Chapter 65: Chapter 17.2
"Jason, you listening?" Raphael asked Jason, who was roused from his memories by the former.
Jason blinked and looked around. After he met Raphael and his team, they went to Joe's Diner where they sat down on the table furthest from the door, right next to the jukebox. They were sitting on the only round table and each one of them occupied the four seats. Raphael sat opposite of Jason, with Suni and Junco sitting next to him. Dhole, on the other hand, was sitting in the nearest diner booth preventing anyone from sitting near them and overhearing their conversation.
"Sorry, Raphy," Jason said while moving his hand and yawning. "Your voice, it's so ... sanctimonious. I zoned out. You could give a history teach a run for their money.
"How 'bout this?" Jason ignored Raphael's glare and turned to Junco. "Why don't you tell me everything. I listen better when it's a beauty talking."
Junco rolled her eyes while Suni looked away with a noncommittal nod of his head; he loathed to agree with Jason but the latter had a point: it was more enjoyable to hear a woman's voice.
"At o' two hundred, a certain criminal and his followers were brutally murdered in the alleyways of the Sumps," Junco explained proficiently as she passed a tab to Jason. Jason swiped through the screen, viewing different angles of the murders. "As you can see from the crime scene, it was not a normal murder. Several victims died from cardiac arrest, the result of intense adrenaline brought by fear literally killed them.
"Unfortunately, there were no cameras within the alleyways so we don't have any suspects. However, the timing of the attacks …"
"You suspect that a Practitioner is the culprit," Jason finished and Junco nodded. Jason swiped through the images before handing the tab back to Junco. "But why come to me?"
"Recognize this guy?" Raphael asked, his voice laced with suspicion, after he took the tab for a while before handing it back to Jason. The latter looked at the image calmly. It was a police record of someone named Quentin Burl and his mugshot portrayed his sneering smirk.
"Nope, not really. Why?" Jason asked, appearing genuinely bemused. Annie arrived and placed a few sugar-powdered doughnuts in front of them and Jason nodded appreciatively. "Thanks, Annie."
"Really? Despite the fact that you met him before?" Raphael asked sharply after Annie nodded and left.
"Did I?" Jason became more confused as he took another look at the picture. Recognition flashed through his eyes as he snapped his fingers. "Ah, right. Now I remember. Q-tip!"
The four of them stared at Jason, some with exasperation, others with amusement. Jason shrugged his shoulders as though it couldn't be helped and he grabbed a jam-filled doughnut before taking a large bite out of it. His mouth, and the tips of his mustache, ended up being coated in powdered sugar but he ignored it and continued eating.
"Right, you were the last one to see the victims," Raphael said while trying to ignore the comical look of Jason's face as he chewed exaggeratedly.
"It wasn't me," Jason answered amusedly after swallowing his mouthful. "I was in the hospital, remember? Pretty good alibi. But, I know who did it."
"Who?" Raphael demanded impatiently after waiting a while. Jason finished his doughnut and grabbed another.
"Pow, wa ib tul lu?" Jason replied with his mouth full. The powdered sugar now coated his nose and a bit of his chin; Suni was having a hard time not smiling while Junco avoided looking at Jason, feeling that he was being too immature right now.
"What? Ungh, you ... you mind?" Raphael rolled his eyes while gesturing at Jason's face. He was clearly asking Jason to stop eating for a moment. Jason swallowed and looked down at the doughnut in his hand before turning back to Raphael.
"No, Raphy, I don't mind," he answered nonchalantly as he stuffed the rest of the doughnut into his mouth. Raphael opened his mouth before closing it again. His sharp nose flared with annoyance at how juvenile Jason was and, if looks could kill, Jason would've been dead by now.
"Can you tell us who could have killed them?" Junco asked and Jason quickly snatched a nearby napkin to clean his face then turned and smiled at her.
"Should've asked sooner, I'd have told you, beautiful," Jason said with a smirk before he leaned back. He didn't tell them immediately, instead, he gathered his thoughts for a moment before speaking slowly. "It was the Reaper."
The table became uncharacteristically silent with the boys looking worried while Junco gave Jason a look mired with disbelief.
"Reaper? You're joking, right?" Junco asked with a slight scoff. She noticed that no one else shared her skepticism. "A vengeful spirit that's been killing people for centuries? The Grim Reaper? That's just a fairytale."
"Practitioners, people who can evolve by cultivating different forms of energy, exists," Jason said quietly with raised eyebrows. "Espers, folks with superpowers, exist. Fucking monsters exist and you're skeptical of spirits and ghosts?"
"Every classification you just mentioned, save for the last one, have roots in science," Junco answered. "Practitioners absorb the natural energy around them to strengthen themselves, Espers have Strange matter, Spellcasters have Psionic Aether, and this allows them to bend the laws of physics. And finally, there are monsters that are mutated or evolved animals. But ghosts and spirits? They're mostly stories and hallucinations of the superstitious."
"Ah, a scientist," Jason said disdainfully. "Nerds who hypothesis and get everything wrong at first due to their shortcomings, right until they have the facts stuffed into their faces."
"Excuse me?" Junco asked offended.
"You morons are the ones who wrongly theorized that gravity was slowing down the expansion of the universe. And that the earth was the center of the universe. Heck, for years, you guys refuted vitalism until Aether came along." [1]
"That's …"
"Look, I'm not saying you're wrong," Jason interrupted Junco who wanted to continue arguing. "It's good to be skeptical. Healthy even. All I'm saying is to keep an open mind. Because spirits - the echoes of one's soul - they exist."
As Jason spoke he used his holo-watch to send an attachment to Junco's tab. Junco opened the file and her mouth fell open as she was stupefied: there were news clippings and video clips of the very beings she refuted. A headless woodcutter swinging his axe, trying to behead Jason. A humanoid creature tearing through a group of armed hunters, the instability of the camera prevented her from getting a better look at the image. And finally, a clip showing the ineffectiveness of bullets against the Reaper; the bullets that hit him were simply dropping from his hands as he slowly slaughtered the people shooting at him.
"You're suggesting that we're not up against a person?" Raphael asked with a scowl. These monsters in the video clips would definitely be hard to deal with, even with an AKEERA.
"I'm saying you can't treat him like a normal target," Jason answered. "Even if he's a Practitioner, the fact that he can turn himself incorporeal means he's beyond the level of Grandmaster, and, to my understanding, no modern Practitioner has managed to break into the Sovereign stage.
"What I'm trying to say is…" Jason paused and leaned forward. His voice became low with caution, surprising Raphael who knew how cocky he usually was. "You see the hooded Reaper? Run the other way if you want to live. That black mist surrounding him? That's the lingering emotion that his victims had. He's killed hundreds without blinking and he'll kill you without even looking. Cause to him, he's just reaping souls the way a farmer reaps his crops. Do. Not. Fight. Him."
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