2:30 am
Dengens, Alocta
Archa 17th, Sunday, XXXX
Being the one to observe left a horrible feeling in him.
He landed lightly on a rooftop, the building sitting on the edge of a gravel clearing which led to an old looking warehouse with lights on. Despite seeming like a cliche, the warehouse was, unfortunately, not abandoned.
A quiet vibration from a small and round device tucked into his ear vibrated, reminding him to press it and turn it on.
"Katie?" His voice was almost disturbingly soft and cracked, with only a slight tremor in it, one you could only hear if you knew him well enough.
His heart thumped loud enough for him to hear it in his own ears, so loud he almost didn't hear Katie's response.
"I'm here, Al," The moment she spoke relief washed over him like a wave at the beach he had been dragged to. "It's ok,"
"Yeah..." His voice trembled a bit more this time. "Yeah, I know,"
There was a 'hm' on the other side, likely Katie not believing him but he wasn't going to try and make her believe otherwise. He had issues, it was clear as day. No point in denying it. But he wasn’t going to let that get in the way of this.
"You have the goggles, right?" Katie's voice asked softly into the comm. link, preventing his mind from thinking too much again.
In response, Alin adjusted the small shoulder bag, Katie's shoulder bag, slung over him until he could unzip it and reach inside, picturing the device in his mind. There was a small flash of light from the bag and he pulled out a snow goggle. Slipping it on made everything go black with white outlines, showing several heat signatures in the warehouse of people working.
"Where are you...?" He muttered mostly to himself but an answer from her would be nice.
"5:00 east side," She told him.
Shifting so he could follow the instructions, Alin spotted several of the signatures in the forms of humans gathered together in a rather small room for around 8-9 people. Frowning, he pressed a button so the image would be sent to Katie who made a thoughtful noise.
“Concerning, but it shouldn’t interfere with our original plan,” She reported much to Alin’s dismay. “Worst case scenario, I’ll head to another floor.”
“Alright…” he whispered.
“I’ll call if I need any help,” Katie replied. He could hear her attempted smile, one meant to reassure him.
It didn’t work as well as they both would’ve liked.
Inside the factory…
Katie stepped carefully across the large storage room of the factory she was infiltrating, barely brushing against the large cardboard boxes stacked up on each other. When it became clear there was no one who could possibly catch her, she made her way to the door.
It was in the hallway when things didn’t go as planned.
A barrage of knives flew past her, a few scraping her cheeks and the top of her ears. Swearing mentally, Katie jumped from side to side, grabbing one of the knives with plans to use it as a shield but ended up dropping it with a hiss.
There was barely anytime for her to process that an ugly looking poison was starting to spread through her fingers. Only seconds after it happened, she was running as fast as she could through the hallway, as a group of workers began chasing her.
Up ahead she saw the door that would’ve been her exit, but it was a heavy duty one, meaning she couldn’t open it and get away easily. Turning the corner, she raced towards the stairs, running up them as quickly as she could.
It became clear simply running wasn’t good enough as guns were aimed and fired at her. The 10-year old danced with light steps around the small pieces of metal made deadly at the speed they were flying at.
The bullets clashed against the staircase, following her when she ran up the stairs. The next floor only had more enemies, all of which she was only barely able to dodge.
Katie jumped started a flying kick at one particular employee, flipping between the gaps expertly thanks to her skinny frame and cartwheeling away, legs kicking hard enough to give someone a bloody nose.
The door to the rooftop went flying when she finally reached and was able to break it down. Running out, her eyes darted around, mind cursing when she saw the fence lining the edges.
She spun to the right, a bullet skinning her shirt. The girl then jumped around to avoid another flurry of bullets and one knife she had to backflip over.
On the building across from the warehouse, Alin watched his friend have several close calls with the bullets aimed at her vitals nervously, body fidgeting as he went into a conflict over whether or not he should intervene.
Katie wouldn’t be happy about it but was that the only reason he shouldn’t try and keep her safe?
Katie mentally cursed when the next thing she knew, she was surrounded on almost all sides. The only way not blocked by the employees who seemed more like soldiers at this point was behind her but the tall fences, made to prevent suicides like the ones at school, were there. Though without another way out…
There wasn’t time to waste on making a decision. The head of the employees took one step forward and she turned around to make a dash for the fence. With a short distance between her and the group, plus these kinds of fences being difficult to climb, there was no way she would be able to get out if she were a normal human.
Though she also wouldn’t have broken into a place like this in that case.
Heart thumping heavily in her chest, Katie took in a deep breath and put all her weight on her right leg. An amber light began glow from inside her boots and soon the veins in both her legs were engulfed in the colored light. When she pushed off, the ground suddenly crumpled a little, leaving a 1-inch crater on the concrete and a trail of the amber light to fly through the night.
