The Stars
There’s a voice in the back of my head that wasn’t there the day before. I’m not sure if it's really there. I’m not sure if it’s separate from me or if it’s just me criticizing my actions and attributing them to another person. It sounds and talks like Huntstone, or at least how I remember him speaking, which implies that it’s probably not real. It’s not Huntstone in my head, but his abstract will to hang onto this plane of existence. It should have a drive, but not its own voice.
This doesn’t make it any less unsettling.
Welcoming me back from spring break was a note stuffed under the radio station door. It was from Vincent and claimed that not only was Mr Scott, our science teacher from last semester, a pedophile, but also not even mortal. Vincent doubted his ability to handle the threat and probably guessed that I wouldn’t tolerate that much abuse of power at the school.
That voice in my head, the Huntstone that probably isn’t, says that I was foolish to not see this coming. It’s in my base nature to challenge anyone who would dare claim to have more power than me. That was why we got along so well in the past - I can’t refuse allying with someone who admits being weaker.
I never thought much of Mr Scott, but the only way to prove Vincent’s claims and then be able to do something about them was to find evidence. After consulting with Israel, Robin, and Ardath, Scott's cellphone and computer seemed like places to start.
We knew that Scott would be in the boys locker room before rugby practice. Robin and I marched right into the locker room while the team was changing and I announced that we were girls invading their private space and required the use of their cell phones for a very important reason. The team couldn’t say “No” to us. It provided enough of a distraction for Ardath to steal Scott's cellphone.
Huntstone seems amused that I didn’t walk in and order Scott and the students to present their cellphones to me as an offering. He points out that we used to do it all the time, although the phones were bigger and the content much more important than the drivel of high school students. I tried to explain that it was because I didn’t want Robin to think less of me; she was at my side the whole time and trusts me to be a decent person.
To which Huntstone replies “If you wanted her to be there, then she should have been following you from behind”.
The phones didn’t reveal a lot - the team’s phones had some uncomfortable text messages from Scott, but Scott was very careful about covering his tracks. I called up Tobias to help us recover the Scott’s deleted cell data - he has a good head for tech. Tobias managed to uncover some of the deleted files, uncovering part of the evidence that we needed. Robin and Vincent went to return the cell phones to the team.
What happened next I’ve been only able to piece together through secondhand reports. Scott attacked Israel and a boy named Caleb after practice, assuming the form of some sort of shadow monster. Shortly thereafter, the same monster would appear in the boys locker room, attacking Robin, Vincent and Dean, killing Dean. I didn’t even know something was up until emergency services showed up at the school.
Dean’s murder brought the group of us, plus Caleb, together in one place. It was suggested that we get into Scott’s apartment as soon as possible and seize his computer to get the rest of the proof we needed to do something about him. However, no one could agree how to get into that apartment. During the argument, someone figured out that Scott wasn’t at the apartment at all, but instead at a club downtown for the evening.
All of us were hellbent on making Scott pay for what happened at the school. Looking back, chasing Scott to the club and confronting him was the stupidest idea we could decide on. But, at the time, it seemed like the right thing to do.
“As it was intended to appear,” Huntstone says.
