Part 1 – Another one?
The early morning sun peeked out from behind one of many fluffy white clouds dotting the blue sky, eager to peacefully wake the people below. Birds perched on rooftops and sung their songs cheerfully. One could not imagine a more perfect start to the day. That is, unless you lived at the Morisato residence. Already, someone was up, but not because of birds or sunshine. As soon as she heard the phone ringing, she could sense that it wasn't good news waiting on the other end.
"What! Almighty One..what are you saying! I don't under..sigh Very well." Belldandy hung up the phone looking slightly confused, but not disappointed. She really didn't quite know how to feel. She could barely grasp what she had just heard. As her thoughts were still running rampant, Keiichi came crashing through the wall and landed on the floor next to her.
"K..KEIICHI! What happened?" She ran over and held his head in her lap, "Ugh...U..Urd...S..Skuld..fight..." Belldandy shook her head, "Honestly..every day with those two. Stay here Keiichi, I'll be right back." As she left she planted a kiss on his forehead, which worked wonders in alleviating his pain. Belldandy walked into the next room, or what had been a room a few moments ago, and dodged a flying Skuld-bomb followed by some stray lightning.
"You little…! I spent weeks working to perfect that potion! Hahaha! You've done it now! You puny second class goddess! Behold the power of Urd!"
Skuld threw two more bombs, "Last time I checked YOU were a second class goddess! And I only broke your potion vial because you keep insulting my ingenious inventions! You even hurt poor Banpei! Besides, that potion would only have made things worse I'm sure. Tell me, have your potions ever done anything helpful?"
Belldandy was getting quite angry at this moment, although quite angry by her standards meant she went from super kind, to only kind. "Urd! Skuld! Honestly! Do you two have to fight every day? You are sisters. And besides, you hurt Keiichi. Stop this quarreling and come have some cake and tea."
Skuld hung her head, "Sorry sis." Belldandy smiled, "It's ok Skuld. Come quickly now, I need to tell you all something as well."
Urd was soon left in the room alone, still holding her fist up. She let some more power go in frustration and blew up the next room over. "I feel SO much better now!" Urd smiled and went to join the others.
Soon, everyone was around the table enjoying Belldandy's cooking. As they were finishing, Belldandy stood and let out a deep breath before relaying the basics of her earlier phone conversation.
"I am sorry to interrupt, but I have a matter of the utmost importance to discuss with you all. This comes directly from the Almighty One."
Urd spit out her tea and snapped her head up, her eyes wide open in an expression of abject horror. Keiichi and Skuld both cast accusatory stares in her direction. "I SWEAR he has it wrong! They can't take away my license again! I'm gonna be so bored!"
Skuld sighed, "Figures. Sis if you only learned maybe you wouldn't have a limited license now would you?" Keiichi smartly kept his thoughts to himself.
Before Urd tested her powers on Skuld, Belldandy interrupted, "No no! This has nothing to do with that at all! This concerns everyone here, in a way even you Keiichi, so please listen." The sound of silence filled the air, the curiosity level in the room peaked.
Belldandy gathered her thoughts and continued in a slightly shaky voice, "The Almighty One brought to my attention that there is a problem with the Yggdrasil system. It keeps insisting that there is another goddess here on Earth, and this is causing it to crash, as you might imagine. This of course explains why our powers have been so erratic and unreliable lately. The scans of both the system for problems, and of the Earth for another goddess, do not reveal anything, yet Yggdrasil will not yield on this point. Its very core is at risk if this apparent contradiction is allowed to continue. Never has Yggdrasil been wrong since it began running. All of the evidence has led the Almighty One to the only conclusion he could reasonably draw. He believes the spirit of a goddess lies in a human here on Earth. This means that the human is normal enough, as far as the body goes, but the soul is that of a goddess."
