Two Ships Passing in the Night – Part V

Disclaimer: This chapter is currently in development. There are likely typos, errors, omissions, inconsistencies and so forth. Please do not treat this as a polished and completed work!

Clara sat at a table by her favourite café. She observed the morning crowd flow while they made their way to work or school. There was a certain sense of satisfaction for not being bound by the clock.


Busy sipping on a latté, Clara closed her eyes and relaxed. While she was not bound by time, she knew someone whose time was about to come at an abrupt end.

The first break in flow started with a few hushed voices. With every passing second, the crowd grew larger until people began to panic.

“Fire! Fire,” a man exclaimed marking it as the first coherent statement yet.

Hurried footsteps passed by, close enough that clara felt the rush of air pass by. Within five minutes she heard sirens approaching in the distance.

Clara opened her eyes and saw a mob surrounding the bistro. She feigned curiosity but knew exactly that was going on.

“Sir,” Clara asked in an alarmed voice. “What is going on,” she asked.

“The Cabaret down the street is on fire,” the man replied without taking his eyes off the carnage.

“A shame,” Clara thought, seeing how that would delay breakfast.
“Is anyone hurt,” Clara asked, but was ignored.

For the next several hours the crowd grew and contracted like the tide. Men fought hard to save the building but the fire ultimately claimed its prize. Eventually the stone structure was reduced to a smouldering heap of broken brick and stone.

“That should take care of all evidence nicely,” Clara thought.

She got up from the table, paid her tab with a generous tip and melted into the crowd. Today was a new day and seeing that traitorous bastard burn made things right as rain.

She thought back over one of Professor Stephen’s lectures. Many of the students had chosen to ignore his wisdom, discounting it as a work of fantasy.

Clara had known better and paid close attention to the lecture on the effects of daylight for these creatures. Direct light could sear flesh or during longer exposures cause the body to erupt in a fiery inferno. In that moment, she knew that their bodies could easily be disposed of.

All she needed was a clear head and a little forethought. That knowledge had certainly done the trick this morning.



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