Months passed in the blink of an eye.

Faith woke up, though sleep didn’t come easily and didn’t last long even so far removed from that day.

The now fifteen-year-old sat up. “Gotta make breakfast…” she mumbled to herself, swinging her feet out of bed.

She planted her feet on the ground, but finding the strength to push herself up was fleeting. The woman sighed. “Fuck…” she cursed.

How much time Faith sat there like that was unknowable. Every second ticked by without her consent, and every minute flashed by like a stranger on the street. Finally, she mustered up enough strength to give her legs the stability to stand.

One day at a time, that’s all she could do. She had a sister to keep an eye on. Exiting her bedroom though, she heard the sizzle of a frying pan.

Making her way to the kitchen, she stopped as she saw Vienna behind the pan, flipping some eggs. Her tail was out and held up behind her.

“What are you doing?” asked Faith.

“Eating,” replied Vienna.

The two sisters remained quiet for a moment, only the sizzle of the cooking foot keeping the silence at bay.

“Has Dad been home?” Faith inquired.

“No. Not that I’ve seen,” said Vienna.

“I see.”

Silence once again.

“Haven’t seen him since mom died,” Vienna commented.

“He comes home real late, changes clothes, and leaves,” Faith told her sister.

“Uh-huh.”

Vienna cut the heat on the stove and plated her food. She turned to sit and eat, but Faith stood in the way, an unintentional obstacle.

“She didn’t die, Vee,” Faith spoke quietly.

“...yes she did, Faith. We saw her body,” Vienna insisted.

“No.” Faith shook her head. “Mom was killed.”

The young lyrebird’s neutral descended into a scowl. “She’s dead Faith. There’s no grand plan or whatever,” Vienna grumbled. “This isn’t like a cartoon. There isn’t a bad guy. Just… mom being gone.” The small girl brushed past her larger sibling, hiding her face.

Faith shook her head again. “No no. It’s all so suspicious,” mumbled the Maestro. “You and Mom are super rare, special Resonators. She gets hired by a scientist guy and then conveniently is dead that day. It stinks. It reeks,” Faith said through locked teeth.

“Yeah it stinks, dead bodies tend to do that,” stated Vienna coldly.

The elder sibling could hardly believe how dismissive her sister had gotten. Though none of this was new behavior. Something in Vienna changed that day. It pained Faith to think about.

“You miss her the most,” Faith whispered.

Vienna didn’t dignify that with a response, eating faster in place of any verbality.

The siblings sat in silence. Faith with her head lowered in deep thought while Vienna polished off the remainder of her breakfast.

Next that Faith became cognizant of her surroundings was the squeal of Vienna’s chair against the wood floor. She tracked her sister as she took her dish to the sink and set it down. Then the lyrebird made her way to the front door and slipped on her shoes.

“Where are you going?” asked Faith.

“Out,” replied the Resonator.

“Vienna, you’re like nine, you’re not going out by yourself,” asserted the Maestro of the home.

What happened next shook Faith’s conviction to its core.

Her little sister glared at her, not just a simple scowl, but an intimidating glower. Faith felt like the little sister from the intensity of her sister’s expression.

“That’s what I thought,” said Vienna. With that, she slipped out the front door.

Once the lyrebird was gone, Faith regained her cool. “That was her rhythm…” mumbled the Maestro. When did Vienna get that strong? She shook her head. “Idiot forgot who’s holding the tuner here,” Faith growled.

She drew the clear tuner from her pocket and laid her thumb on the red button.

Oh how badly she wanted to press down. Demand that Vienna return home and explain herself. But…

“Resonators are love, whether they’re your wife, or your sister, or someone unrelated. We have their tuners, but don’t betray their trust.”

Faith ground her teeth in frustration. “Damn it, Dad.” A couple of frustrated tears spilled. “What the fuck do I do when they betray my trust?”

