Amphora Ch. 02

**Author's Note: I know it's been years but I didn't know how to proceed with this story then got distracted by other stories but given all the encouragement I've received online and from friends I've decided to post once a week or every 2 weeks until I come up with an ending. I apologize if there some inconsistencies like with appearance or certain facts. And this will be told in present tense.

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So just to recap... I got a new Occult Studies professor with a sexy British accent who asked me out and is now saying I'm Pandora and he wants to help me find some vase called an Amphora. For what? What else but to end the world. That's how it usually goes doesn't it? This vase contains all the evils of the world. And I thought the only trouble I was going to get into tonight was getting involved with a teacher.

An ice cold wave washes over me. Apprehension knots in my stomach as I am caught between the fight or flight response.

"Haven't you ever wondered why so many horrible things happen to the people around you?" Professor Martel's blue eyes shine with a great intensity that puts a fear in me for what evil machinations were going on inside his twisted mind. I feel a shift in the air. A sinking feeling in my stomach. Something bad is about to happen.

"You're insane," I mutter. He takes a step forward while I take a step back. My new tattoo begins to burn and itch as Martel begins to roll up his sleeve to reveal the same tattoo. A circle crowned with a trident on a stick with 2 short horizontal lines running through the staff. Some understanding began to dawn on me as I hear a scream from within the restaurant.

I turn in the direction of a bright yellow glow. A steak flambé has gone horribly wrong. The waiter tipped the tray over and now the restaurant was catching fire with lightning speed. In the confusion I take my chance and make my escape.

Once I step out into the cool autumn night air I feel somewhat calmer... until I realize I left my purse with my phone, my wallet and IDs inside. Fuck! I don't want to go back in and face Professor Cuckoo Bird with the matching tattoo. I'll just call the restaurant tomorrow or get new cards and IDs if the place burns down. And I'm due for an upgrade anyway.

My tattoo burns and itches as if someone rubbed poison ivy leaves all over it. I start to feel sick.

"Excuse me, ma'am," a valet asked concerned. "Are you alright?"

I look up to see a handsome blond with cornflower blue eyes. He looks vaguely familiar... If I had blurry vision and club music was playing I think we could have met... I notice a black mark on his neck like a tattoo design but the rest his hidden by his collar and I can't make it out.

"Can you call me a cab?" I ask suddenly feeling ill. I would often feel like passing out after a big disaster. Not from the shock but because I would feel drained; like I had just expelled a great amount of energy. The valet helps me to a bench and raises his arm for a cab to see.

I take deep breaths and count to 1,000. An exercise my step-father Bill taught me. It helps. I scratch at my skull birthmark wanting to claw it off. Did I do something horrible in another life and this is my punishment? That's when a chill goes through my bones. It was fall and cool but this is a wintry chill. Along with the icy shivers comes a paranoid feeling of being watched.

I look up and see a young man with dark hair watching me with dark flashing eyes from across the busy Philly street. He was holding something in his hand. It glints in the night lights of the city. Is it a silver coin?

"Ma'am?"

I look up to see the valet looking at me. Something about his cute face seems... off. Like he was wearing a mask for the world. But I see the white and yellow cab waiting for me and my doubts ebb. I always keep emergency cash in my bra though it'll be awkward fishing for it in this revealing red cocktail dress.

"Thanks," I murmur. I open the door to see an older red haired woman, late 30s perhaps, with lovely facial structure and long legs sitting there smirking as if she had been waiting for me.

"Sorry I..." I never get to finish my thought when I feel a stab in my neck and a tight pinch. "What the fuck?" My world becomes blurry then black.

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I'm in the dark temple again. Martel is there but with other hooded figures. His lips curl into a smile that gives me icy shivers.

"Pandora has come again," he whispers darkly but with glee that makes me nervous. I look past him to see the amphora again, a vase painted with horrific images of death and destruction. It unsettled me but it was as if the vase had a magnetic pull.

I can't help but gravitate towards it. Suddenly I feel a hand slap on my shoulder like a heavy weight keeping me in place. I feel a hot slimy wetness with a metallic scent on my shoulder. I slowly turn, my eyes widen in horror at the sight of crimson blood covering a hand. The blood dripped down my skin staining my fair flesh with it.

I turn further to see the same man I saw across the street from the restaurant flipping a silver coin. He looks at me with his dark eyes. From far away they looked black but upon closer inspection I see that they are a dark blue, an indigo and fathomless.

"Blood is the key," he speaks cryptically with a tenor voice. He could be a singer with such deep musical tones.

"Who are you?" I manage to ask.

"Don't trust them," he says as if he didn't hear my question. "You have been marked."

He grabs my arm to show me the strange tattoo that was marked upon it. It glows red hot and feels like someone is branding me. I scream and it echoes through the temple.

The temple dissolves like chalk in the rain and the real waking world comes into foggy place. My head is pounding just like before when I woke up with the weirdest tattoo in the world.

I'm still wearing my somewhat revealing cocktail dress. I really should have worn something warmer. Yet I feel somewhat euphoric. I remember the stab in my neck. I was definitely injected with something. This was better than the pain killers.

Shit. I already use Elena's secret stash for her stripper friends (and the pain they feel after being beaten by pimps and jealous boyfriends) but now I might get hooked on whatever hard shit some lunatic shot me up with. One problem at a time.

I look around to find myself in a nice room. I'm lying on a comfortable queen sized bed and something smells sweet like hyacinth.

"Good morning."

I whirl around to see Professor Martel and the red haired woman from the cab watching me with something akin to parental smiles. I see that same bastard tattoo on the woman's finger.

