“Enna, calm down.” Gen comforted her, who was sweating and shivering in fear from what she experienced.
To her, it was that fear that struck her to her core, a fear that settled deep inside her, but was violently pushed back for her to see.
Gen gave her water, which she profusely drank.
“Easy. We need to resolve this, cap. People in here are now confused as shit.”
“Probing that guy’s head IS a bad idea. Damn it, Enna. She had to be reckless at a time like this.” Gris looked at his distraught colleague, concern was displayed through his eyes.
“I’ll go calm things down below. Hopefully the people here are easy to talk to. Just… take care of her.” Fein rushed to the lobby hurriedly, his coat waved erratically as he ran. After the door was shut, only Enna’s minute sobbing enveloped the atmosphere. The patient, however, was unconcerned, unaware of what was happening.
“That boy did this to her… How? Enna is a Vassal, and yet...” Gen sighed, clutching her beside him.
Wiz approached Enna slowly. Upon closer look, it seems as though her cognitive abilities are on disarray. Her teary eyes stare blankly into an abyss, her hands twitch at the slightest movement. Wiz wiped the sweat and tears in Enna’s face, and tried to give comfort. She seemed reluctant to accept at first, but once she recognized it was her, she calmed down.
“What did you see?” Wiz softly asked her. Enna opened her mouth, but she’s stammering. Having only an ounce of strength to speak, she uttered three words.
“Fire… Darkness… Vengeance.”
This gave Wiz goosebumps. Their talk with Sora a while ago came back to her. Her intuition was true: That survivor had a flaming soul, and it was not primarily the will to live as she formerly thought of.
Sora also noticed this correlation and jumped out of his seat.
“Wiz… What Enna said…”
“Yes. It’s more complicated than I had imagined.” She stood up, leaving her colleague to Gen.
“I don’t have proper evidence, but this boy has a probability of being a Vassal. The effect on her is, for lack of a better word, abnormal…”
“What?” Gen retorted, seemingly irritated at their situation. “He had a traumatic experience, Wiz. It might’ve resonated with Enna—”
Before he could finish, Sora cut him off. “Gen… What’s happened to her is not normal. If it was a disturbing memory, she could’ve just fought it off with her ability. But look at her. To me, she looks like the very people she manipulated in our past works. Although in her case, it seems rather extreme.”
“So, you’re implying that this frail boy made her ability turn against her?” Gris asked.
“If you count on Enna’s stature, I have no evidence. But isn’t it bizarre?” Sora rhetorically asked.
“That this guy is conveniently the only survivor from Mido. Sure, he’s gravely injured when we got there, but why isn’t he scorched to death? Why was he still breathing, when the others were already buried beneath the snow?”
“I have to admit, that was a bit sketchy…” Gen pondered, but felt a heavy weight pressed on his shoulder. Enna's head leaned to his shoulder. Her eyes were closed, possibly from the exhaustion. Realizing this, he made her comfortable on the sofa they’re currently sitting on.
“This luggage may or may not be a Vassal, but we’ll have to be careful around him, not until we prove his case.” Gris implied.
“I have to say, he’s kind of… off, for a lack of better word. I sense something deep in his tones, aside from the flame, but I cannot pinpoint what exactly…” Wiz shared, hovering her slim hand above the patient's body.
“We have our own hypotheses, but we can’t just go willy-nilly on this case. Command might have answers…” Gen said and stared outside the window. The wind blew strong, carrying snow with it that enveloped the whole city on a gray sheet. Their vision from the window was only limited to a few blocks, and that fact alone made their stucked state more apparent.
“When we get there...” He sighed. The snowstorm delayed them further, much to everyone’s disappointment.
----------------------------------------
The were back on the Beaver. Fein arranged everything so that the hospital may be at ease. They requested immediate transport of the patient to their own med bay and paid for the medications. Still, it was a definite fact that they will be holed up in this city for a while. They isolated their patient inside the med bay and made sure no one will interact with him for a while.
Everyone’s on slight edge, making the already gloomy atmosphere more emphasized. “Lady’s fast asleep.” Gen told everyone, while closing a door, visibly fuming. “That guy is getting on my nerves. I’m not in a position to judge, but hurting her even though he’s in a coma? Seriously, he is potent on that... He definitely has the urge to—"
“Stop, Gen.” Sora calmly said. “We don’t know that yet. The least we could do is calm down and assess. Your rant will just throw everyone off.” Realizing his temper, Gen closed his eyes and tried to calm himself.
Sitting on a chair, he apologized. “Forgive me, I just can’t stand it. Really though, I still can’t believe someone affected Enna’s emotion that much. I mean, her ability’s the powerhouse on that matter, and just like that…”
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“We understand how you feel, Gen.” Wiz assured. “True, in a battle of minds, no ordinary person can beat Altering Feedback, even with her willingly inside another person’s noggin…” She was about to continue, but Wiz paused to take a deep breath.
“…She would go as far as to use one of her more powerful variations… With that being said…” She pointed at Gris, who is also intent on their continued discussion.
“Gris’ theory might stand. To put it: Enna’s ability was mimicked when she was in that boy’s head, presumably by force using another ability. Likely, his own. Without a single testimony, however…”
“An ability that mimics other abilities, huh…” Gris pondered. “I have never heard of such plundering power. Not even in my line of work.”
“However, if that is taken as fact, then somehow, at Mido…” Sora joined in. Gen seemed to also add to their discussion.
“He’s stealing abilities, and was set on a rampage…” Suddenly, Gris remembered something and shared it to the others.
“Hm. There are two pieces that do not fit.” Everyone looked at him.
“Was it he who jammed the distress message? And why Mido?”
It was a mostly-overlooked evidence which casually whizzed past the group, but who exactly jammed the message for hours on end?
