Battle of Bones (Anomaly Saga #5)

3

Meanwhile, two young men were fighting on a rooftop. "Come on, you know what you've done," said the one wearing a purple leather jacket with a white shirt underneath. "So just hand over the statue, and we'll forget about that incident."

The second young man looked up from where he lay, extremely bruised and hurt. "I owe you nothing. You were the one that took it away from me." He got up slowly, holding onto his left arm and staring at the other young man in the leather jacket. He turned around, beginning to stumble, and walked towards the stairs.

"You are weak, Preston," said the other young man. "You've never fought back, always taken beatings. How did you even get that stupid position in the first place? I was supposed to be an anomaly hunter. Not you."

Preston scoffed, looking at him straight in the eyes. "Jacob . . . you're too violent. You'd do more harm than good. Trust me." He coughed.

Jacob suddenly charged at Preston, knocking him off the rooftop. Preston swiftly hit the hard concrete below, landing on his back. He grunted, coughing up blood. He pulled a phone out of his pocket, noticing just how cracked it was. He dialed a number with great difficulty. He put the phone on speaker, laying it down on his dirt-strewn shirt.

"Camellia," he said. "Come pick me up. And, um . . . tell Alf to cook me up some grilled cheeses, too." He drifted away from consciousness.

***

When Preston opened his eyes again, he was lying on the sofa in a room very familiar to him. He was back at the headquarters. Good.

He turned his head and noticed a plate of three grilled cheese sandwiches on the coffee table. He slowly sat up and groaned when his ribs flared up in pain.

"You are so, so dumb," said a familiar voice behind him. Preston looked over his shoulder and saw Camellia staring at him disapprovingly, her arms crossed.

Camellia, like Preston, was one of the younger anomaly hunters. She wore almost entirely black, but her hair was dyed bright pink. She was taller than nearly everyone else, and when she was angry, she was scary.

"C'mon," said Preston, grinning awkwardly. "You like me. I can tell because you told Alf to make me the grilled cheeses."

Camellia's eyes narrowed. "You're on extremely thin ice, adventure boy. You could have died. You know you have a few broken ribs, right? You're lucky we have such a good doctor."

Preston laughed weakly. "Yeah. I thought maybe that's why it hurt so bad. But hey, I got the anomaly statue. And Jacob actually didn't kill me."

Camellia sighed. "I can't ever stay mad at you this long. It's annoying."

Preston reached for one of the sandwiches and took a bite. "So. Anything happen while I was gone?"

"Yes, actually." Camellia leaned back against the wall. "Our radars detected a massive anomaly in Russia. And when I say massive, I mean huge. Most explosive rift in time and space we've ever seen."

Preston nodded. "You guys know what caused it?"

"Yeah. Our trackers have linked it to a couple of the infamous guardians. Chaps the skeleton, and Joe the businessman."

Preston considered this for a moment, then asked, "Who's Joe?"