Preparing For The Near Future

"I can't help you with that." said Jeff.

"Why? ...What happened?" asked Jean.

"The spell only works when nobody has the book." answered Jeff.

"Oh, great." I said, "This means ANYONE could possibly have it."

"Well," said Jason, "what now?"

"Let's look into this case," I suggested, "I have a feeling that this could be connected."

"What if it's not?" asked Iris.

"We won't know until we look into it." I answered.

"Anything else you know, Jeff?" asked Jon.

"No." Jeff answered.

"Not even how she died?" asked Lilith.

"I don't know how it was done," answered Jeff, "and I don't know why it was done either."

"Even though you wanted to get rid of her last winter?" I responded.

"Hey, I got over it!" snapped Jeff, "A-anyways, I don't know why this happened- she's not the kind of person most people would have hold a grudge toward. If it wasn't for her being there in my darkest times, I probably would have gone insane."

"How does a woman like her even fall for a guy like you?" I asked.

"Both of us had… difficult pasts." answered Jeff, "I'm sure you remember how I escaped from that orphanage when I was twelve. After that, I was dealing with… blackmail. It was six years later that I met my ex-wife, Sophia. Even before I had met her, she'd been through a lot of stuff."

"Like what?" asked Lucas.

"I never paid too much attention to who was in that orphanage," continued Jeff, "but I learned that she was at the same orphanage before we actually met. She had previously lost her entire family in a house fire and she was the only one to survive, but about half of her body was covered in burn marks afterward."

"…Oh." I responded.

"Unlike me," Jeff went on, "Sophia actually got adopted. She seemed really happy when I met her. I'll never forget her kindness back then. Other than her, I had no one to talk to. Most of my life, I never really had friends- just acquaintances."

"Well," I said, "this… okay, I really don't know what to say here."

"I hated the world and most of the people in it," continued Jeff, "I had been going through hell, but with Sophia, things seemed like they would be all right. Whenever I saw her she was usually pretty jovial, despite what she dealt with."

"What was it, exactly?" I asked.

"She was happy with her adoptive family," Jeff continued, "but she had trouble with other people. Most stayed away from her, because of her burns. She never really had any friends and was usually alone in public. Eventually, the two of us met. I thought she was beautiful."

"Does everyone have a tragic backstory these days?" I thought to myself.

"I learned something interesting," said Jeff, "apparently, I was the first person who didn't avoid her. That day, we talked… a lot. We kept meeting each other, and eventually we fell in love. We got married a few years later."

"And then you had Jean," I said, "After that, there was more blackmail."

"I didn't want to lose either of them," said Jeff, "they were the only people I really cared about. When Jean was younger, I got extremely busy and we all had to move to your dimension, Ron."

"Why?" I asked.

"Because the people I worked for," answered Jeff, "they needed to for what they were working on. Which, at the time, was just making kids miserable. Sophia ended up getting a job in your dimension too because we really needed money."

"I remember that." commented Jean, "Both of you were really worried."

"I sent to Jean to a daycare," Jeff continued with his story, "so that someone would take care of her when she wasn't in school. I was kind of worried about her, since she also had trouble making friends. She often came home upset, but things eventually changed. One day, when I went to pick her up from that daycare, I actually saw her playing with two other kids. To be honest, I was surprised."

"I never forgot those two," said Jean, "my first true friends. One day though, one of them had to move and we never saw her again."

"After a while, you were the one that had to move," I said, "I was a little sad to lose both of you. The next several years, I had trouble with other people- none really stayed around, so it became harder to connect with others. I went on with my life as friends entered and left, over and over. I can't say I'm surprised that it has happened yet again."

"After we moved back," said Jean, "I got interested in what Jeff was working on. Since I never made any friends over there, I was usually working with him. I… knew what we were doing was wrong, but I helped anyways."

"Our evil plans ended up getting bigger and more complicated," continued Jeff, "and we needed technology that this country had. After some time, we heard about some prophecy and prepared for that, eventually leading to the 'removal' of Greg and Amy. This was around the time Sophia left me and I was… very upset, but I think I understand why she left."

"And then we stopped your evil plan." I said.

"As I've said, I'm done with evil." replied Jeff, "I've been through a lot of pain and caused a lot of pain. I can understand if you hate me… Iris."

"…!" she responded.

"I had to follow orders," he continued, "it's my fault your half-sister and her mother are dead."

"…Oh." responded Iris, looking at the floor.

"I killed her mother years earlier," Jeff went on, "and that's when that… incident happened. HE had you with another woman. You and your half-sister were really only about ten months apart, I believe."

"I grew up living with my mother," said Iris, "and for the longest time, I thought my father had just died when I was really young, and I was shocked to find out last winter that I had actually known him for years. Then, my mother died in a car accident last spring, so I've been living with Charles. We ended up moving to this country because he got transferred. He was a little nervous about coming back."

"Back...?" I responded.

"He actually grew up here," Iris answered, "he used to tell me about it often back before I knew about… y'know…"

"What did he tell you?" I asked.

"He said he didn't like it, so he left." she said.

"Anything else?" I asked.

"He told me had a brother and a sister," answered Iris, "but he never said much about them."

"Hope I'm not interrupting anything." a familiar voice said.

"Sort of." I answered.

"Charles, what do you want?" asked Jeff.

"Ugh… I figured I'd see you sooner or later." commented Charles.

"I decided on sooner." responded Jeff.

"Well, I'm not here to whine about past events." said Charles, arms crossed.

"Well, what are you here about?" asked Jean.

"The murder." he answered, "We've identified a suspect."

"Who is it?" asked Lucas.

"Your oldest sister." answered Charles.

"Ah, crap." responded Lucas.