The sound of tea pouring down a cup rings loud in the middle of a sleepless night. Cider serves the tea-filled cup to Louie.
"Gaia..." Louie says. "Why did your angels take her out?" He added, sipping from the cup.
"You have failed to realize who she is, where she came from, and what she did." Cider replies.
"...She never told me."
"Logic. She's half human and half ancient being: A forbidden child."
40 YEARS AGO
A newborn baby is raised in the air. The baby's pounding mother is out of breath, torn apart by minutes of pain.
"Is this what you want, Timeline-2!?" She says in disdain.
"My blood, my dignity, my life, is tainted by YOUR CREATION!"
The midwife puts the newborn child in a bed, cutting her umbilical cord.
"My life is no match for that of ones that live immortal and powerful... I REFUSE to live a life knowing that he roams free..."
She begins laughing...
"What a world, what a world."
Out of shock, her heart stops; her eyes wide open, her soul left destroyed.
PRESENT DAY
Cider navigates the changelog.
"She was not supposed to be born. But that ancient being just has to ruin all of that..." She exclaims. "We cannot take away an innocent child... But we did take the ancient being out."
She shares with Louie a line from the changelog.
"Eliminated an ancient being for committing a forbidden sin."
"Update 162." Cider added. "During 161's maintenance, we looked and looked for where this forbidden child had gone to."
40 YEARS AGO
Hundreds of angels fly down Trinity Town, in search of the forbidden child.
They search the hospitals...
The orphanages...
And the households...
But no angel can't seem to find the baby.
A few days into the search, Two angels stop by a riverbank to wash their hands. Everything goes to plan until they hear the screams of a newborn child.
"Did you hear that, Pearl...?"
"Yeah, I did. It's over there!"
The two angels rush towards a basket. The baby's crying face shows it all, awake in all her glory in the middle of the pause.
PRESENT DAY
"The only way we can detect ancient beings is for the entire world to pause."
Cider and Louie are playing spider solitaire on the table.
"If they're awake..." She shows her ace and drops it down, making a complete set. Cider completes the sentence.
"Then it's a given."
40 YEARS AGO
Pearl and her subordinate angels, one of them being Cider, arrive at First Gate with the infant.
Despite her hybrid status as an ancient being, her human half collectively overpowered the barrier on their way to heaven.
"She's a beauty, right...?" Pearl says as the angels in First Gate surround her.
"Certainly. It's a shame that she's a forbidden child. The forbidden children before were all known for their erratic attitude, Having killed at least hundreds of people in their lifetime..." An old consul-general replies.
His name is Krill.
"...Why don't you raise her, Consul-General Krill? I'd doubt that she'd go down the wrong path with us angels involved." A young Cider asks.
"Well, I guess it wouldn't hurt to try." He blurts out with a smile.
Having full trust in the capabilities of the old consul-general, the angels around the child begin to smile as well.
PRESENT DAY
Mahjong on the table. Cider makes her first move.
"However, despite our guidance and efforts to help her, her brain's insolence is just... too powerful for us."
30 YEARS AGO
Midnight. The forbidden child is holding a sharpened pencil. In front of her is everything she ever needed...
An angel.
She had taken away the child's toy as punishment for not sleeping. However, in the eyes of the forbidden child, she thought she had taken away everything.
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...She strikes the angel, her pencil ready to stab.
"I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!!!"
She tackles her head-on, though the angel is quick to dodge to the right.
The child headbutts the wall.
Moments after, Krill is having a conversation with the forbidden child, talked over with some tea in hopes of soothing her feelings.
She has a bandage on her head.
"This is the fourth time this week..." Krill facepalms himself, sighing. "One of the ten commandments, child. Thou shalt not kill. I know it's not easy for you to understand. Of course, your mind doesn't allow you to."
The child sits in silence.
"Kill, right? Your thirst for the death of others doesn't suit you. It doesn't suit that innocent face of yours."
Krill reaches out to his pocket and brings out a blank notebook. He lends it over to the child.
"Try journaling, kid. Let out all those feelings."
She begins opening the book to the first page. Using the pencil she used to almost stab an angel, she begins writing the notebook's first words.
KILL LIST.
The first thing she wrote in it?
The name of her foster father, Krill.
PRESENT DAY
TRES cards.
Louie places a card on the discard pile. Three cards are left in hand.
"Tres." He says.
Cider looks at him in silence...
And places her entire deck in the pile; four +5 cards.
Louie lets out a chuckle. "Hmph, cheater."
"You know, they play card games like this all of the time... She has grown, her emotions in the notebook keeping her intact."
"They had picnics, stargazing sessions, games... Anything to keep her mind off things."
28 YEARS AGO
"Look at the sky, child." Krill points out.
"...What of it?"
"Barely any clouds; we're in heaven, after all."
A ball hits the forbidden child right in the face.
"AH! S~Sorry!" a young Zikh replies.
"I'm going to kill you~"
"No, you're not, child." Krill interrupts.
"...I'll be going now?" Zikh asks.
"Of course, Zikh."
She writes something on her kill list. Looks like another angel falls victim to the notebook...
PRESENT DAY
"Time flies fast for both Krill and the forbidden child." Cider says. "A few hundred more games... A few hundred more picnics... And a few hundred more names on the kill list."
She pauses for a while as she looks back at the game.
