Gwen was bounding over the rooftops in her Mirai disguise. She'd gotten Uryu to take in the robe slightly so that it fit her better. Below her on the street level Kid was trying to ignore her, taking a little extra time before school so that he could walk with Maka and Soul and talk about those durn mirrors. That was fine, she needed to find an atlas of the area or a series of maps. She had some of the local money. Still when she spotted the Shop she wanted she couldn't help showing off. She leapt over Kid's head, sailing gracefully across the street.
Then she landed outside the newsstand. "Excuse me, that one please." Mirai handed over the money she'd been given and got the Atlas of the area in return.
/I don't know why you're buying that, Gideon already gave you the location he wanted you to use./ Sophie was in a room monitoring her cybercoms. She wanted to get a feel for Kid.
/Souvineer./ Gwen replied tersely.
/A useless one./ Hardison tsked. /I can e-mail you any map you want, and so can Abby and Garcia. Why do you have to buy a physical one./
/For the same reason people on my grandfather's world still collect print paper books rather than computer files./ Gwen drawled.
"What was that for?" Kid asked, meaning the atlas.
"To find something." Gwen replied through the voice changer, a small amount of smugness in her voice.
"Okaaaay, why did your robe change?"
"I had it taken in, the way I was wearing it I resembled your old /man/ more than I liked." Gwen snorted. "no offense..."
"nobody likes looking like someone's old man." Liz snorted. "Are you alright after Patti yanked your tail?"
"Yeah." Gwen said quietly. "I just... have some old wounds so I don't like to be touched very much except by a few people."
"Like who?"
"None of your business." Gwen replied tersely.
/Now thats low, she pulled your tail?/ Hardison asked her.
/Hells yeah./ Gwen replied. She walked alongside Kid, Liz and Patti, but her body posture might as well have screamed. "I'm on my own, don't come near me." /I had a flash back of Dex laughing when she laughed about it./
"I'm sorry." Patti said quietly. "It just looked so leathery and warm and cuddly." Patti stared at Gwen. "I MUST SEE IF YOU'RE THAT WARM AND CUDDLY UNDER THE ROBES!" Patti made a lunge for Gwen.
She got a clawed mithril dragon foot to the chin. "I just said I don't like to be touched very much and ten seconds later you try to grope me? Bad Patti, no biscuit."
"But biscuits are gooooooood." Patti whined from the ground.
"Patti, normally I'd be beating her up, but after that, you're on your own. She just said she doesn't want you touching her." Liz told Patti. "And you go for her ten seconds later."
"I can't help it sis, Mirai-chan's sadface begs for cuddles!"
/Oh i'm taping this for ZP./ Hardison told her.
/If you do that, I will find all twelve of your WoW accounts and destroy everything in them./ Gwen snapped. /After I take a magnet to /all/ of your DATA STORAGE DEVICES! THEN I'LL SMASH ALL YOUR DESKTOP COMPUTERS AND LEAVE YOU WITH A MID 90'S MICROSOFT MODEL WITH WINDOWS 1995!/
"What makes you think I'm sad Patti-san?" Gwen asked, smoothing her robes and straightening up.
"The way you hold yourself."
"The way I hold myself means 'stay the fuck at arms length or else.'" Gwen grumbled. "nothing more, this is a diplomatic mission. While I will not let any of you come to harm should harm come to find you, I must at least /attempt/ to maintain formality until I get to know you three better." She glared at Patti. "Not to mention, my spouse would be very upset if you grabbed me in the places you seem intent to."
"oh... sorry." Patti blinked. "you're married?"
"The ring is under my gauntlet." Gwen replied. "It won't fit on the finger of these gloves."
"Your voice does sound rather sad Mirai." Kid frowned. "Perhaps thats what Patti was thinking about."
"Perhaps, though quite honestly I view you more like the children in my tribe that I mentor when they're getting ready to learn how to fight." Gwen said quietly. "The three of you appear at least a decade younger than I. I'm more likely to view Patti as a student or a /veerrry/ weird niece if I got to know her better. Not as the sort I'd want grabbing me."
