CHAPTER 8
I LIVE!
It's me, your favorite OriginalAlienSuperspy. Yeah, I hit a deadzone for a while, but it's due to me being swamped with end of the year work. And I still got more of it coming, so I'm gonna post this and disappear again for another short while. Anyways, this is the 8th chapter. Hope you enjoy!
Things hadn't quite gotten back to normal since my cousins' last visit. I suppose it hadn't gone as horrifically as I expected. Usually their entrance is accompanied by a few stolen wallets, a couple of exploding air conditioners, and every boy that looks at me going missing for a couple months. But I was still being hounded by girls for their numbers, and Joey was hounding me for Kira's number. Huh. Well, after the incident where a boy I'd gone on a date with somehow got the (totally untrue) idea that I was involved in a disgusting incestuous relationship with said cousin, I was less than inclined to oblige. I've never had a boyfriend, but I have gone on a date. Once. And after my cousins had stooped so low to screw it up, it wasn't likely to happen again any time soon. John and Damian have been dating a lot themselves recently, so I've been on my own. As they say, there's nothing like being a third wheel in a group of four couples. Kid and I have been getting along better, but I wasn't anywhere near ready to ask him to go with me to the movies with the rest of pack, even if only to have someone to talk to. Mary and I have been hanging out a little bit more, though, as she and Isaac have been a bit rocky lately. Adam's been distant with Leah too, but I can tell he's trying to shake it off- Leah doesn't seem to notice though, or she's just pretending.
I hate soap operas. So when did my life become one!
Right, so I've spent a lot of time alone with my thoughts. And that old journal of my mom's. Could I intrude on my mom's privacy? Read words that had raced through her mind hundreds of years ago? Did I even want to?
"Huh?" I looked up from the pavement as I reached DWMA where crowd of fellow students were gathered around the front doors. "What's going on?"
"School's been delayed." Leah spoke up, skirting the edge of the mob.
"Wha-why?"
Not that I wasn't glad to have the chance to sleep in, but the look in her eyes gave me shivers.
"…They say it's the witch. The one they caught on Valentine's Day. She…she's been murdered."
Now, I usually like to start my mornings with some juice, a shower, lip gloss if I'm lucky, and hopefully, no deaths. But so far, my morning juice was stolen, the shower icy cold, and my lip gloss rolled off underneath the dresser. So, naturally, this cycle wouldn't be complete without some corpse falling down from the sky. Charming imagery, isn't it?
"Dr. Evi-Stein!" I corrected myself in time as I jogged down the hall. "Can you tell me what happened? With the witch?"
Stein glanced at me as he and his chair rolled along (how does he do that?).
"I can't say much right now, but all things considered…it seems she was stabbed from the front."
"Meaning…?" I asked, keeping pace as we journeyed past the classrooms.
Now I didn't 'get on' with Stein, but desperate times, right? He looked at me meaning fully, as if waiting for something to sink in.
"Oh." Stabbed from the front. "Damn."
So the killer was probably someone the witch knew. An accomplice. Possibly a spy. So this wasn't a one-man job. Of course not.
Since when were things that easy?
"Why did she come back?" I asked finally. "She got what she wanted. Coming back was reckless. And she didn't have the serum, so she wasn't trying to assassinate Lord Death or anything…"
"Well, no." Stein sighed. "But our current theory is that she was walked into a trap by her partner. He knew we were trying to track her down, so he had her get caught and then killed."
"Leaving us with no leads." I grumbled.
I hated it when the bad guys got smart!
"Yes and no." Stein screeched to a stop. "We know that there is an attack coming from either a witch or someone who isn't afraid to manipulate a witch. And we'll have to be ready. There was actually one thing I wanted to ask you about-"
"You can't have my kidney."
"We'll talk about that later. What I was wondering-have you ever done a group resonance before?"
I blinked. "Uh…sure. To charge the Jr. Elements."
Now I couldn't cause tsunamis like Mary or whirlwinds like Adam, but I enabled them to do so. I generated this sort of energy. To stay healthy, the Jr. Elements just had to be around me to absorb it. But obviously, this meant we couldn't be too far apart. Anyways, if Leah, Adam, Isaac or Mary needed any extra energy to pull of a big attack or large usage of their powers, we'd do a bit of a resonance so that I could charge them. My powers weren't really as badass, but I got by well enough.
"Not a wavelength exchange. A group resonance is a little bit different. Instead of one person donating their charge to another, a resonance is two meister-weapon teams coexisting. A medley of wavelengths, all balancing, supporting, and exchanging energy together simultaneously."
I shook my head, a little surprised. "No…Why?"
"Mary, we need to talk." Mary looked up from her book, to see Isaac standing a little awkwardly by the fountain.
"Uh, does it have to be now? I'm-"
"Four years."
"What?"
"We've been together for four years."
"Yeah, I know." Mary closed her book. "What about it?"
"The Love Aura only affects girls who aren't already in love."
