Residence of William
Prydor (Baltimore, Maryland)
May 11, 2008, 4:06 p.m.
He had been too busy watching match footage of his next
opponents since returning from the cave to examine the object he and Elyssa had
found. Some things were just slightly
more important, after all.
Now, however, he felt that he had time to look, and so sat
at his dining room table with the stone in hand. With the light coming from outside, in
addition to the incandescent lights he was using, he figured he had enough
light to see some details.
The stone itself was about five inches in diameter, with two
open holes on one end that could be taken as eyes. The stone was carved in a way to make it seem
like a full-sized skull, but yet sturdy enough to stand the ravages of
time. He could make out nothing inside
that would suggest that any jewels or other such things went into the eye
sockets, and was considering any possible uses of this item when the phone
rang. Picking it up without getting out
of his seat was easy enough to do as the nestled the phone into his shoulder. “Hello.”
“Will, it’s me. How
are you doing?”
“Hey, Elyssa. About
as well as can be expected; just finally getting around to taking a look at
this stone thing we found.”
“I see. And...?”
“It’s hard to say.
I’ve only had a few seconds to look before you called. Are you going to be back any time soon?”
“Probably within the hour; Sheriff Adams and I are nearly
done discussing what we’re going to do with Brandy’s court case coming up next
week. Unless something comes up, we
should be good to go.”
“That’s good. I’ll
be here when you come back.”
“All right, Will.
I’ll talk to you more when I get in.”
He heard the line disconnect as he hit the button to shut off the phone
on his end. For once, the justice system
was actually moving fast, as the court case Elyssa had mentioned would be
starting on the 13th. He was looking
forward to getting this done with and out of his life, if only for the fact
that he could get some peace and quiet.
Sighing, he went back to his examination of the stone
skull, looking at it from every angle. Whoever
had stayed in those caves cared for the stone well; there were few
imperfections he could note and the glossy shine seemed to cover the entire
surface. Tilting it back and forth, he
was looking for some sort of identifying mark inside of it when he finally came
across something.
On the inner portion of the skull, right at the top of the
cranium, was a lone symbol--the Greek letter “omega.” It seemed to be engraved into the stone,
though how in the world someone could get to that area without breaking the
thing was beyond his comprehension.
Looking around the object, he tried to find something
else, with no success. That one symbol
was the only identifying feature he could find on the entire skull. That certainly was not going to help his
chances with finding out what it was...but he was bound and determined to try.
He took the skull with him and moved to his computer. Booting up the system, he logged onto the
internet and began slogging through all of the search engines he knew to try to
find a connection. Forty minutes of
searching didn’t give him any answers, as nothing seemed to even resemble the
item he had found. There were a couple
of things he had found that could possibly be what the skull symbolized but he
was not about to close all other avenues of thought without concrete proof. Besides, without pictures it was harder to be
certain of these things.
There was one thing, however, that would not leave his
mind, something he had found while searching online that just would not
dislodge itself. One of the references
to “omega” was through nature, how outcasts of pack animals would be labeled as
omegas by the scientific community. He
had no earthly idea how that would relate to what he had on his hands, but the
thought hung on as tenaciously as a pit bull.
Sighing, he rubbed his eyes, trying to get his mind to
re-focus as the front door opened. He
turned to see Elyssa walking in, her face showing signs of depression. “Elyssa...what’s wrong?”
“We received word right after I got off the phone with
you. The District Attorney wants to try
to cut a plea bargain with Brandy and drop the charges down to aggravated
assault and harassment, if she’ll roll over on the people behind all of this.”
Will’s eyes went wide as he stood up. “Who the heck gave him clearance to do
that? I made it clear that I wanted this
pressed to the fullest extent!”
“He thinks that since Brandy is only an accomplice, he
wants the bigger fish in the pond; thinks it’ll be a better case for his
resume.”
“Does he not know the phrase ‘justice is blind’?”
“It’s politics, Will.
Sheriff Adams is trying to go for the whole thing, but Lincoln wants the masterminds and is
encouraging the bargain.”
He shook his head.
“I’ll have to talk to the guy before I leave for Orlando.
I will be damned if he’s going to let Brandy off so easily.”
“What about our little find?”
“No luck with the skull thing here.”
“Here’s an oddball suggestion, Will. Is there anyone in the locker room there who
might have an idea about this thing?”
“You know, there just might be someone....”
Delta Flight 91 (Baltimore to Orlando
non-stop)
May 11, 2008, 6:27 p.m.
He sat in the very back of the coach class, his thoughts
leaving Baltimore and focusing more on the
upcoming show. He had gotten all he
could get out of the footage he had for Black Phoenix and Kevin Heat,
especially in their tag match during Uprising 4 against Cameron Barclay and
Brad Dalton (both of whom were no longer with NLW). He knew that BP was just on this side of
insanity and was someone to watch out for, as she gave no regard for her own
body, much less her opponent’s. Having
watched her match against Ice Man and later Aphrodisia, he knew it would take a
LOT to put her down--perhaps even the 450
Flashfire splash he still worked on while training. Let Chase make all the comments about him
breaking the turnbuckles that she wanted.
If a 600-pound man can get on the second turnbuckle for a move, the ring
can certainly support his weight.
As for Kevin Heat...the laundry list of titles he held in
NLW alone would speak for itself. In
addition, there was a matter of pride at stake for Will. He was not about to lose to a fellow
Baltimorean and thus be subjected to the inevitable taunting that Heat would
invariably throw in his general direction.
That was one thing he didn’t need, not with everything else coming up
outside the ring.
And then there was his partner for this match. Sure, there was reason for dissent when Aph
beat him at Uprising 6 for the NLW Championship. But he had put that behind him; on that
night, he knew Aph was the better wrestler.
In addition, Aph held singles victories over both Heat and BP, so if
anyone knew their weaknesses it was Miss Jordan. Besides, she had just as much riding on this
match as he did...she would want to manipulate the future NLW title match to
her advantage, and she would definitely be fighting to win. All in all, he rather liked their chances
this week.
And besides, she was the only person he could think of
that might know anything about the stone skull he had in his carry-on
baggage. He didn’t know why this was,
but it was a hunch, and he always played his hunches. They usually paid off well for him in the end.
He hoped that this time would be no exception, as the
plane traveled inexorably to the next step in Will’s journey.
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