The long night led into a bright new day. During the time that he was awake, plans were made. He even went to the dream to check on Branwen and to let her know that it would be an odd period for her. Strangely, she did not mind being alone and did seem eager to visit his world if plans went the way that he intended.

Scott checked to see if Shara was home, but no one answered the door. He thought about entering her home unannounced to check the interior. In the end he opted not to do that. If he did not hear form her soon, he would be more aggressive in his search. Were his thoughts regarding her not clouded by other possibilities, he might even do it now.

Ashton’s truck beckoned to him, but he doubted that he would get away with his brand of driving in the daylight. Not to mention certain legalities best left unmentioned. Instead, he walked into town and head off to work.

Some might question his decision to return to Archers. Clearly there were a lot of interesting things going on that he should attend to at the moment. His reasons were sound, however.

He relaxed his mind as he approached the doors and headed inside. While he still looked beat up, he was able to cover most of the issue with clothing. He also wore a medical mask and used the excuse that he had a cold.

A slight hint of his aura was left to leak out into the area around him. It was not enough to scare people away, but it proved to be strong enough to keep people from looking at him for too long.

Almost a ghost to them, he ignored their curious thoughts about his appearance, and focused on other tidbits of information. Time passed while he worked the floor. He was not scheduled for guest services, but they needed help anywhere they could get it. In this way, Scott was able to wander the floor while unboxing goods and stocking them on the shelves.

The early morning guests were numerous, far more numerous than usual. Given the store hours many more people would cram themselves into the store during the day. Unsurprisingly, there were whispers that the change made corporate happy. It lowered payroll costs and boosted their bottom line back up to vaguely tolerable numbers.

His entire shift went by, and he signed on for a second one. This time he was sent to be a cashier for a few hours. What he did not discover on the floor, he eventually began to hear whispers of at the cash register.

‘It’s going down tonight… This bitch needs to ring me up…’ whispered a voice inside Scott’s head. He did not look toward its source, but out of the corner of his eye he noted that it was a sketchy looking guy with discolored teeth and an unshaven face.

Scott continued to check out other guests while he slipped further into the man’s mind. Surprisingly, he was not thinking of meth. It was something far more sinister. He and a group of associates had designs on the family of a man who was set to testify against once of their drug running pals.

‘That little slut’s a nice piece of ass,’ whispered the man’s thoughts. The image of a fourteen-year-old girl came to mind. It was the witness’ daughter. Apparently, the witness also had a fat old wife according to the deviant’s thoughts.

He did his best not to vomit as he extricated himself from the man’s mind. He was not certain that there would be any money in it, but he had plans for the evening.

Work came to an end, and after he helped to clean up the store he knocked off. Instead of heading home, he went to the address that he fished from the man’s mind earlier. He did call back to let Ashton and Sonja know he would be late, however.

Scott shifted into shadow form and drifted into the darkest knot of shadows that he could find. He watched the area and did his best not to smile. The witness was out of town, and his family was sitting down to dinner on front of the television.

Voices whispered to him from within the home. Errant thoughts captured on a breeze of the mind; it was not their actual voices that reached him but their mental origins.

“Dad’s gonna be back tomorrow, right?” asked the young girl. Her mental energy was sweet and warm, pixie sticks and unicorns. There was a lustful emotive part set aside for one boyband or another, but Scott chose not to delve deeper. Typical American tween. Nice enough young girl who seemed far too innocent to be involved in what was to come.

Her mother also seemed like a decent person. There was nothing particularly repellent about her energy. His senses determined that any hint of corruption about her was likely to just be the result of living a normal life.

The night wore on. Dinner ended, and eventually the ladies of the house retired to their rooms. The meth dealers had not arrived. Shambling forms appeared and began to roam the neighborhood. A scarvulf knocked over a trash can in an alley down the street then looked around a bit like it was embarrassed. Otherwise, nothing out of the ordinary happened.

“Odd,” he said quietly. The monsters don’t seem inclined to attack the houses nearby.

It was possible that newly spawned monsters held an aversion to entering buildings, but that would not stop the ones that spawned inside of them in the first place. He stretched his mass and checked inside the house. There was no sign of monster spawn.

The zombies and the scarvulf wandered away in due time, and just as Scott began to abandon hope that his meal ticket would arrive, a black van turned the corner down the street. It’s lights were out, and it was barely noticeable due to the poor lighting. Yet, it was clearly what he had been waiting for.

Scott shifted forward in the darkness. He moved from shadow to shadow in preparation of the coming conflict.

The van slowly drove toward the address, a sudden flash of light from inside the vehicle revealed that there were five men. The dull red light of a burning cigarette held Blackthorne’s attention for a moment. It was all the light he needed to see into the interior of that blacked out van due to his other sense.

Their thoughts became his property. They were indeed here for the occupants of the house, and they had come armed.