"The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed."

- Carl Gustav Jung

04:38 a.m

10 days earlier

“I thought there'd be more people here,” Tim spoke out to the corridor outside his holding cell. The white light of his cell shone soft shadows of the bars onto what would otherwise be a dimly lit path.

“The 'normal' cells are upstairs,” Pearlman replied in his monotonous voice. “We're in the ones for special people.”

Tim's cell, as he guessed of all the others, had walls that were tiled white, with questionable brown stains on each of the ceramic pieces. A single mat on a concrete ledge in the wall served as a bed, with a stainless steel sink and toilet combination in the corner. The entrance to the cell were blocked by grey painted bars, as they were of the olden police stations and allowed for him and Pearlman, the man in the cell beside him to communicate.

Pacing up to the bars, Tim slipped his hands through them and rested his elbows on the horizontal piece. Leaning in, he could see another pair of hands protruding from the cell to his left, though the angle at which they stood prevented them from seeing each others' faces.

Casually, Tim asked, “So what did you do to get here?”

“Oh you know,” Pearlman gestured a 'whatever' with his hands. “Apparently the cops think I'm some high profile case that needs to get locked up solo till trial. You?”

“Hit a cop,” he replied calmly.

“Wow,” though the tone did not convey surprise. “And how did you end up in punching range?”

Hesitant, but also reluctant to block out what was possibly his only source of conversation there, Tim replied, “Got accused of killing my dad.”

“Sorry for your loss,” instead of sounding sympathetic, Pearlman sounded impressed instead. “But did you do it?”

“No,” Tim replied flatly. “Fucking no.”

“Okay then,” Tim watched as Pearlman withdrew his hands from the bar. “Best get some sleep. It'll be a long day ahead for you.”

Tim looked to the mat that he was expected to sleep on. The lights in the cell didn't turn off from the inside. With everything else that had happened, he was sure he would not sleep a wink. Sitting down on the lumpy concrete ledge, he leaned clumsily against the tiled walls and immediately dozed off.

XXX

Tim's eyes creaked opened to the light of a clear blue sky, a flock of birds cutting through the air above him in formation. He looked down his body to find himself once again wearing his black shirt and cargo combo. His 'dream attire'. His right arm was still missing, the same bloodstained bandaged stump it was the night before.

Sister walked up to him, her small form towered from where he laid. “You awake yet?” she asked in her sing-song voice. The silhouette of her petite figure cast through her white dress by the sunlight behind her, a smile spread across her face.

“No,” he replied, slightly annoyed. She looked overtly cheerful to him. “I'm asleep.”

With a groan, he pushed himself to sit up, his back aching as he did so. They were on a plateau of sort, the grassy, flowered land stretched for about half a mile before ending suddenly, with nothing visible beyond save for the endless blue sky. With another heave, Tim got to his feet and taut his back to stretch it. He looked at Sister only to turn away when their eyes met. He started walking.

She followed after him despite his attempt to walk faster to get away from her. Her steps seemed to glide noiselessly across the ground and she caught up with his pace with seemingly no effort on her part. “And where do you think you're going?”

“To jump off a ledge,” he replied coldly.

“Wait, are you serious?”

“Yes.”

She sped up her pace so she could move in front of him. Though seemingly walking backwards, he was sure she was gliding. Unable to see her feet under her long white dress though, Tim could only assume so as she managed to keep up to him. “What makes you want to do something crazy like that?” she asked in her usual cheerful tone.

“That's how you wake up right?” he replied, looking at the ground behind her instead of directly at her. “You die from 'natural' causes and you wake up. As long as I don't get killed by one of you Family members, I get to live.”

“That's a crazy speculation you've got going there,” she reacted in genuine amazement, slowing down her steps till they were walking side by side.

“That's what I do. It's the only thing I'm good for,” he said grimly. “When I 'died' at the diner from that car, I woke up. But when my father died by The Father's hands, he died for real. It's what I do. I speculate. It's the only thing I can do.”

“Are you okay?”

“Fine,” he replied, his tone glacial. He could see the edge of the plateau now. “Just fine,” he extended his strides.

“Are you trying to avoid me?” she asked.

Without hesitation, he replied, “Yes.”

“Why?”

Tim stopped in his tracked and turned to face Sister and shouted, “Because you left my father to die. You could have helped!”

“And do what?” she calmly replied. “My powers don't work on any of the others and it's not my job to save people.”

“You don't save people?” Tim scoffed. “Than that night in the barn. Why did you save me? Why are you helping me?”

“Because I killed you!” she screamed back. “That night at the barn, I didn't save you. I killed you. Right after The Father cut off your arm, I drove a spike straight into your heart and you survived. That's why I'm helping you. The only person who even has a chance of stopping The Father right now is you, the only person who has ever survived.”