Patti beamed. "Really? I'm like someone's very weird niece? Coooooooooool!"
"hey guys, what's with being so weird, its not cool." Soul walked right past them with Maka, and skipping behind them was Morgan.
"So did you know that the core of Jupiter is really made of high pressure hydrogen? It was compressed so much it turned metallic. Pretty crazy huh?" Morgan asked Maka.
"How do you know so much Morrigan? I mean I knew the one about Jupiter, but that bit about coconut water being similar enough to blood plasma to be used for a transfusion in place of blood I'd never heard of."
Morgan blushed slightly. "Ah shucks."
"When you live a nomadic lifestyle, you learn how to use the things you find along your route. And you learn how to take care of yourself, the most primal needs of living, when your home is the ground you walk on." Gwen said somberly, the voice changer made her voice sound like a dead ringer for Rem. Gwen cursed the female shinigami's melancholy nature.
Morgan nodded. "When I was six years old I spent the summer living on the northern Appalachian trail with just a native american guide. No tent, just a sleeping bag and a backpack full of stuff. I'm naturally handy with tools, and at making them, and it started back then making basic tools from items found in nature. By the end of the summer I was floating around on a lake in a boat I'd made from wicker and deer hides with nothing but my knife, a hatchet, and a pair of scissors. I learned how to make containers, rope, even platforms in the trees. And I learned what plants in the forest were poisonous. I'm every bit as smart as you are Maka, its just that my smarts are more geared towards the kind of things I can learn with my hands, feet, eyes and ears."
Gwen chuckled. "Intelligence, creativity, and curiousity are not mutually exclusive." She mused. "I guard the Curiosity of young Meisters and weapons, but many that I have seen with great curiosity are actually the dumbest in terms of IQ. Likewise, creativity is not always gifted to the most intelligent. Just because you can quote facts and figures and pass an exam, Albarn-san, Kid-san, doesn't mean that you're creative or curious."
"Then how would you test curiosity and creativity then?" Maka asked.
"Creativity would mean that you can take the facts you learn and put them together in a way that completes a task you're set or that you set yourself." Morgan spoke up. "For example what I call the MacGuyver test, give a person a workshop full of materials and an end goal, and have them figure out how to take the materials and tools in that workshop and improvise whatever is needed from seemingly random items."
"And I would test curiosity by making sure you have to face your deepest darkest fears for the sake of nothing less than the truth. Being willing to do whatever you have to do to find the truth, that is how I categorize curiosity."
"including killing?" Kid asked, arching a brow.
"ah that is destructive ends to satisfy one's curiosity Kid-san." Gwen told him. "I find killing an unacceptable means simply because as a shinigami I believe it is the divine who decide when a person dies. Not even a Grim Reaper shall know the day nor the hour of his own death. An accidental death due to an experiment is a grey area, should the person conducting the experiment have taken every safety measure conceivable to protect himself and others, and sabotage and foul play are ruled out, then if people still die it is an act of God. However, I find being willing to sacrifice oneself for the truth to be noble, but equally pointless. If you die before you find the truth you seek, in the act of seeking it, then what point was there to actually seeking it? True, you would have no regrets, but its small comfort in the hereafter."
"Aaah, but what if sacrificing yourself for that truth leads to events that bring the truth to light?" Kid pointed out. "I've got you there!"
"Then it is a selfless act done not for one's own benefit but for others. Truth for the sake of other people is not bad either. Assuming, of course, the deceased were comfortable dying without finding his truth." Gwen told Kid.
"HAHA! THE GREAT ME HAS ARRIVED!" Blackstar proclaimed, appearing on a nearby rooftop out of seemingly nowhere.
"hiii..." Tsubaki had curlicues in her eyes.
"So have you humdrums figured out the clue yet?" Blackstar asked.
"No, the image is a cave and the plant and animal life in it suggests its in the american southwest, possibly in the canyonlands north of Death City."
"Canyonlands?" Blackstar head tilted.
"North of Death City there's a massive maze of canyons." Maka told him. "Its filled with cave paintings and its hazardous because sometimes flashfloods go through. They never reach the city, too far away, but if you're crossing the canyon while it happens its pretty much show over."