The girl was as light as a feather on every building she landed as she lost momentum, but everytime she jumped again the concrete would crumble from the shockwave. Though, the shockwave would decrease little by little until finally, she stumbled across a path, panting harder than an out-of-shape person running the mile, and fell over.
It took a few moments for her to move after that. Her bones were all so sore and painful, getting the chance to lay down and not move was a blessing from the angels themselves.
“Katie!”
Until her worried friend arrived at where she was and forced her to lift her head so he’d know that she’s alive and not dead.
“Hi…” Her voice was dying and her throat hurt a little.
Alin let out a small sigh of relief and landed gently next to her. He held out a hand which Katie took gratefully and allowed him to guide her to a corner of a building, rather than the middle of a road. Plopping down on the cold concrete floor, Katie finally allowed all her muscles to really relax so the soreness would finally, though gradually, leave.
Reaching into her bag, Alin pulled out a small bottle filled with a slightly glowing liquid and held it out to her. Once she saw them, Katie's face scrunched up in disgust but she still reluctantly took it. Popping off the cork, she downed it as quickly as she could, body heaving as a disgusting bitter taste forced its way down her throat.
“God!” She exclaimed and seemed tempted to throw the bottle away but restrained herself by shoving it back into Alin’s arms. “Why hasn’t the taste improved even a little bit?!”
Alin didn’t respond, knowing it was a rhetorical question to her and simply pulled out a newsboy hat, plopping it down on her head as she ranted. The next item he pulled out was a round headband with a 12-pointed star made of amber-colored crystal, which Katie took surprisingly gently since she was in the middle of a rant.
“Holy nora, we have got to stop doing this vigilante thing in the middle of the night!” She exclaimed with a long and loud gasp, falling onto her back.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“I don’t think that’s an option...or that it’s possible…” Alin said quietly with a smile.
“Yeah, right,” Katie rolled her eyes before starting off another rant.
Sitting on a nearby lamp post was a bird with odd eyes. The birds eyes turned like a camera focusing and and made a quiet whirring sound.
And on the other side of the screen...
Two girls were crowded around a small laptop, wide eyed as they stared at the screen, extremely bright from the fact that it was the only light in a otherwise dark room.
When footsteps began to approach, one of the girls slammed the top of the computer shut and two lumps burrowed underneath the blankets to try and pretend to be asleep.
There was a rhythmic knock, it made one of the girls poke out from the blankets. Then the lights were suddenly turned on causing her to scream and dive back under the sheets, rubbing at her now burned eyes.
“Damn it Yuki!” She snapped while the other girl snickered and slipped out.
A small white-furred cat with a split tail was floating near the light switch and making short mewls of laughter. Growling, the girl who yelled in pain jumped out of bed and began chasing the kitten around, yelling all the while.
Another boy walked in, ginger hair, pale skin and squinted eyes due to waking up so early after only a few hours of sleep.
“Morning sleeping beauty,” The other girl snickered to which he glared at her while the other two ran out into the hallway.
“Don’t call me that, May,” He grumbled, narrowing his gaze at her almost angrily.
Mayee simply gave him an eat shit grin and crawled out of the bed. “You know that’s not possible Artie,”
“Don’t call me that either…” Came another grumble and a glare but it was ineffective as he had fallen face first onto the mattress from exhaustion.
“Aw, angry kitty~” Mayee laughed and patted his head gingerly.
“I hate you so much.”
Before Mayee could respond, the girl who went chasing after the cat with split tails stormed inside, holding the said cat by the scruff with wide angry and crazed eyes.
“Is your game finally over, Amelia?” Mayee asked with a curious eyebrow raise seeing as the cat seemed to be ready for another round.
“It had better be,” Angry light red eyes glared down at him, when he squirmed around in her grip.
“Yuki c’mon, we have work to do,” Mayee said and held her arms out. “You can mess with Amelia later,”
Yuki let out a fake whine seeing as he enjoyed torturing Amelia like this but still wiggled out of the Dinan girl’s grip and hopped onto Mayee’s lap.
“Adre barepe, I hate you so much,” Amelia grumbled, flopping down on her bed at the otherside.
She was red-faced from running around, though this wasn’t very evident due to her dark skin. Her long hair which reached her waist was all over the place meaning it would be a pain to brush in the morning.
Luckily, Mayee had her hair in a bun like usual, so she wouldn’t have that problem.
She also didn’t find it necessary to hunt down a mischievous cat just for turning on the lights even if it did hurt.
“Alright, now that the torture session is done…” Amelia huffed, head resting on her hand. “Arthur, you with us?” she called to the ginger who was still laying face first on Mayee’s bed.
