Elementary Virtue: The Prophecy (32 page)

This time, there was no doubt, the tough paramedic Lana Sewell with the dark almond eyes, the wild curly mane and the body of a gazelle, which led to all sorts of fantasies, blushed. She smiled, withdrew her hand, and left the room. The door closed behind her. Gabe remained behind, and he felt suddenly in great shape again, who knew maybe Lana Sewell's enthusiasm for him could come in handy someday. Besides, she looked like a goddess, and he would certainly not reject any willing gazelle. Finally, he was a Leo in his zodiac sign. He grinned silently to himself, but first he had to worry about Carmine and the FBI before he thought about flirting. He planned to leave the country in a week. So there was no way he could be involved in any case with the FBI or beautiful women. That meant he had to stay away from Lana even if she was as sexy as hell. He would save her up for later when Gregory was history. Besides, the least thing he needed now was a jealous Angel. He needed absolutely no one to stand in the way of his trip to Catania in any way.

He rang the bell for the nurse, who appeared shortly afterwards. "Could I see my father?" He looked pleadingly at her. Unbelievably but true, even the older roundish Mexican nurse fell for his charm. She nodded sympathetically, "Wait, I'll get a wheelchair and then I will bring you to him." "I don’t need a wheelchair, I can walk by myself," he said indignantly. She smiled at him encouragingly, "I know, and yet, you are still fragile and have a severe concussion. We don’t want to risk anything," she disappeared, and a moment later, she came back with a wheelchair. Gabe had meanwhile managed to sit on his bed making sure that his nightgown would not fall apart on his backside. He didn’t feel like having that nurse looking at his naked ass. He felt helpless and defenseless in an unpleasant way in this nightgown. Carefully, he sat down in the wheelchair and the nurse, who introduced herself as Martha carted him along the long and empty hospital corridor. This hospital looked uninviting, creepy, and the bright neon light blinded his eyes.

The long naked brightly lit passageway with its linoleum floor reminded him of an episode of American Horror Story, and he was freezing in his thin nightgown. Finally, they arrived in the tract where the ICU was situated. Martha brought him into a large bright room. In the middle of the room, his father was lying on a bed. He had placed a mask over his nose and mouth, like the man that shared Gabe’s room. Through a tube glucose and probably some medication was flowing into his arm vein. He was wearing the same nightgown as Gabe, and his eyes were wide open. His gaze wandered restlessly around, and his eyes were the only living thing about him, it was somewhat scary. Gabe got up and sat down on the bed. He looked at his father intensively, as if he wanted to find out what exactly he realized about his surroundings. For an instant Carmine looked at him, but then his gaze wandered on again. Martha rang for the ward nurse who came up with a new dropper bottle. Once it had been replaced, Carmine's eyes calmed became rigid and didn’t wander around any longer. He looked shrunken in this hospital bed, only a shadow of the man he used to be. Gabe sat there a few minutes in silence looking at him.

There was no sign that he saw him or his environment. Gabe wondered whether it was due to the accident or the mixture he had given him. Whatever it was, it couldn’t have worked out any better for him. From Carmine's side he certainly didn’t have to fear any opposition against his upcoming trip to Catania. For the family as well as his followers he would be a tragic hero, the boy who had survived and they’d certainly celebrate him. Overall, things were going better than expected, there were only two things that could make him stumble. First, he didn’t know whether Angel's mixture could be detected in Carmine's body and, second, he had to humor these FBI dudes somehow putting them on a wrong track. As if his thoughts had become reality, they materialized suddenly out of nowhere, showing up in front of him, observing him. Martha hurried to his side, helping him get back into the wheelchair. "What do you want here?" Gabe couldn’t help it, he had to say something to those two guys in their black suits with their blinkered grim visages. They reminded him of two big black gross looking flies, getting their tentacles out to dig in the dirt. "Do you think my father can tell you anything in his condition?" Desperation was literally written all over Gabe's angry, tired face. Even Martha was convinced of his distress by his acting skills. She snapped at the two FBI agents, telling them to leave that poor boy alone. That he had already been through a lot today.

