Caleb was waiting for him when he stepped out of the taxi and shut the door. The driver didn't seem to notice, but he'd also not seemed to care about much of anything besides getting paid and hurrying to his next pick-up.
Adon watched Caleb as the wraith watched him from where it stood beside the spare room's window. He'd never really seen him outside in the open before. Even when he'd be at the apartment with them, he had disappeared when they'd left, then reappeared inside the car.
So you can physically be outside, too. Good to know.
"Taylor is in the hospital so I'm here to take care of the fish for him," he said as he slowly started walking toward the house.
A blur by the window next to the door drew his attention, but he couldn't quite make out anything inside because of the glare from the emerging sun.
Stopping a few feet from the door, he turned to see Caleb standing a few feet away from him, his stare blank and lips slightly parted.
"You need to make sure that your brother doesn't come after me. If he tries to attack me, I'm not going to take care of the fish, and I won't let Taylor come back here, either," he warned, getting a miniscule head tilt from Caleb before the wraith disappeared.
Hope that means he agrees to keep me alive.
Taking out Taylor's keys, he unlocked the door, then nudged it open so that it slowly swung inward until it bumped against the wall.
He looked around the entire room before carefully stepping inside, then shut the door. There was no way he'd lock it, but he didn't want the banshee to get out, either, if that were even possible. He'd read up a bit more on that specific type of undead since he'd decided to go take care of the fish for Taylor, and wanted to be as prepared as possible. The information had been pretty adamant that banshee's couldn't travel very far from their bodies, and if killed inside of a structure, they were pretty much locked in there... but then again, the much smaller section of information he'd found on wraiths mentioned the same thing.
Definitely was wrong there.
Looking over toward the kitchen counter, he noticed the fish tank sitting where they'd left it and walked over. The animal looked fine at first, swimming near the top of its tank, but then Adon realized that the little pump wasn't working.
He quickly unplugged it and took it out, then walked over to the sink. After a rinse and scrub, he took a few pieces off the little device.
"Ah ha," he whispered to himself as he grabbed one of the keys on his keychain and carefully pushed a stuck piece of the fish's plastic plant out of the small clear tube. It hadn't been visible with one of the plastic pieces in front of it, but after he'd taken it off, it was obvious that it would cause the pump to struggle.
"Hopefully that didn't completely burn out this little thing," he said as he got busy putting it all back together, then walked over to the little fish tank.
Just to be safe, he tugged the little fake plant out and removed two more pieces of it that were already floating on the surface, ready to ambush the filter's intake tube the moment he set it back up, no doubt.
"I'll get you something else later, little guy," he said as he tossed the fake plant in the trash, then got the little filter set back up.
After checking it out one more time, he plugged it in and was immediately relieved when it started right up and began aerating the water again. He added a small pinch of food, then grinned.
"There we go. He should be all set now," he said as he turned around, thinking that he'd see Caleb, but the young man was nowhere in sight.
Instead, he heard a thudding noise echo from beyond the torn-apart wall. It took him a moment to connect the sound to Nicolai's baseball bat as he heard it again.
"Well, that explains where you were... and where I'm going, right now," he said as he hurried toward the front door, only to turn around and run back to the counter. He tugged the fish bones out of his pocket and quickly set them down next to the tank, then turned back around to leave right as he began to see a blurry figure within the destroyed wall.
Of course, things couldn't go so easily for him. Caleb now stood between him and the door, his left arm raised and pointed toward the fish tank.
"I took care of it!" Adon yelled as he turned his attention back to the banshee climbing through the broken wall. Its low growl started up as it took notice of him, making Aden hurry into Taylor's bedroom and slam the door shut.
It was locked a moment later, but it only took Nikolai a few seconds to trudge over to it and begin striking the poor worn wood with his bat.
With his heart hammering harder with each swing of the weapon, Adon turned and ran over to the large window behind him. The latches on it took a bit of effort to unlock, but soon he was able to yank it up.
Thank god there's no screen.
