667 Issue #10: "Old Wounds"
March 29th, 2017 Subject #002: Adam Baudin

We didn’t stay in Scotland long after Rex, or whoever he really was, had been temporarily disposed of.

Violet carefully placed all of the relics inside a bed sheet Claire helped her pull from Rex’s room at the cottage they were staying in. She made an anonymous call to St. Mary’s Cathedral stating that she had found them inside the Tor the morning after we left it. We didn’t want to leave behind any traces of ourselves and Claire swore that she never physically touched anything so we all were in the clear.

Claire was now free of her current ex-boyfriend and, after given the option with the agreement of Jackie, we offered her to come stay with us in New Orleans if she wanted to.

There was no hesitation on her part: Claire had nowhere else to go and no one else to turn to.

Of course this meant that Violet had to make a few more trips than she had on the way to Scotland, but she was happy to have Claire on our side and even happier to be home—well, her new home.

“I talked to Josiah and gave him the short of what happened. He wanted to know if you could recollect what Rex said to you and write it all down. He wants to talk to some people about the Jesus thing.” I found Violet out in the garden with her laptop.

“I’m pretty sure I can remember everything; the fucker always did like to talk. Felt the need to educate everyone as if they were clueless and he was the All-Knowing Fountain of Knowledge.” Violet was now angered by the slightest mention of him and I didn’t blame her.

“I’m proud of you by the way,” I interjected and she paused in her writing to look at me.

“For what?” She seemed genuinely curious as she asked.

“For everything. For standing up to Rex, for not letting other people’s opinions sway you, for getting out and continuing to fight even though it was hard for you to even look at any of us—to look at me.” She had come a long way from where she had been a week ago… a very long way.

Violet looked at me thoughtfully before getting up from her laptop and throwing her arms around me.

“Thank you.” She whispered into my chest as I held her close.

“No, thank you for never giving up on any of us. I can’t imagine what you must have been going through and yet you never once abandoned us.” I stroked her hair as I spoke, relishing in her touch and her company.

“I’m getting better. It’ll take time, but seeing Claire struggling with something that I struggled with, seeing her wanting to give in because she didn’t feel like she was strong enough gave me a boost. It showed me that I had to be strong for her so that she knew that she had the strength to overcome what happened to her. And it made me realize that I had it in me to not give up myself, despite the things that have happened to me in my past. I have the ability to heal and to fix things in my life even when I thought I didn’t.” Violet’s voice was slightly muffled as she spoke into my shirt.

“And it inspired me; it inspired all of us,” I replied.

“They know about me and Rex now, I take it?” She pulled away slightly to look at me.

I nodded down at her, “We talked about it.”

“I never assumed he’d be a Demon. I really do have poor taste in men.” She chastised herself.

“You live and learn, Vi. What doesn’t break you, or kill you, makes you stronger. We aren’t the same people we were ten-fifteen years ago, we aren’t the same people we were a year ago. Life is constantly changing us, evolving us into something new and what just happened is no exception. I’m sorry that you ever had to go through any of this, but it’s shaped who you are as a person, regardless. You are resilient and someone who doesn’t back down or give up even when you want to. You’re a fighter; not just for yourself, but for everyone you love.” I hugged her just a little bit tighter as I imparted on herwhat I considered to be some wise words.

“I love you, Adam. I don’t know where I’d be if it wasn’t for you—or everyone else for that matter.” I could tell she was choosing her words carefully.

“I love you too, Vi. And if I ever see Rex again, which I assume we will, I’m going to kill him.” I quietly assured her.

“Be my guest. I know I said that we don’t kill other humans, but since he isn’t one, he’s fair game now. He’s up to something and I don’t think this will be the last time we run into him.” She agreed with me.

Violet finally let go of me and sat back down in front of her laptop.

“What are you working on?” I peered over her shoulder. She had been out here for a few hours working on something that had really kept her attention.

“I had an idea. We were just sitting around here for months with our thumbs up our asses, waiting for more of our kind to just pop up somewhere. We got lucky with Claire, but what if we had a way to replace other 667 on our own instead of waiting for clues and hoping that those clues lead us to another one of us? I went through the list we compiled from our original files and started looking people up on the internet, matching their names with their places of origin and date of birth. So far, I think I have located about twenty of us based off of that list. We can start at the beginning and fill in the gaps.” She regaled before she turned the computer around for me to see the work she had done.

“Vi, you’re a fucking genius,” I exclaimed, leaning down to plant a kiss on the top of her head. She blushed and turned the computer back around to face her.

“We need to tell the others.” My statement was more of a question as I waited for her to confirm that it was alright to inform everyone else of her work.

“Go ahead and let everyone know. The quicker we replace the rest of us, the quicker we can gather an army to fight. I have a feeling that things are going to start to get rougher than we anticipated. I have a lot that I need to talk to you all about now that I can finally face the world again; we have to really dig into the details of the Seven Year Reign and prepare ourselves. We’re going to meet a lot of opposition from all sides and we need to be several steps ahead of the rest.” I could see the wheels turning in Violet’s head as she spoke.

I agreed with her, “You’re right—and we have a lot of work to do especially after the information that Rex gave us.”

“At least we can be thankful that he’s got a big mouth; he may just have given us several pieces to the puzzle.” Violet smirked before she went back to typing on her computer.

I left her alone to continue her work and went back inside to call a meeting.

We had a lot to discuss and even more work to do.

I had a feeling that things were going to start to get really intense.