After wiping away the tears, Faith found her determination. “I’ll bring her back kicking and screaming then,” she decided. The Maestro stole a glance at the tuner in her hand. “I don’t need this to get my sister back.”

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

----------------------------------------

Despite Vienna’s earlier bravado, she was still a little girl and nowhere near as fast as she’d like to think she was. As such, Faith easily found her but trailed at a distance. They didn’t live in the most affluent part of town. Plenty of shady characters skulked about, but for the most part, everyone kept to themselves.

“Don’t mess with me and I won’t mess with you,” was a pretty common thought among the locals. They knew who belonged there and who didn’t.

Thankfully for the two girls, they were part of the in-group, probably because of who their dad was.

Either way, Vienna was out here with a purpose, that much Faith knew. What exactly the lone Resonator was up to remained a mystery.

A Resonator as young as Vienna all on her own would normally invite trouble. However, as Faith experienced earlier, people were generally unnerved by the aura the little null element was putting out and avoided her as if she was lunar.

At least Faith could take solace knowing Vienna wasn’t being entirely foolish in that she had her very distinct lyrebird tail hidden.

It was a lot of walking around, with no real destination in mind the young girl seemed to be going around in circles. Was she lost? Faith couldn’t be sure.

Finally, the silent chase came to a stop when Vienna ducked into an alleyway. There was no one else around. Had she specifically waited for this opportunity? The alleyway was one Faith had familiarity with, there wasn’t an exit on the other side, and the only way in was also the only way out.

However, the woman that left the alleyway wasn’t Vienna, but a total stranger.

Faith panicked for a moment, but quickly regained her cool, she couldn’t give up her hiding spot so easily. She checked Vienna’s tuner.

Faith Saitou

Resonator: Vienna (Naida)

Species: Demi-Human (Salamander)

Element: Fire

Attribute: Piercing

Rhythm: 43%

The young Maestro’s eyes widened. Vienna not only was using her powers properly, but she was using them extremely well! The salamander woman Vienna had morphed into was much taller than her normal frame with a much heavier tail, but the lyrebird was perfectly utilizing the new frame she found herself in, walking with the same confidence she had in her nine-year-old body.

It made Faith consider… was that actually her sister…?

Either way, Faith had to find out what her Resonator was up to and resumed the hunt.

Nothing crazy happened, despite Faith’s ongoing anxiety about the situation. Vienna walked around town in the guise of this “Naida” character. She gave pleasantries and used a voice not her own without trouble.

It was insanity to the Maestro. She knew what her mother was capable of. Faith had memories of her mom using the guise of her friends to get her to admit things in confidence, only for her “friend” to transform back into her mother and bust her.

Perhaps that frustration only emboldened Faith to mesh with the wrong crowds. Who knew at this point?

By the time it was all said and done Vienna returned home without incident, slipping into the house as the salamander she was masquerading as. Faith was across the street from their apartment complex, watching all of this go down.

How bold of her, thought Faith. At least from the Maestro’s perspective, Vienna shouldn’t have had any reason to believe she’d be able to get away with entering the home in her salamander guise. Faith shook her head. She needed to find out what was going on and quickly found her conviction, following her sister into the apartment.

Sure enough, Faith didn’t have to look far for her sibling - Vienna had dropped her transformation and was in her real body right at the front door. Both sisters had the wind taken out of their sails by the stranger who was in their apartment.

“D-dad?” asked Vienna.

It couldn’t be him. It didn’t feel like him.

“Vienna,” said the man.

The way his once gentle eyes were obscured by thick black shades. The way his warmth was strangled by the heavy three-piece suit. The way his once loving voice had the love taken from it. This was not their father, but a creature who had crawled into their father’s skin and puppeted him around.

“Wh-who are you?” Faith managed to get out through uneven breaths, her grip on Vienna’s tuner causing her hand to tremble.

“Faith,” Ryo addressed his other daughter.

Faith opened her mouth to attack, but the man before them spoke first: “You’re coming to meet Dr. Vim with me.”