“Arthur?” Mayee said, tilting her head towards him.
Yuki chirped and nudged him with his nose. His ears twitched at the sound of steady breathing, a sign of the other boy falling into a deep sleep.
Looking up, Yuki shook his head making Amelia groan.
“Alright, let’s get this over with,” She sighed and stood up.
“Good-” Amelia positioned herself into a running position. Sensing what she was going to do, Mayee picked up Yuki and walked over to the door to give Amelia more space.
“Mor-” Rushing forward, Amelia jumped into the air.
“Ning!” She finished by landing onto the bed with all the force of her jump. The other parts of the mattress went flying up as did Arthur’s formerly limp body.
He fell onto the ground and startled awake, wincing from the pain that came with falling.
“I’m up i’m up!” he grumbled and groaned, adding in a yawn for extra measure.
“Good,” Amelia huffed again then pulled out her laptop. “Now, I think our first order of business is to try and figure out who the heck these two are,”
She pulled up a clear image of the said pair but they couldn’t see their faces.
“You can take a high quality picture but can’t get their identity?” Mayee snickered. Amelia sent her a side-glare, clearly not in the mood for any teasing but didn’t say anything.
In the image, two kids were leaning against the brick wall of a building. One of the kids was blond, long hair tied into a ponytail and a round headband, a girl their age. The boy next to her seemed to be of romanian descent since he had similar features to Amelia. Mayee could recognize the girl somewhat, she was pretty sure she’d seen her somewhere or at school. Or maybe she was thinking of someone else.
“The girl looks familiar,” Arthur remarked. “Amelia, do you have your yearbook?”
“Uh....” Amelia stared at him blankly for a moment then turned to Mayee. “Do you have your yearbook?”
Mayee snickered again then pulled out the book seemingly from nowhere and held it out to Arthur.
The ginger flipped through the pages, examining the images of their fellow classmates and upperclassmen carefully. Yuki peered over his shoulder, purring as he settled down on Arthur’s shoulder. His ears perked up and eyes widened, tail slinking over like a snake to point at a specific picture.
“Eh...close enough,” Arthur shrugged, scratching the cat-fox hybrid under the chin so his purring would start up like a lawn mower.
“Can you even see it?” Amelia deadpanned while squinting at him curiously.
“You woke me up in the middle of the night when we could’ve done this at school, i’m too tired to deal with this detective stuff so yes I can’t see, I’m blind for a reason,” Arthur snapped and his statement was evident from how short-tempered he suddenly was. Now that she had a better look at him, his eyes were indeed green mixed in with a dull milky white, meaning he wasn’t using Yuki to see at the moment. Which meant the one Yuki pointed out likely didn’t look a single thing like the girl they were trying to identify from the video and-
Ok, nevermind, it was actually pretty accurate.
With the blond hair at least.
Amelia shrugged in a “Fair enough,” manner.
“Good night,” he mumbled and turned around so he could face plant back onto the bed.
“Wait, don’t we still have some stuff to tal- “ Mayee cut herself off when she was suddenly faced with a horrifying and pissed off death glare.
“I said, good. NIGHT.” Arthur practically snarled back at her then planted his head firmly back on the bed.
“Nevermind,” She sighed with a good nature eyeroll.
Yuki made a noise and trotted over to curl up near Arthur’s head. The bakeneko began to purr up a storm as the boys both fell asleep.
The girls exchanged knowing smiles, Mayee taking out a camera to snap a picture.
"Not gay for each other my ass," Amelia snorted.
One of Yuki's ears twitched and a tail lifted, smacking the bed absentmindedly in some attempt to reprimand her for swearing.
She simply rolled her eyes, dropping a blanket on them both. Shutting the laptop down and setting it on a nearby desk, she turned to Mayee who was putting her camera away.
“You think we should save this for tomorrow?” Amelia asked quietly, glancing at the boys sleeping forms. She was tempted to draw on them with a permanent marker.
“Not like we have much of a choice,” Mayee pointed out. “We need Arthur to make sure we don’t mess up if we plan on confronting those guys.”
“Right right…” Amelia flung herself onto the left bed, face planting hard. She then pushed herself up and rolled her entire body onto it. “Sleepover?”
“Only if you move,” To put emphasis on this, Mayee had the audacity to poke Amelia’s squishy stomach.
The girls giggled quietly as they crawled around on the bed, adjusting their position every so often. It wasn’t long before silence took over the room.
On the right side from the door, Yuki’s ears twitched and his nostrils flared. He sat up to quickly sneeze a few times then clean out his face.
