Tina Chan - imperfect

“Yes.”

Chelsa tried to leave the room, but Ghost blocked the doorway.

“Ghost, can you please move?” she asked.

Ghost raised his hackles and hissed at Chelsa. Kristi had never seen Ghost act so aggressive to her before.

“Don’t make this any harder than it is,” Chelsa said to Ghost in a low voice, prodding him with her foot in attempt to get him out of the way.

Ghost spat disdainfully and stalked away in a huffy manner.

Finn unlocked the backdoor and the five of them stepped out into the crisp night. Kristi was extra glad of the thick sweatshirt she had pulled on when a stiff breeze blew through.

“How far away is Jabber Boulevard?” she whispered.

“About a ten minute walk.”

The roads were eerie and void of life. Oppidum had transformed from a lively metropolitan to an abandoned city within hours. Chelsa seemed to want to say something several times while walking, but kept changing her mind last minute. Kristi wondered if she was regretting rousing them up to meet a stranger in the middle of the night.

“Oh, I recognize where we are,” Finn said. His voice sounded freakishly loud in the unoccupied roads. “Jabber Boulevard is only two streets away.”

They turned right at the end of the avenue and the street sign for Jabber Boulevard came into view. Chelsa, who had been leading the group the whole time, paused in her steps without a warning and spun around. Kristi took a hasty step back to avoid colliding face first into her.

“Are there patrols?” Kristi asked.

“No. Let’s go back to Finn’s house.”

“You’re kidding,” Troop said. “You dragged us out at three-something in the morning only to turn back now without even seeing if we can receive some help with the case.”

“No, I’m not kidding. Let’s go.”

“At least give us a good reason why we should turn back now,” said Jaiden.

“I lied.” Chelsa’s eyes evaded Jaiden’s.

“I don’t understand,” said Jaiden.

“There is no one waiting for us at Jabber Boulevard. At least no one that you would want to meet. Unless you want to be caught by the United Region Homeland Security law enforcers.”

“Are you saying you led us straight into an ambush?” Kristi said, not believing what Chelsa was telling her.

“Yes— get behind those recycle bins! ”

Chelsa shoved Kristi behind several bins sitting by the curb just as someone walked off of Jabber Boulevard. Then she walked away from the bins and towards the person.

“Chelsa, good to see you,” the person greeted her. The woman was dressed all in black, from her combat boots to her helmet.

“Greetings, Officer Zala,” Chelsa replied.

Officer Zala frowned. “You’re late by over fifteen minutes. And where are the others you promised you would bring? My people have been waiting for over an hour now.”

“I’m sorry. I thought I could convince the others to follow me with the fake instafication I sent myself. I was wrong though; they weren’t willing to break curfew.”

Zala ground her teeth, whether out of frustration or anger, Kristi couldn’t tell.

“I expected better of you,” Zala said. “I will call my men off duty then. Remember, the faster you bring the other freaks to us, the faster you’ll get what you want. I will be awaiting your next instafication and updates.”

“Is that all there is?” Chelsa asked.

Officer Zala gave a sharp nod and left. A few minutes later, three black vans pulled out of Jabber Boulevard and then roared off. Kristi quivered, thinking how close they had been with getting caught.

She looked at Troop, Jaiden and Finn, trying to gauge how they were handling this rapid turn of events. Troop and Finn seemed shocked; Troop’s jaw was tightly clenched, trying to hold back his fury of Chelsa’s betrayal. Jaiden was deathly still.

Kristi was glad Chelsa had a sudden change of heart and decided not to turn them in to the government. On the other hand, she was shaking with anger; Chelsa had the nerves to fake a friendship with her.

Chelsa started coming back towards them. Kristi had a lot of acrimonious words in store for her.

“How could you?” she asked. “I trusted you.”

Chelsa refused to meet her eyes and looked down at the ground. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to. Nothing went as planned. I didn’t know this was the way things would turn out.”

“Sorry doesn’t change the fact that you almost killed us,” Jaiden snapped.

Ghost appeared out of the night and looked up at Chelsa.

“You’re right and I’m wrong, Ghost,” she said.

Chelsa reached down to scratch Ghost behind the ears. Ghost closed his eyes and rumbled.

Suddenly Kristi understood why Ghost and Chelsa had been in a fight; Ghost knew Chelsa was planning on betraying them. He had been trying to signal Chelsa not to turn them in.

“Let’s head back,” Finn said. “No point in staying out any longer than we need to.”

“Okay,” Kristi said, and then she faced Chelsa who still wasn’t meeting her eyes. “You have a lot of explaining to do once we get back to Finn’s house.”

“I promise I’ll explain everything.”

“You’re promises aren’t worth a lot to me right now,” Jaiden retorted. He sounded furious and wounded at the same time.

They speed-walked in an uncomfortable silence. The walk back to Finn’s home seemed both quicker and slower than before. Finn unlocked the door to the house and everyone slipped inside silently so as not to wake up the adults.

They headed into the living room and Kristi adjusted the lights to the dimmest setting. Jaiden, Troop and Kristi sat together on a couch while Finn remained standing by the doorway. Chelsa settled on the ottoman; the whole setup reminded Kristi of an interrogation being taken place.

“Start talking,” Jaiden commanded.

“First of all, I feel extremely guilty right now. I know that probably doesn’t mean much to you guys, but I truly apologize to you,” Chelsa said.

“You can save your apologies for later.”

“Just tell us why you pretended to be our friend,” Kristi said.

“It’s a long story.”

“We have all the time we need.”

“Do you remember Alex? Officer Zala contacted me shortly after Alex died. It turns out the government has known that there were four living Accidents for a while; however, the Revealers had done an excellent job of concealing our locations. By pure chance, Officer Zala happened to find me after being assigned to document Alex’s death. She offered me a deal: if I could somehow manage to steer the other three Accidents, which are you guys, into one place together where she could seize everyone at once, she would bring Alex back to life.”

Kristi closed her mouth when she realized it had fallen open in disbelief. “That sounds like something from a science-fiction book. No one has ever been brought back from the dead.”

“That’s true,” Chelsa said. “But Officer Zala knows several scientists that have been working on ways to revitalize the deceased; it’s a government funded research department and the scientists think that they will have a method to bring a person back to life using their DNA soon.

“At first, I brushed off her offer for two main reasons: first of all, the whole deal sounded preposterous; second of all, I had absolutely no idea how to find the other Accidents. Heck, I thought I was a one-of-a-kind-freak. But when I accidently met Kristi, I began to reconsider Zala’s offer. I told myself I would just pretend to befriend Kristi and let her lead me to the other Accidents then turn you all in and be done with it.

“I wasn’t expecting to actually befriend you guys. And I most definitely did not foresee myself falling in love with Jaiden.” Chelsa threw him a pleading look, which he returned stonily. She dropped her head to her hands and muttered, “I really screwed up, didn’t I?”