"Awww, the end of a show is never fun." Blackstar pouted.
"Sorry we're late." Ichigo bowed politely. "Good morning Morrigan, Mirai."
"aaaah, good morning Raion. Be wary, Patti-san seems to enjoy greeting people the way your father likes to greet you. I already had to hold her back with a foot."
"urgg, I'll be careful. You know my old man still treats me like a child."
"By the standards of our people, you, me, and Morrigan are all children. Shinigami don't often consider a fellow of their species an independent adult till between the ages of eighty and one hundred. It depends on the tradition a shinigami is born into. Just because I'm legal, and you're a year short of legal, and Morrigan is only a couple of years shy of legal, by human standards, doesn't mean we're of age by those of our people."
Kid was listening enrapt until. "Good morning young master!"
"Jimmy." Kid greeted the shop owner standing outside a shop called "Krikut's Crafts, local artisans and materials."
Morgan and Gwen squealed when they realized who the shop owner was.
"I've got a fresh load of local handicrafts for the Deathscythe Conference Festival."
"One of my favorite times of year." Kid beamed. "What are you concentrating on this year?"
"Quilts! Desert nights are good and cold so they should sell briskly." Jimmy extended a hand to Morgan, Gwen and Ichigo. "Jimmy Krikut, owner of Krikut's crafts. Be ya lookin for some crafting supplies young reapers?"
"I'm not, but Mirai and Morrigan are crafting nuts. Morrigan does half the tent repairs in our tribe, makes bags and packs, cordage, shoes, really anything we need. She's even made chinese style paper armor."
"Paper armor?" Kid queried.
"its an old Chinese method of deflecting ranged attacks. They'd take layers of paper and laquer it. It was very thick and sturdy, rather like drywall, but very light and made it easy for their soldiers to move around." Jimmy replied. "Still, I'm surprised you'd know about it."
"I told you, they're crafting nuts. However, if you have specialized sewing tools, one of my tribesmen will enjoy a set." Ichigo was obviously thinking of Uryu.
"I need a new multitool, I have plenty of money for a new leatherman, and if you have some new sailcloth needles and leatherworking thread?"
"Hooooollddd up... come by the store around lunch time and pick out what you want." Jimmy chuckled.
"Jimmy Krikut?" Gwen giggled slightly, pointing to the sign for the store that was a sillouette of pinochio with spools of thread on his long nose and knitting needles in his hand.
"yeah, that was his name when he attended Shibusen." Kid replied. "Students are allowed to pick a code name for themselves when they come to attend school here. The girls NOT Dorm RA is named Eternal Feather."
"Soul eater!" Soul chimed cheerfully. "it sounded like a cool weapon name, not to mention its to the point."
"So then Blackstar is your name really Blackstar?" Ichigo asked. Blackstar had been waiting impatiently for Gwen and Morgan to stop squealing over the craft store.
"Yup, Ore-sama has always been named Blackstar!" Blackstar boasted. "A big name for a big man!"
"I'll acknowledge you as being big when I can look up at you /un/injured. Or when you get a few battlescars as a sign of your valor as a Meister." Ichigo said cooly.
"is that what you test?" Tsubaki asked curiously.
"Yes, my job is to test the Valor of young Meisters and their Weapons. Blackstar is a young man with the seeds of valor, but I don't think they've grown just yet." Ichigo replied. "Thats why I took such an interest."
"And Yuki?" Tsubaki asked.
"She tests the Grace of young Meisters and weapons."
"I test creativityyyyyy!" Morgan beamed.
"And as I said I test curiosity." Gwen chuckled. "Curiosity is an advantageous evolutionary trait for any species to acquire."
"Meaaaannnniiinngg." Blackstar drooped.
"Its like this, if you're curious, you discover enemies coming to get you, sources of food, tools to help you acquire food and water, new sources of water, the opportunity to mate, new places to sleep that are safe. Its really required to have even a little bit of an ability to predict the future, which is what separates humans and shinigami from animals. Even your enemies, the kisshins, can gain from curiosity because it finds them the basic prerequisites to survive, food, water, shelter, and to spot enemies before they themselves are spotted. Its essential for any form of combat to be executed competently. Curiosity is an often underestimated warrior's trait, and just because you're smart, doesn't mean you're curious, the two aren't mutually exclusive."
