Dark Application: ONE (The Dark Application Series Book 1) (5 page)

Luke
stumbled down the hallway and pushed upstairs to his room. He fell on his
bed and threw an arm over his face. He realized that the music was
starting to simmer down, and that his stomach was growling again. Then he
heard talking outside. He recognized Amy’s voice.

He
peered out the window and saw Amy and Travis outside on the lawn, talking
seriously to each other. It looked like they were arguing. Travis
was slouching and pressing his chin aggressively in her face. The look on
her face told Luke everything he needed to know. He reached in his pocket
for his phone to call the cops and then remembered that he had left it in
Chris’s car, right where they were arguing outside. Suddenly, he saw Amy
reach into her pocket and pull out her cell phone. She looked down at it,
and then her clouded expression cleared a little. She threw Travis’s arms
away from her and strode back toward the house, leaving him standing in the
driveway huffing angrily.

Luke
turned and ran downstairs to meet Amy as she was coming inside. However,
as he descended the last step, he heard an ear-splitting scream, and the stereo
went silent. Everyone in the house who was still able to walk came
rushing to the front door, several people shrieking in horror and shock.

“Call
9-1-1!” screamed a girl from outside.

In a
rush of screams and panicked shouts, Luke came to the front door. He
looked outside to see Travis lying under Chris’s car. Somehow, the car
had lurched forward hard enough to knock Travis to the ground, running him
over. He lay in a pool of blood, which trickled out of an enormous gaping
gash in his forehead and dripped onto the cold pavement. He lay,
unmoving, and Luke only stared in shock until Chris charged from the front door
into the night air.

“Okay,
everyone needs to go home, NOW!” he shouted. Everyone listened and gathered
their belongings. They tossed their jackets and purses on and disbursed
into the frigid, misty night. The cold sunk in suddenly and deeply. Luke
shivered hard.

“If
you are underage, I recommend getting the hell out of my house now because the
cops are on their way! And
an
ambulance!”

Chris
was stunning in his order-giving. Even falling over drunk, even after an
entire night of dancing, screwing around, and partying, he somehow gathered up
enough muster to deal with a dead guy in his front yard.

Luke
remained rooted to the spot, staring ahead. His ears were ringing, his
head floating.
Men like him should just die and get it over with.

He began to
walk toward the car and heard Chris shout, “Stay the hell away from my car, Luke,”
but Luke just turned and looked at him.

“My
phone, dude, it’s in your car.”

“Let
me get it, Luke. Just stay away from my car right now.”

Chris
jogged to the driver’s side door and carefully grabbed the phone, shutting the
door gently.

When
the paramedics arrived, everyone had gone. Amy had gotten a ride with
someone on the rugby team, and Amit had left and gone to
Mi’s
house for the night. Just Chris and Luke sat on the front door step,
staring with blank faces at the bloody spectacle. They loaded the body
into the ambulance and strapped down the arms and legs.
Dead.
Travis was now dead.
Men like him
should just die and get it over with.

Thinking
about the phone in his pocket made his leg burn.
What next, phone?
He thought.
Who called Amy at the last second to warn her?
Who started the engine and gave it enough gas to kill a man 15 feet away?
Who invited all these people to my house tonight in the first place?
How does shit like this happen?
Luke’s head spun.

When
the ambulance left, he had to play twenty questions with a cop, who essentially
asked five questions worded four different ways, and then Luke stumbled
upstairs and tossed the phone on his desk. He lay on his bed and stared
hard at the phone, put one leg on the floor, and finally the room stopped
spinning. He either drifted off to sleep or passed out. Either way,
the night was over.

That
night he dreamt of Amy.
Amy checking her text messages.

A
my
didn’t show up in class for two weeks.

The
rain began to harden and freeze, and by the first week of February, the dark
billowing clouds began to let out frozen crystallized snowflakes.

Luke
sat in his chemistry lecture, tapping his pencil on his paper, staring at the
lightly fluttering specks of white slowly plunging past the window frame.
Tiny drifts of snow had begun to accumulate here and there, and
multitudes of muddy footprints covered the sidewalks and tracked into every
doorway.

When
Amy did appear, she came in late to class, her voluminous hair dappled with
snow. She shook off her boots and took a seat a few chairs down to
Luke’s
left. Professor Jones nodded respectfully,
acknowledging her and dismissing her tardiness, and continued the lecture.

The
class felt so different. No one sat exactly in the same places they had
at the beginning of the semester. The students were much more solemn, and
people had a quiet air about them.

The
death of Travis the rugby player had deeply affected Brafferton Community
College and had aired on every news station in the state. Everyone felt
scared, stinging
, mortal
fear. People
whispered about the insane party, the bizarre accident, the mysteriousness of
the situation. Everyone had more and more questions, but there was nothing more
to say about it.

Travis’
parents were trying to launch a huge wrongful death lawsuit, but there were too
many witnesses. There had been no driver in the car. No keys in the
ignition.

