “Come on baby girl, wake up please, come on Farrah daddy loves you” he sobs.

Standing up he sees Wisdom standing in the corner with a crocked smile, smoke soon filled the room and Hartley could see that Wisdom had lit the curtains on fire, this fire spread faster than any she had ever seen soon it began to take over the room, but Doc payed it no mind as he checked his two other children only to get the same result, all were dead.

“What have you done?” he cries as he buried his face into his smallest son’s chest “Why” he screams over and over again. Wisdom tilts her head and her smile widens, soon she began to laugh and Hartley could see that she had lost it.

Sirens could be heard from the distance, by this sound Wisdoms smile dropped, slowly her actions seemed to occur to her and she drops to her knees.

With another flash of light Hartley now stood outside, Doc lay on a stretcher being carried into the ambulance, a cop following him “And your wife sir, where is she?” the cop questions, Doc simply looks away showing Hartley is still bubbling face.

“I have no wife” he says strained.

Hartley looks away from the broken man, she calls her leader and looks to his house, the letterbox was about the only thing that remained standing on it was the street name ‘Fifth Avenue’