Saturday 17 June 2017, Glastonbury, England
On a summer morning Atsuko Kagari better known as Akko was surfing the internet as usual, always trying to find out something about the past of a sportswoman she admired a lot. Chariot Du Nord, a professional skateboarder who performed from 2005 to 2007 professionally doing tricks that the little Japanese girl was enchanted by since she was a child, especially when she saw on television or in video games, especially those of Tony Hawk's series because she was one of the few teenage characters that were unlockable, Du Nord was better known in the professional environment as Shiny Chariot and had a very peculiar style in relation not only to the way of dressing but also in tricks, something that seemed like magic, that somehow also had a bit of a mysticism all around how the French acted on top of the Skateboard. But strangely in the summer of 2007, Chariot ended up disappearing in an extremely mysterious way, both from her professional career as well as her personal life. What ended up sparking the curiosity of the Japanese girl in trying to discover more of the whereabouts of this missing former skater.
Joining the dots with some information she was gathering on the internet about Chariot's personal life and also her early career, one of the things that was quite remarkable about the Frenchwoman's life was the fact that she was an orphan and left France very early, causing her to have to stay in an orphanage for much of her childhood and adolescence, coincidentally in the city of Glastonbury, where it seemed the biggest reports of the presence of Du Nord, this made Kagari even more curious.
Akko found in those searches the address where it appeared to be the old orphanage, since it had been abandoned since the disappearance of the former skater, which is even stranger, for having happened at the same time of the girl's disappearance, where today is a dense forest near Maiden Court Lane, which is also near Glastonbury Tor, the biggest symbol of the city, which already carries many mysteries by itself in how it was raised, since according to mythology it was given as a portal made by witches to access the other world, but they are just silly legends that no one believes, even Atsuko herself can't believe in something like that, she was motivated to take an exit to go there to check herself if all the information checked out about the place.
Leaving everything programmed on her mobile phone with the route she was going to do, besides also talking to her friends to go out all together to check the place.
Conversation group "The magic trio"
[Akko: Sucy! Lotte! Today we have a place to go this afternoon after lunch, come with me we will finally have quite a discovery, get your bikes] 10:21
[Sucy: I hope it's actually for something useful, I didn't wake up early with my phone vibrating here for you to come up with this] 10:21
[Lotte: Where are we going this time?] 10:22
[Akko: I've found a place where we can find out the whereabouts of the Shiny Chariot, it's near Glastonbury Tor, I'm sure we can find something interesting, I guarantee I'll buy you a Domino's Pizza on the way back, I promise] 10:22
[Audio from Sucy: What? But fuck you're still into this Shiny Chariot fixation shit, she's just a skateboarder who must have died in some way that nobody knows about! That's trespassing, Akko. You know what? Fuck it. Come on. I'm in, only if you let me put my mark on it] 10:22
[Lotte: I don't know girls what if someone catches us?] 10:22
[Akko: So we'll go by bicycles and we'll leave them in place in case there is an escape, I'll get some things so that we can get through without being noticed] 10:23
[Sucy: I don't know why all this, just put a cloth over your face and then you run away if you see a guard, it's not like you've never done this before, so I'm up for it, I'm about to be transferred from this orphanage where I am anyway] 10:23
[Lotte: I'm going because if something goes wrong and you alone get caught it could be worse for you, I don't want you to end up hand in hand with some security guard and then turn up in a reformatory, if we get caught I'll be there to smooth things over] 10:24
[Akko: So I meet everyone both ways at Glastonbury Tor] 10:24
After the brief conversation Akko locks the mobile phone and already celebrates accomplished with a gleam in her eyes, starting to get things for this exit, three balaclavas to hide the trio's face in case someone sees them, besides the bike lock and some homemade smoke bombs she made to try to escape more easily.
When she
finished organizing everything and even dressed for the moment, Kagari was playing a little on her Xbox One to pass the time, as usual she was playing GTA V online and trying to still have a match or some mission completed.
A while later...
13:56, Glastonbury Tor
Atsuko had arrived at the square and from there she leaned her bike while she looked at her mobile phone waiting for her friends and also looked at the messages, some from mothers, others from friends talking about other things in the group, where even Atsuko was showing her GTA V games, soon the first of the girls, Lotte, arrived, the two girls hugged and then patted each other on the back.
"Sucy as usual is going to be late" Akko said a bit sulkily.
"Leave it to her, you know how Sucy has to give the orphanage people a hard time just to get out and it's not even two o'clock yet, we still have plenty of time, it's not like we're going to lose anything if we're a minute or two late" Lotte replied to Akko, whose cheeks were inflated.