Chris’s
car had been seized as evidence, so now they had no transportation. Luke
and Amit shared their bikes with Chris, rotating them out, and sometimes Luke
walked when both the bikes were being used. The snow stuck and stayed at
a steady three inches, turning the sidewalks icy and filling the streets with
slushy mud. At times, snow or the cold made biking impossible, and they
were forced to walk or take the foul-smelling city buses.

The
party had left the house in shambles; the dishes were broken, the couches
soiled,
the floors muddy, the bathrooms filthy, and the food
and toilet paper completely gone. The three of them sat around the fire,
eating ramen noodles, silently doing homework around the rickety coffee table
since their rooms were too cold to stay in for long. The house remained
mostly quiet, and when Chris came home with his cheerful demeanor, Amit and
Luke hardly looked up. They generally just stared into the fire.

“I
could get an emergency student loan to restock the place,” said Luke, flicking
crumpled chemistry scratch notes into the fire.

“No,
don’t go into debt over it, Luke. I get my check in six more days,” said
Amit. He worked part-time at the college book store on campus.
“We’ll make it until then, and I can get some groceries so we don’t
starve” he joked. “Chris will be good for a couple months, but me, I don’t
know how long I can go without eating…” he patted his thin stomach.

“There’s
enough here for all of us!” said Chris, grabbing his gut roll and jiggling it.

Luke
and Amit groaned and looked away.

Luke
did his school work, but in the back of his mind he kept trying to think of a
way to make more money. They were certainly behind; not only had the
party set them back, but rent was due in two more weeks, and Chris depended on
donations from his dad who mostly promised a lot of money, but never delivered
much. Luke had been required to appear at the sheriff’s office for
questioning twice, which required bus fare, in addition to the bus fare he
needed in order to get to his internship. In a two hour period, Luke
received text messages from his cell phone carrier, the electric company, and
the cable company demanding callbacks to avoid interruption of services.
In short, they were completely, utterly broke.

Luke hitch-hiked to his internship the next day.
A man
in a blue pickup truck gave him a lift, and when Luke pointed to the industrial
complex where he wanted off, he looked around, a little bewildered.

“Are
you sure this is the place?” the man asked, gazing across the mostly-empty
parking lots.

“Yep,
this is where the magic happens,” Luke joked and gave a wink. “Thanks so
much sir, your help is much appreciated.”

“No
problem, son. Be careful. Have a great day,” he said and drove off.

It was
nice and warm inside, as usual. Sergeant Coffield looked up skeptically
at Luke, an expression he’d grown used to. “Hey there,
Sarge
,” he said, and strode back through the hallway to his
work station.

Kevin
was there, sitting over his keyboard, the reflection of the computer monitor
glaring in his large black eyes. He turned and smiled enthusiastically when
Luke came in.
“Hey there, Luke!
How was
your weekend?”

Luke
hadn’t said anything to anyone about the incident at his party, and he didn’t
know how many people knew how involved he’d been with all that. Not that
he had anything to do with the death, he tried to convince himself. Just
that it had happened at his house. That was all.

But
Kevin was always polite and never in a bad mood, and Luke had started counting
on Kevin’s stable state of cheerfulness to lighten him up. They settled
into their work, with Luke occasionally asking a question, and Kevin always
willing to help him out.

After
about a half hour of working in silence, Kevin, who had been perusing a news
website, turned and said, “Hey Luke, did you hear about the missing girl?”

“No man,
who is it?” he asked. Alright, finally something to take the spotlight
off
the dead guy at his house.

“Some high school senior from Fort Christanna High.
She was last seen at a party in town.
Some
college party.
Apparently she never made it home,”

Luke
fidgeted uncomfortably in his seat.
No more parties at my house
,
he thought.

“Not
that much of a mystery, if you think about it. Small town girl,
disappeared at a party? She ran off with a guy, of course,” said Luke.

“They
are doing a search for her anyway. Looks like her parents are pretty
loaded,” said Kevin.
“Says here that she wasn’t really the
party type.”

“Huh,”
Luke said.
Yeah, right
, he thought.

Kevin
turned back to his monitor, his back to Luke. The room was dark,
silhouetting Kevin’s shape against the bright computer screen. Luke could
see his messy ear-length hair trembling as his skinny arm worked the mouse.
It was like Kevin never left, like he just sat in this room working on
the computer all day and night.

“Hey,
we should go out sometime, Kevin, get the hell out of this room for once.
You like to hang out on the weekends? You ever stop working? You
got a date for Valentine’s Day?”

Kevin
slowly swiveled in his chair, a hesitant smile on his face. His eyes were
round, his face pale. With a slow, calculated tone, he said, “I have a
pretty major project that I’ve been working on for the last year, and I have to
work out some, uh… kinks… before I begin my dissertation.”

Luke
blinked.

“What
that means is, no. I never go out. I am stuck in this room until I
finish this damn project I started.” His smile had faded. His head
twitched, as though his neck were just a twig holding on his skull. Deep
wrinkles cut across his forehead and he looked at Luke with solemn, bleak eyes.

Luke’s
gaze dropped, and then he forced an awkward smile. “Well hey, when you
finish this, I’m
gonna
take you out and we are going
to go celebrate,” he said.

