Chapter 1. Introduction

Ashley was gone, her work was still here, a very painful trade. It's been two week since Helen Magnus has lost her daughter and she seemed to be fine. Everyone at the Sanctuary knew that was a mask, but nobody confronted her, not even Will. She deserved to grief in her own way. Still, it wasn't just a mask, she felt nothing but a big void inside her, she couldn't cry, she couldn't think about Ashley as being dead, she couldn't grief. One day she just announced everybody that she was taking a couple of days off and gave them brief instructions. She was needed somewhere else. That was it, simple and without further explanations, she just left.

The Irish country side was astonishing all year long, the people, the scenery, the customes. Thlasa loved it and cherished it, it was her real home. The facility she had been leading for 15 years fitted perfectly into the scenery at first sight. At a closer view, it seemed like a military base with strict rules of conduct and action. It was founded in 1967 by Helen Magnus and the other Sanctuary leaders out of necessity and was functioning independently supporting the Sanctuaries around the world. It's objective was to capture the most dangerous human abnormals world wide (abnormals using their abilities to torture and kill, to change governments and threaten the social equilibrium of a community), study them and, finally, put them down. These abnormals couldn't be brought to answer for their crimes before a customary court without people knowing of their existance and create world wide panic, so it was the only way to punish them. This facility was created to answer a condition imposed by the governments to allow the Sanctuaries to function in their countries. It broke all of Helen Magnus' principles, but in order to continue her work she had to obey.

The year 1967 was a bad one for the Sanctuary network. In june that year, The Council of the European Union issued a regulation about the classification, packing and labeling of dangerous substances. A faction of human abnormals tried to assassinate members of the Council from every member states in order to force the European Council to reconsider the regulation. The attacks were stopped, but the governments of the member states urged the Santuary network to deal with any further problems of that kind in a more... persuasive way than research and shelter or imprisonment.

Therefor, that year, Helen and the other Sanctuary leaders set up an establishment on the Irish coast called Gá (Need in Irish), a new tipe of sanctuary, this time a sanctuary for humans only, to protect them from dangerous beings. It was a hard decision to take, because the main role of the sanctuaries was to protect abnormals and learn from them. But, in order to do that and keep the two dominant species on the planet save, she had to comply. Still, sanctuaries had had directives from the begining to put down any abnormal considered too dangerous, but it hadn't quite applied to human abnormals. So, Gá completed in a strange sense the primary goal of the Sanctuary Network. The Sanctuary Council decided unanimously that Gá would remain a secret for all other sanctuary members.

Because of the high risk level of assignments that Gá personnel had to take, the facility had been thought up more as a military base: harder trainning programms with constant physical and psychological evaluations, more strict chain of command. That was the only way to assure the survival of all the members of Gá, because safety had always been the first concern. After a decade since Gá was created and governments eased the preasure on the sanctuaries, they started to try to cure abnormals' deviant behaviour rather then putting them down, with some degree of success. Still, the ones that they couldn't cure were killed. Thlasa was leading Gá since 1995following the same rules, but bringing a new meaning of belonging to the members through her ability.

Helen had known Thlasa since 1942. Thlasa was 16 years old, running from an organisation called The Division which Helen had been trying to bring down for almost 2 years. The Division was created by former members of the Irish Republican Army and collected human abnormals to use their powers against the british. They succesfully collected humans with mind reading abilities, visual manipulation abilities, shape shifters. Thlasa was an empath whom The Division wanted to use as a human lie detector. She managed to escape badly wounded and hid in a small village near Cork. Helen tracked her down and saved her life in the only possible way: she injected her own blood into the girl to raise her immun system. Thlasa survived and gained Helen's longevity. She worked with Helen at the Sanctuary, raised Asley and Henry together. Her ability was a real asset for the Sanctuary network. She could connect to another person and feel what that person was feeling and even give comfort by soothing negative feelings. She had learned to only use that ability when needed and not constantly like in the begining when she would feel everything the others around her felt, good or bad feelings and she was on the verge of psychological collapse.

The two women's relationship was more than anyone could understand, Thlasa was Helen's support and comfort, she could feel Helen's state of mind, share it with her and even take some of Helen's pain and dispear on her. That was her way of thanking Helen for saving her life. Through the years, the link between them became permanent, it wasn't dependent of space proximity anymore.

The day Helen arrived in Ireland turned out to be in perfect harmony with her state of mind. The sky was black and it was raining hard. She liked that weather, she felt comfortable, it remainded her of the all the times she had spent on the roof of her Sanctuary watching the city, especially during the rain, then it was strangely quiet.

She got out of her rented car to look at the old castel that hid inside the most dangerous human abnormals on the planet. She knew that a division of Gá was currently bringing down the Cabal, folowing Druitt and Tesla and finishing the job without the two of them knowing and for the first time she felt (with shame) that the facility was doing exactly what she herself wanted to be doing.

Thlasa was waiting for her at the front door, Helen was sure her friend knew she was coming. They hugged for a long time in the rain, sharing Helen's pain. No words were said, they didn't need to. Thlasa knew the huge degree of pain Helen was feeling for her daughter's death and even felt it herself since before Helen got there. But, still, Thlasa didn't expect the way Helen was feeling. It was like she was numb inside, powerless to face what had happened. She looked into Helen's blue eyes and smiled sadly. That's why Helen came here, because she knew no one would understand what she was feeling and she couldn't find the words to explain, nor the power. Thlasa could feel her and she could share her state of mind.

Later that day, Helen and Thlasa were drinking a botle of wine in Thlasa's private quarters.

"I've heard you have a difficult case" Helen was the first to speak.

"Shape shifter... nasty one and highly intelligent, he impersonated the Bank of Ireland senior manager and almost succeded on stealing 14 millions € until we caught on to him. But he eluded us again...". Thlasa knew her answer was hazy, but it was just like Helen to divert her attention from personal problems to work. "I'll give you the details tomorrow morning and maybe you'll want to give us a hand while you're here".

Helen poured herself more wine and picked up Thlasa's glass to do the same.

"I've been expecting you sooner" Thlasa said and looked at her glass. "I thought you'd come six days ago, I felt your pain stronger then. Was the memorial then?"

Helen smiled sadly. "I thought you might not come then. Still I wanted you there so much. Was it too much for you? I know Ashley meant a lot to you too." She said and looked at Thlasa. Her eyes held no reproach. She understood.

"I wanted to come, for you, but I felt you at every moment. I can still do that, you know, even after 14 years of talking to you on the phone" Thlasa smiled and looked at Helen intensly. "I know you understand, you studied my ablility alongside myself, you taught me to control and develop it. I couldn't bear your pain then and I couldn't comfort you, so I... I couldn't have helped you then. I hope I can at least now." She took Helen's hand into her and opened her mind completely to the other woman's feelings. The pain and despair flooded through her, filling her senses and clouding her mind. It was too intense for a person to endure alone, so Thlasa took away some of that pain and made it hers, it burnt her soul and tears started running down her cheeks. For the first time after the day Ashley had died, Helen was also crying, the way that only a mother would cry for her dead child. She was finally in someone's company, someone who understood how she felt without having to find the words to express it.

Thlasa was her best kept secret, her only egocentric side, her tranquility. She wasn't about to let anyone take that away from her, at least not again, not like 16 years ago.

To be continued

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