"...You're gonna buy this property?" Cider asks Louie.
"I'll do $700." Louie thinks to himself.
"I bid a thousand."
Silence from Louie.
"...Damn it."
22 YEARS AGO
"Damn it." The forbidden child nonchalantly replies. "I'm going to kill you for this, Krill."
The child is now eighteen.
"Haha, go figure. You're bankrupt." Krill replies.
"Same time today tomorrow?" She asks.
"Certainly, my child. Now back to your room."
The child navigates her way out of the patio and into her stonehouse, though she had forgotten one thing with her to bring back...
Her notebook.
"Child! Your notebook!" Krill says, chasing her out.
She leans back and sees him holding her notebook out in the sky. Krill gives the notebook back to her.
"Thanks." The child replies.
As Krill walks away, the child takes her pen out and opens the very first page of her kill list...
Crossing out Krill's name in it.
PRESENT DAY
It's Louie's turn.
"Cat." He says, putting a card on the pile.
"Goat." Cider replies, putting another card on the pile.
"Cheese."
"Pizza."
A pizza comes out of the discard pile. Matching with what Cider had said, both parties are quick to tap their hands on the center.
Cider's hand gets there first.
"Hah, this game's stupid." Louie complains.
"Unpredictable, right?" Cider responds. "But the mind can also be an unpredictable thing."
22 YEARS AGO
Dining table.
Bread, butter, milk, and chicken ham are on it, all served just for the two of them.
Krill drinks a huge glass of milk. He slams it down the table.
"So, what do you want to do in the future?" Krill asks, slicing a piece of bread.
"I wanna go down there and live a life. Probably go to college, get rejected by art school~"
"There's no room for such jokes like that on my table, child." Krill replies with a reprimanding tone.
"Sorry." She replies. "I want to go to college. I want to live with the people."
Krill slides the butter knife along the faces of the sliced bread.
"I think I can able to handle my mind now." She says.
"You think?" Krill asks as he takes a slice of chicken ham from the table.
"I know you're not going to say yes..."
"...You read my mind well." Krill replies.
"So I'm just going to have to kill you."
"Funny, joke, my child." He says, plating his food with all the meals on the table.
"I'm not kidding."
Krill freezes in place.
"You're the only one who can stop me. The rest of the angels want me out of this place. Why not do the best of both worlds, right?"
Krill's hands begin shaking. Blood comes out of his mouth. He's quick to touch and figure out what's going on.
"~What... did you just do?"
"Don't worry, Krill. It'll be quick."
She stands up from her seat.
"You won't have to suffer that much." She says as she walks away from the dining area.
"By the way, thank you for everything." She says, looking back at a suffering Krill one last time.
He loses his breath and begins spasming. Out of control, His chair falls to the ground.
MOMENTS LATER
The girl enters her room and picks up an already-prepared bag. She swiftly makes her way outside.
From a distance, Zikh is calling.
"Hey, FC!" Zikh says, waving at her. "You look beautiful today!"
"That's harassment." She replies. "Anyway, I don't think I'll be returning here for a while..."
"Oh, is that so? Why?"
She bluntly replies with a suspicious quote.
"...Because I don't think you have a consul-general to serve anymore."
PRESENT DAY
Chess pieces are on the table.
"Her change of plan, her sudden will to go down Timeline-2... That's because of the the instincts of her being half ancient being."
She picks up her remaining white pawn.
"Angels are to heaven as Dream Creatures are to the dreamworld as Ancient Beings are to earth. Too long being in the wrong place, and you start feeling extreme desperation."
Cider promotes her white pawn into a queen.
"That's exactly why you have a dream portal with you, right?"
A FEW DAYS AFTER KRILL'S DEATH
Silence at the Garden of Eden.
A few dozen angels are in the premises, along with heaven's two other consul-generals:
The consul-general of death, Archimedes...
And the consul-general of inanimacy, Sartorius McDee.
The two call on the attention of the angels in the garden.
"Attention! For the crimes of murdering consul-general Artexerxes Krill, The council declares the forfeiture of the life of the unnamed forbidden child." Says mcDee."She shall be one of the things you angels will focus on delivering here for judgment during Timeline-2's future update maintenance."
"But sir, the roadmap! There are no plans to update Timeline-2 for four more years!" One of the angels responds.
"That is why on behalf of the bereaved consul-general, we are changing the roadmap." McDee answers. "What she did is most certainly a heinous crime. Her attitude herself poses a threat, but no prolonged pause shall be necessary. Timeline-2 itself isn't in danger, anyway."
McDee takes a long pause.
"Therefore, we shall be updating Timeline-2 once every two years, within 15-30 day intervals. Your top priority will be to search for the forbidden child."
"And it goes on like this up until we find her. We'll be leaving you all with an angel that we believe shall be next in charge..." Archimedes replies.
A recognizable angel steps up to the pedestal in the garden.
"..Consul-general-elect Astasektu Cider."
PRESENT DAY
Louie thinks of his next move...
"...Rook to G7." Louie replies, moving the rook respectively.
"...Checkmate." Cider says, commending Louie."Nice job, Logic. Now it's your turn to draw your cards."
Louie looks directly at Cider's face.
"She's just called the Forbidden Child, right?"
Silence from Cider. Louie fixes his sunglasses and smirks at her.
"Well then, let me tell you the story of how she became Gaia."