Both then sat down on the bench and looked at their mobile phones, Atsuko was randomly laughing at some things she saw on Twitter, many of them being memes as usual, Lotte was watching her Instagram, some short videos and just passing the time, this until 14:09 when finally Sucy arrived. Manbavaran calls out to the two girls who stop looking at her phone, Kagari puts it away in her pocket and stares at the pink haired girl a little angrily.
"I had to tell Nelson that I was just going out with you guys and I was going to Domino's, she doesn't believe in me that much anymore " said Sucy shrugging his shoulders.
" Whatever, now let's go " Akko got up and mounted the bicycle like the other two girls, and with that the Japanese girl began to trace the route to where the place was on Google maps, looking for a support that was on the handlebars of the bicycle.
Continuing through the route pedaling there, it was already possible to notice that the path was getting a dense forest, mainly when entering Maiden Court Lane, as if it was just a middle thing, Kagari noticed that it was a little different from the expected but it still fit and with that when arriving close to the destination, the girl pulls the bike over, as Lotte and Sucy, they attach the bikes to some tree trunks already well positioned in case they need to make an escape.
" So that's what we came for, bush? " Sucy asked in the greatest debauchery to Akko who only showed her middle finger back to her friend.
" You'll see it's not just that " Kagari replies and with that as they finish securing the bikes the Japanese woman offers balaclavas to the two girls, only Sucy refused to take them, as did Lotte
" No, I'm not wearing this ugly thing on my face, I have my own bandana for that " said Sucy already taking the bandana from her bag and tying the reddish coloured cloth above her nose.
" We're not criminals, there's no reason to put those things on, since you said we're just going to have a look," Lotte replies, and with that Kagari even gets a bit sulky, giving up the idea of wearing the balaclavas.
The trio goes through the trees, where they manage to find what seemed to be a trail, which strangely started only after the trees, not being connected with any exit to the street. With a little caution and even getting scared the girls walk through the middle of the trail confident of where they were following, noticing that the vegetation was still very dense, even the trees were getting higher, which was somehow a little strange.
" Akko, this is scaring me, where have you put us? " Lotte shrugged with fear as she walked
" Are you afraid of the werewolf catching you? Hahahahahaha! " Sucy answers jokingly with the whole situation, while Akko makes a sign for them to be silent.
Walking further into the forest, the vegetation lowered a little again, they arrive in a place where there was a gate with the initials LN and a symbol of a circle with three points distributed, one in the upper central part, and the two in the lower parts both left and right, that gate seemed to be a little abandoned and full of moss, even showing a degree of oxidation.
" LN? What is LN? " Sucy asked.
" Luna Nova, is the name of the orphanage where Chariot stayed all her life until she disappeared, we found here one of the biggest mysteries in history " Akko answers, passing his hand through the gate and also taking some pictures with his mobile phone.
On the other hand it was already possible to see that Sucy was climbing a tree and was calling the girls, Lotte was still on the ground, already Atsuko was making sure to also climb to give a look, when she climbed she could notice that on the inside it was possible to see a building all abandoned.
In a kind of circular format containing even a tower, with vegetation occupying much of the place was possible to notice the abandonment of the place, so much that Kagari was taking pictures and more pictures with the mobile phone, saving them for the investigation that was taking about the whereabouts of Chariot.
" Let's go inside, there's no one there anyway " said Sucy pointing to the inside and Akko makes sure to agree, as he is already calling Lotte.
Yanson goes waiting to see if it's still a good idea and with that the duo goes walking through the branches trying to get closer to the wall of the abandoned building, but when Akko was close, being the first to go forward the branch where she leaned broke, Sucy could see that it wasn't a good idea to go through the tree, so she got down from there, both Kagari's friends laugh a little when seeing her all fallen on the ground.
" That's not funny! I don't know how a branch that thick could have broken so easily, it seems that there's something making me want to fall, but what the hell.
" Or it could be your weight anyway " answers Sucy laughing.
" Let's try to find another way in," Lotte said.
Akko agrees with the head, they go together walking around the wall, where Sucy could notice that in a part there were holes that could facilitate the climbing, said and done she was doing it, climbing part by part of those holes of the wall, going carefully, but when she was going to put her hand on the top part of the same wall, she felt something pushing her hand and with that the Manbavaran fell backwards with everything what made Atsuko laugh a little of her friend.
" Everything that goes comes back " Kagari said laughing.