Good Cop cleared his throat visibly feeling uncomfortable, "I'm really sorry, but we need the confirmation of a testimony from you Mr. Grande about the night before the accident." Gabe looked puzzled, what the hell did they want from him? "Do you know a certain Rhonda, with whom your father spent the night before the accident?" Gabe raised his eyebrows in surprise Interesting enough, he thought things had just come full circle without his intervention.

Leyla was a nervous wreck. Today was Friday, last day of School before fall break. Monday, they’d leave for Sicily. Amazingly, enough her parents bought her story about the study trip to Italy. It might have helped that Moonworthy would accompany the class. However, they thought they were going to Rome, and Leyla feared that Shannon, who finally had traveled back to Lerici, could try to meet her in Italy, as she still thought that Leyla knew where Gregory was. Leyla could hardly wait to sit finally on that plane to Rome, where they would change plane to Catania. Tonight they all met one last time at - the Crowd - before they left, to go through the details. Leyla hadn’t heard anything of Gregory since the breakup. There had been no sign of life, not even after he got the Rap Video. Maybe he would contact Aiden or Shane as they informed him about the hotel in which they were staying. She sighed. Gregory could be such a stubborn ass. He ignored them like something he forgot at the supermarket. Damn she was so damn jittery and could barely sit still. She saw Angel, who was glancing over and tried to act calmly.

There was no trace of Gabe lately, which was quite strange. She hadn’t seen him all week. Leyla was standing lost in thought in front of her locker arranging her stuff when Greyson appeared out of nowhere in front of her. She winced startled, and dropped a few books, as she hadn’t heard him coming. "Hey Leyla, I'm sorry I didn’t mean to scare you." She forced herself to remain calm. Her heart was pounding like a sledgehammer, "Oh. Hi Greyson, so we finally did it. Holidays. Yippee! I was already a bit absentminded. Are you going away?" He picked up her books giving them back to her, "Yes I’ll go to Italy with some friends," Leyla almost dropped the books he just gave her again. So, it was true, she thought, and felt nausea rising, "Where are you going to in Italy? Gabe and Angel going with you?" "We are traveling to Rome, to do a little sightseeing, and Angel is coming with us. As for Gabe, I'm not sure if he will be able to join us. Didn’t you hear about the accident? He and his dad were involved in a car accident last weekend. His dad is in a vigilant coma and Gabe was lucky, he wasn’t hurt that bad, but still got a laceration and a strong concussion. That's why he wasn’t at school the whole week.” Leyla was stupefied. That was why she hadn’t seen Gabe at school lately, something was wrong, Greyson didn’t tell her the truth. Gabe was their leader, and they would never go to Italy without him, leaving him behind even if he was injured. Something was incredibly wrong. "That would be a real shame," she said seemingly sympathetically, "but, his dad will he be all right?" She thought of Ana, if she had heard of the accident. Greyson shrugged, "I don’t know, but as far as I heard it’s pretty intense. The two of them were on their way back from Lake Simcoe, where they spent the weekend together, as the Ferrari got off the road. It's a miracle that they survived at all and that Gabe got away with a concussion." Leyla nodded agreeing, "There was more than just a guardian angel at work."

Greyson agreed and asked her about her holiday plans, and she tried to keep her answer as vaguely as possible, and wished him a safe trip to Italy. There was something wrong she felt it. Carmine Grande was in a coma, and Gabe had remained almost unharmed? Probably no guardian angel but a wily devil had been at work. Maybe Gabe himself had caused the accident? Didn’t his dad oppose of his travel plans to Sicily? She rushed home. There was still a lot to prepare and to discuss before their departure. Once she arrived home, she contacted Ana with Skype. She sometimes mixed up local time, but today it was all right. Ana was just having lunch when she called, and she was euphoric about Leyla's call. She was surprised to hear that her father had an accident and was even in a vigilant coma. No one had informed her, "I had no idea about it and Mom hasn’t heard anything as far as I know," she shrugged, "well, it's not that we want to stay in contact with him necessarily, but it is still funny that we haven’t heard anything. How is Gabe?" Leyla told her what she had heard from Greyson.

