The Hooded Girl

III

When Alastair arrived at St. Clair Station, he hadn't the slightest idea he'd been followed.

When he'd headed to the escalator, she'd shadowed him on the stairs. When he'd turned into the plaza crowning the metro, she'd hung close behind.

He walked up Yonge Street in a daze, mind racing. His curiosity of what a human life would've been like would inevitably fade. The eagerness to do what he was born to do would evolve into pride, into fullness incomparable. He knew it was a grandiose exaggeration, but it quieted his doubts. It swept Kayla from his mind, the nibbling emptiness that weighed his heart. He welcomed the comfort, temporary as he knew it was.

He crossed the street. A hundred yards further, came a fork in the road. Upon taking the sidewalk's turn, the usual, inexplicable discomfort came on in a blink, but he paid it no mind. The street sign was rusty, faded. Even up close, it was difficult to read the worn-out, "Harroway Blvd" etched into plate. The metal was dull. Grey. Even the trees, the grass, the houses all seemed washed out, like an old watercolour.

The twinges of boredom began to fill his mind. He felt the thoughts being fed to his brain, thoughts of turning right back around and going back to the mundane whence he came. Good, he thought. That was what was supposed to happen.

He moved further down the street, even as his discomfort mounted. Go away and stay away, his mind groaned. You don't want to be here. It's not worth your time -- you don't want to come down here, and you know it.

He flicked the thoughts away, powerful as they were. He passed the treeline, the first barren front yard... and vanished.

The Hooded Girl could only stand and stare, feeling a sense of hope she hadn't felt in forever. What she had seen, the telltale magic she had witnessed, brought tears of relief to her teal eyes.

Oh my god. I've found it.