"What did you shoot me up with?" I angrily demand. My head begins to throb with pain. Effects must be wearing off. I start to feel an ache in my muscles and shiver with imaginary cold. As the euphoria ebbed I felt a stab of depression.

"Have some tea," the woman had a voice of a caregiver, sweet and gentle. "It will help with the withdrawal."

I push the woman away as she presents me with the tea.

"Kidnapping? Really?" I snap. "I've dealt with freaks before but this is new. None of them ever kidnapped me before."

"Tessa," Professor Martel uses my first name as if we are on intimate terms. I shiver with revulsion as well as the withdrawal. "I didn't want to drug you but you didn't give me a chance to explain though I suppose it's partly my fault I was over zealous at meeting you at last that I ripped the band aid off too quickly so to speak."

I rush for the door, I feel more free without my heels. They don't try to stop me. I open it and trip out. I feel like a foal that was just born and learning how to walk. I get a stomach cramp. Maybe I should go to rehab after this...

I don't get far. Barely 5 feet from the door. I decide to crawl feeling my dress ride up. I'm sure Professor Martel and his accomplice are having a good look as well as a laugh at their captive struggling to escape.

I hear their foot steps and their gentle voices calling, "Tessa, you need to rest."

I manage to climb to my feet and turn a corner. The building I'm in seems to be a mansion. There's a large window and I see that it's early morning. I see the Philadelphia Museum of Art in the distance. It's a cloudy day and the light hurts my eyes.

There were suits of armor lining the hall as well as stately paintings from the Romanticism era and the Renaissance. I recognize them from text books from school. I see Martel and the woman standing back giving me space while keeping a watchful eye.

"Please come back to bed, Tessa," the woman pleaded.

"Stay the fuck away from me, you bitch," I spit venom as fiercely as I can though it comes out weak.

I stumble forward getting more feeling back in my legs. I pick up the struggling pace only to crash into another body in a group with other people. They were talking about something in hushed tones but when they see me they grow silent, eyes widened in awe and a small gleam of terror.

"Tessa Cavanaugh," the young man was shocked but no more than me when I recognized him as the valet who called me the cab.

"YOU?" I get my claws ready to scratch his eyes out but I see Martel and the woman closing in on me. I head for the closest door hoping it's an exit from the nightmare I find myself in but instead it's an ornate ballroom with a painted ceiling depicting the Greek gods together in heaven looking down on their lowly creations.

I'm stunned to awe despite my frightening situation, the artist enthusiast in me can't help but be impressed. I look down at my feet to see I'm in a circle. The tiles are arranged in a strange design depicting arcane symbols including the one that was tattooed on my arm and on the bodies of my kidnappers.

"Lovely isn't it?"

I turn around and almost faint from the dizziness I feel as a result. I sink down to the floor looking up at my smiling professor whom I used to think as attractive but now he fills me with dread.

"Are you some kind of cult?" I ask trembling.

"Yes but not the kind you think."

"Kidnapping seems in line with exactly the kind of cult I'm thinking of."

"My apologies about that," Martel looks somewhat remorseful. "I told Avaline it wouldn't be necessary but..."

The red head stepped into the room with her long legs making graceful strides. I assume she must be Avaline.

"Why don't we get this over with then and you tell me why you kidnapped me so we can get to the part where I eventually escape then call the cops on you all."

Avaline smirks. I want to rip it off her face. Martel is more solemn. He walks around me like a lion stalking its prey.

"You know the story of Pandora I assume," he begins.

"Bitch opens a box she's not supposed to and curses humanity for all eternity."

Martel chuckles, amused by my snark.

"Interesting interpretation but it wasn't a box she opened but a vase, an amphora," he mused. "A gift from Zeus."

"I would have returned that gift," I sigh. "Or at least exchanged it." Zeus didn't mean it as a gift. It was to get back at Prometheus for stealing fire from Mount Olympus and giving it to humans. Prometheus created humans and doted on them and Zeus punished us all for it.

"Some might think that way," Martel is patient with me. It annoys me.

"Now do you remember what was left in the amphora?"

I think it over trying to remember through the pain of my muscles, stomach cramps, and shivers, "Hope. Hope was left before it could escape."

Martel knelt down so we could be eye to eye. I glared at him with my brown eyes, my mouth curved in disgust.

"Hope," he repeated. "Humanity survived because of Hope."

We stare at each other for a moment. Both trying to read the other. Usually I'm good at keeping my feelings in check but because of the drugs and withdrawal I could feel the air shift. Something bad was about to happen. It's a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach and the hairs on my body stand on end.

The electricity flickered. The valet seemed to be short of breath. Avaline went to him as he frantically pulled out his inhaler.

"Tessa," Martel placed his hands on my arms as if to keep me from flying away. "Tessa, breathe. Breathe and listen to me."

Maybe I could blow them all up. But there was a look in Martel's cool blue eyes that is hypnotic. He has a snake charmer quality that eases me like a wild beast kept in a cage until her trainer came and commanded her to settle.

"Who are you people?" I ask. The lights return to normal and the valet regains his breath with Avaline rubbing his back. They must be related. I notice some similar features between them. My tattoo burns with incredible energy, glowing a deep blood red like a stop light. Martel's tattoo seems to glow with mine.

"We are the Styx Brotherhood," he speaks softly but his eyes are alive with electricity. "An arcane society that worships Mysteries and preserves relics that others would consider dark and evil. And you are Pandora. With you to lead us we will right this corrupted, vile society that humans call civilization and the world shall be reborn again."

His words take time to sink in. Once again I ask myself: How do I attract these freaks?

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TO BE CONTINUED...