"As Yggdrasil is not currently equipped to scan the human population and sort goddess soul from human, this would explain the apparent absence of this phantom goddess. This is a cause of great concern and has become top priority in heaven. This error can shut down the entire system forever unless it is resolved. Not to mention the possibility of incredible inner torment within this individual. The Almighty One did not give me the specifics of how and why, so I can not tell you more than that. The only way to resolve this is to find the human, and release the goddess inside. And if this happens, she is to live with all of us and we, Urd, Skuld, and myself, are to become her mentors. She will be another sister of ours. Even Keiichi can help, although not officially, but his kind heart will surely be of benefit to a new goddess. Keiichi, I hope this is all right for you. I sometimes think I only bring you trouble."
Keiichi immediately responded, "Not at all! Belldandy, everything we have gone through, bad and good, I would never take any of it back no matter what!" Belldandy flew into his arms, "Oh Keiichi!"
She got a little under 3 seconds of squeeze time until Skuld pried them apart, "That's waaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyy too close! Back..back..there! Now that's acceptable!" Keiichi and Belldandy let out a mutual sigh.
Urd scratched her head, "So..we're supposed to sort through all of the women of the world somehow and find a goddess, with nothing to help us and no instructions whatsoever?"
Belldandy smiled, "Oh no..we have to include all the men too! This soul can be in any absolutely any human body according to the Almighty One. Young and old, male and female, we can't rule out anyone or we may overlook her. So we just have to work hard and keep our hopes up!" Everyone starred with opened mouths at Belldandy, who was still smiling.
Skuld then brightened considerably, "Don't worry! I'll have a solution in no time!" She ran off to her work space/bedroom, Urd went to get some sake, mentioning that it helped her think, and Keiichi sat in the same spot praying that Skuld's inevitable invention would be safe.
Belldandy, on the other hand, had something on her mind that she couldn't shake. She wandered off into the forest behind their house and sat on a tree stump. A bird alighted on her shoulder and she gently stroked its head with her fingers. She had sensed something in the Almighty's voice. Something that she hadn't heard for a long time. Only once before, in fact, when she had been very young. It was sadness. Grief. He knew something about this goddess that he wasn't telling them. Could it be the love of a father for a lost daughter? Or was it something more?
"Look at it! Isn't it beautiful? Skuld's own Mr. Soul Finder (Version 2.5)! Ah! What a sleak design, such wonderful curves, the way the sun shines off the outside, the lovingly applied bolts.."
Keiichi sighed, "Ok, enough already. The real question is, does this..um..thing work?"
Skuld gave Keiichi the evil eye, "Of course! I'm a genius! Prepare yourselves..SWITC ...OWWW! Urd! What was that for!"
Urd sat perched in a tree and tossed some more acorns to the ground, "Aren't you going to tell us what this does first?"
Skuld scowled, "I was going to! After it started, but since you insist. Mr. Soul Finder here sends a signal into space that relays off of any and all available satellites. It then uses their combined range to scan the entire world's population for signs of a goddess soul. How it does that is my little secret although I CAN tell you that I have tapped into Yggdrasil's resources to accomplish this..but anyway, the results are displayed on this monitor with pinpoint accuracy, plus or minus a few feet. So, without further ado..SWITCH ON!" Skuld hit the machine's switch, which only served to short out the power in Keiichi's house.
Urd sighed, "Ok, stand back! If it's power you want…" Urd began to chant and everyone backed far far away, as more of a habit than anything else. Lightning shot out from the sky and struck the machine, causing numbers to suddenly start appearing on the screen.
Keiichi yelled, "It's working! Look! Hey, wha…AHHH! There are three goddess signals right around here! They must be behind the house or something. Imagine the luck!" Urd and Skuld collapsed as Belldandy tapped Keiichi lightly on the shoulder, "Um..Keiichi dear. My sisters and I are goddesses you know."
Keiichi slumped over while Skuld got up and resumed studying the screen. "Okay! Mr. Soul Finder has finished the scan, and thanks to my brilliant inventing abilities, it only took a few minutes to search the entire world. We've got 4 options here on Earth. Us three," Everyone looked at Keiichi who turned red, "And a 4th…"