“An ability perhaps?” Gen suggested.
“Possibly, but if that kid was on a rampage, wouldn't he be blunt enough to not consider that precaution?” Sora assessed.
“I would go as far as to say that the boy won’t take lengths to strategize in that state, but if we take his case as fact, I think it would be it. A set-up. An organized group, maybe? Hitchhiked into that boy’s grudge in order to carry out a town-wide arson.” Sora added speculation that was seemingly believable.
“As for why Mido…”
Wiz supplemented. “Mido was supposedly a remote haven for Vassals wanting a quiet life in the countryside. A snowy countryside, that is. People in there, Vassal or not, respected each other, and their little community prospered. I can speculate that someone, either that boy or an external persona, had a deep-seated anger to the community as whole, therefore committing that… atrocious scene.” She gritted her teeth.
No one followed. After a moment of humming silence…
“Ahem.”
Gris suddenly cleared his throat, much to the others’ surprise. “I think… I can make out an angle.”
“What is it?” Sora asked.
“The jamming. It was an ability.”
“Huh? How can you be so sure?” Gen inquired, albeit he is unsure himself. Gris answered.
“I know we hurriedly passed on that jamming as quick as wind, but to my mistake, I think I overlooked the tonal readings. I was so caught up to the disaster that it didn’t cross my mind. Until now.”
He hurriedly pulled out a small, rectangular record chip, used for recording signals. “You see, I only realized this as of now. We heard the distress message came through as radio at command, but the very same signals, containing the same distress message I gathered at the town were made of… tones.”
Everyone was keen to listen.
“An ability user might have encoded that message, planning to use that specific method of communication as a surefire way to get help… But a tonal-oriented message is almost impossible to manipulate using normal jamming devices.”
“Which is where the ability comes in.” Gris nodded to follow his statement.
“So, a certain guy had an ability that turned tonal message into radio? Seems convenient…” Sora reacted, crossing his hands. “But I have seen such cases of Vassals breaking down ability tones into simple instances. Radio waves are not out of the question. Beats me, though.” He shrugged.
Gris chuckled. “Well, that is my take on the case. At this point, everything we ask to answer are just speculations.”
“Might be uncertain, but it’s the best we’ve gone so far. Kudos.” Gen sneered. Gris just laughed, amidst the seriousness.
“Ah, we are grasping at straws, inevitably. But, the possibility of the survivor being a Vassal seems to increase, and this case expanded a bit larger than it was before... Hmm…” Fein said, rubbing his forehead, thinking. All this time, he sat across the others, silently observing and listening to the discussion.
“If all of these are to be pointed as facts, it's likely that that boy, the one who’s too injured to move, is the 'culprit'. But the possibility of a terrorist group acting against the town also cannot be denied… Such entities exist, yet we have no witnesses left breathing to give insight, except for one. All of these speculations, yet no hard evidence…”
That soon-to-be statement was drudgingly wrenched. Everyone pondered. All information was spread out; their only job was to put all the pieces together. However, all of these were instances of incidents, incidents that may make sense and are connected in the broader scheme of things, but when each isolated from each other, they loses cohesion. A mystery yet to be unsolved because all pieces seemed to fit at first glance, but they’re not.
The tragedy that befell the small town of Mido. Its sole survivor’s pure vengeance. The image of flames manifesting in Wiz and Enna’s minds. The latter girl’s break. This much conundrum, manifesting in only a day. They were truly stuck in a rut.
Everyone was taking part in pointing out information now, adding much to the confusion. Fein noticed that his group was stirred up by fatigue and decided to break the ice.
“Let’s take a break, everyone. Before we’re too exhausted to act.” Fein called.
“After this, let’s hurry to command.”
Gen stood up. At first, when things seemed to be tame, he trusted in their command to give explanations, but with these new possible angles…
“Tell me, captain: with this crap spreading out now, do you believe command has an answer?”
Fein paused. After a moment, he answered.
“Unlikely. But we have no choice. Despite our brain-wracking speculations, we’re out here empty-handed. We can’t possibly answer all of these by ourselves.”
Gen shrugged, passing by Fein at the same time.
“Exactly my point.”
Once he noticed that everyone’s mood inside the Beaver was on neutral, Fein called out.
“Everyone!”
As expected, everyone stood up and faced their captain.
“The Mido survivor is the only possible ‘witness’ of the Mido incident. As much for our lack of intel, we had to trudge through the disheartening aftermath. All of us suspect that he is the culprit but make no mistake: no concrete evidence and no testimony means our job is not over. Not until we make our man speak.”
“So!” He vigilantly enunciated. “As captain of Designation 7, I declare the survivor as a valuable asset: You cannot bring yourself to trust him and his nature, but protect him with your lives, if you must.”
“Not a person will be left behind here. Stay virtuous, everyone!”
“YES SIR!” A resounding response resonated with him. Smiling, he took it upon himself to solve this case once and for all.
Once everyone dissipated into their rooms, Wiz and Fein were left.
“Captain? May I ask?” Wiz said, exhaustion can be heard in her voice.
“What is it?”
“That boy… I’m tired of calling of calling him ‘that boy’… Should we give him a… name? Even if it’s just a designation?”
“A designation? Hmm…” Fein touched his chin. Noticing both of them are drowsy, he decided it would be best to dismiss work and rest first.
“We’ll discuss it tomorrow, Wiz. Don’t overextend yourself; you just recently recovered.” She just nodded, lazily. The captain then guided her to her room.
“Get some sleep first.”
“Ayy… Cap’n…” Wiz said, drowsily before closing the door. Fein chuckled at the sight, understandably so.
Seating at a vacant seat, he thought to himself.
‘Designation… Now… What would be your name, survivor?’