Tim, shocked by the outburst, the first time she had raised her voice past her normal delicate tone, stood stunned. “You killed me?”

“Yes,” she replied unhesitatingly.

“Why?”

Looking down at her bare feet, “It's our job. We're grim reapers,” looking back up and staring the teen in the eye, she found neither anger, confusion, nor fear, but a questioning gaze. “Remember how I told you the dream scape are parts of alternate universes.”

“Yeah...”

She circled around him, her white dress dragging against the grass and the dirt, but never staining, its length extending and diminishing randomly. “That's where your consciousness go after you die. Other worlds. Our job is to separate your consciousness from your physical body and send them on to the next world. We used to be living humans, like you. We died, and made a deal with some creature from another dimension. In return for a hundred and thirty nine years of servitude, we get a second chance at life on Earth again,” she changed direction and headed for the edge of the plateau. This time, Tim followed in her steps, listening intensely. “It wasn't always like it is now. We didn't go around killing indiscriminately. We take the life from people at the edge of death. That is, until The Father went insane. He corrupted most of us with the promise of power. To feed on human consciousness to get stronger. Enough power to tear our way back into reality and be kings and queens.”

“Even you?” Tim asked. A part of him knew the answer.

“Yeah,” she replied softly, barely audible over the wind. “Even me. For awhile. Then I came back to my senses, but the rest were too overcome by power to talk out of.”

Something Sister said struck the curiosity in Tim. “Why one-three-nine years? What's so significant about that time?” Tim asked.

She explained, “Time doesn't flow at the same rate in every world. An hour in your world could be a second here. Maybe even a day. I'm guessing a hundred and thirty nine years is equivalent to some odd number of time for whoever gave us these positions. That's my theory anyway.”

Before they knew it, they were at the cliff edge of the plateau. As expected, looking down saw to nothing but a thick layer of cloud. No ground could be seen but Tim felt in his aching bones that it was a long drop.

Tim continued, “You haven't told me why me yet.”

“There were four of us at the barn that night. Me, The Father, The Son, and The Mother,” she paused.

After waiting for her reply which seemed to not be coming, he pushed on. “So?”

Sister turned to him, and he saw a look of grimness that he felt unfitting of her crease-less, bright face. She replied, “We've never had more than one of us for one target before.”

And he realized the implication. Having more than one hunter meant being able to piece together more information than any other living person could. It meant that Sister could communicate with him while he actively fought the other members of The Family, instead of being cut off and being unable to do anything. If he was only faced with The Father, Tim would never have gotten these bits of information from Sister. If it was just the Sister, he won't be able to use the information against the Sawman, since they'll never meet.

She turned away from him and peered down the vertical drop. “Are you still going to jump?” she asked.

“I have to test out my theory.”

“It'll definitely work. You guessed right.”

Tim forced out a laugh, “It's not that I don't trust you but, well, actually I don't trust you,” he turned back to her and caught her stare. “Not entirely. Besides, nothing left to lose. My father's dead. Best friends are next. If I fail at whatever heroic thing you expect me to do, I'm not going to have much left to live for anyway.”

He stepped closer to the ledge, but upon looking down, his body froze, as were bodies to do when faced with death defying actions and logic.

Sister sounded concerned as she asked, “What's wrong?”

“Nothing. Enjoying the scenery.”

Abruptly, he felt her pressed herself against his back. The sudden movement almost made his footing slip, his body jerking slightly in reaction. Sister placed her hands on the blades of his shoulders, and, with her voice echoing in his mind, “I am sorry about your father.”

A sudden feeling of sexual attraction surged through his body and he felt the urge to spin around to embrace the girl fully. Preferably naked. He had felt that sensation before and knew that whatever power the girl had was what forced the sharp spike in his lust. He had never acted on it for he had always felt a certain sense of fear in his chest when she acted that way. Originally, he was unable to identify that terror, but knew now that it was bloodlust. Her bloodlust.

She continued, her voice increasingly sexual, “But you are wrong about one thing.”

He swallowed hard before replying, “And what's that?”

“That night at the barn, I didn't feel any connection with you. Someone must have gotten to you first,” she started saying. He remembered meeting The Son before her. “I'm feeling the connection now. Which means I've marked you. You're mine. So if I were to push you instead of you jumping off yourself...”

“I'll die for real,” the realization dawned on him.

Sister pushed softly against his back. Not much strength was used but it was enough to cause him to tip forward. Snapping out of his trance, Tim bent his legs, looked up to the endless blue sky, and jumped from the edge into the abyss below.