Ana thought too that the course of events was rather suspicious. She would check with her Mom if she heard anything regarding the accident. Then they chatted for a while about this and that. Ana was still in close contact with Saul. They were Skyping regularly, and he would soon go to Switzerland for a concert. So they would soon meet again. Ana was all excited about it. Leyla was happy for Ana, but still felt a twinge of envy. She truly wished for some normality in her relationship with Gregory, if there was still something like a relationship existing between them. When Ana asked about Gregory, she kept her answer vague but full of confidence. More confident than she was, and if she was perfectly honest, meeting Gregory in Sicily scared the shit out of her. The Crowd was packed as usual on a Friday night. Leyla arrived after having briefly called Brooklyn, who was on her way to Paris with her parents by now. The Akandos including Aiden, Mila, and Shane were already in the back of the Club, as usual. "Hey guys, I am sorry for being late," Leyla was a bit out of breath. She pulled Aiden to her side telling him about her conversation with Greyson earlier. Aiden looked around the Crowd, but there were none of the Vultures there tonight. "Folks, I think Gabe is up to something drastic this time around, and I further guess, that Carmine didn’t approve of his plans, so he simply got him somehow off the streets," he looked thoughtful at them. Thinking back to the story that had happened many years ago with the cat, he hadn’t forgotten how ice cold Gabe could be if someone were in his way. He sure was capable of anything, subtle but highly dangerous and not to be underestimated. "Enjoy your weekend guys be watchful and silent as a graveyard about the real reason for our -study trip. We will meet at the airport Monday morning. Please try to be on time," he lifted his beer bottle, "to a successful mission." All of them toasted to each other except for Leyla, who didn’t care for beer.

Mila pushed Shane hard in the side making him almost spill his beer, "Did you hear that? If memory doesn’t fool me, you are the one, who can’t keep his mouth shot, don’t you Shane? So, this time, around, you will have to keep silent as the graveyard. Do you really think you can handle this, blabbermouth?” She was leering at him. Leyla shook her head, sometimes Mila was simply too much, she was about to walk by, as she didn’t feel like listening to any further embarrassing attempts Mila made in her clumsy way to get Shane’s attention in the most impossible ways, when something totally unexpected happened. Shane turned around grabbing Mila, pulling her to him with an unexpected move. "Oh, come on and shut up Alice, now you're due," he grabbed her roughly by the back of her head and kissed her. The kiss looked more like a punitive measure than a loving approach. Leyla was standing beside them not able to get past them, as they completely blocked her passage. Aiden looked amused in her direction, their eyes met and they grinned at each other. Leyla squeezed past the two, who would probably not move apart each other soon. Now that they finally made it, they wouldn’t stop kissing soon. The punishment had apparently turned into passionate kissing meanwhile. She pushed her way past them. Aiden took her aside grinning, "It was about time, the tension in the air between these two was almost unbearable." Leyla nodded, he was right. The air had literally burned between them. She looked at them still kissing not noticing what was going on around them. So, now it was official, she was going to be the only one of her friends dying a virgin. Her coffin would bear the inscription - returned unused.

Aiden touched her arm, "Everything okay with you?" She sighed, "Everything is fine, but I can hardly wait, to get on that plane."
"I can imagine," he said turning to James, who had asked him something. Leyla felt alone, abandoned, and depressed. She should be full of anticipation completely over the moon, but all she felt was fear. Fear about Gregory being serious not wanting her anymore. Fear that he was going to die. Fear that she would not see him again, and finally fear of the moment in which she would see him again.