Kevin
laughed, the darkness dispelling from his face, and the same cheerful demeanor
coming back. “You know, I’m going to take you up on that offer someday,
Luke. I’m taking you up on that alright,” he said and turned back to his
computer grinning.

Luke
was happy to have cheered Kevin up a bit this time. Kevin was an
interesting fellow.
Introverted, awkward, but genuine.
Luke liked that.

When
he left that day, he opened the door of the warm cement building and entered a
swirling ice-cold blizzard of fluffy snow that melted on his face and dripped
down his neck. He stood miserably waiting for the bus. His hands were
crammed in his pockets, his shoulders pressed to his ears, desperately trying
to keep the freezing wind out. The icy air stung his nose and drafts of
it blew through his thread-bare shirts.
God I wish I had a jacket.
God I wish I had water-proof boots. God I wish I had a car. I NEED
some damn money! I would do anything to have enough money to at least be
comfortable.

His
phone suddenly vibrated in his pocket, startling him. His attention
perked, his heart skipping a beat. Just then, the bus appeared around the
bend. He shivered, and then considered throwing the phone in front of the
bus tire. But some deep intrigue, some complex curiosity that drew him in
like a dirty magazine, or a grotesque horror film, made him eager to take the
phone out and turn it on. He fought the urge, the blustering cold making
him reluctant to remove his hands from his sweater pouch.

The
phone, ignored in his pocket, vibrated again. He didn’t reach for it yet.
It was too freezing out here. He’d wait till he sat down in the bus.

The
bus pulled up, heaved to the curb, and Luke stepped aboard, throwing himself
into a vinyl seat. It wasn’t as warm inside as he’d hoped. The door
swung shut and the bus lurched forward onto the road. He finally pulled out his
phone.

The
blank screen flashed almost imperceptibly, and then the
Dark Application
logo lit up the screen, without any command of Luke’s. The black and
white square with the large blue “D” in bold type dazzled the screen, and then
became a thumbnail in the top right-hand corner. Dim blue lettering
flashed across the middle of the screen, first fast and unreadable, and then
slowing down and repeating itself over and over.
Loading: Please
Wait. Don’t turn off phone yet, download almost complete. Turning
off the phone may cause you to lose any unsaved data
.
Hello,
Luke Jeffers.
Loading
, Please
Wait.
Hello, Luke Jeffers.
How was work
today?

The
last phrase made Luke’s heart jump into his throat. His white fingers
trembled, clenching the phone. The question mark hung there on the
screen, the last dim blue lettering to fade.

Frantically
Luke looked around the bus. The bus driver was an older lady with a gray
jacket. She looked forward at the road. Behind him, two other
passengers sat near the windows, a man in slacks with an umbrella leaning
against his seat, and a student (high school or college, Luke was uncertain),
with a hood on, ear buds in, and a huge backpack. He searched the space
outside the windows. There was nothing around for miles out here except
for the empty skeletal remains of shut-down warehouses. The snow obscured
his vision, and he wiped the frosty window with his sleeve.

The
phone was texting again.
Hello, Luke. Have you called Amy yet?
Valentine’s Day is less than two weeks away…

Then
the broiling feeling, the heart-gripping adrenaline rush began to come over
him. He could feel his temperature rising, and his muscles were suddenly
pumped with oxygenated blood. He suddenly felt like getting up and running.
The phone flashed more letters.

60095
Gold Commerce Way.

He
looked up, and saw street signs passing like ghosts in the snowy gray wind.

He
pulled the emergency stop cord, jumped up and shouted, “
Stop the bus!
I need to get off
NOW
!”

The bus
driver
braked
hard, a startled expression fixed on her
face. Bewildered, she watched him in the mirror as he charged toward the
door and brushed fiercely past her, leaping into the slushy street without so
much as a thank you. She shook her head angrily and slammed the door.
The bus pulled away.

Before
the bus had disappeared around the next block, Luke was already jogging in the
other direction. The phone vibrated. Without breaking stride, he
looked at it.

300
feet turn left.

The
adrenaline rush was bursting in him now. He pumped his legs hard,
breaking into a full sprint, the cold no longer a bother to him as his body
temperature rose. At his guess of 300 feet, he halted at an alleyway on
the left, and stole quickly between two buildings.

The
snow was light here, the sky just a strip of gray high above within the narrow
passage. He stomped mindlessly through puddles, not sure of where he was
going.
Just blindly running.
The freezing
wind stabbed into his aching lungs, which pumped hard as his heart rate
accelerated.

The
phone vibrated again.
White door on left.

Luke
pushed through the pain, the energy in his muscles feeling like a release.
He felt enraged, unusually strong and agile, powerful… he felt great!

The
electric energy built in him and began to peak. He felt like shouting,
and he sprinted harder, letting go of his legs and feeling his blood boiling.
He hadn’t run like this in years. He pushed on, and then skidded to
a stop when he approached a white metal door in the long alley.

He
stopped,
his heart erupting in his ears was the only sound
in the drab, barren landscape. He looked behind where he had been, seeing
nothing but gray.
Ahead, the same.
He opened the
unlocked door and slipped into the building.