"So I could have the biggest curiosity in the room? Bigger than Maka's or Kid's?" Blackstar demanded, getting up into Gwen's face.
"Blackstar, ask Patti what happened when she didn't respect my personal space." Gwen deadpanned.
"JUST ANSWER MY QUESTION!" Blackstar shook Gwen.
Gwen retaliated by sending Blackstar flying in a Judo throw about six feet. "Touch me again and you'll get much, much worse."
Why oh why oh why did the trauma from Dex keep being rubbed raw by something as simple as exuberant behavior while she was here?
"Mirai are you okay? That... incident isn't giving you trouble is it?"
"Too early to tell." Gwen growled, turning invisible but not imperceptible. "Oye, Nakatsukasa-san, teach your Meister to respect personal space or I'll do it for you." She said coldly.
"Blackstar, shaking people isn't how you get answers to your questions. And what were you doing shaking a shinigami of all people like that? You're lucky she didn't use anything like Kid's death cannon."
"We weren't fighting Nakatsukasa-san, I was simply using a gentle throw that I knew from his musculature and life force that he could withstand as a rebuke." Gwen replied.
"I see." Tsubaki sighed. "Well, if you don't want to be touched, I can't blame you. Blackstar is a... er... he's a bit much to handle sometimes."
"yooooo." Kilik called out, waving as he rushed over with Renji, fire and thunder. "Look who I found!"
Renji puffed out his chest and grinned as he proclaimed to the other weapon meister pairs. "I am the Baboon King Nuekage! I am a shinigami who tests the resolve of young Meisters and Weapons." He strutted, steam literally snorting from the nostrils of his baboon mask. Renji was wearing robes similar in appearance to the markings on "Chimpette's" fur and a large baboon skull shaped mask carved from mahogany on his face. Large carved skybroom wood gloves, a wood known for its toughness, covered his fingers up to the very fingertips. The billowing cotton cloak had been woven in a way that made it look like shaggy fur.
"Nuekage keep your voice down!" Rukia sighed in disgust as she and Nekomata appeared with Kim and Jackie. "Ah yes, I am Yuki, a shinigami who tests the Grace of young Meisters and Weapons."
"Nyaaan, I'm Nekomata, I test the capacity of Meisters and Weapons to feel jooooyyy nyaaaaaannnn." Rangiku meowed, pawing slightly at Maka's leg. "Why do you think I follow Maka-chan and Kiddo-kun around but not Soru-kun or Pati-chan? Cause Pati-chan and Soru-kun can feel joy very well already. Maka-chan's joy is stuck somewhere inside. And Kiddo-kun's joy is as tightly bound up as his sphincter!"
Gwen snorted in laughter. Morgan sighed. "Ah well, if there's one virtue of Nekomata, its her candor!"
"i'm so happy you think so Morrigan-chan, nyaaaan, let me make you happy with my clevage!" Nekomata shoved Morgan's face into her breasts.
Morgan shrieked, and fell over with blood spurting from her nose. "You're a lecher Neko-chaaaan! You're going to corrupt these poor innocent children with the joy on your chest!"
"Nyaaaaan, if more of us valued food and cheer than hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world. My job is to discourage hoarded gold and help people to value food and cheer more." Rangiku stuck her nose in the air.
"Indeed, it would make the job of the just easier, by reducing the amount of people who are wicked." Byakuya said solemnly as he and Soifon approached in costume with Ox and Havar. "I am Sakuyaken, a shinigami who tests the Pride of young Meisters and their weapons. Is your pride a hindrance? Or does it create unyielding standards of excellence and behavior? Are you a man of your word? Or does your word crumble if it becomes too inconvenient to keep it?"