Gregory could hardly believe his eyes. What were Donna Tiziana and Giacomo doing here? What did they have to do with the Milan? He was upset, standing in front of the assembled group looking rather hostile than friendly at him. The only fact that calmed him a bit was, that Keanu, Yaros, and Milos were by his side, although it was not exactly clear to him what was going on and whether the hostile glances were meant for the other two guys by his side. One of the Milan, a tall blond dude with shoulder-length hair falling into his face, looked at him in such a grim and hateful way that Gregory would have liked to buzz off and take a hide. No one was saying a word. All of them seemed to be waiting for him to give a speech or something. Unfortunately, Gregory didn’t have a clue what he was supposed to say, what they expected of him. He felt like a rabbit being chased by a horde of wild dogs from one disaster to another without understanding why and what it was supposed to do. He felt that way since the damn story had started and neither Aiden’s nor Keanu’s explanations had ever helped to change that feeling. Well, maybe with their help he had been able to become a bigger, stronger rabbit, but the dogs that chased him were, unfortunately, becoming bigger too. With pointed teeth, they were sharpening their knives, if he didn’t behave as they wanted him to. So what did they expect of him? He truly had no clue and therefore he didn’t know what to say to them either. Undecided what to do next, he stood there looking at the crowd of about twenty or more mostly young people.

Before he came to a decision what to do, he heard a loud unfriendly voice. The voice came from the guy with the long blond hair. He threw his hair back with an angry gesture, staring at him. His dark eyes were narrowed to slits. He raised his hand pointing at him, "Is this you prophesied savior? The one who is supposed to bring the amulets to the crater? You can’t be serious! I mean look at him. He is nothing but a kid. He looks scared as shit even seeing us here. I am asking you now, what do you think will happen when he will be eye to eye with the Vultures and the Mafia Brothers? The Boy won’t leave the shit house; he is going to sit there all day. I say, forget the crap we don’t need that kid. We are doing well without getting involved in that kind of shit. Screw the amulets and the fucking legend. All this superstitious crap is making me mad! We no longer live in the Middle Ages, damn it. Do you really want to follow that kid to Sicily and rush yourselves into perdition? Look at him. He is nothing but a ridiculous little dwarf, some kind of self-important nobody. I will tell you what we should do, we should get him on the next boat to Sicily with the two amulets, and we are not holding him back, no way. Let the moron go to Sicily if he wants to go there. We haven’t had any problems with the Vultures since the pact. So I say we will make sure that it stays this way. Who's with me?"

Murmurs went through the crowd, and Gregory felt incredible anger rise within. He had never even wanted any of this and now this guy accused him of getting them involved in things they didn’t want to do. Fine, he thought, who needed these idiots. He was on the verge to singe the head of that damn blond dude when a second angry voice beside him brought him off stride. Milos spoke up, "Quiet, damn it!" he raised both hands and stepped forward, and then he pointed at the blonde guy, "what about you, Mikiel, I guess you know it all then? Hear me now, and listen carefully, I am only going to tell this once. When did you become such an asshole? Did Mommy and Daddy not pay enough attention to you! Is it the same old story that made you a murderer and a psychopath?" the blonde went into battle position, "I am no murderer and the only psychopath, I see here is you."

With a single gesture, a flame jerked up becoming a fireball aimed at Milos. A cry went through the crowd. Gregory reacted instinctively blowing the fire with a well-aimed blast to the side. Unfortunately, the flame hit a car, parked on the side of the house with full forces, which immediately went up in Flames. With a further movement of his hands, Gregory brought up water from the lake, making it spill over the vehicle and on the gathered Milan. They all looked like drowned rats and no one said anything at first. Gregory was surprised how the elements obeyed him within seconds. He had not even made any special effort. The thought had been enough. That was quite scary, but on the other hand, it was also an incredibly good feeling. He had to be careful with his thoughts it seemed though, keep them under control. The blonde guy screamed, it had been his car, a blue Jeep that had been hit by the fireball. "You did that on purpose, come here and fight like a man, you coward."

Gregory stepped up to Milos his eyes on Mikiel. The stare of Gregory's unnaturally bright blue eyes, an afterglow of practicing his skills, made Mikiel clearly lose his confidence and had him look away. "People of the Milan, I am telling you something now, and it will be the first and last time that I will address myself to you. I never asked for your help, and I can go through my struggle alone. There is another prophecy about me, which doesn’t have much to do with your pathetic amulets and Jamiro. The destiny as the legend says is to overthrow the corrupt Vultures with their Mafia methods and to free the citizens of Sicily from their burden. They have suffered enough with the Mafia, and they don’t need the Vultures to make their lives even harder, as some of them have unyielding magical power and are using them to suppress normal people. My responsibility so to speak is to break Ourday's curse and to placate the elements, that's the real reason I have to go to the Etna and not mainly the amulets. But, if you want me to, I will bring them along with me to throw them into the crater. That's up to you," then he gave the blond guy a cold stare.