" Fuck you, that hurt, it seems that there is something that won't let us through, this is very strange " said Sucy.
" Let's make a human ladder, it's not possible that we can't do it that way," Akko suggested to her friends.
" Why didn't you warn us beforehand that there was a rope, we could have tried to jump over this wall with a human ladder before we smashed ourselves, Akko, you're also a fool " Sucy puts his hand on his face with a bit of anger.
Using this time the holes of the support wall, Lotte stays below, holding Sucy that goes in the middle and then Akko is the one who goes up last, with this she ended up staying at the ideal height of the wall, but strangely she saw something different, she saw a movement, she could notice from afar that there were some people there and that the place was not all abandoned, she was even a little shocked and lowered her head so that nobody looked.
" What is it Akko? Get that shit up " Sucy said angrily.
" There are people here " Akko answers her a little fearfully.
" So what? We're not killing ourselves holding you up so you can give up now, just go up and don't let anyone notice you," said an irritated Sucy, already feeling Akko's weight on her shoulders.
Atsuko went up the wall and managed to stay seated in the place and with that she left the rope, where she tied it next to the roof of a building that was close to the wall, where it was a blind spot that no one noticed the presence of the girls there, and with that the others were soon climbing the rope arriving to sit on the wall and noticed the difference.
" It doesn't look like what we saw at the entrance, very strange this place, but okay, let's get down from here, I want to see what it is and then paint a mushroom on this wall, I'll make sure to spend all my spray paint on this disgraceful wall " said the Manbavaran all motivated by hatred for the wall.
The three climb down from the wall by jumping to the inside, after Kagari untied the rope and with that she could continue her exploration of the place, where she went looking in the surroundings, kind of they were still scared being able to hear some of the people inside, besides familiar sounds.
" This is a skate rink, come on, we don't need to go undercover, we just discovered the biggest mystery of Shiny Chariot's career, she decided to hide in the orphanage and set up a skate rink," said Sucy shrugging and almost walking away as if nothing had happened.
" Sucy! " Both of them give Manbavaran a good telling off so that she didn't advance that far along the way.
And carefully they went walking to the tip of what seemed to be a house after the wall, where they could see the skateboarding track in more detail and there was a group of girls, especially one with red and salmon colored hair that was on a halfpipe going up and down.
" I know this one with the red hair, she's in my class, she's Amanda O'Neill... " Lotte said until the others had finished.
" That troublemaker O'Neill? And you really think she's going to welcome us breaking into a place like this? " Akko asked.
" I am also going with Akko, she has already called my mushrooms amateur art, on top of that she has run over my art more than once, let's try to look elsewhere without us being noticed " Manbavaran said and Akko also agrees with her head.
Just as the three were about to move on and walk some more, Kagari noticed someone holding her shoulder and it wasn't Lotte, they felt a voice giving them a cough, and when they looked back they noticed that it was an adult woman with blue hair and wearing glasses who was watching the three girls and when they thought of walking forward another woman also surrounded them, this time one with lilac hair a little shorter, both were with their arms crossed.
" It would be a good time for us to use violence, don't you think? " Sucy said.
" Sucy! " shouted the two to Manbavaran who was going through her bag and the girls were still trying to distract the two women.
" So what do the invaders intend to do here in Luna Nova? " said the blue"haired woman in a very imposing manner.
" Do you really think that you would escape in a good way and jump over the wall of our property? Now you will face the consequences of the invasion of our property, we will call your parents right now.
" Oh great, at least I'll get away with it," said Sucy shrugging.
" Sucy! " They both say in despair.
" Please don't tell my mothers, they don't know I trespassed, they will kill me if they know I was breaking the rules, I swear we only came here to... To... É... " Akko was trying to speak, but the presence of the two girls was making her a little intimidated, so much so that they were getting even closer to the trio.
Akko was grabbing something on the bag, she remembered the smoke firecrackers she made, so she was on her last hope trying to find an escape, when she found them, Kagari took them and threw them on the ground hoping it would work, but they just fell on the ground without doing anything, the first one at least. With that she was trying somehow to throw all the rest, but nothing happened, so much that was forming a circle of other people that were on the property, leaving them even more without escape.
" Oh, shit! I would have sworn these things would work out " Akko said getting sulky.
" We have no way of escaping, girls, it's better if we just tell the truth at once," Lotte said as the other two swallowed their saliva, trying to find an escape route among the many people who were gathering at the scene to watch the commotion.
See you, lesbian witches...