9.

Greta Turner woke upon her living room sofa. Her last conscious moment prior to this one was that of being pulled down off a four-story high roof top ledge. She remembers the rain and she remembers a breeze, she remembers her legs turning to jelly causing her to collapse. There was a guy too; she remembers that but not all so clearly.

Yeah, this guy she remembers, a stranger, she had heard his voice as he spoke, but she did not hear all of what he had said. Then there was a face, a brief sight of a face before there being nothing, before to waking up on her couch.

Her hair is dry, her clothing is dry and there is a blanket over her. Slowly she sits up while focusing straight ahead. How did she get here? Has someone been looking after her? Then she sees him. He is sitting on a chair about twenty feet away and to her left; he would have been seated behind her as she lay.

'Hello Miss Turner ...' she jumps with a brief moment of fright and manages not to curse in reply. 'I apologize for our current situation as I do for frightening you just now. As thing are, I had no other option other than to bring you home.'

'Who are you?' she asks still being freaked but not overly so with the fact that there is a stranger in her home. 'How do you know who I am? How do you know where I live?'

'Easy Miss ... I am only here to help and maybe in turn you may help too ...'

'What are you talking about?'

It is dark but not completely so. This man with whom she had seen in the moment before she had passed out so happens to look ever so differently now then what he had, perhaps her mind is playing tricks on her. He may be sitting slightly in shadow right now, but he is not Darkness, in many ways he is the opposite of Darkness.

On the roof he had short dark hair and a minimal amount of dark facial hair and he also wore a suit, Greta is sure of this. In the here and now his hair is shoulder length and light brown, not close to as dark as she was sure it had been and his beard is a few inches long and also brown, his suit is replaced by ... robes? What's up with that? Looking at him Greta is sure that he is the very same guy; sure, he more or less confirmed such with the words he has already spoken.

'Miss Turner ... Greta ... if I were to say to you that you know in your heart who I am you would know what I am saying, right?'

'No ... I don't know ... I'm not sure. What time is it? How long have we been here?'

'Early hours of the morning Miss Turner, about six hours after our roof top incident.'

Alright so, if this is true, why is her clothing and hair dry? There is a persona in Greta's mind; this stranger cannot be the person with whom she is thinking of. It is impossible, maybe not. With how life has treated her, shouldn't Greta feel uneasy with the fact a stranger is in her home. Strangers certainly have not always been kind to her. This moment, she feels oddly at ease with it. This stranger will not harm her in any way, she is sure of this too.

She stares at him a moment or so before asking, 'what could you want from me? I don't mean to be blunt ... there must be a reason why you have come to me.'

'There is ... your daughter ... Lonnie ...'

'You know where she is?' she speaks the words before realizing, 'of course you do ...' She almost feels embarrassed if it weren't for the current subject matter being what it is. 'Is she alive? ... I'm sorry.'

'That is quite alright' he says more to reassure her than anything else. 'We need to get the two of you to reconnect. Not only could that benefit you both, it could do so much more too.'

Unable to control her emotions Greta's eyes quickly well up and tears soon begin to flow. Her daughter is still out there and still alive too.

***

At twenty-seven years of age Sammy Fontaine had been working at a mental health facility for a number of years. Being at such a place was a ...calling, keeping an eye on Darkness on behalf of Light. He is one of only so many, who can slip easily between world, come for one and walk in the other.

By such a time as this in Sammy's life, a certain Majella Smith has been here at that facility for close to three years and is not all so far away from such a time where she will get an opportunity to escape, in fact her time of escape is super close. Also, at such time as this, Sammy has gotten to know a young lady by the name Abigail. He met Abigail at a night club a couple months or so prior at a night club and it didn't take long to find out that Abigail is Majella's eldest sister. He even insisted that Abigail should write a letter to Majella and leave it with him.

He did not openly discuss of what he actually knew with either sister, and with that there was a delay with passing the letter onto Majella. If he had been able to discuss of what he knew then he may have been able to do something about saving the life of the elder sister though in such other problems would have occurred. Before Majella had been taken from her home and brought to this facility, she had foreseen the death of her big sister though with seeing the death of others in her mind she could not always be sure where and when such a death would take place.

Sammy knows of the death and feels somewhat ... guilty for it even with the fact he done nothing wrong. He had no prior knowledge that it would occur, again, if he had then what would have changed?

If only Sammy had talked with Majella, then Majella could have told him of what she had seen and with that Sammy may have been able to help or do that something different. Thing was that by the time the letter had been delivered and read, Abigail was already dead. Something or someone else, as it is, will take his attention in the here and now. It is a visit paid to him at the facility by someone he had not seen in over fourteen years that really provides a shock.

The visitor Sammy received; it was none other than his own mother. Sammy had briefly reconnected with his father eight years before this moment though dear old dad passed on no information as to where mom could be or as to what kind of condition she may be in, so having his mother come to him at his place of work came with much surprise.

Mother had been religious so maybe her finding him should not have been so much a surprise as it had been as Light itself is what first lead Sammy to this place, still, seeing his mother came as one heck of a shock. She is aware of Abigail Smith's death and that her youngest sister is in this facility. Lost for words, Sammy listens to what his mother tells him.

How and why is mother aware of such things? What exactly is it that she knows? So many thoughts run through Sammy's mind, one of which so happens to be that of his own sister, a sister he had known nothing about when he had lived with his parents for Sammy's sister had been dead some time before Sammy himself had been born and with all things being what there are, Darkness had a hold on Sammy's sister and the circumstances of her death, well maybe Sammy can get some answers now that he has reconnected with mother.

For a lot of things there is a reason, and some reasons interfere with others. More often than not these reasons play into the hands of Darkness. For Sammy, things are extremely complicated, and he cannot allow complication lead him astray from where he needs to be or away from what he needs to do.

What Sammy needs to do ... exactly what that is ... will be completely up to him ... a Magpie is what a Magpie is.