Mary's eyes grew a little bit larger. "Isaac, I've really got to-"
"You were falling all over those guys! I need to know if you've been stringing me along the past four years, or-"
"Isaac. I really have to go." Mary said flatly, shoving her book into her backpack and pushing herself off the fountain. "I'll see you when I get home."
"I wouldn't count on it." Isaac snapped, disappearing into the school.
"She wouldn't even say anything!" Isaac groaned, in the process of bashing his head into a table.
"It…sounds bad…" Adam scratched the back of his head as they sat at a table in the back of the library.
"Doesn't it bother you, Adam! Leah was hanging off those renegade cupids too! And you two have been together practically since you met."
"Well, no, it's not…" Adam coughed. "Let's talk about you're problems, Isaac. I'm here for you, man. My issues don't matter."
Isaac snorted. "You're just in denial. Because really, we've both been led on for years by a pair of girls who apparently thought we weren't 'official' or 'serious' or whatever stupid categories girls put their relationships into as an excuse to screw around with our heads. In my book, 'together' means together. And after four years…I feel like I just wasted my time."
"So end it." Adam shrugged, a little reluctantly.
"End it? Ugh, I should, right?" Isaac fiddled with an eraser.
"Yup. And you should start by getting rid of all her stuff, so you can be a free agent again." Adam nodded.
"Whoa, whoa. If I'm ending it with Mary after four years, what're you doing? You and Leah were together for fifteen."
"Uh, ah, I, er, um…" Adam fumbled with his words. "I haven't seen her yet. I'll see her today. Yeah. But we'll start with you. Give me your wallet."
Isaac shot up. "Dude, you still owe me ten bucks from the carnival, and I don't care if you ended up dropping the cotton candy, it was still my money-"
"I don't want your money, Isaac." Adam rolled his eyes. "Wallet."
Isaac eyed him suspiciously, but handed it over.
The second Adam opened it, a whole chain of photos unfurled itself. And they were all photos of-
"Mary on the bench, Mary in the photo booth, Mary at the restaurant-dude, seriously!" Adam looked at his friend in disgust.
"What?" Isaac shrugged. "You've got pictures of Leah right?"
"Well, yeah, like one. Okay, let's just get rid of these." Adam ripped the plastic chain from the wallet.
"Hey, hey!" Isaac tried to swipe them back. "I haven't even broken up with her yet."
"So here." Adam tossed Isaac his phone. "Type away."
"I'm not breaking up with her through a text message, Adam." Isaac said firmly.
"Why not? Because she's been so good to you?"
"We've been in a relationship for four years. If we break up…I want it to be an actual break up. You know, go all the way with it."
"You're a good guy, Isaac." The way Adam said it, it sounded like 'good guy' was filthiest, most horrible and sickening insult he could think of. "From what you told me, it doesn't seem like she was very willing to talk to you."
"Look, why don't you go talk to Leah if you're so badass, and then we'll talk." Isaac muttered.
"Fine. I-I'll go find her right now."
"You do that." Isaac snatched his wallet back as Adam left the library.
Once he was sure Adam was gone, Isaac looked over his pictures of Mary and sighed.
"Tee-hee."
His eye twitched as a girl's giggling reached his ears. "You mind?"
"Oh, hey Isaac!" Kira's head popped up from behind a book at a neighboring table. "Have you seen L.J.?"
"No." Isaac replied dully.
"I guess that's okay. Hey, have you seen this book?" Before Isaac could stop her, Kira plopped herself into the seat across from him.
Now Isaac was immortal, but even he had developed the tendency to cringe away from the schizophrenic missile launcher.
"My voices pointed it out to me!" Kira said naturally as she turned the page. "Ever heard of Excalibur?" (A/N O.O - what you look like right now)
Isaac attained an expression somewhat reminiscent of a deer in the headlights. "Kira. Put the book back."
"But-"
"You're a weapon. Why would you be interested in Excalibur?"
"Because my voices are. And the voices are never wrong." Kira studied him. "You should talk to her again, Isaac."
"Wh-what?"
"Your girlfriend. You should talk to her again."
Isaac looked around. "It's not nice to eavesdrop, Kira."
"I know. That's why I don't do it." Kira nodded. "Anyways….I think I'm gonna go on a quest."
It was as if going on a quest was as ordinary as going to get ice cream.
"Kira, you don't want to find Excalibur." Isaac insisted. "He's…"
What would he say? 'Crazy?' That'd be like bitching about the pot to the kettle.
"…not fun."
"Hm…where can I find some mountain climbing gear?" Kira said thoughtfully.
"Are you even listening to me!" Isaac burst. "Kira-"
"So it's decided!" Kira stood on the table dramatically. "I, Kira Aslen, shall go on this quest!"
"Sssssh!" The librarian hissed angrily.
"This isn't good…" Isaac mumbled to himself.
Could he let a crazed, impaired girl leave the grounds alone? It was dangerous for someone like Kira, given the nature of her condition-she could hurt someone!