By the window, there was a flash of light. Had Arthur not have fallen into an extremely deep sleep, practically a coma, he would’ve sensed something was wrong and his eyes would have confirmed it. But at the moment, Yuki was the only one who could sense anything.
And the sound he was hearing sounded a lot like ticking.
____________________________________________________________________________
“I’m back….”
Katie’s call into the second floor trailed off and was cut off by a yawn. She trudged through the living room until she reached the kitchen, flicking the lights on slowly so they wouldn’t burn her eyeballs out.
“Welcome back,” Madeleine, a 24-year old woman with fiery red hair, greeted her from her seat at the kitchen table.
“Aunt Leine you didn’t have to stay up…” The blond girl mumbled, rubbing her eyes as she went to hang her bag on a chair. Plopping down, Katie sprawled over the table and made grabby hands for a glass of milk sitting just out of her hands reach. “It’s only...a bit past 12…”
“A bit too much if you ask me,” Madeleine laughed lightly. “Kids your age need as much sleep as they can get.”
The 10-year old rolled her eyes and grumbled under her breath, something about how even if she’s 10 she can still handle staying up so late and there’s no need to rub it in, dang it. She’s a tween now, not a kid anymore thank you very much.
“So,” Ms. Bates pushed the glass of milk towards Katie’s still empty and still attempting to grab it hands and leaned forward like they were exchanging gossip. “Did you find anything interesting?”
“A wearry werd ‘one…” Came the jumbled response as she was trying to speak and drink at the same time.
“Speak or drink, choose one and stick with it,” Ms. Bates grinned with a hint of disgust. She had never been a fan of when this happened.
Katie chugged the milk down in one go then wiped her mouth with a napkin Ms. Bates had prepared beforehand. “I said; a really weird one,” She repeated. “Not the kind you’d find at a company like theirs too,”
“Hm…” Ms. Bates hummed thoughtfully and frowned with concern and curiosity. What could it have been? It’s not every day or night you hear something like that. She also wondered if this was the start of something dangerous. The entire reason she was letting Katie do this in the first place was because the girl had promised to only scout things and not get involved with anything.
“I don’t think it’s important though…” Katie added quickly. There was no way she was going to stop going out just because her aunt thought it would be too dangerous. “They weren’t even guarding it properly, just leaving it out in the open. Getting it was weirdly easy.”
A bit too easy perhaps?
“Well, why don’t you show me tomorrow? School starts rather early after all,” Ms. Bates pointed out.
Katie groaned and rolled her eyes. If anything, she already knew all the material and could easily test out of taking any classes but that wasn’t an option at the academy she attended and she could complete work ahead of time but attendance was still required at her current grade level. Once again age played into it but she thought it was unnecessary. It’s not like she and the other kids haven’t wandered around the entire city by themselves before.
“Unfortunately…” Katie added last minute with another groan. Ms. Bates simply laughed in response.
Grabbing her bag, the tween said a quick good night to her guardian who replied with the same words.
The girl arrived in her room and dropped her bag on the half square set up of couches surrounding a TV sitting on a stand by the left wall.
“I’m back mom,” She said to a picture sitting on a desk covered in papers, hair accessories, and other misc. Items. “Dad...Jay….” The picture held two adults, one holding a girl with short blond hair around the age of 3-4 and a boy around 12 stood nearby. “I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow,”
She walked over to a loft and reached up to pull down a foldable ladder. Once it was stable, Katie clambered up to the bed covered in fuzzy blankets. On top of that, they were all fresh out of the dryer.
“Thank you, Leine,” She smiled and flopped down, frame shaking under her weight.
“Katie, are you in bed?” Ms. Bates called from the hallway.
“Yeah!”
“Alright, I’ll turn off the lights then!”
As if on cue, the lights went out. But for her, a soft blue glow kept her room lit enough to not keep her awake but still offer some comfort from the dark.
Katie tucked herself underneath the blankets and sighed as she let her muscles relax. Her hat and round headband were on the couch ready to be worn for the next day. Her schoolwork and homework were finished and she could turn it in tomorrow on time.
Tomorrow would be a new start.
Tomorrow she would…
The last thought didn’t finish, as she closed her eyes and everything went dark.
It had been a long night, especially for a 10-year old, so it was easy to slip into a deep sleep.
That was why she didn’t notice a glow coming from her bag.
Buried underneath the many items of her pocket dimension bag was the gemstone she had taken from the factory, glowing in rhythmic beats as if signaling something. The patterned flashes of light stopped. Then the light began to move as a straight line around and around like a clock hand. The light made 10 rounds, humming and vibrating the entire time. When the 10 rounds were over it stopped.
In another part of the city, a large building went up in flames, an explosion enveloping the area.