"I wonder why you attack each other with fire, as I had been informed the Milan ruled earth and water, seems that the vultures are already among you, which I find quite odd.” They all looked at him silent and Keanu joined him. Gregory continued, "Don’t you read any newspapers? The Etna has become as active as it hasn't been for more than twenty years lately, which is quite scary, don’t you think so? So if there will be a major Eruption it could as well have an Impact on your beautiful island, think about that Scenario for once, instead of being as hostile. Keep in mind that I don’t need you, any of you. I'll bring your amulets to the Etna if you want me to and I will break the curse for all of the Onendas so that everyone can continue to live a normal life again, without being threatened and without any magical powers. Most of the local Vultures in Sicily may not have powers or only weak ones, but there are always exceptions, you should know that yourself. Take an example from Keanu's father. Besides, I've met some Vultures in Canada who had very strong powers. One of them even has caused a lot of trouble poisoning a punch at a school prom. So, I am telling you, that if you don’t want to come with me to Sicily, that's fine with me.

If I die before having accomplished my destiny, so be it. Unfortunately, however, this could have severe consequences for you, no one knows. I will be on my way to Sicily soon, with or without you. Some Akandos will be at my side, they don’t know any fear, even if they are not really in danger of any volcanic eruption because they all live in Canada, no big deal. But, they are my friends and I can count on them, friends are very rare in life."

He turned and left without saying another word disappearing into the house. After a moment of silence, they all spoke at once. Keanu stepped forward raising his voice so they fell silent again. He lifted his hands, "Folks, didn’t our clan always want to free Jamiro’s and Aaliyah’s Spirit? Did wealth become such an issue to us that we forgot where we came from?” he pointed in the direction where Gregory had disappeared a few moments ago. "He's our only chance to free ourselves from the oppression of the Vultures and the rich powerful families in Sicily. One thing must be clear to you in all fear to lose your riches. We are not free! As soon as we will not dance to their tune for once, they will not hesitate to cut the water supply. In case, you forgot; This Island has actually no drinking water, except for the reservoir, which you see in front of you and a wannabe-desalination plant.

What's wrong with you people? Remember when you condemned me and chased me off the Island because I triggered a fire in my ignorance?" He turned halfway as if he was leaving. Then he turned around again, "You are nothing but a selfish bunch, thinking only about yourselves, and I swear to you, this attitude will catch up with you sooner than you would like. In any case I'll go with Gaetano to Sicily, and I will try to save our honor or what there remains of it," he was already halfway on the way to the house when Ubana’s voice stopped him, "Keanu, wait! " He had an agility no one would have expected of him. Climbing to the steps of the porch and turning to his people he said, "He's right, we don’t have to allow the Vultures to push us around like this and stay back lethargically. We need to help Gaetano to bring the amulets to the volcano. Our origins required it and that the Etna has become that active, the first time in twenty years, is a sign that we cannot simply ignore. I say we go with him, and we help him." When they didn’t seem to listen, and their exited voices kept on talking, he took out a gun shooting once into the air. Although it was only a signal gun, kept on each boat for an emergency, the blast didn’t miss its effect. Everyone looked at him in surprise. "I say we escort him to the volcano - which doesn’t break our pact with the Vultures if we don’t influence the elements. Are you with me?" The Milan looked at each other uncertainly, and Mikiel with his long, still dripping wet hair finally spoke, "Okay, old man, we will give him safe conduct, but if the Vultures should attack him, we will not stop them with elemental weapons. We are only his escort, nothing else. We are no slaves of the Vultures and never will be, but we will comply with the pact. Besides, this prophesied savior can defend himself quite well, as we all were witnesses previously and have seen with our own eyes. Let’s vote then, who is coming along to Sicily?" he looked at the crowd. After a moment's thought, all of them raised their hands except for Donna Tiziana and Giacomo. Mikiel raised his hand. "Now that it is all clear, we will meet at dawn and set sail with - the Petala -."