"You can't just go by yourself!" Isaac blurted.
"Oh? You're coming, Isaac?" Kira asked.
"Uh…" Somehow this conversation was taking a turn for the worse.
"One of these days, somebody has got to take that book out of the library." Isaac muttered irritably as he hiked up the mountain with Kira.
"This is taking too loooong…" Kira groaned, suddenly morphing her arm into a missile launcher. "How 'bout we just bring the cave down to us?"
Isaac may have been immortal, but at that moment his heart ran cold. "Put that away!"
"Hmph." Kira returned to normal. "Someone's being a spoil sport."
"Spoil sp-aagh!" Isaac had reached the top of the mountain, only for his leg to plunge up to his shin in icy water. "Ugh…great. Can we go home now?"
"No!" Kira snapped, pointing down the cave path. "We need to go into that obviously ominous mystical cave even though we'll probably be walking right into the mouth of a monstrous beast guarding the sword!"
As Kira took a big breath, Isaac rolled his eyes and waded down the river and was swallowed by the dark cave. "Please, the sword would've made the beast commit suicide by now. Again, why are we here? You're a weapon and I've…got a partner…"
Kira's shadowy outline tilted her head to the side. "Is there something wrong with Mary?"
"Yeah, you could say that."
"Worry no more! Dr. Kira is here to listen to all your problems!" Kira said excitedly.
"Kira-"
"Dr. Kira."
"Docto- oh good gods, what am I saying!" Isaac clutched his head. "Let's just have a quiet time, okay?"
Isaac covered his face and sighed as they walked along in the pitch black, listening to the dripping water as they continued against the cold current.
"Isaac…"
"Well, the quiet time didn't last long." Not that he expected it to.
"Isaac…I don't think that's supposed to be there."
"Be where?" Isaac looked up to see that they'd entered a dimly lit cavern.
But even the flickering torches were all that was needed to see that the room was completely empty. Waterfalls gushed behind a stone platform, but there was no sword. No Excalibur.
"Thank god." Isaac grumbled. "But still, where are all the fairies? They should be throwing a party in here right now."
"We wouldn't want to be anywhere near that thing." Kira's voice dropped dramatically, the pep gone.
Isaac followed her gaze, and felt his temperature drop. On the stone wall, branded in scarlet, was a symbol of a monstrous bird. The same brand that had been stamped onto the school the night of the attack.
"Oh, that's not good."
"A quest? Isaac, Isaac, slow down!" I put one finger in one ear and clutched my phone to the other. "Where are you? With Kira! Her voices said so? Isaac, what're you tal- The enemy has who! Just get back here! Did you call the school?"
Oh, shiznap.
"So the goons who attacked the school might have Excalibur. What's the worse that could happen?" John asked as we sat in the classroom, Stein sitting pensively at his desk.
"He's supposed to be nearly impossible to deal with, right?" I nodded.
"True, it does seem unlikely that anyone would willingly and knowingly pair themselves with Excalibur. However, if the person in question had a strong resolve…it's possible."
"Okay, so on a scale of one-to-ten, how screwed are we?" Damian asked, sitting on one desk boredly.
He'd arrived a whole half hour late, the least he could do was pretend to be interested!
"That's hard to say. Really it depends on the meister wielding him. We had a student here once weild Excalibur for a full day. And even though he'd never had a partner before, the effect was pretty dramatic. We even considered elevating him to a three-star meister."
"Why would you do that?" I asked exasperatedly.
I was still technically a one-star meister, because I hadn't taken the necessary exams yet. And even though I was lazier than a log, it still irked me to hear that some punk nearly skipped me by two levels in one day.
"It's called 'cheating' L.J." Damian said, stretching out. "So basically what you're saying Doc, is that if any old adolescent kid can wield the sword effectively, we'd better pray our enemy is a 6-year-old girl. Right?"
"About right, yes." Stein nodded. "Which is what makes this even more important."
"Right, so wh-"
"I apologize for being late." The door opened, revealing Kid. "My father's just informed me of the situation."
This guy sure liked big words. Not only that, but he seemed to talk more to his dad in one week than I did to my mom in a year- minus the shouting, of course. But enough of that- what was he doing here?
"What're you doing here?" Damian asked, cracking his back idly.
Yeah, what he said!
"I asked him to come here." Stein said, lighting a cigarette. "And with this new piece of information, it's a good thing too."
"Okay…" I tried not to look uncomfortable. "Why are we here?"
"It's pretty simple." Stein replied, hands in his pockets. "I want you and Kid to perform a group resonance."
Oh crap.
Stay tuned for chapter 9: Death is Order, Life is Chaos.
Where all these questions and more will be answered:
Can L.J. resonate with Kid?
Does L.J. read the diary?
What happens with Isaac, Kira and the others?
Will I be able to go five sentences without snarking? Not likely!
See you in about a week!
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Hugs,
Original Alien Superspy.
Saving the world. One nap at a time.