"and I am Queen Bee." Soifon smirked under her yellow and black bee mask. "I test the loyalty of young Meisters and their weapons. Loyalty to your country, your comrades, your partner and your cause. But loyalty must not be given blindly, rather, it must be given wisely to the Master to whom you pledge. You must not only be able to hold the loyalty of others and give your loyalty, but to be willing and able to understand thoroughly the causes and reasons for which you fight." She smiled. "You will be unable to pass my tests of your virtue as Meisters and Weapons unless you can show that you can wisely give and obtain loyalty."
"We will, at some point be testing all of you and your weapons, prepare yourselves. I suggest quiet, contemplation, and a good cup of tea." Byakuya said coolly.
"Tea?" Maka head tilted.
"It is better to have tea on your breath than meat." Byakuya said serenely. "Old Buddhist saying."
"Actually its better to have /rice/ on your breath than meat." Gwen deadpanned. "I think his point is, have a clear mind. When you find the location, you will find the place of your first test."
The walk to the school was rather embarassing for Maka, who felt almost like she had an honor guard, and it rather aggravated her. As soon as, however, they arrived at the school's steps, all the shinigami who had accompanied them seemed to fizzle and disappear.
"its not like a soul protect at all is it?" Maka asked, looking back at where the group was standing moments before.
"I guess not. Isn't soul protect supposed to be like a shield?" Ox asked. "They just fizzed from sight, like static."
"Weird." Soul mused. "maybe they were holograms or something?"
"No. When Blackstar clung to Yuki's leg the night they left our mirrors." Tsubaki told Soul. "Yuki shoved him so hard he went flying. He got right back up of course, Blackstar can take more than being thrown against a wall but..."
"So they really are there..."
"What about a super soul protect." Patti suggested brightly.
"A what?"
"no, I suspect its something more subtle than simply a super strength soul protect." Kid mused. "Something Mirai said the night she left our mirror. There is more in heaven and in earth than is dreampt of in your philosophy. Perhaps, these shinigami and the tests they will have, will have things unknown." Kid mused. They were climbing the massive stairs to Shibusen now.
So Kid stopped in to see his father before school, parting from Maka and Soul. "Good morning father, I had some questions for you before school."
"oh well I'll answer as best as I can son."
"How much about supernatural phenomena has Shibusen discovered as of yet, can you give an estimated percentage?"
Shinigami-sama hmmed. "Two hundred years ago I would have said about fifty percent. But the two centuries since then, and the six before that, have made me revise that estimate, along with the recent events. I'd saaaaay, maybe about ten percent if we're lucky."
Kid's jaw dropped.
"Shibusen's focus has been rather specific, we concentrate on destroying kisshins and witches and for the most part containing the damage the witches do. Have you wondered why every single witch known to exist is not on my list?"
Kid rather scratched his head. "Not sure."
"We do not have a blanket "kill first, ask questions later" order on witches because not all of them are evil. Its just that the destructive ones are in the majority." Lord Death told him. "We have an amnesty policy for witches that are willing to agree to certain restraints whom Mabaa wants Dead. As well as witches with /very/ specific abilities. But this amnesty policy has been used a sum total of 4 times in Shibusen's history. Its applied with the utmost discretion. And there are other considerations. The kisshins are criminals and monsters that harm people, but the witches also hate kisshins, they are more to us like the Soviet Union was to the United States. An enemy nation. They are two distinct attitudes."
"So our purpose is very specific, and thats why we don't know so much." Kid mused.
"Well, our scientists have tended to have very specific kinds of research. Either geared towards defending against and killing kisshins, or geared towards negating and mitigating magic and counteracting spells." Which Kid knew was a Shibusen specialty that Meisters and Weapons could take up.
Kid looked darkly at the ground. "I want to try to understand more of what we don't know." Kid said quietly.
"A wise idea." Shinigami-sama replied.
"Er father, another question, who's in charge of teaching survival skills to Weapons and Meisters?"
"aaaaah, that is Azusa's ballcourt. She may look like a bureaucrat, but she is tough, she is intelligent, and cover warfare is a specialty of hers. She's the one who trains all survival and covert specialists. Even Sid and Nygus had to pass her mustard before they could take up covert operations as a specialty. Why do you ask?"