He knew that it was a life or death situation, but he really didn't want to damage more of Taylor's property. The door was already going to be gone in a few moments considering the amount of inhuman strength Nikolai was putting into it.
Not wanting to wait around to see the final results, he quickly hopped out of the window, then slammed it shut. The sound reverberated around the too-silent neighborhood backyards surrounding the house. He half expected Caleb to be behind him when he turned around, but there was no one there.
Alright. Just get the heck out of here and back to the car.
Adon was about to hurry toward the chain-link fence on the left side of the house, but he didn't get very far. Something had his feet stuck, drawing his attention down to the ground.
Nothing's there?
He lifted them up one at a time. There was no resistance and none of the overgrown weeds were tangled around his shoes.
"I'm going crazy."
Shaking his head, he ran a hand through his messy hair and started running for the fence-line. Unfortunately, he got a total of two steps away from the window before something grabbed his ankle, stopping his ability to breathe and somehow dragging him down into the earth. Everything went black as he was pulled through layers of soil and rocks, eventually falling through a ceiling.
He landed painfully against a damp, concrete floor, his head hitting hard enough to make black dots dance across his vision and rob him of desperately needed air.
What the heck... happened?
He fought to remain conscious, focusing on his breathing but unable to move. He began to feel liquid warmth slowly pool against his hair.
Hurts.
A solid thump against a wooden surface drew his struggling attention. When another one sounded closer, then after a moment, a third one even closer, he realized what had happened.
Get up, get up, get up!
Shivers began to pulse through his aching body as the last thunk sounded, this time on the solid concrete, then began to drag.
Caleb! I took care of the fish.
His mind blanked for an unknown amount of time, but his consciousness quickly returned when he felt something scratching at his chest.
What the...?
His shirt had clearly been torn open, and as he fought to see anything in the utter darkness, something blunt but thin began to scratch at his chest, right above his heart. After several moments, Adon managed to open his left eye, but he really wished he hadn't when he saw who was leaning over him.
"Ni... ko," he rasped, earning a deep growl from the apparition above him.
Why can't I talk well? Or breathe?
He knew that he'd fallen through the ceiling, but the actual fall hadn't been the whole way, thankfully. He'd also managed to break at least a little bit of it with his left foot, though it was numb now.
His mind tried to focus on how to get Nikolai to stop scratching up his chest but it shifted when he felt something frigid push farther beneath his chin, forcing his head back and making him cough from the pressure.
The baseball bat?
A sharp pain in his chest made him whimper and Nikolai growl as he quickened his pace. Adon couldn't help but wince every few moments as the banshee scraped away at his flesh, gaining more fervor the deeper he got.
He forced his eyes open after a particularly sharp stab of pain and blinked, surprised to see Caleb standing just behind his head, staring down at him as his brother continued his efforts.
"W-we... had a deal," he cried, the words barely audible, even to his own ears.
Caleb didn't seem to register what he was saying, leaving Adon to try one last thing as the darkness edged at his vision again.
"Taylor... won't come... back. He's at the... hospital. Bad shape," he rasped, lying as he turned his head the slightest amount to try and alleviate enough of the pressure to be able to finish talking. "The fish... will die. He won't be able... to come back."
Nikolai seemed to hesitate, but he definitely wasn't removing the bat or backing away.
"Your little brother... will be... sad, if it... dies."
There was a long moment of silence, but finally, thankfully, the baseball bat was removed, allowing Adon to suck in a deep, painful gasp of air. He panted hungrily, knowing that he needed to get as much air as possible to try and stop himself from passing out again.
Unfortunately, even though Nikolai had stopped hurting him, his body had taken too much damage to keep the darkness out of his mind. Adon watched with blurry vision as the banshee slowly tilted its head back, slight dagger-like lines, perhaps teeth, appearing as it seemed to open its mouth in slow motion. Adon began to slip into unconsciousness as he watched, and a shrill, constant, wailing screech soon followed him into the abyss.