Keanu could hardly believe it. What had gotten into Mikiel? He had never thought that he would agree to join him, even providing -the Petala- his boat, which meant -Small Fire -. Mikiel used to be his friend before he caused the fire and everyone had been against him. Mikiel played him quite ill and had brought up those who hadn’t been against him so far until all of them wanted to chase him off the island. Keanu didn’t know exactly where Mikiel's hatred towards him had come from all of a sudden. Maybe he had lost someone he loved because of him. He didn’t know and would probably never find out. However, it had come as a surprise to Keanu to see, that Mikiel had power over fire today and he wondered how that was even possible and what was going on? But, now was not the time to ask questions. He had to forget the grudge he held against Mikiel and be grateful that he was voting for the mission, even if he didn’t want to interfere, and probably would not flinch if Gregory would be killed. He was the same self-centered bastard, who cared only about the amulets that had to be thrown into the Etna, so the legend thirst of the Milan clan was allayed. He shouldn’t care how Mikiel got his sudden change of mind. The important issue was, he committed to going to Sicily. Now he had to find Gregory and tell him that the Milan were going with him. Who knew what this young hothead was going to do?

He would be able to grab himself a boat and take off to Sicily by his own. He left the Milan and went into the house. There was no trace of Gregory. Keanu cruised through the house looking for him. He met Veronica fiddling around with the washing machine. Keanu looked at her questioningly. Veronica jerked her thumb upwards towards the top floor. Keanu hurried up the steps, looking in every room and finally found Gregory on the stairs. He was hurrying down the stairs, with his Shuffle bag hung over his shoulder, his skateboard under his arm. He looked as if he was going to make an exit. "Are you up to something specific?" Gregory looked annoyed trying to pass by on the narrow staircase, "Let me through, I'm not coping with that Milan shit any longer," he stared at him and his eyes were incredibly sad and depressed. Any hope had disappeared from them. "May I ask, where you are going?"
"No, you may not!" he stormed past Keanu sitting down on the steps to put on his vans. Great, Keanu thought, the kid actually wanted to get the hell out of here because the Milan had reacted so repellent, and he had to carry the can for it that was so typical! "Don’t be stupid! Where do you want to go?" Gregory didn’t answer continuing to tie his shoes with angry jittery movements. "Come on, Gregory, now is not the time to snap, you're so close to your destination and you have come so far you can’t give up now."

Gregory looked up, and the sadness in his eyes was gone. He looked as if he was incredibly angry with himself and the whole world, "What makes you think that I have given up? That’s not what this is about, but I am tired of being pushed around, playing everybody's fool, carrying the can for all these idiotic prophecies like the one with your amulets. I am fed up risking my life and receiving treatment as if it was my entire fault by your people." Keanu sighed, why did he have to take everything so serious, "Forget the people, you have to do it for yourself, and if you are thinking straight for just one second, you know exactly that the amulets connect to the curse, there is no denying that. If you bring them there, you will be free and not only you, the Milan the Akandos and if you look closely at the matter, even the Vultures will be free. We will all be free from old stories and constraints, haunting and imprisoning us like threads of a puppet. I don’t claim that all of the greedy Vultures become all of a sudden gentle lambs, but some of them will wake up and make the difference between right and wrong, I am sure about that. They haven’t yet understood that their damn island will drown this time if they should succeed to get you out of the way. They are going to find out eventually that you bring them light into darkness. They are so damn afraid of losing their power and riches, which they built on the detriment of others. Time is up now, they will find out eventually that getting benefit out of exploiting others destroys them in the end, and if they will kill you - the only person in the world - that can avoid an elementary disaster such as a massive eruption of the Etna, then they are doomed. Not because of your actions. And, all of this only because the prophecy says, they would be deprived of power when the Savior came along."