"I'm going to have to go out into the canyonlands. I'm not going to go without having some idea of how to handle myself, Liz and Patti in an emergency."
"In that case, Azusa can give each of you a combat survival pack for three days."
Kid drooped. "Couldn't it be 8 days?"
"Kid, do you know what it feels like to carry eight days of rations on your back?"
Kid blinked. "no."
"A day's rations is about the weight of what you carry in your backpack to school, textbooks, gear, notebooks, ecetera. Picture that, multiplied by eight." Shinigami-sama pointed out.
Kid hefted his bag. He'd weighed it before, twenty pounds. "One hundred and sixty pounds." Kid groaned. It was more than he weighed. Having a symmetrical amount of days of gear was completely out of the question.
"You want to carry eight days of gear for you, Liz and Patti?" Azusa glared at Kid over her glasses. "has your father explained the math of that for you?"
"Well um... yes..."
"If you're dead set on that much for each person, I suggest you set up a base camp at the entrance to the canyonlands." Azusa told him. "I'll put my old volkswagon bus at the entrance filled with gear. When you need to get home, or you're in trouble, call me, I'll give you a cellphone with my number on speed dial."
"What about a more permanent basecamp?" Kid asked. "It may take more time to search than I generally have."
Azusa sighed. "fiiiinneee, I'll find a minivan owned by Shibusen. A car is actually a very good shelter you know. Now i'm going to give you a booklet about wilderness survival. Memorize as much of it as you can, I'm not letting you take any wilderness gear out unless you can demonstrate to me that you can protect yourself, Liz and Patti if one of you gets too hurt to proceed or lost."
Kid groaaaned, it was going to take him weeks to get all this to the standard Azusa demanded of him. He'd better get started.
"So Timburr, can you build this for me? And is Stunky gonna be able to help you?"
"Stunky stunky."
"Timburr timburr..." A team of ten Timburr had been hired to build the different testing areas for Kid and company. They'd just been asked to build an Indiana Jones style series of traps, with symmetrical objects as bait.
"As for you Vespiqueen." Soifon beamed. "I want you and your hive to get settled in the cave system I picked out for your test."
"Soooo, Trapinch, Rhyhorn, you guys are gonna set up a fake dispute over territory for them to mediate, but Rhyhorn you have to be really aggressive about it and be ready to attack them okay?" Ichigo asked.
"Rhyyyyhooorrnnn." Rhyhorn nodded.
"But you can't seriously hurt them, just rough them up a bit so that they have to get exercise and defend both the trapinch and yourself." Ichigo explained.
"I think for my test it will require an act of kindness." Rukia mused. "The question is, how do I do it with four Pachirisu, two Castform and a Charmander?"
"I have a book on electric rodents you can read." Gwen offered. "I'm sure you'll figure out something."
"errr, Taichou, what are you going to do?" Renji asked, looking over at the group of wild Larvitar, Bagon and Gible he'd been given for assistance in his testing.
"I have an idea Abarai Fukutaichou, no worries." Byakuya smiled, giving the dragon and dark pokemon a pat on the head.
Gwen mused on matters as she watched the Timburr pour over the plans for her test. With dozens of wild pokemon busy to the north of the city in the canyonlands Shibusen would have a group of allies to the north. She also had to start caching supplies north of town.
"SHE REQUIRES WHAT?" Maka shrilled when Kid told her what Azusa required for the group to go to the canyonlands. "What the fuck does she think is going to happen."
"Maka please don't shout. This isn't like going to Italy and staying in some posh hotel for a few days. This is the canyonlands. They're easily the most difficult to navigate part of the desert outside the city." Soul pointed out, pausing his Xbox game and turning to look up at his Meister that afternoon.
"Alllriiiightt." Maka sighed. "How many of the others did you convince to help you?"
"YES! Thank you Maka." Patti grinned. "I've never gone camping before and I really want to go!"
"Blackstar and Tsubaki are in, Ox and Havar, I still have to convince Kim, Kilik is all up for it if he doesn't have any missions that day."
"aalllriiiightt." Maka facepalmed. "Lets make this a swaree."